there with the trash and hungry rats.
It was Clyde who found me. It was Clyde who saved my life and even though I lie to him, I would do anything for him. Well, not anything, but a lot.
I just wanted to forget all about seeing that man get shot to death. Besides, I needed to come up with a good lie in case I had to tell one to Clyde about tonight.
Chapter 7
LULA HAWKINS
Daddy begged me to come back to Mississippi after I called to tell him about Bo getting killed.
“I’ll pay your way home and you can move back into your old room ’til we find you another apartment. Why in the world you went runnin’ off to a hellhole like California in the first place is beyond me. Girl, what was you thinkin’?” Daddy’s voice sounded like it was a million miles away.
Etta’s voice was the next one I heard. It was a boom that sounded like it was coming at me from all different directions. “I tried my best to raise you right after your mama up and dropped dead. I see now that I didn’t do too good a job. You done quit your job, run off and married some musician, and now look at the mess you done got yourself into. I’m surprised that the devil who shot Bo didn’t shoot you, too.”
“I don’t want to come back to Mississippi,” I whimpered, spit oozing out of my mouth, greasing the telephone in my hand.
“Well, what do you plan to do, besides worryin’ everybody to death? Did Verna and them confused friends of hers put you up to runnin’ off the way you did? You ain’t got a lick of sense, but it ain’t like you to be runnin’ off. You ain’t smart enough to come up with a clumsy scheme like that on your own. Didn’t you shame yourself enough by gettin’ pregnant by that woman’s husband? You headed for trouble, girl. Bring your tail back on home before it’s too late,” Etta said, growling.
“I’m not comin’ back to Mississippi. Bye, Etta. I’ll talk to you and Daddy later.” I hung up and dialed my stepsister’s number. She picked up right away. “Verna, I might need you to send me a little more money until I find a job and a place,” I said dryly. I had cried all the way to the police station when they took me downtown to get my statement. To add insult to injury, by the time I got back to the motel, somebody had stolen Bo’s car! I didn’t even call the police back to report that. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to drive Bo’s car anymore so it didn’t matter. It was in its last days anyway. We had spent a lot of money during our journey on that car, so that it would get us all the way to California. And we’d made it by the skin of our teeth. I was glad it was gone. It was one less thing I had to worry about.
“Baby, don’t you worry about a thing. Me and Odessa’ll be out there as soon as we can get a flight,” Verna assured me. “I’ll give you every dime I got.”
“Thanks, Ver. I knew I could count on you. Let me…let me speak to Odessa.”
“She standin’ right here. Don’t keep her on the telephone for too long. She ain’t doin’ so good.”
I heard some muffled moans before Odessa spoke.
“Lula, you doin’ all right, girl?” Odessa sounded like she had a frog in her throat.
“I’ll be fine,” I lied. I felt like I was going to fall apart any minute.
“I’m comin’ out there to bring my brother home and you, too, if you want to come. You can stay with us.”
“I think I’ll stay out here for a while. The motel manager said I can stay here for a while. He’ll let me stay in the room, if I help the maid. And he’ll pay me minimum wage. That’ll do until I can do better.”
“Well, you be careful out there. You ain’t in no country town no more, and all kinds of shit be happenin’ in California. Get some rest and we’ll get out there as quick as we can.”
The first day was the hardest. As much as I hated cleaning motel rooms, it kept me from thinking about what had happened to Bo. The motel manager seemed just as shady as some of the people who checked into the musty rooms, which some of them rented by the hour. Even though the shifty-eyed motel manager promised to pay me under the table and let me pay a lower rent, it seemed too good to be true.
And it was.
It was a Saturday night. I’d spent most of the day helping the regular maid mop up the motel’s filth. “Hurry up, hurry up so I can get up out of here,” the testy old Black woman insisted, waving a mop handle at me. “I gots to get away from here before it gets dark. And if you smart, you won’t go out your door after it gets dark.” When the maid left, trotting off toward a bus stop with a can of Mace in her hand, I felt all alone in the world. It was hard to tell what time it was from one hour to the next, because there was always a ruckus going on in the parking lot and in the rooms on both sides of me. With all of the moaning going on, it sounded like somebody else was being murdered in the parking lot and in the other rooms.
Not long after the maid’s departure, I crawled into the sad-sack of a bed, almost rolling to the floor when the mattress flattened out under my weight. I had just dozed off when a thumping noise woke me up. Somebody was coming in my door! I sat up and clicked on the dim lamp, clutching my heart and breathing through my mouth. It took me a moment to focus.
Jose, the motel manager, a sly grin on his wide, homely face was walking toward me, limping like one leg had suddenly grown longer than the other. I couldn’t tell which was more frightening, him or his huge shadow on the wall. His shirt was unbuttoned, showing off a belly the size of a water-melon you would only see in Texas. He stopped in the middle of the floor and smoothed back his long, oily hair with his slow hand.
“What the hell—what in the world are you doin’ in here?” I hollered. I was so scared and shaking so hard, it felt like I was in a vibrating bed. I was surprised that I was even able to get my words out. “What do you want, Jose?”
“Don’t get up, mami. You right where I want you to be,” he said, growling under his breath, sliding off his cheap flannel shirt as he moved toward me. I could smell his foul body odor from across the room. “You just relax. I know what you want…”
I rubbed my nose and tried to come up with the meanest look I could. “What do you want?” I yelled, not taking my eyes off his, which were so bloodshot I could barely see the whites.
“You know what I want. Shit, you want it more than I do. I seen the way you looked at me today.”
“You bastard!”
“Keep your voice down,” he ordered, holding up his hand. “As it is already, seems like these walls talk,” he added with a suggestive sneer. Then he humped the air with his wide hips.
He jumped on top of me, covering my whole body like a fleshy blanket. His dusty, hard, greasy hand covered my mouth. He slapped me when I bit his fingers, drawing blood.
“You Black bitch. If that’s the thanks I get for helpin’ you out, you can get the hell out of here!” he roared, shaking a fat fist in my face.
I kicked Jose to the floor. I was amazed to see a man his size jump up as fast as he did.
“I’ll leave first thing in the mornin’,” I said, pulling the musty bedcovers up to my neck.
“No, you’re leavin’ now or I’ll call the cops and tell ’em you tried to rob me. Bitch.” The angry man slammed the door so hard on his way out, a velvet picture of Jimi Hendrix caressing a snake fell off the wall.
I got dressed and tried to call Odessa and Verna back to let them know that I was checking out of the motel, but the telephone was dead.
I’d met a little Spanish girl earlier when I’d gone out to get something to eat. She had checked into the room next door. She seemed friendly enough, so I knocked on her door.
“What?” she barked, cracking open her door just enough for me to see the body of a naked White man sprawled across the bed snoring.