— If You Come Softly —
by Jacqueline Woodson

 

Chapter 10

IN THE LATE AFTERNOON SUNLIGHT, JEREMIAH STOOD IN his mother’s room, running his hands over her dresser, softly fingering the bottles of lotion and the pictures in silver frames—him at two in a diaper and T-shirt, pointing at her, her smiling into the camera, the two of them walking in a park somewhere—maybe he was five in that one. And then at the far end of her dresser, in a tiny frame, a picture of her in a wedding dress, holding a bouquet of white roses. Jeremiah picked it up and stared at it. His mother was smiling and looking off, away from the camera. Maybe to where his father stood. His father. Jeremiah bit down on his bottom lip. Where was he right now? With Lois Ann somewhere. Once he had run into them in Manhattan—his father and Lois Ann, walking slowly down Spring Street, his father’s arm around Lois Ann’s shoulder. And for a moment, as he walked toward them, Jeremiah had thought Lois Ann was his mother and he had smiled. And his father had smiled back, cautiously, slowly, like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing—his son walking toward him, smiling.

How long had it been since Jeremiah had smiled in the presence of the two of them. Months maybe. He had smiled that first day, years and years ago, when he didn’t know anything—before the news of his father’s affair got out. He had come home to find his father sitting with Lois Ann on their stoop, and he had smiled. Smiled because it was so rare to find his father home relaxing, a glass of wine in one hand and a copy of a video in the other. “I been waiting for you to get home from school,” his father had said. “Figured we could watch this movie together.” And Jeremiah had smiled even wider—because he was young then, maybe twelve or thirteen, and he didn’t know the ways people—his parents-could hurt each other. Yeah—he was only twelve or thirteen, and he didn’t know that Lois Ann and his father had a thing going on, a heavy thing that would eventually break the family apart.

Jeremiah squinted at the picture now. He could feel tears coming on, a thick knot of them rising up in the back of his throat. It had to do with this picture of his mother in her wedding dress and October and the lazy afternoon sun streaming through the window. It had to do with Ellie and Percy Academy and the fact that maybe he was a little bit in love with a white girl he barely knew. But mostly—right now, standing in his mama’s room holding this picture close, it had to do with them, his parents.

They had married in Prospect Park-in the boathouse—on an amazingly blue day in October. It would be seventeen years tomorrow. Seventeen years ago, they had thought they’d be together forever—and in some ways, seventeen years is forever. Eleven movies in seventeen years. Three books-and maybe his mother would have written more if she hadn’t had him. And maybe that’s why they never had another one. But the only child thing—that had stopped mattering so much a long time ago. Yeah, sometimes he wanted a brother or sister, but it was more than that. He wanted more than that too-somebody deep. Somebody who could know him—know all of him—the crazy things he dreamed on stormy nights, when he woke with tears in his eyes and pulled the covers tight around him. How alone he felt most days-even with his homeboys surrounding him—the way the loneliness settled deep inside of him and lingered.

He placed the picture back on the shelf gently and closed his eyes. Ellie was there-behind his eyelids, smiling at him. What would become of them? Today in class, he had caught her staring at him, a tiny smile on her lips. Jeremiah stared back without smiling. He couldn’t smile. There was something scary about the way he felt-light-headed and out of control. The whole classroom seemed to drop away, and for a minute, it seemed like it was only the two of them in the world. Then Mr. Hazelton said something and the class faded back around them. Jeremiah turned back to his textbook. When Mr. Hazelton called on him, he stuttered some answer that seemed to satisfy the teacher. But he wasn’t in that room anymore. He was somewhere far away. With Ellie.

I’m going to kiss you soon, Jeremiah had found himself thinking. I don’t know when or where or how, but soon I’m going to kiss you.

And later, as he changed into his gym clothes, he had found himself thinking about her, imagining the two of them together somewhere. Somewhere.

He needed someone to talk to. Someone who knew him well enough to rub his head and say, “Everything’s going to be all right.” There was something like a fire in his chest, something hot and tight and unfamiliar.

Jeremiah felt the emptiness of the house settle down around him. Where was his mother? Where had all the people who used to fill these rooms gone to?

“Daddy ... ” he whispered. “Mama ...”

The house echoed. Jeremiah sat down on the edge of his mama’s bed, pulled his knees up to his chin, and wrapped his arms around them.

And with the late afternoon light casting heavy shadows across everything, Jeremiah rested his head against his legs. And cried.