Caul Baby by Morgan Jerkins (read any book .TXT) 📕

covers to sulk in peace, but the brownstone was not the same as it had been when she left. Construction workers were knocking the spearheads clean off their necks before throwing them into the back of their truck. New spearheads of the same design were removed from small plastic bags and welded onto the gate. She’d never called someone to come repair them, and before she could ask who exactly reached out to them, she saw Maman sitting by the left front-facing window with a proud and surly look on her face.

15

Hallow knew that Maman was trying to throw her off course, but why? Unless there was something that she was not supposed to know, something beyond just the dirtiness of the spearheads that Iris neglected to mention. She couldn’t confide in anyone. Josephine would always defer to Maman, and Hallow was too impatient to talk to Iris and endure her circumlocution. Only one option remained.

Helena had not exactly left her room spotless when she moved out two years ago, and their communications with each other had been few and far between since then. There were loose sheets of paper wrinkled or crumpled into balls strewn across the wood floor. A few jackets still hung in the closet, and a large chest was underneath the bed. Hallow rummaged through them all, searching for some kind of clue as to where her cousin might be. Helena spoke of different neighborhoods when she last visited the Melancon home, but there were too many to take a good guess at one in particular, and her social media profile just listed New York, NY, as her location. She did have Helena’s number, though. At least the number Helena wrote down out of pressure from Maman. It was the only thing Maman asked for since she agreed to cosign on Helena’s lease in order to keep tabs on her in some kind of way. The number could’ve changed, but Hallow had no time to rack her brain over every and any hypothetical situation. Hallow dialed the number and took a deep breath.

“Hello?” Helena responded.

“Helena? It’s Hallow.”

“Oh, hey. Hey, what’s up?”

“I’m good. Look, I was wondering if it was possible for us to see each other.”

“Everything okay?”

“I’d rather us talk in person . . . if that’s okay.”

“All right. Hmm. Meet me at Harlem Nights—on the corner of 138th and Adam Clayton Powell? Not too far from Abyssinian if you remember from years ago? It’s a wooden-looking building. Go there at four p.m. sharp—as soon as they open—and sit all the way in the back. I’ll meet you there.”

Harlem Nights was a rustic, juke-joint-like establishment wedged between Strivers’ Row and Abyssinian Baptist Church that had just opened its doors when Hallow approached it. Hallow took a seat toward the back of the venue near the kitchen and bathroom and folded her hands across the table. When a waitress came over, Hallow asked for grapefruit juice and artichoke dip and saw a silhouette of another person growing larger and larger the farther it moved toward the back. Before Hallow could get a look at the face, she was in awe of this person’s silvery white hair and smooth hands that defied what Hallow presumed to be old age. The woman pushed back her hair and revealed herself to be Helena, who had become the mirror image of her mother. Her hair was unkempt yet shiny and full of volume. Her eyes were all-consuming and unfocused. Her smile was both inviting and mocking all at once. She was beautifully unrestrained, confidently full of herself, and Hallow wanted to shrink underneath the weight of Helena’s heels or hide within one of the pockets of her leather jacket.

“Hey, did you find the place all right?” Helena asked.

“Y-yeah,” Hallow stuttered. “Where are you coming from?”

“Just the Upper West Side. I got a cramped studio down there. Very small, but it’s right near Central Park, and I like running, so it balances out. So what’s up?”

The waitress returned with Hallow’s artichoke dip and grapefruit juice. When Helena declined ordering anything else to drink besides water and the waitress walked back to the front of the place, Hallow started to tell Helena about what happened at the town hall meeting at St. Philip’s and said, “I don’t know what to do, Helena. I don’t know what to do.”

“How is Maman treating you?”

“She’s just—the worst!” The waitress came with Helena’s water, and Hallow smiled at her until she walked away. “Let me ask you something: Do you know anything about the spearheads on the gate?”

“No, what about ’em?”

“Yeah. Iris told me to check them, and then when I did, I saw these red marks there, and they—they almost looked like blood. But then Maman had them replaced after I asked them about it. Do you know anything about it? Because I don’t remember anything.”

“Spearheads. Hmm.” Helena stroked her chin and took a sip of her water. “If you don’t remember, then it might’ve been before your time.”

“And since you’re older than me, I thought I’d ask—”

“Yeah, but not by much . . . and I blocked out a lot during that time. A lot of memories from that time are a bit”—Helena held her hand horizontal in the air and made a downward swooping motion—“shaky.”

“Why is that?”

Helena soothed the back of her neck and winced. “I really don’t want to get into that right now. It makes me uncomfortable.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

“It’s whatever. But no, I don’t know anything about spearheads. Is that all you wanted to talk about?”

“No.” Hallow laced her fingers and said, “I can’t take it anymore, Helena. I really can’t. I want to be more a part of Harlem. I want to help more people who look like us. That Asali Givens case just shed light on a lot, and we act like we are our own island, like nothing we do affects where we live, and today made it all too clear that it does.”

“I want to tell you a story. Back when I was getting