Tempest Rising - Diane Mckinney-whetstone [74]
Mae walked a few paces before she looked around and realized that Victoria wasn’t at her side. “What you stop for, pudding?” she called.
“It’s Tyrone.” Victoria pointed to Tyrone rushing toward them.
“Your leg’s still bothering you that much?” he asked, his face so worried-looking Mae thought there was something else amiss as she walked back to where they were.
“You shouldn’t be walking on that leg if it’s still hurting that much.” He was right next to Victoria now, and his voice and his face softened. “Where you headed anyhow? Why you not going to school today? Where’s your sisters?”
“I’m going to the clinic,” she said, putting her tongue against her chipped tooth and almost smiling. She was glad to be standing here with Tyrone next to her. The air got warm and spongy when he was around and dabbed at the pain and fear that was usually like silt clinging to her skin, absorbed the silt for a moment and her skin could breathe.
“You shouldn’t be walking on that leg.” The concern in his voice made it crack, and he cleared his throat and lightly tugged at the pompoms swinging from her hand-knitted cap. “You should be riding.”
“Mae doesn’t have a car. Ramona doesn’t either.” Her voice was low and dragging because she was tired and the slower she talked, the longer she could lean on the side of the building while Tyrone cleaned the air.
“I know,” he said as he lifted the pile-lined collar to her coat and pulled it up around her neck. It was the only thing he could think to do, hearing how slow her words were falling and thinking it was the pain in her knee coming out in her words. “But couldn’t she have gotten a ride or even a cab?”
Now Mae was where they were; she heard the part about the cab. “Lord, Lord, Lord!” she exclaimed before Tyrone could speak to her directly. “Do you know how much they charge you just for sitting in the cab? The meter jumps to sixty-five cents soon as you close the door, and then got the nerve to click every few seconds after that. Lord, no, I can’t afford no cab all the way down to Philadelphia General, especially not when the el’s right here.” She pulled at the ends of her head scarf tied in a bow under her chin and tucked them under the velvet collar of her tweed chesterfield. The coat used to be Ramona’s, but Mae had commandeered it, had it shortened, had the buttons moved over to accommodate her wider frame.
Tyrone noticed how off-centered the buttons were, and suddenly that angered him as much as watching Victoria being forced to walk. “Well, how she gonna get up and down those el steps? Looks to me like she can barely walk on the level ground.”
“We don’t have a choice, now do we?” Mae switched to her proper voice, the one she used for the caseworkers and judges. She pulled Victoria to her and squeezed her shoulder. “I’m explaining to you that I don’t have money for a cab. I mean, we’re on our way to see about her leg, what else can I do? I mean, I’m doing the best I can. Now maybe your daddy wants to loan you his big fine brand-new deuce and a quarter since I don’t think you have much of a car to drive, least every time I see you, you seem to be walking, so unless you willing to go one better than my best and give us a ride, in your daddy’s car, of course—”
Tyrone held up his finger to stop Mae, thinking what nerve this stump of a woman had, squirting him with insults, scowling up at him with her one good eye, when he was only looking out for Victoria’s well-being. He cringed at the thought that the likes of Mae had mothered his baby doll, Ramona. But since she was Ramona’s mother, his good raising kicked in, and he put lead to his tongue and instead reached under his printer’s apron to get to his pants pocket.
Mae watched him pull up a modest wad of bills. She licked her lips; it was unconscious, and when she realized she was doing it, she