Show and Prove (20 page)

Flex, the fellas, and even Q just crack on up, and that's when I break out with no good-byes. I'm halfway home when thunderclouds overcome the sky, rip open and drench the street, bringing the heat wave to an end. People who live close race for cover while other run and wait under store awnings. I storm alone through the downpour, but I can't cool down.Knowing that Qusay also dissed Cookie is no consolation. In fact, it makes it all that much worse. Like Nana would say,
Sorry fi mawga daag, dem tun roun bite you.

“W
illie, get off the phone, dammit!”

Heat rages across my face. “I'm sorry, Sara, can you hold on a minute?” Before she can answer, I drop the receiver on my bed, throw open my door, and barge into the living room. “Why you got to be screamin' at me like that when I'm talking to somebody on the phone?” Outside, thunder claps like it has my side.

My mother grabs a handful of Chee-tos from the bowl on her lap and stuffs her face. “You don't want to look bad in front of your girlfriend of the month, get off the phone. It's been an hour, and you don't pay the bill. I'm not telling you anymore.”

I storm back into my room, and it takes my all to not slam the door. If Sara weren't still on the line, I'd tear it off its hinges like the Incredible Hulk. I take a few breaths and then pick up the receiver. “Look, Princess, I got to go.”

“Yeah, I do, too. I'll see you tomorrow. Bye.”

“Remember to save the overtime for me.”

“Willie.” I wait until I hear the dial tone and then crash the receiver into the base. I fling open my door and charge into the living room, but my mother's not there. The water in the kitchen runs as she washes the dishes as the rain beats against the windows.

I change the channel on the TV and throw myself on the couch. I swing my feet onto the coffee table for good measure. Two can play this game.
Neither heat wave, thunder showers, nor winds stopped pop legend Diana Ross from performing a free concert for almost half a million fans in Central Park.

When my mother comes back into the living room, she scoffs and knots her arms across her chest. “Oh, really?” she cracks. Then Ma walks in front of the TV to block my view.

“Move.”

She doesn't budge. “You don't own the TV, Willie.” She sounds pathetic.

“Neither do you.” I could have stopped right there, but she started it. “Wilfredo does.”

Her face turns red. She comes toward me until she is hovering like one of those thunderclouds outside. Wagging her finger at me, she says, “No te ponga fresco conmigo, Guillermo…”

“How am I being fresh when I'm just telling the truth?” I tilt my head so I can see the TV screen. “It's called AFDC. Aid to Families with Dependent Children. Wilfredo bought the TV for Gloria and me, and now's my turn to watch it.” My mother stands there, breathing hard over me. I sense the dramatics coming on, but why should I sit through this performance again? “As the only man in this house—and the only one with a damn job—I deserve a night in peace, so move.”

Ma's heaves grow stronger. I scoot across the sofa, pretending to be into
Magnum, P.I.,
and watch her clenched fist from the corner of my eye. My mother finally says in a low, even voice, “You think because you buy a carton of milk here and a box of cereal there you're the man of the house? If you're such a man, Willie, why don't you move out on your own?”

I've heard that shit before. “Trust me, I will when I'm good and ready,” I say, avoiding her angry stare. “ 'Sides, my being here gets you a bigger check.”

“Not more than what you eat,” my mother cracks. “You're not doing Gloria and me any favors.”

“I shouldn't have to do diddly-squat 'cause I'm your kid.”

“So now you're a kid…. ”

“You know what I'm sayin'. You the mother!” I jump to my feet, the coffee table scraping across the floor. “You're supposed to get a job and take care of us.”

Gloria walks into the living room. “I heard my name.”

“I do take care of you! I've been taking care of you.” My mother claps on
been
so close to my face that my ears ring. “I got a job!” The thunder outside mimics her and I almost want to fight Mother Nature, too.

“Doing what?”

“Being your mother!”

Gloria whispers, “Guys, stop. C'mon. Please.”

My mother turns to her and says, “Bring the Monopoly game.” Gloria wrinkles her nose in confusion as she heads for the bedroom. “How much you make at your summer job, Willie?”

“Not enough, but at least I'm working.” With minimum wage now three thirty-five an hour, I make two hundred thirty-five dollars every two weeks, but I only take home a hundred and fifty-five. I mean, when they're not docking me for some wack reason. Plus the feds nab almost fifty-four dollars, and the state snatches up sixteen more. And I'm a minor, so why do I have to cough up another ten damn bucks in Social Security?

Gloria returns with Monopoly and hands the tattered box to my mother. Ma slaps the box against the plastic on the sofa, rips open the cover, and flings it aside. She grabs the play money and counts off a stack of tens, twenties, and fifties. “Again with this?”

“You afraid to know the truth?”

“No.” I swipe the money and count it. Six hundred and seventy dollars. “Welfare gives you almost seven hundred dollars a month?” Man, I actually thought it was a lot more. Even so, she still gets way more than I do, and I have a full-time job.

“You think this covers everything we need? First thing we have to do is pay rent. Give me two hundred dollars.”

She reaches for the stack in my hand, but I yank it out of reach. “You don't pay no two hundred dollars in rent,” I say. “Section 8 pays most of it.” Busted and disgusted, can't be trusted. Just because I hate welfare doesn't mean I don't understand how the damn thing works.

Through her teeth, Ma says, “The program only pays seventy percent of the rent. I have to pay the remaining thirty. Give me sixty dollars.”

I'm no math whiz, but I know that fifty percent means half, and half of two hundred is one hundred. Since she didn't try to be slick and say she had to pay more than that, I peel off three twenties and toss it on the coffee table instead of handing it to her.

Gloria raises her hand like she's Horshack in class. “I'll be the bank!” I roll my eyes as my sister scampers to kneel by the coffee table and straightens out the twenties.

“That doesn't cover utilities. Gas and electric are another ninety-two dollars.” My mother motions for me to subtract the money. I count out another four twenties and a ten. “And thanks to the both of you, the telephone bill is another fifty dollars.”

I give my sister a dirty look. “I ain't going to argue with you about that one.” Gloria sucks her teeth at me as she snatches the bills and lays them across the table. “You still have almost five hundred dollars.”

“No one's eaten yet, and nobody eats more than you.”

“So break out the cupones then.” I don't have to ask her how much she gets, because I know this by heart, too. “Every month you get three hundred and forty dollars in food stamps, so don't try it.”

“How far do you think that money goes? For three almost-grown people, not far. Unless you want to eat bony chicken and fatty meat.”

“Ew,” says Who Else.

“Look me in the eye, Willie, and tell me that I buy that cheap meat for you.” I'm not stupid. If I say that, she'll buy that nasty stuff to spite me. When I don't answer, Ma adds, “And all that canned and packaged food that you like so much. Campbell's soup, Chef Boyardee, Hungry-Man dinners…The way you eat that stuff is the way that stuff eats through the cupones. To buy you those things, I have to take another two hundred dollars out of the money we get under ADFC.” Ma slides four fifties out my fist and hands them to Gloria. “And you know what else? I can't use food stamps to buy all the other things we need to get from the supermarket.”

“Like what?”

“Toothpaste, soap, shampoo and conditioner…”

Gloria puts her two cents in. “Toilet paper!”

“Paper towels, batteries, lightbulbs, your shaving cream…”

“Kotex…”

“Gloria, shut up.”

Ma reaches for two more fifties, but I yell, “Hold up! Another hundred dollars? Just for toilet paper?”

“Yes! This is for everything I need to keep this place clean. Palmolive to wash the dishes, Brillo pads to scrub the pots and pans, Mop & Glo to clean the floor…” Ma returns the fifties to the Gloria's “bank,” so the welfare stack is down to one hundred seventy bucks. “Now let's talk about clothes.”

Now she's really trying it. “I buy my own clothes.”

“You spend all your money on your trendy jeans and sneakers, but who buys your socks and underwear?” She takes me off guard with that one and snatches a fifty out of my hand. “If it weren't for me, you'd be running around with dingy calzoncillos under all those brand-name clothes.”

“¡Ay, fo!” Gloria says while pinching her nose. “And perpetrating a fraud.”

“Yo. Shut. Up.”

“And fifty dollars per month for the both of you is conservative, especially during the winter. You of all people know good shoes aren't cheap. And let's not forget the cost of doing the laundry each month.”

Gloria pops up and yanks money out my hand. “That's another fifty.”

I only have three green twenties and a yellow ten left. I make a fan out of them and wave them in front of my mother's face. “You still got seventy dollars.”

“That's gone before the month is halfway over,” she says.

“How you figure?”

Ma snatches one of the twenties.
“Mami, I need supplies for a school project.”
She grabs another.
“Mami, I want McDonald's tonight.”
She snatches another. “
Ma, can you lend me five dollars so I can go to the movies with Smiles? I'll pay you back.
Which you never do.
Ma, I neeeeed to have that tape, but I'm short two bucks.
” She grabs the ten. “
I need, I want, I want, I need
…It's endless. But let me ask you to buy a few loosies while you're at the bodega, and you humiliate me in front of the entire neighborhood. You want to talk about embarrassment.”

“I'm supposed to pay you back for little things here and there?” I say. “And what's wrong with wanting to eat lean steaks and wear nice clothes? You don't like bony chicken and welfare cheese either.” I really wanted to go all the way off and tell her that only girls can buy cheap clothes and still look good. When we first moved to this block, my mother wasn't the one getting made fun of for wearing Woolworth sneakers and Korvette jeans. “Ever since you told me that if I wanted to wear Lee jeans and Nike sneakers, I had to buy them for myself, that's exactly what I've been doing. I do legit work when I could be robbin', stealin', slingin'…. ”

“So what you're telling me, Willie, is you want to be paid better for doing the right thing. Guess what? We all do.” My mother's voice breaks. “I can't win. If I let someone out there pay me to do what I do here for nothing—not even appreciation or respect—I'm a bad mother for leaving my kids alone or letting someone else watch them. But if I take care of my own home and raise my own kids, I'm a bad mother because I collect welfare and food stamps. Bad enough I'm judged by strangers who have no clue how much more month there is than money, but I have to take this shit from my own son!” Ma tosses the bills in her hand in the air and runs out of the living room.

After a moment of stunned silence, outside our window lightning crackles and thunder booms. Gloria and I drop to the floor to scoop up the scattered bills. At one point, though, I say, “This is stupid. It's not like it's real.” I throw the bills I'm clutching back into the game box on the sofa. I wait for Gloria to say that I'm the one who's stupid for making Ma cry like that. Instead she stands up, walks into the kitchen, and finishes doing the dishes. I go back to watching
Magnum, P.I.,
but I have no idea what's going on.