“You guess.” For some reason Tamela directed the comment to Geneva.
“Yes,” I said.
“How do you know?” Tamela canted her head sideways, like Boyd studying a curiosity.
“I don’t know for sure.”
There was another long silence. Then, “Darryl didn’t kil my baby.”
“Tel me what happened.”
“It weren’t Darryl’s baby. I was with him, but it weren’t Darryl’s baby.”
“Who is the father?”
“White boy named Buck Harold. But it don’t matter. What I’m sayin’ is Darryl didn’t do that baby no harm.” I nodded.
“Baby didn’t belong to Darryl and I don’t, like, belong to him, know what I’m sayin’?”
“Tel me what happened to your baby.”
“I was staying at Darryl’s place—wel , it weren’t his place but he was living there, like, in one of the rooms. So, one day, like, I start having pains and I figure my time come. But the pain just keeps getting worse and worse, and nothing happens. I knew something was wrong.”
“No one got you medical care?”
She laughed, looked at me like I’d suggested she apply to Yale.
“After that night and the next day, final y the baby came out, but it was messed up.”
“What do you mean?”
“It was blue and it wouldn’t take no breath.”
Her eyes glistened. Looking away, she swiped the heel of a palm across each cheek.
A steel shaft entered my chest. I believed her story. I felt pain for this young woman and for her unbearable loss. Pain for al the Tamelas of this world and their babies.
I reached out and laid my hand on hers. She pul ed back, dropped both hands to her lap.
“You put the baby’s body in the woodstove?” I asked gently.
She nodded.
“Darryl told you to do that?”
“No. Don’t know why I did it, I jus’ did it. Darryl stil believin’ it’s his baby, getting off on the fatherhood trip.”
“I see.”
“Nobody did nothin’ to that baby.” Tears glistened on her face, and her bony chest heaved below the red halter top. “It was just born wantin’ to be dead.” Tamela wiped her cheeks again, anger and sorrow betrayed by the roughness of the gesture. Then she curled her fingers and rested her forehead on her fists.
“You couldn’t revive it?”
Tamela could only shake her head.
“Why did you go into hiding?”
Tamela looked over her knuckles at Geneva.
“Go on,” Geneva said. “We’re here. Now you tel her.”
Tamela drew several unsteady breaths.
“One day Darryl gets to fighting with Buck. Buck tel s him I been playin’ him the fool and the baby was his. Darryl goes batshit, decides I kil ed my own baby to dis him. He say he gonna find me and mess me up bad.”
“Where did you go?”
“Cousin’s basement.”
“Your father is there now?”
Two head shakes.