“That’s why you should let Mr. Dee take you out.”
“I’m thinking about it.”
“What is there to think about, Mom?”
She gave him a look that said he’d crossed the line in challenging her. “That’s enough, Kenny.”
Kenny unclasped his hands and sat up straighter. “Why do you always shut me down when you don’t want to hear the truth? You know you spend too much time alone, and what’s going to happen when I go to college? Will you still be here in this apartment growing old and alone?”
Justine’s hand curled into tight fists to keep from slapping her son. How dare he talk to her about her life, when she had sacrificed everything to raise him—alone. She’d lied and continued to do so about his existence and a world she created where she could continue living a lie that had become so real she didn’t have to think of what to say.
“What you don’t know is that I’ve had to go through a lot of shit to get you to where you are today.” Justine knew she’d shocked her son, because she rarely cursed in his presence. “So, don’t you sit here and tell me what I should and should not do when it comes tomylife when I’m responsible for you and not the other way around. If I decide to go outwith your Mr. Dee, then it will be my decision, not because you want it for whatever your reason is. And if I decide not to see him, then that’s because I have my personal reasons for keeping him at a distance.”
“Is it because he’s White, because you’re always talking about what White folks are doing to our people?” Kenny continued, refusing to back down.
Suddenly it hit Justine that Kenny was right, because most of her conversations with him were a recap of the nightly news with reporters talking about the Vietnam War or the Civil Rights Movement, unaware that as a teenage boy, he shouldn’t be bombarded with the horrors going on in the world when his focus should be going to school and hanging out with friends, regardless of their race or religion.
She’d made a grievous mistake when exposing her teenage son to events better left for adults. Perhaps if she hadn’t moved from Harlem, then Kenny would have been exposed to the demonstrations boycotting F.W. Woolworth because of their White-only lunch counters in Southern cities. Justine was raising Kenny in a racially diverse neighborhood, where he attended school with kids from different races and ethnicities.
“It has nothing to do with him being White or Italian, Kenny,” she said in a softer tone. “Frankie’s uncle is a nice man, and I like him and—”
“Like him enough to let him date you?” Kenny said, cutting her off.
“Why are you like a damn dog with a bone, Kenny?” she countered angrily, “That won’t let it go?”
“And why are you cussing so much, Mom, when it’s something you never do?”
His reprimand suddenly hit Justine. She’d preached to Kenny that folks used profanity when they couldn’t come up with the appropriate word for something. But she wasn’t about to apologize to him, not when he continued to challenge her.And as a child, that was something Justine refused to accept. She was the adult, and he wasn’t.
“I’m going to say this, then this conversation is over,” she stated firmly. “If I decide not to go out with your Mr. Dee, it has nothing to do with his race, because it’s Black folks who have hurt me far worse than Whites. That’s something I will tell you about in the future. Right now, we’ve agreed to be friends like you, Ray, and Frankie. He will come here to eat, and if I feel comfortable enough with him, I will go to his place for dinner. Our friendship will never lead to marriage, because that’s something neither of us want.”
Her explanation seemed to please Kenny when he flashed a wide grin. “That’s cool.”
Justine leaned over to kiss his cheek, then pulled back at the last moment. He wasn’t a little boy who enjoyed his mother hugging and kissing him, but a young man capable of making her a grandmother.
“Yeah, real cool,” she said, smiling. “I’ve got more typing to do before I turn in for the night.”
“Don’t stay up too late,” Kenny teased.
She smiled. It was something she always told him. “Same to you.”
Justine moved off the sofa and walked to her home office. To say the day was filled with surprises was an understatement. First, there were the annoying telephone calls from Norman Robinson, then Frank’s unannounced arrival with a typewriter she’d been coveting for a long time. Then her invitation for him to share dinner with her, his request to take her out, and her ambivalence in giving him the response she knew he wanted. And in the end, they had agreed on friendship, because there was no place in her future where she could envision spending it with Francis D’Allesandro. He would become someone just passing through her life, and it was impossible to predict whether she would be left with good or bad memories of him.
What had really thrown her for a loop was her son questioning her about her life. That he was concerned she was going to grow old and be alone. She hoped to grow old, and even if she ended up alone, she hoped to spoil the grandchildren Kenny would give her. She wanted his life to turn out differently from her own when he’d fall in love, marry, and have a family where she would be able to spoil her grandbabies.
“Are you certain you want to work with me in the store this summer?” Giovanni D’Allesandro asked his son.
Frankie stared at his father. “I told you before that’s what I want to do, Poppa. Why are you asking me again?”
Gio shared a smile with his wife. “Because I’ve decided to close the store for two weeks and take your mother and the girls to Italy for vacation.”
Frankie slowly blinked. “What about me?”
“You can stay with your Nonna if you want, or come with us.”
Suddenly it dawned on Frankie that his father was joking with him. There was no way he was going to take his family to Italy and leave his son behind. “I think I’ll go with you guys.”
Kathleen rested a hand on his back. “There was no way we were going to leave you here. Remember when we all went to the photographer to have our pictures taken because I said my mother wanted updated pictures of her grandchildren?” Frankie nodded. “That’s when I had him take photos for everyone’s passports.”
