“Mr. Dee said I can get to see Frankie on weekends—that’s if it is okay with you, Mom.”
Justine slowly shook her head as she rolled her eyes, wondering why her son wanted her to look like the bad guy with his Mr. Dee. “Yes, it will be okay.”
She had to understand the older Kenny became, the more he’d want to explore the outside world, and that meant loosening the reins to allow him to mature. What her son didn’t understand was her fear that so many young kids were ruining their lives because of drugs. The articles she read in theAmsterdam Newsabout Black folks overdosing in alleys, on rooftops, and in vacant lots and buildings made her bloodrun cold. She didn’t know if the stories were written for shock value or as a warning to the Negro race that taking drugs was nothing more than another form of slavery. That they would only be able to break free from the chains of addiction once they were dead.
Her fear of Harlem wasn’t in her imagination. It was as real as the neighborhood’s documented history, even before the Great Migration of Negroes coming north to find employment or to escape Jim Crow. Before there were Negroes, Harlem had become a destination point for diverse European ethnic groups that included Germans, Jews, Irish, and Italians.
She’d typed a thesis for a student who had researched the history of gangsters in Harlem from the turn of the century to post-World War II. It was as if he’d been an eyewitness to the criminal activity of people he had known intimately. Justine had found herself transfixed by the names of gangsters who’d set up lucrative rackets to make money that included prostitution, loan-sharking, bookmaking, gambling, extortion, and even murder. The ringing of the telephone shattered her musings as Kenny jumped up from the table to answer it.
“Should I assume that you don’t get that many calls?” Frank asked, smiling.
Justine nodded, returning his smile. “You assume right. If the phone rings six times a day, five of them are for Kenny.”
“Wait until the girls start calling,” he teased.
“Please, Frank. That’s something I’m not looking forward to.”
“You have to know it’s only a matter of time when he will take a real interest in girls.”
“I know.”
“That doesn’t bother you?” Frank asked.
“I’m not going to lie and say it doesn’t, but hopefully he’ll wait until he’s more mature and responsible when it comes to sleeping with girls.”
“I don’t think …” Frank’s words trailed off when Kenny rushed into the kitchen.
“Mom, that was Ray. He and a few other guys are going to the park to play baseball. Can I go with them?”
“Yes, but don’t forget to wear some old jeans. I don’t need you putting holes in your good ones when you decide to slide into a base. And remember, I want you home when the streetlights come on.”
“Thanks, Mom. See you later, Mr. Dee.”
“What are you smiling about?” Justine asked Frank when Kenny left.
“You,” he said softly.
“What about me?”
“Even though you told Kenny he could go and hang out with his friends, you’re still struggling about letting him go off on his own.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” she said defensively. “I allow Kenny to hang out with his friends, but I need to know where he’s going so if something were to happen to him, I could tell the police where he’d been. I’m not one of those mothers who will go to bed while their kids are still in the streets getting into who knows what. I don’t need the police knocking on my door telling me they found my son dead in some alley from an overdose of drugs, or that he’s been arrested and locked up for something he shouldn’t have been doing.”
“I doubt that’s going to happen to Kenny.”
Justine’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “Why, Francis? Because you say so?”
Frank realized Justine only called him Francis when she was upset with him. What he couldn’t figure out was what he’d said to upset her. She deserved a medal to have raised a boy who exhibited all the signs that he would grow up to make her proud to be his mother.
“Yes, I say so, Justine. I don’t have kids, but I’ve seen and been around enough of them to know if they’re going to make their mothers proud or weep for them. It isn’t easy raising kids in a city where they are exposed to so much negativity before they even reach adulthood.”
“There is one thing in particular that I worry about when it comes to Kenny,” she admitted. “And that’s drugs.”
Frank nodded. “I know, because my youngest sister died from a drug overdose.”
Justine gasped, then bit her lip. “I’m so sorry.”
Suddenly his face went grim, and Frank chided himself for telling her about his sister. It wasn’t something he liked talking about, and especially not to someone who wasn’t family. Despite his growing feelings for Justine Russell, he knew she would never become a part of his family. Not because he didn’t want it, but because she didn’t.
