Pumpkin

1 "OMG, PUMPKIN! YOU EVEN DRIVE like a prude!" Pumpkin Tavares allowed the condescension in LaTom's voice to roll off her back. She may not have had a date in a little while —okay, a long while. In any case, she certainly wasn't taking driving advice from her cousin who spent most of her time in the back seat of cars. While they were parked. Somewhere off road. Late at night. "Next time we need to catch a cab," LaTom said from the back seat of Pumpkin's car. "Hmm, hmm," agreed her sister, LaRon, who sat in the passenger seat. Pumpkin raised a dubious eyebrow at the empty threat. Cab drivers expected payment. They also sported those handy off-duty signs on top of their cars. Not that her cousins would pay attention to a come-back-later or closed-for-the-day sign on her car. In their minds, Pumpkin existed as their personal chauffeur. "I could drive better than this." LaRon drummed her fingers on the dashboard. "I should've gotten my license." "Me, too," LaTom piped in from behind her sister. Well, there wasn't anything stopping them now. Except the convenience of being a backseat driver and not having to take any responsibility. "What did you say, Pumpkin-Head?" said LaTom. Pumpkin opened her mouth. Her lips flapped like a fish out of water, no air going in or out. She hadn't just said that out loud. Had she? LaTom glared at her in the rearview mirror. Pumpkin's eyes slid away and onto the baby LaTom bounced on her lap. Yes. On her lap and not in the car seat. "I really wish you'd strap him in back there," Pumpkin said. Little LaRico stood on his mom's lap. His chubby fingers played with the automatic window button; watching it magically go up and then down. A few miles back he'd gotten the glass down enough to stick his head out of the window like a little dog, with tongue hanging out of the mouth and all. It kept the fussy baby quiet, but then a cop pulled into traffic and, from her driver's seat control panel, Pumpkin put the window on lock down. "He's in the back seat." LaTom let LaRico loose on the floor. "When we were kids, there were no laws about car seats." "That's right," LaRon chimed in from the passenger seat. Her eyes skimmed dot matrix perforated forms. "The government is all up in mamas' business nowadays." With the attention off her, Pumpkin decided not to point out how these suggestions became laws after the deaths of many children. She'd never win the argument. Neither LaTom nor LaRon had gone to law school, but they both knew the system inside and out. Instead, Pumpkin focused all her will on the car in front of her to move the last few feet forward so she could break free of the gridlock. The sounds of the late afternoon traffic assaulted her ears: the impatient bursts from the expensive, new model cars; the wheezing grunts of the hooptie mufflers; the squealing of breaks protesting the snail's pace of Friday rush hour in Saint Anne's Parish, Louisiana. And then, it appeared out of nowhere. Like a horse —a white horse with flaxen mane and tail— leaping over an agitated mass of trolls. Like a villain appearing in a cloud of magic to deliver a devastating blow to the budding happy-ever-after. Pumpkin couldn't be sure which role the white, Ford Mustang with gold trim played as it charged through traffic. Its front wheels left the road for a split second. Its tail pipe breathed a sigh of exhaust as it seized a hole in the bumper-to-bumper traffic and escaped off the exit ramp, like magic. The next moment, the highway seized up again. The horn behind Pumpkin blared, demanding she move the few feet forward to get them all closer to nowhere. Pumpkin's little, orange Beetle obliged, knowing it could never achieve such a feat as leaving the asphalt on its four small tires. Or swerving its round frame across the double yellow divide. Pumpkin stayed in her lane and inched forward along with the rest of the rabble. A quarter of an hour later, the lane opened up and they reached their destination. Pumpkin pulled up to the front entrance of the Saint Anne's Department of Family and Child Services: DFACS. "Just drop us off here, Pumpkin." LaRon's hand was already on the door. "That food stamp line always takes long with all those old folks and cripples." Pumpkin stared straight ahead and gave an internal shake of her head. She wouldn't put it past her cousins to fake a disability to gain an advantage. It took a few seconds for Pumpkin to register the silence. She turned to look over at where LaRon and LaTom stood outside her car. Two pairs of the darkest brown, nearly black, eyes glared at her. Crap! She'd spoken her mind out loud again. Early in life, Pumpkin instinctively developed an internal filter to use when dealing with her cousins and their trifling-ness. It worked thusly: mouth stayed shut, head might nod, or noncommittal grunt might sound from the back of her throat in response to any foolishness they said or did. But never did her true feelings travel from her head to her mouth. This morning the filter appeared in good working condition when LaRon called, and guilted Pumpkin into interrupting her schedule and driving them here. Pumpkin tried to cover her verbal slip by nodding in appeasement. But then her mouth flew open. "Do you two ever worry that you feed into the negative stereotypes of single moms?" "What do you mean negative?" they said in unison. "Well, both of you are able-bodied, educated women. Why not get a job?" Pumpkin's hand flew to her mouth, no one more shocked than she was by its masochistic defiance. "We have a job." "We're stay-at-home-mothers." "Are you saying that's not a job, Pumpkin-Head?" "Because it’s a full-time job." "And we deserve to get paid for our time." "I thought you were a feminist, Pumpkin?" "It is... I am..." Pumpkin wasn't sure which question she was answering. Since their youth, the two of them had a way of firing more than one at a time, so that Pumpkin didn't know who was speaking nor to whom she was answering. "It’s just that both of you get child support from your babies' daddies." Six children, five daddies. That's another story. "It’s enough money for food, too. Don't you worry you're cheating someone else who may need it more?" "Who says we don't need it?" LaTom threw a baby blanket over her Dolce top before settling LaRico on her shoulder. "We want the best for our kids." LaRon's Jimmy Choo’s tapped the pavement in annoyance. "Mama?" The voice came from the backseat of the car. Pumpkin turned to the face of her eight-year-old son, Seth. For both the duration of this conversation, as well as the duration of the ride, Seth's face had been buried in a chapter book. "Mama, I have to use the bathroom," he said from his booster seat in the back. Now, technically eight-year-olds don't have to sit in boosters, but Sethie didn't quite reach the seat belt's shoulder strap yet, and admittedly, Pumpkin was a card-carrying, licensed to hover, helicopter parent. She turned to her cousins. "Could you?" They both rolled their eyes in annoyance. As if Pumpkin hadn't left work early, yanked her son out of his after-school routine, and scrambled across town to help them run an errand during rush hour. LaRon made an impatient gesture to Seth. "Fine," she said. "Thank you," Pumpkin said. "I'm just going to park and be right in." Ten minutes later, Pumpkin found a spot and headed back towards the building. The Saint Anne's DFACS building loomed, imperious and menacing in the cloudy sky. Time and the elements had faded its facade to a pale shade of brown. Its shadows blotched the countenances of the women ushering their children in and out of its doors. Unlike LaRon and LaTom who typically skipped up the steps, these women looked daunted, despondent, and demoralized as they entered the building. No one took pride in turning to the welfare system. Pumpkin watched one mother exit the glass doors; one child in her arms, another walking beside her. The little boy walking alongside her reached out and took his mother's hand in his own, a smile on his lips, unwavering trust in his eyes. Pumpkin felt the jolt that halted the mother's steps. The love that passed between the two reverberated in the air. The determination that lit up the mother's eyes was palpable to any witnesses. Coming down the steps, the family passed a table. The red and white banner strung across its front read "Preston Whitely for Mayor." Pumpkin saw the light in the mother's eyes dim under the scrutiny of the two women stationed behind the table. They handed out fliers to passersby, but their manicured hands retracted as the mother and her children neared. One woman looked down, wrinkling her nose at the mother's worn shoes. The other woman flipped her highlighted hair over her shoulder, the gleaming ring-set on her left hand sparkled. The light from the ring must've caught the mother's eye because the woman winced. She reached out her left hand, all fingers bare, and pulled her son closer to her. As the family passed by Pumpkin, the mother glanced up, a brave front on her face. Pumpkin offered her a smile. She'd been in that mom's shoes. A young mother, alone in the world. Wondering where she and her child's next meal would come from. Eyes cast down when approaching home, fearful of a notice on the door. Pumpkin had hated walking up the DFACS steps as a child, certain a mark was being stitched into her hand-me-downs. The clothes Pumpkin wore now were purchased off the rack with her own money. Her shoes weren't designer, but they were brand new. Though she was now a self-sufficient woman, Pumpkin often feared people would spot a scuff or scrape left over from those years. "Excuse me." Pumpkin turned and stopped in her tracks. Not because of the near collision, but because of the Adonis who stood before her. Tall and lean with dark, thick curls atop his head. But it was his eyes that arrested Pumpkin. They took her back to her teen years, watching Donnie Simpson on Video Soul; or farther back to Smokey Robinson doo-wopping with The Miracles. They were a pale gray. And he smelled... edible. Like fresh baked, butter croissants sprinkled with earthy spices. "Excuse me," he repeated, with a slight Southern drawl that was more refined than lazy. He prolonged his vowels just enough to let you know he was Southern, but the consonants he pronounced perfectly. "Are you Heather?" And of course, he was looking for someone else. "No, my name is Malika." He looked at her and squinted. Then his eyes rolled past her up the steps of the DFACS building. "Oh, sorry. I thought you could have been one of my volunteers." He stepped away, clearing her path to the entrance. I thought you could have been one of my volunteers. Pumpkin looked beyond him to see a voter registration table. I thought you could have been one of my volunteers. Part of her knew she should simply walk into the DFACS building to find her cousins and her son, because who knew? LaRon and LaTom could've let him go to the bathroom by himself and just forgotten about him —again. But another part of Pumpkin smarted. He'd taken one glance at her, paired it with her Eubonic-consonant-rich name, added it to her current location, and come away with an incorrect assumption. "You know, I could have been yours," she said. He turned back. "Mine?" "I mean, I have done something like this before." "Something... with me?" "No! I've never met you before." He opened his mouth to speak, thought better of it, then started again. "What exactly are we talking about?" This was not going the way she'd planned. But what exactly had she planned when she opened her mouth? Her filter malfunction needed to be repaired soon. Pumpkin took a deep breath, clearly aware of his smokey eyes watching her with... was that wariness or amusement? Growing up in her family, she had trouble deciphering the two.