Free The Dear One by Jacqueline Woodson Page B

join, we made our own clubs just like we’ve always been doing.”
    â€œI guess—”
    â€œJack and Jill is about taking care of our own, and that’s what bringing Rebecca here is about, what the Seton chapter of Alcoholics Anonymous with its all-black membership is about, what black sororities and fraternities are about, and the sooner you learn all of this, the better.”
    â€œI still don’t like Jack and Jill,” I mumbled.
    â€œYou don’t have to. Just like you don’t have to like dancing and skiing. That’s why I don’t always make you go. I just want you to experience it all, to get a taste of every little bit of the things I didn’t get a chance to sample when I was a girl. If you think what I’m giving you is not enough, then fine, go live with Bernard.”
    â€œI don’t want to anymore. I’m sorry,” I said.
    â€œDon’t be,” Ma said wearily. “I just want you to know that I do love you, Feni, and I do want you here with me. I’m just not the kind of mother who goes around saying it every day.”
    I backed out of the den and stood outside the door. The words began sinking in and settling my stomach. They made sense to me now. We were not some TV family where everything was perfect all the time. Dad wasn’t here anymore, and it really didn’t matter because when he was here, he was a stranger anyway. It was only me and Ma, and maybe we weren’t so close. The thought made me sad. Other girls were close to their mothers. They did things together. But I liked being by myself and thinking thoughts no one else knew about, not even Ma. I was a true-blue loner, and maybe Ma was too. So we fit together like a jigsaw and came apart just as easily.
    I stood outside the door for a long time. Then I looked at the paper in my hand once more before tearing it into a thousand pieces. I walked past Rebecca unnoticed as she grunted through a toe-touching exercise, and stuck my tongue out at her back.

Fifteen
    â€œYOU HAVE TO COME MEET HER, CAESAR. I NEED SOMEONE to hate her with.”
    At lunch Caesar and I sat in the crowded pizzeria on the corner sharing a calzone and Coke. Caesar’s eyes were bright with excitement.
    â€œI can’t believe she’s only fifteen,” she said. “How old does she look?”
    â€œI don’t know. She thinks she’s a grown-up just because she’s pregnant.”
    â€œCan you imagine?” Caesar wondered aloud. “My mom would nail me to a cross!”
    I took a big bite of calzone. “You know something? I don’t think my mother would be all that mad. I just think she’d be really, really disappointed.”
    â€œ Your mother?”
    â€œCaesar, you know her from before. She’s different now.”
    Caesar looked doubtful.
    â€œSince she stopped drinking, she’s a lot calmer. She still works a lot, though. But I think if I ever got pregnant, she’d take care of me. And Marion and Bernadette too. Bernadette’s over there tutoring Rebecca right now, and Marion bought all these nice clothes for her. She didn’t have hardly anything when she came to stay with us.”
    â€œWhat happened to all her stuff?”
    â€œMa says they never really had anything.”
    â€œNo clothes?”
    â€œHer family doesn’t have any money. It’s a whole bunch of them living in four rooms.”
    â€œGod! She probably never had her own room before now.”
    â€œThat’s the worst part. She’s staying in my room. She’s the last person I see before I go to sleep and the first person I see when I wake up!”
    â€œHorror show!”
    â€œThe guest room is cold, and I threw a fit when Ma suggested Grandma’s room.”
    â€œYeah, that’s too sacred, I guess.”
    â€œShe’s such a pain, Caesar. All she talks about is the baby and Danny.”
    â€œWho’s Danny?”
    â€œHer