Family Tree the Novel by Andrea N. Carr

Author:Andrea N. Carr
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: fiction, african american, literary fiction, narrative writing, familytree, novella length, andreacarr, andreancarr, familytreethenovel
Publisher: Andrea N. Carr

CHAPTER 10

When I got out of school, I waited for Lady at the same place like I always did, but this time she didn’t come. I didn’t know what to do. What if the men came, the way they used to with Mamma and me? What would I do? I didn’t know, but I knew I’d better get home. I knew I was late even though I couldn’t tell time yet, and I didn’t want to get into trouble. Mamma had a way of knowing things even when she wasn’t around.

I remembered to cross the street when the light was green, just the way Mamma had taught me when I was four and she walked me to kindergarten.

“Look both ways before you step off the curb, even if the light is green.” I could hear mamma say. I looked both ways then I ran across the street, trying to hurry in case Lady was there looking for me. I was almost home; it was only two street lights to home from school, straight up the street, no turns. I was relieved about that. I was almost there when I could hear Lady calling me from behind. I turned around and she was running after me.

I yelled to her before she got to me, “Where were you?” I was scared and crying.

She ran past me and said, “Hurry up.”

When we got around the corner of the driveway to near the front door, there was a white man in a car, pulling in the driveway behind us. She was afraid of him. She told me to run in the house as fast as I could, not to believe anything he says. She had been trying to miss him, on the way home. That’s why she didn’t come. She had to stay after school because she had gotten in trouble. She needed to tell me to wait, but didn’t feel she could reveal our secret to him and that was, I was waiting for her unattended; to walk me home. My mother made us keep secrets because she worried about what people thought of her.

My mother had kids out of wedlock and seemed to be ashamed of this fact. She never wanted anyone in her business. The teacher wouldn’t let Lady come out of the detention room. How could she let me know what to do? She knew I depended on her, and so did Mamma, to keep secrets. So she lunged at a pair of scissors on the desk and her teacher let her go after he tried to stop her. He followed her home to tell our mother what had happened. We usually arrived home about an hour and a half before one of my older sisters or Brother got home. We were alone. We made it in the house just before he got there. She slammed the door and locked it.

I was still crying. She hugged me and said, “You can’t tell Mom.”

I promised, I wouldn’t.

We sat our stuff down, and he knocked at the door.

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