Kameela by Tamario Pettigrew

Author:Tamario Pettigrew [Pettigrew, Tamario]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: 562 Publishing

14

IN THE BEGINNING I ain’t blame the Robinsons’. I thought they was good people. I surely didn’t blame Mr. Robinson. I thought he was broken up, too. I thought he ain’t know nothing that happened, but the more I looked at it the more it seemed like if he wasn’t part of what happened to Kameela, he allowed it. That’s what I kept thinking. He was different than I used to see him. Mr. Robinson never helped her like he should have. He only intervened to keep the peace. He turned a blind eye to what was going on in his house or he was complicit.

In the beginning I used to see Mr. Robinson the way I saw Pops. Pops was oblivious sometimes. Sometimes he was just making sure I was eating and alive but he wasn’t taking no active role in my life like how Mama used to. He wasn’t trying to manage my life like Mama. He was helping me grow and see things but only if I had a problem or if there was something he wanted me to understand. He knew I was alive and he knew I was eating and that’s all that mattered to him. Pops was straightforward and honest. He was working or he was sleeping. He was shopping at Super Duper or he was watching TV. It was simple. I understood him. He had a routine. He’d usually sleep all day, only waking to go to work. Sometimes he’d forget to cook and I’d eat whatever I could. Pops would have salami, bologna, or ham and cheese in the fridge for his lunch. I’d make a sandwich if I got hungry. Sometimes he wouldn’t cook me nothin’ and before he left for work, he’d stick his head in my door and say, “Did you eat?” He’d tell me to eat a can of spaghetti or ravioli, or some leftovers he cooked earlier in the week, or a bowl of cereal before he left.

The weekends was different. Pops always cooked on the weekends. On Sunday he’d cook a big Sunday meal and he’d stay on the couch all day watching television on his day off from the plant he worked at down in the Southtowns.

On the weekend, I stayed out past midnight. I was out like usual, just hanging around. Playing. Talking smack. Enjoying my summer. I was hoping I’d see Kameela. She didn’t come out today.

In the burned-out house Altron, Salina, and the rest of them was in there playing spades at the water-damaged kitchen table. Everyone was in there playing spades or waiting their turn to play spades. I didn’t stick around. They tried to make fun of me not wanting to play spades. Salina said I looked sad. It wasn’t the same when Kameela wasn’t around. It was like I was by myself when she wasn’t there. Junior kept asking me to be his partner because he had next. I tried but I was bored. It wasn’t fun. I wasn’t laughing or being myself.

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