Who Asked You? by Terry McMillan

Author:Terry McMillan [McMillan, Terry]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Tags: Contemporary Women, Family Life, Fiction, streetlit3, African American, UFS2
ISBN: 9780670785698
Google: BtfywDxsU8MC
Amazon: 0670785695
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2013-09-17T00:00:00+00:00

While Ricky and me was taking our bath I remembered I had forgot to tell him what Nurse Kim told me to tell him and while we was putting on our pajamas he just said, “I ain’t going to no prison when I grow up.” After we clean out the tub and hang up our towels, Grandma go straight in to take her shower. “You boys did a nice job cleaning up after yourselves,” she says, and then give us a pat on the head. We about to read. And then Grandma will say our prayers with us.

Ricky sit on the couch and I sit in the big chair when the phone ring. I answer it. “Hello,” I say, like Grandma made me start saying instead of “Hi,” ’cause she said it was not polite.

“Hi, Luther.” I hear a lady’s voice that sound like my mama’s but I know it can’t be her.

My heart seem like it start beating really fast and the phone slide right out my hand on the carpet but I bend over and pick it back up real fast. “Who may I ask is calling?” I say, like Grandma told me to even though I know it’s our mama, but I just wanna hear her say it.

“It’s Trinetta. Your mother.”

“Who you want to speak to?”

“Why you acting like you don’t know who this is?”

“’Cause I thought you died.”

“Why in the hell would you think something stupid like that? Did anybody call and tell you I was dead?”

“No. But you have not called us.”

“When you start talking all proper?”

“All the time. Grandma won’t let us talk ghetto anymore.”

“Ghetto?”

“Who you want to speak to?”

“What?”

“I said, who you want to speak to?”

“This ain’t funny and please don’t get cute.”

“I’m not trying to be funny and—”

“Just tell me how you and Ricky been doing?”

“Fine.”

“Where’s Mama?”

“She’s taking her shower.”

“Well, how’s Mr. Butler?”

“Who?”

“Your grandpa?”

“He can answer a lot of questions.”

“No shit?”

“No shit. Where you calling us from?”

“I’m still in Atlanta. And watch your mouth, Luther. You ain’t grown.”

“You mean the capital of Georgia?”

“Well, well, well. You are smart for almost being in third grade.”

“Fourth grade. I get to skip third. What do you want?”

“You need to watch your mouth, Luther. That ain’t no way to talk to your own mama.”

“What do you want me to tell Grandma?”

“Tell her I just want to talk to her about something.”

“You ain’t . . . you aren’t coming back to get us, I hope?”

“What if I said I was?”

“Me and Ricky ain’t . . . are not going nowhere with you.”

“Oh yes you would, if I came back there.”

“We don’t want you to come back.”

“Where’s Ricky?”

“He doesn’t want to talk to you.”

“How you know that?”

“’Cause he won’t get up to come over here to the phone.”

“Well, guess what?”

“I don’t feel like guessing.”

“You might have a little sister or brother sometime next year.”

That’s when I press the button on the phone that make it hang up, and then I pull that long rubber cord out the wall

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