'Honkey trash,' she hissed under her breath. The teenagers had shocked her, shouting, "There goes the mama and her little niglets." The white punks had laughed out the window as they squealed away, over the sound of their blaring car stereo, leaving her and her babies in a cloud of fresh tar and dust. "Ignorant bigots," she said out loud, clarifying her fury, when they were out of sight. She had caught a glimpse of a confederate flag in their rear window. Great, just great.

 

Jaretta had been walking for an hour with groceries, from the White Hen to her condo. Life here in the suburbs was very different. In the quiet black city neighborhood where she had grown up, there had been only a few whites and she didn't remember cultural collisions. At college, it had been totally different, too. Educated people are subtly instructed on how to mask racism cleverly. Now she was so much more vulnerable. She couldn't rely on the safety of being a married, educated, upper-middle-class, black woman any longer. Now she was a single mother, divorced, close to poor and had no job. Yet.

 

And here she was stuck walking miles, no Pace bus in sight, and listening to this crap. It was enough to try anyone's program. Don't take it personally,  she  reminded herself. After all the grief she'd been through the last two years, at least she had that. On Wednesday and Sunday evenings, she'd get a sitter for the kids and head for the closest meeting, at the Deer Park Christian Church for her Adult Children of Alcoholics group. That was wonderful. There she could remember to count her blessings. She was sober, unlike her father and brother and relatively sane, unlike her mother who had managed to convince herself that their family was perfect and anybody who didn't think so could stay away, thank you.

 

Jaretta luckily had her three little boys, David, Keith and Mershaun. Poor Mershaun, stuck with a name like only his daddy could pick. She thanked her Higher Power every day for his disappearance. Not that he was missing in action or anything respectable or even remotely heroic. His disappearance had come on the seat of a Harley, her former best friend, Ruby, planted firmly on the rear. Waving she was, too, all the way down the driveway. Mershaun overnight had become Matthew, although she always forgot to call him that.

 

It didn't matter that Raymond, her ex, didn't send a penny. Alone in bed, she said her prayers and asked for help for the four of them and, strangely, all odds against it, she knew it would come. She didn't waste her prayers on dumb things, like the Lotto. She'd just talk aloud, to someone she trusted right there in the room. Then she'd turn over, hug her pillow tight and give thanks for the grace of faith that refreshed her like iced tea.

 

Tonight she kissed her little babies whom she loved with her whole heart, turned on her wide hips, promised herself to eat less and exercise in the morning, forgave the dopes in the Chevy their trespasses and smiling, slept soundly.