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At age seven, Malika learned that she’d almost killed her mother. Malinda told her this. The older girl urged the first-grader to look at the scar on their mother’s underbelly. Malika remembered a different type of skin there. A shiny, raised lump she’d later find out was a keloid. She waited until her mother took a shower after dinner and lingered in the bedroom. It would have been too suspicious with Malika on her own, so Malinda said she would join her.
“What are you two up to?” Brenda asked her daughters as they pretended to play with Barbies on the king-sized bed that almost flushed the sides of two walls.
“Nothing!” they shouted in unison. One of the few times they were on the same page. The Hunter girls watched as their mother pulled a thick, floral nightgown over her head, control-top panties doing nothing to hide the scar.
“See,” Malinda whispered to her younger sister, pointing at Brenda’s belly. “You did that. Mommy got that because you almost killed her when you were a baby.”
“But I didn’t do anything,” Malika defended herself. “I was too little to hurt Mommy. Babies can’t kill their mommies.”
“Oh yes they can! A lot of them kill their mommies when they’re born. That’s what you almost did.”
“But how?”
Malinda tried to explain as best she could that it happens from time to time, these homicidal babies. She said they were lucky Malika wasn’t successful and she and their mom got to come home. When she relayed this story to Bailey, who had officially become her work BFF, he referred to Malinda as “Satan’s spawn,” then apologized, but dug his heels in and said he had indeed meant what he said.
Twenty-three years on from learning this tragic truth, Malika laid in her bed recalling that day. Her parents couldn’t understand why she didn’t reach out to her sister. Why weren’t they closer? Why didn’t she spend weekends in Central Jersey and get to know her nephews more? Malinda and her husband finally bought that investment property on the Shore that they’d been talking about for a while. When it wasn’t rented out, the whole family could use it. Wouldn’t that be nice? her mother or father would ask. No was Malika’s internal response, but she would squeeze out a Yeah, I guess, praying for the conversation to be over or the subject to change.
“Why wouldn’t you come? I don’t understand,” Brenda asked her daughter as Malika did stretching exercises on her bed. “Since when don’t you spend Thanksgiving with your own family? Especially now?”
“I have to be here,” Malika said. Here was Queens, specifically Jackson Heights. “Channing’s parents are coming. This is my first time meeting them.”
Brenda Hunter paused for a few seconds. “Then bring ‘em here,” she said, a glint of optimism in her tone, pleased at her solution. “Malinda’s got the space. Her dining room is huge.”
Huge. Her living room was huge. The boys’ bedrooms were huge. The master suite—huge. The three-car garage and the driveway the two SUVs were parked in and the two-story foyer, all huge. Malika’s entire apartment could fit in the play area in the finished basement. Her brother-in-law had a pool table for himself and a batting cage and two basketball hoops for his sons. The house was huge. Malinda’s life was huge. Malika got it; she didn’t need to be reminded. When she told Bailey this, he said those houses were soulless McMansions and he’d gladly remain in his one bedroom across from Morningside Park until he took his last breath.
“Channing wants to keep it small,” Malika said. “So do I. A big dinner will be too overwhelming.”
“Overwhelming?” her mother scoffed. “Since when do you cook? You just have to show up. “Oh, Malika,” she took an extended breath. “Daddy’s gonna be so disappointed. Malinda, too.”
“It’s just one night. It’s not a big deal.”
“But what about …”
Her mother continued to talk, but Malika stopped listening. She needed an out. This conversation was headed in a circular direction and the thought of circles made her nauseous.
“ I, I have to go,” she stuttered, thinking of a lie. “I have a prenatal class.”
“Oh, all right,” a dejected Brenda said, breathing heavily. “The boys will be so hurt.”
“I’ll call Daddy tomorrow.”
“Do you think we could do Thanksgiving at your place and then Friday at my sister’s?”
The word “disappointed” hung over Malika’s head in neon pink. Not a flashing, on and off neon that offered some reprieve, but a static one that was illuminated all the time.
“Nah, no,” Channing said into the phone. She could imagine him closing his eyes and shaking his head. “My parents want to go into the city that day. They’re leaving on Sunday, so we don’t have much time.”
“Couldn’t you go to the city on Saturday?”
“We’re going sightseeing that day. Friday is strictly shopping and Saturday I’m taking them to see the usual: Empire State, Statue of Liberty, World Trade Center memorial. That sort of thing. Then dinner and a show later. Lion King. I’ve been telling my mom for years that I’d take her.” Malika moaned loudly. “What? Why are you getting an attitude?”
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