Trigger Warning: This short story possibly contains potentially distressing material to those who have experienced sexual harassment or assault.
I hardly knew him. He always had a cigarette in the corner of his strawberry lips. He wore a brown, faux leather coat that hung loosely on his tall, stick figure frame. He was stained with Miller-Lite-Newport cologne.
I could hardly see his eyes, which were always shrouded by sunglasses (no matter if the sun was out or not), but Mama introduced him to my brother, sister and I as Papa Matthew. We already had a grandpa, Tony, but Granny said that Papa was Mama’s real daddy. I didn’t care who was what, I enjoyed the idea of having two grandpas.
When Papa Matthew came to visit, he never stayed for long. One day I’d wake up to him cooking in the kitchen, with the aroma of honey-butter biscuits and scrambled eggs sifting in the air. The next day he’d be gone.
My brother and I always made his short visits worthwhile, though. We had a habit for watching Tom and Jerry and movies in the living room on the flat screen. I would climb in his lap and rest my head on his bird chest, rhythmically matching the rising and falling of his breathing with my own.
He and my brother threw the football in the backyard and wrestled like hogs – mud and grass flying everywhere. I gawked with jealousy, wishing I could play also. Just so I could keep Papa to myself.
“Come give Papa a kiss,” he’d say when he noticed my longing. I did his will, smiling and giddy that he had paid me mind. My sister on the other hand, wasn’t too fond of Papa. Every time I wanted her to join our game of cops and robbers, dolls or Candy Land, she ran to Mama.
I thought her foolishness upset Papa, because when he noticed it, he’d look at me solemnly, bottom lip poking out and say, “You love Papa, right?” as if the little love I had alone would suffice for him, and fix the pretend hurt my sister inflicted on him.
“Yes,” I replied with little haste. He’d plant one on my cheek, and all was OK in our world.
My sister and I come home from school, running off the bus and straight into the kitchen so I could fix us bowls of ice-cream; for the sun beat us up on our treacherous race to the house, and a cold treat was rightfully due.
Before I could open the refrigerator, a loud knock rapped on the front door. Startled, my sister darted behind the stereo speaker in the living room. I rolled my eyes and peaked through the curtains. Mama normally didn’t let us answer the door while she was away, but the person at the door was no stranger.
I flung it wide open, letting the Summer humidity blast through the doorway. I hadn’t seen him in so long and time presented itself as the gray hairs in his beard and the balding on his head. He’d gotten slightly muscular, making his already skyscraper stature a mountain. His lips were darker, a telling sign of tobacco abuse. His brown, faux leather coat almost fit perfectly now.
“Come give Papa a hug.”
I tied my arms around him, burying my face into his stomach. He had to bend considerably to return my embrace, but he did; arms traveling down my back and his hands resting on my waist. We held each other for a while, neither of us daring to break the reunion.
“Ya’ daddy ain’t hurt y’all or ya’ mama again, huh?” he asked, breathing into my scalp.
I peeked behind his frame to see daddy sitting on the love seat, staring blankly at the powered off TV. Disease made daddy sick in the head. He was forgetful to the point of forgetting our names, and aggressive enough to hit mama, bite me and send us both to the hospital.
“No,” I answered.
“Good, ‘cause Papa will do anything for you.”
We finally loosened the hold we had on each other, and I began skipping into the kitchen to finish prepping my sister and I’s bowls of ice cream. Suddenly, Papa grabbed my wrist, yanking me back in front of him.
“You miss Papa?”
I nodded, placing my fingers over his to pry his vice grip loose. But, the intensity in his eyes cut me short, as they wandered from my sky-blue polo shirt to the new hump under my khaki skirt. He let go of my wrist, slapping his hands on either side of my face.
“Give me a kiss.”
Before I could even flinch, his lips pressed hard against mine. His lips a black hole, cold and hungry, devouring everything in its perimeter.
This isn’t right.
I tugged hard enough for him to loosen his grip, and darted for the kitchen table. Trembling uncontrollably and head spinning, I reached in the small pocket of my backpack for the Nokia Mama gave me for emergencies.
“Would you tell on Papa if he did something bad to you?” I nearly jumped out of my seat to find him standing right over me. I peered into the living room to see if my sister was still hiding behind the stereo.
She was gone.
Daddy?
Still staring at the TV.
The question bounces off the walls in my head, frantically searching for an answer that wouldn’t leave me slumped in the bayou.
I sit at the kitchen table, motionless. I was petrified that he would register my body language as alluring; not breathing – in fear that he’d want to taste more than my misery. I avoided his gaze that rested on my face – terrified to see the burning, ravenous desire to devour me in the pits of his eyes.
My eyes began to burn, a lump rose in my throat, all while desolation and panic were taking its rightful place in my stomach.
“Tootie,” Papa said impatiently.
“I don’t know.”
A wicked grin creeped at the corner of his lips.
“We gonna’ go in the back room later, OK?”
I nodded my head nervously, and walked speedily into the living room – sneaking my phone into my bra. When I reached the sofa, I quickly shot Mama a text message, telling her to hurry home.
Sent.
I turned on the TV, which summoned Papa to return and plop down right next to me. He was close enough where I could hear the thumping of his heart, close enough that I could smell the desperation on his breath; close enough where I could feel the lump rising under his Levi’s.
He pulled me right on top of it.
My short, chunky legs quaked as his cold, withered hands slithered up my skirt; exposing my knees, my thighs and blue panties.
I cried to daddy. I pleaded, screamed silently that he save me from the monster that had become Papa – but another kind of beast had a hold on him. He couldn’t even help himself.
I looked to the ceiling and prayed for an angel. The Rapture, Jesus sailing with a sword in his mouth to slay this unrighteous creature.
Just as he was about to strip me of my childhood, the front door opened.
“Tootie?” Mama shouted,
Instantly, Papa threw me off him, hissing at me to fix my clothes.
“Yes Mama,” I said, melting with relief.
She appeared from the hallway and I sprinted to her, making myself a vine around her legs.
“Hey Nett,” Papa said, staring at the floor.
“What’s going on?”
“Me and Tootie was just watching TV.”
Mama looked down at me to search for the urgency that was in the message I sent her, the slightest sign of distress, the one indication that would have him meet his maker.
But I masked it all, allowing my hopelessness to bury itself into the depths of me.
He still visits me. In the lonely, loitering men that whoop and holler outside of the corner stores, in the staff and students at school who can’t seem to unglue their eyes from my ass and in the men who come into my job on Friday nights slamming packs and cans of Miller Lite's, Budweiser’s, and Corona’s on the counter – begging for my number and a pack of Newport long’s in the carton.
