The Realest Ever

Chapter TWO

AUNT RUTH

Two days later Kyra was still struggling to keep a positive attitude as she cleaned the blinds and windows in her bedroom on what was actually a beautiful Saturday afternoon. At bedtime Kyra’s room was cramped with herself, her two year old daughter and her eight year old son, but it wasn’t the crowded conditions that had her fighting off a wave of depression. It was her new landlord that made Kyra wonder if maybe she should’ve stuck it out in Arkansas.

When she reached out to her aunt two weeks ago, Kyra didn’t think Ruth would take her in. Fifteen years ago when Kyra’s mother went to jail, everyone assumed Ruth would be the one to step in for her sister’s kids. But they were wrong about that. Before anyone even had time to ask her, Aunt Ruth said she was too busy. She had too much going on to be burdened with three rugrats that weren’t even hers.

Kyra’s brother Duke and her sister Jackie were sent to Arkansas, where most of Kyra’s family was from. The only reason Kyra stayed in Overbrook Meadows was because Donovan begged her mom to take her in. But that didn’t last long. Soon Kyra was shipped off to Arkansas as well, and for a long time she hated her aunt for being so cold-hearted. Kyra would’ve given up a kidney to stay with Donovan in Texas, but fate had other plans.

When Kyra summoned the courage to flee Arkansas fourteen days ago, Aunt Ruth was her absolute last resort. Kyra had her finger poised over the hang up button when she called her, and she was blown away when Aunt Ruth told her, “Of course you can come stay with me, child, until you get your life back together. I’ll help take care of your kids. You been gone a long time. I miss you Kyra. If you need somewhere to stay, I’m here for you.”

Within a week Kyra took her aunt up on the offer. She spent her last dime on bus tickets and packed all of the clothes she could carry in two huge suitcases she got from her brother. Duke wanted her to stay with his family, but Kyra knew she had to leave Arkansas entirely. She had troubles with her ex, the police and Little Rock’s child protective services. But Kyra wasn’t fearful when she got on that bus. Aunt Ruth’s offer of food and shelter was a light at the end of a very dark tunnel.

That light dimmed very quickly.

Kyra’s first surprise when she arrived in Overbrook Meadows was that Aunt Ruth’s three bedroom home actually had only two bedrooms. The third one was filled with junk that Aunt Ruth was in no hurry to remove. Kyra offered to clean it herself, but Aunt Ruth said she didn’t want anyone going through her personal stuff. Kyra accepted that.

They decided to let Quinell sleep on the couch while Kyra and Kat shared the one bedroom, but that only lasted one night. The next morning Aunt Ruth complained that Kyra’s son was a lot bigger than she thought he was. She said Quinell sleeping on the couch was messing up her cushions. He’d have to sleep in the bedroom with Kyra and Kat instead. Ruth offered Quinell an air mattress to sleep on but insisted he spread it out in his mother’s room rather than clutter up the living room. Kyra accepted that, too. Unfortunately it was only the beginning of Aunt Ruth’s tyranny.



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After cleaning the windows and making her bed and putting Quinell’s air mattress away, Kyra was lured out of her bedroom by the sound and smell of frying bacon. She found her son in the living room sitting quietly on Aunt Ruth’s precious sofa. The TV was tuned in to Saturday morning cartoons, but Quinell was distracted by the good smells coming from the kitchen. He was a fair-skinned boy with large hands and feet and a small mouth that was almost always closed. He countered his quietness with watching and listening, and Kyra knew he was formulating his own opinions about what was going on in their new home.

Kyra found her daughter Kat sitting quietly on the outskirts of the kitchen, like she knew it was something good going on in there, but for whatever reason she couldn’t get close to it. Kyra hefted her daughter and went to speak to her Aunt for the first time that morning. Last week Kyra greeted Ruth with a hug and a kiss. Today she gave her a guarded, “Hey, Auntie.”

“Hey,” the head of the house said without turning away from the stove.

Aunt Ruth was fifty-six years old. She was tall with golden brown skin and short hair that she preferred to keep curly. Ruth wore large glasses with thick lenses. She had a burgundy robe pulled over her night gown. From the back, Kyra saw that the heels of her feet were ashy and calloused from too much time spent barefoot.

“If y’all want something to eat, I got some peanut butter in the cabinet,” Aunt Ruth said.

Kyra didn’t take the bait. She put Kat down and went to the cabinet to retrieve the peanut butter.

“Don’t put that baby down in here,” Aunt Ruth said, looking over her shoulder. She stopped smoking four years ago, but her voice was still a little manly from the four decades of damage she caused herself before quitting. “I told Kat I don’t want her in here while I’m frying bacon,” Aunt Ruth continued. “Don’t want no grease to pop up on her.”

Kyra didn’t say anything, but she did pick up her child and deposit her outside of the kitchen. One of the things Kyra found strange about her aunt was how Ruth could say something mean-spirited in a way that left plenty of defense if someone tried to call her on it. She probably wasn’t doing it now, but Aunt Ruth did it so often Kyra had to give conscious thought to how she responded to her.

Kyra found half a loaf of bread on the kitchen table.

Ruth turned to face her.

“Don’t eat all my bread, neither. I need three pieces for my breakfast.”

Aunt Ruth had one gold tooth, a canine, and a faint moustache above her top lip. Her nose was pudgy, as was the rest of her body. Kyra didn’t think she was physically unattractive, but maybe the rest of the world disagreed. Ruth had been married three times, each one ending in divorce. She had one son who went to the military and then moved to California afterwards. Kyra hadn’t heard anything about him since she’d been there.

“If y’all want some bacon, you should’a went down to the WIC office, like I told you to,” Ruth said. “We would have enough food for everybody.”

“We don’t need bacon,” Kyra said. What she needed was a utensil to make their peanut butter sandwiches, but her aunt was standing in front of the counter drawer. Kyra understood that no one was eating anything until Aunt Ruth had her say.

“Your son asked me for some bacon,” Aunt Ruth informed.

Kyra looked back at him, and Quinell abruptly returned his eyes to the television.

“He’s just a kid,” Kyra said. “He smelled bacon, and he wanted some. I’ll tell him we’re eating peanut butter.”

“That ain’t the point,” Aunt Ruth said. She turned towards the stove and began removing the crispy strips of pork. She placed them on a plate lined with paper towels. They looked and smelled delicious. “The point is,” she said when she faced Kyra again, “that you didn’t do what I told you to.”

“I only been here a week,” Kyra said. The sight of the bacon made her stomach rumble. It was loud, and she knew her aunt heard it.

“You been here long enough to get some food stamps,” Aunt Ruth countered. “You got two kids and not a dime in your pocket. They can give you an emergency card the day you walk in there.”

“You knew I didn’t have any money,” Kyra said, careful to keep her tone neutral. If Aunt Ruth put her out, Kyra knew she’d have to take her family to a women’s shelter. She had no other relatives in Overbrook Meadows, and she didn’t have any money to take the Greyhound back to Little Rock.

But returning to Arkansas was not an option. Even a homeless shelter was better than that.

“Yes I knew you didn’t have no money,” Aunt Ruth said, greasy spatula in hand. “But we also talked about getting you on some benefits, until you start working.”

“I said I would go Monday,” Kyra reminded.

“You could’a went yesterday,” Ruth said. “You could’a went the day before that. Hell, you can go today. They got places open for emergencies.”

“I didn’t know it was an emergency,” Kyra said. “You still got a lot of food in your refrigerator.”

As soon as she said it, Kyra wished she hadn’t. Aunt Ruth’s eyes widened.

“That’s my food! I’m on disability. I don’t got enough money to be feeding all of y’all. I said I would give you somewhere to live. I never said I could pay for all the food your kids been eating. If you wanna know the truth, I think you being irresponsible, Kyra, not going to get those food stamps.”

Kyra took a deep breath. Her face reddened, but she managed to maintain her composure. The word irresponsible hurt her more than Ruth knew. Or maybe her aunt did know how often the word was tossed around in Arkansas. Ruth knew about Kat’s father, and she knew about Kyra’s run-in with CPS. Maybe she chose the word irresponsible because she wanted to pour salt on the wound.

In her defense, Kyra thought getting hooked on public assistance in Texas was the irresponsible thing to do. She saw it many times: Young girls realize they can get Medicare, housing and free groceries simply by remaining unemployed and not supported by their children’s father(s). Kyra knew she’d work harder to get a job if she didn’t have too much help along the way, but her aunt had a valid point.

“Do you want to take me to the welfare office today?” she asked with a defeated look in her eyes.

“Naw. We got enough food to make it through the weekend,” Ruth said right away. “It’s gon’ be too damned hot today. And that place is always packed on Saturday. You’ll be in line for hours. But we do need to go first thing Monday morning. I’ll take you then.”

“Okay,” Kyra said.

“Y’all can have that bacon,” Aunt Ruth said, wiping her hands on a wash cloth. “It’s some eggs in the refrigerator, if you wanna cook ’em. You wanna go out tonight? Want me to watch the kids?”

Kyra frowned. “No.”

“Alright,” Ruth said and promptly left the kitchen.

Kyra was left standing there, wondering if that was what this breakfast argument was about. Did Aunt Ruth really just torture two children with the smell of bacon just so she could get Kyra to do her bidding?

Kyra pushed the thought away. When you have nowhere else to go, why burden yourself with complaints about how bad your situation is? It’s better to look on the bright side, like how everyone had a roof over their head last night, and no one in the house was getting high. Plus Kyra could feed her children a hot meal this morning. That was something to be grateful for.

“You want some bacon and eggs?” Kyra called to the living room.

“Yes!” Quinell jumped off the couch and headed her way.

“Hold on, I haven’t made the eggs yet,” Kyra said with a grin. “I’ll let you know when it’s ready.”



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By eleven o’clock Kyra had her kids fed and dressed and on the bus stop down the street from Aunt Ruth’s house. Quinell didn’t talk much as they waited for the #8 to round the corner. Kyra hoped he wasn’t getting depressed about their new environment.

“You ready to go back to school on Monday?” she asked him.

Their bus stop didn’t have a roof or clear, plastic walls like the fancy ones downtown. There was just a fiberglass bench that was thankfully beneath a tall pecan tree. The shade it provided was a welcomed blessing. Quinell was busy trying to coax ants into an ant lion’s trap, but he dropped his poking stick and stood before his mother.

“I guess so.”

Kyra held her daughter in her lap. Kat’s hair was freshly styled with ten shiny plaits that had the pleasant aroma of Royal Crown hair grease.

“You nervous?” Kyra asked her son. “I know I used to get nervous when I had to move to a new school.”

“You moved a lot when you were little?” Quinell asked her.

“I did,” Kyra said. “But not as much as you. When I was little, I grew up not too far from here. I went the same school you’re going to on Monday.”

Quinell’s eyes brightened. “You went to Sunrise?”

Kyra nodded. “Sure did.”

“Is it fun?”

Kyra smiled. “I don’t remember it that much. The teachers are all different now anyway. It won’t be the same for you. I remember I climbed up on the roof one time during the summer. That was fun.”

Quinell’s smile grew wider. “Really?”

“They used to have a covered walkway in the back,” Kyra recalled. “It had these poles holding it up. Me and my friend used to climb them like monkey bars. Once we got on top of the walkway, we could follow it to the school and then climb on it.”

“What was up there?” Quinell asked, his eyes glistening.

“I don’t want you trying to get up there,” Kyra said quickly. “It was stupid for us to do it. We could’a fell off and broke our neck.”

“I won’t try to get up there,” Quinell promised.

“I’m serious.” She gave him a stern look. After her trouble in Little Rock, Kyra found herself over-thinking everything about her parenting. She couldn’t bear to get call from more social workers because of a curiosity she ignited.

“I’m not,” Quinell said. “Was it toys up there?”

“That’s what we went looking for,” Kyra confirmed. “We thought we’d find all kinds of cool stuff. But mostly it was just rocks they had all over the roof. It was some Frisbees and tennis balls the kids threw up there, but they were all old and ugly from being in the sun and the rain for so long. Lord knows I shouldn’t have had my butt up there in the first place.”

But as she spoke, Kyra couldn’t stop a wistful smile from brightening her features. The voyage to the summit of Sunrise Elementary would forever be one of her fondest memories. She and Donovan were big time explorers when they were little. Their imagination was often the only escape from a reality that was much too ugly for eight year old Kyra to see every day.

“Are you glad we came back?” Quinell asked, noticing his mother reminiscing.

“I didn’t come back for me,” Kyra said. “I did it for you. I know things don’t look too good right now, but it’ll be better here in Texas. Do you like living with your auntie?”

Quinell took too long before he nodded.

“Do you like it better here or in Arkansas?” Kyra asked.

Quinell answered right away this time. “Here.”

Kyra nodded. She looked up and was happy to see their bus coming to a squeaky stop in front of them.



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The bus was fairly empty, so Kyra didn’t have to squeeze her family into two seats. She took a window seat and sat Kat in the empty spot beside her. Quinell got two seats by himself across the aisle. He faced the windows, smiling with his sneakers dangling a foot off the floor. Kyra was happy to see him happy. But she knew she wouldn’t be free of her nagging guilt until she righted all of her wrongs. The problem was, some dated back to before Quinell was born.

When she first left Texas in 1999, Kyra went to live with her Aunt Joyce in Little Rock. Joyce already had five kids of her own, including four year old twins. Joyce did the best she could to care for her sister’s brood, but she lived in a bad neighborhood, and Kyra’s brother Duke was the oldest man in the house. Kyra only had three years left in high school, and Joyce knew that she’d been fending for herself for quite a while. Aunt Joyce left Kyra to her own devices, for the most part, and she was thankful that Kyra graduated high school before she got herself pregnant.

After graduation, Kyra found a job as a waitress. Shortly afterwards, she fell in love with a boy she met at a neighborhood house party. Tommy was tall and skinny with rich, dark skin and a pocket full of dope money. He only used a condom three quarters of the time, and Kyra was not surprised or particularly upset when she learned that his withdrawal method was not effective. She was only nineteen, but most of the other girls in Kyra’s neighborhood had babies by that age. Not one person in Kyra’s life told her she should’ve waited when they noticed her belly growing bigger and bigger.

Kyra went to live with her grandmother because Aunt Joyce didn’t have the time or patience to help raise a brand new baby. Kyra’s relationship with Tommy continued as usual, even though the bun in her oven began to garnish negative attention. Kyra heard rumors that Tommy was still with his ex-girlfriend Alisha. Alisha even confronted Kyra a few times. When Alisha called Kyra a ho, Kyra called her a ho right back. And when Alisha wanted to meet up to fight, Kyra was down for that, too. But thankfully others intervened when they saw how far along Kyra was at that point.

“You can’t be fighting no pregnant girl!” an older bystander warned.

“Her face ain’t pregnant,” Alisha had said. “I can slap the shit out of her.” She had her rings removed, her weave removed and her shoes off already. Alisha had a razorblade hidden in her mouth as well, but Kyra wasn’t afraid of her. She brought half a dozen cousins with her to rival the half a dozen hood rats Alisha brought as backup.

The tension reached a boiling point on Christmas Eve, two months before Quinell was born. Incensed that Tommy was really going to stay with Kyra and start a disgusting family with her, Alisha went to Kyra’s grandmother’s house and knocked calmly on the door. She wanted to rip Kyra’s hair out when she answered, but Alisha maintained her cool until Kyra summoned Tommy to the door.

Tommy called her a bitch, and then Alisha punched him in the chest. She ran away, and Tommy stumbled back into the living room. Tommy tried to tell Kyra that Alisha had something in her hand when she punched him, but Kyra could see for herself. There was a steak knife sticking out of his bony chest. At first Kyra thought he was holding it in his arm pit (Ha ha, you so funny!) but she saw the blood, and she saw the look of shocked confusion in her baby-daddy’s eyes.

She laid him on the couch and watched in horror as Tommy yanked the knife from his wound. The blood began to flow in earnest then. Kyra’s screams brought her grandmother running from the main bedroom. The ambulance responded within ten minutes, but Quinell’s father was pronounced dead an hour after being stabbed. Tommy was only eighteen years old. The doctors said he would’ve died whether he pulled the knife out or not, but Kyra never believed that.

Alisha was arrested, but she managed to get her murder charge dropped to second degree because no one actually saw her stab Tommy and no one could prove she took a knife to the residence specifically to kill the love of her life. Kyra had her bastard child in February, and once again she was right on par with the other girls in her neighborhood. Whether they lost their daddy to the grave or the penitentiary, there were enough fatherless black children in Little Rock to fill several high schools.



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When they got to the library, Kyra had to wait nearly an hour for a computer. But that was okay. She found a couple of romance novels to check out as well as a few DVD’s to watch with the kids this weekend.

When she was able to get online, Kyra checked her career builder site. But by then she couldn’t deny that she was too preoccupied to care about a job at that moment. It had been two days since she sent Donovan a friend request on Facebook. Kyra was dying to know if he accepted it yet.

She abandoned her job search and logged onto Facebook, surprised to see fifteen notifications this time. Most were to inform her that people accepted her friend requests. The last person on the list was Donovan Mitchell. Kyra’s heart shot up in her throat when she saw that Donovan sent her two personal messages as well.

She worked to steady her breathing as she clicked on his name. Kat was trying to talk to her, but Kyra was so excited she wouldn’t have noticed if her daughter recited the whole Gettysburg Address. Two seconds later Donovan’s profile popped up. Kyra found herself staring at the same screen she accessed the other day – except now it was virtually uninhibited.

Kyra’s eyes were wide and nearly frightful. She wiped her mouth and noticed her fingertips were cold. She chuckled nervously, trying to shake off the jitters. Sheclicked on Donovan’s “Photos,” and then she clicked on the first album labeled “Profile Pictures.” A page full of small images appeared. Kyra clicked on the first one, and finally, after more years and dreams and prayers than she could keep up with, Kyra saw the boy who ascended Mount Sunrise Elementary with her and never tried to steal a kiss when they got to the top.

Donovan was a grown man now.

Kyra took a deep breath and blew it out slowly, her eyes quickly filling with tears.

The last time she saw him, Donovan was a junior in high school. He was skinny and athletic with brown skin like cognac and one of those high-top haircuts that were all the rave in those days. Kyra could see that this was the same Donovan, but the differences were nearly as shocking as reconnecting with him in the first place.

The biggest dissimilarity was the sheer bulk Donovan added to his school-boy physique. As Kyra clicked from one picture to the next, she noticed at least one hundred pounds of new Donovan that completely dwarfed the old Donovan images in her mind. The added weight was mostly muscle. It was stacked oh so perfectly on his chest and arms and shoulders and thighs. He wasn’t too muscle-bound. He was just right.

As Kyra clicked away, she saw that he accomplished his dream of playing college football. She saw that he coached high school football, and he still had a good relationship with his mother, Ms. Beverly Mitchell.

Kyra backed out of his profile pics and noticed Donovan had eight more photo albums. The largest one was labeled “Vacation Pics.” It had more than fifty photos. Kyra was both nervous and elated as she explored the albums one by one. It almost felt like she was peeking into Donovan’s personal life, but she noticed comments on a lot of his pictures and figured this type of snooping was acceptable.

With the Facebook photos, Kyra was able to trace much of Donovan’s life, from his graduation from Western Hills to his football days in Ohio and his subsequent return to Overbrook Meadows. Kyra didn’t know why he didn’t go on to play for the pros, but Donovan looked successful and fulfilled in his recent pictures, and Kyra was increasingly happy for him.

One thing Kyra didn’t like was her omission from Donovan’s high school photos. But she knew she shouldn’t get upset about that. The few high school pictures Donovan posted were from his senior prom and graduation. Kyra was long gone by then. But still, she couldn’t help but wonder if Donovan missed her, because he looked so happy with his other friends from Western Hills. Kyra forced the silly thoughts from her mind.

Her smile didn’t slip again until Kyra came across more recent photos of Donovan in the presence of (and sometimes the arms of) a beautiful woman. Kyra didn’t believe she was jealous of the brown-skinned girl who kept appearing, but she couldn’t think of a better explanation for the unease she suddenly felt.

She never expected to return to Texas and spark a relationship with her old friend. She and Donovan never attempted a relationship before she left, as a matter of fact. And why would they? He was her best friend. They introduced themselves as brother and sister so often, a lot of people thought that actually was the case.

Kyra closed the photo album she was looking at, but she opened it again a second later and stared at the woman Donovan was embracing. Her hair was long and curly. Her waist was slimmer than Kyra’s, but Kyra thought her curves looked better. The woman definitely had better hair than Kyra, but it was probably a weave. If Kyra had money to go to the beauty shop, she could–

What the hell? Kyra caught herself and chuckled. Why was she comparing herself to Donovan’s (apparent) girlfriend? Was she really sitting there fantasizing about being with her play-brother?

Ewww!

Kyra shook her headand returned to Donovan’sProfile Pictures. She found the photo she liked the best, which was a simple shot of him from the waist up. Donovan’s hair was short, his shirt tucked in. He would’ve looked preppy in the collar shirt, but his physique screamed athlete. His chest was awesome, his eyes smiling, but still piercing. His neck and shoulder muscles begged for a slow massage. His lips were perfect, and they begged for something too, but Kyra wouldn’t allow those thoughts to take hold.

After nearly thirty minutes of her photo-investigation, Kyra finally backed out of Donovan’s albums and read the messages he sent her. They were both sent two days ago, the day Kyra found him on Facebook. Kyra’s blood flowed hot in her veins as she read the first one:

“Kyra! OH MY GOD! I can’t believe it’s really you! You have no idea how many times I searched for you on Facebook. I thought I would never find you. I looked for you just a few weeks ago, but I could never find your profile. I’m so happy to finally see your pictures. I can barely sit still. I been worried about you for the last fifteen years. Your profile says you’re back in Overbrook Meadows. Is that true? I know that can’t be true. I would love to see you! I’ll fly to Arkansas if I have to. Write me back soon! P.S. I see that you’re a mommy now! That is so awesome, Kyra! Hurry and write me back!”

Kyra’s brain was racing when she finished reading. Her heart was racing as well. She always knew Donovan missed and cared about her as much as she missed and cared about him, but seeing it with her own eyes gave her joy like nothing else.

She quickly read Donovan’s second message:

“Kyra, I’ve been waiting like crazy for you to respond, but you won’t! I feel like I’m chasing a ghost again. When you get this message, please call me. Don’t bother responding on Facebook. Just call me. Please.” He gave her his number.

Kyra pulled her cellphone from her purse. She added Donovan’s number, but she didn’t call him – not right away. There were too many people in the library who were already giving her strange looks because of her extra-excited computer time. Kyra knew that her first talk with her best friend after two and a half decades would be much too rowdy for this hushed environment.