The Summer Kitchen Read online

  In Poppy’s driveway, I sat with the question circling in my mind. I could call the police, or CPS—someone official to check on the kids, see what was going on, get help and services for the family if needed… .

  There were organizations set up to handle situations like this—Meals on Wheels, food pantries, summer lunch programs… .

  Weren’t there?

  If I called someone, how long would it be before action was taken? Tomorrow? The next day?

  What if nothing came of it? The headlines were full of stories of kids who slipped through the cracks of an overburdened, underfunded social services system, kids who were living in desperate, dangerous situations.

  I sat with my fingers on the car keys, thinking of the groceries in the back.

  You can’t just wheel in there and start handing out food to someone else’s kids, Sandra. Kids should be taught not to take food from strangers, for one thing.

  Just call someone …

  That’s why cities have social services… .

  But even as I tried to convince myself, I knew that if it were as simple as making a phone call, someone would have done it already. Those kids were hungry today, and they had been yesterday, and any number of days before that.

  I took the groceries into the house, let Bobo into the backyard, laid out some clean newspaper in the kitchen, and started making sandwiches.

  This is crazy. You can’t just go down there… .

  But I kept making sandwiches. I couldn’t help thinking of the story the nuns had told us about Jake wandering alone in the marketplace, just three years old. He’d come so close to disaster. If someone, a stranger, hadn’t intervened, there was no telling what would have happened to him. If passersby had minded their own business that day, if everyone had looked the other way, he could have ended up in the hands of dangerous people and been sold into a life so terrible I couldn’t bear to imagine it. When he was brought to the nuns, he was so hungry he would have gone with anyone who would give him food.

  Those children down the street were Jake. Different country, different faces, but they could have been my son, all those years ago. If I didn’t have the courage to help now, I didn’t deserve Jake at all—I didn’t deserve to have him home, ever.

  I finished the sandwiches and put them in the car before I could try once again to talk sense into myself. I considered bringing Bobo for moral support, but he was covered in wet dirt from nose to tail. “All right, buddy,” I said, before heading out the yard gate. “If I’m not back in twenty minutes, call out the National Guard.”

  Bobo barked and went back to digging in the dirt.

  On the way to the apartment complex, I engaged in an ongoing mental dialogue about the wisdom of what I was doing. No telling what sort of people lived in a place like that. Hadn’t the woman I’d driven home from Wal-Mart confessed that she was afraid to step out her front door? Hadn’t Holly and I decided that the strip mall across the street looked like a place where all sorts of unsavory activities might go on?

  It’s just a bag of sandwiches, Sandra. You’re not moving in. You’re just dropping off some sandwiches. It won’t take long.

  What could possibly go wrong?

  I thought of Poppy, of what had come of a simple trip to the store. A lot of things could go wrong. Life could change when you least expected it—the minute you let your guard down, made some seemingly harmless decision.

  Maybe you were meant to see the kids in the Dumpster. Maybe all of this is happening for a reason.

  It was an odd thought, a paradox in a voice that seemed to come from some boldly determined part of me I didn’t even recognize. The voice of my mother arose to beat it down. Who do you think you are, Mother Teresa? If there were a grand plan here, why would anyone choose you, of all people?

  I pushed her out of my head as I drove into the apartment complex. The area around the Dumpster was deserted, as was the parking lot. With the car idling, I tried to decide what to do next. There was no sign of the children, no way to know where they might be. I could leave the sandwiches by the Dumpster. They’ll find them, if they come looking.

  This whole thing was a stupid idea.

  Lately, it was hard to know which voice had the better grasp on reality. Prowling around some government housing complex was completely unlike me.

  I turned off the car, climbed out, grabbed the sandwiches, and hurried to the Dumpster. It wasn’t until I got there that I noticed a movement behind the corner of the building. By then, it was too late. I looked up, and three teenage boys were circling the Dumpster, trying to get between me and my car.

  My heart jumped into my throat, and I froze in place, suddenly aware of my own vulnerability. I recognized the boys from the day I’d met the real estate agent at Poppy’s house. They couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen, not yet fully grown, but together they had the menacing aura of a gang.

  I was out of view of the road, trapped between the Dumpster and the wall of the building.

  If I didn’t come home tonight, no one would know where to look.

  The largest of the three, a tall youth with a boyish face, drew his tongue slowly over his lips. “If it ain’t the pink house lady,” he said, his dark face nearly hidden under an off-kilter ball cap, his chin jutting out with the words. “That yo’ nice car out front? How ’bout you gimme the keys fo’ that nice car?”

  The smallest boy, a gangly kid with wide brown eyes and his hair hidden in a do-rag, darted a concerned glance at his friend. “B.C.,” he muttered out of the side of his mouth.

  “Shut up, Monk,” B.C. snapped, then uncrossed his arms and took a step toward me. “We just talkin’. Ain’t we, Pink Lady?”

  My mind raced through the possible options—tell them to get out of my way, be forceful, confident, authoritative? Yell for help and hope it would frighten them? Threaten to call the police? If there was a police report, Rob and Holly would find out everything. They’d think I was insane for coming here. They’d think I was having some sort of a breakdown. They’d lock me up and only let me out for PTA meetings and trips to Starbucks.

  The off-base thought made strange, sardonic laughter press my throat and spill from my lips.

  The largest boy, B.C., stiffened. “You laughin’, Pink Lady? You laughin’ at me?”

  “Leave her alone!” The teenaged girl I’d seen yesterday was standing just beyond the Dumpster. She looked incongruously adult again today, in tight red shorts and a halter top, her hair clipped in a messy twist. She carried a toddler on her hip, a little girl with caramel brown skin, dark fluffy pigtails like the top knot on a French poodle, and her thumb in her mouth.

  “Well, look who here.” The smallest boy, Monk, turned halfway. “Ain’t you too good to talk to a black boy?”

  She returned his look narrowly and hiked the toddler onto her hip again.

  B.C. laughed. “Wanna come here and play, pretty baby?”

  The girl answered with a sarcastic smile. “Yeah, right. And then my brother’d kick your butts when he found out. He knows y’all messed up his truck, by the way. If he didn’t just get out of prison, he’d of kicked your butts already. Don’t mess with our truck again.”

  “We didn’t mess with yo’ brother truck.” Monk’s voice carried a hint of fear. He glanced nervously at his partners.

  “I bet,” the girl challenged. “You better leave our stuff alone.”

  “Yo’ brother bes’ not mess with us,” B.C. postured. The volley of threats dribbled to a halt, and they all stood staring at each other, trying to decide what should come next.

  “That yo’ baby?” Monk asked finally.

  “Pppfff!” the girl spat. “Does it look like it’s my baby? It’s my cousin’s.” She cuddled her chin protectively over the toddler’s head.

  Monk studied her. “You cousin a stripper? Because I seen that baby down at Glitters las’ week.”

  The girl fluttered a nervous glance in my direction, then glared at Monk. “No.”
r />   Having found a tender spot, Monk grinned. “Maybe you a stripper. You gonna take it off fo’ us, pretty baby?”

  Throwing out my hands, I stepped between them like a referee at a boxing match, the sandwich bag swinging from my elbow. This had gone too far. After ten years of coaching soccer and being the dugout mom for baseball, I should have been able to handle kids with attitude better than this. “All right. That’s enough. You boys go find something else to do before you end up in trouble. Get out of here. Leave her alone.”

  Monk’s eyes narrowed. “What you hidin’ in the bag, Pink House Lady?”

  “Sandwiches. Would you like one?”

  Monk’s brows drew together, and B.C. gave the bag a critical frown. For an instant, they seemed tempted. They looked back and forth at the bag and each other.

  “No,” B.C. finally spoke for all of them, and they moved on. Monk glanced over his shoulder just before they disappeared around the corner.

  I stood there with the girl, temporarily at a loss. Up close, she looked as if she might be twelve or thirteen. She was tall and long-legged, but underneath the grown-up clothes and the makeup, her body was hard and straight, her face still rounded with a look of childhood. The boys’ assumption that the baby was hers, and their questions about her working at Glitters and the toddler hanging around at a strip joint, were nothing short of obscene.

  She gave me a worried look, as if she were sensing my thoughts. “I gotta go.”

  “Wait,” I said, before she could slip away. “I brought some sandwiches. I saw the kids digging in the Dumpster yesterday.”

  Her eyebrows rose and knotted in the center. She didn’t come closer, but didn’t step back, either. Both she and the toddler flashed quick, interested glances at the bag, then she shrugged. “They do that all the time. Their mama doesn’t care.” She studied me with obvious curiosity.

  “They shouldn’t be in there. It’s dangerous.”

  Shrugging, she let her passenger slide to the ground, then held the toddler’s hand.

  “Unna nan-ich!” the toddler whined, tugging the bond between them to get closer to the sack, while sucking furiously on her thumb. “Unn-ungwee!”

  “Ssshhh!” The girl’s gaze flicked over the bag, then back to me. “You from CPS or someplace?” Her chin tipped upward, her face narrowing cautiously. In the sunlight, her eyes were a deep blue. Conflicting currents swirled behind them. I had something she wanted, but she was afraid. Of what, I couldn’t imagine. “Social workers don’t get high-dollar wheels, usually.” Her gaze darted toward my car.

  I had a mental flash of how out of place I must look, standing there beside a Cadillac SUV in my paint-spattered sweat suit. “I’m not with CPS. I’ve been down the road working on my great-uncle’s house on Red Bird Lane. I gave one of the residents here a ride yesterday.”

  “I saw you,” she said flatly.

  “I didn’t realize what the kids were doing in the Dumpster. It just hit me today as I was driving past. Do you know where they are?”

  She shrugged in a way that said she didn’t care if the kids dropped off the face of the earth. “They hide places.”

  “Maybe I could leave the sandwiches with their mom.” I pictured myself walking up to some stranger’s door, handing her a bag and saying, Here, have some sandwiches. I saw your kids digging in the Dumpster yesterday … She most likely wouldn’t give me a hug and a thank-you.

  “Their mama’s probably asleep. She’s always asleep … unless she’s got a man over.”

  I looked down at the bag, getting a sudden sense of the complexities of the situation. I wished I’d stayed at Poppy’s and minded my own business. “Maybe I could just leave this on their doorstep. Which apartment do they live in?”

  “There’s lots of cats around here. They get into stuff. I could give it to ’em.”

  “Unna nan-ich,” the toddler repeated behind her fist. No matter where I left the bag, it would probably go to someone who needed it.

  “All right,” I said.

  “I’ll make sure everyone gets some and stuff.”

  “Good.” I handed over my cargo with the feeling I was being sold a bill of goods. “I’ll trust you with the job, then.” As she turned her attention from me to the bag, I recognized the You’re so lame look kids employ when they think they’ve hoodwinked an adult. “I didn’t catch your name.”

  She focused her attention on me again, and the toddler stretched upward, touching a jelly stain on the paper. “Cass.” Shifting the bag in her hands, she weighed its contents.

  “Nice to meet you. And what’s your little cousin’s name?”

  With a blank look, she followed my gaze to the toddler. “Oh … uhhh … it’s Opal. Say hey, Opal.”

  Opal stared up at me with a soulful expression.

  “Hello, Opal,” I said, and she scooted behind Cass’s leg.

  Cass shifted her hips to one side, squinting against the sun as it peeked through a hole in the clouds, then faded again. “Those kids’ll get back in the Dumpster again, anyway.” Her expression was flat, pessimistic, emotionless, a dull gray mask on a face that should have been young and hopeful. She was a beautiful girl, with long blond hair and stunning blue eyes. She should have been giggling over fashion magazines and trying new hairdos with her friends. “They do it every day.”

  I didn’t know how to answer that. The sad truth was that even if I wanted to fool myself into thinking a few sandwiches could make a difference, she knew I hadn’t accomplished anything by coming here. Tomorrow, the cycle would repeat again.

  Opal poked the jelly drip, then brought a sticky finger to her face and tasted it. How often does she go hungry?

  “I could bring some sandwiches again tomorrow.”

  “If you want,” Cass answered, tipping her head to one side, noticeably perplexed. Perhaps she was wondering if I would really show up again.

  Would I? I wasn’t sure myself.

  The question followed me like a shadow as I parted ways with Cass and Opal and left the apartments behind. Back in Poppy’s driveway, I stood leaning against the car, overwhelmed, the memory of the last half hour swirling through my mind. I recognized the look in Cass’s eyes. I knew what it was like to be a child keeping secrets, afraid to tell. How many times had I wanted to confide in someone—a teacher, a neighbor, a pastor—about what was happening in our house? My mother’s behavior ranged from vegetative to violent, depending on her mental state and what medications she was taking. If my stepfather was worried about it, it didn’t show. He worked in his office off the den, every available space crowded with architectural drawings. He came and went in his black Lincoln—a new model every two years, some of which I never saw the interiors of before they were traded for replacements. He ate oatmeal for breakfast every morning, rinsed the bowl and put it in the dishwasher. He drew sketches of odd, theoretical machines in the margins of the daily newspaper. Every so often, he blew up at my mother when he came home in the evenings and found her still in bed, never having gotten up, showered, or fixed her hair, and too mellow to care. For God’s sake, Nora, you have children to raise! he’d say, and then he’d storm away to his office, close the door, and lose himself in the hypothetical again.

  In Poppy’s little pink house, none of that existed. Together, Poppy and Aunt Ruth had locked the family curse outside their door. There, the newspaper was only a newspaper, not something to roll up and use as a weapon. The beds were made by nine, and the voices were soft and pleasant, like sunlight warming the rooms. There were cookies in the jar and popsicles made from Kool-Aid, and if Aunt Ruth thought my curly, strawberry blond hair was difficult and singularly unattractive, as my mother had deemed it, she never said so. She only brushed it around her finger and said, My, my, but your hair does curl up so nicely, SandraKaye. I’ve seen movie stars who didn’t have such beautiful hair… .

  If not for Poppy and Aunt Ruth, I would never have known there was a way to live other than the one I saw at home. As a child, whatever
you experience seems like what should be… .

  Voices pushed away my thoughts, and I looked up and down the street. On the sidewalk, a group of people was strolling along—a young blonde in medical scrubs, most likely a home health nurse like the ones who had cared for Poppy; an elderly woman in a wheelchair; and a bulky middle-aged man, who lumbered along in an uneven gait I recognized. He’d walked by repeatedly during the estate sale, and lately I’d seen him tending the flowers outside the little white church.

  During the estate sale, he’d stopped a couple times to sift old plastic flowerpots and discarded plastic glasses out of the rubbish pile. He seemed harmless enough, so Holly and I had let him take what he wanted. Poor thing, Holly had whispered behind her hand. He’s probably homeless.

  It wasn’t until later that we learned he lived in a house with his parents. His sister stopped by looking for him, frantic as she told us he was mentally handicapped and wasn’t supposed to be out wandering alone. Now, he waved as if he remembered me from the estate sale. “Hi-eee, lady!” he called, releasing the wheelchair handle, his arm moving in a wild sweeping motion that caused him to let the wheels drift toward the edge of the sidewalk.

  The woman in the chair clutched her armrest. “Ted-eee!” she complained, her words slow and slightly slurred. “Watch out!” She swung a hand toward the road, and he looked down.

  The nurse leaned over and straightened the chair, moving it away from the curb. “Be careful, Teddy, okay? You need to push your mom’s chair with both hands.”

  “Huh-oh!” Teddy grabbed the handle securely. “I watchin’, Mary. Doin’ it good, right, Mama?”

  “Yes, Ted-eee,” the old woman said, reaching back, and brushing her fingers across his wrist.

  Teddy turned his attention to me as they reached Poppy’s driveway and stopped. “Hey-eee, lady. I gone get pots, soo-kay?” He pointed toward the junk pile.