The Book of Adam and Jo: an Interracial Literary Romance Read online

  Gettin’ Up. Perfect.

  “Definitely a Q-Tip kind of day,” she thought aloud, adjusting her rearview as the song’s jazzy beginning bars began. The mid-range sound system artfully filtered the bass line through durable speakers as they thrummed to capacity down the street. Jo had long ago lost all relative understanding of the concept of “loud.”

  After an hour, Jo pulled up to her mother’s stately white house with the green roof, the front yard a walking advertisement of colorful wildflowers.

  Jo’s mother Belinda owned Urquhart’s Floral Designs, the only flower shop in the county. Most people just called it “the flower shop” on account of the clunky family surname and its prominent location off the highway announcing the unspoken ceremonial split between the white and black sides of town in Bethesda.

  Everyone knew where Jo’s mother Belinda lived and everyone knew Jo’s mother Belinda, since everyone knew everyone, and Belinda’s mother had been one of Bert Bertie’s six daughters that’d grown up in Leland. Every one of them had been a legendary beauty. Belinda’s mother was the middle child and the first to leave Bethesda when another boy from Leland, grandaddy Richard, convinced her to elope with him and move to Ohio, a decade after the great migration up north. Belinda’s mother spent twenty miserable years there before she and Belinda moved back to Bethesda.

  Belinda herself followed the same path almost verbatim, except she’d gone to college in Ohio where much of her childhood memories had grown exaggerated in her absence. She would’ve moved back home then if she hadn’t met Jo’s father Spence Abrams, an industrious tradesman constantly looking for the next place that needed skilled labor so bad that they didn’t care if he was blue, so long as he could do the job. He could’ve moved up the ranks a hundred times but he liked the freedom of just worrying about himself and his hours. If a white man got too familiar and started talking sideways, he was liable to quit or get fired at any moment.

  It wasn’t until Belinda’s mother died that Belinda regretfully made the trip back— she wanted to run the flower shop in her mother’s honor, the way her grandfather had wanted her to. Spence hemmed and hawed about the idea of moving, since he too was from the coast, and the whole point of moving was to get away from North Carolina. But he reminded himself that he could do his job anywhere, and was pleased to find that there was plenty work to be had, not to mention Leland’s location gave him easy access to two other states.

  Jo did not possess the adventurous spirit of the two women that came before her. Wherever she lived was just fine with her. And when Bethesda got too confining, she plopped down an hour away and stopped in Canton. Going to university in Charlotte was about as adventurous as Jo would probably ever get. Judah’s birth all but guaranteed that.

  Jo caught Judah’s eye once she parked the car in front of the house. It was a warm day in April and he was in the yard playing while her mother Belinda pruned.

  “Hey, mom!”

  “Hey buddy, you ready?”

  “Yeah.”

  Judah spent every other weekend with his grandmother while Jo played weekend gigs as a DJ at the local university. Canton was a college town, a family-friendly, convenient go-between of a city. She usually found plenty of work without venturing more than a half-hour in any direction. Drywall made her a living, but DJ’ing was her passion.

  “C’mon get your stuff. We got an hour drive and it’ll be bedtime before you know it,” Jo reminded him as she shooed him inside past the screened-in porch.

  “Jo, can I talk to you a minute?” Belinda shouted from her front yard. Jo stifled an eye roll. She knew if her mother was trying to pull her aside like a colleague, it meant she had something to say that was “sensitive” in nature. Which was usually something Jo didn’t want to talk about, or something that was none of her business.

  “Are you datin’ someone?” her mother whispered from her knelt position in the yard like there were a thousand people inside the house with glasses up to the wall to hear.

  “No.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Uh, quite.”

  “Judah keeps bringin’ up some guy named Adam?”

  “Oh Lord,” Jo let out an amused breath and bumped her head against the screen net of the front porch.

  “What’s all that?”

  “This random guy we met at the hardware store on the way up. He was a full-blown redneck. Swastika tattoo, confederate flag truck, the whole thing.”

  “Lord a’ mercy.”

  “And get this: he knows Kenny. He’s the contractor on the house I just worked on.”

  “He live on the north side?”

  “I didn’t ask, but probably.”

  “Well, that shouldn’t be all that surprising.”

  “No, I guess it isn’t.”

  The north side of Bethesda was mostly white and had confederate flags on every corner. Most black people in Leland didn’t like to venture too far out there and for good reason. But Jo never encountered problems there. For the north side, the Civil War was still fresh and a raw subject, but they weren’t jarred by the sight of a black face. It was the white version of the projects. Don’t go by yourself, no driving around after dark, follow the rules and you’ll be fine. And as far as Jo could tell, the rules were “be polite, and don’t move in.”

  “He didn’t say anything to Judah, did he?”

  “Actually, he was oddly charming. Said he admired my work. Judah kept calling him Thor and he just smiled. And that was it.”

  “Well, he made a big impact on Judah.”

  “Sad,” Jo lamented. “You should’ve seen him. He didn’t even know what the flag was about. He was like, ‘Are you friends with Captain America?’”

  “Oh, Lord. That’s funny.”

  “I was like, ‘yeah baby, that’s exactly what that is.’”

  “He needs to be around some men, Jo,” her mom offered. Jo stiffened.

  “He’s alright.”

  “His dad doesn’t see him but one or two times a month. Take him to church, maybe?”

  “You’re already taking him to church.”

  “I’m talkin’ about you, Jo. There’s a few that haven’t been snatched up yet.”

  In her mind, Jo laughed hysterically and then vomited.

  “I’m not even remotely interested in men right now. Plus, I don’t see how shacking up with some random man is going to help Judah become more well-adjusted somehow.

  “I’m not talkin’ about shackin’ up, I’m talkin’ about settlin’ down.”

  “Well, I’m sure as hell not interested in settling down right now, whatever the hell that is. Work is steady and I’m plenty settled.”

  She didn’t quite have the industrious spirit of her father but watching him, she learned what not to do and what she didn’t want. And she had fond memories of driving for miles and miles with her dad and picking what songs to play in the car, and on the boombox at the worksite. She learned to work alone and learned to be selective. And when Kenny offered to be her liaison for a fee, she didn’t assume the worst like she knew her father would. Her father had been greedy for money, which made Jo into someone greedy for time.

  “You gonna hang drywall until your arms fall off? Until your upper body’s in shambles like your father?”

  Jo didn’t address her mother’s denial. He’d left her four years ago and there was still a lot for her to cope with. Namely that her unwritten rules for life hadn’t worked for her, and certainly wouldn’t work for Jo.

  “I’m not saying I’ll never get back out there, I’m just saying I’m good for now. In fact, I’ve never been gooder.”

  “Well, I’m not gonna be here forever. You can’t just keep burnin’ the candle at both ends.”

  “You don’t need to be here forever, mom. Just until Judah learns to microwave hot dogs by himself.”

  Belinda tilted her head with an exaggerated frown.

  “So how’d the DJ’ing gig go?”

  “Fine. Same as usual.�
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  “Anything special happen?”

  Jo’s mother didn’t know the process of a DJ becoming successful, but she figured it had something to do with the right people showing up at the right time, and “something special” happening. So she asked about it every week.

  “Nope. Nothing. Which is why I said ‘same as usual.’”

  “Alright,” Belinda said with a passive tone.

  “I’m not trying to be snippy, mama, I just… I know you don’t get why I do it, but as long as I can, I’m going to.”

  “Judah’s getting older, Jo. He’s gonna need more of your time.”

  “It’s the opposite, mom. He’s getting more and more independent.”

  By that time, Judah came rushing out the front door with his backpack in one hand and shoes in the other. He threw his shoes down in front of him, sat down on the front porch astroturf and attacked the first foot.

  “Other foot,” Jo reminded him. He switched feet, but then he also picked up the other shoe.

  “No, no,” Jo said and bent down to help. Judah smacked her hand away and she straightened up.

  “Use the same shoe you had before, Judah.”

  She managed her motherly duties in earnest but entirely on autopilot, a million miles away. No one suspected that inside, Jo had been wrestling her thoughts. Trying to concentrate, constantly having to wrench herself back to the present moment.

  Because ever since Friday afternoon, she couldn’t quite get over meeting blond, Nazi, Norse-God Jesus at the hardware store.

  He looked more like a Gabriel. Or rather the Gabriel, as in the archangel. Piercing blue eyes, tall, stout, protector of all mankind and with a fucking message for her.

  Sure he was wearing a swastika, but angels have to blend in, you know? Though he was doing a piss poor job of that too.

  Whatever. She was glad that they had mutual acquaintances, so her sick brain would not further fantasize him. He hadn’t disrespected her or Judah in any kind of cartoonish way, but she could only imagine the depths of bizarre conscience contradictions lay beneath the ruggedly handsome exterior.

  She tried not to dwell on the request for her number. Twice. Each request sending the blood racing around the tracks of her veins. He’d stopped at two and she was glad of that. Her life was already enough of an embarrassment at this point, and letting a white supremacist holler at her would be one of the dumbest cautionary tales ever.

  * * *

  “So… who’s this Adam guy you’re seeing now?”

  “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

  A week later, Chris Montgomery was on her porch, Judah’s father. He handed her Judah’s overnight bag as Judah came running inside the house.

  “I’m not seeing him, he’s technically a client.”

  “Judah said the two of you hung out the other day.”

  “He really used the term ‘hung out?’”

  “Well, no. But he said you let this guy drive him around in his car? Something about Captain America?”

  “Sounds like Judah’s telling you some more tall tales. We ran into him at the hardware store, exchanged pleasantries, and it turns out Kenny subbed me out to one of his houses. He’s a foreman.”

  “What’s the Captain America connection?”

  “Well, Judah saw him in the store and was like, ‘look mom, it’s Thor!’ I apologized to him. He was a good sport about it.”

  “What are you leaving out Jo?”

  “I’m not ‘leaving anything out,’ I’m just… staying away from certain details because I don’t wanna hear you freak out.”

  Chris just furrowed his brow.

  “So… the guy lives in Bethesda and… just so happens to be… of the region…”

  “He’s a skinhead?”

  “Well, no. He had his hair. But… there was a swastika on the arm,” Jo lowered her voice, “and he has a giant confederate flag on the front hood of his truck. Hence, the Captain America reference.”

  “He didn’t say anything to you guys, did he?”

  “No. Like I said, he was nice about it.”

  “Well… seems like he made quite an impression on Judah. You might wanna… steer him in a more healthy direction.”

  “Isn’t that what you’re here for?”

  “There’s only so much I can do two weekends a month. You have him the majority of the time,” he pointed out, as though he were complaining about a fact he was powerless to change.

  Jo sighed, weary of the responsibilities she felt like he was saddling her with. But she didn’t want to fight. Besides, he was kinda right.

  “It really wasn’t all that. Judah just has an active imagination. And we just so happened to run into each other. I doubt it will happen again.”

  “Still. Just keep an eye on it.”

  “Yeah,” Jo bristled.

  He cared sooo much, that he was willing to make sure that someone else took care of it. It took so much strength for her not to just shove the door directly closed over his face.

  “Just a heads up, I’m going to Maryland for a conference in two weeks.”

  Chris was getting his Master’s in political science while working at a non-profit think tank as a research assistant. Basically, if there was an opportunity for him to go to D.C., he was taking it.

  “So… what does that mean?”

  “It means I won’t be able to pick up Judah next weekend.”

  “What about your mom?”

  “She doesn’t like the drive, you know that,” Chris scoffed.

  “…So what, I’m supposed to just cancel my gigs?”

  “Can your mom take him twice in a row? We can switch the rotation.”

  “No, we can’t. My mom’s already planned to take him to that indoor water park.”

  “In April??” he furrowed his brow.

  “May. And it’s indoors, it doesn’t matter.”

  Chris sighed his annoying sigh. One that indicated he didn’t have a plan and never intended on making one. He was doing it, and it was her problem.

  “Well, I can’t skip this meeting. I’m the research assistant.”

  “I’ll figure it out. What about child support?” Jo changed the subject.

  “What’s the matter, I thought this was the busiest time of the year?”

  Motherfucker.

  “It is. I’m doing fine now, but I let March go by without saying a word. I hate that you keep making me bring it up.”

  “Jo, I can’t just fork over a third of my meager paid internship out of some outdated patriarchal obligation. You’re the breadwinner right now, you’re making triple what I’m making.”

  “We agreed it would be for contingencies, not part of the income. As it stands, I might have to pay for a babysitter for two days because you flaked out on me,” she argued.

  “I didn’t flake out on you.”

  “How long have you known about the trip?” she challenged.

  “Awhile. But I was asked last minute to present,” was his excuse.

  If she didn’t hate the inflexible court system worse than this, Jo would drag this giant baby man through it. All it would do is create more whining and complaining that she didn’t have time for.

  “Fine. But you owe me. Next weekend you get, I need three days.”

  “I’ll see what I can do,” he said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. Jo didn’t budge.

  “Oookey doke,” Chris cheerily replied, “bye Judah.”

  “Bye, dad!”

  Jo closed the front door behind her and headed into her son’s room where he was already out of his shoes and working on his pants.

  “Shoes go in your closet. Pants in your hamper.”

  Jo stood in the doorway while Judah wordlessly complied.

  “Judah, you know that man we met the other day with the cool truck?”

  “Who, Adam?!” he said, as though she were the one randomly bringing up strangers in conversation regularly.

  “Yeah, him. He was very nice, but you know he wa
s a stranger. That we’re probably never going to see again. Right?”

  “Well, but you work with him.”

  “I work for him. But I never saw him before that day. I work for a lot of people, that’s my job.”

  “But he said he was gonna call your phone number.”

  “No, he wanted mommy’s number, but I never gave it to him.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because if he wants to call me to work, he can call Kenny, and Kenny will call me.”

  “What if he wants to call you to play?”

  “Mommy doesn’t want to play. With him.”

  Lies.

  “Why not?”

  “Because mommy doesn’t need friends to play with.”

  “But how do you know that?”

  Jo was just trying to set an expectation with Judah before this Adam thing got too out of hand. Now she was realizing she was much too late.

  “Okay. Well how about this? If we run into him again, and he’s still a nice guy, and he says it’s okay, I’ll let you sit in the truck next time, how about that?”

  “Okay, mom.”

  “If we ever run into him again.”

  “If we run into him,” Judah mimicked his mother.

  As though Judah had the Lord on speed dial, Jo’s phone began ringing from the other room.

  “Hey Jo. Sorry to bother you on a Sunday, but Adam’s been blowing me up for a week about the Cormier house. Think you can stop by there tomorrow?”

  3

  Chapter 3

  Jo sat a moment and took a deep breath before she got out of her car the next day, having pulled up to the Cormier house. She had an odd tremor in her hands that was more than just the coffee she didn’t finish this morning. She was used to working alone and in the wee hours of morning or evening. She was breaking a cardinal rule, and not for a very good reason. Kenny told her what the job was. She knew what an attic looked like. Was she really willing to brave whatever bizarre situation this was about to turn into? Just to run into him again?

  Adam appeared at the entrance sporting long johns under his unbuttoned checkered shirt, work boots, and a man bun as he leaned against the front porch that wasn’t there when she last saw the place. He crossed his big arms and aimed his electric blue eyes in the direction of her car and smiled.