Read Online The Heart Does Not Bend by Makeda Silvera - Free Book Online Page A

life.
    “How come yuh not outside playing wid yuh friends?” she asked one evening.
    “Nutten, ah just have lots of homework, and ah borrow gardening books from the library to read.”
    “Dat good, girl, maybe yuh can tek over Myers’ job,” she teased.
    Dennis came sometimes to help with the weeding, and I kept up with the watering, but the magic was gone and even the flowers looked faded.
    Punsie and I resumed our friendship. It was hard to stay angry for long on our street. Everything took place outdoors and you had to pass people’s houses to get to the main street. It wasn’t the first time Punsie and I had fought; it was just the first time we’d hit each other.
    One day I came home from school to hear shouting coming through the windows of our house. I lingered outside in the front yard and listened.
    “Ah telling yuh fi yuh own good, it nuh right to be so brawling. If yuh a go do it, do it under cover. A danger yuh putting yuhself in.”
    “But Mama, what mi doing? Him ask mi to come to de country wid him for de weekend, what wrong wid dat?”
    “Yuh nuh see nutten wrong wid dat? Suppose man come in wid gun and machete fi kill unnu ass?”
    “Mama, it safe. Frank go dere all de time,” Uncle Mikey pleaded.
    “All de time? Ah sure yuh just another in a long line a man. Yuh be careful, dats all I haffi seh, because dem money man will run lef yuh at the smell of trouble. Remember yuh is a poor uneducated bwoy.”
    I made a lot of noise slamming the gate and went inside.Mikey had a small suitcase beside him and he was sitting, looking up at Mama like a little boy as she stood by the stove cooking.
    “Hi, Molly,” he greeted me, “how was school?”
    “Fine, Uncle,” I said, and went straight to my room.
    A car horn blew shortly after, and through the window I could see Uncle Mikey climbing into Frank’s car. When we sat down to have dinner, Mama’s face was a dark cloud. “A trouble him a head for, yuh know. Mi see it, as sure as God mek apple.” She spoke with finality.
    I didn’t respond. Nobody had explained anything to me.
    That evening Petal came to the fence. “What going on wid yuh granny and uncle?”
    “Nutten,” I said. “Nutten, yuh too fast.”
    “Mi know is what. Mi mother and father say him like man. Dem say Mrs. Galloway son is a battyman.”
    “Yuh lie!” I shouted at her.
    “Yuh uncle is a battyman, yuh uncle is a battyman,” she sang.
    I started yelling names back at her: “Dundus gal! Dundus gal! Yuh ugly like mi don’t know what. Yuh face favour when bammy eclipse. No wonder yuh nuh have no friends. Yuh would frighten God himself.” I went up on the balcony shivering with anger. That was the last day I ever talked to Petal. She’d come to the fence and call out to me, and she even slipped a note through the fence saying she was sorry, but I never forgave her.
    Before I turned fourteen my periods started. Mama lectured me about not getting close to any boy, not a touch, not a kiss. By then, I was spending more time with Punsie, and I was interested in a boy who lived down the street. Punsie was the firstone I told. Although we were just a year apart, she had all the answers, and she enjoyed teaching me.
    “Punsie, mi granny say if a boy kiss mi or touch mi, ah can get pregnant. Is true?”
    She laughed loudly, then said, “Yuh too fool. Come mek mi talk to yuh some more ’bout de birds and de bees.”
    We hurried around to the fowl coop where we would have privacy and sat on an old bench.
    “First of all,” she whispered, “a boy have to put him thing inside of yuh fi get yuh pregnant. But yuh can’t get pregnant wid a kiss, or even if de boy feel yuh up.”
    “How you know that?” I asked.
    “Mi know, mi try it already, and remember, mi have a big sister and brother. Anyway, Junior like yuh. Him say mi must tell yuh.”
    “Don’t fool wid mi!” I exclaimed proudly. “Yuh sure?”
    He was one of the most handsome boys around, and I hadn’t expected him