Drumsticks Read Free Page B

doll I owned as an adult. I used to keep some little West African cuties on a shelf in the kitchen, but I ditched them when I last repainted the apartment—ended up giving them to a neighbor’s little girl.
    I used to tell all my secrets to my dolly when I was a kid. In fact, if memory serves, my father caught me whispering tearfully to her once. Naturally he insisted on knowing what I was telling her. I’m sure I lied to him. Daddy wasn’t big on superstitions or black people who fell under their sway. Lucky charms, Friday the 13th, dream books, avoiding ladders and cracks in the sidewalk. All nonsense, he said. Work hard, eat right, do the honorable thing, and you won’t need luck.
    But I did. I needed a lucky break.
    Four days a week, the north quadrant of Union Square Park was converted into a farmers market—a heady mix of ravishing wildflowers, spices, craft works, and seasonal produce. Twenty varieties of apples and squash and arcane hybrids of potatoes; pumpkins as big as a Volkswagen, homemade pies, sheepskin blankets, and brick oven focaccia; hand-churned butter and organic honey—an endless list of goods that city folks craved and were prepared to pay dearly for. By night, the same patch of the park became a gathering place for teenagers polishing their rollerblading skills.
    So, the question was, Did I really need that bunch of authentic, gritty broccoli rabe, or was I inventing an errand just so I could get a look at the doll’s creator, the real-life Mama Lou?
    With the bustling market on my left, I walked and scanned the skinny strip of Broadway—or Union Square West, as the new street sign was calling it—running along the park. There was a vitamin store at the corner of 17th, and next to it, a McDonald’s. I’d always found that kind of amusing.
    A few doors below, there was a pissy-looking wine shop, and then the terraced seafood restaurant where middle-aged lovers liked to gather on summer nights.
    I continued south. Past the hugely successful all-night coffee shop where the younger crowd flocked, naively hoping to spot a few supermodels consuming their midday yogurt and heroin.
    Finally, 15th Street. That was where the dolls were sold, Justin had said. I’ll be damned, there they were! A bevy of dark dolls dressed in riotous colors. The folding table, set up in front of the office building with a bank on the ground floor, was thick with them. And the real Mama Lou was at her place, on a metal chair. No customers around, she was playing solitaire at one edge of the table.
    I didn’t go up to her right away. Instead I looked at the goods on the unattended folding table next to hers, which contained a sea of unctuous body musk in dark little glass vials. Some people find those scents sexy, I think. I don’t get that.
    â€œHe’ll be back in a minute, honey,” the doll lady said, placing a ten of hearts on the jack of spades. “I’m watching his stuff for him.”
    â€œOh, that’s okay,” I said. “I’m just looking.”
    A black man with matted hair, who had been dozing near the entrance to the ATM, roused himself and approached me, paper cup extended.
    I gave him a buck, but when he wanted to engage me in one of those panhandler flirtations, I shook him off and sauntered over to the doll lady’s table.
    â€œWhat’s the matter?” she said with a teasing laugh. “Don’t you need a new boyfriend?”
    â€œFunny you should ask,” I said. “As a matter of fact, I do. Since I can’t get the old one back.”
    â€œOh, you’ll get him, honey. Just let me know if his granddaddy is single.”
    We had a good laugh together.
    â€œWhat’s your name, baby?” she said.
    â€œNan.”
    â€œI’m Ida Williams.”
    She swept all the cards together then, ending the game. I looked at her ebony hands, nimble even though they were old, with knuckles like little