Excerpt of The Twelve Tribes of Hattie by Ayana Mathis
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"I'm so ashamed," Hattie said. "I'm so ashamed."
"Hattie, listen to me. Our little baby isn't anything to be ashamed of."
She shook her head. Later that evening, and for years to come, he would wonder if he had misunderstood her, if her shame wasn't at having a child with him but something larger that he didn't understand, and if it wasn't his failure to grasp this that had doomed them. But in that moment, he thought she only needed convincing, so he talked about renting her a house in Baltimore, where he'd grown up, and how they'd bring her children from Philadelphia and what it would all be like.
Hattie's eyes were red-rimmed, and she kept glancing over Lawrence's shoulder. He had never seen her so skittish, so in need of him. For the first time, Lawrence felt Hattie was his. This was not proprietary but something all together more profound— he was accountable to her, wonderfully and honorably obliged to take care of her. Lawrence was forty years old. He realized that whatever he'd experienced with other women— lust? infatuation?— had not been love.
Hattie was incredulous. She refused him.
"This is our chance," Lawrence said. "I'm telling you, we won't ever get over it, we won't ever forgive ourselves if we don't do this. Baby."
"But do you still . . . ?" she asked.
Lawrence had discussed his gambling in passing. He had told Hattie he made his living for the most part as a porter on the trains, which had been true for a few months many years ago. Hattie's uncertainty made Lawrence understand that she did not take his gambling as lightly as he had supposed.
"I'll stop," he said. "I already have, really. It's just a game or two when it's slow with the trains."
Hattie wept in heavy wracking sobs that shook her shoulders and upset Ruthie.
"I'll stop," he said again.
Lawrence slid next to Hattie on the banquette. He leaned down and kissed his daughter's forehead. He kissed Hattie's temple and her tears and the corner of her mouth. When she calmed, Hattie rested her head on his shoulder.
"I couldn't stand to be a fool a second time," Hattie said. "I couldn't stand it."
Hattie had hardly spoken during the four- hour drive to Baltimore. Lawrence's was the only car on the highway— his high beams tunneled along the black road. Such a dark and quiet night, the moon was slim as a fingernail clipping and offered no light. Lawrence accelerated to fifty miles per hour, just to hear the engine rev and feel the car shoot forward. Hattie tensed in the passenger seat.
"We're not too far now." He reached over and squeezed Ruthie's fat little leg. "I love you," Lawrence said. "I love you both."
"She's a good baby," Hattie replied.
August had named the baby Margaret, but Hattie and Lawrence had decided before her birth that they'd call her Ruth after Lawrence's mother. When Ruth was nine days old, Hattie brought her to meet Lawrence in a park in his neighborhood.
"This is your father," Hattie said, handing her to Lawrence. The baby fussed—Lawrence was a stranger to her—but he held her until she quieted. "Hush, hush, little Ruthie girl, hush, hush," he said. Tears rose in his throat when the visit ended and Hattie took the baby back to Wayne Street. In the hours and days until he next saw her, Lawrence thought of Ruthie every instant: now she is hungry, now she is asleep. Now she is cooing in the arms of the man who is not her father. It was possible, of course, that Hattie was mistaken and Ruthie was August's baby, but Lawrence knew, he knew in a way that was not logical and could not be explained, that she was his child.
Excerpted from The Twelve Tribes of Hattie (Oprah's Book Club 2.0) by Ayana Mathis. Copyright © 2012 by Ayana Mathis. Excerpted by permission of Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
