Any Love Will Do

By Patricia Woods

Though Tracey was born to win, she was raised to fail by her own mother. Her mother was a woman who showed no remorse for hurting her, and any displayed emotions from her mother only served as a benefit to her. The physical and mental abuse that Tracey endured caused her to develop severe depression, insecurity, and fear. Her quest for love made her vulnerable to whoever she perceived loved her, and her fear and insecurity made her a target for bullies.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Jun 29, 2021
• ISBN: 9781662435720

Book preview

Chapter 1

As I sit here, not wanting to live anymore, strongly considering suicide, I reflect back on all the pain and the things that got me to this dark, depressed place.

*****

According to Momma, her mom, Julia, moved from Palestine, Texas, to Dallas, where Momma and her brother went to public school from kindergarten to third g rade. Then Momma was put in Saint Peters Academy boarding school, and she went there until she graduated from high school. The schools were segregated then, so only black boys and girls attended. Mom and her brother, Uncle Bert, had different fathers, and Grandma sent him to stay with his father where he attended a public school. When school holidays came around and the other kids went home for vacation, Mom usually didn’t. Her mom would make her stay at school. Most of the time that she saw her mother was when she came once a month to pay the school tuition. The school was primarily her home and the nuns and the priest her family. The church instilled in her the morals and values of the Ten Commandments, along with the other stuff that was written in the catechism, but Momma developed her own set of values and morals.

Momma was a cute skinny little caramel-colored girl of five feet, four inches tall. She had a nice smile, thin lips, with perfect teeth. Her hair was black and short, but not very stylish because she had no one to teach her how to fix it. The teachers were white and didn’t know much about combing colored girls’ hair, but Momma did her best to style it and keep it neat and clean. In her junior year, she started dating one of the boys there. His name was Aaron. Aaron was a tall young man of about six feet three. He was proportioned to his height, with a dark complexion, perfect white teeth, and full lips. He was a handsome man with a beautiful singing voice, which he used to woo her into loving him. They courted for a year, and he took her to her senior prom. He was the first man to give her the attention she had so longed to have. She finally had someone other than the nuns and priest to pay attention to her. He was her first love.

When they both graduated from school, Aaron went off to the Air Force, but before he left, she gave him the most sacred thing a woman can give, the thing that the Ten Commandments talks about a woman should only do when married—she gave him her virginity. Her farewell gift to him would last him a lifetime because she became pregnant.

Although Momma was eighteen and had graduated from high school, she was ashamed that she had gotten pregnant before being married. She wrote Aaron and told him about what she felt was the absolute worst thing that could happen to her. She hoped he would not be angry that she was pregnant, and to her surprise, when she received a letter back from him, he was happy to hear the news. He promised to marry her when he came back, and with that news, she felt she could withstand any ridicule or ass beating her mother was going to give her once she found out that she was pregnant. But she was certainly not going to tell her; she’d have to find out on her own.

Julia was a thirty-six-year-old woman that you didn’t want to reckon with! She was a big-boned high yellow woman, about five feet, ten inches tall, with a mean streak like a junkyard dog.

Her life growing up in the 1930s was a prejudice and oppressive era of the South, and it had taken a toll on her patience. She was emotionally and compassionately bankrupt. She was cunning and crafty—a survivor who didn’t take no shit from anybody. She did what she had to do to make it in her world even if it meant sleeping with the white man to pay her bills. Her cotton-pickin’ days were over. The white men loved her, I guess, because she had white features. She had light skin, a narrow nose, thin lips, and piercing brown eyes. Her posture was straight, curvaceous, and poignant. She always wore red fingernail polish and red lipstick, but her skin required no makeup.

She was elegant. She subdued men with her Mae West-like prowess, and she feared no one. She carried herself with confidence and pride. She wore furs, fine jewelry, and drove a 1941 Chevrolet Belair. Although it was a ten-year-old car, black folks thought she was riding rich. Most of them didn’t live on the level that she did, and very few black women or men for that fact drove a car that fine. In that era, it took courage to do the things that my grandmother did to live, but she did whatever she had to do to survive.

Chapter 2

Momma had begun to show.

Erma, are you pregnant? her mother asked.

Huh? Momma was lost for words and scared. Huh?

Don’t huh me, girl! I said, have you fooled around and got yourself knocked up?

In a small frail voice, she answered, Yes, ma’am.

Julia walked toward her, and Momma closed her eyes; she waited for the slap on her face to come, but it never came. She opened her eyes, and her mother was standing there just looking at her.

Well, whose is it? I bet it’s that Aaron boy you been all crazy over?

Yes, ma’am.

Well, we just gon’ have to take care of it. Momma couldn’t believe what she was hearing or, even more, what she wasn’t hearing. No ridicule and no knock up side her head. You gon’ have to find a job, you know? her mother said.

Okay, I will, Mother.

Ooooh, Lord, I hope this baby don’t come out black with big lips like its daddy.

Momma didn’t say a word; she knew not to, but she thought, My baby is going to be beautiful, you watch.

One month before the baby was born, Momma got a letter from Aaron. He had met another woman while in the Air Force. It had been such a short period of time for him to move on to someone else. Did he ever really love me? she thought. The pain was unbearable, the deceit unacceptable, and someone had to pay.

Chapter 3

According to Momma, on December 30th, nine months later, with her mother by her side, Momma delivered a healthy baby girl. Me! I was born in Baylor hospital in Dallas, Texas. I was light brown with hazel eyes, thin lips, and no hair.

Oh, thank you, Jesus, my grandbaby ain’t black! And she’s so pretty! She got all her fingers and toes! And thank you, Lord, she don’t look like her daddy.

Yes, Mother, she is beautiful, but she does kinda look like her daddy.

Naw, child, no, she don’t. She looks like me. I’m going to the department store tomorrow and buy her the prettiest dresses I can find and some shoes.

Mother, she’s too little for shoes right now.

Don’t you tell me what she’s too little for! I’ll buy her some shoes if I want to. Anyway, she’ll grow to ’em. Besides, since her daddy found him a new woman, he probably won’t be coming around to buy her nothing anyway.

Okay, Mother.

She had told her mother about the letter she had gotten from Aaron the same day she received it. And as she poured out her heart with tears and pain, her mother slapped her and told her she better not be crying over no damn man. She told her that she could take care of her baby by herself and that she was going to help take care of her too.

That next day, Julia went out and bought four new dresses for me, some sleepwear, some bottles, and some diapers. Momma had never seen her mother show this kind of excitement and passion or anything resembling love. All she could remember is her mother being disconnected from her and favoring her brother. She told me that her brother would pee in the bed that they shared, but he wouldn’t take the blame for it when their mother would ask who did it. So my grandmother would make both of them suck the pee from the wet pissy sheets until she was satisfied. That was her punishment for them. She remembered how her mom would cook a big meal and make her and her brother wait until the people from the church that she had invited eat first. So she was perplexed to see this loving behavior coming from her mother toward me. As much as Momma tried, she could not stop her feelings of jealousy. She wished her mother had showed her this kind of love and attention.

Momma breastfed me for the first two weeks after she brought me home from the hospital. But this was about to change. I want you to stop feeding the baby from your breast ’cause your milk ain’t no good, her mother said with an authoritative tone. I bought her these here bottles, and I’m gonna show you how to make her a formula with pet milk and Karo syrup, and that’s what I want you to give her from now on. Momma was silent for a minute. You hear me, girl?

Yes, ma’am.

And I’m gonna take her off that bottle and that pacifier when she turns one.

Why would you do that, Mother?

’Cause I don’t want her lips to get all stretched out and big from sucking on those nipples.

Mother—

Don’t you tell me no different. You living in my house, and you’ll do what I say!

Yes, ma’am.

Aunt Bessie was my mom’s close friend and had been around before I was born. According to her, when I cried, Momma would put me into a dresser drawer for a little while and close it to muffle the sound. Aunt Bessie said she was at the house one day, and she witnessed how I was treated. I found this out later.

Why do you put that baby in that drawer like that, Erma? my Aunt Bessie asked my mom.

That’s where she sleeps. Mother told me she couldn’t sleep with me no more, and she told me to put blankets in the drawer and make that her bed. I only close the drawer sometimes when she won’t stop crying.

You don’t want that baby, Erma, so why don’t you just give her to me?

I ain’t giving you my baby!

But you barely hold her or give her much attention.

How do you know? You ain’t here all the time.

Well, every time I am here, I notice it. Seems like to me that you’re taking your anger out on this baby because you’re mad at her daddy. You act like it’s the child’s fault that her dad is involved with another woman.

I don’t want to talk about it, Bessie! Momma would say.

All right, but you know her daddy will be home in a couple of weeks. If you continue to treat her like that and he picks up on it, he may try to take her from you.

And what does that matter? He ain’t gonna get her, Momma said.

Never mind, Erma. I’m not going to argue with you about this.

When Aaron returned from the Air Force, he had a new addition to his life—me. I was his first child. It was a happy time for him, but that would only last for a little while because he had to tell Momma some more bad news. The woman in his life was now his wife. Life, as he knew it, would never be the same—and neither would mine.

Chapter 4

They named me Tracey, but they called me Trace. I was now four years old. Momma had long moved out of her mother’s house. She had got low-income housing in the projects, two buildings down from where her mother lived. My daddy had come to see me on several occasions in the past four years, but each time he came, they would argue and she would send him away. I never got to spend much time with him. We didn’t get a chance to really have fun together, but the bond between us was there. Easter was coming in two days, and I wanted my hair curled like Shirley Temple on TV, but Momma said no! When my daddy came over that day, I told him about my wish to have Shirley Temple curls. He called a friend of his, and she fixed my hair like Shirley Temple the night before Easter. Momma tied it up with a scarf so it would stay for the next day. I got to see my daddy on Easter, so it was a happy day for me.

The only other thing I remember that my daddy did with me was that he’d pick me up and put me on his shoulders and carry me to the store. My little legs would be dangling over his shoulders, and I would clamp them around his neck so tight. You’re choking me, baby, he would say, and we would laugh. Then he would unclamp them. Daddy’s not gonna let you fall.

Then he’d secure my not falling by holding his strong hands around my legs. I would place my chin on top of his head, and my teeth would clank together whenever he stepped off a curb, and then there was more laughter. It was the best and only fun I can remember we had together. One day, Daddy came over and they argued about something. This time, I was really scared. Although Momma cussed at him all the time, this time it was worse than I had ever heard. Daddy never cussed around me, and although he had a reason to, he didn’t do it that day either. He told her he was divorced and he wanted to be with her again. He wanted to be with his daughter so he could help raise me. I didn’t understand everything they were saying, but it didn’t matter what he said; she didn’t want to hear it. He was trying to defuse the situation with words of hope for them, but it only got worse. She was angry. The argument got explosive. She grabbed an ice pick out of the kitchen drawer and charged at him. He fell back on the little cot-like bed that was kept in the kitchen. He was holding her wrist so that she couldn’t stab him.

Go get Ms. Julia! Daddy said. So I ran out the kitchen door down the street to the third set of project buildings.

Mother! That’s what I was told I had to call her.

What is it? she said.

Momma is trying to kill my daddy! She has this ice pick in her hand, and she’s fighting him.

Mother didn’t say a word; she just bolted out of that house like lightning, strutting full speed down the sidewalk and into our house. Erma! Stop that nonsense right now! Mother didn’t cuss very much at all. The most I heard her say was shit or damn. Momma didn’t pay her any attention; she was after Daddy’s jugular.

You black motherfucker, I’ll kill you! my mom was saying. Mother walked over to the cot and grabbed Momma’s arm and took the ice pick from her hand and snatched her up off my daddy. Momma was furious and still out of control. Mother shook her like she was a rag doll.

Did you hear what I said, girl? The whole time Momma and Daddy were wrestling and tussling, Momma didn’t cry. She was too angry, but as soon as Mother got her to calm down, she broke down and the tears flowed. Daddy fixed his clothes and kissed me on the cheek.

I better leave, he said. Then he picked me up and said, Daddy loves you, baby!

With tears streaming down my face, barely able to get the words out, I said, I love you too, Daddy… Don’t go! But he left anyway.

Chapter 5

Mom had contacted her father in Houston, and he made arrangements for us to take the train and come to see him. Granddaddy had two other kids by another woman—a son, named Marvin, who was thirteen, and his daughter Celeste, who was ten at the time when we went down there. Granddaddy was married to Lilly Belle, who was their mother. She was the nicest grandma ever. She was so different from my grandmother. She didn’t raise her voice at me, or hit me, and she was always so kind to me. She would actually have conversations with me about school and other things and let me ask questions when I didn’t understand something. I wasn’t ever allowed to do that with Mom or Grandmother because inquisitiveness meant disrespect. I was basically only to speak when spoken to. I was only five, so I didn’t have much to talk about, and I didn’t dare talk about what was going on in our house. I had been warned about that. I had been told that what goes on in our house stays in our house!

This was the second time my granddaddy would have seen me since my birth. It would be the first time for my aunt, uncle, and new grandma to ever see me. I don’t know if Momma had seen her siblings before now, but they were all so happy to see both of us. Aunt Celeste was excited to have a big sister, and Uncle Marvin seemed okay with it too. The day after we got there, my aunt took me to what was considered their park, but the only thing in it was a few swings. She pushed me on the swings for a while, then she said, I’ll be back in a few minutes. I got to go get something.

Okay, I said, with excitement to be on the swings. They lived in the Fifth Ward of the projects in Houston, and there was a lot of dry grass and dirt at the park.

Out of nowhere, all of a sudden, a swarm of dragonflies seem to want to attack me. I jumped out of the swing screaming, but I was afraid to move. I was just swinging my hands to keep them away from me. Auntie, Auntie! I cried out. Fortunately, the house was near, and they could hear me crying and screaming. She ran to my rescue.

Baby, they don’t bite, she laughed as she swatted the air. But I ran as fast as I could back to the house. She continued laughing at me. When I got to the house, my uncle Marvin tried to console me with a juicy kiss. Ugh, I said while wiping my lips. That’s wet! He laughed. This family gave me a lot of loving attention, and it was refreshing.

During our visit, one night, Mom went out to a juke joint in the neighborhood. When she got back to Granddaddy’s house, she was drunk. I was sitting in Granddaddy’s lap while he read me a story. My mom swiftly walked toward us and began to throw punches at me. She hit me with her fist. With a slurred voice, she cried while hitting at me.

That’s my daddy, that’s my daddy!

Erma, stop that! Granddaddy said has he shielded me from the blows she so violently pursued!

Don’t be hit’n that baby like that.

So she bent down on her knees and laid her head on his legs and cried. She had always accused him of loving his other two children more than he loved her, and now he was showing love to me. She didn’t like that. I was confused. I was crying too. I loved my mom so much, and I didn’t like to see her sad, but what did I do wrong? I wondered. The vacation was over. I had a good time while I was there, but soon I would be back home to a less loving environment.

Chapter 6

One day, Momma was going to the store. I was almost six. She went next door to Ms. Linda’s house, our neighbor, and asked her if she would watch me while she went to the store. Linda said yes.

Don’t you ask for anything to eat over there ’cause I don’t want folks thinking I can’t feed you! You hear me?

Yes, ma’am. Ms. Linda had just finished cooking diner for her kids and asked me if I wanted to eat. I said, No, ma’am, thank you. She insisted.

We getting ready to eat, and I can’t let you sit there while we eat and you don’t eat. I whatn’ raised like that, she said.

But my momma told me not to eat over here.

Well, I’m gonna fix you a plate anyway ’cause we don’t do that around here. So sit down over there so you can eat.

Well, my grandmother had instilled in me to be obedient to grown folks, and I didn’t seem to have a choice, so I sat down. I didn’t like something she cooked, so I didn’t eat that. I ate everything else, but she was mad that I didn’t eat that particular thing. She said that I was wasting her food. I didn’t want any of it in the first place, I thought. So when Momma got home, she told her that she fixed me a plate and that I wasted her food. Momma was furious, and she took me in the house, put the groceries down, went and got a switch off the tree, and came back and began to beat me.

Momma, she made me eat! I screamed while she struck me everywhere on my body. Through tears and broken words, I continued to explain, Momma, I told her I didn’t want to eat, but she made me! Momma, Momma, please! I was confused. They told me I had to do what the grown folks said, and when I did, I got in trouble. I didn’t know how to be defiant because I was taught with fear not to be.

I told you not to eat over there! She just kept hitting me, ignoring my every word. She accidently hit me in my face with the switch. I think it was an accident, but I’m not sure. Ow, Momma, please, please!

Shut up! she said as she continued to hit me. How can a person be quiet while they’re being beat? I thought. She had always whipped me pretty bad, but this time was different. The fury in her eyes displayed hatred. It was if I’d committed a major crime. But I was innocent. I was only doing what I was taught to do. You were supposed to obey adults and not talk back. I was confused by the mixed messages. She beat me until the switch broke, and then she got a belt and continued her beating with much more fury. Ow, Momma, please stop!

I told your black ass not to eat over there, and that’s what I meant!

I’m trying to tell you, Momma, she made me eat!

But she didn’t care what I had to say. The beating continued for what seemed to be hours to me until the belt buckle hit me and tore my skin. I guess the scream that I let out this time was more intense than the rest, and somehow it registered that she might be killing me. At least that’s what it felt like to me. I can still see her face to this day. It was like she hated me. I was only six. I lay on the cold linoleum floor and continued to cry.

Shut up before I give you something else to cry for! she said. I did my best to quiet the sound of my pain. I was able to reduce the sound down to a whimper. Get up and go upstairs! she said. I didn’t say anything. I just got up and did as I was told. My body hurt with pain, but my heart hurt even more. This couldn’t be my mother; it just couldn’t be.

Chapter 7

I went to Saint Peters Academy School in Dallas, Texas. We lived on Johnson St. in the Roseland projects. There were swings, slides, and clotheslines in the back of each unit. Most of the kids I lived around didn’t go to a Catholic school. I’d walk to school by myself most times until I would get to the expressway by the underpass, which was close to the school, and then I’d meet up with my schoolmates. It was a common thing back then for young kids to walk unescorted. One day, I got hit by a car while walking to school. The car threw me up in the air, and that’s all I remember. I was just in the third grade. It happened on a surface road where cars were exiting from the freeway. The ambulance took me to the hospital, and they called my mom, and she came. I guess I was unconscious because I don’t remember much.

My cousin told me later that she was afraid for me, so I guess she had heard that I was out of it for a while. Anyway, my mom never talked about it, consoled me, or made a fuss about it. She only said that I had to watch for the cars. That’s why I have little details of it. I went back to school when I got better. My godmother, Ms. Catherine, who worked at the school, was also my counselor. She always greeted me with love and concern. She was a short brown-skinned lady with a hunched back. I often wondered why she was bent over like that, but I never asked. She was very nice to me, and she always saw that I got my studies and other curricula, like piano lessons and etiquette classes. Sister Frances was my piano teacher; she was a very strict nun. Every time I would hit the wrong key on the piano, she would hit me on my knuckles.

Perfection, perfection, she would say, and you were not allowed to cry. If you did cry, you were reprimanded for that also. I was pretty good at playing, though, so I didn’t get hit that much. But one day in my English class, I had come to school, and I hadn’t finished all my homework. Ms. Bell was my teacher for that class. She was a very tall black woman and not very nice to me.

Tracey, your homework is not finished! she said.

I didn’t know how to do it, Ms. Bell. I said.

Come up here in front of the class! I slowly walked with embarrassment to the front of the class. Hold out your hand. I opened my hand with my palms facing upward. Turn your hand over!

Reluctantly I did. Bam, bam, bam! Three times she hit me on my knuckles, and then my fourth finger began to bleed, and then she stopped. I was crying, so she took me to this room and put a Band-Aid on my finger. Go back to your seat.

I wanted to run out of there and go tell my momma on her so she would come to that school and tell that woman not to ever hit me like that again. But I didn’t. When school let out, I saw Father Collins standing in the corridor near the front-door exit. He was always talking with the kids. I felt his kindness every time he talked to me. I ran over to him and grabbed him around his leg. I just wanted him to comfort me after my trauma.

Hey there! he said with a smile, like usual. I raised my finger.

Ms. Bell hurt my finger because I didn’t finish all my homework. He touched my shoulder.

My child, I’m sorry you were hurt, but you must do your homework, okay?

Okay, I will, Father. I left and walked home. When I got home from school that day, Momma saw my finger wrapped in the bloody Band-Aid. What happened to you?

I began to cry. Ms. Bell hit me with the ruler real hard and busted my finger.

Why did she do that?

Because I didn’t finish all my homework.

Well, that’s what you get for not finishing it!

"But I didn’t know how to do it, Momma. I asked you to