Searching for Tina Turner by Jacqueline E. Luckett Page B

curfew. I miss my friends. I want
     my privacy back. Dad said it, and I’m outta here.”
    “I can’t apologize for something I haven’t done, Kendrick. There’s a reason why you abused drugs. I want to make sure that
     you take your time and get all the help you need so that it never happens again.”
    “Jesus Christ!” His words snap from his lips. “Are you ever going to forget, or do I have to spend the rest of my life making
     up for it? I’m not an addict, Mom. I just made a mistake.”
    “Yes, you did, Kendrick.” Lena’s words sail into the air as Kendrick puts the car in reverse and races down the driveway.
     “But you don’t have to take it out on me.”
    Lena tosses her car keys and oversized handbag onto the kitchen counter and trips, not for the first time, over Kendrick’s
     size 12 Nikes. If it’s true that feet never stop growing, Lena thinks, her son’s shoes will be two sizes bigger in no time.
     Adrenaline helps her to unload the rest of the groceries, to shove butter, vegetables, and the fifteen-pound roast into the
     refrigerator and hurry to the front door. It helps her lift the boxes, one by one, into the living room as carefully as if
     they are full of Steuben crystal and to strip away the clear tape of each box in one long piece.
    She checks the invoice against the thirty-eight CDs and resists the urge to run to the computer, type each song into a spreadsheet,
     and alphabetize them. Instead, CD in hand, she scours the front of the complex stereo system for the simplest buttons: power,
     load, play. Randall has, they have, the best, most convoluted music equipment his money can buy. He once told Lena that even
     if they couldn’t afford the amplifiers, concert-quality sound of the six-foot speakers with super-sensitive tweeters, woofers,
     and other components she doesn’t understand, that he would have bought them anyway. After their children, music is their strongest
     common denominator.
    The volume knob is obvious, and one exaggerated twist fills the room with music. Tina’s voice bellows from the speakers, and
     the infectious melody cloaks Lena. For now, it is the beat she needs—steady, strong, funky. So, Kendrick can drive; can do
     whatever he wants without the need of his mother’s consent. He values his father. His father values him. Who values her?
    Tina knows it, sings it, summarizes it as clearly as the pain, the ache that works its way to Lena’s heart:
And I don’t understand what’s your plan that you can’t be good to me
.
    Tina’s question is Lena’s: “Who will be good to me?” Her question is for Randall, for Camille, for Kendrick.
    Through the living room, the hallway, up the stairs and down again. Head and hips shake to the beat. The handmade sofas, the
     wall-sized art, the spindly Venetian vases—they say Randall has been good to her. Fingers snap and feet dance. Let the tears
     stream.
    The day after Randall gave her the yellow diamond, Lena put her camera into the armoire; a memento of who she was and her
     value. She stops in front of a black-and-white picture taken with her 35mm the year before she married: Lulu and John Henry
     on their thirty-sixth anniversary. The award-winning photo was published by the
Oakland Tribune
for all her world to see. Years later, it was supposed to be submitted along with her business plan. The contrast is high
     and sharp; the focus on their eyes. They look straight into the camera, and the lens captures their love for each other and
     the photographer.

Chapter 8
    R andall flips through the rows of CDs hidden behind the doors of a built-in cabinet that also houses the stereo. He once told
     Lena that he wanted to own all of the most important jazz albums of the twentieth century. The first time he mentioned his
     goal, he and Lena had been sharing their stories. Like Lena wanted to study photography, Randall wanted to major in music
     even though he played no instrument. He chose to major in business—his