He then turned to the other side and sought out his son and daughter-in-law. “Joe and Otha Mae. You come, too.”
When everyone he had summoned was inside, he closed the door behind him and pulled down the shades to the front windows. What they couldn’t hear, he knew, the Bennetts outside were counting on seeing, and he wanted to make sure they didn’t see or hear anything. He loved the lot of them, but Lord knows they were a nosy bunch.
“Everyone, be seated,” he said in his authoritative voice. Henry was already sitting in a rocking chair. His arthritis was acting up today.
Ethan watched as Michael and Taye sat on the sofa holding hands. He could remember them as little ones, doing practically the same thing at one time or another. The two of them had always been close. Maybe if he had paid more attention he would have seen it coming, but in truth he hadn’t. The fact that they were courtin’ had come as a complete surprise to him. But it hadn’t to Henry. He claimed that he’d known all the time and had been concerned about it when they were teenagers and Taye used to follow Michael around like a puppy with love in her eyes. But he’d figured she would grow out of it.
Evidently she hadn’t.
“Now then,” Ethan finally said when everyone looked at him expectantly. “We all know why we’re here.” He then turned his full attention to Michael and Taye. “I understand the two of you have stirred up a hornets’ nest with this talk of being in love.”
Michael’s hold tightened on Taye’s hand, something both grandfathers noticed. “Yes, sir, and if being in love with Taye has stirred up a hornets’ nest, then so be it.”
Poppa Ethan frowned. “So you’re willing to cause problems in the family?”
“Yes, sir, if it means loving Taye.”
“And you think you love her, son?”
Michael nodded. He wondered if everyone had failed to notice that he was not some sixteen-year-old boy. He was a man of thirty-three, three months shy of turning thirty-four. He’d been married before and had a thirteen-year-old daughter. He knew about love and didn’t need anyone questioning him about it. However, the man who was asking was someone he respected and held in high esteem and someone that he and Taye loved dearly. “I know I love her, Poppa Ethan.”
“And you’re willing to do what’s best for her?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Even giving her up if you have to?”
Michael paused. That particular question had been asked by his own grandfather. He shifted his gaze from Poppa Ethan to his Grampa Henry. “Yes, Grampa, if I had to. But I don’t have to. There’s no reason for me to have to do that.”
“What about to end the feud in the family?”
Michael inhaled deeply. He then looked at Taye before gazing back at his grandfather once again. “I love the family, but I love Taye more. She means everything to me. The girls have accepted what we have, and we want all of you to do the same. But if you don’t, then we’ll do what we have to do to be together. We are Bennetts, that can’t ever be taken away from us, but if the family wants to disown us then that’s their choice.”
“See there, Poppa?” Otha Mae wailed. “What did I tell you? Taye has bewitched him. Michael has always had good common sense, but being around Taye these past few months has made him lose some of it. No soul in their right mind wants to marry their cousin, blood or otherwise.”
“I did,” Poppa Ethan said, feeling completely exhausted. It didn’t take much for Otha Mae’s hysterics to nearly drain the very life out of him. “I married my Idella.”
Otha Mae frowned. “But the two of you weren’t related.”
“If you ask me, all black folks are related some way or another. Who can be rightly sure they ain’t, the way our families were split up and separated during slavery times?” He sighed deeply. “Idella’s ma and pa took me in and raised me as one of their own when I was barely sixteen and my own folks died. So in a way it was like being part of her family. In fact, I considered myself as such. And when I went to them at the age of twenty and told them that I wanted to marry Idella, they didn’t have a problem with it.” He sat back in his chair and stared at his son and daughter-in-law. “Just like I don’t have a problem with Michael and Taye marrying. Neither does Henry.” He shook his head before gazing intently at his son. “You need to learn how to put a lid on Otha Mae every once in a while, Joe. She gets too carried away with things.”
Otha Mae stood fuming. “I can’t believe you, Poppa. In your eye Taye can do no wrong. You were just as accepting of those two pregnancies of hers as you were of this. And it’s wrong. What type of example is she setting for the family?”
Michael stood to say something in Taye’s behalf, refusing to let anyone, even her mother, say anything against her. But Grampa Ethan touched his hand. “Sit down, son, and let me handle this.”
Michael hesitated, but after looking into the old man’s eyes, he relented and returned to his seat.
Grampa Ethan just sat there and gazed up at Otha Mae for the longest time before finally saying, “Ever since that child was born, I’ve watched you trying to make her into something perfect. Then the first time she made a mistake, you couldn’t handle it; you all but disowned her. But you of all people should have understood. Therefore, I can say this and I can say this without batting an eye. You, Otha Mae Robbins Bennett, are a hypocrite. How can you fault Taye for having a baby out of wedlock when you had one out of wedlock yourself?”
Poppa Ethan didn’t know which of the two women, Otha Mae or Taye, gasped in shock the loudest.
Otha Mae dropped back down in her seat. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve never had a child out of wedlock. You must be—”
“Yes, you did, so stop lying,” Poppa said in a firm tone. “Your father told me, and he had no reason to lie on his own daughter.”
Otha Mae hung her head down, and for the longest time she didn’t speak. When she did, she raised eyes full of shame to Poppa Ethan and asked in a quiet voice, “How long have you known?”
Poppa Ethan sighed deeply. He loved his daughter-in-law, even with all her faults. But someone had to get her straight once and for all, and since Joe wasn’t trying to do it, then for the family’s sake the task fell on him. “I’ve known since before you and Joe got married. Your father, being the honest and religious man that he was, felt I had a right to know that the woman my son had chosen to bring into our family had had a child out of wedlock at the age of fifteen. It was a child that he and your mama gave to a childless couple who once belonged to his congregation before he was called to a church here in Macon.”
Otha Mae nodded. She then forced herself to meet her husband’s gaze. “Did you know?”
Joe gazed at the woman he’d been married to for going on forty years. He’d known he should have put his foot down countless times, but it was easier just to let her have her way. “Yeah, I knew. Daddy told me about it before I married you.”
“And you married me anyway?” she asked incredulously in a soft voice.
“Yeah, because I knew you were a good woman and I wanted you for the mother of my children. Any mistakes you made before we got together didn’t matter to me.”
“Just like any mistakes Taye has made don’t matter to Michael, either,” Poppa Ethan said, leaning forward in his chair. “Knowing about your past, Otha Mae, how could you be so unforgiving to your own daughter? A sin is a sin, big or small, one or two. Taye made a mistake, but then so did you.”
Taye sat beside Michael speechless. She had had no idea that her upright, Bible-toting mother had given birth to a child before she married Taye’s father. To find out that she had done so was a shocker.
“I didn’t want Taye to make the same mistakes I did. I didn’t want to think that the reason she had made those mistakes was somehow connected to me and my past. I didn’t want to think of myself as a bad seed,” Otha Mae said, beginning to cry softly.
Taye immediately got up and went over to her mother and knelt down. “Oh, Mom. You
aren’t a bad seed. You are an inspiration to my girls and me. I made two bad decisions in life, for which I’ve learned lessons and for which I plan to set good examples for my girls, and I’ve done that. I hadn’t been involved with a man in over ten years, because I was too afraid of making another bad decision which could cost me your love.”
Taye took a deep sigh as she wiped tears from her mother’s eyes from the handkerchief her father had handed to her. “But what I feel for Michael is right. It’s good. I love him. He loves me. I know you love Sebrina and Monica and want the best for them. Then please want the best for me, too. And Michael is the best.”
Otha Mae nodded slowly, accepting her daughter’s words, then reached out and hugged her youngest child to her. Then they both cried together, washing away years of hurt and misunderstandings.
“I think,” Poppa Ethan said moments later, “that what’s been discussed here among us should stay here among us. There’s no one beyond these walls who needs to know what’s been said. What’s important is that we continue to love each other as a family, to support each other, and to always be there for one another.”
He leaned back in his chair. “Some days I feel so tired I think this may be the night when I’ll lie down for the last time before going to join my Idella. But so far, the good Lord hasn’t seen fit to take me on home. But when he does, I want to know that my family ain’t back here cuttin’ the fool. I want to believe I left them with at least a grain of good sense. Although nobody’s perfect.”
He slowly stood to his feet. “Now me and Henry are gonna go out there and tell everyone our decision. Some gonna like it. Some ain’t. But those that ain’t just have to get over it. The ones that will like our decision are the ones that are gonna continue to keep this family strong. They’re the ones like Taye, Michael, Rae’jean, Brandy, and Alexia.” He then shook his head, ashamed. “And the one who’s hell-bent on keeping the family populated is Victor Junior. But then there’s no hope for the boy. He got it honest.”
Michael walked over to Taye and gently pulled her from her mother’s arms into his. “Later today, we’re going shopping for an engagement ring,” he said, hugging her tight.
The younger Bennetts decided to have a fish fry to celebrate the grandfathers’ decision to give their blessings to Michael and Taye. The older Bennetts, those who weren’t happy with the decision, decided to stop their grumbling for the time being—at least until after they could get a good-tasting fried fish sandwich into their stomachs.
Michael, Victor Junior, and Quinn—who’d been adopted into the family already—had gone to Chucky’s Seafood and purchased at least twenty dozen blue crabs. A fire was lit under a huge pot in the backyard, and now the spicy aroma of boiling crabs floated through the air. Everyone was having a good time, and after a while they forgot there was supposed to be a division in the family.
Rae’jean was in the kitchen with Aunt Otha Mae and Cousin Agnes to help with the pies they had decided to bake when one of Cousin Fred’s kids came running inside and told her there was a man in the front yard who wanted to see her.
Wondering who it could be, she wiped the flour off her hands and left the kitchen. Walking through the living room, she smiled when she glanced up at what once had been her grandmother’s prized “wall of frame” with the Kennedys’ and Martin Luther King, Jr.’s pictures hanging proudly. She saw that her grandfather had recently added John F. Kennedy Jr.’s picture on the wall beside that of his father, John F. Kennedy, Sr. Rae’jean’s smile widened, as she knew her grandmother would have liked that.
Opening the front door, Rae’jean stepped outside on the porch, then stopped short when her breath got caught in her throat. Ryan was standing by the huge oak tree in her grandfather’s front yard.
“Ryan? What are you doing here?” she asked him as she came down the steps and walked over to him. “How did you know where I was?” To say she was glad to see him was an understatement. It had been ten days since she had seen him, and she had missed him every one of those days.
He smiled. “I’m an investigator. Finding people is my specialty.” He reached out and covered her hand with his own. “I had to return to Miami for that case I’m working on. When I called back to the office, my secretary gave me your message that your return back to Boston would be delayed a few days because of a family matter. I couldn’t wait to see you, so I decided to come here.”
He took a deep breath as he continued to look at her. “I want to know what you’ve decided. Do you want for us to have a serious relationship or be just friends?”
“What do you want?”
“I asked you first.”
Rae’jean smiled as she looked up at him. “I want us to have a serious relationship.”
Ryan grinned happily. “So do I.”
Her smile widened, tilting the corners of her lips. “So it’s official we’ll be doing the dating thing now?”
“Yes, it’s official, and we’ll be doing the dating thing now.”
“So can I consider myself your girl?” she teased.
He shook his head, grinning, wanting so much to kiss her. “Oh, yeah, you’re my girl all right.”
She wanted to kiss him, too, but out of the corner of her eye she saw nosy Cuzin Sophie watching them. Rae’jean decided that she would make time for them to go someplace private and kiss—and maybe do some other things—later. “Come on; let me introduce you to my family,” she said, taking his hand and leading him to the backyard. “I may as well warn you that they can be a rowdy group.” She thought she should at least warn him, since she wasn’t sure if he knew what antics went down in a large family, and hers could take the icing off the cake.
“Really? How rowdy are they?”
“Oh, you’re about to find out.”
Rae’jean cast her eyes to the man sitting in the car beside her. “Thanks for bringing me back to the hotel, Ryan.”
“Don’t mention it,” he said, holding her gaze. The hotel’s neon sign reflected off the shine in his eyes.
Then were was silence. Simmering heat. Swelling tension. It had been like that between them all day. Even with her family around she had felt his eyes on her every movement, and whenever she had looked up to meet his glance she had felt the desire and the hunger within him. It had been there all through her family’s friendly game of volleyball, all through the seafood they’d consumed, and all through her family’s nosy questions and pointless inquisition.
And it was there now and it was affecting her big-time.
She had never felt this way before, this hot, this keyed up, this intense, this filled with desire and wanting. She was very much aware of him. She urged her gaze away to look at the beautiful landscape of the building. “Do you want to come up to my room for a drink?” she finally asked to break the silence.
“I’d love to.”
She then waited for him to get out of the car and come around to open the car door for her. “I forgot to ask what hotel you’re staying at,” she said as they began walking up the sidewalk to the entrance of the Marriott Hotel.
He smiled and it increased the hunger growing inside of her. “This one.”
Her eyebrows drew together. “Oh? What a coincidence.”
“Not really. I knew you were staying here.”
She nodded, tilting her chin toward the ground. “Due to your investigative skill, right?”
“That’s right.”
She smiled and glanced back at him. “You’re good at it. Was it hard to find me?” The thought that he had gone through all that trouble to see her had touched her.
“No, mainly because I was determined to find you. I wanted to see you, although I wasn’t sure how you would feel about seeing me. For all I knew, you could have made the decision that you didn’t want any type of relationship with me. I took a chance in coming.”
They walked in silence until they reached the entrance to the hotel. Then they stopped walking. They stood facing each other, their gazes locked, each he
aring the unsteady beat of their own hearts. They knew their relationship would change once they crossed over the hotel’s threshold and needed to make sure this was what they wanted. They had already decided earlier that day that they wanted to have a relationship, one that meant more than an assuaging of overworked hormones.
“Ryan, I—”
“Shh, it’s OK,” he said softly, reaching up and gently stroking her lips with his thumb, holding her silent. “It’s a big step for me, too. We don’t have to if you aren’t ready for it.”
“Are you ready for it?”
He hooked a finger under her chin and lifted her gaze to meet his. “I think I’ve been ready for it since the first time I saw you, standing that day at your window. But I knew you were off-limits. But that didn’t keep me from wanting you, thinking of you often.”
He skimmed his palm against her throat. “And then when you showed up at my office that day, I was thrown for a loop. After finding out you were no longer engaged, it seemed like fate had intervened, but I didn’t want to believe it. The pain of my ex-wife’s betrayal had gone deep, and another serious involvement was what I didn’t want. But I couldn’t stay away from you, Rae’jean. I had to accept the fact that even without my knowing you intimately, you’re in my blood. There’s this thing between us that won’t go away. It’s been there since the first time we set eyes on each other. Making love won’t get rid of it; it will only intensify it, strengthen it. I think you should know that up front. This has to be your call.”
He continued to watch her watch him. He wanted her more than he had ever wanted a woman. He wanted to possess her mind, body, and soul. He wanted to brand her his with his passion; he wanted to show her how special he thought she was. He had felt honored that she had shared her family with him today, a family he’d never really had. Even with the questions her grandfather had asked outright, regarding Ryan’s intentions toward his granddaughter, he hadn’t felt pressured or been made to feel like an outcast. After just meeting him, the Bennetts had included him within their close-knit fold.
A Family Reunion Page 39