by Mary Monroe
Pee Wee and I had shared a good laugh over that. Our life together was so idyllic at times that my meddlesome mother’s antics and crude comments didn’t bother us. I had the best of both worlds. He was not just my husband; he was also my best friend.
In spite of all my shortcomings and flaws, I looked at matters of the heart from a realistic point of view. I knew that no man, or woman, was perfect, and that anybody could make a mistake. Me jumping into bed with that low-down, funky, black devil that I got involved with last year was one of the biggest mistakes I’d ever made in my entire life. It had been such an intense and passionate affair that it had me acting like a fool. I had done things for him that I had never done to please a man. I’d told lies to be with him. And I’d given him money. It had begun gradually, but when I realized I was “paying” for some dick, I got real concerned because that went against everything I believed in. When I refused to continue paying for my pleasure, the relationship ended in a violent confrontation. Luckily, I had escaped uninjured—at least physically. But I had “paid” a very high price for my mistake. I was so disgusted with myself that for a long time it was hard for me to look in a mirror without flinching.
My husband had reluctantly forgiven me, and we had moved on. “Annette, you ain’t the first woman to cheat, and you won’t be the last. I’ll get over what you done … I guess,” he told me, cracking a weak smile to hide some of the pain that I’d caused.
I could not have been more repentant and humble if they’d revised the Bible and included a psalm in my honor. “Honey, I swear to God, something like this will never happen again,” I assured him, with reconstructive ideas about how I was going to repair my marriage swimming around in my head.
Once that was behind us, I began to focus on the only intimate relationship that mattered to me now. But I was no fool. I knew that if I could fall into the deep black hole of infidelity, anybody could. However, since it was usually the man who acted a fool and got involved in an affair, it was more important for me to focus on what my husband might or might not do. I believed that if he ever did cheat on me, I had to look at the situation from an overall point of view: Would I be better off without this man? Does he no longer love me? Is he worth fighting for? Is this marriage dead? Has he become such a slimy devil that he is no longer good enough for me anyway?
Had any of that been the case, the bombshell that my husband dropped in my lap this morning wouldn’t have caused so much damage. Because when he informed me that he was having an affair, I could not have been more stunned if somebody had told me that the Easter Bunny was a pimp.
He had committed the granddaddy of indiscretions: a torrid, ongoing, “I’d rather be with her than you,” sexual relationship with a woman whom I had called my friend. To me, that was the worst kind of affair. If I couldn’t trust my husband and a woman I called my friend, who could I trust?
To make matters even worse, I was probably the last person in our circle to hear about his affair!
CHAPTER 2
Pee Wee was self-employed, and he took advantage of his position. He usually moseyed on over to the barbershop he owned, which was located a couple of miles from our house, whenever he felt like it. Some days he didn’t go in at all. He had dependable people working for him, so it wasn’t necessary for him to be on the premises all the time.
He spent his time away from work fishing in some of the many lakes and rivers in the northern Ohio area or just hanging around the house enjoying the lifestyle of a successful, self-made man. Lately, he’d been taking off days so that he could do special things for me. One day last week he took off so he could shampoo our carpets and prepare dinner. Now that might not sound so romantic to most people, but when he did that, it was because he wanted me to be extra nice to him. That was one of my easiest jobs. Pee Wee didn’t have to do much to get me to be nice to him. I never told him that, but it was a win-win situation. The more he pampered me, the more I pampered him.
I didn’t think anything about him going in early that Friday morning and then coming back home about an hour later, until I heard the red Firebird he drove pull up and stop in our driveway. I knew it was his car without even looking out the window. He had done one of those stupid things that men do to the motors of their cars so that it now had such a distinctive sound I’d know that Firebird was in the vicinity immediately, even without seeing it.
Right away I assumed he had forgotten something, or that maybe he had decided to take the day off so he could do something special for me. Since we had been trying to repair the damage to our marriage that my affair had caused, he initiated sexy little activities like calling me at my job and ordering me to meet him at a nearby motel for a quickie.
One day last month he’d sent a stretch limo to my job to bring me to a romantic hotel suite that he’d reserved for the night. By the time I got there, he had already ordered a candlelit filet mignon dinner and a dozen red roses. The last time he’d called me at work—interrupting my weekly staff meeting—it was to tell me to meet him in an alley behind the Grab and Go convenience store so I could give him a blow job in his car.
I was the one who had cheated, but he was the one who was bending over backward to keep our marriage alive. That was the kind of man he was.
Just thinking about my passionate relationship with my husband generated a wicked smile that spread across my face like a knife wound. There was just no telling what he had up his sleeves, or in his pants, for me this time.
I turned off the radio. Now I was so turned on, I practically collapsed back into my seat at the table, settling into it like a jaybird claiming its nest. I spread my legs open as I waited for Pee Wee to come in the house. It got so hot between my legs I had to spread my thighs so I could cool off my crotch.
I was anxious and curious to see what he was up to. I hoped that it was something that we could do quickly, because I had a lot of work on my desk at the office and I wanted to get there at a reasonable hour, hopefully before noon. That was mainly because I had plans to do lunch with a sister friend from the Baptist church that I attended from time to time. That poor woman—she had just found out that her husband was fucking his ex, so she needed some advice. Advice on what, I didn’t know. I was surprised that a woman with a cheating husband would want advice from a woman with a man like mine. What in the world did she think I could tell her? I certainly could not tell her what to do to keep her man from cheating. It was too late for that. But I was also known as a good listener, and I had two very nice shoulders for people to cry on. I was pretty sure that those were some of the things that made me so appealing to my husband.
My office hours were from nine to five; but as a senior manager for Mizelle’s Collection Agency, I had a lot of flexibility. Some days I went in an hour or so earlier than I was supposed to, some days I stayed an hour or so late, and some days I worked from home. I didn’t even have to get out of bed or my nightgown on those days. I just propped up a few pillows in my bed, kicked back with my legs crossed at the ankles, and perused a few files. I even enjoyed a few glasses of wine while doing it. It seemed like I was literally getting paid to “kick back.” What more could I ask for? But since I loved my job and I loved getting out of the house, I preferred going to work to staying home.
Glancing at my watch, I saw that it was a few minutes past eight. I was already dressed and my office was only a short drive from my house. I figured I’d get there early enough to finish most of the work on my desk and address any issues that required my attention before I went to lunch with Sister Scruggs. Since it was casual Friday, I wore a fairly short denim skirt and a yellow Bob Marley T-shirt. It was a “youthful” outfit, but I was a youthful middle-aged woman. It was also one of my favorite outfits. I had been a fool for Bob Nesta Marley since his “I Shot the Sheriff” days. Before my recent 100-pound weight loss, wearing T-shirts or skirts or dresses with hems above my ankles was something that I could do only in my dreams.
The bathroom scale was still my worst enemy
. When I stepped on it this morning, it claimed I had gained eight pounds back, and here I was smacking on my third Krispy Kreme glazed donut in the last twenty minutes! I laughed out loud; then I glared at the donut, hating it for what it represented. Just thinking about all the compliments I received about my drastic weight loss, and the proud way my husband looked when we went out in public, brought me back down to earth. I put the rest of that third donut back into the box and brushed the crumbs off my hands. “Now,” I said with a mighty belch, proud that I still had some self-control and discipline.
I had sent my daughter off to Reed Street Elementary School, which was only a few blocks away. I still had time to have a couple of cups of coffee before I left the house. And if Pee Wee had something else in mind for me to do, there was time for that, too.
Despite all the problems that we had encountered in our eleven-year marriage, Pee Wee and I still had it good.
Life was so good to me.
I was happy. My husband was happy. I had everything I wanted. My proverbial cup was not just running over, it was falling over.
I never would have guessed in a million years that I was about to lose that cup and everything in it.
I looked at my watch again. I listened and waited. The longer I listened and waited, the more anxious I felt. The wind was howling like a wounded animal. Normally, it was one of the sorriest sounds in the world as far as I was concerned. It didn’t bother me much this time, though. The wind was also blowing hard. It made the tree branches on the cherry tree that leaned toward the side of my kitchen rattle the window above my sink like a clumsy burglar. It seemed to be taking a long time for Pee Wee to get out of the car and into the house. But then he was not as spry as he used to be. Like with me and most of our friends, intruders such as arthritis, gout, excessive gas, incontinence, and other ailments associated with age had become some of his most frequent visitors. He was still in good shape for a man his age, but he had slowed down considerably over the years. However, he wasn’t that slow. Several minutes had passed since he pulled up in our driveway!
I rose from my seat at the table and was about to trot over to the window above the sink so I could look out into our driveway on the side of our house. I wanted to check and make sure he had not stumbled on a rock, or stepped on a pop top and landed faceup on the ground like old man Kelsy next door did from time to time. Before I could reach the window, I heard his car door slam. A second later, I heard a second car door slam. That was odd, but I didn’t go to the window to investigate. I scrambled back to the table and sat back down, trying not to look too excited.
As soon as Pee Wee opened our back door and entered the kitchen, I knew that something serious was about to unravel.
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SHE HAD IT COMING
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CHAPTER 1
People often tell me that when it comes to picking friends, I “sure know how to pick ’em.”
I saw my best friend kill her vicious stepfather on the night of our senior prom. Our boyfriends—mine would later end up in prison for life without the possibility of parole for rape and murder—who had reluctantly agreed to be our prom dates, were relieved when I called them up and told them we had to cancel due to Valerie’s “sudden illness.” While our classmates were dancing the night away and plotting to do everything we had been told not to do after the prom, I was helping Valerie Proctor hide a dead body in her backyard beneath a lopsided fig tree.
Ezekiel “Zeke” Proctor’s violent death had come as no surprise to me. The first question that had entered my mind during the crime was, “Valerie, what took you so long?” It happened sixteen years ago but it’s still fresh on my mind, and I know it will be until the day I die, too.
Mr. Zeke had been a fairly good neighbor as far back as I could remember. When he wasn’t too drunk or in a bad mood, he would haul old people and single mothers who didn’t have transportation around in his car. He would borrow money, dole it out to people who needed it, and he never asked to be repaid. He would do yard work and other maintenance favors for little or no money. And when he was in a good mood, which was rare, he would host a backyard cookout and invite everybody on our block. However, those events usually ended when he got too drunk and paranoid and decided that everybody was “out to get him.”
When that happened, barbequed ribs, links, and chicken wings ended up on the ground, or stuck to somebody’s hair that he’d thrown it at. People had to hop away from the backyard to avoid stepping on glasses that he had broken on purpose. There had not been any cookouts since the time he got mad and shot off his gun in the air because he thought one of the handsome young male guests was plotting to steal his wife. In addition to those lovely social events, he’d also been the stepfather and husband from hell.
Valerie’s mother, Miss Naomi, bruised and bleeding like a stuck pig herself after the last beating that she’d survived a few minutes before the killing, had also witnessed Mr. Zeke’s demise. Like a zombie, she had stood and watched her daughter commit the granddaddy of crimes. Had things turned out differently, Miss Naomi would have been the dead body on the floor that night, because this time her husband had gone too far. He had attempted to strangle her to death. She had his handprints on her neck, and broken blood vessels in the whites of her eyes to prove it.
To this day I don’t like to think of what I’d witnessed as a murder, per se. If that wasn’t a slam dunk case of self defense, I didn’t know what was. But Valerie and her mother didn’t see things that way. They didn’t call the cops like they’d done so many times in the past. That had done no good. If anything, it had only made matters worse. Each time after the cops left, Miss Naomi got another beating. They also didn’t call the good preacher, Reverend Carter, who had told them time and time again, year after year, that: “Brother Zeke can’t help hisself; he’s confused,” and to be “patient and wait because things like this will work out somehow if y’all turn this over to God.” Well, they’d tried that, too, and God had not intervened.
“None of those motherfuckers helped us when we needed it, now we don’t need their help,” Valerie’s mother said, grinding her teeth as she gave her husband’s corpse one final kick in his side. She attempted to calm her nerves by drinking Vodka straight out of the same bottle that he had been nursing from all day like a hungry baby.
Miss Naomi and Valerie buried Mr. Zeke’s vile body in the backyard of the house that Miss Naomi owned on Baylor Street. It was the most attractive residence on the block; not the kind of place that you would expect to host such a gruesome crime. People we all knew got killed in the crack houses in South Central and other rough parts of L.A., not in our quiet little neighborhood in houses like Miss Naomi’s. Directly across the street was the Baylor Street Mt. Zion Baptist church, of which almost everybody on the block attended at some time. Even the late Mr. Zeke …
The scene of the crime was a two-story white stucco with a two-car garage and a wraparound front porch that was often cluttered with toys and neighborhood kids like me. The front lawn was spacious and well-cared for. A bright white picket fence surrounded the entire front lawn like a hounds-tooth necklace. Behind the house, as with all the other houses on the block, was a high, dark fence that hid the backyard, as well as Valerie’s crime.
Miss Naomi’s house looked like one of those family friendly homes on those unrealistic television sitcoms. But because of Valerie’s stepfather’s frequent violence, the house was anything but family friendly. He had turned it into a war zone over the years. Valerie’s baby brother, Binkie, referred to it as Beirut because Mr. Zeke attacked every member of the family on a regular basis, including Valerie’s decrepit grandfather, Paw Paw, and even one-eyed Pete, the family dog.
Even though there was blood in every room in that house, that didn’t stop me from making it my second home. Over the years I had learned how to get out of the “line of fire” in time to av
oid injury whenever Mr. Zeke broke loose.
It was because Valerie was my oldest and dearest friend and Miss Naomi my surrogate mother that this house was the only other place in this part of L.A. where I felt welcome and comfortable. When I went to visit, I didn’t even knock, or announce my arrival. I came and went as casually as I did in my own house, two doors down.
I had innocently walked into the house and witnessed Valerie’s crime that night. As soon as I realized what was happening, I threw up all over the pale pink dress that had cost me a month’s worth of my babysitting money. I continued to vomit as I watched Valerie and her long-suffering mother drag the body across the kitchen floor to the backyard so casually you’d have thought it was a mop.
Before they reached the gaping hole in the ground that had several little mounds of dirt piled up around it like little pyramids, they stumbled and dropped the corpse. There was a thud and then a weak, hissing sound from the body that made me think of a dying serpent. Somebody let out a long, loud, rhythmic fart. I could smell it from where I stood in the door like a prison guard. And it was fiercely potent. I couldn’t tell if it had come from Valerie, her mother, or if it was the last gas to ooze from the asshole of the dead man. It could have even been from me, but I was such a wreck, I couldn’t even tell. I squeezed my nostrils and then I froze from my face to the soles of my feet.
I held my breath as Valerie stumbled and fell on top of one of the mounds of dirt. Miss Naomi, breathing hard and loud, fell on top of Mr. Zeke’s corpse. One of us screamed. I didn’t realize it was me until Valerie scolded me. “Dolores, shut the fuck up and help us,” she hollered, swiveling her head from one side to the other, looking around. Why, I didn’t know. With the tall dark fence protecting the backyard like a fort, none of our neighbors could see her. “We need to get him in this hole now,” she said, huffing and puffing. I couldn’t believe that this was the same girl that Reverend Carter had baptized less than a week ago in the church across the street from the scene of her crime.