by Jewel Daniel
He saw her face flush bright red. He liked her innocence.
"One last question," she asked. "When you changed my clothes, did you look at me naked?"
"No, I closed my eyes," Kwabena answered sarcastically. "Of course I looked at you. And I like what I saw."
"You're not supposed to see me naked! That's inappropriate."
"We're married. I'm probably the only man who has to wait until his wife is drunk to see her naked!" he teased. "And by the way, what is a virgin doing with all that sexy lingerie and paraphernalia?"
She smiled to cover her embarrassment. "They were for my bridal shower. I was engaged to be married."
"Really? What happened to him, and how come you guys never made love?"
"It's a long story."
"Mama and Papa won't be here before tonight. I have all day."
With a heavy sigh, Tamara confessed, "He never showed up to the wedding. Turned out he was a con artist. Took every cent I owned, including what my mother had put aside for my education, and disappeared. As for the experimentation thing, turns out he was also gay."
"I'm sorry," Kwabena said sympathetically. "Your year was definitely worse than mine."
The doorbell rang. He looked at her in her lopsided robe, her bloodshot eyes and unkempt hair and said, "I'll get it."
Kwabena trotted upstairs and opened the door to face a well-dressed couple. The woman, a tall, slim, good-looking lady who appeared to be in her early- to midthirties wore a dark brown skirt and leather boots and a long wool coat. She looked vaguely familiar. The accompanying man was one or two inches shorter than Kwabena with slightly graying hair at his temples.
"Hello. May I help you?" Kwabena asked politely.
The lady spoke in a businesslike tone, "Hi I'm Leyoca Novak. Is Tamara in?"
Tamara, who had come up the stairs behind Kwabena, exclaimed in surprise, "Mommy, Carl, what are you doing here?"
Leyoca stepped into the foyer past Kwabena and hugged her daughter. Carl followed. Leyoca assessed Tamara's rumpled hair and lopsided robe and Kwabena's shirtless body with a skeptical look on her face. "I decided to come a little early, meet my son-in-law and see how you were doing. It's a little late for you to be in your bedclothes, isn't it?"
Tamara looked at Kwabena's shirtless sweaty body and her own state of dress and dreaded what her mother must be thinking. Then she remembered her manners.
"Mommy, Carl, this is my husband, Kwabena. Kwabena, this is my mother, Leyoca, and her husband, Carl."
Kwabena shook their hands, realizing only then that Tamara had never talked about her father. "I'm pleased to meet you. Is there anything I can do for you? Can I get your bags, or getyou something to drink?" Kwabena asked.
"You can get some clothes on," Leyoca said to him coldly.
"I'm sorry," Kwabena apologized. "I was working out when the doorbell rang. I'll go change." He trotted downstairs.
She turned to Carl. "Honey, can you get the bags please?" As soon as Carl stepped out the door, she turned to Tamara and ordered, "Go make yourself presentable. Have you looked in the mirror?"
"I was at a party last night, and I just woke up," Tamara explained, escorting her mother up the stairs to the kids' room. "I have to apologize for the lack of ac commodations. I haven't furnished the other rooms, so I'm afraid you and Carl will have to share the bunk bed."
She looked at the bunk bed with the full mattress on the bottom and the twin mattress on top. "It's fine. We've slept in smaller spaces. Now please go make yourself decent."
A freshly showered Kwabena dressed in jeans and a polo shirt met Leyoca and Carl in the den. Tamara was still upstairs. "Have you eaten yet? I'm about to prepare breakfast."
"I'll help you," Leyoca volunteered.
As they went into the kitchen, the grilling began. While Kwabena chopped onions and peppers to make omelets, Leyoca inundated him with questions.
"Let me be frank with you," Leyoca finally said. "Tamara is very impressionable and, unfortunately, easily fooled by good-looking men. I am not going to stand back and let you screw her out of everything she owns. I let it happen once. I won't allow it again."
Kwabena decided to be honest. "Mrs. Novak, I like and respectyour daughter very much, but what we have is a business deal. I get my permanent U.S. residence, and she gets paid. Everything was discussed and arranged upfront. I have no intention of defrauding her in any way."
"And you get to live in her fine house and a few other fringe benefits, right?"
He knew exactly what fringe benefits she was talking about. If only he was getting that. "I rent the basement, ma'am. We have a mutual agreement. And we've also developed a very close friendship."
"So what work do you do? Or do you work at all?"
"Research."
"What kind?"
"Biomedical research."
"Really. What do you work on?"
Kwabena tried his best to explain his line of work in layman's terms. It was always difficult, even when speaking to scientists from different fields of work.
"Don't dumb it down for me, Kwabena. I work closely with many people in the medical profession and it insults my intelligence when they assume I won't understand."
Without going into too much detail, he outlined his specific area of research, which included smart prosthesis and rheumatoid arthritis drug development.
Leyoca's face slowly brightened. "That means you must be familiar with Dr. Michael Botanga's work."
Kwabena was pleasantly surprised. "You know Mike? He was my mentor in grad school. Now we're friends, collaborators and business partners."
Leyoca looked at him quizzically. "Wait. Are you Dr. Benjamin Opoku?"
He smiled broadly. "Yes."
"Then we've met before. Five years ago when I had just started my marketing firm, Mike hired me to do a marketing campaign for a new rheumatoid arthritis drug. He introduced me to you as his business partner." She remembered thinking he looked young for a business partner. Back then he was slight, bordering on scrawny.
Kwabena vaguely remembered. "You're Ley Fontaine?"
Leyoca laughed. "Yes, I am. That was before I married Carl. In my experience, having a name like Leyoca that readily identifies your race and gender makes it harder to gain clients. So when I started my business, I used Ley to be race and gender neutral."
They started discussing science and business, comfortably chatting and laughing until Leyoca was finally satisfied that he wasn't there to rob her daughter blind. The more they talked, the more she respected and liked him. He was well mannered and appeared decent and honest.
When Tamara came downstairs, she was shocked to see her mother and Kwabena chatting and laughing like old friends. She whispered to Kwabena, "What miracle did you work?"
He replied with a smile. "Just my good old charm."
Her mother, who had been setting the breakfast table, came over to her. "You didn't tell me that Kwabena was Dr. Benjamin Opoku. We actually met before. I've done work for Independent Labs."
Tamara looked at Kwabena. "Benjamin? Ben isn't short for Kwabena?"
He smiled. "Benjamin is my middle name. My parents gave us both traditional names and Christian names. When I came to this country, I used my Christian name because it was easier for Westerners to pronounce."
This was going better than she anticipated.
Just then the doorbell rang. Kwabena was at the stove, expertly flipping omelets. "I'll get it," she said and went to the door.
"Dr. Opoku, Mrs. Opoku!" Tamara exclaimed in surprise. They weren't supposed to be coming until late that evening. She and Kwabena intended to move most of his clothes out of the basement and into her room before they arrived to make his parents believe their marriage was real.
Tamara stood at the open door, staring idiotically.
"Are you going to invite us in?" asked Akwape irritably. "It's rather cold out here."
"Oh, where are my manners? Come on in, make yourselves at home." She ushered them into the
foyer. Carl jumped off the couch and went to help Dr. Opoku remove the bags from the waiting taxicab.
Akwape embraced Tamara perfunctorily. "Where is my son?" she asked.
Tamara led the way to the kitchen where Kwabena was still at the stove, now making flapjacks. Akwape hugged her son, then asked in highly accented English, "Why are you cooking and not her?"
"Because I enjoy cooking," Kwabena answered, kissing his mother on the cheek.
"That's why you have a wife."
"Never mind her," Dr. Opoku said, entering the kitchen and embracing his son. "She left her brainmouth filter at the airport."
Tamara led them to the breakfastnook, where Leyoca had resumed setting the table, and introduced her mother and stepfather.
"Where is your real father?" Akwape asked Tamara.
Tamara hesitated. Leyoca stepped in and said vaguely, "He's not with us."
"Oh, I'm so sorry he passed," Akwape said.
Leyoca quickly changed the subject. "I hope you guys are hungry because we've got a big brunch here."
"This table is too small for all of us. Maybe we should try the dining room," Tamara suggested, and they began moving the settings into the dining room.
It was a brunch to remember. It started out a bit awkward as both sets of parents observed each other, indirectly interrogating each other.
"You look quite young to be the mother of a twentysix-year-old," Akwape said.
"I take that as a compliment," Leyoca responded. "I'm forty-three years old."
Akwape did a mental calculation. "You married rather young."
"I was not married to Tamara's father."
A shocked expression came over Akwape's face. She turned to Kwabena and said in Twi, "You are going to bring disgrace to our family."
Leyoca did not understand the words, but she couldn't miss the tone. Smiling pleasantly, she went for the shock factor. "Yes, Mrs. Opoku, I was a statistic."
"Statistic?"
"Yes, an unmarried teen mother on welfare. And as for Tamara's father, he's not dead. She doesn't know who he is."
Akwape's face turned red, and her jaw dropped. Indignation was written all over her face.
Kwame looked at his wife and frowned. "Get off your high horse, Akwape," he said in English. "The Opokus have always been a humble family, regardless of their accomplishments or status in life. We have been around the world enough to know about challenges and successes. Your family is an example of great success. Apologize, Akwape."
Akwape was embarrassed but not deterred. "I just want to know about these strangers Ben chose to..."
Kwame responded deliberately, "Akwape, they are no longer strangers. They are our family now." He turned to Tamara. "I don't know how familiar you are with our culture and customs, but for us, marriage is not between a man and a woman-it is between families. Now that you are Ben's wife, our families have become one." He looked at Kwabena. "That is why the marriage process is so long and complicated back home. I assume you will initiate the process belatedly."
"Akwape," Leyoca chimed in. "If you want to know more about me, you can read my book, By the Boot Straps. It's all written and out in the open for all to see. That way I don't pretend to be what I'm not."
"You wrote By the Boot Straps?"
At the mention of the book, the discussion took a different direction. Both Akwape and Kwame had read the book and found it inspiring. It described Leyoca's journey from a teenage single mother and high-school dropout on welfare, to a high-achieving advertising executive. Detailed in it were her struggles to complete her GED, take college courses and work full time at several menial jobs while taking care of her daughter, without the support of a father. They had also read her second book, Out on a Limb, where she described her struggles as a single mother trying to climb the corporate ladder and the risk she took in leaving a Fortune 500 company to open her own advertising and marketing firm. Akwape and Kwame had found both books quite enthralling. However, it was written by Ley Fontaine, not Leyoca Novak.
Akwape looked at Leyoca with a new sense of respect. Then she surprised Leyoca by announcing that she herself was an author. She had written several books on the Ghanaian culture and the role of the midwife in the local villages. She had been a midwife for many years before her husband's work forced her to travel. The books were published and circulated only in Ghana, and she was interested in expanding the readership to America.
The initial tension out of the way, both families were talking and laughing like lifelong friends. Kwabena looked at Tamara across the table and smiled. Tamara smiled back triumphantly. They had done the impossible. They had tamed the most dominant women in their lives and made them friends with each other.
As Tamara looked around the table at everyone getting along amicably, she sighed. If only this were a real marriage, it would be perfect.
Thanksgiving Day rolled around quickly. It was one of those upside down days, mild and pleasant in the morning but cold and harsh in the evening. A clipper system was moving through the Northeast, with blizzardlike conditions in Pennsylvania, New York and points north. To the south, where Tamara lived, rain was expected.
Everyone gathered for Thanksgiving dinner at Tamara's home. In addition to Tamara's folks and Kwabena's parents, Kwabena had invited Mike Botanga and his family, Christopher Ngala, and Edebe, his wife and teenage daughters. Afie and her husband, recently back from their honeymoon, were spending the day with them. Jordan and his brood along with Tamara's cousins and aunt were also joining them this year.
The first to arrive was Ebony, and she brought a guest. It was the same guy who had been sitting in the car the night of the gala when she asked Tamara to babysit. She introduced him as her boyfriend, Rashid, then announced to Tamara with a wink, "The kids are sleeping over tonight."
"But Mommy and Carl are in their room," Tamara protested.
"No sweat. They can't wait to try out their new Dora and BRATZ sleeping bags." Kayla and Katanya entered just then, lugging what looked like duffel bags.
Darlene and Leticia arrived not too long after. Darlene brought a bottle of wine and whispered in Tamara's ear while handing it to her, "That little incident with your husband last month-water under the bridge." Tamara nodded in agreement. She was too happy to hold grudges.
Leticia brought her famed garlic mashed potatoes. According to Leyoca, there was enough garlic in it to kill a vampire.
A little after two, Tamara removed the turkey and basted it. Darlene came into the kitchen just as the doorbell rang.
"Can you put this back in for me? I need to fulfill my role as hostess," Tamara said and rushed to get the door.
Tarnara opened the door to Christopher Ngala, holding a large pitcher of red punch covered with Saran wrap. He greeted her with a one-armed hug, the other carefully holding the pitcher. "Don't forget, you owe me a dance off at the next party we have," he teased.
"I'll remember that," Tamara laughed. She looked up and saw Mike Botanga and his family walking up the driveway. She said to Christopher, "The kitchen is to your left. Just place the drink in there."
Kwabena guided Christopher to the kitchen. Darlene had just closed the oven door and stepped away when she collided into him. The drink spilled, soaking Darlene's sweater.
"Oh no!" Darlene squealed, looking down at the deep red stain in her sweater.
"Oh, I'm so sorry," he apologized, grabbing a napkin and trying to wipe the stain from her sweater.
"I'll get towels," Kwabena offered as Darlene slipped on the wet floor. She fell right into Christopher's waiting arms. "Damn!" she exclaimed.
They were both standing in a slippery puddle of bloodred drink, hugging each other, soaked to their skin. They looked at each other and laughed.
Kwabena reentered the kitchen with towels as Darlene went in search of a mop. Without taking his eyes off Darlene's retreating back, Christopher said to Kwabena, "Do you believe in love at first sight?"
Kwabena took one look at him and said, "Man,
you've got it bad."
Christopher smiled and responded dreamily, "I think I've just met the most wonderful woman to walk this earth."
Kwabena just smiled. "You can borrow one of my shirts."
By three o'clock, everyone exceptJordan had arrived. It was snowing lightly. The weather pattern had changed and instead of rain, they were getting snow; a light dusting to an inch, according to the weatherman.
While the kids played and the men watched television, Akwape, Aunt Leticia, Mrs. Edebe and Mrs. Botanga had taken over the kitchen. Every now and then, Kwabena entered the kitchen, trying to help with something, but he was promptly shooed out by his mother, who stood to her policy that the kitchen was no place for a man.
Around five-thirty, Jordan and his family finally arrived, late as usual. When Tamara opened the door, she was surprised to see the amount of snow that had already accumulated outside. The wind swirled the flakes violently, howling loudly. She couldn't see as far as the neighbor's house across the street. Jordan shooed the kids inside behind Becky, then ran back into the swirling white snow to the car. He returned with a bundle of blankets and comforters. Dusting off the snow he announced, "I brought two airbeds, some extra blankets and a few snow shovels. Nobody's going anywhere tonight. The blizzard that was supposed to hit Pennsylvania just decided to pay us a visit."
Jordan's kids promptly joined the five other children, and Becky joined the ladies in the kitchen, leaving Jordan to watch the game with the men. With the exception of the turkey and stuffing prepared by Tamara and Aunt Leticia's mashed potatoes, there was nothing traditional about this meal. Akwape, Mrs. Edebe and Mrs. Botanga prepared a variety of African dishes. Becky brought jerk pork and fried plantains.
Just before they announced dinner, Akwape went downstairs to shower and change. Leyoca was in the dining room setting the table. Tamara stayed in the kitchen, putting the final garnishes on the turkey. Just then Kwabena entered and tried to grab the turkey neck. Tamara promptly slapped his hand. He whispered in her ear, and she laughed. He hugged her from behind and stole a quick kiss, certain no one was looking.