“Mom, I am almost there. I will call you later, when I get to the hospital and find out what is going on.”
“Okay, darling. If I had known this conversation would go in this direction, I would have not brought it up. But I wanted you to know from me what was going on. I apologize from the bottom of my heart. I never knew I was hurting you so deeply. I pray you find it in your heart to forgive me.”
“I forgive you, Mother, because I know enough to know forgiveness frees the forgiver. Holding on to stuff is like drinking poison and expecting it not to have an effect on you. What I must do now is put some things in order in my own life. You made a decision for yourself to do what was best for you, not being concerned about what I would think, or anyone else for that matter. It is time I do the same thing. I cannot continue to live for the money, the cars, the houses . . . nothing. If I have to lose it all in order to gain my soul, my peace, and my happiness, then I will have gained what matters most.”
“I agree with you one hundred percent. I hate that you had to come to this conclusion on your own and that I failed as a mother to teach you such a core principle. But as I have found myself saying, late is not as bad as never. You are still young, beautiful, and you deserve all the happiness in the world. If I could reverse your sorrow and replace it with joy, I would.”
I sighed. It was not her fault. I should have taken over my life a long time ago. I should have set my own standards. I should have followed my own heart and adhered to my own set of rules and convictions. But I had followed the voice she gave to me. But now I had to find my own.
I drove into the Erlanger Hospital parking deck, was blessed enough to find a space close to the front, and I parked. Before getting out, I decided to check myself in the mirror, and just like I thought, my face reflected the quantity of tears I had cried. I reached into my purse and pulled out my M•A•C compact. I dabbed the sponge into the foundation and proceeded to mask the evidence of my anger, hurt, and frustration. I smeared a little Viva Glam V lip gloss on my lips so they would pop, and with my hands smoothed down the loose hairs that were trying to escape from my ponytail. Satisfied with my express makeover, I stepped out of the car. The banana-colored DKNY sundress I was wearing from the closet at Seth’s house made my skin look radiant. The six-inch Prada heels and sunglasses—also from the closet—matched the dress perfectly. I used to hear old people say there was no reason to look like what you had been through. Emotionally, I was harboring a national disaster, but on the outside, I looked as if I had just stepped out of June Ambrose’s fashion house.
I entered the hospital, not knowing what to expect. I would soon be laying eyes on the “other woman.” Technically, I was the “other woman,” because even though I was married, the other woman in my mind was the one who was good enough for everything but truly falling in love with. And that would be me. Nonetheless, with each step, I walked with my head held high. I had discovered so many things about myself over the past few days, and Byran was about to meet a different woman than the one he’d left balling on the kitchen floor. Oh, no, I had connected with a different part of me. As I thought about it, it was interesting how my mother and I had come, through introspection, to two different conclusions about our lives.
“Allyson,” I heard someone call.
I turned around to see a worn and weary-looking Byran coming toward me from another direction. I went to meet him, and the closer I got, the less I recognized him. I could tell he had been crying and not sleeping, as the bags under his eyes held the evidence. I hugged him, and he laid his head on my shoulder and cried some more. I could feel his burden, his pain, his guilt. I could feel the weight of his son’s death as his eyes poured his heart onto my shoulder. No words were exchanged—I expressed my condolences by holding him.
Several people walked by and offered their sympathy, and eventually I was able to guide him to a nearby chair so we could sit down.
“Thank you for coming,” he said. “All I have been able to do since they took my son away is walk up and down these halls and cry.”
I grabbed his hand. “I cannot imagine what you are feeling right now, because our baby never had the opportunity to make it as far as your son did. But I remember how empty I felt inside, because to me, that baby was still a soul.”
“That is the reason this is happening to me. I convinced you to get rid of our baby, as if I had no regard for life. God is showing me how it felt to you to have to do that. I was so selfish, Ally. I was only thinking about myself and what I wanted and what was best for me. And now look. I don’t have either child.” He dropped his head in his hands. “This has been the worst time of my life. I don’t know how I will ever be able to get over this.”
“You will. It looks bleak right now because it just happened, but time heals all wounds.”
He looked at me—almost as if he was staring through me. “There is something different about you. I can’t really pinpoint what that something is. I just know there is a difference. You even look a little different—more alive.”
“I am different. I have spent the last few days reflecting inwardly. I found out some things I do not like about myself, as well as some things that I do.” I squeezed his hand. “But we are not here to talk about me. This is about you. Other than the unbearable pain I know you must feel, how are you holding up? Have you been eating?”
“Not really. This cafeteria food sucks. But I was too afraid to leave and go get something for fear of something happening.”
“I will go and get you something. What is the next step? Are you all going to do a memorial here, transport the baby back to Atlanta, or what?”
“I want to have him transported back to Atlanta, but she wants to cremate him here and take his ashes back. However, I cannot fathom burning my baby.”
But you can fathom having me suck up one through a vacuum? I tried to dismiss that thought.
“I see. So what are you going to do?”
“I have not made a final decision. I am going to wait until she is a little stronger—maybe tomorrow—before I try to convince her to make a decision. I just broke the news to her right before you came. She woke up asking about him, so I had to tell her.”
“No mother wants to outlive her child.”
A short older woman wearing a white jacket came toward us. Her tag read NANCY.
“Mr. Ward, Ms. Pace is asking for you.”
“Thank you, Nancy. I will be right there,” Byran told her.
“I will go and get your food while you go find out what’s going on,” I said.
Just as he was about to answer, I looked up to see a couple coming toward us.
“Byran,” the woman called.
He stood up and hugged her. While the two of them embraced, the man who was accompanying her extended his hand and introduced himself.
“Hello. My name is Andre Pace, and this is my wife, Dorothy. We are Shatrice’s parents.”
Shatrice? Where have I heard that name before?
I, in turn, extended my hand to shake his. “I’m Allyson Ward.”
“We know who you are,” Dorothy said.
“Darling, let’s not allow the nature of this situation cause us to lose our cool,” Andre replied. “Nothing that has happened is this young lady’s fault.”
“Humph. If she had never forced Byran to marry her, he could have been with Shatrice, and my grandbaby would be alive right now. The stress of this all has killed my grandson and is trying to take my daughter, too.”
Who is Shatrice? I forced Byran to marry me?
I turned to Byran, because I was certain at any moment he was going to come to my defense. But he stood quietly, hands in his pockets, not even attempting to correct this woman. I was forced to defend myself.
“Ma’am, I am not sure what you are talking about, but I did not force anyone to marry me.”
“Yes, you did. Shatrice told me the whole story. Byran, please tell me that you did not have her around my grandson.”
; “She just got here, Mom,” Byran said.
Mom?
“Anybody want to fill me in on what is going on?” I turned to Byran. “Who is Shatrice? Why does that name sound so familiar to me? And what is this lady talking about?”
“Excuse me for a minute, Mom and Pop,” Byran said, grabbing my hand and pulling me from the chair. “I will be right back.”
“What the hell is going on?” I snapped.
“Those are Shatrice’s parents.”
“And who the hell is Shatrice?”
“Remember that day you came home from the abortion clinic and . . .”
Before he could finish his statement, I reached back as far as I could, with as much strength as I could muster up, and I slapped him. For it dawned on me that this woman, Shatrice, was the woman who had come out of my house that day, whom he had claimed was a relative. But I thought his baby’s mom’s name was Leah?
“You led me to believe your baby’s mother was a woman by the name of Leah,” I shouted. “You are one sorry bastard.”
He was a low-down excuse for a man, and he deserved whoever was crazy enough to be with him. But crazy had occupied me long enough. No longer would I continue to live in bondage for the sake of a dollar. I would not care if I had to go and live in a shelter. At least there I would be free.
I was done.
I’d had enough.
Taken all I could take.
He could have it all.
I wanted one thing.
Out.
Chapter Eighteen
“Girl, where have you been? Ever since you got married a year ago to that big-time pastor husband of yours, you act like you don’t know a sista no more,” said my childhood friend Kristal Howard.
“You know how it is when you get married and you assume the role of a wife—especially the wife of a pastor. You become too busy to hang out. Plus, Byran and my mom have this thing about married women hanging out with single women.”
“Seem like to me that don’t matter, because you still about to get a divorce and you have not been hanging with me.”
Kristal and I had spent the last couple of hours outside discussing the happenings of my life. It had been almost two weeks since the episode with Byran at the hospital. He’d gone to church the following Sunday and announced he would be taking a couple of weeks off, which was all the better for me because I did not want to go near the church, neither did I want to be near him. He had come to the house and gotten a few of his things, and I had not heard from him or seen him since.
“So, this agreement y’all have . . . how are you going to get out of it?”
“Well,” I said, “I have been looking at the details of the contract, and I cannot imagine what I must have been thinking at the time I signed it and so—”
“I know exactly what you were thinking,” Kristal interrupted. “Racks, on racks, on raaaaacks,” she joked. “I would have been thinking the same thing. If a man came up to me today, tells me all I have to do is accompany him to events, give him sex and sexy pictures when he wants them, girl, I would scream a yes to him too. Trust me, you do not have to worry about explaining anything to me, because where I am from—the hood—what you did is what we call ‘come up.’”
“The come up?”
“Girl, yes. The come up.”
“I do not even want to hear an elaboration on that, so I will just leave that alone,” I said and laughed. “As I was saying, the only thing in my contract that gives me an out without me having to get up in front of people and embarrass myself by admitting to some sort of infidelity is—”
She interrupted again. “What about his infidelity?”
“Can’t prove it. I have no solid evidence, and when the baby died, so did my living proof.”
“Just get up and tell people that you want a divorce. If you put it on yourself, then it wouldn’t make him look bad.”
“To him it is worse, because it is going to appear he did something to me or that he did not know how to be a good husband.”
“He did, and he doesn’t,” she shouted.
“Yeah, but to stand up and say I want to divorce him without giving an explanation is along the lines of defamation of character because of what he does. The church will then begin to scrutinize everything he does. Right now they are lenient because those in leadership who are married with families understand the dynamic of the balancing act. Although he was spending most of his spare time with Shatrice, in their minds he has been taking the past year to get established as a new husband.”
“Yet he was laying up, playing house with another woman.” She sucked her teeth. “These pastors are something else, child. I hope I don’t end up with one, because I will be redefining the role of what it means to be a first lady. Honey, I would be up in that church, setting things straight, and if he wanted to act a fool on me, I would show him how big of a fool I was.”
I laughed hysterically at her because I could envision her tussling with the men snatchers in the church if she thought one was after her husband. She was a true size eighteen, wore micro braids, had long fingernails, and sported gold rings on every finger. I would pay big money to see a showdown between her and one of the deacons or mothers in the church.
“You are laughing, but I am serious,” she continued. “You need to let me beat some good sense into Byran. He might not be in love with you, but he would definitely be letting you up out of this contract, and not empty handed. He owes you for taking up all this time in your life when you could have been with someone who actually loves you. I better not see that nucca in the street nowhere.”
“First of all, I will pray without ceasing that God does not ever allow you to become the wife of a pastor.” I laughed. “Because you would not last a day. Secondly, all pastors are not like Byran. Some are really in it for the right reasons. Byran saw an opportunity to advance, and he took it. Truth is, I did too. I should have cared more about God’s people than to go along with him in some foolishness like this. I believe there are many pastors who actually care about what they are doing for God, and regardless of my situation, I believe not all of them are cheating on their wives.” I sipped my lemonade. “I just happened to get a bad one from the litter.”
“That is one of the reasons I don’t go to church and instead sit at home and watch one of those TV pastors.”
“Kristal, there is no such thing as a TV pastor. They are pastors who have a broadcast on TV,” I said, shaking my head.
“Whatever. When you attend TV church, you don’t have to worry about all of that drama.”
“Whose broadcast do you watch?”
“Several of them. Girl, I dedicate my church hours to the Lord every Sunday.”
“Church hours?”
“Yeah, like business hours, I have church hours. No matter what comes up, everybody knows not to bother me during church hours. I get up, make my coffee, and I start tuning in around seven o’clock. I catch Bishop I. V. Hilliard out of Houston, Bishop Jakes, and on the Sundays I need to figure out how to make some money, I watch Creflo Dollar so his wealth anointing will flow through the screen and fall on me.” This girl was hilarious. “Then I have a little praise and worship with Bobby Jones Gospel, and I finish with Lift Every Voice with Cory Condrey—CoCo Brother, Jesus baby!”
I almost fell out of my chair when she said that. She sounded just like the people on Cory’s Atlanta-based radio show who sang the jingle when he was on in the evenings.
“Sounds like you have your, um, church hours down to a science.”
“Oh, yes, honey. I have to get my praise on. I figured out a long time ago that you can do a lot of things, but one thing you cannot do is make it without the Lord.”
It was sad that my friend knew this and I was just learning it. Here I was, married to a pastor, but I had never seen the benefit of, nor did I know the importance of, having my own relationship with the Lord. As the days drifted by, I was beginning to see why everyone needed to know the Lord.
&
nbsp; “I am learning that very thing.”
“Trouble is the best teacher.”
“Indeed it is.”
“We have to figure out how to get you out of this contract. Are you sure that is what you want? You don’t want to try to make it work? What if he gets rid of Shatrice?”
“He can keep her, get rid of her . . . not my concern. I know I deserve better, and it is more than he can offer. He can offer me all the things money can buy, but he has no clue about the things money can’t afford. Because what I want is priceless.”
“I hear you, girlfriend.”
“Besides, you cannot change the nature or the heart of a person. Only God can do that. And to be honest, I am not sure if he even talks to God except on Wednesdays and Sundays, when it is time for him to preach. I never paid attention to this, but we have never prayed together. We don’t have conversations about the Lord outside of church. Is that not strange for a pastor?”
“I would say that it is. But maybe he just wanted a reprieve from church when he got home.”
“A reprieve from church, yes. But a reprieve from God too? I am not saying that because I have had a spiritual awakening over the past couple of weeks, I know everything there is to know about God. All I am saying is, any man of God should have a relationship with Him every day of the week and not just the days you go to church. And the relationship should carry on into your household. I read over in the New Testament that a man needs to be able to rule his own house before he can rule the house of God, which in my opinion, starts with total submission to God. And this house was not submitted in the first place.”
Kristal stared at me as if I was growing a second head.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” I asked.
“I am amazed at what you are speaking. I have known you for many years, and I have never known you to talk about God this much. A change truly has come over you.”
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