He looked different now with a ’fro instead of locks. He’d grown some too. Sometimes I’d wondered if I hadn’t made him up altogether. But now he was here, leaning close, kissing my hair.
“Doll, is it you? What happened? I lost my phone. My mom went loco about the MySpace. You look so good . . . Why did you run away from me?”
I looked up front at Zeely and my father, thankful for once that his attention was occupied. My hand pressed against his, a feeble attempt to stop him from caressing my shoulder. My fingers found my lap again. There was no use.
He’d found me.
41
Grace
I talked to the baby today. I told her I was sorry for trying to kill her. I think she understood. It’s a girl, I think, but I hope I’m wrong. Being a girl is a difficult thing. Men don’t have to think so hard. Or at least I don’t think so, although Daddy thinks too much. I told her to just keep quiet and try not to get too big while I try and think of something.
Diana Dixon
“Who was that girl with Jerry in the hall?” I loaded salad onto my fork, staring at the baby in a travel crib next to Thelma. She had beautiful eyes, that little girl.
Zeely nibbled on a french fry. “That was his daughter, Monique.”
“She’s striking. And so tall. She could model easy.”
My friend pointed a potato stick toward the baby. “She’s his too.”
“Wow. Such cute kids.”
“You act surprised. It’s not like he’s ugly.”
It’s not like he’s cute. “No, but I wouldn’t have expected those girls to be his.”
Zeely shrugged. “They look like him to me.”
“I guess.” I opened another pack of salad dressing, immediately wishing I’d brought my own from home. I puckered.
“Nasty?”
“Too much vinegar.”
“Want some of mine?” Zeely pushed her cheeseburger across the table.
“No thanks.” Zeely’s size six cheeseburgers would become solid fat on me. “Let me ask you something.”
“Shoot.”
“A guy left a message last night. A lawyer. Brian’s brother? Maybe he said friend. Ron Jenkins. Do you know him? He sounded . . .”
“White?” Zeely pinched off a piece of the sandwich. She bit half and put the other part back on the plate.
I pulled down my bottom lip. White. Did my old college roommate describe me as black? Or Kim, my old prayer partner from church? What about Jackie, my neighbor before I moved away? I looked over at Zeely, a darker version of all three women—they had the same personality, painfully blunt. Would my friends say I was black? Absolutely. “Yes, he sounded white.”
“He is.” Zeely picked up the whole burger this time and took a bite.
A trail of vinaigrette dripped onto my shirt. I thought of the picture in my drawer, the one I’d seen this morning. “Is he the redhead in the graduation picture? Between you and Brian?”
“Yep. That’s Red.”
“Red? I remember you talking about him, but I just didn’t see him as . . .”
“White?” Zeely laughed this time.
“Yes, that. Real light skinned maybe. Light enough to make you wonder. Like Joyce.”
Now Zeely seemed irritated. “So now that you know, does it change anything? Does it matter?”
“Not to me. It must matter to you though.”
Zeely sat up straight. “Why do you say that?”
I dabbed my shirt. “Because you never mentioned it before.”
42
Ron
“Good afternoon, sir.”
“Hello, Dee. How are you?”
I couldn’t help but smile as the coat checker reached for my coat at the Sterling Club. No matter how many times I came here, my best times were usually spent as I checked in my coat. I pushed past the woman’s outstretched hand and hung my coat on the first hanger.
She looked around, both worried and delighted. “Here’s your ticket, Mr. Jenkins. And please stop hanging up your coat, you’re going to get us both in trouble.”
The things I’d looked down on from my window lately played through my mind. It pained me that of all things in town for anyone to worry about, they would waste their concern on whether a grown man hung up his own clothes. “Okay, I’ll tell you what. Next time I’m here, I’ll come in and toss my coat on your head and storm to my seat. How’s that?”
She shook her head. “We’ll both get fired. They’ll know you’re fooling. And when I don’t sling it back at you, they’ll know I’m fooling too. You know I don’t mind what you do, but I have to be careful. You should too. They already think . . .” Her voice faded as she rearranged my jacket on the hanger, just for effect.
Considering that what seemed frivolous and even enjoyable to me might cost Dee a much needed job, I apologized. I knew what people at the club thought of me. The trick of it was that they had no idea what I thought of them. I stepped away, whispering something Dee already knew—that I’d much rather have had lunch with her than any of them.
Except Mindy, of course.
Of course.
Dee patted her salt-and-peppered afro and said she understood but I should try and have a nice lunch anyway. Eat something. Said that she’d told the fellas in the back to put a little twist on my plate: sweet potatoes instead of white, hot sauce hidden in my greens, and cornbread instead of yellow cake. Most of all, she said, I should smile. Mindy looked to be in a good mood.
I doubted that, but thanked her anyway and passed the maître d’ to Mindy’s table—soon to be our table. I couldn’t help thinking of Brian as I approached. He’d sop this place up like butter, both reviling its luxury and reveling in it at the same time. Though he wasn’t going to church anymore, Brian still had something honest at the core of him. Something true. My life had turned into one big lie.
“On time? That’s a first.” Mindy stood to greet me. I didn’t realize until she rested her hand on my arm that my whole body had tensed in preparation for a barrage of kisses or some unexpected spit in my ear.
I’d seen her briefly at the office, but she looked different now, both better and worse. Her face seemed radiant, but her eyes were streaked red, cried wide. I tipped her chin up. “Getting enough sleep?”
She sniffed and not from a cold. “You know how it goes, surfing the Net for research and next thing you know it’s 2 a.m. No sleep, Min weeps.” She offered a weak smile.
I’d come to say something today, to do something, to try to be honest and true. Mindy’s tears hadn’t been part of the equation. I could deal with a lot of things, but watching a woman cry wasn’t one of them. Still, if I didn’t speak up now, there’d be a lot more tears in the years to come. It was now or never. “I need to talk to you about something.”
My intended waved for the waiter. She gripped her elbows and leaned forward, pushing the tablecloth out of place. If I’d heard something at church, it wasn’t true, she said. People could be so jealous. Didn’t I know that? Didn’t I love her?
Before I could answer, the waiter arrived with sparkling cider. Astute enough to sense the tension, he suggested house salads and moved quickly away. I wanted to tell him to wait for me, but there could be no more running. This was it.
I rolled back the foil and popped the cork on the chilled cider, commenting again at how much the bottle looked like champagne.
Mindy sighed. “I wish it was.”
“Why?”
Her eyes looked even redder than before. Wetter. “To celebrate us and whatever good news you have to tell me.”
She wasn’t going to let me off easy. No way. “You don’t know what I want to talk about. What if it isn’t something to celebrate?” There was no sense in boosting her hopes. This was a day of reckoning. Mindy pushed back the cuff of my shirt and rubbed my wrist with her thumb, in small circles. “I guess I was hoping you’d say that you’ve changed your mind about that silly case. I know Daddy wants to take it, but it’s all wrong for you an
d for your career.”
My career? I had no idea she’d been pondering it so closely. Interesting. I also had no idea that her father had told her about the case at all. I let her know as much.
She said that he’d let her know and that at first he’d been excited at the opportunity to do justice for a gifted member of the community. “Lately, though, he says you’ve been distracted and perhaps you’re too close to the case to do a good job. He thinks it could be a mistake in the long run, especially if you damaged your ethical reputation. He explained it all to me.”
So that she could explain it all to me, no doubt. “There’s a lot involved, I admit. I’m praying about it. I want to do my best for the client, and yes, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have some concern for my brother too.”
She pushed back from the table then, all diamonds and teeth. “He’s not your brother, okay? Please give that a rest. That’s the other thing Daddy wanted me to talk to you about. I know you had a rough childhood, but if you want to move up, you’re going to have to move on. Like it or not, there’s still a color line in this town, and your friends are on the other side of it. You’re a lawyer now, not some trailer trash in the ’hood.”
I hadn’t known before then that it was possible to choke on water. Probably went down the wrong pipe when I opened my mouth so wide. My eyes went pretty big too. For several seconds, I said nothing, gasping for breath instead. The waiter, who’d been always nearby, but never close exactly, asked if I needed a doctor.
I shook my head, thinking of all the times in my life when I’d needed a doctor but hadn’t been able to afford one or get to one. Instead, I took light shallow breaths and deep, silent prayers. As my pulse slowed, words came. “So I’m supposed to move on, huh? To what? You?”
She twirled the carat solitaire in her left ear. “Yes, move on to me. To us. Our children.”
We hadn’t ordered yet, but my plate arrived when the waiter brought the salad. It smelled right on time. I gave the guy a nod and a fat tip. “Can you box that for me?”
Mindy looked horrified. “This isn’t some chicken shack. Are you kidding me?”
I wasn’t. The waiter grinned from ear to ear. “I’ll be right back with it.”
Good. I hoped he did come right back, because what I had to do now, say now, wouldn’t take long. Even though this would hurt her, going on like this would hurt her more. I took both her hands in mine and willed myself not to get my coat and walk out without another word.
I’d done it before.
She didn’t resist my touch.
“Melinda, we won’t be having a family. I came here to ask you to postpone the wedding, but you’ve cleared up everything for me. The wedding is off.”
“You can’t do this to me.” She dragged her hands to her lap and stared down at her engagement ring.
Amazing. “Keep it.”
Mindy shook so hard even her spritz-stiff hair moved. A bead of sweat ran down her face. “You think it’s this easy? You think you can put me down and go back to your little ghetto life? I’ll destroy you. And them. You’ll never practice law in this state again.” Desperation seeped through the cracks in her voice.
I started laughing. “No more law? Good. I’m pretty sick of it.”
Mindy picked up her fork. She was in a composed rage now, stabbing at her spinach, chasing down tomatoes to skewer them too. “You’re a fool. You’re not one of them. You’ll always be outside. You told me how things changed in college when they could go to their all-black schools and clubs. How they told you to go back to your own. They don’t love you. None of them. Especially not that Zoë or whatever her name is.”
Maybe not, but I planned to find out. The waiter returned with a Styrofoam container with a Wet-Nap and a plastic fork. He offered to get me a Coke too, but I shook my head, stood, and put my napkin down lightly lest I dive across the table and strangle Mindy with it. There was nothing worse than giving yourself to someone and having them beat you up with your own stuff. Maybe she was right, maybe Brian or Zeely hadn’t really loved me. If not, then they were in good company, because Mindy certainly hadn’t loved me. Of that much, I was certain.
On the way out, I did not reach over the counter to get my coat. I held out my ticket instead. Dee took my number and gave me my jacket before handing me a card of her own:
Mount Olive Missionary Baptist Church. Where Everybody Is Somebody and Jesus Makes the Difference.
“Stop by some Sunday,” she said.
I grinned, forcing my arms through the sleeves one at a time so I could hold on to my lunch. “Don’t be surprised if I show up sometime. Don’t be surprised at all.”
43
Mindy
My reflection in the ice bucket reminded me of day-old bread; stiff and pasty. My resolve felt much the same. I’d gambled everything and pushed Ron too hard and now all these months of preparation were gone when I needed them most. I needed a place to go now, a place to hide, and my last chance had just walked out the door. And I knew from the look on his face that he wouldn’t be coming back.
And now, I had to play my last card.
The Joker.
I took the bottle of cider Ron had opened and started toward the car. The club would bill everything to Daddy’s account anyway. Once outside, I reached into the pocket of my knee-length mink and pressed 1 as I pulled out my phone. It only rang once before someone picked up.
“Daniel? It’s me.”
There was laughter on the line. Cold, mocking laughter. “Why, Melinda, I’m surprised. Booty calls so early in the day? Your daddy will know something’s up when you can’t walk at dinner.”
I squeezed through cars in the parking lot. Probing eyes. If only it wasn’t day. Too many people my father knew had seen what happened at lunch, had watched me walk to the car. Daniel’s sarcasm just made it worse. I knew Daddy had said horrible things to run him off. Terrible things. Still, I needed him to hear me. This wasn’t a joke.
“I need to talk to you.”
“About what? You know we talk best without words.”
At my car now, I climbed inside and locked the door, lowered my mouth so that no one could read my dry, cracked lips. “I’m pregnant.”
He didn’t laugh, but the silence was worse.
“So why you telling me? Tell your preacher man. I’m sure he’ll be thrilled.”
“It’s not his. He’s celibate. We never—” My Corvette seemed to close in on me. There wasn’t enough room. I didn’t have enough words.
Daniel was out of character now, sounding a little like he had two years ago, before Daddy found out about us. There was a small melody in Daniel’s voice when he was hurting, imperceptible if you didn’t know him well. “Get real, Mindy. You, go without? Not even for your little choirboy. You kept going until you broke me down.”
The cider went down easy, both warm and cool somehow. “Danny, please, don’t be like that. You know I’ve only been with you. Ever.”
“Right. That’s all I’m good for. Not good enough to be with you in the daytime. Or meet your friends. But you think a baby can change all that, huh?”
I dare to hope so.
“What can Daddy do now? He’s against abortion. He’ll have to accept this. It isn’t how I wanted to do it, but maybe this is the only way.”
The only way left now. Ron’s face, so calm and strong an hour earlier, seemed fixed in my mind. He could have gone through, given both of us an easy way out, but he hadn’t. He’d chosen love. He’d chosen Zeely. I wanted to hate him for that, for being strong enough to choose her, but I couldn’t. Somewhere, under all the hurt, I was proud of him. “I’m sorry I let my father hurt you. Hurt us. I’m sorry I didn’t take your side. I’m ready to do that, to make it be about our family. Let’s get married. Today.”
“Too late, Mindy. I told you when you started coming around again not to expect anything from me. I’m through with God and I’m through with you.”
“Don’t say that. Please. Maybe God
is in this somehow, even in our mess. My father won’t deny his own flesh and blood. He can’t.” I didn’t sound very confident despite my sure words.
Daniel really laughed then, almost split my soul in two. He said that maybe one day when I was pushing a little black boy down the street and someone crossed their white daughter to the other side, maybe I’d understand. He’d do anything for the baby, even raise it if I wanted to keep my safe, white life, but as for my father and I, we could both go to the same place he was headed—hell.
The phone clicked in my ear. I rolled down the window and screamed, no longer caring who could hear. With my last bit of energy, I tossed the cider out the window, closing my eyes just in time when it returned to me as a shower of sweet, sharp glass. I dropped back in my seat, too numb to cry.
There’d be no celebrations now.
Not ever.
44
Grace
Fall’s first freeze crunched under my feet, leaving green footprints on my white, sparkling yard. Zeely had offered me a ride this morning, and for once I was going to take it. She’d called a few minutes before, saying she’d be down as soon as she got her dinner in the crock pot. Me, I couldn’t even figure out what I was having for breakfast. That woman should be a Girl Scout leader.
While I didn’t have dinner settled on, I used the time to check on my latest garden experiment—summer bulbs fooled into blooming out of season. The gardener on TV had insisted that getting plants to bloom when and where they were planted wasn’t easy. Considering how many times I had done it myself, I figured it couldn’t hurt to try.
I was wrong, of course. I’d picked daffodils, of all things, and buried them in my side yard. The TV gardener had advised keeping the bulbs at a constant forty degrees with plenty of moisture. The numbness in my toes read forty and falling. The ground felt like an icy rock. When I turned on the hose, water spurted out of it. Since it wasn’t frozen, I figured the daffodils and I had a chance. I hoped so. I could use some color in all this cold.
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