Across the room, Grace straightened her lips, removing the smile from her face. Monique looked pretty satisfied too.
“I’ll give you a quiz grade for that answer, Sean.” I looked at the clock. “One more. It’s open to everybody. Achebe based his title on what famous poem?” I had them now. Only Monique would know it, if even she did.
Sean’s hand shot up first, followed by Monique’s. This was priceless. I nodded to Sean, rooting for him to get it right despite our past problems.
“The Second Coming by Yeats. William Butler Yeats.” Sean grinned. “See? I’m not as stupid as you think.”
He had me there. Sean wasn’t stupid at all. I was. In that moment, as he stared at me defiant and triumphant, I saw all that he could be, all that I could have been, and the girl sitting behind him blurred in the edge of my vision. Monique hadn’t been here long, but his love for her had made Sean remember how to love himself. I wondered for a moment how I might have been different if Grace had shown up for the concert that day. Beyond Sean, I saw her, looking at me too, maybe somehow wondering the same thing. Not that it mattered now.
What did matter was Sean and all the boys like him in this school, in this town, in this world. I made a note to go home tonight and read my own books, take my own counsel, remember what it was I was meant to do in the world. Joyce was right—when Karyn died, when I walked away from the church, I hadn’t just stopped believing in God, I’d stopped believing in people too. I’d spent much of my career trying to save black boys. Maybe two of them—Quinn and Sean—had been given back to me to teach me how to believe, both in God and in man.
I pulled out two five-dollar bills and placed the first on Monique’s desk. I stepped up a row and handed the second bill to Sean. “I underestimated you.” I even smiled. “It’s a mistake I won’t make again.”
After the class let out, I had some trouble breathing. Water didn’t help. A walk in the cold outside just made it worse. Something pressed on me, squeezing, pulling . . . That same thing I’d felt at that church with Quinn. It got so bad that I did something I thought I’d never do; I asked Grace to borrow her Bible. She looked so happy I almost told her to forget it, and by the time she started in on the benefits of the different versions, I’d snatched a King James off the top of her stack and headed for the faculty lounge.
The book had a few gaps in it, secret places as Eva had called them, spots that had been read so often that the Book fell open to them without trying. I went through them all, learning more about Grace than she could ever tell me. The last time I’d held a Bible at school was to showcase it as a tool used by slave masters to keep their human property docile and civilized. I never added that, in my heart, I thought it’d been used to do the same thing to me. Eva or any of the other church people might not have meant it that way, but that’s just how it went.
I did all right letting the Bible fall open until I got to the biggest break, the spot where the binding cracked, where the page was yellow with highlighter, a page creased with pain. On top of that, she’d had the nerve to mark the spot with a ribbon. Ephesians. The bright marker showed the trail that her eyes had taken. The ink in the margins showed the journey of her soul. I dared to follow.
Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself . . .
I grabbed the arm of the sagging couch as the verse hit me. Predestined. It was a word I’d once used a lot when talking to boys, telling them that they’d been created to do great things before the foundation of the earth. And now, thinking over the word and its context, I wondered what my mother really meant if this was true. If I was meant to be adopted by Jesus anyway, did it really matter who my mama and daddy were?
Daddy? You never mention him.
My breath got thick again. I’d never put much on my father because I knew the nature of men. I’d spent my life studying them. I’d convinced myself that he hadn’t known about me, that my mother was the one who should have cared. It was she who I threw in God’s face again and again in those years, asking why God would want me when she hadn’t. I forced my eyes down again.
According to the good pleasure of his will . . .
If the first part was a blow to the head, this got me in the gut. Pleasure? Could there be anything in me that could give God pleasure? I’d pleasured a lot of women and I was a sure thing for a good interview or a quick controversy, but it was hard for me to imagine God being pleased with me.
. . . to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
I slammed the testaments shut, both Old and New. I knew that the writer, the Apostle Paul, had meant God’s grace, but when I read it I saw brown eyes and big hips—my Grace. At home on my headboard was a worn piece of embroidery that I read every morning before my feeble, tattered prayers. Now this.
As if the whole bit about adoption in God’s family wasn’t enough, they had to go and throw in something else to mess with my head, the glory of God’s grace.
And my Grace too.
Back in the office, I went at my laptop like a madman. Sweat stung my eyes. My breath was steady and her Bible was safely in her possession, but I was messed up in a bad way. No matter how many times I listed the futility in pursuing God, pursuing Grace, something told me I wasn’t going to be able to walk away. After the break-in at her place, I’d spent plenty of nights watching over Grace’s condo. More than once I’d seen Lottie driving through. Until this whole mess with her was officially over, I’d have to lay low. There were the students to think about too. They were teasing us enough as it was. One kid had gone so far as to ask if we lived together. I thought Grace was going to pass out. It was all I could do to keep from saying what I was thinking—I wish.
I don’t wish that really though, to live with her. For one, she’d never go for it. She’s old school, the marrying kind. For two, it’d be too easy for her to walk away from some live-in thing, and I wasn’t up for that.
So you’re marrying her now? What are you, nuts?
Pretty much.
During our one and only date, Grace had told me that she was looking for something at Testimony Social Services. She hadn’t said more, but from her notes in that Bible and the way we vibed, I wouldn’t have been surprised if she was adopted too. Though many of the files were now closed, my clearance with TSS—they’d given me a part-time gig since I spent so much time there—might help find what she was looking for. I wasn’t sure why, but I wanted so much to do something for her, something that had real meaning. Still, it was kind of nosy and crazy and I wasn’t sure how far to go.
“Brian?” Grace pulled me out of my thoughts.
I looked up at her, stuffing my feelings back into their cave. “Yes?”
“I’m going to run over to the cafeteria for a moment and see how things are going with the assembly this afternoon. Do you need anything?”
You.
I shook my head, looking away. Pretty soon, I wouldn’t be able to look at her at all, which worried me with Lottie running around like the school’s resident psychopath. I’d tried to talk to Joyce about it, but with what she had going against me, nobody much wanted to hear my side.
Sweat stung my eyes as I tried to think it all through, fit all the pieces together in a way that might work, but nothing was working. If I thought I’d needed God that night in the cafeteria, I knew I needed him now. A few kids with a gun seemed like nothing compared to losing Joyce, to losing everything . . .
Maybe if I found something out for Grace, she’d see how I felt without me having to show it. I listened for her boots going down the hall, then logged into the Ohio adoption database. Maybe I could find something to give her as a peace offering. Something so she’d know my true feelings even if I couldn’t act on them. If I hurried, I might have something before she returned from downstairs. The wonders of technology. I almost typed in Grace at first, but then I remembered and put in her maiden name, Diana Dixon. If she’d been adopted like I thought
, it could still be a longshot, but maybe there’d be something.
One entry found to match your criteria.
I glimpsed at the office door, still closed like she’d left it. It seemed like forever until the blue bar inched all the way across the screen. I held my breath and let it out in a fizz as the disappointing red words flashed on screen.
Locked by client. Contact Testimony Social Services.
Oh well. I could get the code, but I wouldn’t. Besides being illegal, it would break any bit of trust Grace had left in me. At the bottom of the page, in small letters was the file’s last activity and an ID code, a chain of numbers and two letters:
BM.
Birth mother.
My head fell into my hands as I remembered all the things I’d said about my mother in front of her. No wonder I’d freaked her out.
Before logging out, I clicked the date the case had been created and did a search for a couple of terms: Clark County, Black. Enter. Fifty entries flooded the screen. I skimmed the log. All births but none of them made sense.
What am I doing?
I clicked exit then, but instead of logging me out of the program, it netted me another list. One of the entries, a baby boy born in Hamilton county, stole my breath.
It can’t be.
The office door creaked open, Grace’s heels tapping to her seat. I blinded the monitor with the push of a button and pushed back from my desk, my head pounding. I pulled the plug from the wall.
She tapped my shoulder. “Ready to go down?”
“Down?”
“The assembly?”
I looked at the pages stacked in my inbox. Joyce was probably going to say things that I didn’t want to hear, like how she might not be around next year. I’d much rather stay right here. “Right.”
“Well, it’s starting. The kids are going in.”
“Sure. Let’s go.” I stood up and pushed in my chair, still trying to grasp what I’d just learned. I’d remember later thinking then that the day couldn’t get much worse. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
We entered the crowded cafeteria in silence and slipped in beside Zeely on the faculty row. Joyce stood slightly above us on a podium I’d made two years before. She looked good up there, as good as could be expected. The same sickening calm graced her face as usual, and her eyes had that same stubborn determination.
The second hand hit twelve and Joyce began to speak.
“Thank you all for coming.” She beamed at the group. “As some of you know, and others of you are learning for the first time, I am ill. In fact, I am dying.”
Way to beat around the bush.
Grace’s hand attached to my wrist with a firm, desperate grip, but her expression didn’t change. Zeely, on the other hand, looked as if she’d been hit by a truck.
Joyce unbuttoned her blazer. “Don’t look so sad, everyone. If I die tonight, I have been blessed beyond measure—”
Someone behind us started to cry. No, wail. Grace swallowed hard. Her fingernails dug into my skin. I tightened my grip on her hand, trying not to look at Lottie, a few seats down with bleary eyes, shrouded in a waterfall of braids.
Joyce lifted her hands, the way she had when we were kids. I loved to see her like that, in the pose of a loving teacher. Her eyes fastened on me as her voice welled up through the silence.
“Stand up, everybody. I want a circle of love.”
The group joined around the room. Joyce took her place inside the ring, lifting her hands like a maestro. Vulnerability clawed at me as I remembered the many times I’d done this same exercise in high school. I closed my eyes, waiting for Joyce’s questions; questions I was still trying to answer.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Imani,” we all answered.
“What is Imani?”
“Faith.” The circle captured the word.
“And what is faith?” She whispered this part, as she always had.
“Power!” The word came out of me like a blast. This time, it was me who grabbed onto Grace.
Joyce spoke again, this time in a guttural tone. “Power to—”
“Power to create, to love, to change the world.” A baritone answered from the door.
A gasp choked in my throat as the speaker, an ebony man with graying temples, approached Joyce in the center of the circle. The sound I’d swallowed came out of Grace’s mouth instead. I didn’t even want to imagine why. Instead I stared at him, trying to tell myself that it was somebody else.
It wasn’t.
It was Malachi Xavier Gooden, “X” as he’d been called back in the day. The friend who’d replaced Ron in my college days. The enemy who almost cost me everything.
Joyce looked at me one more time before welcoming the visitor openly.
“Bantu Gooden? I’ve been waiting for you. Please. Come in.”
I tried not to swallow my own tongue as X cut into the circle and stood by Joyce’s side. When she patted his hand, I almost threw up in my mouth.
“Some of you know Bantu Gooden. He was one of us not so long ago. He’s moved on to greener pastures now, but I’m thankful he’s surprised us today.”
My hand slipped from Grace’s fingers.
Joyce continued. “There have been problems this last year, as you all know. Problems I can’t fix.” She lifted her head. “But God can. Dr. Mayfield will serve in my absence for the duration of the term. That’s all for now. I just wanted you all to know why I might not be around as much in the weeks to come.”
Grace looked away, probably searching for Zeely, who was halfslumped onto Jerry’s shoulder at the end of the row. I felt Zee’s pain. Mal’s presence was just an added blow, like a brick through the window of a burning house.
Overkill.
I stood my ground as X—Dr. Gooden was how people knew him now, we’d met before professionally with less-than-stellar results— approached, burning my nose with his stinky, cheap cologne. He had the nerve to be smiling. I wasn’t.
“What are you doing here?” I had to know if Joyce had asked him or if he’d tricked her too.
“Just taking care of my people, that’s all.” He leaned over and kissed Grace’s hand.
God was real, I knew that then because I didn’t punch him in the mouth.
Grace looked like she wanted to do it for me. “Mal? You—you never mentioned coming. Why didn’t you tell me?”
That was it. I wedged my body between them, turning to Grace instead of him. “He didn’t want you to know. That’s how hustlers run their games.”
Grace looked like the toothpaste at the bottom of the tube. Squished. She looked as horrified to see that we knew one another as I was to see that the two of them had some connection. Was this the fool she’d told me about at dinner? The one who she’d been engaged to but who couldn’t make up his mind?
That figures.
Mal touched one of my locks. I slowly, carefully, removed it from his hands and knotted it at the end. I’d trim that tip off when I got home. Maybe the whole thing.
He laughed with that irritating laugh of his. “Well, I see you haven’t cut that mess off your head yet. I knew they’d get tired of you at Oh-State sometime. They finally realized that even when you paint trash gold, it’s still trash.”
I smirked, thumping the clergy pin on his lapel. “You should know.”
48
Grace
When it was my turn, they said I was too far along, that it’d take two days to kill the baby. Even Mom couldn’t bear the thought of that. I wasn’t going to do it anyway. Like Daddy always says, things will work out. Somehow.
Diana Dixon
Brian thundered away, leaving me alone with my ex and an audience of empty chairs. Mal and Brian not only knew each other but knew each other well. Something had strained their relationship, something that neither of them wanted me to know about. I found this quite interesting since Mal had seemed so concerned about my past.
My former beau touched my elbow and plastered a sm
ile over his angry look from his conversation with Brian. “Don’t look at me like that. I’ll explain everything.”
Right. “I’m all ears.”
His smile collapsed. “Not now. I’ve got to hit the road to make it back for youth revival. Soon, okay? I’ll ride over early and drive you home—”
This again? “This is my home.”
“Right. I’ll drive you back to Cincinnati. We’ll have a picnic at the zoo after church, just like old times.”
“I don’t think so.”
As he turned, I saw something hanging from the chain on his neck. A ring. Our ring. In the confusion before, I hadn’t noticed it. I wished I hadn’t now. “It’s good to see you too, Mal, but as far as that date, I don’t think so.”
He gave my cheek a lingering kiss. “No strings. Just talking. Aren’t we still friends?”
Friendship had never seemed so dangerous until I moved here. “I guess.”
After giving me a satisfied look, Mal left as quickly as he’d come. I stood in the empty cafeteria wringing my hands, trying not to think about the Cincinnati Zoo. The butterfly garden would be long out of bloom by now. After our Sunday picnics, I’d often returned there to clear my mind, get my head on straight, especially during the “hair phase” when Mal continually indicated his displeasure over my new appearance. The blunt and blow-dried style had been born in that garden. If I went with Mal again, I had a feeling that something would die.
My hair.
I stared up at the clock. There were fifty minutes until my next class and I was late for my appointment with the scalp specialist Thelma had recommended to me. She sounded encouraging over the phone. I hoped she was as sweet in person. After this day, I felt like I needed my head examined instead of my scalp.
I looked around the examination room—at the leaning stack of magazines, at the glass container of cotton balls, even the bottle of hand wash at the sink—anywhere but at the bald-headed giant smiling in front of me. This was something the doctor might have mentioned on the phone.
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