“I said what are y’all doing here? Don’t y’all have a church of your own to go to this morning? Don’t know why you-all are out here all up in my business—and uninvited, I might add.”
“Well, Bertha Kaye,” Phoebe said, “we certainly do have our own church. But the question is, do you have a church of your own to go to? ’Cause this place certainly don’t look like anywhere I’d go looking for someone like you, Cuz. So we came to find out why you’re here.”
“And because my daddy sent you.”
“Well,” Phoebe said, “what did you expect when he found out that you sashayed your big, wide butt out of a perfectly good church to come here?”
Bertha didn’t want to deal with the biting truth of Phoebe’s words. Trying to ignore the conviction in her heart, she lifted her hands up in praise mode and said, “Our church is one of acceptance and love. We give to You, O majestic Lord, the misguided sheep of the world.”
“You trippin’, Bertha Kaye,” Phoebe huffed, not caring one bit about Big Missy and the others studying them like monkeys in a zoo.
Mr. Louis Loomis, who was growing tired of the stares, turned to the crowd and said, “This is an A and B conversation—so C your way out of it.”
Most of the onlookers started drifting away, but Big Missy and another woman decided to stand their ground. Big Missy said, “You people have no respect for anything, let alone God’s own house.”
Mr. Louis Loomis could see straight through this woman. He knew her type, black or white, red or green. She reminded him of Cleavon Johnson’s mother, Vernine—all wrapped up in religion and just as mean and rude, nasty and ungodly-acting as can be. He said, “What would you know about how to act in God’s house, holding on to the devil’s hand like he your date?”
Big Missy turned on her heel and marched off, indignant over that old man’s practically calling her a heathen.
Bertha herself kind of wished that her fellow members would just go away. She knew that her people didn’t like this church, and she also knew that all four of them—Mr. Louis Loomis, Miss Sheba, Phoebe, and Melvin Jr.—loved a good fight. What better place for fight-loving people to be than here, where it would be easy to provoke a confrontation?
So she tried another, more peacemaking reproach. Smiling broadly, she said, “As much as I love you all, my sisters and brothers in the Lord—”
“Help her, Jesus,” Mr. Louis Loomis prayed, hoping to cut off having to listen to nonsense. But Bertha was persistent. “I have to speak the truth. And the truth is that my old church, your church, has not transcended the muck and mire of wanting to keep the Body of the Lord segregated and separate. Gethsemane is a black church. And my church simply wants to be called ‘church.’”
Sheba had to catch herself from popping “Girl, please” out of her mouth. Instead, she said, “Bertha Kaye, I think I speak for us all when I say that I like being a member of a black church. If a black church was good enough for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., it’s show ’nough good enough for me.”
Bertha knew she couldn’t counter that, but she wasn’t giving up without a try. Giving Sheba a dry-toast smile, she said, “Despite our obvious style differences, we shouldn’t fight with each other.”
When no one replied, she smiled a bit more brightly and added, “Come on, let me show you-all our bookstore—something few all-black churches have.”
Phoebe sniffed in disgust, thinking that cut was a very low blow.
As Bertha led them down the corridor to the bookstore, Phoebe pointed to a large oil painting on the wall and asked, “Who is that?”
“Pastor Lyles. I think the portrait does him more justice than the TV.”
“It does?” Phoebe said, studying the image of a bland-looking man with hard gray eyes.
“Yes,” Bertha replied.
“Pity,” Phoebe murmured. Rev. Lyles would have blended right into the background of the picture had he not been wearing a rich black silk robe, trimmed with the most beautiful silver material she had ever seen.
“Well,” Bertha said, “Pastor Lyles may not have the look that you-all like, but he certainly can preach like no one I’ve ever heard preach the word. He is so intellectual in his delivery—no emotionalism, no hollering and screaming. And when he speaks, he’s so still, you hardly know he’s moving.”
“Makes you wonder if he’s kinda dead, huh?” Melvin Jr. scoffed.
Deciding not to let Melvin Jr. get to her, Bertha explained with obvious patience, “Pastor Lyles preaches like he does because he prepared himself for the ministry in the wilderness.”
“Humph,” Mr. Louis Loomis said under his breath, “I need to sell you an acre of the Mississippi River, Bertha Kaye, if you really believe that craziness.”
Melvin Jr. chuckled. “Fool,” he said, “you got to know that chump ain’t been training about nothing other than taking your money.”
“What would you know, Melvin Jr.?” Bertha shot back. “You don’t go to this church.”
“Then tell me, Bertha. What wilderness he been out to? Ain’t no wilderness to speak of out here.”
“Well, Mr. Know-It-All Melvin Earl Vicks, Jr., my pastor trained in Montana. I know they got some wilderness out there.”
Melvin Jr. laughed out loud. “Girl, ain’t nothing in Montana but a bunch of cowboys hoping black folks can’t find their way out there and come set up some rib shacks on their streets.”
“Forget you, Melvin Jr. Didn’t nobody invite you here to tell me about my church.”
“You’re right, Bertha Kaye,” he answered in a mean, tight voice, “didn’t no-body worth mentioning invite me here.”
“Boy, you getting on my very last nerve,” Bertha hissed at him.
“Ditto, baby,” Melvin Jr. snarled. He curled his lip like he had a toothpick sticking out of his mouth and shot Bertha a cocky glance—the kind brothers give sisters when they’re standing on the corner with their boys, acting cool and checking out “the scenery.”
Bertha was furious and thoroughly embarrassed. Seeing the ruby tint on her cheeks, Melvin Jr. smirked, then flashed her a searching look that made Bertha turn away, all fidgety and breathless. Fists clenched, she started walking off with fast, prissy steps.
When she reached the Abundant Grace Bookstore, Bertha snatched open the door and stood there fuming as they all piled in. Now, for the first time—which was surprising, since Bertha always paid attention to people’s clothes—she took a good look at what her visitors were wearing. That fact alone let her know just how bad those four had been acting all morning.
Mr. Louis Loomis had on a suit with “Sears” written all over it. If he didn’t love himself some Sears, Bertha didn’t know who did. Miss Sheba’s outfit was so loud you needed some shades to block out the glare. And Melvin Jr., much to her chagrin, was as sharp as ever. His three-inch Afro was groomed to perfection, his sideburns and mustache trimmed neatly, and the mint green leisure suit he was wearing fit him like a glove, highlighting every muscle in his arms and thighs. To take her mind off the man’s thighs, Bertha dropped her eyes down to his forest green leather platform shoes. Melvin Jr. was just too fine for his own good.
Then she cast an eye over Phoebe, who was wearing a classy red knit dress.
“Why you staring me down like that, Bertha? Something wrong with the way I look?”
“No, I like your outfit,” she told her cousin. “But why did you pick that color?”
“Red is my favorite color. You know that.”
“It may be your favorite color but red is a color black women do not need to wear,” Bertha said, knowing full well that she was only picking a fight with Phoebe to get her mind off Melvin Jr.
“And why is that?” Phoebe demanded.
“Well,” Bertha said, with great care in her voice, “Pastor Lyles once told me that red is too alluring on black women—especially real brown ones like us. Red on brown women can raise illicit passions in some men, even in this church—men who would otherwise remain chaste and
brotherly in their thoughts.”
“Well, I don’t know about all that, Cuz, since the men at my church don’t think like that. Your pastor must be kind of freaky-deaky to even think up that kind of junk. Any man who think like that up in this warehouse y’all call a church ain’t nothing but a nasty coyote, who wouldn’t know the Lord if He smacked him upside the head so hard it gave him an Afro.”
“Lower your voice,” Bertha told Phoebe. “This is my church and these men are my brothers in the Lord.”
“Brothers, huh? What brothers you see up in here, other than Melvin Jr. and Mr. Louis Loomis? Show me these brothers you so worried about, Bertha Kaye.”
“Well, there is one family . . .”
“You mean that Oreo with his wife and kids?” Sheba said. “The one who prancing around here with his butt so tight, he need Ex-Lax just to take a step?”
“Why don’t y’all have any black men at this church, Bertha Kaye?” Mr. Louis Loomis asked with some concern.
Bertha sighed with just a tad bit more drama than necessary. “I don’t know, Mr. Louis Loomis. Perhaps this church isn’t right for them.” She tried to force a cheery smile onto her face. “But then, I do keep praying that the Lord will send a brother to this church who has what it takes to become a full-fledged member. I am hoping to find a good Christian man here.”
At those words, Melvin Jr. looked very hurt, then mad, and stormed off to another section of the store.
“Now look at what you just did,” Phoebe scolded. “You out here in Mayberry looking for a good brother and you just ran off one with your foolishness. Bertha, you must have faith like Abraham, when God sent him a ram in the bush, to believe you gone find a brother worth having up in here.”
Bertha’s eyes followed Melvin Jr. across the store until he disappeared behind a shelf of Bibles. She was teary for a second, and then said with a cheerfulness that sounded forced at best, “Let’s take a look around the store—it has everything imaginable.”
Ironically, the store did have everything. It just didn’t have everything imaginable, because nobody imagined anything black to put on the shelves. Leading them to the music section, Bertha started pulling out albums and eight-track tapes she wanted them to look at. She handed Mr. Louis Loomis, who only liked old-time bluesy-sounding gospel, an album of hymns by Hubert Westerlake, a St. Louis baritone who thought he could sing like Tennessee Ernie Ford. Mr. Louis Loomis couldn’t even bear to take it from her hand, so he just let the album fall to the floor.
Sheba picked up an eight-track tape by the American Worship Center Quintet. “Lawd, I know this is one messed-up store if they trying to sell this,” she said. “Listen to the names of these songs: ‘On a Hayride with God,’ ‘No Milk in My Coffee or Tea, Just Jesus the Lamb for Me,’ and a Christian remake of the Bee Gees’ ‘Stayin’ Alive.’”
Sheba was laughing so hard, she had to wipe her eyes. Bertha frowned at her and glanced around.
“Girl, quit worrying about those people,” Sheba said. “You know that anybody, black or white, would think those songs sound stupid.”
Melvin Jr. reappeared, frowning, and said, “It’s almost ten forty-five. Does your church start at eleven, or are you all on a different and better schedule than the rest of us?”
“What do you think, Mr. Vicks Jr,” Bertha snapped, “since you think you different and better than everybody?”
By now the hallway was filled with worshipers, all moving in the direction of the arrows marked “Sanctuary.” Melvin Jr. started toward the bookstore door to join them but, glancing back, saw that Bertha had not moved. “You are planning on going to church, aren’t you, Bertha Kaye?” he asked.
Bertha stood still, with both hands on her hips, for a long moment, as if to say, “You make me, Melvin Jr.”
Melvin Jr. unbuttoned his suit jacket and hung his hands on the waistline of his pants, with his feet wide apart. All of a sudden, Bertha started moving toward the door real fast, as if she knew exactly what Melvin Jr. had just said.
“Those two are always fussing and fighting,” Phoebe thought. “Why can’t they see that they are crazy about each other?”
The one time she’d asked Bertha if she ever thought about Melvin Jr. as a boyfriend, all Bertha said was, “Phoebe, how I’m gone go with Melvin Jr.? Everybody at church know that we been fighting and talking about how much we can’t stand each other since we were four years old. Now, how are we supposed to get around all of that and then step up in church with the nerve to be in love?”
III
“You sure the Holy Ghost can get in here this morning?” Mr. Louis Loomis asked, staring at the pictures of the deacons and assistant pastors on the wall. “Some of these people look like they would stand right at this door to the sanctuary and tell the Lord Himself, ‘I dare You to come in.’”
Bertha pulled one of the heavy doors open and a stern-faced usher handed each of them a program.
“Isn’t he going to lead us to our seats?” Phoebe whispered.
“No!” Bertha said, irritably. “Will you-all be quiet and just sit down? Good Lawd, don’t take all of this drama to walk in church and sit down.”
“Speaking of drama, missy,” Mr. Louis Loomis said quietly, letting her know he wasn’t happy with that little outburst.
Ignoring him, Bertha asked, “But first does anyone have to go to the bathroom? If so, do it now. Pastor Lyles has the doors locked after service starts, to stop folks from running in and out distracting others.”
“I just wish your pastor would try to stop me from going to the bathroom,” Sheba said.
“Come on,” Phoebe urged. “Let’s just go sit down before my cousin here busts a gasket.”
She started walking down the wide aisle, thinking that the inside of this church looked like a cross between a fancy movie theater and a convention center. The sanctuary had the same decorating scheme as the vestibule and the bookstore: white textured paint, pewter gray trim, and lush wall-to-wall black carpeting. The pulpit was a large stage, which Bertha proudly informed them revolved and had an orchestra pit that held up to a hundred musicians. Melvin Jr. looked at the orchestra pit, pointing out to Mr. Louis Loomis that it would be nice to have a big band to play for the men’s chorus they were putting together, called the “KMs,” short for the “King’s Men.”
There were no pews in the church, just black velvet chairs with impressive chrome trimming, which were very comfortable when Phoebe sank down in one.
“Don’t sit there, Phoebe,” Bertha said, pulling her cousin to her feet.
“Why not? I like this seat.”
“We are sitting down closer because I am joining this church this morning.”
“Say what?” Melvin Jr. asked, horrified, as Phoebe scowled in disbelief.
Mr. Louis Loomis and Sheba didn’t say a word. They simply made eye contact, thinking, “We’ll see about that, Miss Lady.”
Bertha turned away and led them down to the front, past row upon row of white faces. “Lawd, girl,” Mr. Louis Loomis told Sheba, “I show do hope this place don’t catch-a-fire. ’Cause if all these white folks get to running out of this building, we dead.”
Sheba laughed. “Yeah, it’ll be just like a horror movie, when all the black people have to die before the movie music stops playing good.”
Bertha sighed loudly and murmured, “Lord, give me strength.”
They got settled in their seats, and then suddenly the lights in the pulpit became blazing bright, the orchestra pit rose up, and the two TV cameramen took their places. The stage floor rotated, and a huge choir that looked to be a hundred strong appeared, all draped in fancy black robes with silver brocade stoles and silver brocade edging their sleeves. Behind the choir was a large mirrored cross that reflected the changing colors of the blue, yellow, and red lights hanging over the stage.
As the orchestra struck up the first chords of the song, Phoebe strained her ears, thinking that the tune sounded familiar. When the choir started in on the first ve
rse, it hit her that they were trying to sing Elroy Thorn and the Gospel Songbirds’ newest song, “Faith Is Something Else.”
But this rendition didn’t sound anything like the original. The choir had eradicated the beat so completely that Melvin Jr.’s mouth fell open as he leaned toward Phoebe saying, “How . . .”
“Lord knows, I don’t know how they managed to do that one, son,” Mr. Louis Loomis answered. “You gone have to consult the Lord on that. Although I fear even He gone be hard pressed to give you an answer.”
The soloist took the microphone, and Bertha whispered, “That is Mrs. Lyles, the pastor’s wife.”
Four notes into Mrs. Lyles’s solo, Mr. Louis Loomis whispered in a very loud voice, “That woman ’bout to run my pressure up so high, I’m gone have a stroke.”
“Mr. Louis Loomis,” Bertha said, hoping to quiet him. “Mrs. Lyles may not have the strongest voice but she does sing from her heart.”
Just then Mrs. Lyles hit a high note that made her sound like she was choking on water going down the wrong way. Melvin Jr. sat straight up and exclaimed, “Oh no!”
Sheba, who had been studying on a way to make Bertha see that she did not need to be at this church, suddenly found it. When Mrs. Lyles strangled out another note, she stood up and started waving her arms around, hollering out, “Sing, girl, sing that song! Jesus!”
Pushing past the people in her row, she moved out into the side aisle, where she started doing the foot version of the Holy Ghost dance—hunching her shoulders up and down, with her arms tucked in at her sides and her feet moving real fast. Though it looked like she was doing an Irish jig—Soul Train style—her movements perfectly highlighted the faintest beats of the song.
Sheba’s dancing so upset one church member that she put a handkerchief up to her mouth, as if she were trying to quell her nausea. Her husband stroked her back, saying, “Put your head down between your knees and try not to look at her until your stomach settles.”
When Phoebe and Mr. Louis Loomis saw how disturbing Sheba’s performance was to these people, they stood up and started clapping and shouting out, “Praise the Lord, everybody. Thank you, Jesus!”
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