by Neta Jackson
Ruth Garfield bustled in alone, sniffing at the new-paint smell—Yo-Yo got called last minute to work at the Bagel Bakery, she grumbled. Chanda was home with sick kids. Edesa and Delores wouldn’t be making it either; Delores had to work the evening shift at the county hospital and Ricardo had taken off who-knows-where, so Edesa was baby-sitting the Enriques kids.
So that was four who couldn’t make it. Would Hoshi show up with her mother? That would be interesting.
I was especially sorry that Edesa and Delores couldn’t come. I wanted to bounce my Welcome Bulletin Board idea off them and get their help with my Latino students’ names. As I tried to figure out who else might be coming, Avis pulled me into the hallway. “Just wanted you to know that I phoned Adele this afternoon and encouraged her to come tonight—to not let her mom’s confusion isolate her from the group. But don’t push her about what happened at the shop. She still needs time.”
“Why can’t we talk about it?” I knew I sounded exasperated, but I couldn’t help it. “It would help clear the air. It’s no fun that MaDear thinks Denny’s some redneck racist who killed her brother.”
“I know.” Avis’s voice was soft, almost swallowed up by the doorbell. “Let’s talk later, all right?”
I hustled to the front door, which was standing wide open so people could walk right in. Hoshi and Florida stood on the other side of the screen door. “My mother insisted we ring the bell,” Hoshi apologized. Even through the wire mesh, she looked stunning in a tailored white pantsuit, her long black hair caught back in the simple ponytail at her neck. Florida said nothing, but her amused grin said everything. “Mother” was standing a good five feet behind them, clutching her handbag.
“We are so glad you have come!” I said, a bit too loudly, pushing open the screen door. “Come in, come in!”
In contrast to her tall, svelte daughter, Mrs. Takahashi looked like a prim ladybug in a red blazer, navy skirt, and walking shoes, her own dark hair coiled neatly into a bun at the back of her head. Hoshi led her mother around the room and introduced her to Avis . . . Ruth . . . Stu . . . Adele . . . Florida she’d already met . . . and Nony, of course. Everyone greeted her and shook her hand, as warm and courteous as Wal-Mart greeters, but Mrs. Takahashi looked like she hadn’t defrosted from the Ice Age.
“Any word about Carla?” I whispered to Florida as I headed for the kitchen to get cold drinks, but her smile died and she shook her head. What does that mean? I wondered as I returned with a pitcher of sweet tea for the sisters who grew up down South, and a pitcher of ice water for those not yet accustomed to drinking tea-syrup. Will they start Carla in school near her soon-to-be ex-foster parents? How dumb could that be!
The typical banter that usually characterized the first fifteen minutes of Yada Yada had been replaced by polite conversation directed at Mrs. Takahashi: “Did you have a good flight?” “How do you like Chicago?” “You must be very proud of your daughter.” Except Florida couldn’t resist bugging Hoshi: “Girl, why’d you bring your mama on the El? Ain’t that hustlin’ her cultural exposure a bit too fast?” She was grinning as big as a toothpaste ad and wanting to laugh, I could tell.
Avis suggested we start our prayer time, and Mrs. Takahashi perched on the edge of one of the dining-room chairs as if the back might be a pincushion in disguise. Her Royal Uptightness put me on edge, too, but I tried to focus on the psalm Avis was reading.
“Give thanks to the Lord,” she read, sounding like she was giving a call to worship at Uptown, “for he is good! His faithful love endures forever. Has the Lord redeemed you? Then speak out! Tell others he has saved you from your enemies. For he has gathered the exiles from many lands, from east and west, from north and south.”
She looked around the room. “Psalm 107 seems written just for Yada Yada, especially tonight, when Mrs. Takahashi has joined us all the way from Japan.”
Those who had Bibles hurriedly flipped to Psalm 107 in our various translations as Avis continued. “We represent many lands:
South Africa, Jamaica, USA, Israel, Asia—even Mexico and Honduras, though Delores and Edesa couldn’t be with us tonight.”
Ding-dong.
The doorbell? I set my Bible down and headed for the foyer. Who had come late? The door was still standing open to catch any evening breeze, but I didn’t recognize the person on the other side of the screen. “Yes?”
“I gots yo’ Avon order.”
“Avon? I didn’t order any Avon.” I tried to speak quietly, so as not to disturb Avis’s devotion going on in the front room. But as my eyes adjusted to the dim daylight on the front porch, I wanted to burst out laughing. I’d never seen an “Avon lady” wearing wraparound shades and a tight red bandana around her head. This one looked like she’d been poured into her jeans too.
I suppressed a smile. “Sorry. Maybe it’s for my upstairs neighbor. What’s the name on the order? I could give it to her.” I opened the screen door, ready to take the brown paper bag she held in her hand.
The woman in the bandana jerked the screen door right out of my hand. “It’s for you!” The paper bag dropped, and in its place she held a butcher knife, waving it in my face. “Git inside!” she hissed. “Git inside now.”
11
I nearly wet my pants. I can’t let this crazy woman come in! Then the woman shoved the knife just inches from my throat. Like stop-frame photography, I noticed the tip was broken off. Yet the blade itself was ten inches long—long enough to go through my neck and out the other side.
I backed up.
“Turn around an’ walk inta that room.” The hiss was low, like a talking snake. “Don’t mess wid me, an’ nobody’ll git hurt.”
My mind felt detached from my frozen body. Would my feet even obey me? But I turned around and started—slowly—for the living room. The stranger crowded behind me, something—her hand? the knife?—pressing into the small of my back. Oh God! Oh God! What should I do?Within seconds I’d be bringing danger into a roomful of unsuspecting women—my sisters, my friends. Yell! Run! But the words stuck in my throat, and my feet kept walking.
I could hear Florida’s voice, then Ruth. Nobody paid the least attention as I mechanically crossed the hall into the living room, my shadow close on my heels. Suddenly the “Avon lady” shoved me aside. “Dis is a stickup!” she yelled. “Don’t nobody move!”
The shove nearly sent me to my knees. I caught the back of a chair and managed to remain standing, though my legs felt like rubber bands. Someone screamed. I didn’t recognize the voice till I saw Mrs. Takahashi’s mouth stretched into a big O. Everyone else sat like ice sculptures. Ruth’s hand hung in the air—she usually talked with her hands—and Avis’s finger still touched the open page of her Bible, like she was about to make a point.
Mrs. Takahashi was babbling gibberish or Japanese. I didn’t know which.
“Shut up! Shut up, you—!” The bandana woman pointed the knife straight at Hoshi’s mother, spouting a string of obscenities.
Hoshi flinched and put a hand over her mother’s mouth, like she was shushing a toddler. “Shh, shh, mama-san. Please don’t.” Tears puddled in Hoshi’s eyes then ran down her face.
Oh God. She’s terrified.
The intruder strutted into the middle of the circle, still waving her knife. “Jist do as I say. Ain’t nobody gonna git hurt.” She stopped in front of Nony, who was wearing a necklace of multiple chains and chunky gold earrings. “The jools. Take ’em off. Rings too.” Nony’s hands trembled as she obeyed.
The woman stuffed Nony’s jewelry into the pocket of her denim jacket then held out her free hand to Stu. Stu had to fiddle a long time with the row of little earrings that ran from her lobe to the top of each ear, then she practically slapped them into the intruder’s outstretched hand. The stranger pushed her wraparound shades right up into Stu’s face. “Don’t mess wid me, snow bunny.”
My own legs wobbled so much I finally sank into the chair. The woman whirled at my movement. “Don’t you go nowhere.
” She peered beyond me to the hallway. “Who else be here?”
Amanda! My heart thudded so hard in my chest, I thought sure it could be heard clear across the room. Oh God, oh Jesus, keep Amanda out of this. The last I’d seen Amanda she was reading a book in bed, earphones clamped over her head. And Willie Wonka. For the first time in my life I was grateful the old dog was almost stone-deaf.
I shook my head. “Nobody,” I lied.
The intruder stopped in front of Avis. “Gimme dat.” She pointed at a pin Avis was wearing that fastened the long, bright-colored scarf she was wearing around her neck. “An’ dat.” The woman pointed to Avis’s wedding ring.
Avis looked up into the woman’s face. She was calm, but a thin film of sweat glistened on her forehead and upper lip. “Please. Don’t take my wedding ring. It’s the only thing I have left to remember my husband.”
“What? He dead?” The woman stared at Avis for a moment then motioned with her free hand. “Okay, okay. Just gimme da pin. Hurry it up.”
Florida narrowed her eyes when the stranger stopped in front of her. “What? Do I look like I got jewelry?” Florida’s voice dripped sarcasm. “I know where you’re comin’ from, scrub. You’re pumped off your head. You snootin’ snow? Shootin’ H? What?”
“Shut up! Mind yo’ own bidness.” She moved on.
I noticed the wiry intruder avoided Adele, who sat with her arms crossed in front of her, big and foreboding. I got no such clemency. “Yo’ rings, fool.” She danced around, keeping an eye on the circle of women, waving her knife, as I tried to wiggle my wedding ring set over my big knuckles. I wanted to throw it, scream at her, do something—but I numbly put it into her hand and watched it disappear into her jacket pocket.
When she got around to Hoshi and Mrs. Takahashi, the older Japanese woman pinched her mouth like it was stitched together and pulled her handbag close to her chest. The thief pointed the broken tip of the knife. “You. Gimme da money.”
Mrs. Takahashi shook her head.
The stranger grabbed for her purse. “I saw you git money outta dat ATM, slit eyes!”
Ohmigosh. She’d followed them here!
Fire smoldered behind the pressed lips and almond eyes. Hoshi’s mother held on tight to the handbag and swatted at the knife waving in her face—and suddenly a wail filled the room. A line of bright red blood appeared across Mrs. Takahashi’s palm down to her wrist.
“You grabbed it, you blasted fool!” the intruder shrieked. She whirled around and looked at me. “Git her somethin’ quick. No! Don’ leave da room—whatchu got?”
Blood was running down Mrs. Takahashi’s arm. “Mama-san!
Mama-san!” Hoshi cried. Her shoulders were shaking.
Ruth Garfield whipped out a large white handkerchief—Ben’s, no doubt—stalked over to Mrs. Takahashi’s chair, and wrapped it tightly around her hand. “Press here,” she commanded Hoshi, indicating a vein on her mother’s wrist. “Hold her hand up— high.” She turned and glared at the stranger. “Vilda chaya!” she spit out and stalked back to her chair.
“Whatchu call me? Din’t I tell you nobody git hurt if ya do what I say?” The woman behind the shades was practically screaming.
Adele rose up out of her chair, like a bear coming out of hibernation. “That’s it. You’ve gone too far. Get out.” She pointed toward the front door. “Get out. You got what you wanted. Get out!”
I would’ve run, if it’d been me. But the bandana-headed woman eyed the big ruby ring on Adele’s right hand, and her eyes seemed to glitter. With a sudden movement she grabbed Mrs. Takahashi out of her chair and held the frightened lady, still clutching her handbag, in front of her in a one-arm grip.
“I tol’ you. I don’t wanna hurt nobody—but I will if ya don’t siddown now, Big Mama.”
Adele didn’t move. “She needs medical help!” The handkerchief around Mrs. Takahashi’s hand was staining bright red.
The knife moved slowly to Mrs. Takahashi’s neck. “Siddown!”
Adele slowly sat.
The intruder kept a grip on Hoshi’s mother, who was too terrified to scream or cry, and caught my eye. “You! Tie up Big Mama there.”
Tie up Adele? I couldn’t have been more shocked if she’d asked me to walk on the ceiling. “With what?” Think, Jodi! Say you’ve got rope in the basement then call the police . . .
The woman gestured with the knife toward the box fan in the front window. “Use th’ estenshion cord. An’ hurry up, you—” She peppered me with all the cuss words in her gutter vocabulary.
I took a deep breath, hoping my rubbery legs would hold me up, and stumbled toward the fan. The rest of the room was deathly silent, except for Hoshi’s stifled sobs and the intruder’s raspy breathing. I unplugged the cord and turned to face our adversary. Surely she wouldn’t make me—
“You! Big Mama. Put yo’ hands behind yo’ chair.” Then she pointed at me. “Now tie her to the chair.”
This was a nightmare! I couldn’t tie up Adele —of all people! But the crazy woman was glaring at me from behind Mrs. Takahashi’s terrified face, so I walked in a daze behind Adele’s chair, knelt down, and began to wrap the extension cord around her hands. “I’m sorry, Adele—so sorry,” I whispered behind her back, but Adele gave no sign that she heard me.
“She tied up?” the intruder’s voice demanded. “Now take ’at ruby ring off her han’, an’ be quick ’bout it.”
With dread practically dripping from my pores, I wiggled the ring from Adele’s thick finger. Oh God, Oh God . . . send somebody . . . do something! Finally the ring popped off into my hand and I stood up—and nearly stopped breathing. The stranger’s back was to the hallway, but over her shoulder I saw Amanda standing behind her in the doorway.
I wanted to yell at my daughter to run. Instead I said loudly, “Here’s the rotten ring” and stepped forward—but not all the way, making our captor push Mrs. Takahashi back into her chair before reaching out to snatch it. When I looked again, Amanda had disappeared. Thank You, Jesus, thank You, thank You— “An’ tie that one too!” The knife pointed toward Stu. “I don’t like Cinderella’s attitude.”
Before I could obey—did we even have another extension cord in the living room?—I suddenly heard the click of Willie Wonka’s nails in the hallway. “Woof! Woof!” The chocolate Lab skidded to a stop in the hallway just outside the living room. Willie hardly ever barked; he wasn’t much of a watchdog. Yet he knew something wasn’t right.
The dog’s bark freaked the bandana woman. She whirled on the dog, slashing her knife through the air.
“He won’t hurt you!” I yelled.
“Then git him to shut up, or I’ll hurt him,” she snarled.
I knew Willie wouldn’t leave voluntarily, so I grabbed his collar and dragged him over to the front window and made him lie down against the wall. Before I could straighten up, I heard a demanding male voice: “What’s going on here?”
Denny! I looked up just in time to see the intruder whirl around to face my husband, pointing the knife at his throat. Where had he come from? Like actors in a tableau, Denny and the woman faced each other, motionless. My heart raced. But time seemed to stand still—half a second? half a minute? Then she lunged with the knife.
I screamed. “Nooooooo!”
12
I t happened so fast, it was over in a blink. As the crazy woman lunged at Denny with the knife, he grabbed her wrist. The next moment she was on her back on the floor with Denny spread-eagle on top of her.
“Jodi!” he yelled. “Take the knife!”
My body parts suddenly came alive, and I scrambled toward the pair on the floor.
“Git off me, you—” The woman struggled beneath Denny’s weight, letting loose a string of cuss words that made all the words she’d been throwing around for the last fifteen minutes sound like kindergarten babble.
“Take the knife!” he commanded again, trying to keep from getting kicked from behind by her flailing legs. The woman still held the handle o
f the butcher knife in her right hand—how in the world was I going to get it away from her? As Denny dug his nails into her wrist, she finally let go. I snatched it.
“Call the police!” he bellowed.
“I already did, Daddy.” Amanda reappeared in the living-room doorway, barefoot, wearing only an oversized T-shirt, her brown eyes wide and her face chalk-white.
“An ambulance we need too.” Ruth appeared at my side. “And take that horrid knife away, Jodi.”
I stared at the ten-inch knife in my hand as though seeing it for the first time. A streak of Mrs. Takahashi’s blood was smeared along the sharp edge. I had an overwhelming urge to throw it away from me, but instead I ran to the kitchen and dumped it into the sink. “Don’t touch that!” I hissed at Amanda, who’d followed me. “And call 911 again for an ambulance.” I ran back to the living room, just as I heard sirens screaming . . . coming closer . . . and screeching to a stop outside our house.
Stu was busy untying Adele. Nony, Ruth, and Avis huddled around Hoshi and Mrs. Takahashi, and Florida flung open the screen door for the police. The crazy woman was still cussing a blue streak on the floor.
Four big police officers—two black, two white—pounded into our living room. “Police! Don’t anybody move!” One had his gun out of its holster. Taking in the scene at a glance, he pointed it straight at Denny’s head. “Okay, buster, let ’er go. Put your hands behind your head.”
“No!” I yelled. “Not him—her!”
Immediately the other women in the room started talking all at once, arguing with the police, pointing at the intruder on the floor, holding up Mrs. Takahashi’s wounded hand.
“Quiet!” yelled the cop with the gun. He looked at me. “You. What’s going on here?”
I couldn’t believe this! “That . . . that woman on the floor came in here with a knife . . . and . . . and she robbed us . . . and cut Mrs. Takahashi’s hand. And that’s my husband—stop pointing that gun at him!”