The Bride Experiment

by Mimi Jefferson

Joan made herself a cup of tea. There was no way she was going to get to sleep tonight.

  Chapter 16

  James didn’t know his heart could race so fast for so long. His tux was stuck to his body like a wet suit. Everything was a maze of confusion. First there was one doctor, then another doctor, a surgeon, and then a specialist. Next there was a police officer, then a detective—not to mention, the menacing eyes of his family members and friends. They stayed away from him, huddled in their prayer circles in the corner of the hospital’s waiting room. James couldn’t remember feeling more alone.

  His mother’s sisters were seated with big black Bibles in their laps. They had been praying out loud, but now they were only holding hands. Tears were flowing from their silent faces. James thought he had wanted them to stop praying, back when they had been praying. He thought all the vocal cries of “Holy Father” and “God Almighty” were making him uneasy. But now that they had stopped, the quietness had brought him no relief.

  His mother was dead. James had known before the paramedics got there. He could tell from the way she was lying on the floor. He refused to check her pulse. He didn’t want to know if her heart was working or if she was breathing or not.

  It was a half hour ago that a beautiful black woman in her thirties had walked up to him and had given him the tragic news. Unlike the other female doctors who walked back and forth throughout the hospital, she seemed particularly concerned about her appearance. She had on a fitted black dress underneath her white coat and had freshly relaxed hair, which reached just below her bra strap. Her hair was the work of an expert colorist, brown with highlights of blond that stuck out between the layers. Her makeup, while tasteful, was overdone and seemed to be more fitting of a makeup-counter girl than a physician. She was the type of woman with whom James would have smiled, flirted, and then left with her phone number. But today he only stared at her as she mouthed the words “I’m sorry, we did all we could do.”

  James hadn’t cried yet for his mother. He was still waiting to hear something about his brother. The minutes turned into hours as James waited to hear word on his brother’s condition. It was midnight when the surgeon came in. He was older and self-assured. James tried to read him as he watched the doctor walk closer to him and his family members. The doctor was used to people trying to read him. His face said nothing. The family gathered closer to hear his words. His mother’s sisters all got on their knees and bowed their heads.

  The doctor said in a low, gentle voice, “During the surgery, we realized Miles’s injuries were much more serious than we had initially thought.” He said Miles’s name like he knew him. He went on. “They couldn’t stop the internal bleeding. The team of surgeons tried, but we don’t believe Miles will make it through the night. Now is probably the time to go in and say goodbye.”

  James could feel the walls in the room close in on him. He could barely breathe. What had just happened ? His mind raced. Everything had happened so fast. His mother and brother couldn’t be dead? Just like that. Wasn’t someone about to come in and shout, “Hey, you just got punk’d”? He must be on some cruel edition of Candid Camera, right?

  James looked around for the cameras, but all he saw and heard were his mother’s sisters wailing and crying bitterly. They wanted to get up so they could walk to Miles’s room, but the grief was too strong. There were cousins screaming, uncles quietly weeping, and friends of the family looking at it all and trying to stay strong by rubbing backs and giving long, deep hugs.

  This was no little thing. James couldn’t shout, “Do over!” “My bad!” or “Psych!” He couldn’t run away and start all over again tomorrow. He couldn’t walk away from it and deal with it later.

  James ran out of the waiting room, out of the hospital, and onto the dark streets. He didn’t want to see his brother for the last time. He didn’t want to watch him take his last breath. He didn’t want to digest the accusing stares his family kept giving him with their tear-stained faces. James couldn’t take one more moment of being swallowed up by all those pairs of condemning eyes.

  As James walked, he remembered teaching Miles how to ride a bike. He taught him how to tell time, too. Later on, he taught him how to drive and how to tie his first necktie.

  When Miles was ten and playing Martin Luther King in a school play, James and Agnes got there early so they could sit in the first row. Their father wasn’t there as usual, but Miles didn’t seem to care. He delivered his lines with power, clarity, and authority. James got up after Miles had finished speaking and started shouting, “That’s my brother. That’s my little brother!”

  As James walked faster and faster, he allowed himself to cry for the first time that night. He cried and walked, until he couldn’t see straight. Then he sat on a bench and cried until he couldn’t cry anymore.

  Hours later, James walked back to the waiting room. Only his aunt Lorene, his mother’s oldest sister, was in the room. She had always been James’s favorite aunt. She and her husband had been married for many years, but they had no children of their own. She would dote on James and Miles, often acting as their second mother.

  James stood ready for a tongue-lashing, but none came. There was a calmness about Lorene that had not been present the last time he saw her. She stood up when she saw him walk in the waiting room. “I have been waiting for you. Miles . . . well . . . Miles.” She wiped tears from her eyes. “We are going to bury them side by side. We are hoping to have the funerals this weekend. Your uncle Carter and aunt Shana are making the arrangements. I’ll call you when everything is final.”

  James took in her words: “We are going to bury them. . . .”

  Lorene waited a few moments, then continued speaking. “Your cousin Jackie took Alexis and Morris home with her. But if I were you, I would pick them up as soon as possible. You know how Jackie can be. She will be fine, but as soon as something more entertaining comes up, she will just pop up and leave those kids. Nobody could get a hold of anyone on Raquel’s side of the family to take them in.

  “I would have taken them myself, but your uncle is old and so am I. We are way past being able to run around after a couple of kids. And you know your aunt Sylvia can barely take care of herself, with her arthritis and all. And aunt Kate already has a houseful, since Randy came home from Iraq and promptly moved his wife and three kids into his mother’s one-bedroom apartment.”

  “Thanks, Aunt Lorene. I’ll take care of it.”

  Lorene started to walk toward the door but changed her mind. “James, what happened? We have all been trying to understand what drove Raquel to do this. With your track record with women, we couldn’t help but think it had to be something you did to her.” Her voice got uncharacteristically loud. “James, please tell me you didn’t have anything to do with this. Please tell me my youngest sister and my nephew were not shot to death over some petty nonsense. Please, James! Please!”

  James said nothing.

  Lorene gasped, then started to cry. “I need to go. James, maybe you should think about not coming to the funerals.”

  James knew he would never forget the repulsive look on his aunt’s face as she left the waiting room.

  Chapter 17

  The crystal glass doors at the entrance of the church and the beautifully landscaped cobblestone-lined entryway were two of the many reasons why Raquel imagined herself getting married at the church years before she was ever engaged. She loved the idea of walking hand in hand with James after their wedding and having their friends and family members toss rice as they stood next to sweet-smelling roses and carefully placed daffodils.

  A man in a suit spoke to the police officers on both sides of Raquel as they were preparing to walk out the crystal doors. “Peterson, Ramirez, walk straight to the cruiser. Do not talk to the reporters and do not stop. Drop her off at county and meet me at the station. This one is going to be all over the news, and I don’t want to have to explain away any goof-ups to the media.”

  Raquel was walking out of t
he church, but not to her family and friends throwing rice. Instead, she was greeted by flashing camera lights and reporters. All of her wedding guests had been questioned and told to leave the premises hours ago. She was handcuffed with an officer on each side. Her wedding dress was bloodstained and torn in several places. The biggest hole was in the front, near her stomach, exposing her girdle. The tiny roses that adorned her hair had shifted, causing her carefully done tresses to spike from her head. She had three scratches on her face: one on her left cheek, one underneath her right eye, and the last, about two inches long across her forehead.

  The newswoman, bored with the long wait, didn’t notice Raquel because she was too busy primping her hair. She used her hands to fluff the ends of her red curls but stopped when her cameraman tapped her on the shoulder. She immediately turned around and ran to Raquel, sticking a microphone in her face. “What happened today? Do you care to make a statement?” Raquel kept moving, trying to stay upright as she watched the beads on her wedding dress fall to the ground, one by one. She wished she could follow them deep into the earth, never to surface again.

  The redheaded newswoman now had company. Two other reporters ran out of their news vans, all of them desperately trying to get Raquel to say something. “What happened, miss? Do you care to make a statement ? Where did you get the gun?”

  The bright lights momentarily blinded Raquel, causing her to trip. She braced herself to hit the ground but never did. The officers held tightly on to her. They walked briskly as they stared straight ahead.

  “Did you just snap? Where did you get the gun?” They didn’t care or didn’t notice that she almost fell. “Why did you do it? Did he cheat on you? What happened today?”

  Raquel could see the police cruiser only a few more steps away. She looked around, hoping that somebody, somewhere, would come rescue her. One officer released her and went to the driver’s side, while one police officer tightened his grip and escorted her to the backseat. He quickly slammed the door, noticing but not caring that a piece of her dress was hanging out the door.

  When Raquel was just a little girl, her mother would leave her alone in a cold, lonely apartment. Raquel used to hum herself to sleep. As long as she was humming, she didn’t have to feel the fear and the tears that swelled up in her eyes. The tears never had the chance to fall down her face. The louder she hummed, the braver she became.

  As she hummed, she imagined herself not alone in an apartment, but rather surrounded by people who loved her. Her imaginary mother would tuck her in and read her a story. Her imaginary father would stop by her room, once the lights were out. He would refuse to leave until his precious little girl was asleep.

  Raquel wasn’t allowed to have a pet. But when she was daydreaming, there was always a dog. He was brown and white, and his name was Totter. He loved Raquel as much as she loved him. If she ever had a bad dream, Totter was always there to comfort her.

  As Raquel traveled to the police station, even though she hadn’t done it for years, she hummed and went to an imaginary place. Instead of being handcuffed in a police car, accompanied by two cops, she was a highly sought-after celebrity named Maggie Fountain. Maggie wasn’t on her way to the police station; she was on her way to the Grammy Awards in a limousine. After successfully debuting her first CD, she was the new “it” girl. The past year found her on the cover of Essence, Ebony, Newsweek, and Rolling Stone.

  The paparazzi were relentless in their pursuit of her. She couldn’t go and get a cup of coffee or a burrito from her favorite fast-food restaurant without causing frenzies. As they approached a stoplight, she heard a helicopter hovering right over the car. She giggled and wondered who had rented a helicopter to follow her today. There were reports that she was pregnant, and every magazine and entertainment show wanted to be the first to show her baby bump. She shook her head. There was no baby and therefore no baby bump. She was much too careful for that.

  In a few months, she had a movie to film with Taraji P. Henson, Terrence Howard, Mary J. Blige, and Jennifer Hudson. In the fall, she was getting her own talk show and introducing a line of high-end handbags. There was absolutely no time for a baby.

  She imagined that a reporter from Entertainment Tonight was in the car with her. He was getting an exclusive story on her next project. They laughed and talked like they were old friends until their interview was suddenly interrupted when the car came to a sudden stop.

  A waiting officer pulled her out of the patrol car, stepping on her dress in the process. The large gray building looked like a towering mountain to Raquel. There were three times as many reporters now, but they couldn’t get close to her. Several dozen police officers held them back behind a thick strip of yellow tape. They yelled out questions and the photographers flashed their cameras. Raquel barely noticed. She was too consumed with what lay ahead as the officer walked next to her and eventually opened the door leading her into the mountain.

  Chapter 18

  “Welcome to Clarkston County, Miss Raquel,” the officer who walked her in said; then he handed her over to the waiting guard. He completed some paperwork and left her to the large dark-skinned guard who sat before her; she had an attitude that Raquel could feel. There were no cameras here, just a frumpy woman behind a desk with a halfway-eaten package of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and a twenty-ounce Coke. Scattered about her desk was a mix of papers; most seemed work related, with the exception of a few tabloid magazines.

  Raquel looked up at her, trying her best not to look defeated. Raquel pushed her shoulders back and held up her head. The woman came from behind the desk. “Do you know why you are here?” Raquel nodded. She recalled the officer in the suit explaining her rights before the other two handcuffed her and walked her to the patrol car. She heard him, but she wasn’t listening. She nodded when he was finished and he seemed appeased.

  “Let me do a quick pat-down and we will start with the paperwork. Do you have any weapons, drugs, syringes ? Anything like that?”

  “No.”

  The officer used both of her hands. She moved them past Raquel’s arms and shoulders. She slid her hands underneath her arms and then her breasts. She moved down her thighs between her legs and concluded at her ankles.

  Raquel closed her eyes and hummed while this was going on. She imagined she was playing a part in a movie where she had to pretend to be arrested. She told herself this was not the most humiliating thing that had happened to her. This was the acting job that would lead to her first Oscar.

  “Is she there yet?”

  Raquel looked around the room to locate the voice. The female guard retrieved her walkie-talkie from behind the desk.

  “Yeah, they just dropped her off.” The guard spoke into the intercom. “She’s in here, trying to look like she ain’t scared as heck.” The guard laughed. “Girl, when do you go on break? You gotta come down here and see this for yourself. She looks like a hot mess. Worse than she looked on the news.”

  Raquel’s shoulders deflated and she inspected her dress. She wanted to cry, but she quickly changed her mind. Whatever was about to happen to her, she wouldn’t cry.

  “Okay, Cinderella, it is time to get booked.” Raquel tensed up. “Don’t worry, this part is easy,” the female guard added.

  Raquel answered her basic questions the entire time, wondering what the not-so-easy parts would be.

  The guard looked up from her completed paperwork. “That’s a pretty dress. Too bad you are going to have to take it off.” Raquel remained stoic. Suddenly two officers arrived with five ladies in handcuffs. The guard shook her head in disgust. “It’s going to be a busy night. On Saturday night, everybody acts a fool.”

  The guard turned to the two officers. “I’ll be back. Just let me place her in holding.” The guard led Raquel out of the booking area and down a hall, where other guards were located. Without words, she was transferred from one guard to another, like she was a piece of trash. The new guard looked at Raquel with compassion, but she was too overwhelmed to
absorb it.

  “Try not to say anything to anybody,” she whispered. “If they ask you a question, answer it. But don’t go overboard. I’ll come back as soon as I can so you can make your phone call.”

  Raquel smelled the holding cell before she saw it. There were three women in the cell. Two of them stared into space, with drool hanging from their mouths. They didn’t seem to know where they were or who they were. One was standing in her own feces, with vomit covering her shirt. Raquel had never seen a toilet like the one in the cell. It offered almost no privacy. Someone was using it, and her face and chest and legs were exposed. These women were locked in a cage the size of Raquel’s master bathroom.

  One of the drooling women started scratching feverishly like a dog does when its body is infested with fleas. The thought of being locked up in that small space with those women for an unspecified amount of time had Raquel shaking.

  There was no way she could be locked up in there. Raquel let out a scream that could have broken glass. Then she attempted to run from the guard, only to find herself pinned to the floor before she had a chance to move more than a few steps.

  “Now, little lady, don’t make this harder than it has to be.” The guard yanked Raquel off the floor and shoved her in the cell, locked it, and walked off.

  Raquel scattered to a corner, mumbling underneath her breath. The drooling women looked like zombies. They had swollen heads, with bulging eyes. She could see the bones in their faces. They looked so skinny, they could wear children’s clothes.

  Raquel heard the toilet flush. She looked up at the woman walking away from it. She was wearing a pair of cheap high-waisted jeans and an orange T-shirt with matching running shoes. Her hair was freshly relaxed and pulled back in a ponytail. She looked like a soccer mom on her way to a game.

  “You know, another outburst like that and you are going to get yourself hurt,” the woman said as she walked closer to Raquel. “If that was anybody but Mrs. Penny, you would have been black-and-blue by now.”