Gettin’ Merry

by CATHY L. CLAMP; FRANCIS RAY; BEVERLY JENKINS; MONICA JACKSON; GERI GUILLAUME

  What if she wasn’t stable? He sensed a sort of sadness and vulnerability, but his inner intuition told him there was something solid and strong about her. Intelligence and warmth shone from her eyes despite their glacial color. He wondered how her face changed when she smiled.

  Inside the brightly lit coffee shop, she ordered hot chocolate, rich with cream. He ordered regular coffee, strong and black. Once he sat down, he realized how badly he needed the caffeine.

  The drinks arrived quickly. She took a sip, and a soft sigh emanated from her. “It’s so good,” she murmured. The hint of a smile hovered about her lips and he eagerly waited for it to break.

  “Did you want talk to me about something?” he asked. His voice was too abrupt. He felt remorse as the shadow of her smile disappeared.

  “It’s hard to put into words,” she said. “You write about the black community and the responsibilities of blackness so well. What I wanted to know is . . .” Her voice trailed away.

  Trey sipped his coffee as he waited for her to finish her sentence. The coffee was good, hot and rich. He almost felt the caffeine rushing to his brain, erasing traces of his fatigue.

  “I want to know how to do it,” she said.

  Baffled, he asked, “Do what?”

  “Be black.”

  A chuckle emerged from his throat. “Lady, you don’t need lessons. When you look like you do, it’s something you just are.”

  “Not necessarily. My parents were killed in an automobile accident when I was a baby. I survived and my white grandparents raised me.” Her voice had fallen to a whisper and Trey had to strain to hear the words. “They’ve spent the entire twenty-two years of my life trying to keep me and anyone else from realizing what I am.”

  Trey raised an eyebrow. “Which one of your parents was black?” he asked.

  “My father.”

  “Your mother’s folks resented him?”

  “Terribly. They blamed him for her death.”

  “That’s tough.”

  “I look somewhat like my mother. They’ve always been wonderful to me except for this one thing—if I deal with anything black they think they’ll lose me just like they did her.”

  “What about your father’s people?”

  “I don’t know who they are.”

  “Why not?”

  “My grandparents took great pains to keep that knowledge from me.”

  “But you’re grown now. How can they continue to keep this from you?”

  “True, I’m well over eighteen, but no matter how hard I try, I can’t make any black friends. I’ve never dated a black man. What will make that change once I meet my black relatives? What if they—” She stopped and took a deep breath. “When I try to connect, it’s as if everyone seems to know I don’t belong.”

  Trey felt a rush of sympathy for her. It was a certainty that, looking as she did, she didn’t feel as if she fully belonged with her white relatives, either. Her dilemma puzzled him. “America doesn’t let folks escape the fact of their blackness if they look even slightly black,” he said. “I can hardly believe you’ve been rejected by everyone you’ve approached.”

  “Not rejected; it’s more like a feeling of not fitting in, not belonging. Maybe I’m not doing something right,” she said.

  “I don’t see how you could do anything wrong if you use the usual social graces. Have you been to a black church?”

  “A couple times, but it didn’t work.” She studied her hands. “I realize that it’s not them; it must be me, too.”

  Trey caught that one word. “Them?” he asked.

  “Yes, them. Everybody is them—whites, blacks, Asians, Hispanics. Believe me, Dr. Fraser, I haven’t escaped my race. I just can’t figure out how to experience it.” Her eyes looked like frost melting, and defeat laced her voice.

  He was unsure of what to say. For some reason, he had the impossible urge to fix everything for her. “What do you know about your father’s family?” he asked.

  “I know they are from Atlanta. His last name was Smith. Evan Smith.”

  “Maybe that’s where you should start. Finding them could be a first step.”

  She looked away. “But how do I start?” she murmured, as if to herself.

  “Start with your grandparents. Maybe it’s time to confront them with who you are.” He could almost feel her withdraw from his words. “No. Maybe I’m wrong,” he continued. “I think you need to start with yourself. It’s going to take courage and determination. Never give up on what you want. And most important, never give up on who you are.”

  She stared into the swirling brown depths of her hot chocolate.

  Trey couldn’t stifle a yawn. Concern crossed her face. “You must be exhausted,” she said. “I can’t tell you how much it means to me that you’ve given me your time and attention.” She touched his hand and electricity rushed through his body.

  “No problem.” He wanted to invite her to his hotel room, but resisted the crass impulse. As much as he regretted it, he was going to have to let her walk out of his life. He took out his wallet and removed his card, his personal one with his address and private home phone number.

  “Nobody can keep you from who you are but yourself, Anne. When you make it to Atlanta, please let me know how you’re doing.”

  She took his card and stared at it. Then she glanced up at him through her long lashes. He had the feeling that she didn’t want their time together to end, either. If she was the one to make the suggestion, it didn’t have to. His heartbeat accelerated at the thought of how it would feel to kiss those soft, full lips, to make love to her.

  But all she said was, “Thank you.”

  Disappointment filled him. But maybe she’d come to Atlanta soon. He’d like to see her again on his home turf.

  Chapter 2

  Not only was Trey Fraser gorgeous, but he was a nice guy, too, Anne decided as she walked away from his black Toyota 4Runner and got into her small pickup truck. Suddenly aftershocks of excitement and giddiness felt like an anxiety attack. She leaned her burning forehead against the cool plastic of the steering wheel.

  She could hardly believe that she actually had talked to the man of her dreams, much less spilled all her business like a babbling fool. How had she found the nerve to approach Trey Fraser in the first place? Certainly asking him out and blabbing her private pain indicated that she’d finally lost the few marbles she had left. Jeez! How to be black—had she really asked him that? No wonder he’d laughed. But he’d listened and treated her with respect.

  Anne shook her head as she started the motor and put her truck into gear. A few minutes later, she pulled into the driveway of the split-level home she shared with her grandparents, a nice home in a nice neighborhood where the lawns were cared for and property values mattered.

  As she tramped across the snow to the house, her head overflowed with thoughts of Trey. His smile, his voice, his easy stride, and his strength—he reminded her of a black panther on the hunt, lean and sleek muscles seemingly relaxed but coiled and ready to spring. When his long, sensitive fingers circled the rim of his cup as he talked, she couldn’t help but imagine how they’d feel against her skin. Even the scent he wore, reminiscent of fresh air and Georgia pine trees, enticed and thrilled her.

  The blare of the television interrupted her thoughts as she entered the house. Anne was hanging up her coat in the hall closet when her grandmother appeared, a heavy woman with a ruddy pink face that showed evidence of years of hard work.

  “Have you eaten?” Grammy asked. “I made meat loaf.”

  “Sounds good,” Anne said.

  Her grandmother followed her into the kitchen and watched while she filled her plate with meat loaf, mashed potatoes, green beans, and rolls.

  Anne settled down across from Grammy and picked up her fork. Her grandmother liked to talk to Anne in the evening before she left for her night-shift job as a licensed practical nurse. Anne doubted that Grammy talked much to Papa anymore. She’d worked ni
ghts for as long as Anne could remember while he worked days fixing air conditioners in the summer and furnaces in the winter. Her grandparents lived separate lives.

  “How was the meeting?”

  “I went to a lecture. It was good,” Anne replied.

  “Betsy’s going to be able to come up for Christmas after all. She’s bringing Todd and the baby, too.”

  “That’s great. Been a long time.”

  Grammy nodded. “Too long.”

  Anne shifted in her chair. Now was as good a time as any to bring up her father. “That lecture I went to on campus brought up the importance of knowing your roots. I wondered . . .” Her voice trailed away as she watched the expression on Grammy’s face change to guarded anxiety and resentment.

  “What made this come up all of a sudden?” Grammy asked, her eyes narrowed.

  Anne shrugged. “It seems strange that I don’t know anything about my father’s family.”

  “I don’t see anything strange about it. We’ve raised you; we’ve housed and clothed you. I’m dragging myself into work every night so you can get an education. We are your family.”

  Anne stared at her plate, her appetite gone. “I know that and I’m grateful, but . . . but I thought it would be good to know something about my heritage—”

  “Your heritage! Your heritage is people who care about you, who work hard to give you everything you need. We are your heritage, honey.”

  Anne flushed with frustration. “Was my father all that terrible?”

  “If it weren’t for him, my daughter, your mother, would be alive today.” Grammy shook her head. “I can’t bear to talk about it. Anne, your father is dead and buried, and I suggest you leave him in the past where he belongs.” With those words, she got up out of the chair and left the kitchen.

  Anne scraped her plate and rinsed it. She had no intention of leaving the topic of her father and his family alone. She’d been obediently silent for her twenty-two years about the fact of her blackness. It was time she found out what she wanted to know. Also, in a few weeks her relatives would arrive for Christmas. They’d have some idea about the man her mother had married. Most of them resented Anne anyway. She doubted that the uproar that was sure to follow over the closet skeletons she rattled would upset them overmuch.

  Anne went upstairs and ran her bath. Staring at the steaming hot water filling the tub, she wondered what her father had looked like. She closed her eyes and tried to picture him. But the image of Trey’s face was the only thing she saw.

  Three weeks later, Anne got off the plane at the Atlanta airport Christmas evening. This Christmas could go down in history as one of the worst in her life. When Anne had rattled the skeleton in the family closet of her mother and the black man she had married, it was as if the bones fell to pieces and the family along with them.

  But amid all the accusations, the screaming, crying, and yelling, a calm came over Anne. She walked upstairs and packed her suitcase. The family looked stunned as she announced her intention to go to Atlanta and seek out her paternal relatives.

  But by now her initial bravado had fizzled and the airport seemed as lonely and deserted as she felt. Its once-festive Christmas atmosphere had grown tattered and old before the day was even over.

  Anne retrieved her one bag and made her way to the taxi stand. “Merry Christmas,” she said to the turbaned driver.

  He looked at her and shrugged. “Where are you going, lady?”

  She hesitated. She’d planned to get a hotel room near the airport. That would make sense. But it wasn’t sense that made her flee her family and her grandparents’ split-level house on Christmas Day. It had been anger and pain, frustration and need. She’d been sensible all her life, and look where it had gotten her—alone and without a place to go on Christmas Day.

  Anne pulled out the business card she’d kept in her pocket for the past three weeks and stared at it. Trey Fraser had told her to come and see him when she arrived in Atlanta. His concern and interest had been the catalyst that had caused her to finally break free from the inertia that had gripped her for so long and find out who she truly was. It was crazy, but right now there was nothing she wanted more than to see him again. If she followed her heart, where would it lead her?

  When she walked out of her grandparents’ house, suitcase in hand, it was as if a new chapter of her life had started. For once, she wasn’t going to play it safe and do what was expected of her. She was going to take a risk, a wild gamble of the heart. What did she have to lose?

  She read Trey Fraser’s address to the driver.

  Trey was happy to get home. He loved his family, but a heavy dosage of them was exhausting. He was the only male in a family of three women. His mother and sisters had had a fit when he showed up without his ex-girlfriend Renee. They’d questioned him to death about the demise of the relationship. That’s what he got for breaking up with Renee before the holidays.

  The first thing that greeted him when he walked into his house was the red light flashing on his answering machine. He hung up his coat in the hall closet and pushed the button.

  “Hi, honey. Merry Christmas. Detroit is cold as Hades frozen over. Wish I were in Atlanta with you. I’ll be in town tomorrow. Maybe we can get together. Love you.”

  Trey sighed. So Renee was going to pretend as if nothing had happened between them even though he’d sat her down and had the talk. With Renee, he should have guessed that a subtle, albeit direct, approach wouldn’t work. Sometimes it took the verbal equivalent of a sledgehammer to drive in something that Renee didn’t want to hear. It was over between them and she was going to have to realize it.

  The relationship wasn’t fair to her and that was why it had to end. She’d grown to be nothing but a habit to him, an available escort and convenient sex. He had no desire to marry her. He prayed Renee would find the right man for her. Every woman deserved someone who could truly love her.

  He simply wasn’t the man for Renee, and she couldn’t understand why. She argued with him every time he tried to end it. They were compatible and got along, she’d say. He’d given up and given in to her until he finally decided to stand his ground and end it.

  “Why not me?” she’d asked.

  The answer was a simple one. What stood in the way was Trey’s dream that one day he’d fall in love. He’d been waiting all his life for that special feeling to finally hit him.

  Renee had called him a fool to believe that he had a soul mate out there somewhere. Maybe she was right—he should settle down with her or some other suitable woman and start the family he’d always wanted. But something inside him whispered that he needed to wait, that he needed to be free and available. Something told him that his soul mate was out there somewhere. He knew in his bones that the reason he’d never fallen in love was because when it happened to him, it would be a once-in-a-lifetime, forever-after sort of thing.

  He could imagine her. He’d always liked long, lean women with braids or dreads and satiny deep chocolate skin. He’d bet his soul mate looked like that. She’d be classy and confident, with a ready laugh and a sharp tongue like his mother and sisters. White teeth gleaming—

  The ring of a doorbell disturbed his reverie. Trey’s eyebrows rose. Who’d be out visiting on Christmas Day? Carolers, maybe?

  He pulled open the door and blinked at the light-skinned short and plump woman standing there, wrapped in a down-stuffed parka large enough for her to winter in Antarctica. She had a suitcase by her side, and the expression on her face was anything but confident.

  “You don’t remember me,” she said, her voice quavering.

  It was the ethnically confused woman from Boston. He’d never forget her inexplicable appeal. “Anne with an e,” he said.

  Profound relief crossed her face.

  He glanced at the large suitcase. Did she expect to stay? Generally, he didn’t like unexpected visits, and uninvited houseguests were anathema. But for some reason, letting this particular woman and her suitcase into
his home didn’t bother him at all. “Why don’t you come on in?” he asked.

  Her icy eyes seemed to melt away. “Th-thank you. Th-thank you so m-much,” she stammered, pushing her suitcase through the door in front of her. “I don’t mean to impose. It’s so kind of you. . . . Oh, the cab is waiting. . . .”

  Trey motioned for the cab to go and picked up her suitcase. When he closed the door behind her, there was something significant and final about the sound of the door shutting, a line in time that marked something new. He felt as if he should know this woman well. She wafted on the edges just past his memory. There was a connection that he couldn’t understand, along with an unbidden urge to care for her. “Please, make yourself at home,” he said.

  She smiled at him, and it was as if the sun broke through the clouds. It had to be a sign.

  Chapter 3

  Anne struggled out of her coat. Trey took it from her and tried to hang it in the hall closet. It was too bulky for the hanger and promptly fell off. When the coat hit the floor the third time, he gave up and handed it back to her. “Why don’t you lay this on that chair over there?”

  She cleared her throat. “OK,” she said.

  He settled on the couch and watched her as she tried to hang the monster over the back of the armchair, gave up, put it on the seat, and sat on it. Her face, while plain, was pleasant, soft and gentle, as were the rounded curves of her body clad casually in a light blue sweatshirt and jeans. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am to be here,” she said.

  The memory of their conversation weeks ago returned to him. “So what brings you to Atlanta on Christmas Day? Are you visiting your father’s family?”

  “I’ve just flown in.” She shifted, not meeting his eyes. “I’m sorry to barge in on you like this. I was on my way to a hotel and it was an impulse.”

  “It’s all right.” And to his surprise he realized that it was. Her presence was like her, soft and easy. “Would you like something to drink?” he asked.