Seasoned with Grace

by Nigeria Lockley

  Before anyone could stop her, Grace swung wildly at the counter, knocking over Junell’s mug of tea and taking out her tablet. From there she ran to one of her cabinets, ripped the dishes from the shelves, and threw them on the floor. Each ornately decorated dish crashed to the floor and shattered into hundreds of pieces, mirroring what had become of Grace’s life.

  Candace and Junell pleaded with Grace to stop, but she could see only their lips moving. The rage inside of her spoke louder than they did. She went from shelf to shelf, pulling out glasses, bowls, and plates of fine china. They’d been reserved for special moments in her life. Now was as good a time as any to bring them out. With each toss of a dish, she thought about the last time she’d seen Javier’s face, which was in the zigzagged fragments of broken glass in the mirror on her vanity in the trailer.

  Grace stooped down and picked up one long sliver of china from the mess. Then she straightened and stood as erect as a soldier. “When I see him, this is what I’m going to do to him.” She swung her hand in the air haphazardly. Completely wrapped in a web of anger and shame, Grace didn’t even notice that Candace had crept up behind her until she felt Candace’s bicep lock around her neck. Her body stiffened like a board in Candace’s arms. Candace forced Grace’s body against the island in her kitchen and bent her over.

  “Get that dagger of china out of her hand,” Candace said to Junell.

  Grace lifted her head a few inches to see Junell standing in the center of the living room, crying and shaking.

  “Come on! We need to get this dagger out of her hand. She’s starting to bleed,” Candace shouted.

  “I can’t,” Junell squealed.

  “You can.” Candace adjusted her stance and tightened her grip around Grace’s neck. “Hurry up. I can’t restrain her for much longer,” Candace added, struggling to hold Grace’s hand containing the long sliver of china steady.

  “How did you do that? You’ve got to teach me that move to use on the show,” Junell said. As Junell tiptoed toward Grace and her little belly entered Grace’s field of vision, Grace opened the palm of her hand and let the sliver of china fall to the floor. Slow and steady droplets of blood followed the china and created a burgundy puddle.

  “Just give me some paper towels,” Grace said once Candace released her from her death grip. Candace complied, and Grace snatched the paper towels from Candace’s hand and wrapped them around her palm as a makeshift bandage. Next, Grace began to massage her sore neck. Stepping over all her broken dishes, Grace reached for the one glass she had not smashed, and pulled a bottle of whiskey out of a green container that had the word sugar embossed on it in black script.

  “What are you doing, Grace?” Candace and Junell shouted at the same time.

  “A time like this calls for a drink. Shoot. When did y’all become Oprah and Gayle?”

  “This is not the time for any drinks. We need you sober if we’re going to attack this thing head-on,” Junell said, stepping on the shards of dishes like there was nothing on the floor. She wrapped her arm around Grace’s and led her to the couch.

  “Javier’s been on TV all morning, talking about you, but I know that’s not true. I don’t know what happened in that trailer, but I know you did not come on to him. If you’re going to win this thing, then you’re going to have to start talking and fast, Grace.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You can,” Junell retorted.

  “I can’t,” Grace said, her voice cracking, signaling her tears would soon betray her and reveal the gravity of the situation.

  “You can,” Candace chimed in.

  “I won’t,” Grace said as the tears streamed down her face.

  Chapter 33

  If he could, Ethan would climb out the window to escape the influx of phone calls, e-mails, tweets, and Google alerts attacking him. The first thing he did when he entered his office was call up TMZ and issue a statement on behalf of his client.

  “The graphic nature of the film struck a chord in Grace’s personal life and triggered a memory from the past that she wished had remained dormant. She is sorry about the loss of time and money on the production of this film. However, she and her management team have decided it is in her best interest to walk away from this project before any further damage is done to her psyche.”

  The reporter asked him twice if he was sure he wanted to go with that statement. Ethan ran his tongue across his pearly white teeth and thought about his statement each time the reporter asked him. Each time he answered, “Yes, I’m sure.” He felt peace on the inside and as light as a bird. Javier Roberts had had his face plastered on every media outlet that would listen, but Ethan’s heart and mind hadn’t gotten the chance to align fully with the spirit of God, because he didn’t see this attack coming. Now he had to find a way around this mountain.

  After he spoke with TMZ, he paced back and forth across the floor in front of his desk, running his fingertips along the smooth wood of his desk. “Lord, I’m waiting on you to lead me and guide me,” he said into the air to reaffirm his confidence.

  “Hey, Mr. Summerville,” Alice said, letting herself into his office. She was carrying a cordless phone and had a Bluetooth hooked up to her ear, and the corners of her mouth were folded into an expression that was marked with a mixture of hostility and irritability. “I know you’re not taking any calls, but Candace is on line two. She said it’s about Grace.”

  Contorting his body so that he could pick up the phone and still face his secretary, Ethan grabbed the phone. “Candace?” He stared down at the rounded tops of his two-tone oxfords while Candace caught him up on the day’s events.

  “She what? What do you mean, she won’t talk? And she hasn’t left her room since then? Candace, relax. Tell Junell I’ll be there soon with the heavy artillery.”

  “Come down, or we’re coming up,” Ethan shouted to Grace.

  “I’m not discussing this with you, Candace, or Junell,” Grace yelled back.

  “Do you feel comfortable discussing this with Horace or Pastor David? They’re both here. Take your pick, but you’re going to talk to someone today,” Ethan told her.

  Grace looked at her hand. Her blood had saturated the paper towels and had turned them a deep burgundy. She fingered the layers of brittle skin that covered her bottom lip. As she took stock of her situation, she realized that she’d let Javier do it again. He had taken her power, reduced her to shreds, and had her cowering in her bedroom like a little schoolgirl.

  “Grace, I thought you were reclaiming your life,” Horace said coolly.

  “I’m not like you, Horace. I can’t just trade in my life for the life of Christ. You were weighed down by currency, and I am chained to my pain,” Grace called.

  “But you don’t have to be, Grace. You can be free,” Pastor David said, joining the conversation. She imagined his hands exploding in the air like fireworks when he said the word free. “Grace, the man in the Gadarenes was bound by chains and fetters, but even those weren’t strong enough to hold him, and every now and then he’d bust out of those chains—like you do. Yet every time the chains came off of him, he would remain at the graveyard, crying and cutting himself.”

  Grace looked at her wound.

  “Even though the chains were off of him, he couldn’t leave, because a legion of demons dwelled within him. A legion. Do you hear me?”

  “Yes,” Grace squeaked, rocking back and forth on the edge of her bed.

  Pastor David went on. “Anywhere from three thousand to six thousand soldiers could be included in a legion. Pain was there, most certainly, and shame too. They had that man living far from his family, surviving the best way he knew how, but they never, ever allowed him to step away from the lonely place in the graveyard. He was surrounded by dead things, like memories of the past, which the enemy uses to taunt us. Those demons had him twisted up inside and out.

  “But when he saw Jesus, it all came stumbling out. When he encountered the truth, the thousands of lies that floode
d his body, saying he wasn’t worth anything, saying, ‘This is where you belong, you rotten piece of trash, you filthy thing,’ they all had to cease. Jesus was able to cast a legion of demons out of that man, and I say that same power is available to you right now, you hear me?”

  “Yes!” rang out upstairs and downstairs in the condo.

  The story of the man in the Gadarenes was faintly familiar to Grace. It was the topic of one of the last few sermons she’d heard before running away from home. Her pastor, Dr. Wyatt Kendrick Clarke, had taught a monthlong series to his congregation on riding their lives of demonic possession. His sermon from Mark, chapter five, was to be the last one in the series and the final one that Grace would attend. At that time, as he spoke about vanquishing darkness from your life, she believed she had the power to do it. In her sixteen-year-old mind, it wouldn’t be actualized until she was far away from the church and her family. That time she’d heard the sermon only with her ears; this time she listened with her heart.

  Rising from a corner of her unmade bed, Grace approached the full-length mirror in the corner of her room. She gripped the fourteen-karat gold borders of the mirror and stared into her empty eyes. What she saw in the mirror could not be who she was. Her apple-shaped face seemed to have sunken in since she last looked at herself. A veil of darkness had taken up permanent residence over her face; small bean-shaped bags rested under her eyes. Grace thought of her first session of anger management. “What do you see?” she asked herself.

  As Pastor David rallied the group downstairs in prayer, Grace looked at herself for the first time in her life.

  “I see God’s creation. I see a woman. I see . . . I see . . . I see . . .” Streams of tears ran down her face, washing away all the shame, all the names, and all the pain that had held her captive for so long.

  Grace ran out of her room to the foot of the stairs and stopped. The first pair of eyes to meet hers was Horace’s. His eyes fastened on to hers and held her. He transmitted strength and warmth. There was no need for embarrassment; she could speak her truth.

  “He raped me. Javier Roberts raped me on the first job that I did with him,” Grace said.

  Junell gasped.

  “We were shooting a—”

  “Jonathan Black ad for his fall shirt collection,” Junell interrupted, finishing Grace’s sentence. She sandwiched herself in the pocket of space between Ethan and Horace. “I worked that job with you. When the shoot was over, he sent everyone home.”

  “Except for me.” Grace pressed one finger to her chest.

  With each step she took toward them, she revealed the details of that night. She rocked and shook as she teetered down the steps. Collapsing on the bottom step, she exhaled. “This movie is a reenactment of that rape.” The tears came back again.

  Horace knelt in front of her. He wrapped his large hands, which were coated in white dust from a construction site, around Grace’s hands. It had been so long since she had thought about the differences in their financial status. His job as a construction worker no longer mattered. Monetary support wasn’t what she needed. Right now she needed his comfort. She gripped his hands and brought them to her face.

  Grace rubbed her cheek against his knuckles like a cat. For the first time ever, she noticed the dimple in his strong chin. Leaning into him, she pecked his chin. Following her lead, he began to peck at her lips.

  Pastor David cleared his throat loudly, interrupting Grace and Horace’s comforting exchange of kisses. Grace covered her mouth, and her cheeks turned a burnished bronze. Junell and Candace both flashed her a thumbs-up.

  “Grace,” Pastor David said, stepping to the right side of her, “I am sorry this happened to you, but if you believe with your heart and confess with your mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord and that He was raised from the dead by God, as Romans, chapter nine, says, salvation and healing will be granted to you, just as they were granted to the man in the Gadarenes.”

  Ethan took a wide step over Horace’s feet and sat beside Grace at the foot of the steps. She looked into the faces of each one of them. They were beaming with love, goodness, faith, patience, and peace. It was time to be made whole.

  “I do believe that Jesus Christ is Lord and that He was raised from the dead by God, and I fully expect God to do the same for me,” Grace announced.

  Chapter 34

  After Pastor David led everyone in prayer, Ethan asked that everyone except Junell leave. Now it was time for them to prepare Grace for the damage-control process. In the industry damage control usually meant a lot of sobbing and wailing on every talk show or news outlet that would have you, followed by several interviews and photo shoots with magazines, to reveal the dark secrets that had served as the catalyst for the celeb’s trouble. Then there were the public appearances and the scheduled photo ops with the celebrity as he or she attempted to reestablish a normal life. None of that was going to work in this situation.

  “Junell, Grace, pull up a seat,” Ethan said, setting up his command post in Grace’s kitchen. Layers of purple, lavender, and pink coated the sky. Dusk enveloped the Harlem sky and filled the room with the splendor of God.

  Junell eased into her seat, cradling her belly, and Grace sat in hers with her eyes wide open and fully focused on Ethan.

  “You know what comes next?” Ethan said.

  “Damage control,” they both replied in unison, feigning excitement, with spirit fingers in the air.

  Ethan unbuttoned the cuffs of his black-and-white gingham-print shirt and rolled them over. “Now, here’s what I’m thinking.” Ethan paused for a few seconds and stroked his goatee. “We have to do things a little differently for this situation.”

  “Precisely what I was thinking,” Junell said, jumping up from her chair. “We’ve got to get you all over prime-time television, not just daytime.”

  “Would you sit down and let me finish, before you try to commandeer this outfit?” Ethan barked.

  With one raised eyebrow, Junell looked at Ethan and walked to the refrigerator. “What baby wants, baby gets,” she said, pouring herself a glass of vanilla almond milk before returning to her seat.

  “Ethan.” Grace raised her hand in the air. “One moment please. Junie, thank you for the spectacular job you did cleaning the place up, and thanks for getting me some new dishes.”

  “Girl, this stuff came from Target. While Candace cleaned up all the glass and china, I asked one of the runners to go and pick up some dishes from Target.”

  “You sent a runner?” Grace squealed. “Junie, you’re finally learning how to use this actor thing properly.”

  Ethan clapped his hands together and positioned them to make the time-out signal. He’d had enough of the girl talk; it was time to take care of business. This stuff needed to be released while he could hear the Lord speaking directions into his heart. There was no time for flamboyance and distraction. Jesus was most definitely about to turn this whole thing around.

  Both ladies closed their mouths and sat at attention, with their hands folded in front of them, like class was in session and Ethan was the headmaster in charge.

  “Red Tape.”

  “With Diane Khan?” Grace asked, with her pointed nose, eyes, and flower-petal mouth scrunched together in the center of her face. She planted her hands firmly on the countertop and shouted, “Are you crazy, Summerville?”

  “No, he’s brilliant,” Junell noted, lightly tapping her temple. “Red Tape is live. The audience will have a chance to see you and connect with you on a deeper level, and no one will be able to censor you.”

  Shaking her head rapidly from side to side, Grace said, “I can’t.”

  “You can handle Khan. There are bloggers who are more intense than she is. You survived Perez and Wendy. You can do this.”

  Grace was still shaking her head.

  “We’re casting a wide net, right? One show, one night, and we’re going to put this thing to bed.” Ethan leaned on the counter and stared directly into Grace’s eyes. “W
hat do you say, Grace King?”

  “Grace King says no. I can’t do this,” she said, banging her fist on the granite countertop.

  “You’re not going to be alone when you do this,” Ethan said smoothly.

  “You’ll be surrounded.” Junell pointed up. “The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost will be present, and so will we,” she added, grabbing her friend’s hand.

  Apprehension had taken flight long ago. Now shock and awe filled Grace’s heart as she took a seat on her bonded red leather couch. Glancing over her shoulder at the men in her life—Pastor David, Ethan, and Horace—she thought of everything they represented: her past, her present, and her future. Yet she thanked God that He’d represented Himself in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, assuring her she could do this.

  “Gracie,” Pastor David called to her in a whisper, like he used to. She turned her head and stared into his eyes. Water lined the rims of his eyes.

  “Pastor, I know you’ve never been interviewed before, but you’re not supposed to start crying until during the interview.”

  He placed his hand on her shoulder, smiled, and leaned in close to her ear. “Gracie, I just wanted to tell you that I’m sorry for everything and I’m proud of you. Don’t tremble or shake. Your truth is more powerful than any lie of his. God is going to bless you in this.”

  God is going to bless me in this. God is going to bless me in this. Grace held on to that thought and adjusted herself on the couch to make sure she received the right amount of natural light while the cameras were rolling.

  One of the runners brought in a high-backed black matte stool and placed it in front of them. Ethan, Horace, and Pastor David took their seats on mounted chairs that had been place behind Grace’s leather couch. A soft hush covered the room as they waited for the interview to begin. A few moments later Diane Khan emerged from Grace’s downstairs bathroom, which had been turned into hair and makeup for the reporter.