A Natural Woman

by Lori Johnson

He laughed. “Okay, any particular reason?”

  She hesitated, then said, “Remember the guy I told you I was dating? He’s planning on visiting tomorrow and I’m not so sure bumping into you is liable to go over too well.”

  “I see. You obviously told him about Vegas.”

  “Yeah, just a few days ago. He really hasn’t had a chance to process it all yet.”

  “Okay, if it helps ease your mind, I can assure you, tomorrow I will make a point of being somewhere other than Garden View.”

  She picked up the Hurston novel and ran her fingers over the title. “Thanks, Kenneth. I know it probably sounds strange and I really hate having to ask it of you at all. But the last thing I need is any additional drama in my life right about now.”

  “Hey, whatever it takes to make you happy, you know I’m more than willing to do. But I’ve gotta ask, and I know with our relationship ending the way it did, this is most certainly none of my business, but are things between you and this guy okay?”

  “Sure, they’re fine,” she said.

  “I mean, he hasn’t done anything that would cause you to be afraid of him, has he?”

  She grabbed the card Kenneth had given her and shoved it back between the pages of the book. “Oh, you mean like try to choke the shit out of me?” she said. “Nope, he’s yet to pull a stunt like that, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “Aliesha,” Kenneth said after a strained and extended pause. “You know if I could take back that night, I would. I know I was wrong and I know you’re still entitled to be hurt about it . . . But dammit, woman, what else do you want me to do? Sit here and pretend like I don’t hear the fear in your voice?”

  She tossed the book aside and said, “Everything is fine, Kenneth, really.”

  “Yeah, okay. If you say so. But as a friend and someone who truly cares about your well-being, in spite of my one moment of gross and inexcusable idiocy, if you ever need me, baby, I’m here, okay? Just call me, Aliesha, and I’ll be there—no strings attached, no questions asked.”

  “All right,” she said, struggling against the urge to break down and unleash the words knotting her throat in their search for a way out. So why don’t you come now. I need you. And I’ve missed you more than you’ll ever know. She shook her head and finally summoned forth a whispered and less revealing, “Thank you . . . and good night.”

  On hanging up the phone, she stared at the opened gray suitcase, the crumpled T-shirt, and the book she knew she’d probably never read. You really do need to clean up in here, she told herself. And getting rid of these things would be the perfect place to start.

  She carefully repacked the items she’d removed from the bag and zipped its flap closed again. But rather than lug the suitcase from the room, like she’d originally intended, upon rising she walked away and left the bag sitting where she’d found it. Her textbook once again clutched to her chest, she turned off the room’s light with her free hand and, without looking back, closed the door behind her.

  PART II

  CHAPTER 17

  After parking in front of the barbershop, Aliesha sat in her car and chuckled at the trio she saw stumble from the establishment’s entrance. Sam Junior and his rambunctious twins deserved their own half-hour comedy special. The little boys sported the same fresh, new haircuts, the same dirty blue shorts and stained SpongeBob T-shirt ensemble. Suckers jutted from the corners of their downturned lips as they snarled, kicked, and swung what appeared to be rolled-up comic books at each other. In his valiant efforts to keep them from maiming one another, their father, Sam Junior, appeared to be absorbing the bulk of the hard blows in the already bruised and banged-up space between his ashy knees and ankles.

  So much had transpired in the two weeks since Aliesha had last stepped inside Wally’s Cool Cuts, it felt like two months or more had passed. But a twinge of déjà vu hit her the moment she walked up to the door and placed her fingers against the handle.

  She entered, not unlike the time before, to the tinkle of the bell above her head. Likewise, the same blues, though a different singer and a different song, asserted its presence with a wail and a holler from the oversized speakers of the shop’s ’80s-style boom box.

  Wally looked up from the customer seated in his barber’s chair and smiled. “Hey, Miz Ahh . . . Wait, I mean . . .” He snapped his fingers. “Eaton. Doctor Eaton, right?”

  She paused, smiled, and said, “Really, plain ole Aliesha is fine.”

  She glanced at Gerald, who, once again, was working a pair of scissors over the head of the man seated in his chair while yapping nonstop into the phone mashed against his ear. But as Aliesha strolled past, he made eye contact and extended her the courtesy of a “What up?” head bob.

  While her pace slowed, her heart rate rose with every step she took toward Dante’s station. Unlike her first visit, this time she found him already on his feet and working on the customer in his chair. Also, swiveling from side to side in the barber’s chair nearest Dante’s station was a long-legged, baby-faced young man who greeted Aliesha’s curious gaze with a wide, goofy-looking grin.

  “Miz Professor. Nice to see you again,” Dante said without gazing up from his clippers. “A little early, aren’t you?”

  Aliesha pulled a textbook and a highlighter from her bag. “Take your time,” she said. “I’m in no big hurry.”

  Not long after she sat on the empty bench directly across from Dante’s workstation, the young man seated in the adjoining station stopped swiveling and openly gawked in her direction. Finally he said, “Yo, D., man, you were right. She does kinda look like a nice cross between Max from Living Single and the singer India.Arie.”

  Dante shut off his clippers and rose from his crouch wearing a glare. “Man, you ain’t even suppose to be here. But since you are, why don’t you make yourself useful and go see if those towels are ready to go into the dryer.”

  The young man shook his head, leaned forward, and broke into his wide toothy grin again. “Man, like you said, I ain’t even suppose to be here. And since I’m not officially on the clock, I ain’t studyin’ ’bout you or those towels. Now why don’t you stop tripping and introduce me to this nice lady?”

  “Because she didn’t come in here to listen to any of your nonsense,” Dante said before he switched his clippers on again.

  “Yeah, like you the only somebody up in here with enough going on to talk to a female that’s got book smarts and a degree.” The grin the young man aimed at Aliesha struck her as more mischievous and playful than low-down and lecherous.

  When she smiled back, he leaped from his chair and thrust his hand in her face. “Pleasure to meet you, Miz Professor. They call me Yazz. I’m the baby boy of this here ragtag, hair-cutting operation, but I’m by far the smartest and most uniquely talented.”

  The man in Dante’s chair, who had looked asleep, suddenly blinked open his eyes and chuckled. “You mean the biggest smart ass with the most mouth, don’t you?”

  “All right, Willie, man,” Yazz said. “Don’t start none, won’t be none, hear?”

  Dante looked at Aliesha, his eyes apologetic and baring a hint of embarrassment. He nodded toward Yazz. “Don’t mind him, Miz Professor. He’s young and mainly a threat to himself.”

  “Oh, see!” Yazz shouted. “See the disrespect I’ve got to put up with around here? Mark my words, though, y’all gone miss y’all some Yazz when I’m gone.”

  “Is that right?” the customer named Willie said. “Well, where you going, son? And ’bout how long you ’spect it’s gonna take you to get there?”

  All three of the men, including Yazz, laughed.

  Aliesha watched as Dante removed the cape from around Willie’s neck and flung it at Yazz. “Here, take care of this for me. I’ve got to prep him for a shave. And while you’re at it, go ’head and see about those towels.”

  Yazz balled the cape under his arm and said, “I swear if y’all don’t treat me like I’ve got flunky or something stamped on my forehead.
”

  Rather than reply, Dante picked up a thick strap and started drawing a long, old-fashioned straightedge razor up and down it. As a still-muttering Yazz trudged off in the direction of the laundry room, Dante smiled and winked at Aliesha before launching into a conversation with Willie about some local sporting event.

  Aliesha turned her attention to the textbook she’d brought along. A couple of minutes passed and she’d become somewhat engrossed in her reading when she heard Wally say, “Yo, Gerald, man. Ain’t that Roz just pulled up out there?”

  Gerald, whose last customer had left just as Dante had begun preparing Willie for his shave, walked over to the window, stooped, and peered out. “Oh hell!” he said. He spun around and, while hightailing it back to his workstation, he shoved a hand into his pocket and jerked out his cell phone. By the time the visibly angry woman barged into the shop, Gerald had positioned himself in his barber’s chair with his back facing the door and his phone locked against the side of his head.

  The up-and-down heave of the woman’s ample chest reminded Aliesha of the in-and-out swell of a bullfrog’s throat, while the crooked blond wig on her head looked like a worn and tattered reject from Tina Turner’s old collection. The woman adjusted her hair and wiped the sweat from her brow before she shouted to no one in particular, “How long has it been since Sam Junior was in here? And where he’d say he was headed?”

  Wally shook his head and began sweeping away the loose hair from the neck and shoulders of the man still in his chair. “I’m sorry, ma’am, Sam Junior isn’t one of my customers. Might want to ask my man Gerald, here.”

  The woman marched over and slipped behind Wally and Gerald’s workstations. After lowering the volume on the boom box, she jabbed Gerald in the shoulder. “Uh-uh, don’t act like you don’t see me standing up here. Where Sam Junior go?”

  Gerald swung around, wearing an ugly scowl. “Look here, woman, can’t you see I’m on the phone?!”

  The woman threw up her hands. “Hell, man, when is yo’ talking ass not on the phone?!”

  When Gerald mumbled something, turned his back, and resumed his previous conversation, Yazz, who by then had returned from his banishment to the laundry room, clapped and unleashed a loud, mocking hoot.

  The noise drew the enraged woman’s attention. However, when she ventured a few steps to the rear of the shop, Yazz hollered, “Hold up there, Miz Lady. Ain’t no need of you even wasting your time. Everybody back here’s name is Bennett and ain’t none of us trying to be up in it.”

  The woman flipped Yazz her middle finger and said, “To hell with you and all the rest of y’all’s trifling asses. You can play deaf, dumb, blind, and crazy if you want to, but I know damn well that fool was up in here. Tell you what, if you see him again before I do, be sure to let him know I wants my damn child support. Them big-headed twin bastards ain’t his only responsibility. He got a eight-year-old daughter been needing new shoes and a chipped tooth fixed for months now. You’d best be glad I didn’t catch his lying ass up in here, ’cause it sho’ wouldn’t have been nothing nice.”

  The woman glared into the barber’s mirrors behind Wally’s station and adjusted her wig one last time before storming out.

  “Don’t you think that was kind of mean?” Aliesha said. “Somebody could have at least told her he’d been in here. I came pretty close to doing so myself.”

  “See, that’s the problem,” Yazz said. “Y’all women know everything, but the rules. Brother Man Rule #1 reads as follows, ‘When at all possible, as it pertains to matters of the heart, particularly those not involving you, mind your own.’ Hate to be the one to break it to you, Miz Professor, but if Sam Junior hada wanted ole girl to know where he was, he’da told her.”

  Aliesha looked at Dante. “You agree with that?”

  Dante stroked the hairs on his chin and said, “All I know is the last time Roz got hot behind some of Sam Junior’s mess, dude ended up with a sliced tendon in his calf and a huge chunk missing out of his thigh.”

  Yazz snickered. “And you’d best believe neither of them places was hardly what she was aiming for. Had she not been drunk, them twin boys of Sam Junior’s just mighta never made it here, if you catch my drift.”

  “Humpf,” Willie said. “I always wondered how he got that jackrabbit gait of his. Fool had the nerve to tell me it was some old war injury.”

  The men’s loud laughter deepened the frown lines cutting trenches in Aliesha’s face. Deciding she’d had her fill of their Brother Man rules and childish chatter, she reset her sights on the pages of her textbook. Still, every so often, bits and pieces of their conversation drifted past her filter and forced her to look up.

  Yazz: “You know what that was all about, don’t you? Sam Junior got himself a new woman.”

  Willie: “What? You means besides Roz and that girl he had them twins with?”

  Yazz: “Yup. Dude got him some little ole Mexican chick who stay over in Midtown somewhere.”

  Willie: “How he gone juggle three women when he can’t hardly halfway take care of one?”

  Yazz: “According to what I heard, that ain’t much of an issue when it comes to the senorita.”

  Willie: “Yeah? She got a good job or something?”

  Yazz: “Man, this slim done went from being a newbie, slinging fries and apple pies, to being manager over at one of them McDonald’s on Union.”

  Dante: “Why you say it like that? You one of those insecure types who can’t stand seeing a woman in charge?”

  Yazz: “No man, I’m just saying, seem like everywhere you look these days some Juan Carlos, Maria Gonzales type is getting cut a break.”

  Willie: “Hate to say, it but the boy got a point. Just about anywhere you go ’round here now, all of the maids, the janitors, the groundskeepers, and the folks working on these here housing construction sites are all Hispanic.”

  Yazz: “Yeah and how they end up with all the damn jobs when most of them are here illegally and can barely speak English? Hell, I made the mistake of going through the drive-thru at Popeyes the other day and dude’s accent was so thick, I couldn’t understand a freaking word he said. I swear, man, you’da thought I was talking to Pepe Le Pew or Ricky Ricardo or somebody.”

  At that point, Aliesha slammed her book shut and cleared her throat, but Yazz ignored her. “And a lot of those jokers are nasty, too, man. You ever watch any of those old episodes of Sanford and Son? Remember how Fred was always warning Lamont about hanging out with his Puerto Rican neighbor, Julio? And how he was always having to chase dude’s goat outta his yard?”

  Dante said, “Come on, man, even you gotta know television and reality are two different things. Besides, wasn’t like Fred was ever gonna be up for a housekeeping or best yard of the month award his damn self.”

  Yazz said, “Naw, man, I’m saying though. My cousin Trey live right next door to some of these Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, or what have you. And man, you look over there and all you see is goats, chickens, dogs, and cats all up on the porch, in the yard, and probably in the house, too.”

  When Yazz noticed Aliesha squinting in his direction, he said, “What? I guess you think I’m wrong for saying that too, huh?”

  “Maybe if you could hear yourself, you’d realize just how ignor . . . insensitive you sound,” she said. “How much you wanna bet that not more than 30 to 40 years ago, a bunch of White guys were sitting up in a barbershop somewhere saying the exact same things about folks who look like you and me?”

  “Hell,” Willie said. “I’ll do you one even better. No doubt as we speak, somewhere in Riverton a bunch of good old boys and rednecks are having this same conversation about the Mexicans, the Niggas, the Asians, and damn near anybody else they feel is a threat to they little patch of dirt and so-called privileged way of life.”

  Dante put down his razor in order to slide his palm against Willie’s. “That’s right, man. Talk about it.”

  Aliesha looked at Yazz, who was smirking and shaking his he
ad. Without even being conscious of it, she slipped into her lecture voice. “Just try not to use one or two case scenarios to make such wide-sweeping, blanket judgments, is all I’m asking. They’re not all here illegally. They’re not all ignorant, dirty, and nasty. It may surprise you to know that quite a few of them come from families that’ve lived here for generations. By the same token, many of them have a wonderful command of a language that a lot of our own people routinely butcher. I’d dare say, all most of them want is to be afforded an opportunity to make an honest living, just like you and me.”

  “Yeah, nice speech,” Yazz said. “But I’m saying, this ain’t the classroom. How you know what they’re really like? You ever lived around any?”

  “For what it’s worth,” Aliesha said, “the man I’m currently dating just so happens to be of Latin descent.”

  Yazz slapped his knees and grinned. “Oh! Oh, my bad. I didn’t realize my comments were hitting so close to home. You hear that, Dante, man? I guess jobs, houses, and business loans aren’t the only places where our Hispanic hombres are getting cut in on a piece of the action.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Aliesha said. “Aren’t I as free to date whom I please, in much the same way your friend, Sam Junior, is?”

  Yazz stopped grinning and said, “Well, if you really wanna know what I think—”

  “We don’t!” Dante said. He reached into this pocket and yanked out a twenty-dollar bill. “Why don’t you do us all a favor and run on over to your next favorite spot to hang out, Popeyes, and get yourself something to eat?”

  “Yeah,” Willie said as he stood up and pulled out his wallet in order to pay Dante. “Go on over to the chicken shack and worry them folks over there for a while. Matter of fact, I think I just might stop in there for a minute myself. You need a ride?”

  Yazz bolted from his seat and snatched the bill from Dante’s hand. “Hey, if Willie’s driving and you’re paying, it’s all good by me. You want me to bring you something back?”

  Dante shook his head. “Nothing other than my change.” He looked at Aliesha. “What about you, Miz Professor? You want anything?”