The Exorsistah

by Claudia Mair Burney

  The old man didn’t flinch. A mocking grin spread across his face. “I came to tell you and the first novice in the holy order of Saint Frank that it’s time for dinner.”

  Francis seemed to soften. “I’m sorry, okay, Father Miguel.”

  Father Miguel gave him a curt nod. “Shall we?” Same thing Francis said earlier. He reached for my hand, taking me by surprise.

  I stammered. “You’re tryna to help me up?”

  He sighed, and he looked remarkably like Francis when he did it, if you can imagine two people having the same sighing expression. It was weird. I took his hand and let him help me to my feet.

  “We cool?” I said.

  “We’ll see,” was his clipped reply.

  I wasn’t mad at him for that. That worked both ways.

  I walked between Father Miguel and Francis, wondering if the grouchy old priest might insult me all the way into the house. Instead, he asked me if there was anything they could do to make me more comfortable.

  I wanted to stay, “Stop acting like I’m a pole dancer Francis brought home and treat me with some respect.” Instead I rolled with the strained effort he made to be more hospitable, more for Francis’s sake than his.

  We went inside the bungalow without further incident, and right away I caught the delectable scent of fried chicken, greens, and some kind of pie emanating from Penny Pop’s kitchen. My mouth watered so much I almost drooled on myself.

  Francis went to wash his hands, and I followed. I thought I’d wait outside the door, but he beckoned me to come in—door open—and promptly splashed me with a spray of water from his drenched hands.

  I got him back good, and the only thing that kept us from Water War I was Penny Pop, who must have heard our giggles and started fussin’ from the kitchen.

  “Don’t y’all be in there playin’ ’round. You got to eat my food while it’s hot. Now, my fried chicken ain’t bad cold, but the rest ’a this stuff’ll be hit if you let it get cold. And I can’t be warming up food ’cuz folks is playin’ when it’s time to eat.”

  “You heard, Penny Pop,” I said, flicking a few more droplets in his face.

  “I’m gonna get you back,” he said, grinning.

  “If I stick around that long.”

  An expression of mock serious appeared on his face. “You don’t know the day or the hour when my vengeance will come.”

  “Then I’ll dip in forty-five minutes and miss the day and hour altogether.”

  We let our noses and appetites lead us to the kitchen, where right away Francis made a big production out of ribbing Penny Pop about her cooking style.

  “Sistah Pop, do you have any meaningful concept of cooking without pork? Every time you put on a pot of greens I find some poor sow’s foot or other body part floating inside it.”

  “Boy, that’s the food of our ancestors. We couldn’t eat the good part of a pig, uhn-uhn. Wasn’t no ham or pork chops for lowly slaves. We had to eat low on the hog, while them other folks ate high on it.”

  He’d heard that speech before. Francis mouthed the “low on the hog,” and “high on the hog” part along with Penny Pop.

  She caught him and hit him with a pot holder. “And don’tchu go to telling me you part Latino again. ’Cause they be eating pig, too.”

  “But Sistah Pop,” he said, “I think you be putting ham hocks and a little bit of drippings in the cold breakfast cereal.”

  Penny Pop paid him no mind, obviously used to that kind of pre-dinner banter. “Boy, I been cooking since before you was born, and you need to mind yo’ bit’ness.”

  Frances kept their verbal dance going by begging her not to overcook all the vegetables. They continued to affectionately rib each other until the old man came in with Mother Nicole and everybody got quiet like he was the breath that blew out all the candles.

  Francis, Mother Nicole, and Father Rivera settled down at the dining room table. This room had a more formal air, a white linen tablecloth, and each place set with Martha Stewart precision. The playfulness we shared in the kitchen disappeared, and we ate almost in silence, except Mother Nicole, who made it a point to be nice to me.

  “So, Emme where were you staying before you came to us?”

  “With my friend, Kiki.”

  “Is she your age?”

  “No. She’s closer to your age. She’s in her upper forties. She was like a mother to me.”

  “What happened there?”

  “Her husband.”

  Father Rivera cleared his throat, and Penny Pop bounded in from the kitchen and set a gigantic bowl of peach cobbler in front of me.

  She practically wailed, “Lord, have mercy, Jesus Father God! That chile just said her friend’s husband tried to molest her.”

  Father Rivera glared at her. “That isn’t what she said. I think you’re inferring a lot from two words.”

  She ignored that. Fanned her big ol’ bosom. “I can’t take that kind of talk. I gotta feed that baby. Some ol’ pervert tryna take advantage of little children. Look at her. Ain’t no bigger than a minute. Young enough to be his daughter.”

  Francis chimed in. “Don’t let Emme fool you. She can handle herself.”

  “Not against no big grown mens.” She kept fanning herself as if bad things literally inflamed her. She peered at the cobbler. “Baby, you want some whipped cream with that? Wooooo weee! That thang done got me so upset I ain’t even put the whipped cream on. Her husband! Father God, Jesus Lord, have mercy!”

  “I’ll pass on the whipped cream, thank you.”

  She tore into Francis. “And don’t you go to talking ’bout no complex carbo-high-drates,” she said. “That chile don’t need to be watching her weight. She ain’t got none to watch. She need cobbler, with whipped cream and—”

  Francis quipped, “Some drippin’s in it.”

  Everyone at the table laughed. He went on, “Real peaches are a lot better for the soul. And it’s a better form of carbohydrate, and they’re sweet without being loaded up with white sugar. I’m not tryna have Emme miss no meals. I just want her to be healthy.”

  A mischievous twinkle appeared in his eyes, and he reached over to take my cobbler! “You don’t want this, do you, Emme? You want to be fit for the kingdom, right?” He winked at me.

  “Uhn-uhn, boy. You ’bout to see if I can handle myself or not, for real. Quit playin’!”

  He pretended to be shocked. “Awww, see. You’re turning on me already. Now you gon’ get all big and sassy like Penny Pop.”

  Penny Pop put her hands on her hips and looked outraged. “Who you callin’ big? I ain’t big. I’m substantial. This here is what you call sturdy. I’m gonna last.”

  Francis looked her up and down. “Until the diabetes sets in. And the high blood pressure. And God knows what else.”

  Penny Pop stopped his trash-talking by making a cross with her fingers. “Whooooooaaaa! Boy! Don’t you be claimin’ that mess for me. You know I go to New Testament Word of Faith Christian Center, and we don’t be makin’ no negative confessions. I ain’t Catholic. I don’t go in for no sufferin’ for righteousness sake. Don’t get me wrong. I ain’t mad at y’all, but I can’t go wit’cha there. I just got some Catholic leanings.”

  When she said leanings she leaned into Francis’s chair, almost toppling him over. “Uhn-uhn. I got the leanings. So I’ma rebuke you. I ain’t claiming no diabetes.”

  She leaned her substantial body on him until she made him crack up.

  Finally Father Miguel slammed his fork on the table. “Can we just have a quiet dinner? Without comedy or tragedy”—he looked at me—“to ruin what little appetite I have left.”

  Francis straightened up, and Penny Pop moved her substantial self back into the kitchen, hips swingin’ side to side, looking unfazed. It felt like a blanket of gloom settled on everyone at the table. I decided to try to break the thick silence that had descended upon us with a crack on Francis. “I’ll eat my cobbler if I want to, drippings and all.”

 
; “Have it your way, hardheaded girl, but if you want to be like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego standing in the fire, you’re going to have to give up the King’s bread.”

  “Nobody’s trying to throw me in the fire right now. For all the jacked-up things people actually did to me, nobody ever did that. And if you haven’t noticed, this ain’t bread, but even if it were, it would have been God who blessed me with it. When God blesses me with bread, I roll wit’ it. When God blesses with cobbler, I roll wit’ it. And if He ever calls me to stand in fire, I’ma roll wit’ that, too. To everything there is a season.”

  Father Rivera raised his water glass. “Spoken like a true spiritual warrior.” I shot a look at him, and he had that same twinkle in his eye that Francis often did. Francis, however, must have missed that.

  “Don’t mock her.”

  Father Rivera put his glass down. “I’m not mocking your lover, Frank.”

  “She’s not my mother,” he said, his voice steely, but drenched in sarcasm. “Oh, did I say mother? I meant to say she’s not my lover. Emme and I are just friends, and I’d appreciate it if you stopped implying she’s anything else. It’s bad form, padre.” Francis picked his napkin up from his lap and practically tossed it on the table. “Excuse me.” He looked at me. “Emme, I was kidding about the cobbler. Enjoy as much food as you’d like while you’re here.” I heard the front door to the house close a few seconds later.

  Oh no, he wasn’t leavin’ me alone with Father Grinch. I didn’t need bro’ to steal my Christmas or anything else.

  I snatched up my bowl of cobbler, said, “Excuse me!” and dashed after Francis.

  I found Francis sitting in his Camry. He had his black rosary beads in his hand, but he didn’t look like he was using them. The motor was running, the air-conditioning was on, but he didn’t look like he was actually about to leave. I knocked on the door, and he reached over and opened it for me.

  “Can I come in?”

  “If you want to.”

  “Whatcha doin’?”

  “Thinking about praying.”

  I handed him the peach cobbler and got inside. Closed the door behind me. I held out my hand. “Okay, I’ll take my cobbler back.”

  He pulled the bowl closer to him. “What if I wanna keep it? I like cobbler. I don’t get to eat it much, and it’s smelling good, chica.”

  “I’ll crack you in the head if you try to keep it, that’s what. And you’re in a weakened state because you didn’t finish dinner. You won’t even be able to defend yourself.”

  “But I got this cobbler. I can eat it, get a sugar rush, and take you down.”

  “Yeah, but that ain’t right. You can’t hit a girl, so stop playin’.” I emphasized my words by putting a stern don’t mess with me look on my face.

  He handed me back my dessert.

  I was glad he could joke even though his eyes looked sad. Yet, despite the fact that he had his own secrets, I liked the compassion in his eyes.

  “Hey, Francis, you said you were thinking about praying. Do you get points with God for that? I think about praying a lot more than I actually pray, and I could use the points, if you know what I mean.”

  He stared out the windshield. “I don’t know if you get points or not. You’ll have to take that up with God. If He says yes, let me know. I think about it more than I do it, too. And I could use all the points with Him I can get myself.”

  “I’ll bet you don’t do too badly. You pray seven times a day.”

  “I must need it more than seven times a day.”

  I turned my gaze to where he looked into the empty parking lot. The kids I had watched earlier poked in and out of slamming doors. They looked spent. It was cool in the dark now—if you call eighty-five degrees cool.

  Francis’s voice had the dejected sound of someone who carried a two-ton weight on his shoulders. “You’ve probably lost all respect for me, now that you’ve seen Father Miguel and me at war with each other.”

  “What do you have on him?”

  His body language changed before my eyes. He tightened like he had a balled-up fist on the inside. “He doesn’t understand me. He doesn’t even get me wanting to be a priest. I mean, how hard could that be for him? He is a priest.”

  “You didn’t answer my question, but I’ll let that pass, like I usually do.”

  His eyes brightened again. “Hey, you wanna learn to pray the rosary?”

  I thought about Jamilla’s Catholic church. I wasn’t sure if I needed to mess with that.

  Francis must have read my hesitation wrong. “It’s just a method of praying, Emme. You act like I just asked you to draw a pentagram and kill a goat.”

  I tried to say this delicately. “Um … speaking of killing goats …”

  He stared at me, openmouthed for a moment until he cracked up. “This ought to be interesting. That was a heckuva transition.”

  “Is there some kind of religion that is like … I don’t know … Catholic, African, and, um … Voodoo, all mixed up together?”

  “Why?”

  “I’m curious.”

  He ran his hand through that shiny Blacktino hair of his. “Why, Emme Vaughn?”

  “Come on, Francis. Tell me. Do you know about anything like that?”

  “Santeria is like that. It’s an Afro-Caribbean religion, most often practiced in secret, but nowadays people are a little more open with it. They practice it a lot in Latin America, but because of immigration, you can find it in pockets all over, including here in Michigan. I’ve seen signs of it in Mexican town in Detroit.”

  “Do people who practice Santeria do stuff that could open you up to demon possession?”

  “Yes, Emme. They do. They kinda like the experience of possession, but they think of it in a whole different way than we do.”

  He frowned, narrowing his pretty eyes at me. “Why are you asking about Santeria? If you’re thinking of a switch, I don’t recommend that religion for you. If you have problems with Catholic doctrine, you’re definitely going to be put off by worshipping the African Orishas.”

  “I’m not thinking of switching. I like being Pentecostal, with maybe a hardly noticeable Catholic leaning.” I leaned on him like Penny Pop did, but rather than laugh he slipped his arms around me.

  I went all paranoid. That was awfully close, yo. I must have stiffened like a corpse, because after the longest minute in the world, he pulled away. His cocoa-red skin a little more red than usual.

  “Okay. Lesson one,” he said softly. He placed the rosary in my hand and told me to hold the crucifix. I sat my cobbler between us on the console.

  He turned his knees toward me, so the tip of his right knee touched the tip of my left one. I tried not to think about how that affected me. This was a prayer lesson. Innocent. He probably didn’t even realize he was touching me. We were in his little car, and it was nothing.

  So why did my stomach feel like the attack of the killer butterflies?

  He leaned a little in my direction, his scent rushing into my awareness; a fresh and outdoorsy smell, like he’d been chopping wood and doing natural, manly things.

  I was so into him, I didn’t hear the words he spoke. I knew it was some kind of question because his voice went up at the end. “Huh?”

  “Pay attention, Emme,” he said like a kid pretending to be a schoolteacher. “Do you know how to do any of it?”

  “No. I mean my mama use to do it, but I ain’t pay it much mind then, and I think I saw a nun do it on TV recently.”

  I started saying what I had heard the TV nun say, not only because I remembered some of the words, but because he was so near.

  “Our Father who art in heaven,

  hallowed be thy name.

  Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done

  In earth as it is in heaven.”

  “Good.” His eyes brightened. “That’s good! But that’s not where you begin. Do you remember how the nun started?”

  “I think she kissed the crucifix.”

&nb
sp; “Nice! Lots of people do that, but maybe you should make the sign of the cross first.”

  “Why?”

  “For lots of reasons: to remember Golgotha. For protection against evil. For the grace it gives you.”

  “Do I make the sign of the cross while I’m holding it?”

  “Sure. If that’s how you’re feelin’ it.”

  “Show me how.”

  He took my hand in his—fireworks!—then fixed my fingers so that my thumb, index, and middle finger tips were all connected to the crucifix. He tenderly cradled my hand in his, like if he wasn’t careful he might break me. He gently lifted my fingers still holding the silver Jesus, showed me the first point of the cross by touching my fingers at my forehead. “In the name of the Father.”

  I repeated the words. Then he moved my hand and touched my fingers to my abdomen with a blush, carefully avoiding my breast.

  “And of the Son.”

  Again, I repeated after him. This felt like such a righteous, holy thing to do. I forgot about the initial fireworks and became enraptured by what he was teaching me.

  He moved my hand from left shoulder to right, “And the Holy Spirit.”

  He released my hand.

  “The sign of the cross is a powerful symbol, Emme. And don’t make the mistake of thinking this is a Catholic or Orthodox thing. It’s for all believers. For centuries, Christians have used it as an ally against evil. St. Cyril of Jerusalem said, ‘It is gratuitous because of the poor. Easy because of the weak. A benefit from God, the standard of the faithful, the terror of demons.’”

  “Which translated means anybody can do it, and the demons are scared of it.”

  “You got it.”

  His gold-speckled eyes took me in and fireworks returned with a bite. What was I supposed to do with that? I was so green when it came to relationships, I wouldn’t even know what to do if he tried to kiss me.

  “Now you can kiss,” he said.

  If I wasn’t so dark, he could have seen that I had turned ten shades of red. “What?”

  “The cross. You can kiss it.”

  “Oh,” I said. I tried to play it off.

  His eyes sparkled with mischief. Probably said it like that on purpose to mess with me.