by Pearl Cleage
“Encourage them how?”
He put down his mug, and I thought for a sickening second I had gone too far, but his voice was calm. “Well, to really answer that question, I have to go back a ways.”
“I've got time.”
He looked at me steadily for a minute, as if he was trying to decide how to tell me something important. When he spoke again, his voice was quiet and hard. “Twenty years ago, I had a buddy whose sister got snatched two blocks from here. She was coming from the grocery store, and a man dragged her over by the railroad tracks and raped her and then cut her throat and left her lying there.”
How many stories like that have we all heard? How fast do we learn to turn the pages of the newspaper, or put the for sale sign up, or just thank the gods that it wasn't anybody we knew and loved who had met such a terrible, lonely, meaningless death?
“This cat, her brother, was on the road with me, played in my band, and this was his baby sister, so he was in a bad way when he got the news. When he came home for the funeral, I came with him. It was bad … real bad. Then somebody told him that she wasn't the first one. Somebody had been snatching women around here for months, raping them, killing them, tossing their bodies into the Dumpster or leaving them in the street, and nobody was doing a damn thing about it.”
Something in his voice made the hair on the back of my neck stand up, but I had asked him, so I had to listen.
“When we got back to the hotel, my buddy just kept drinking, and talking like you do when you're drinking, but something he said stayed in my mind. He kept asking how they could keep electing black folks to the mayor's office and putting in black police chiefs and still can't protect a woman coming home from the grocery store? ‘That don't make no sense,’ he kept saying. ‘That don't make no damn sense.’ And you know what?”
“What?”
“He was right. It didn't make sense. So I started trying to figure it out and one day I realized that the answer was obvious.”
He looked at me expectantly, but it wasn't as obvious to me as it had been to him.
“And what was the answer?”
His voice was so quiet now, it was almost a whisper. “We had to get rid of the bad guys.”
“The bad guys?”
He nodded. “What bad guys?”
His eyes bored into mine. “I think you know.”
Of course I knew. We all know. That's why we triplelock our doors and run to our cars in the dark and don't walk in the parks alone and meet our daughters at the school bus. Rapists and robbers, wife beaters and woman haters, crack dealers and child abusers. A bad guy is a bad guy is a bad guy. …
“And did you?” I said. “Did you get rid of the bad guys?”
He sat back. “You tell me.”
What had I noticed from the very first day? I could walk all over this neighborhood and never get nervous. The men spoke politely and always seemed to be about business. The absence of youthful predators and brokendown desperadoes was striking and wonderful. I felt safe.
“But how—?”
“I'm a reasonable person, so I always give a man the benefit of the doubt. If someone is acting a fool, I'll sit with him and try to figure out why.”
“What if he didn't know what he was doing was wrong?”
He looked at me. “They always know.”
That's why it's so scary. Did the guy who killed Blue's buddy's sister know what he was doing? And if he did, how could he do it anyway? And what are we supposed to do with him then?
“So what good does it do to talk to them?”
“Sometimes people need to be reminded of consequences. But I am only required to remind them once.”
“And after that?”
“After that you have declared yourself on the side of chaos, and you will be treated accordingly.”
On the side of chaos. That pretty well sums it up, I guess, and chaos is always bad for women and children, but I still had to know. I took a deep breath and went for it. “Have you ever killed anybody?”
He looked at me and his eyes softened a little, but his voice never did. “I'm a soldier, and we're at war.”
He said it so calmly it didn't even seem strange. I knew there was a war going on between black men, but I had never heard one of them acknowledge it so directly and declare a side.
“Why doesn't that frighten me?” I said softly.
“I'm not at war with you.”
“But how can you just decide to claim a part of a city and then—”
He interrupted me gently. “And then what? Make it safe for people to live in? Demand that the men act like men?”
“But is that your responsibility?”
“Absolutely.”
“What gives you the right?”
He considered the question. “Well, it doesn't make much sense for me to be careful not to smoke a cigar around Lu andthensendher outintothe world andnot make sure DooDoo and King James don't keep their distance.”
All he had to do was say the names and I had an instant flash of Uncle DooDoo leering at Aretha while he draped a muscular arm possessively around his niece. Ofcourse I wanted somebody to protect Lu from him. Of course I wanted somebody to make sure Mattie and Jerry could grow their collards in peace. Sure I liked being able to walk around after dark without looking over my shoulder and knowing there hasn't been a rape or a crack house in this neighborhood in five years. But what price was I prepared to pay for that safety? My head was spinning.
“You know what's funny about black women?” Blue asked gently.
“What's that?”
“They're the only women in the world that you have to talk into letting you protect them.”
“Maybe we've just forgotten how.”
“Exactly,” he said. “And that's why I'm here.”
“Why?”
“To help you remember.”
The idea of protection is so central to everything that goes on between men and women, even when we don't admit it. Probably especially when we don't admit it. Blue's decision to take matters into his own hands and create a safe environment for people to live their normal, ordinary, everyday lives seemed so extraordinary in the face of the chaos we routinely accept as a community that I didn't quite know what to say. His unequivocal acceptance of the traditional male role appealed to me on a truly visceral level, but did that mean I had to become a more traditional female to balance things out?
My mind was already on overload, but I thought I understood something I hadn't before. Something personal.
“Is that why you stopped singing?”
He smiled. “I didn't stop singing. I stopped recording.” The distinction was, I'm sure, crucial to a singer the same way a writer will always separate the act of writing from the choice to publish.
“Is that why you stopped recording?”
“That's part of it.”
“What's the other part?”
“The other part is a conversation for another day,” he said, standing up and buttoning his coat. “I've taken up enough of your time.”
“No problem,” I said, walking him to the door. “But what did you come over here to tell me?”
“Whatever you wanted to know,” he said, turning to face me.
The truth sounds funny sometimes when you just say it right out.
“I see.”
“So how'd I do?”
I opened the door and looked right into his eyes. “So far, so good.”
22
BETH WAS CALLING FROM AUGUSTA. She had just registered six hundred voters and been waited upon by two black county commissioners and a committee of party regulars who were prepared to abandon their previous commitments and throw in with Beth as soon as she said the word. The fact that it was one o'clock in the morning seemed to make no difference to her at all.
My first impulse was to tell her to call me in the morning, but if I wanted to know what she was really doing, this would be the time she'd be most likely to slip and tell me. She was s
till high on the energy of all those women in the audience sending her their collective wave of love. This was that euphoric after-the-show moment when the ego, which cares nothing for pretense, is still in control.
“So what did you tell them?”
“I told them if they were really serious, they should send a delegation to Atlanta to see me where we could speak in a more relaxed atmosphere.”
That meant she intended to invite them to her house so that she could be positioned under her portrait like a queen receiving her subjects.
“I'm sure they'll make a persuasive presentation,” I said, determined to stay out of it. Beth had never paid the kind of dues Precious was paying at that growers meeting. People came to see Beth for inspiration. They came to see Precious for solutions to real-life problems.
“You should be at that meeting, don't you think?”
The idea could not have been further from my mind or of less interest. “It hadn't occurred to me.”
There was a pause, and then Beth's voice reproached me. “We talked about this, Gina. Unless you've reconsidered our agreement and you'd rather not do the speechwriting segment at all.”
Suddenly I understood why Beth had wanted to break the project up into three discrete chunks. She knew exactly how much I needed to pay off the weasel, and she had offered it to me, to the penny, in three payments. If I abdicated on one-third of the work, she had a right to abdicate on one-third of the money, and if she did, how was I going to replace ten thousand dollars?
Beth had me between a rock and a hard place, and she knew it. The thing was, I couldn't even get mad. This was part of what I earned with my own bad behavior. This was just another way for the universe to reinforce all those rehab lessons about what it means to be a grownup. Being indignant was beside the point.
“Of course not,” I said calmly. “But these kinds of early sessions are rarely any help to a speechwriter. You haven't even made your final decision yet, have you?”
There was just enough air before she responded to let me know that the question was moot. She actually was going to throw her hat in the ring for governor. It was clearly a bad idea whose time had come.
“You'll be among the first to know,” she said.
I had to smile. That was so like Beth. Not the first to know. But among the first.
“So how is everything coming along there?” she asked.
“Fine, except they've asked Precious Hargrove to be on the dedication committee, and she accepted.”
Beth groaned. “How could you let that happen?”
“They didn't consult me. I don't think they were aware of a possible conflict of interest.”
“This could be very awkward,” Beth said, sounding annoyed.
“Very,” I said.
“Have they printed up programs or invitations or anything yet?”
“No,” I said. “Nothing's going to the printer until next week.”
“Are you proofing everything first?”
“Of course.”
“Good. That buys us some time.”
“Some time for what?”
“To figure out how to get her off the list.”
“She's one of the cochairs, Beth.”
“Let me worry about that,” she said quickly, moving on. “What about the papers? Are you making good progress there?”
“It's going very well,” I said. “I've got about half the stuff pulled that I'll need for the video, so there won't be any problem there.”
“You haven't come across any of the kind of material we discussed, have you?”
I hesitated, then lied, even though lying is another one of the things I'm working on. “No.”
Of course, Beth heard the hesitation. “Are you sure?”
“I'm sure.”
She let it slide, but I knew she didn't believe me. Too bad. I wasn't ready to surrender Son's private life to Beth's disapproving stare just yet.
“Good enough,” Beth said, yawning loudly. “What time is it? Good lord, Gina! Why didn't you tell me? Did I wake you?”
“No problem,” I said. “When will you be back here?”
“Tuesday. I'll call you when I get in. And Gina?”
“Yes?”
“It's good to have you back on the team.”
23
IHAVE A LOVE/HATE RELATIONSHIP with malls, but I needed a dress for the party tonight, and Lenox Square offers a dizzying array of stores to choose from. Of course, many of the stores are aimed at the market segment that can still expose their midriffs without causing passersby to avert their eyes, but there are still lots of choices for people like me who aren't twenty-five anymore, but who aren't fifty yet either. That's one of the things I like.
The other thing I love about Lenox in a completely perverse way is the totally unapologetic excess. It's full of beautiful, totally unnecessary stuff. Even the food tends toward Starbucks coffee confections and the decadence of gold-boxed Godiva chocolates. The mall environment is meant to do one thing and one thing only: make you spend your money.
Everything here is in service of the shopping. The restaurants are either fast-food places where you can wolf down your lunch and get back to the business at hand or more leisurely establishments facing the mall where you can see people ducking into shops and emerging with bags. Faced with such temptation, you rush through the meal in order to be sure to catch the sale on more stuff you don't need.
Most of the time, I feel too guilty to enjoy the mall. My mother ruined it for me. She never went to the malls voluntarily and when I dragged her—only until I was old enough to drive myself!—she would ruin the whole trip by muttering continuously about the evils of American capitalism. When she went with me to buy a prom dress, she lectured me the whole time about consumer culture and how many poor people could use the money I was prepared to spend on whatever pastel creation I had set my heart on for prom night.
After I learned to drive, I'd go by myself, but my mother's voice stayed in my head, so I never could really relax the way guilt-free shoppers can. The personal being political takes a lot of the fun out of stuff if you're not careful. That's why Flora could spend only two hours in search of an outfit for the party. After that, she'd start feeling guilty and the fun was over.
But today, I was on a mission. I'd given myself until noon to find a dress that makes me feel the way I looked in my imagining of the party. When Aretha said the party attire was “after five,” I knew I'd have to buy something.
I can't even remember the last time I got dressed up to go out. “After five” seemed like a dress code from my parents' generation, but maybe that's why it appealed to me. “After five” had a sophisticated sound like “supper club” or “cocktails.”
The dress I had in mind would match that nod to another generation's undeniable cool. It would have to have class and sass and be sexy enough to let my landlord know I was open to a friendship as long as it didn't include a celibacy requirement. I knew this was going to be a special night, and I needed a special dress. I also needed to wash my hair, get a manicure and a pedicure, and find shoes I could dance in, but one thing at a time. Once I had found the dress, everything else would fall into place.
But it was already eleven-fifteen. I'd been here since ten and nothing. I'd tried on a couple of things, but everything looked too young or too old or too fast or too slow or just not special. I took a break for a cup of overpriced coffee and watched people coming down the escalator, bags of perfect purchases slung over their arms, chatting and comparing notes. They had all found what they wanted and here I sat, sipping and sulking, when I remembered there was another option.
Aretha had guaranteed Flora that the dress of her dreams could be found in Little Five Points, a funky intown neighborhood bravely resisting gentrification, and she was as good as her word. Flora's dress was a oneshouldered tangerine sheath that made her look amazing, and she had found it, tried it on, and paid for it all within forty-five minutes. Maybe my dress shared my mother's low
opinion of the malls and wouldn't be caught dead in a store where Ashanti and J-Lo play on the in-store music system.
I left the mall, found a cab, and fifteen minutes later got out in front of Stefan's, a vintage clothing store whose window was already displaying my dress, an ice-blue satin number that hit midcalf and boasted a cinched waist and lightly padded shoulders. I loved it, and more important, I could see myself working it. I went inside, tried it on—it fit!—and told the smiling salesman to wrap it up. I headed out the door in less than halfan hour.
I even had enough money left in my budget for an evening jacket. Of course, that was an extravagance, but it completed the outfit perfectly, and I figured if Blue Hamilton was going to send a limo for me, the least I could do is dress the part.
24
THE LIMO ARRIVED AT EIGHT on the nose, and Flora and I strolled out like we were used to traveling this way. Aretha wasn't coming over until later, so she stood in the blue doorway with Lu and ShaRonda, waving and issuing last-minute instructions on fashion and comportment.
“Don't forget to check your seams every once in a while.” That from Aretha, who had talked me into a pair of stockings with seams to set off my forties-style dress.
“I won't.”
“Don't forget to talk about something besides collard greens and compost.”
That from Lu, who was concerned about her mother's ability to make appropriate chitchat without her dad's guidance.
“I won't.”
ShaRonda, giggling and waving in jeans and an oversize T-shirt, looked eleven years old again. She didn't seem to have any advice, contenting herself with offering makeup suggestions that could all be summed up in one word: more. By the time we settled into the back of the black stretch that Blue had sent to fetch us, we had enough advice to last us.
Flora looked over at me as we pulled away from the curb, and we both burst out laughing. “You'd think we'd never gone to a party in our lives.”
“Well, it's been a while for me,” I said, “but I think it's like riding a bike.”
“Or sex!” she whispered, although this car was so big, the driver's seat looked about a block away behind a glass partition.