Forgivin' Ain't Forgettin'

by Mata Elliott

  Cassidy paced her bedroom floor. She loved Nile. Nile was a blessing. All babies were blessings. But Cassidy didn’t know how to be with babies. They revived her insecurities, represented her failures.

  “I haven’t been to a movie since Nile was born.” Shevelle didn’t sound disturbed by that fact, she was simply stating it. “I can take her with me and take her out of the theater if she gets antsy . . .” As Shevelle continued to talk, Cassidy shifted her thoughts all around, trying to figure out how she was going to get out of this one. She couldn’t say she had plans after just inviting Shevelle to do something tonight. And she couldn’t pass Nile off on Odessa because Odessa was going to the revival with the Purdues.

  “I’ll take her with me,” Shevelle said.

  “No.” Shevelle was her friend. True friends were there for each other. Cassidy sat on the bed. “I’ll watch Nile.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure. You go and have a good time.”

  Cassidy pressed the phone’s off button and curled on the bed as her stomach cramped and the memory came crashing forward.

  “Don’t do it,” Colvin begged, torment visible in his expression.

  Cassidy stared at him and then at Minister and finally at the baby in her arms.

  Trevor sauntered toward the five-month-old. “Hey, sweet as peaches, what’s the matter?” he asked. Cassidy lifted her finger from the piano, ending the one-handed lullaby meant to soothe Nile. She gazed at Trevor as he squatted close to the cranky baby.

  “I just changed her, and before that she had a bottle,” Cassidy said, letting him know she wasn’t ignorant about baby basics.

  “Maybe she just wants to get out of this thing.” He unfastened the safety straps, then scooped Nile from her car seat that doubled as a rocker. The baby’s cries quieted to coos as Trevor cradled her close to his chest. “That’s better, isn’t it?” He wiggled his fingertip against Nile’s chin. The baby kicked one chubby foot and pumped her hands as a smile filled her entire face.

  Trevor brought the baby to Cassidy. Before he could hand her off, she stood and lowered the piano cover. She moved to the coffee table and one by one packed Nile’s toys in the baby bag. Shevelle would be back soon.

  And Trevor would be leaving soon. He had dropped in to pick up something, and then he was going back to his office. The first of the week, she’d overheard him telling Odessa that June was a whirlwind month, filled with graduations, weddings, and family reunions. He and the children wouldn’t get in before eleven some nights.

  He tickled Nile some more, and the baby giggled, dribbles of spit wetting her chin and his finger. Trevor smiled at the baby. “You’re a real cutie,” he said, lowering himself to Odessa’s rocking chair. He wiped Nile’s face with her bib as Cassidy strolled toward the window, away from them.

  At exactly 5:30 the next evening, the chime of the doorbell was followed by a knock that shook the screen door. “Hey, girl,” Yaneesha Polk called, cupping her hands above her eyes and peering through the screen at Cassidy.

  Cassidy hung the straps of her tote bag on her shoulder and joined Yaneesha outside. A sister from church, Yaneesha was one of those who might engage you in casual chitchat one Sunday and walk by you without half a glance the next. Cassidy smiled. “Thanks for the ride, Yaneesha.”

  “Ain’t nuttin’ but a thang.” The ends of Yaneesha’s black shoulder-length perm were dyed raspberry. She was wearing purple jeans and a shirt with the word “Yummy” written across the chest. “So where’s Trevor?” Yaneesha appeared as excited as a fan on the verge of coming face-to-face with her favorite pop star. It was clear why Yaneesha had insisted she pick up Cassidy.

  “He’s not here,” Cassidy stated, and headed for Yaneesha’s Jeep. Yaneesha pranced beside her, her supersize hoop earrings rocking every time she moved her head. She straightened her gold cat-shaped eyeglasses and glanced back at the house as if Cassidy had lied and Trevor would suddenly appear.

  During the thirty-minute ride, Cassidy thought of Sister Maranda Whittle several times. The Sparrow Ministry staff meeting Maranda had invited Cassidy to attend was also scheduled for this evening.

  Yaneesha swung into a spot in the underground garage of the Diamond Retirement Condominiums, and the women waited for the elevator. After a ride that consisted of four stops, they reached Mother Almondetta Hartwell’s floor. Yaneesha, having been here before, led the way to 22G.

  Cassidy’s pastor encouraged members not only to pray before joining a ministry but also to attend a few of the staff meetings to get the feel of things. Truthfully, Cassidy hadn’t prayed about whether or not she should join Special Day. The ministry responsible for making sure each senior citizen member received a birthday card, present, and visit on their birthday seemed a logical place for her to serve, since her time spent at the senior center and the nursing home had proven how much she liked interacting with the elderly. But Cassidy would do as the pastor requested and sit in on a couple of the meetings first. Then she would decide if she would join Special Day or Kidpraise.

  Their hostess for the evening, the facilitator and founder of Special Day, opened her door.

  “Hello, Mother.” Yaneesha smiled, and light from the living room chandelier hit Yaneesha’s gold tooth, making the upper incisor gleam.

  “Say hello to Delightful,” was the first thing out of Almondetta’s mouth.

  “Hello, Delightful,” Yaneesha cooed at the white Chihuahua and gave it several pats on the head. Cassidy smiled at the dog, solely to appease Almondetta. She found Delightful altogether too creepy for her taste. On the way over, Yaneesha had given Cassidy the story about Delightful. The little dog had passed away two years ago, but Almondetta, unable to part with her canine companion of thirteen years, had her freeze-dried.

  Within moments, Cassidy and Yaneesha were standing barefoot on Mother Almondetta’s white wall-to-wall carpeting.

  “Can’t have folks tracking in dirt and germs,” she said in a tight voice, pointing to a basket. Cassidy placed her shoes in the basket next to Yaneesha’s. Her appraising gaze sweeping the length of Cassidy, Almondetta’s lips formed a pink frown. Cassidy decided not to take offense at the greeting that thus far felt icy. “Hello, Mother Hartwell. I’m Cassidy Beckett.” She gave a genuine smile and offered her hand. “I’m glad to be here. I believe Special Day is a fundamental ministry.” A segment of the senior population had lost their spouses and many of their peers to death and their children to relocation. Surely, a special hello on a birthday was a welcome occurrence.

  The widow and church mother barely touched Cassidy’s fingers before dropping her hand. “Yes, I know who you are,” she muttered, and turned. Once again, Cassidy chose to dismiss Almondetta’s snobbish behavior. Focus on the more important matter of learning about Special Day. She and Yaneesha followed Almondetta out of the living room, painted and furnished in blue tones, onto a terrace with a table set for three.

  “Isn’t anyone else coming?” Cassidy asked. Special Day had been active for several months. Of course, there were more workers.

  “People usually come to one or two of the meetings, but they don’t join,” said Yaneesha, plopping down at the table.

  “Goes to show how people are all talk and no action,” Almondetta sniped, setting Delightful on her doggie chaise. Almondetta lowered herself to one of the chairs, smoothing her crocheted dress over her thin bones. She adjusted her wig as if it were a hat and stared at Cassidy. “Church ministry is serious business. It’s not for the lazy.”

  Cassidy folded her hands in her lap. “I love the Lord. I love serving on His behalf, and I aspire to give my all.”

  “We’re still in the planning stages. Yaneesha was supposed to collect the names of our seniors, but she hasn’t given me a list yet.”

  Yaneesha didn’t seem bothered by Almondetta’s report. The young woman sipped from her glass and reached for one of the brownies on a tray in the center of the table.

  “Perhaps I can help Yanees
ha get things started,” Cassidy volunteered, seeing a need. She decided another meeting wasn’t necessary. She was ready to join the Special Day team now, although an internal siren beeped that she’d taken a wrong turn and was facing a dead end.

  chapter nine

  Ms. Emma and her husband, Harold, babysat Nile while Cassidy and Shevelle went to dinner. The two women talked and laughed nonstop through the meal and all the way home. Shevelle parked her car in front of her grandparents’ house, and Cassidy and Shevelle hugged good-bye. Shevelle was going back to Delaware in the morning.

  Back at Odessa’s, Cassidy prepared for bed, turned up the radio, pulled the top sheet up to her chest, and propped her back against two pillows. On Fridays, the host of her favorite Christian talk program asked a series of trivia questions. The first listener to call in with all of the correct answers won a CD or an inspirational book. Cassidy had her Bible open and was searching for the answer to question number four when she heard Trevor ushering the kids up to the third floor. They were just getting in.

  The bare stairs creaked as he came back down. Cassidy peered at the digital bedside clock. It was midnight, and Solid Ground Church Ministries was opening its daily radio program with its popular gospel theme song. The Chicago church was one of the largest black congregations in the nation, and its leader was the young, gifted, and energetic Bishop Colvin Culpepper. Cassidy and Colvin had been friends once. Good friends. And when she stood at the crossroads of a heart-wrenching decision, Colvin had offered wise advice. But she hadn’t followed it, and now his voice simply reminded her of the decision she longed to travel back in time and change.

  Cassidy turned to her beloved classical station, lowered the volume, and snapped off the lamp. She could hear Trevor moving about in the guest bedroom, and soon the bathroom. Her lids hung heavy and her limbs began to loosen as she identified the splash of water hitting the sink and the scrub of toothbrush bristles grazing Trevor’s teeth. She listened as he juggled what was probably mouthwash at the top of his throat, and she eventually heard a steady trickle as he relieved himself. Three more sounds followed that one: the flush of the toilet, more water hissing from the spigot, and finally, the click of the light.

  Cassidy heard these same sounds, in the same order, around the same time every night now. And she’d discovered them to be a melody as gentle as the one streaming from the radio.

  Trevor changed into a pair of sweats and grabbed his Bible. Once downstairs, he opened the front door and stood for a couple of minutes, allowing his shirtless chest to drink from the refreshing breeze while he studied the slice of moon and sprinkle of stars hovering over the houses across the street. “Thank you, God,” he whispered. It had been a good day. It was always a good day when his family was safe in bed. Life was fragile. Here one moment, gone the next. That being the case, Trevor always remembered to thank the Lord for getting them all home in one piece.

  He walked into the kitchen, flipped the light switch at the top of the basement stairs, and carefully navigated the narrow steps leading to the bottom level. The basement had become the late-night hangout Trevor retreated to—a quiet, kid-free zone he needed now and then. Brandi didn’t venture down herebecause she found it spooky. And he supposed a child would. The length and depth of the room gave it a cave effect, and the only dependable sounds boomed from the water heater. Peeling paint scarred the walls, and the cemented floor was a carpet of cracks. Brown boxes of all proportions cluttered the walking space, and cobwebs and spiderwebs mingled and dangled from the rafters above. Brittney, tomboy though she was, wouldn’t tread anywhere near a spider. That alone kept her from opening the door leading to the basement.

  Trevor laid his Bible on the old, rickety desk Odessa said he could use. He pressed his bottom into a cushioned chair that had lost its plush feel, and opened the book before him to the twelfth chapter of Romans. It had been Brenda’s favorite passage. He read the entire chapter, the last verse a second time. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good. It was a challenge for him to make something good stem from Brenda’s death. He’d made sizable monetary donations to anti-drinking-and-driving organizations, but he felt there was something more that he should do, in Brenda’s honor. What it would be, he had no idea.

  “Brenda,” he mused, closing his eyes, leaning deep into the cradle of the tattered leather chair. He remembered Brenda’s eyes, skin, voice, her smile. She had the most beautiful smile on her face the morning of the day she died as they shared a kiss and a hug and a few quiet moments before he left the house.

  Trevor drew a hand over his face and let out a lengthy sigh. The events of that last day with Brenda were charted with indelible memories, and each time he viewed them they seemed to unfold in slow motion.

  He was in the middle of an interview with a potential driver for one of the Seconds delivery vans when Grace uncharacteristically burst into his office.

  “Excuse me, Trevor,” she quaked, rushing to his desk.

  Right away he knew something was wrong, Grace calling him Trevor, instead of the formal Mr. Monroe. Struggling to remain calm in the face of calamity, Trevor prayed and quoted every scripture of faith, healing, and deliverance he knew as he drove too fast to the hospital.

  “It could go either way,” the doctor told him.

  Thirty minutes later, Brenda was dead, and Trevor had to figure out how he was going to tell his children.

  Trevor let the memory dissolve and sat up straight. He closed the Bible, but his ring finger caught his eye, and the past immediately took over his thoughts again. About two months after the funeral, he had removed his wedding band, and it rested with Brenda’s in a small box in his top bureau drawer. Putting the rings side by side had been his way of paying tribute to the bond he and Brenda shared and always would share; it was not a signal to the world that he was ready to start dating again, as Kregg had mistakenly assessed.

  Trevor resumed a reclining pose, his long legs extended beneath the desk as a conversation he had with Kregg a few weeks before sprang to mind.On the way home from a City Champions meeting, they’d stopped at the market to pick up beverages and snacks to go with the boxing matches they were planning to watch on television. Two young ladies walked by, one whispered something to the other, and both burst into giggles.The women smiled over their shoulders at them, and Kregg nodded and smiled back.

  “I hope they don’t think we’re a couple,” Kregg said.

  “What does it matter? I thought you only had eyes for Rave,” said Trevor.

  “Maybe I’m looking out for you.” Kregg grinned. “Helping you get back in the game.”

  Trevor passed on a wisecrack and resumed the task of deciding between sour cream-and-onion or plain potato chips.

  “Do you think you might want to hook up with us sometime?”

  Trevor frowned. “You mean double-date?”

  “Maybe even get a good-night kiss out of the deal,” Kregg said, and patted him on the back.

  Trevor had to admit he missed kissing and all the good feelings it entailed. But he only wanted to kiss Brenda, and she was gone.

  Slightly swiveling the chair, he thought more about dating. The opportunity had presented itself if he’d been interested. His church sisters began pushing up on him a week after his wife’s burial.

  Lynette Graham, her grandmother leading the way, stopped by his house without calling. Said they wanted to make sure he was okay. Lynette barely offered more than a complete sentence of conversation, whereas her grandmother prattled incessantly, and by the time they left, Trevor had a throbbing headache and more information about Lynette than he was comfortable knowing.

  Then there was Judith Long, who believed candor paved the way to love. She came right out and admitted she was alone and lonely; while her twin sister, Edith, seemed to think the way to a man’s heart was through food poisoning. She showed up at his job with two covered casseroles and a roast. He hadn’t had a bout of diarrhea that deadly since he was seven and accepted Kregg
’s challenge to a worm-eating contest.

  Priscilla Barnes, missing a front tooth and armed with a body odor that lingered well after she’d left the room, also made his diet a priority.

  “Have you eaten?” she asked one evening, pushing her way into his foyer.

  “No,” he croaked. Depressed over Brenda’s absence, he hadn’t eaten since breakfast that day. And he didn’t want to eat dinner or anything else with Priscilla, who’d flounced into the kitchen, planted a brown bag on the table, and withdrawn two TV dinners.

  “I got you a Hungry-Man,” she announced in a husky alto.

  Trevor stared, voiceless and numb, as she rummaged through drawers and shelves in search of tableware, running her uninvited hands over Brenda’s things. It seemed unholy and it made him angry. While he was in the process of devising a tactful way of asking her to leave, she accidentally shattered the cup Brenda had sipped coffee from each morning. A rock of pain weighting his chest, he overlooked politeness.

  “You need to go,” he said.

  The glower Priscilla flashed him could have sharpened all the knives in the knife block, and Trevor wondered if she was entertaining throwing the hot dinner she’d pulled from the microwave in his face.

  Honestly, Trevor didn’t understand all the hoopla women made over him. He considered himself as ordinary as the next guy and as flawed. His eyes were too dark, his nose larger than average, and at certain angles, it seemed his ears stuck out.

  Trevor closed his eyes, but not the subject. If he were to date, whom would he ask? And what could he offer a woman when he still craved Brenda? He pondered how Brenda might feel about him dating. They had never discussed what one would do if the other died. He’d just taken for granted, as she probably had, that they would be together forever.

  chapter ten

  Cassidy popped straight up and grabbed at her throat in a plea for air as her speeding heart geared to drive through her chest. After so many years, she thought she’d be immune to the nightmare that commonly bruised her nights. But she was as rattled as she’d been the first night she bolted out of sleep like this, back when she was a student at Tilden.