It's All Love

by Marita Golden

  “So, Melba,” said Bates, sitting next to her on the couch, “how did you end up with Deacon Ezra? I figured that square to be dating a reject from the animal shelter, but I'd tear down the Walls of Jericho just to get a look at you.”

  “You ain't exactly what I'd imagined either,” said Melba.

  “You thought I'd be some handsome, pious, country-talking, Bible-beating, chitling-eating scoundrel,” said Bates, pouring himself another vodka and orange juice.

  “Exactly,” said Melba. “You didn't think I came to hear that bullshit you wrote in that sorry-ass letter to Ezra.”

  “Touche,” said Bates, clinking glasses with Melba as they both laughed. “I've found that folks like a more homey response from their miracle workers, and believe me, those letters are highly effective,” said Bates. “But enough about me, dear,” said Bates, leaning forward. “When you, Ezra and his mama goin’ to get married?”

  “Shit, what I look like, one of your dumb-ass followers?”

  “No, you look like a woman in search of something,” said Bates, moving closer to Melba and looking deeply into her eyes. “What you looking for, Melba—and don't tell me nothing—I specialize in recognizing the faces of those in need, and sister, you are in need.”

  “What I need,” said Melba laughing nervously, “is another fucking drink.”

  Bates poured her another. “Seriously,” he said, “what you want?”

  “Why should I tell you? You ain't got it,” said Melba.

  “If I ain't got what you want, then what's the harm in telling me, especially since you ain't got it either,” said Bates.

  Melba's head was light from the scotch; she enjoyed the sensation. She took a long swallow from her glass and looked into Bates's eyes. “Shit, you really believe you a prophet, don't you?” asked Melba.

  “I'm a nigga from Houston's Fifth Ward who hustled my ass out of Texas,” said Bates. “I stay in the finest hotels in America, have two homes, a Jaguar and a Mercedes. Folks feed me when I'm hungry and make love to me when I'm horny and all I have to do is give ‘em what they want—salvation in a neat, uncomplicated package. But that ain't what you want, is it, Melba?”

  Melba walked over to the patio window; the view of the city was breathtaking. The sky was clear, and the stars flickered over the Potomac River as it coursed behind the Washington Monument. It saddened her to think that if she hadn't met Bates, she might have never seen the city this way. “I want—” Melba started and stopped. It frightened her to talk beyond generalities about what she wanted. She was used to talking about what she didn't want: her job, a boring life with Ezra, marriage, children, poverty, and old age. “I want to be happy, I want more life, I—” Melba began to cry, she leaned against the patio glass and sobbed.

  Bates sat Melba down on the couch and took her drink from her. He held her hands. His voice was soothing. “Melba, you can have more; in fact, you deserve it, and it's all within your reach.” Bates's manicured fingers stroked Melba's hands. “If you come with me, I'll show you more life in a week than you've seen in all your years.”

  “I can't go with you,” said Melba, rising from the couch and stumbling toward the door.

  “What's keeping you here, Melba?” asked Bates. “Ezra or that chump change you making dancing for them fools, or just plain old fear?” Melba stopped at the door and turned to face him. Bates was standing now, his voice resounding throughout the suite. “Tonight, when I saw you, I thought you were different, but I was wrong. You're scared of life, just like Ezra and the thousands of suckas who keep me in tailored suits and fine suites. You keep praying and wishing and talking while life goes right by you. So you'll stay with Ezra and keep dancing in funky joints and talking about wanting more life, and one day you'll wake to find that you're Mrs. Johnson, praying for the one that got away. But it didn't get away; you just never went after it.” Bates called the front desk for a cab and helped Melba into her coat. Bates was no prophet, but Melba knew he was right. “This wasn't about sex,” said Bates, “the Prophet gets more ass than toilet seats, you dig. This was about imagining the possibilities.”

  “What would I do if I went with you?” asked Melba.

  “Make love in fine hotels, travel to new cities every week, help me spend my money, meet the rest of the world, and learn to live,” said Bates.

  “And for this you just goin’ give me money,” said Melba.

  “Hell, yeah,” said Bates. “What you think them men in that strip joint give you money for? You've got something, Melba, that a square like Ezra could never appreciate. He just wants to put you in a pumpkin shell. I want to teach you to fly. Maybe, after a few months, you'll leave me, hell, maybe I'll make you leave, but you'll never put up with Ezra or his mama again, ‘cause you'll know that there's real life in the world.” Melba removed her coat; Bates smiled and canceled the cab. Melba followed him into the bedroom. “You can always change your mind,” said Bates.

  Melba was silent; she looked blankly down at Bates's smiling face and sat on the bed next to him. “Show me something better, Bates,” she whispered. Bates began unbuttoning her blouse. Melba closed her eyes and prayed silently for a miracle.

  V

  Melba could hear someone calling her name. The voice exploded in her aching head. She opened her mouth to respond, and the smell of her breath caused her to recoil. Her eyelids felt as if they had gravel in them. A hand on her back shook her. “Stop,” she moaned, but the shaking continued. She opened her eyes, and the sun slammed into them like a punch. She shut them tightly and very slowly inched them open again. Ezra was standing beside the bed in his black Sunday suit.

  “Ezra, what you doing here?”

  “I came to take you home, Melba.” Ezra's voice was strained and unnaturally calm.

  “Hell you mean, I'm already home,” replied Melba.

  “You ain't home, you in the—” Ezra stopped, his voice cracking with emotion, “you in Bates's hotel room.”

  Melba sat up. Fully awake, though still groggy from her hangover.

  “Where's Bates?”

  “He's gone,” said Ezra. “He left after the healing service. He told me you were here.” Melba scrambled nude across the bed to the dresser, searching frantically for her purse. Ezra turned his head away from her naked body. Her purse had been emptied out, the contents resting on the dresser. The money, including her own few dollars and Ezra's check, was gone. A card from Bates lay next to her purse:

  Mind your wants cause somebody wants your mind. Sorry, but I decided last night when I saw that you had taken Ezra's check (along with my five hundred dollars) from me, that maybe you weren't ready for life with the Prophet. It was noble of you to take Ezra's offering but I got the check back. Wish we could have worked things out, (Lord have mercy woman you sure make good love!) but me and the Lord moves in mysterious ways.

  Spiritually Yours,

  Prophet John C. Bates

  Melba let the card drop to the floor. Her head was spinning and she felt nauseous. She leaned against the dresser for support. Ezra held his head down and extended her clothes toward her. “Look at me, Ezra,” Melba commanded, “goddamm it, look at me,” she screamed, knocking the clothes from his hands. Melba grabbed his face, forcing him to look in her eyes.

  “You can't make me share your shame.”

  “I ain't ashamed.”

  “You slept with him,” said Ezra, forcing the words from his mouth.

  “Yes, I slept with him,” said Melba. “He promised to change my life, and God knows I need my life changed. You want me to wait on you and your Lord, who don't even love you enough to keep you from being taken by bastards like Bates. Your Lord ain't shit!”

  Ezra grabbed Melba's shoulders and shook her. His chest heaved and tears cascaded from his puffed cheeks as he raised his right hand above her. “My Lord, my Lord loves me you—” Ezra's voice was a whisper between clenched teeth. His right hand trembled above his head. “My Lord is the only one who loves me.” Melba waited fo
r him to slap her or say something mean. It was what most men would do. Ezra sat down on the bed and sobbed, holding his face in his opened palms.

  Melba took her clothes and ran into the bathroom. She slammed the door shut and began heaving violently. She rested her head on the commode and cried. When she was sure she was finished vomiting, she got in the shower. The water felt good, and Melba instinctively began to sing. “If you wanta help me, Jesus, it's all right,” she sang, remembering her mother's favorite spiritual.

  Melba, fully dressed now, found Ezra in the living room. He stared blankly out into the D.C. scenery from the patio window. “Why'd you come here, Ezra?” asked Melba.

  “ ‘Cause I'm cursed to love you,” replied Ezra, “even though you ain't no good.”

  “Please. You don't love me, you want to marry me so you can turn me into your mama—is that love?”

  “That's all I know to do with my love,” said Ezra, his words emerging in full breaths.

  Melba stood quietly behind him, trying to fight the urge to apologize for breaking his heart. As bad as she felt for herself, she felt worse for Ezra; he had been betrayed by her and Bates in the same evening. Yet he had come for her, here in another man's hotel room, and she knew that was some kind of love, though she was not sure it was the kind of love she wanted.

  “Bates was right about us; we're suckers, chumps who wouldn't know what living was if it walked right up to us. You say you want to live, but you're afraid to even leave you mama's house. And you certainly ain't goin’ leave it to marry a sinner like me,” said Melba. “And the bad thing is, Ezra, you the best prospect I got.”

  “I ain't nothing to you no more,” said Ezra, putting his hat on and heading for the door.

  Melba grabbed him and pulled him close to her. “Listen, Ezra, the Prophet showed us something. He made us pay dearly for this miracle of sight, but he showed it to us.”

  “He showed how wrong we are for each other.”

  “No, Ezra, he showed us something far more important than this thing we call a relationship. He showed us how desperately we want to live. That's why I ain't ashamed, Ezra, I won't be ashamed for trying to live.”

  Melba put her arms around Ezra and held him tightly. She felt the familiarity of his arms sliding gingerly around her waist. He suddenly pushed her away. “I got the car double parked,” said Ezra, opening the door and bolting out the room ahead of her. Melba put on her coat and took one long last look at the gorgeous view of D.C. Then followed Ezra slowly to the elevator. She made a note to play two dollars on number 725—straight.

  Wilhelmina

  JONETTA ROSE BARRAS

  I,T STARTED with the mirror. Johnny swore that much on the day he lay dying at New Orleans's Charity Hospital. He had been taken there one Saturday evening after losing consciousness during dinner at his older sister Louisa's house.

  Louisa had triple washed the greens, meticulously stripping leaves from each stem, and boiled ham hocks on the electric stove, which she hated because invariably the food heated too quickly. The electric stove was her husband's idea of spoiling her; gas is better, she asserted, but didn't dare tell him to take it back to Sears—although she thought about it each time she burned her gravy.

  She had rounded out the meal with candied sweet potatoes, cornmeal-coated fried trout, fried green tomatoes, and peach cobbler. Mouths salivated even before she told everyone to sit down and asked Louella, Karen's oldest girl and Louisa's grandniece, to say the grace.

  Everyone was filling his or her gold-trimmed porcelain plates with seconds, and pleasant chatter filled the air like a quiet gospel hymn. But all of that stopped when Johnny upped and passed out in the hallway, on his way to the bathroom. The cobbler and ice cream hadn't even been served.

  Some of the relatives, thinking the fainting spell a minor event, threatened to hogtie him for messing up a perfectly good dinner with unnecessary theatrics. If he acted like everybody else and ate like an adult instead of a bird, all of that could have been avoided.

  But Johnny wasn't putting on, as some had suspected. Despite a battery of tests for illnesses of which neither he nor Louisa had ever heard, doctors were unable to determine the reason for the fainting episode, which resulted in him being unconscious for three hours, prompting emergency room attendants and the first doctor on the scene to suggest that he had entered a diabetic coma. That was a false diagnosis.

  Louisa promised, in colorful and less than Christian language, to sue the hospital until her younger sister, Alberta, stepped in: “Stop it! You vexing Johnny, sister. You oughta be ashamed, trying to make money off his misfortune.”

  Alberta sucked her teeth and turned her head, a habit she had picked up from her now-deceased great-grandmother that served notice to anyone in listening distance that she was upset; one step further would cause her notorious temper to be unleashed.

  “Alberta, you know that's not true. You know these doctors treat us poor people different from how they treat other people. They just tell us anything. I like ‘em to know we poor, we're not stupid or retarded.”

  Alberta didn't say another word on the subject. Her teeth sucking was the final comment. The chastising quieted Louisa. The internist assigned to the case smiled as he continued poking and pulling at Johnny.

  After a full week of examining every crevice of his body, taking so many tubes of blood that some joked he would need a transfusion, and collecting so many stool specimens that Johnny lost all desire to use the bathroom, Louisa offered her own diagnosis and dared the doctors to dispute it: “The man's suffering from grief. Plain and simple, grief.”

  She swore Johnny was witnessing his last days and began making preparations for his wake and interment at LaBatt Funeral Home near the underpass on Claiborne Avenue.

  “That's absurd,” said one of the six attending physicians, looking around to see the affirmative head shaking of his colleagues. The team, which included three specialists, couldn't decide exactly what ailed Johnny.

  “They just working on him for the insurance money,” Louisa asserted. Alberta sucked her teeth and looked out the window.

  “Bunny, you know it's true,” Louisa added, using her sister's nickname, hoping to curry favor.

  “Everything is about money to you. Sometimes I don't know how we're sisters.”

  The bickering and confusion went on like that, even as other family members were notified of Johnny's hospitaliza-tion. They came in droves during visiting hours, believing themselves capable of divining his illness, although trained doctors from as far away as Dallas, Texas, had been unable.

  ON WHAT WOULD BE Johnny's last day on earth, his first cousin Antoinette was at his side. A tall, slender woman, who, even at forty-five years old, turned the heads of young boys, Antoinette had never married. She adored Johnny. If they hadn't been cousins, the family teased, Antoinette would have roped him into marrying her. When she was twelve and he was thirteen, Louisa caught them kissing under the magnolia tree and ran into the house, interrupting her mother's community meeting without even excusing herself, and blurted out, “Mama, they kissing right now. Johnny and Antoinette. Like they boyfriend and girlfriend.”

  Ruby Ann turned nearly beet red, which was a whole lot of embarrassment given that the woman was so high yellow she looked white, her red hair didn't help to dissuade the non believers who questioned her racial origin. She begged the ladies’ pardon for her rude daughter and returned to the chatter of the moment, as if nothing had been said. Later that evening she picked up the telephone and called her brother, Winston. “I want you to do something about that girl. You gotta get her away from my Johnny. She's corrupting the boy, Winston.

  “They like each other too much. We both gonna be sorry, if you don't do something. I can't watch these children every minute of the day. I have my meetings.”

  After that, Antoinette's visits to her first cousins became more infrequent. She and Johnny saw each other in the park, outside of school, at ball games, however.

 
; “They still acting weird,” Louisa reported to her mother.

  “Relatives in the bayou marry each other all the time, and nobody thinks they're bad,” Johnny argued one day when his mother returned to what had become the saga of Johnny and Antoinette.

  “I'm not raisin’ you to be like those heathens, speaking in tongues, eatin’ possum, and bathing once a month. This is New Orleans, we civilized down here.

  “I'm gonna talk to her mama this time; your uncle Winston thinks this is funny. It's not.”

  After that conversation, Antoinette's mother, Janine, announced to the family at the next monthly Sunday dinner that her daughter was going to a nice Catholic boarding school for girls in California next year.

  “It's such a fine school, and she'll be around more refined young ladies than those at Claret public school where she is now. It's a little expensive, but me and Winston only have two children, we should offer them a chance that we didn't have, don't y'all agree?”

  “Janine, what a great plan,” Ruby Ann chimed in.

  Nothing but forks and knives hitting plates could be heard for a few seconds after their comments. Everyone knew why Antoinette was being sent away Johnny and Antoinette made the best of the next two months. They were, in fact, inseparable. No one worried any longer; the problem had been taken care of.

  This was all before Johnny had that terrible accident on Chef Menteur Highway; everyone believed he would die, but he didn't. Ruby Ann attributed the miracle to the power of St. Jude, to whom she had made a twenty-one-day novena. Normally nine days was enough to move mountains; Ruby Ann said she wasn't taking any chances with her only son.

  The accident happened three months after Antoinette left. Johnny was riding with his friend when they had a head-on collision. The friend died, and Johnny was left partially paralyzed. He never went back to school. The following year was filled with a series of agonizing operations and rehabilitative treatments.