More Church Folk

by Michele Andrea Bowen

  The conversation that had been so lively and full of laughter just minutes ago was completely wiped out by a hush, followed by some “Lawd Jezuz”es, one or two “What in the world”s, and a very loud “Girl, move, so I can see that.”

  Essie and Johnnie got as close to the bishop’s wheelchair as they could without being too obvious with their nosiness. They were, after all, in enemy territory. The last thing they needed was for the enemy camp to notice them creeping up, trying to get all in its business.

  Denzelle and Obadiah had already made their way over to the wheelchair. Lena, whom Obadiah had given instructions to stay in her seat, had simply ignored her husband and gone right over to a spot where she could see and hear everything. When Lena had gotten herself an eyeful, she went and stood with Essie and Johnnie, who were about to burst with curiosity, since their fishing expedition hadn’t yielded much.

  “What is wrong with Bishop Giles, Lena?”

  “He is real stiff, Miss Johnnie,” Lena answered carefully. She wasn’t exactly sure how to give them a more accurate description of the state that Bishop Giles was in.

  “How stiff?” Essie asked.

  “Well, Miss Essie,” Lena began carefully in her slow and deliberate voice, “the entire bottom half of the bishop’s body is real stiff, like something is wrong with him.”

  She started laughing and then stopped, as Essie and Johnnie were standing there just staring at her, clearly waiting on more information than this weak mess she was handing them.

  “Okay,” Lena continued, “his hands are stiff, his feet are stiff and swollen, his joints, especially his knees, are stiff and swollen. In fact, everything is stiff and swollen. It’s like he is all stiff and swole up. And he looks like a mess, with everything all swole up and stiff. I don’t know why he even came out like that. He is so stiff, they couldn’t even put real pants on him. I don’t even know how the bishop can pee, being all messed up like that.”

  “Baby girl,” Johnnie said, “put this conversation in reverse. Did I hear you say that the bishop has some kind of affliction that would make it hard for him to wear pants and pee?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Johnnie grabbed Essie’s arm.

  “Come on. We are going over and seeing that. And I don’t care who is over there in their so-called camp of supporters.”

  They hurried over to that table. And this time they went and stood where they could get a perfect cinematic view of Larsen Giles, who looked as if he was getting stiffer and stiffer all over his body. Essie thought he looked just as crazy, and also very frightened.

  All of a sudden Bishop Giles’s body jerked back and his mouth froze. Ernest stared down at his best friend, tears filling his eyes. He’d told Larsen not to take all that stuff. And now this fool had up and stroked out on him. He looked around for his son, who ran over to his side.

  “Marcel, call an ambulance. We have to get Larsen to a hospital.”

  “Okay, Dad,” Marcel said, now scared himself.

  Marcel had never seen his father so afraid. He’d told them not to take that stuff, especially when that Rico and his friend, Kordell, had gone and found some mountain white boys to be their suppliers. He knew to be cautious when Rico told them their names. Harold and Horace Dinkle? Who in their right mind would trust two white boys who ate bear meat, named Harold and Horace Dinkle?

  Marcel watched as the bishop’s mouth went from stiff to slack. He hoped folks thought this was a stroke brought on by hard living, high blood pressure, and the stress of this conference. The last thing they needed was for one of their “clients” to start putting two and two together. If they were not able to continue to convince their waiting customers that this stuff was not only the baddest male drug around but the safest, they were not going to have the money needed to buy Sonny’s Episcopal seat. Tonight alone they had folks lined up to get some of that batch Harold Dinkle had just brought down from western North Carolina.

  Some of their flunkies ran over to follow Ernest and Marcel, who were rapidly wheeling Larsen Giles out of the room. A few were truly concerned. Many were curious. And some just wanted to look important—as if they were so close to Larsen Giles and the Browns they would be falling short of their responsibilities if they didn’t hurry and accompany them to the waiting ambulance.

  Eddie noticed that Denzelle had quietly slipped out, obviously following the Browns and the bishop. Denzelle took note of Larsen Giles’s condition and then made a call on his mobile telephone.

  “Theo, man. How long do you think the FBI has been in on whatever is going on behind the scenes at this conference?” asked Eddie.

  “Since long before Denzelle went to Mozambique,” was all Theophilus said.

  SEVENTEEN

  Eddie pulled at his tie. He was glad that they did not have to wear tuxedoes to these events anymore. He was a big man, six foot six and a good 262. Tuxedoes just weren’t his thing.

  It had been a long and exhausting evening. Leave it to Marcel Brown and “nem” to turn what could have been a great church party into a big funky mess. Eddie’s folks were tired and fed up with the way these Triennial Conferences were run. They had decided to forgo their plans to talk about this evening, and go back to their rooms to get a good night’s sleep. This was something, as ominous as it was, that needed to wait until tomorrow when they were fresh, rested, and ready to go to war.

  He sat down on the side of the bed and pulled off his shoes.

  “Man, my feet are killing me, baby.”

  “I would massage those dogs, if the funk wouldn’t burn my fingers off first,” Johnnie told him, laughing.

  “You wrong, woman. You know you are so wrong. How you gone treat your man like that, when his feet are aching?”

  “How you gone ask your woman to touch them stanky thangs in the name of love?”

  Eddie got up off the bed and started stripping down to get in the shower. He held his hand out toward his wife.

  “Want to join me?”

  All Johnnie did was smile and peel down to Eddie’s all-time favorite outfit—her birthday suit. She sucked on her sapphire tooth and licked her lips.

  “You are a fast thing, Mrs. Tate,” Eddie said, and then winked. He turned on the shower, made sure the water was at the perfect temperature, stepped in, and then pulled his wife close to his body.

  Johnnie was not a short woman. But she had to stand on her tiptoes to reach her husband’s mouth.

  “Mmmmm,” she murmured in sheer delight. They had been dog-tired when they got back to the room. Johnnie assumed that her hubby, who had been going strong since four-thirty that morning, would sit on the side of the bed and fall asleep before he got his shoes off good. But this boy was acting all frisky, and he didn’t have any WP21. Now this was the way to end the evening.

  Johnnie kissed Eddie’s lips again. Just the touch of his lips on hers made Johnnie moan softly. That man had the best kisses in the Windy City. Before she met Eddie, Johnnie had had her fair share of men in her life. So she knew when a man knew how to put it on you and when he didn’t. She always told Essie that you could look at a brother-man and tell whether or not he had any special “skills” worth paying any attention to.

  In fact, one of Johnnie and Essie’s favorite people-watching things to do when they were waiting on their husbands to emerge from one of those long and drawn-out conference meetings was a game called “Do you think he got skills?” They were having such a good time laughing and playing this game on the campus that Precious and Saphronia came over to find out what they were up to. And then they wouldn’t leave until Essie and Johnnie promised to let them play, too. It turned out that Miss Saphronia McComb James was better than all of them at figuring out who was skillful and who was a dud.

  The biggest surprise came when Saphronia told them that Rev. Denzelle Flowers had too many skills for his own good, and it was going to cause him problems if he didn’t get on his knees more and cultivate a richer relationship with the Lord. And then she
had them cracking up when she told them that Bishop Ottah Babatunde from Nigeria might have looked like an African king, running around the campus in all of that overpriced garb he liked to wear, but he was a measly peasant behind closed doors.

  When they questioned her judgment because Babatunde was so big and fine, Saphronia made a bet that she could find a woman willing to confess whether she was right or wrong. They were mad at Saphronia when she managed to find a loose-legged heifer named Tangie Bonner who blabbed out all of Ottah’s pitiful business. Johnnie had really hated handing over that hundred-dollar bill when they went shopping at one of those quaint boutiques in Raleigh’s Cameron Village.

  That day Saphronia spent three hundred dollars in that store and didn’t have to pull a dime from her designer bag. Johnnie vowed that this would be the last time she tangled with Saphronia on a bet. Who knew that Miss Thang had all of those skills?

  But the surprise came when Miss Saphronia told them that Bishop Abeeku from Ghana was the man in closed quarters. When they all looked at her with raised eyebrows because the bishop seemed so nerdy (even if he did have an African accent), all Saphronia did was roll her eyes and then tell them to check out the bishop’s wife. It didn’t take them long to note that Mrs. Abeeku, who was lush and beautiful, acted just as Susie James did with Bishop James.

  And they knew just from the tiny bit Susie had let slip, that old country boy, who loved the feel of Mississippi soil running through his fingers, could put it on his wife. Susie once slipped and told them that Murcheson could clear up your skin better than anything that Clearasil could do. And Susie James had some of the most beautiful skin in the entire Gospel United Church.

  Johnnie smiled to herself and practically purred when Eddie stood behind her, giving her the delightful experience of feeling the entire length of him pressed against her body. She blushed—something only Eddie had ever seen Johnnie do. He knew that his wife had been around the block. But when Johnnie decided to get saved and make Jesus Lord of her life, she became brand-new, washed clean, made whole, and purified from the inside to the outside. She was like the women in the Bible who had some very colorful pasts before it occurred to them that the Lord was what they’d been looking for all that time.

  Eddie held Johnnie in his arms, his heart burning with love for this woman who was so totally his. He could feel her heart in his heart. It was the most miraculous experience and Eddie didn’t think he’d ever grow used to this—that it would always be a wonder and breathtaking experience for him to feel Johnnie’s heart beating just for him.

  He kissed her neck. It was wet and soft, and he could still taste her perfume. She leaned closer to him and for a moment all Eddie could do was whisper, “Thank you, Lord,” before he got busy making that hot water sizzle. It had been a long and very interesting day, and making love to his wife was just what he needed to bring it to a close.

  Eddie and Johnnie were freezing when they came out of the shower. They had kept the heat going in there so long they found themselves having to take a cold shower for real. Shivering, they hopped in the bed and pulled up all the covers. Eddie pulled Johnnie into his arms and kissed her on the forehead. He said, “Girl, you keep that up and I’m gonna have to go and find some of whatever that stuff is Rucker Hemphill been running around the conference whispering about, and trying to convince folks to buy.”

  “Is that the same stuff that had Bishop Giles looking like this?” Johnnie asked. She sat up in bed and fixed her hands and legs as Bishop Giles had been positioned in the wheelchair.

  Eddie started laughing and said, “You missing something.”

  Johnnie reached over to the nearby chair, grabbed one of the small decorative pillows, and placed it in the middle of her body to form the same kind of tent that Larsen Giles had had.

  “You know you are so wrong,” Eddie told her, cracking up with laughter. If that crazy girl didn’t have Bishop Giles sitting up in the wheelchair down pat, he didn’t know who did.

  “Then why are you laughing?” Johnnie asked in between chuckles. “You know that Bishop Giles was looking just as crazy. And did he really believe that nobody would notice this?” She patted the pillow.

  “I’m surprised it took as long as it did for somebody to see it,” was all Eddie said. “Plus, I can’t understand how Larsen Giles thought he wouldn’t look weird. Why would Ernest wheel him in like that? He is supposed to be the bishop’s boy. Baby, you know good and well that I would not have wheeled Theophilus up into a banquet hall looking crazy like that.”

  Johnnie nodded. Neither Eddie nor Theophilus would have allowed that to happen. She didn’t understand why no one in Larsen’s camp had tried to dissuade him from showing up in public like that.

  Eddie sat up and got the telephone off the nightstand.

  “Who are you calling, baby? It’s late.”

  “Denzelle Flowers. I want to know if there is any news on Bishop Giles’s condition.”

  “Why not call Theophilus?”

  Eddie blushed.

  “Baby?” Johnnie said, laughing because like her, Eddie rarely blushed. “Is there a reason you can’t call Theophilus?”

  “Well… I kind of saw him heading back to his and Essie’s suite with a very expensive bottle of champagne in the crook of his arm.”

  “Yep, you better call Denzelle. ’Cause if you call your ace boon coon, you will get cussed out.”

  Eddie nodded and said, “And it will be Essie and not Theophilus cutting up with me.”

  “You dang skippy it’ll be Essie,” Johnnie told him. “This conference has been the craziest and most stressful one we’ve ever attended with you guys. And I hate to tell you this but you and your ace have been slipping on the job just a taste, and not taking care of business behind closed doors.”

  Eddie hung up the phone and rolled Johnnie over on her back. He pulled a long, pale brown leg up around his hip.

  “Slippin’? Me? I’ll show you what is slippin’, red bone.”

  “You are so nasty, Eddie Tate.”

  “You like it, too. Don’t you, red bone?”

  “Who you callin’ a red bone, boy? You just as red as me.”

  “Yeah, I’m red and hot, like red hots. And you know how much you love yourself some red hot candy.”

  Eddie started kissing the nape of Johnnie’s neck and pulled the other leg up on his hip.

  “So, you like how I’m slippin’ on the job now, baby?” he whispered in a voice that was so low and sexy, Johnnie could barely contain herself.

  But she was not about to let the good pastor think he’d gotten the best of her just yet. She sucked on that sapphire tooth, grinned up at Eddie, and said, “I think you could do better.”

  “Better than this,” Eddie whispered.

  Johnnie blushed.

  “Or better than that.”

  Johnnie blushed some more and didn’t say another word.

  “Can’t get much better than this, can it, baby?” Eddie whispered and began to make up for what he knew had been a rough week. He even added some extra mileage for what he knew was the beginning of a few more rough days.

  All Johnnie could say was, “You know you the man, baby.”

  “Yes, I am, baby,” he replied. “And you better recognize.”

  EIGHTEEN

  Denzelle stuffed a forkful of those delicious pancakes in his mouth. They had been eating hotel and campus food for over a week. And this meal at Rev. Quincey’s old schoolmate Lamont Green’s Aunt Queen Esther’s house was just what the doctor ordered.

  Rev. Tate had called him and asked if there was someplace they could meet away from everything and everybody. After giving it some serious thought, he and Obadiah settled on Miss Queen Esther’s house. She was a loyal member of Obadiah’s home church, Fayetteville Street Gospel United Church. Her family was good friends with Fayetteville Street’s current senior pastor, Rev. Russell Flowers—Denzelle’s uncle. And she was a praying woman who was real tight with Jesus. His uncle Russell always j
oked and called Miss Queen Esther Jesus’ first cousin.

  Most of the folk they wanted to avoid at the conference wouldn’t be able to find them at Queen Esther’s house, they wouldn’t even know they were there, and they certainly wouldn’t be able to find out what they were up to. It was a relief to be able to sit down together without having to deal with any of their adversaries, or worrying if any of their flunkies were nearby, working overtime to listen in on the conversation. All throughout the conference there had been some encounter with Marcel Brown, Ernest Brown, Sonny Washington, Rucker Hemphill, Ottah Babatunde, Larsen Giles, or that no-good Rico Sneed and his best friend, Kordell Bivens.

  About the only one in that unholy alliance they didn’t have to be bothered with was Ray Caruthers, who had been holed up in his room with a messed-up stomach since his feet touched American soil. What they didn’t know was that Ray had been the first conference casualty of WP21. Bishop Caruthers had forgotten his promise to himself to leave that stuff alone, when he kept running into one fine and willing woman over and over again. Shortly after taking too many swigs of that nasty stuff, Caruthers was forced to spend most of his time in the bathroom once the substance made its way through his very sensitive digestive system.

  Queen Esther was absolutely delighted when Rev. Flowers’s nephew called her and asked if they could meet at her house. She had been at that infamous 1963 Triennial Conference in Richmond, Virginia. In fact Queen Esther, her best friend, Doreatha Parker, and their husbands had been in that first group of church folk who stormed that stage to find out if their pastors’ names were in the infamous blue book Saphronia James’s grandmother, the late Mother Leticia Harold, had given to Bishop James. That book had had the names of all the preachers and pastors who had been over to that funeral home ho’ house having the time of their lives.