by E. N. Joy
“And just where was it again that you and the late Willie met?” Paige asked with her thick, long eyelashes fluttering over her big, brown eyes. She knew darn well she recalled the story Mother Doreen had told about how she and her now deceased husband had met.
“Well . . . uh . . . at church,” Mother Doreen stammered. “But when I went to church, I didn’t set out to find no husband. I set out to find the Lord. I just got blessed with both. Because ’spite all the issues me and Willie had to endure in our marriage . . . ” She looked up. “God rest my Willie’s soul.” She drew an invisible cross across her heart with her index finger, and then continued. “My marriage with that man was a blessing. I wouldn’t trade those years of my life for the world.” She looked at Tamarra. “And I know if you look back on your fifteen years of marriage, your good outweighed the bad, and you wouldn’t trade it for the world either.”
“No, not the world,” Tamarra partly agreed, “just a little island off the coast of Mexico with enough tequila for me to forget that low down dirty dog of a man ever existed.” Tamarra shook her head. “And thank goodness we never had any children together to remind me of that dirt bag.”
The comment Tamarra had just made stung Deborah for her own personal reasons. Reasons that were between her and God. She quickly recuperated and just shook her head, her shoulder length sisterlocks dancing with every movement. She wondered if she’d be needing to pray for these women all over again.
The women began to murmur and mumble, mostly in support of both Paige and the other woman’s earlier remarks about what they perceived as failed singles events.
Deborah cleared her throat to get the women’s attention. “If you ladies would have let me finish, I believe my suggestion would have covered your concerns regarding male participation in the singles events.” Deborah was able to keep from shooting daggers at the women with her eyes before proceeding. “I was going to suggest that even though we can’t seem to get the single men at New Day to join the Singles Ministry, we can still invite them to the dinner. That might break the ice and even get a few of them to become members.”
The women began to nod and chatter in agreement of Deborah’s suggestion. Finally, a breakthrough, Deborah thought a moment too soon.
“Where were you thinking we should have the dinner?” another woman asked.
“Oooh, The Olive Garden has that bottomless salad,” Tamarra suggested.
“But Red Robins has those bottomless fries,” Paige countered.
“Weren’t you the one who just made a comment referencing your weight?” Tamarra reminded her friend.
“Yeah, and now I can’t wait to eat,” Paige chuckled. She was never one to diet, and complaints about her weight were far and few in between. She knew that if she didn’t like her size, she could do something about it. But being “big boned” pretty much all her life, she’d accepted the fact that she was a lifetime member of the big girls club with a platinum card.
“How about we have the dinner at—” The women in the room spoke amongst themselves, throwing out the names of their favorite restaurants as suggested locations to hold the dinner.
“Excuse me,” Deborah interrupted, once again clearing her throat. “I was thinking that we could have the dinner right here at the church, in the fellowship hall.”
The women eyeballed one another and nodded.
“Hmm, now that doesn’t sound bad either,” Paige said. “My cousin has her own catering business, Integrity Catering. I know she’d give us a good deal on catering the event.”
“Now you know good and darn well I do catering for a living,” Tamarra huffed. “You just trying to be funny. Besides, why would you want to have someone outside the church cater when God has everything we need already in this house?”
“I wasn’t trying to be funny,” Paige stated. “I just figured you’d want to relax and enjoy the dinner instead of preparing it.” Paige rolled her big eyes.
Those all too familiar sweat beads began to dance about Mother Doreen’s forehead. It was now Deborah’s turn to intervene before these meetings ended up giving the sixty-something-year-old woman a heart attack.
“I was thinking that we women would prepare the food and invite the men,” Deborah explained.
An instant hush swept over the room, and the women stared at Deborah as if she were standing naked before the Lord . . . literally.
Tamarra stood up and put her hands on her hips. Her fingers wrapped around her toned waist. “I wish I might even think about slaving in the kitchen for a bunch of men who don’t even find us worthy enough to come fellowship with us for a night. And it’s just one evening out of the month. Oh, but I’m sure they’d come out to eat our food.”
“Yeah, I bet if that mini skirt, low cut shirt wearing Lorain was a member of this ministry, the men would flock here in droves,” one woman added. “The way they dang near be salivating over the woman is just shameful.”
“Guess our skirts ain’t short enough and v-necks ain’t v enough, like that Jezebel spirit possessed Lorain’s,” another complained. “Guess we all can’t be spiritual divas like good ol’ Sister Lorain.” Her tone was laced with sarcasm and a hint of jealousy.
“Then she be having the nerve to run to the altar every dang on Sunday and fall out in the Spirit, showing every ounce of her—”
“Ladies,” Deborah interrupted. “We’re getting off track again. And in addition to that, we’re starting to sound like the children of Israel with all this murmuring and complaining. We’re always talking about how we want the Lord to use us, but now we won’t even let Him use us to cook a meal for some members of our own church.”
“Not just members, the men,” Tamarra corrected.
“Ya heard?” a young twenty-something woman stated. “And my momma told me don’t cook for no man but my husband. That’s almost just as bad as giving up the milk for free without making him buy the cow.”
“And the men at this church probably wouldn’t appreciate it anyway,” Tamarra continued, rolling her eyes. “Trust me, I’ve been a member for nine years. I know how these New Day men are.”
“Let them cook for us,” Paige suggested. “Ain’t nothing wrong with a man cooking for a woman. Besides, just in case one of these men at New Day is my future husband and God just ain’t revealed it to me yet, I don’t even want him to get the impression that I’m going to be cooking for him all the time. I need me a man who’s gonna take me out to dinner. I ain’t trying to always be in no kitchen.”
“You could have fooled me,” a woman said under her breath, just low enough so that Paige didn’t hear her, but the woman next to her could. The two of them shared a private chuckle.
Mother Doreen just shook her head. Listening to these women talk, it was no wonder they were all single. It may not have been scripture, but Mother Doreen was a strong believer in the saying that the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach. Seeming as though these women weren’t trying to lift a finger in the kitchen, they might never find their way to a man’s heart, which explained all their war stories.
“How about a compromise?” Mother Doreen suggested. She had everyone’s attention. “The women cook the meats and maybe some main dishes, and we have the men bring beverages, rolls, desserts and side dishes like potato and macaroni salad, you know, things they can buy from the grocery store deli, since I’m sure most of the men don’t cook.” Mother Doreen bit her tongue in adding her thought, Because most of y’all women don’t even cook.
“We can have a sign up sheet,” Deborah added, in full agreement with Mother Doreen’s suggestion. Somehow, she and Mother Doreen always managed to end up on one accord. This ultimately led the others to follow suit.
The women now spoke amongst one another in more lively tones, nodding their heads in favor of the direction in which the Singles Dinner was heading.
Finally, there was a consensus. Deborah was relieved. She stood in the front of the room, wondering how she’d been unofficially put in ch
arge of the Singles Ministry anyway. After all, it was Mother Doreen who God had given the vision to and who had taken the idea to Pastor for approval. But after the first few meetings, it was evident that these pack of women needed someone who would come before them boldly, so to speak. And although Mother Doreen was the Singles Ministry leader appointed by the pastor of New Day, Deborah pretty much took charge. This was to both Mother Doreen’s approval and appreciation.
After ripping a sheet of paper from her notebook, Deborah passed around a sign up sheet. The women bragged and boasted about their specialty dishes as they signed the sheet.
“I’ll get with the church secretary and check the church calendar,” Mother Doreen said, “and then I’ll run a couple dates by Pastor in order to get approval on everything.”
“Sounds good to me,” Deborah said. “Sound good to you, ladies?” she asked the women.
“Sounds good,” they all replied.
Deborah smiled with satisfaction. It looked like this Singles Dinner was going to turn out just fine after all. But just like everything else in life, looks could be deceiving. Very deceiving.
Chapter Two
“Now I didn’t mind slaving over my stove the last four hours cooking up all that fried chicken and macaroni and cheese for these men to eat,” Tamarra said to Paige as they made their way back to the fellowship hall. They were returning from retrieving serving utensils from the church kitchen. “But I didn’t say anything about serving these men.”
“Yeah, Mother Doreen and Sister Deborah know they pushing it,” Paige attested. “I’m just going to keep mine real, I ain’t old school. I’m not into making sure no man’s dinner is on the stove when he gets home from work when I have been working just as long and just as hard as he has all day. If not longer and if not harder. Then I got to turn around and make sure I pile the food up on his plate too. Child, please.” Paige sucked her teeth. “I remember watching my mother do that for my father every night. She’d fix Daddy’s plate first, then me and my brother’s. By the time she’d fix her own plate and sit down to eat, Daddy would want seconds. So she’d get up and fix him another plate. To this day I don’t ever remember my mother eating a hot meal. You feel me?”
The clicking of Paige’s sassy three-inch Mary Jane pumps matched her sassy attitude. As a matter of fact, Paige’s entire personality rang sassy. Twenty-seven years old, never married, never engaged, and no children, she was a pretty good catch for men. With her beautiful, deep chocolate skin and deep dimples, she had caught quite a few; more than she could count on both hands.
That’s why she never bought into that concept of skinny women having better luck at finding a man than plus-sized women. She carried herself with so much confidence. And when it came to dressing, she made sure her clothes fit appropriately, complimenting her full-figure. She looked her best when she felt comfortable. And when she was comfortable, rays of radiance surrounded her, attracting many men. Several of them had even been pretty good catches, but for some reason, Paige always managed to find a flaw in the men she dated.
Paige felt that these flaws were immediate cause for dismissal. After all, she was a child of the King, and God certainly wouldn’t have sent her flawed merchandise. So she was content with dating as many men as need be in order to get to that perfect man God had for her.
“Now I am old school when it comes to having dinner ready and serving up my man’s plate and all that,” Tamarra stated, “but like the young sister said at the meeting, only when he’s my husband. A husband who’s bringing home the bacon so that I can fry it in the pan and put it on a plate. That’s one thing I can say about that no good ex of mine, Edward made good money, and he wasn’t stingy with it. I didn’t mind cooking his food and preparing his plate because he tipped well.” Both Tamarra and Paige laughed. “Anyway, ain’t nary one of these men my husband for me to be fixing their plates. But I’ma let the Lord use me however He wants for now. But you best believe Sister Deborah and Mother Doreen are going to hear my opinion about this.”
“I guess I can go ahead and let God use me without complaint,” Paige shrugged, “but if they want seconds, they’re getting up off of their behinds and fixing it themselves, because I’m eating me a hot meal.”
Paige and Tamarra made their way back into the fellowship hall where everyone was waiting for the food to be blessed by Mother Doreen.
“Before I bless the food,” Mother Doreen started, “I’d like to first thank the members of New Day Temple of Faith Singles Ministry for planning this wonderful event. I know God’s heart is so pleased at how you all came together to see to it that it was a glorified event in His eyes. For those of you singles who have yet to join the ministry, we thank you for receiving our invitation. We hope that the fellowship you engage in tonight will encourage you to want to become members of the ministry, where we support, encourage, and even hold one another accountable. Because Satan has so many weapons he tries to attack the single saints with, like the spirit of lust. And to know that we have sisters, and hopefully some new brothers, there to touch and agree with us in prayer, we can send those demons to flight. Amen?”
“Amen,” the thirty-five persons in attendance declared.
Mother Doreen blessed the food and the hands that prepared it, then the festivities began. Every one dug in and looked to be enjoying the food and the company. It blessed Mother Doreen’s heart to see how the dinner had come together so well after getting through all the bickering. Once the prospective date had been set on the church calendar and the pastor had approved the idea, she and Deborah worked together almost daily to make sure that the event went on without a hitch.
Of course there were a few glitches when two women both signed up to bring corn pudding. They fussed about who had signed up first. Mother Doreen resolved the matter by convincing one to make fried corn instead. Once that matter was water under the bridge, there came the issue with the Church Program and Newsletter Ministry failing to list the dinner in the Sunday program for two weeks straight. But it was now obvious that hadn’t affected the successful turn out.
All singles had been invited to attend, whether they were actual members of the Singles Ministry or not. And when several RSVPs were received from singles who weren’t members, including ten men, the members were hopeful that the ministry would grow . . . with more men, of course. Nonetheless, the turnout could be counted a success.
“So, Sister Tamarra,” said Maeyl, a gentleman who served on the New Day’s Tape and Sound Booth Ministry. He swallowed a forkful of macaroni and cheese before continuing. “You made this mac and cheese, huh?”
“I sure did. It’s my great grandmother’s recipe. My husband . . .” Tamarra caught herself, then cleared her throat. “My ex-husband used to love it.”
“Well, I don’t blame him. I’d marry you for your cooking skills alone. And if we ever did get a divorce, I’d have to sue for alimony in the form of a pan full of macaroni and cheese every month for the rest of my life.”
Tamarra tried her best not to blush. She was never one to like showing her emotions. That’s why she always prayed to God before going to the Singles Ministry meetings that her emotions wouldn’t get the best of her, but it never seemed to work. For some reason, no matter how many times she told herself that she was going to keep her lips sealed and not share with the group, she always managed to discuss her past marriage. Whenever she did that, it was next to impossible for her to talk about it without getting emotional, whether the emotion was hurt, pain, or anger.
Tamarra had always felt that God’s purpose for her was to be an encourager and to uplift others. When someone else was in need of encouragement, the Holy Spirit always gave her just the right words to say or pray. So if anyone ever saw her broken down, how could she expect them to believe in the words she was saying to them?
“I surely appreciate the compliment,” Tamarra stated, not looking up at Maeyl.
“It’s no compliment, it’s the truth.” Maeyl was feeding Tamarra c
ompliments the same way he was feeding his mouth forkfuls of food.
“Thank you.” This time Tamarra looked at Maeyl. His almond shaped brown eyes stayed glued on his plate and not on her as she had expected they might be. He was devouring the macaroni and cheese as if it were the only food on his plate. From the looks of it, he couldn’t have cared less about Paige’s honey glazed ham she’d bought from the Honey Baked Ham store. Never mind Mother Doreen’s baked chicken or Deborah’s mashed potatoes and gravy and all the dishes others had bought or home made. No; he only had eyes for Tamarra’s macaroni and cheese. Now if she could get a man to only have eyes for her.
“You’re welcome.” Maeyl still didn’t look up from the plate, confirmation to Tamarra that his compliments toward her food was genuine and that it wasn’t some slick way to try to flirt with her, although she definitely wouldn’t have been offended by a little flirting.
Maybe life after her ex-husband was wishful thinking. She’d given him her best years. What did she have left to offer another man anyhow? She was a size six when she had married her husband, and now she was a size twelve. She was a toned size twelve, but twice the size nonetheless. But she felt like half the woman. Everyone always told her that the average size for a woman was twelve, but she didn’t want to be average. She wanted to be the size that had caught her a husband in the first place. Why had God let her waste all those calories on that cheating man?
“Anytime, Maeyl,” Tamarra eventually replied to Maeyl’s last statement under her breath with a tone of defeat. “Anytime.”
Seeing the disappointment on Tamarra’s face, Paige, who was sitting right next to her witnessing the exchange between Tamarra and Maeyl, lovingly patted her friend’s knee. When Tamarra looked up at her, she winked. Tamarra let a smile cross her lips, signaling to her friend that she was okay.