Divas of Damascus Road

by Michelle Stimpson

  Yolanda picked his card up off her freshly mopped floor, pushed her trash can’s pedal, and tossed the card into the abyss. This Mr. Loop-Misser was definitely not the man for her.

  Her phone rang. Dianne. It was time.

  Yolanda was late but just in time to avoid having to park in the lot and get out to look for Dianne. The evening buses arrived with few passengers, even on weekends. She’d offered to buy Dianne a plane ticket, but Dianne had refused the offer. One look at the man beside Dianne explained her refusal.

  Dianne had the same slight smile Yolanda remembered. Her hair swayed with each step she took toward the curb. She’d put on a little weight but looked all the better for it. Yolanda and her older sister, Regina, used to tease Dianne about having a fat face. Finally, her body had caught up with her plump cheeks. She looked like a full-figured model, precisely proportioned to resemble a beefed-up skinny girl.

  This “John” she had brought along walked with his hands in his pockets, leaning to one side, looking like Lenny-who-got- plenty from Good Times. Yolanda took a deep breath and told herself not to trip, that Dianne was a grown woman. If she wanted to keep fooling around with these weird men, that was her business. Dianne was still her cousin, her girl. She would respect Dianne’s decisions.

  Yolanda let down her window and called, “Hey, Dianne!” One of the benefits of living in a town with a population of nine thousand: you could act country in Dentonville. Dianne waved back and motioned for Yolanda to pull up a little closer. She got as close to them as possible, about twenty feet away, and then parked. The sensors chimed as Yolanda got out of the car to hug her estranged cousin.

  “Aah! Hey, Yo-yo. Girl, look at you!” Dianne leaned back and looked her over from bottom to top.

  “You ought to quit!”

  Yolanda hugged her again. Once upon a time they had been more like sisters. Yolanda took her turn, getting a good look at Dianne. “Girl, you look so good!”

  She didn’t accept the compliment. “Please, fat as I am? But look at you! What have you done to your hair?”

  “I whacked it all off.” Yolanda did a little pivot on the balls of her feet, stopping in mid-swing to give Dianne the profile of her tapered haircut. The bulk of her hair was brown, but she’d recently incorporated a bronze frost to accent her skin and light brown eyes.

  Dianne ran her hand along the nape and gasped, “Aunt Gloria almost killed you, didn’t she?”

  “Girl, she cried for days. But you know how much I hate hair.” Yolanda had been one of the first to jump on the bandwagon when the short, cropped styles made their debut.

  “It makes you look so professional and powerful. I love it!” Dianne shrieked.

  “Thank you.” Yolanda smiled, her jaw muscles hurting from this unusually long set of cheek-push-ups. “I am so glad to see you. Momma’s going to be so happy that you made it.”

  “Oh, Yo-yo, I’m sorry.” Dianne stepped aside and introduced the man with her, “This is James. We’re... together.” She clasped her hands over and waited for Yolanda’s reaction.

  Yolanda’s face asked the question: so what does that mean?

  “We’re dating,” Dianne lowered her head and whispered under her breath.

  “Hi, James.” Yolanda stepped forward a little to shake his hand. He didn’t bother to fish his hand out of his pocket. Rather, he gave Yolanda that “what up?” gesture—jerked his head back and tipped chin real quick?

  Yolanda just knew the next words out of his mouth were gonna be “What’s your sign, baby?” But instead he said nothing, let his nod do the talking.

  Dianne was a little embarrassed, and Yolanda was already suspicious, but this was Dianne’s life, Dianne’s choice. If she was happy with him, Yolanda would try her best to be civil to him, because if anybody deserved to be happy, it was Dianne.

  “We’d better get going. The rehearsal dinner is in just a few hours,” Yolanda said, leading the way back to her car. Dianne grabbed her purse and tugged the larger suitcase for a minute before Yolanda went over and helped her haul it to the trunk. James helped himself into the backseat of the car before Yolanda and Dianne even had that heavy suitcase patted down into the trunk. There was something wrong with the picture.

  Yolanda had another self-talk: All right, now, this is just what you’ve been praying about. Keep your mouth shut. Don’t jump to conclusions. You don’t have to put your two cents into everything, right or wrong. Just pray for him.

  Dianne jumped into the car, ignoring the fact that her man had just proven himself a boy.

  Against every ounce of righteousness in her, Yolanda withheld commentary, overlooked it like a bad odor among strangers.

  “Where’s Regina?” Dianne asked Yolanda as they pulled from the curb and into traffic.

  Yolanda shifted gears, looked behind her, and drove smoothly to the stoplight. “Oh, she’ll be there. She’s been so busy with the baby that I told her to stay at home and rest up for tonight and tomorrow. Actually, we already rehearsed because there’s so much stuff we still have to do. The timing was a little off. So, I guess this is a rehearsal dinner without the rehearsal.”

  “Alright. How old is the baby now?”

  “He’ll be four months old on the fifteenth. He is so cute, Dianne. Looks just like his daddy. I told Regina, all she did was carry that baby for Orlando.”

  “I’ll bet you and Regina and Aunt Gloria are spoiling him rotten,” Dianne guessed correctly.

  “Oh, there is so much cute little stuff out. We can’t help it.

  “Enough about us. What have you been doing with yourself?”

  “Just working,” Dianne sighed, “working every day.”

  “You still into computers?”

  “Yeah, I’m still hanging in there. The market is a little tough right now, but I’ve seen worse in other fields, so I’m not complaining.”

  “Yeah, it’s tough in every industry right about now,” Yolanda agreed with her. “It’s a blessing to be employed through all this mess.”

  Old downtown still had its charm, its brick-paved streets dividing rows of mom-and-pop businesses. The older ones still had cash registers with bells that rang every time the cash drawer opened. The newer shops and specialty stores boasted neon signs and state-of-the-art displays, though their edifices sang songs of decades gone. Old and new together.

  Past the railroad tracks, the planned communities began their bombardment of advertisements: three-foot signs boasting maximum square footage next to minimum prices, with an asterisk.

  When Dallas got too busy, those who wanted to keep their jobs but lose the city sought out the quaint, small-town atmosphere of Dentonville. With the city flee-ers came city crimes and city taxes. But they also brought conveniences and higher property values for the natives. Yolanda’s mother’s house had nearly doubled in value, and the extra property she owned would bring in a nice piece of change, too, as soon as she found the right tenant.

  Here, on the newly developed side of the tracks, came light gray streets and houses so close together you could see into your neighbors’ kitchen, if they were the kind who didn’t put up curtains.

  Dianne and Yolanda chitchatted as much as was appropriate with James in the car, and then Yolanda made an effort to include him in the conversation.

  Whether Yolanda did so to confirm her suspicions or to give him a second chance, Dianne couldn’t be sure.

  “So, James, have you ever been to Dentonville?” Yolanda asked. The question itself was a joke. The only time visitors came to Dentonville was to shop at the new outlet mall—and it wasn’t all that. Just a bunch of overpriced knockoffs.

  “Aw he—” he stopped himself just shy of profanity. Rephrased his response. “Naw, I never even heard of Dentonville until now.”

  Suspicions confirmed.

  “Ooh, James, look.” Dianne tapped on her window. “There’s that Nike outlet I told you about.”

  He perked up quickly, craning his neck to catch a preview of the store. “W
e gone have to check that out before we leave.”

  “How long do you plan to be in town?” Yolanda asked Dianne.

  “We’ll be here until Tuesday. I’ve got a few more days of vacation time I need to use up before November.”

  This led to Yolanda’s next question. If Dianne had come alone, the boarding arrangements would have been simple—Dianne would stay either with her or with Regina and Orlando. But with James here, things were questionable. “Where are you guys staying?”

  “Well...” Dianne held her breath. “I was thinking maybe...we could stay with you.”

  “I really don’t…We’ll have to talk about it,” Yolanda told her. This was a conversation better left between two women.

  They drove back to Yolanda’s house and got unwound for a little while before getting all wound up again for the dinner. Dianne took a shower in the hallway bathroom while Yolanda freshened up in the master bedroom. James parked himself on the sofa, took the remote in his hand, and commenced to flippin’ through channels like a madman. Mind you, he didn’t ask for permission to turn on the television, let alone change the channel from Lifetime.

  It took everything in Yolanda to keep from making a comment about his lack of home training.

  Dianne knocked on Yolanda’s bedroom door. “Can I come in?”

  “Yeah,” Yolanda called to her from the bathroom.

  Dianne came into the bathroom and stood beside Yolanda as she applied a fresh coat of lip gloss. In Dianne’s eyes, the bright vanity lights made Yolanda look like a glamorous showgirl about to go onstage. Her eyes twinkled, her teeth glistened, and her skin glowed.

  “I used to watch you and Regina work magic with curling irons and makeup,” Dianne said. “Even though I was the oldest, I wanted to be just like y’all.” She squeezed behind Yolanda and made her way to the toilet seat. She sat on the stool and looked up at Yolanda the same way she had years before. She pushed her knees together and spread her feet apart, hiding her hands in her lap, just like she used to.

  “Girl, please. Don’t try to be like me. I’m not Jesus,” Yolanda told her.

  “Hmm. Aunt Gloria used to say that all the time.”

  “She was right, you know?”

  “Yeah. I know.” Dianne watched her a cousin little longer, this time setting her elbow up on the counter and letting her chin rest on her hand.

  For Yolanda, this moment of déjà vu, this easing back into old familiar roles was both comforting and menacing, somewhere between being in the spotlight and under the microscope.

  “Yo-yo, about what you said earlier. You wanted to talk. About me and James and where we’re going to stay.” She slid into the topic carefully. “I mean... we’re all adults here. It’s not like we’re kids, you know?”

  Yolanda hesitated, contemplating which part of her tongue she’d have to bite. She didn’t want to come off like she was judging Dianne. And she didn’t want to sound like she was Dianne’s mother, because God knows Dianne really never had one. But Yolanda had her convictions. She had to answer to God for what went on under the roof He’d put over her head, even if Dianne wasn’t her child.

  “I know we weren’t raised like this,” Dianne continued, “But... like I said, we’re grown. We all know about real life. So... is it okay if James and I stay here until Tuesday?”

  “Dianne, you know I love you. And you know I respect whatever decisions you make for yourself. But I also have to respect my house and myself. I can’t let you two sleep together in my house if you’re not married.”

  Dianne laughed at herself and shook her head, then exhaled. “You haven’t changed one bit, you know that?”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment. Besides, I just got this house built six months ago. I’m the only one who’s lived here. This house is totally sex-free. I haven’t even had sex in here, so you know I’m not about to let somebody else go there.”

  “You got issues,” Dianne teased, and stood, straightening out her pants with her hands.

  Yolanda smiled back at her, looking down at her fat face like she used to back at Gloria’s house. “Where’s your phone book? I’m gonna call around and see about getting us a room somewhere.”

  “My phone books are at the top of my coat closet, right next to the front door,” Yolanda directed her.

  “Everything in its place, huh, Yo-yo?”

  “You know it.” Yolanda nodded.

  Dianne hugged Yolanda one more time. “It’s nice to know you’re still the same, Yo-yo. Even if it means I won’t have enough money to go shopping at the outlets while I’m in town!”

  “Uh, you got a man in there.” Yolanda pointed toward the living room.

  “Please.” Dianne rolled her eyes, looking as if she wanted to say something profane.

  Yolanda didn’t say anything, but Dianne knew that she’d let the cat out of the bag.

  When they were growing up, Gloria didn’t have much to say when it came to men because she didn’t have one of her own. But rules number one, two, and three were: he must work. Yeah, they needed to be faithful and decent and respectful, but a sorry, lazy man was nothing but trouble from the get-go. Gloria got up on that soap box so often, the girls could mouth the sermon in their sleep. “That other stuff you can work on. You can teach a man how to treat you. But if he ain’t got it in him to get his black behind out of bed every day and go to work, it’s somethin’ wrong with him. Trust me when I tell you, his elevator ain’t goin’ all the way up!”

  Dianne shrugged a little, avoiding Yolanda’s eyes, and said, “James in between jobs right now.”

  Yolanda reasoned within herself. Okay, a man can actually be between jobs. Yolanda left the topic alone because she didn’t want to start sounding like her mother.

  Dianne called from the kitchen as she searched through the phone book. “Which hotel is the closest to Richard’s church?”

  Yolanda rushed from her bedroom and stopped cold upon entering the living room. There was James, with his socked feet propped up on the edge of the table that Yolanda often used for dining. She could almost see the bacteria crawling from between the threads of cotton to the plate she might set down in another week or so. I know he did not!

  She didn’t even take time to process the thought. “Get your feet off my table!”

  James shot her a “who you think you talking to?” look, and Yolanda shot a “you” right back at him.

  He removed one foot in order to get his shoes, but let the other foot linger a little longer. By the time he’d finished putting on both shoes, Yolanda was back with the Clorox wipes, disinfecting the entire table as her guests looked on—James in annoyance, Dianne in embarrassment for both of them.

  “I eat here sometimes,” Yolanda huffed after she finished.

  “Whatever.” James flipped the channel.

  Dianne called the first hotel in the phone book.

  Chapter 4

  For as much as Regina loved motherhood and Orlando Jr., there were days when she wished she could take it all back and return to the life she had lived before the baby. The whole “tote bag” routine was getting old, and Regina couldn’t see how any woman in her right mind would go through childbirth or the dog-tired days of new maternity a second time, let alone a third.

  Orlando thought it would be a great time to add to their small family. He was the third of five children raised in a loving biracial family where the house was always bursting at the seams with energy, music, and laughter—not to mention the complementing aromas of freshly made tortillas and fried chicken.

  “Baby, don’t you want our kids to grow up close?” he had argued.

  “What kid-s? I’m not having any more kids.” Regina’s voice was chilly and stiff. She sucked in a deep breath and tried to snap the top button on a size ten checkered skirt that would have swallowed her before she got pregnant with Orlando Jr. She’d purchased a couple of new outfits for the occasion of her mother’s rehearsal dinner, but neither of them seemed to fit the bill for tonight.
It was painfully clear that she was getting bigger by the month. All the more reason to turn off the baby-making oven.

  Orlando rolled over on his side to watch Regina try on a series of outfits that were still ten pounds out of her reach. Their master suite was the perfect aphrodisiac, with mirrors, candles, flowing draperies, and sexy little novelties that Regina picked up here and there to make their bedroom a love retreat.

  Little did he know that he’d picked the least appropriate time to talk to Regina about putting her body through nine months of alterations again. To him, she was beautiful. Though the outfits didn’t fit the way they used to, she looked a whole lot better than some of his coworkers’ wives. Besides, the best thing about Regina was her legs, and she was a long way from losing the slope that drove him crazy when she wore calf-length skirts—like the one she tried on now.

  He smiled as he stuffed a satin throw pillow under his chin and took in the view.

  Regina stood, her bare feet flat on the carpet, facing their closet sliding door that doubled as a full- length mirror. Her long black hair flowed several inches down her back, a deep wave here and there. His wife was often mistaken for a teenager with her taut skin, bright eyes, and button nose. But once she opened her mouth, there was no mistaking her womanhood. She handled business.

  This enigma was completely sexy to Orlando. Like her appearance, her personality had two sides. She could be ice-cold sometimes, but she could also thaw and melt and spread her love all over him when he pushed the right buttons.

  “Baby, that looks good on you,” Orlando hummed.

  “Yeah, as long as the hook is hidden up under this top.” Regina fussed and lifted the sleeveless knit tank so that Orlando could see the covert damage motherhood had done to her figure. “Do you see this?” She grabbed the flesh hanging over the rim of her skirt and pulled on it like a piece of bubble gum stuck to the bottom of a shoe. “This is what’s left after having a baby. This fat ain’t going nowhere, and I’m not about to add to it.”

  Regina wondered sometimes how her husband’s clear gray eyes could be so clouded.