Landon handed her the flowers. “I had hoped to be able to ask you myself, but yes. I do want to marry you.”
“But why? I mean . . . you never let on.” She had been dreaming about being with him for so long but never in a million years thought it would come true. Pastor Landon was an educated and well-traveled man, and why would he want to spend time with her?
Landon stood, hat in hand. “You’re pretty special to me, Shar Gracey. I’ve prayed about this. And you’re the one for me.”
Johnny waved Landon’s comment off and then said, “Mr. Dorsey thinks you’re special too. His choir needs someone with your strong vocals. And you could even make some money to help with your ma’s medical bills.”
Marlene’s eyes bucked as her hand went to her hips, “Johnny Gracey, you’re not fightin’ fair.”
Shar turned her attention to Thomas Dorsey. “You want me to travel? I thought your choir performed Chicago.”
“We do, but we also go on the road for extended periods of time. I will be leaving in three weeks and would love for you to come with us.”
With wonderment in her voice, Shar asked, “I would get paid?”
Thomas nodded. “Your pa told me that y’all need money to get your mama to the doctor. My choir members don’t get paid, but if you’re willing to sell my sheet music after each service, I can pay for that.”
Shar turned to her mother. “And you would go to the doctor?”
“I would make sure of it,” Johnny Gracey said, while giving his wife a look that dared her to defy him.
But Marlene wasn’t done matchmaking. “I’ve got home remedies, Shar. You don’t have to concern yourself about me. You just worry about getting yourself down the aisle. Every preacher needs a good wife.”
Blushing, Shar turned away from her mother to cast her gaze on Landon, the man she had been dreaming about marrying ever since that first day he walked her and her mama home. She turned to Thomas Dorsey and said, “Thank you kindly for wanting me in your choir, Mr. Dorsey. But do you mind if I speak with Pastor Landon first.”
Her daddy stepped closer. “What you gotta speak with him about? Didn’t I tell you that your sanging voice was gon’ take you places?” Johnny’s eyes misted as he added, “It’s the only thang I ever had to give you. But I’m mighty proud that you’ve got a chance to get out of here and see the world with it.”
Shar’s daddy and most of his brothers and sisters could sing like songbirds. He’d always reminded Shar that she got her voice from his mother and that she wasn’t gon’ waste her talent like the rest of the Graceys had. Shar had assured her daddy that she wouldn’t waste what the good Lord and Grandma Gracey had given her.
She turned back to Landon. He was so handsome and kind and everything she ever wanted in a man. At six feet, he stood taller than most of the men she knew. Shar always liked the way his trim mustache looked against his smooth chocolate skin. She wanted to marry this man like she wanted to breathe. But would Landon wait for her? Would he allow her to do this tour so she could earn enough money to help her family?
“Pastor Landon is not going to wait around forever for you, chile. You go running off to see the world because of some pipe dream of your daddy’s and you’ll miss out. Hear what I’m telling you, Shar?”
“Yes, Mama, I hear you.” She then asked her daddy, “Do you mind if I speak with Pastor Landon on the porch?”
Johnny waved them off. “Go on, but be quick about it. Mr. Dorsey is an important man, and he don’t have all day for you to be diddling around.”
Landon walked Shar out of the house. Once they had taken their seats on the stoop he said, “I didn’t know your dad was so set on you singing.”
“That’s all he’s ever talked about since I was a kid and he discovered I could sing. He said that his mama wanted to sing, but got beat so bad trying to save her youngest son from a lynching that she lost her voice.”
“You never told me that.”
“I don’t like thinking about Grandma Gracey having her beautiful voice beat out of her. I never heard her sing because I hadn’t been born when it happened, but my daddy said that the world lost something special indeed, when Grandma Gracey’s voice left her.”
“Do you really have to go, Shar? You already sing in the choir at church, and I’m sure you could find other churches in Chicago to sing at also?” Landon said.
“But Mr. Dorsey is going to pay me.”
“Is money so important, Shar? Don’t you care at all about the fact that I want to marry you?”
“You know I care,” Shar said quickly. “Any woman would be right pleased at the thought of being the wife of Pastor Landon Norstrom. I am mighty proud that you asked my parents for my hand.”
“Then stay here with me, Shar. I’d treat you like a princess. I can promise you that.”
Shar’s eyes became misty at Landon’s promise to treat her like a princess, but she didn’t respond.
Landon got the hint. “There’s more that you’re not saying, isn’t there? I need to know what I’m up against.”
She closed her eyes. Wishing that she wasn’t poor and colored and needing to decide between love and money. But she wasn’t Cinderella, and no matter how bad she wanted it, no princess fairytales was coming her way. She was Shar Gracey, the daughter of a woman who was too poor to go to a doctor. “My family needs the money. My mama is sick. I can feel it in my bones. But she won’t go to a doctor because we don’t have the money.”
“I know a doctor who I can get to check your mama out. He does house calls, and if I let him know what’s going on, he might be able to work out a payment plan.”
“What about the medicine, Landon? If she needs medicine, can you pay for that too?” She lifted a hand to halt his answer. “I can’t ask you to do that. My daddy wouldn’t take your charity.”
“We could take up a collection at the church.”
Shar shook her head. “Most of the folks at the church just as bad off as we are. I can’t see burdening them with our problems.”
Landon put his arm around Shar. As he touched his forehead to hers, they both let out a long-suffering sigh.
Tears slid down Shar’s face as she asked, “What are we going to do?”
“I can’t answer that for you. All I can do is love you and hope that you choose me.”
Shar pulled away from Landon and grabbed hold of the rail as she made her way down the steps. She didn’t know why life was so unfair to her, but life ain’t never gave a dang about what she wanted. “What kind of choices do I have?”
Landon didn’t get up, didn’t respond, just kept his eyes on her, looking and waiting.
Pointing toward the door, she said, “If I go in there and tell Mr. Dorsey that I’ll go on that tour with him, my daddy will be over the moon with joy and my mama will get the medicine that she needs. But then I lose you.” She paused for a second and took a deep breath. “But if I say no, I won’t go on the tour, I’ll stay right here and marry you. I’ll be happy, and you’ll be happy, but then my mama might die.” She turned away from him and whispered to herself, “How can I live with that?”
She thought about Mother Barnett saying that somebody was going to get some good news today. At that moment, she couldn’t help but wonder if her good news was sitting in the house talking to her parents about the tour or if he was directly behind her, waiting on an answer as to whether or not she would become his wife.
6
As the week progressed and Shar still hadn’t made up her mind whether she should stay or go, her parents started in on each other. Things became so contentious between her parents that Shar sat on the porch rather than go in the house most evenings. But sitting on the porch didn’t stop her from hearing the arguments. Even now as she tried to set her mind on other things Shar could hear her daddy saying, “If that Pastor Landon really loved Shar like he claims he do, he’d wish her well and promise to be waiting when she gets back.”
“And why should he do that?”
Marlene yelled back.
“Why shouldn’t he? What kind of man, claiming to love a woman, won’t let down his pride so that she can have the things she wants out of life?”
“You that kind of man, Johnny Gracey.” Marlene’s voice was filled with accusation and venom. “You promised to love me and see to my happiness and Shar’s happiness, but you’re breaking my heart and you don’t even care.”
“Marlene, now that’s not fair. All I ever strived for in life was to do right by you and Shar. But the two of us together barely bring in enough money to pay the rent on this house. How we going to afford the care you need without Shar bringing in some extra money? You think I want you to sit here and die just so Shar can run off and marry that preacher that you been throwing her on for over a year now?”
Shar felt as if she was being pulled in a hundred different directions. She and her daddy had always been close. He’d told her on countless occasions that she was the apple of his eye. But her vacillating over this decision was causing him to look at her differently. Her mama was mad at her for even considering going on this tour. And Shar hadn’t heard a peep out of Landon since Sunday afternoon. She’d never dreamed in a million years that her prayers would get answered like this.
Shar couldn’t take anymore. She got up off the stoop, getting ready to headed to the church. They was having a fish fry this Friday, so she hoped that she would be able to catch up with Landon and talk this out. She felt like a poster child for the phrase, be careful what you pray for because you just may get it . . . and then be forced to choose between two blessings.
Before Shar could get off the porch, her mama stopped arguing with her daddy because a coughing spell overtook her. It sounded so awful that Shar opened the front door and raced to her mama’s side. “What’s wrong with her, Daddy?”
Marlene was struggling to hold herself up as her body was being ravished with a cough that she couldn’t stop or control. Johnny took his wife’s arm and sat her down on the couch.
“Now do you see what your constant bickering has done?” Shar barked at her father.
Marlene lifted a hand as she struggled to regain her voice. “Not his fault.”
Shar looked at her daddy. She saw fear in his eyes. His wife was suffering, and he couldn’t do a thing about it. She turned her eyes back to her mama, and for the first time since all these coughing spells began, Shar noticed how much weight her mother had lost. “Mama, do you want me and Daddy to get you to the hospital?”
Marlene shook her head as she got up off the couch. “I’ll be fine. Just need to rest is all.”
Shar followed her mother. Marlene got in her bed. Shar put a blanket around her and then sat down next to the bed. Marlene closed her eyes, looking as if the coughing had zapped all the energy out of her body. She sat there rubbing her mama’s head while she slept, remembering all the times that her mama had done this same thing for her when she was feeling poorly. She would return the favor, and nothing more needed to be mulled over.
As tears rolled down her face, Shar’s heart was breaking with the knowledge that even though her prayers had been answered, she was still Shar Gracey and life just wasn’t gon’ roll over and let her be happy.
“Looks like you done made up your mind. Am I right about that, baby-girl?”
Her daddy had come into the room with them. Shar nodded.
“Do I want to hear this decision of yours?” he asked.
She nodded again as she wiped the tears from her face. “I suspect you right, Daddy. If Landon really loves me, then he’ll wait until I get back from this tour.”
Johnny clapped his hands. “Did you hear that, Marlene?” Marlene’s eyes fluttered, but she didn’t respond. “And I don’t care what you got to say about it, because I’m getting you to the hospital no sooner than Shar gets herself on that tour bus.”
After having a five-day pity party, Landon realized that he didn’t want to lose Shar, even if it meant that he would have to get in line behind her singing career. He loved her, and if he hadn’t made it clear enough the last time they spoke, Shar Gracey was the only woman for him. With hat in hand, Landon made his way back over to the Gracey house.
Johnny opened the door and came out on the porch with a suspicious look on his face. “No use trying to talk her out of doing what she was born to do, Reverend. Does God tell the rooster not to crow or the lion not to roar?”
“Now, Johnny, I know you don’t attend church or have much interest in the things of God like me and Shar.”
“What does my not wanting you to stop my daughter from pursuing her dreams got to do with me not attending that church of yours?” Johnny folded his arms around his belly, waiting on an answer.
“Nothing, I didn’t mean it like that . . . ” Landon shook his head. “Look, I’m not here to argue with you or to stand in Shar’s way. I was just hoping that you would allow me to see her one more time. Is that possible?”
“Well I don’t know about that.” Johnny puffed out his chest, showing that he was every bit the man of the house and his word was law around there. “Shar has a real chance of getting out of here and making something of her life. And I just don’t believe that the good Lord blessed her with a voice like that, just so she can hang around here, helping her mother with the washing.
“So if I let you talk to Shar, I want you to give me your word as a man of God that you won’t be putting no thoughts of marriage and babies in her head.”
Landon didn’t understand why Johnny was so dead set against Shar and him getting married. Didn’t every father want marriage and a happy home for his children? “Look, Mr. Gracey, I can promise you that I won’t try to stop Shar from doing what she wants to do. But you need to understand something. I love your daughter and have been dreaming about marrying her for at least a year now. I want to do right by her.”
“Then let her go on this tour so she can help her family out,” Johnny demanded.
“I will. Now can you please let me speak to Shar so she doesn’t leave town without me at least saying good-bye?”
Begrudgingly, Johnny opened his front door and hollered inside, “Shar, get out here, gal. Pastor Landon wants to talk to you.”
Shar rushed to the front door. She stepped out on the porch with her daddy and Landon. Joy shone across her face at the sight of him. “How are you doing today?” she asked.
Landon smiled. “I’m better now that I have you in my presence.” Landon then turned back to Johnny who had just rolled his eyes at Landon’s statement. “Do you mind if Shar takes a walk with me?”
“Just around the corner and back, that’s all the time y’all need to talk,” Johnny said as he stepped back into the house. He then turned back to Shar and said, “Don’t stay gone too long. Your mama might be needing you.”
“Okay, Daddy, I won’t be long.” Shar stepped off the porch and started walking down the street with Landon. “I never expected that you’d come back by the house. I was getting ready to go by the church, but then Mama had another one of her coughing spells.”
“Is that right,” Landon said, allowing his chest to puff a bit at the knowledge that Shar was still thinking about him. As they rounded the corner, Landon said, “To tell you the truth, Shar, this situation has been on my mind all week. I could barely concentrate to write my sermon.”
“I don’t want God mad at me for troubling your mind, Landon. Please get your sermon done and preach a grand message this Sunday. I surely need to hear something grand to stop my heart from aching like it’s been doing.”
Her mind was made up. Landon could see it all over her face, but he couldn’t stop himself from asking. He had to hear the words fall from her lips. He stopped walking, looked into her eyes as he asked, “You’ve made up your mind, haven’t you?”
“This hasn’t been easy for me, Landon.”
“I don’t doubt that.”
Shar lowered her head, shuffled her feet, and then spit it out. “The thought of losing you is breaking my he
art, but I have got to go.”
Overcome with emotion, Landon grabbed hold of Shar’s hands, not caring who saw the preacher holding hands with the lady he intended to marry. “I just got to let you know that I’m not going nowhere, Shar Gracey. I’m going to be right here waiting until you return. And when you return home, the first thing I’m going to do is ask for your hand in marriage again.”
“Oh, Landon, do you really mean it?”
He let go of her hands and started back on their journey down the street. “As sure as the day is long, I mean every word.” He stopped again and looked into her eyes. “I love you, Shar. Been loving you for a long time now, and I believe that our love will survive.”
Tears sprang to Shar’s eyes. “I love you too, Landon. But I never imagined that you felt the same way about me. Never imagined that you would love me enough to let me go for a spell.”
“I’ve been trying to put my house in order. I just opened a savings account down at the bank. I wanted to show your daddy that I’d be able to take care of you. So that once you come back, you’ll never have to leave my side again.”
“I have no doubt that you’d be able to take care of me. I’m just thankful that you’re willing to wait for me to go and do what I need to do for my mama. I promise you that when I come back home, I won’t be thinking about anything but becoming Mrs. Landon Norstrom.”
“And Shar . . . ”
They had resumed walking, rounded the corner, and headed back to her house. “Yes, Landon?”
“So that we don’t miss each other too much, maybe we should exchange letters.”
“I would love that.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small Bible with a black leather-bound cover. “I want you to take this with you. Whenever you feel sad or alone, just remember that God is always with you and I will be with you soon enough.”
How Sweet the Sound Page 4