Over the Fence

by Mary Monroe

  His next words flew out of his mouth. “Odell got another woman over in Hartville.”

  CHAPTER 30

  MILTON

  YVONNE THREW HER HEAD BACK AND LAUGHED LONG AND LOUD. “You think Odell is fooling around? Is that all he is supposed to be doing?”

  “You don’t think that’s a big deal?”

  “Maybe it is to you, but it ain’t to me. Shoot. I thought you was going to tell me something I could sink my teeth into. Like him being a sissy, pretending to be a normal man, and that Joyce is just a front. Something that juicy could keep us conversating all night. Now that I think about it, for all we know, Odell and Joyce might not even be having sex. That could be the reason they ain’t had no kids.”

  “I don’t know if Odell is a sissy or not. But I do know they trying to make a baby, because they won’t stop talking about it.”

  Yvonne gave me a puzzled look. I didn’t give her time to say nothing about my last comment.

  I said, “And I know for sure that he is having sex with somebody else . . .”

  “What if he is? I still don’t think that’s so juicy. Heck! A lot of married men have a few flings somewhere along the line. Odell ain’t no saint. If Reverend Hayes can’t keep his pecker in his pants, we can’t expect regular men to do it.” Yvonne’s lips curled up at both ends, like she was about to laugh some more. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to hear that Odell done stepped out on Joyce. When women get around a man as handsome as he is, they ain’t responsible for their actions. I’m sure them young girls that shop at the store make goo-goo eyes and shake their tail feathers at him all the time.”

  Me and Yvonne had never been violent with one another, but this was one time I wanted to beat the dog shit out of her. Somehow, I managed to keep my hands to myself. “He ain’t that good looking!”

  “You might not think that, but I do. And so do every other woman I know. If Odell got a side woman, Joyce must not be keeping him as satisfied as she think she is! Humph!” Yvonne shook her fist in my face and kept talking. “If you ever get crazy enough to fool around with another woman, you better make damn sure I never find out. Because if I do, you’ll have to start peeing from a different body part!”

  “I ain’t never cheated on you, and I swear to God I never will. But when a married man have a short fling or a one-night, hit-and-run type of episode with another woman, that’s one thing. Even God can excuse that. That ain’t the case with Odell.” We was still standing in the middle of the floor. I didn’t like the way this conversation was going. I had already blabbed too much.

  “My Lord. I never would have guessed . . . Can’t you talk some sense into him?”

  “Baby, Odell’s private life with another woman is his business, not ours.”

  “When he dragged you into his mess, he made it your business. And anything that involve you involve me. I ain’t about to stand by and let us get caught up in a cheating mess that could scandalize our names.”

  “All right. I’ll tell you everything I know. I’m a little drunk, and you done pestered me into distress. I need to sit down before I go on.” We dropped down on the couch. I gazed at the floor for a few moments. When I looked back at Yvonne, her face was scrunched up so tight, I knew I had to finish what I had started, or I’d be sorry. The inside of my mouth was so dry by now, I had to jiggle my tongue a few times before I could keep talking. After I took a deep breath, the words rolled out like marbles. “Odell is crazy in love with this other woman. What do you think about him now?”

  Yvonne looked at me like I’d just sprouted another nose. “Did he tell you this?”

  “Naw. I caught him with her myself.”

  Her mouth dropped open, and her eyes got as big as pot holders. “When?”

  “Back in July.”

  “I—I can’t believe my ears.”

  “Well, you better believe them ears! And that ain’t all. He got three little boys with her. I seen them, too.”

  “Come on, Milton. You ain’t that drunk, and if you trying to be funny, it ain’t working. I know you get jealous of Odell, and I can understand why. I get jealous of Joyce sometimes, too. But I wouldn’t stoop low enough to tell such a tall tale like the one you telling me now.”

  “I ain’t never lied to you!” I hollered, slapping the side of my thigh.

  “Calm down, sugar,” she said, rubbing my arm. “I know you ain’t never lied to me on purpose about nothing serious. But there is a first time for everything. Maybe you can’t help yourself. But this is a mighty big whopper for you to start with. If it’s true, you ought to be able to prove it.”

  I snorted and waved my hand. “You damn right I can prove it. When we get off work tomorrow, I’m going to borrow Willie Frank’s truck and take you to Hartville so you can see I ain’t lying.”

  Yvonne gasped. “You taking me to the woman’s house?”

  “Naw. I don’t know her address. But I know somebody that know all about her and Odell. One of them waitresses at the restaurant where him and her was eating at.”

  “How do you know that waitress ain’t lying?”

  “I seen him all over his other woman with my own eyes, and I heard them little boys call him Daddy.”

  “Good God!” I had never seen Yvonne looking so spooked. “Do Joyce know?”

  “What’s wrong with you? If she knew he was playing her for a fool, do you think she’d still be with him? And do you think he’d still have that sweet job?”

  “Well, she’d be a damn fool if she knew about that woman and stayed with Odell, anyway.” A angry look crossed Yvonne’s face, and she shuddered so hard, her eyes crossed. “When did you tell him you knew what he was up to?”

  “That Monday after I found out, I paid him a visit at the store. You should have seen how wimpy he got. He whined and blubbered and begged me not to tell nobody. I was surprised he didn’t shit his pants.”

  Yvonne got quiet and looked deep in thought. “Him being a next-door neighbor and such a close friend, with beaucoup money, did he offer to make it worth your while to keep quiet?”

  “Something like that.”

  “Something like what?”

  “Um . . . he said that if we fell behind on our credit account, he’d overlook it and give us extra time to catch it up. Odell being such a good buddy of ours, I told him that what he was doing wasn’t no business of mine. But I didn’t want the guilt of carrying his shame to burden me too much. So, for my own peace of mind, I let him have a piece of my mind! I told him that his behavior was giving the rest of us married Christian men a bad name. He got so overwhelmed, he almost got the heebie-jeebies, and he begged me not to tattle. I swore I wouldn’t. He was so grateful, he gave me a hug.”

  “A hug? Is that all? A man in a pickle like he is should have at least gave you a few bucks. He didn’t offer none?”

  I shook my head. “Even if he had, I wouldn’t have took it. I would never take advantage of a close friend. Now can we end this conversation?”

  Yvonne gazed at me for a long time before she said, “Yeah . . . for now.”

  CHAPTER 31

  YVONNE

  WHEN WE FINALLY WENT TO BED, IT TOOK A WHILE FOR ME TO GO to sleep. I couldn’t stop thinking about what Milton had told me about Odell. If everything he said was true, I would never be able to look at Odell the same way again. I didn’t know how I was going to listen without screaming the next time Joyce bragged about him. Even though I had always thought Odell was a snob, I’d still had some respect for him. Just knowing that a colored man was managing the most prominent colored-owned business in town had made me realize nothing was impossible. It had gave me hope that Milton might be as successful as Odell someday. I should have realized Odell was too good to be true. I was as mad as I was shocked. It was like finding out Santa Claus was a member of the Ku Klux Klan!

  I woke up before daylight Tuesday morning. The first thing I did was nudge Milton until he started wiggling. “Did you tell me last night that Odell had a woman on t
he side and three kids with her?”

  “Why?” he asked, without opening his eyes.

  “I just want to make sure that my mind wasn’t playing tricks on me and that I hadn’t dreamed it all.”

  “You ain’t dreamed nothing. Now, I ain’t going to talk about this no more until we get Willie Frank’s truck and go to Hartville when we get off work this evening.”

  “How do you expect me to get through today with this on my mind and not talk about it?”

  “You ain’t got no choice. Now, get up and go fix me some grits so we can get our tails to work.”

  * * *

  I was glad we was so busy at the grill, I didn’t have much time to think about what Odell was up to. Halfway into our shift, Milton called up Willie Frank from the telephone in Mr. Cunningham’s office. Milton asked him if he could come to the house this evening and let us borrow his truck so we could go check on Milton’s sick cousin in Lexington, one town over. When we got home, Willie Frank’s truck was parked in front of our house. We had gave him a key to our house, so he was stretched out on the couch when we walked through the door.

  “I’m so happy to see you, I could wrap it in eggshells,” Milton told him, sitting down on the arm of the couch. “And we sure do appreciate you letting us borrow your truck.”

  Willie Frank sat up and wiped his eyes. “Anytime. Which cousin you going to check up on?”

  “Columbus. Last week that numskull tried to take a shortcut home from his job through a pasture and got trampled by some cows that went on a rampage. He was doing all right until yesterday, when he started having headaches and stuff. His wife called me at the grill this morning and told me,” Milton explained.

  We didn’t like to lie to Willie Frank, but sometimes we didn’t have no choice. We couldn’t tell him the real reason we needed to use his truck. Milton’s cousin that “got trampled by some cows” was actually in jail for stealing a cow.

  “Hmmm. I hope Columbus ain’t too bad off. Y’all want me to go, too?” Willie Frank said.

  “No, we need you to stay here and hold down the fort. I’m sure some folks will drop in before we get back,” I told him. “Just make sure they wipe their feet before they come in, and don’t give out nothing on credit.”

  Me and Milton didn’t waste no time. We changed out of our work clothes and rushed out the door. When we got outside, Odell was strutting up on his porch. He gazed at us with a curious look on his face as we hurried toward Willie Frank’s truck.

  “How y’all folks doing this evening?” he hollered. Before one of us could answer, Joyce peeped out the front window and waved.

  “We doing fine,” Milton replied. “Um . . . we on our way to visit my sick cousin over in Lexington. Crossed-eyed Columbus, with the bald head. He got trampled by some cows.”

  “Lord almighty! Them narrow, bumpy dirt roads going into Lexington is dangerous, so drive careful. I’ll pray for your cousin, and y’all, too,” Odell said.

  I was tempted to tell him to pray for hisself, because he was going to need it. “We’ll see you later!” I yelled.

  Milton cranked up the truck, and we eased on down the street.

  “By the way, you never told me why you was in Hartville that day you seen Odell. We don’t know nobody over there,” I said before we even made it to the corner.

  “Cecil Braxton asked me to drive him over there in his truck. He don’t drive too much since he had his stroke. Anyway, we went to this restaurant that he wanted to go to. Odell was already there with that woman.”

  I gasped. “Cecil seen them, too?”

  “Naw. The place was too crowded. He don’t know nothing. Why don’t you rear back and take a nap? You look tired, and it’s hard for me to drive and talk to you at the same time.”

  “I ain’t sleepy. It never bothered you before to drive and talk at the same time. And don’t change the subject. What I want to know is, If you and Cecil was together in that restaurant at the same time, how did you talk to that waitress and he didn’t hear?”

  “He was using the toilet while me and her was conversating.”

  “And you didn’t mention it to him?”

  “Hell no. He ain’t broad minded like me. He would have gone up to Odell and busted him right then and there. I wasn’t about to let Cecil embarrass Odell in public.”

  “Oh. Well, if we ain’t going to the woman’s house, exactly where in Hartville you taking me to?”

  “You’ll find out soon enough. Now, be still and hush up until we get there. You making me nervous.”

  Hartville was about a hour away, so it was hard for me to be still and stay hushed up for that long. But I did.

  When we finally got there, Milton parked across the street from a restaurant with a sign outside, on the wall next to the door, that said PO’ SISTER’S KITCHEN. There was at least twenty folks lined up waiting to get inside.

  “This place must serve some damn good food to draw such a big crowd,” I commented.

  “Baby, it’s so good, it’ll make you want to slap your mama for what she fed you. You should have seen how many folks was here the day me and Cecil came.”

  “I hope you don’t expect me to stand in that long-ass line. I done been on my feet enough today.”

  “Don’t worry about that. We didn’t come here to eat. I’m going to go straight up to the counter and ask for that waitress I told you about.”

  When we got to the doorway, I followed behind Milton as he plowed his way through the crowd. People started grumbling right away. We kept walking until we got to the counter, where a cute dark-skinned waitress was plucking deviled eggs off one tray and loading them onto a plate.

  “What the . . . ? Look, y’all have to wait in line like everybody else!” she barked.

  “You just the person I’m looking for. Do you remember me?” Milton eased in.

  She set her tray down and squinted. “Nope. Should I?”

  “I ate here one day back in July. There was another customer eating at the same time, and I thought it was somebody I knew. I asked you about him, remember?”

  “Pffft! I don’t remember most of what happened last week, let alone last July. Now, if y’all plan on eating or ordering something to go, get in that line, like I said.”

  “We ain’t ordering nothing, ma’am. And we’ll be out of here in a minute or two. But if you don’t mind, I need to talk to you about something.” Milton didn’t wait for her to respond. “When I was here in July, I asked you about that tall dark-skinned gentleman with his pretty redbone wife and their three little boys. They was at a table not far from where I was sitting.”

  The waitress smiled, and a goo-goo-eyed look crossed her face. I suspected she was another foolish woman that had been dazzled by Odell’s good looks and charm. She didn’t waste no time getting chatty. “Oh yeah. You mean Odell Watson. Him and his wife, Betty Jean, and their kids come here almost every weekend. Odell always leave me a good tip. A whole quarter.” I almost gagged when I heard how generous he was when it came to food. But when it came to drinks at our house, him and Joyce never tipped more than a nickel. The waitress glanced at me, then back at Milton. “What about him?”

  “Um, nothing. I told my wife that I had seen somebody in here that day that looked just like somebody we know . . . her long-lost cousin we been hunting for, for three years. She didn’t believe me, so I brung her here to see for herself. I thought maybe he’d be here this evening.”

  I’d had no idea Milton could come up with lies so good so fast.

  “Well, this is his favorite restaurant, so he might show up later this evening.”

  “You know him good, huh?” he went on.

  Once the waitress’s mouth started running, she couldn’t stop it. “Yup. I been knowing Odell for over five years. We belong to the same church. Last Easter, Pastor Bradshaw let him make a speech about the importance of family. Poor Odell leaned on that pulpit and boo-hooed like a baby because his wife and kids is the only kin he got left. So he can’t b
e nobody’s long-lost cousin. Thank God his wife got a bunch of kinfolks to help nurture him. His sister-in-law been working here for years. I feel sorry for that sweet man, having to spend so much time alone on the road. See, his job as a traveling salesman keep him away from home quite a bit. What’s your names? I can let him know somebody asked about him.”

  “That’s all right,” Milton threw in. “With a wife and three kids, and him having to travel so much for his work, he got enough on his plate. He don’t need to know that a stranger was asking about him.”

  “Okay. I won’t say nothing to him about it. He is such a wonderful man, I wouldn’t want to do or say nothing to rattle him.” The waitress sighed and kept talking, with her eyes looking even more goo-goo. “I wish I had a man like Odell. He is the best-looking one I ever seen. And he is so devoted to his family. Betty Jean struck gold when she latched onto him. Woo-hoo!”

  I realized now that there was no end to women swooning over Odell. Poor Milton. Up until I found out what Odell was up to, I had been one of them women.

  “Thank you, ma’am. That’s all,” Milton said. “Now we’ll let you get back to work.”

  He grabbed my arm and led me back outside. “See there? You believe me now?” There was a satisfied expression on his face.

  I shook my head and followed him back to the truck. “Odell got these folks believing he is a traveling salesman—and he done joined a church over here. He is so busy visiting with his ‘sick daddy’ two or three days a week, he rarely got time to go to church with Joyce. But he got time to join one with his other woman? Sheesh! If Joyce had even a slight inkling that she got a bona fide fake for a husband, she would have a foaming-at-the-mouth fit! When the shit hit the fan, I hope he get everything he got coming! That—that phony-baloney devil! When I think about how he talked down to us that day we tried to get a ride home from work, my blood sizzles. We might not be sophisticated and well to do like him and Joyce, but other than us doing a little shoplifting and serving recycled drinks, we stay smack-dab on the straight and narrow!”

  Milton patted my shoulder. “Calm down now, sugar. I know you upset about Odell hoodwinking us in such a unholy way. But this is our secret. If it get out, a heap of lives could be ruined—including ours. We can’t even let Willie Frank in on it. Promise me you won’t spill the beans.”