A Good Man (38 page)

Justin smiled. “And that means more sequins.”

“Rhinestones, too,” Gary said.

“And nothing can match,” Justin said.

Tony sighed. “But these boots are great.”

John patted Tony on the back. “And they’ll go so badly with everything we’re going to choose.”

“We were each supposed to accessorize her, right?” Tony asked.

“So we’ll act like we didn’t hear her right,” Justin said. “I get tired of hearing her anyway.”

“Could you at least try to match the boots?” Tony asked. “I mean, we could match this brown …”

Justin towered over Tony. “Dude, we know you like Shani, but come on. We’re a team, remember? We got to stick together on this, and teams stick together no matter how hot the girl is.”

“Yeah, but …” Tony looked at the camera. “America, I just don’t want Shani mad at me, you know?”

“Bro,” Gary said, “no matter what we do, that girl gonna be mad at us. We might as well have some fun with it.”

Tony hugged the boots to his chest. “I’m keeping the boots.”

“Fine,” John said. He held up a sparkly clutch. “Pink okay?”

Justin handed him a floral print clutch. “Looks like my grandma’s couch. Use this one instead.”

John smiled. “Perfect.”

Tony sighed. “Y’all are wrong.”

Justin put his face in the camera lens. “Yep. We’re stinkers.”

Gary laughed. “I’ll go get her some purple leggings.”

“Oh, man,” Tony said, “that dragon of hers is gonna spit fire.”

“Dude,” Justin said, “I would pay good money to see that.”

“And now,” Graham said, “it’s time for the Team to accessorize Shani. Shani, will you come out?”

Sonya led Shani, wearing a blindfold, to a mirror where the wide-screen TV used to be in the great room. Once Shani was in place, the Team took out their accessories and showed them to Sonya.

Sonya had to run down to a couch to cover her face with a couch pillow so she didn’t laugh too loudly.

Graham, however, was not as quiet. “Good God in heaven! What are you doing?”

Sonya put her finger to her lips.

Graham didn’t get the hint. “Oh my goodness!”

“Graham, shut up,” Sonya said. “Um, okay, Team.” She mouthed, “Y’all are wrong,” to John. “Let’s accessorize Shani.”

“Who’s going first?” Shani asked.

“Shani,” Sonya said, “I think it will be fairer if you don’t know.”

And now, John thought, we’re going to decorate Shani as if she were a maypole or a Christmas tree. He, too, put his finger to his lips. He nodded at Justin.

Justin draped several garish, hot pink scarves around Shani’s neck.

“Feels like silk,” Shani said.

I doubt silk costs four ninety-nine. John set the black-and-white checked beanie on her head.

“A hat?” Shani said. “Nice touch.”

Gary wrapped a wide, rhinestone-studded lavender belt around Shani’s waist, clipping the “grandma’s couch” clutch to it.

“All right,” Shani said. “Whoever’s doing this is doing it right.”

Sonya briefly left the room to laugh in the kitchen.

Tony helped Shani into some electric blue leggings and the brown boots.

“Oh, so warm,” Shani said. “And they fit just right.”

Sonya returned in time to see John putting cheap, gaudy silver and gold necklaces and bracelets on Shani, finishing with a half dozen macramé earrings in every color of the rainbow.

John mouthed, “We’re done,” to Sonya, and Sonya dropped her pillow and went over to Shani. “Oh, they’ve done so well, Shani.”

“They?” Shani said.

“I mean,” Sonya said, “he has done so well.” She turned Shani to the mirror. “You can take off your blindfold now.”

Shani removed her blindfold.

I didn’t know a person’s mouth could actually bounce off the floor. I hope they show that in super-slow motion on Monday night.

“Oh, hell no!” Shani screamed. She tore off the hat and earrings. “Y’all didn’t even try!”

Sonya’s smile broke into laughter, and the Team joined in. “But everything matches a white dress, Shani!”

Shani ripped off her belt and scarves. “No dates this week. None.”

Sonya seemed to have recovered, though she was still dabbing at her eyes. “Can we do that?”

Graham’s face turned to stone. “Y’all can do whatever y’all want. You know y’all are dead wrong.”

Shani had removed all but the leggings and the boots. “Y’all need to be punished.” She looked down. “Though these boots are all right.”

“I told you,” Tony whispered to John.

“And as punishment,” Shani said, “we’re all going to go see an art film.”

Sonya put on the black-and-white checked beanie. “That doesn’t sound like punishment.”

“The movie is in Portuguese,” Shani said.

“Portuguese is a beautiful language,” Tony said.

“Suck-up,” Justin whispered.

“And the movie takes place in the world’s largest garbage dump,” Shani said, “where all these accessories should be.”

“Except for the boots?” Tony asked.

Shani smiled. “You get these?”

Tony nodded.

“And yet you let them do this to me?” Shani asked.

Tony winced. “I tried to get them to do it right.”

Shani stalked over to Tony. “Just for that, you have to sit next to me for the entire movie, and you better not fall asleep.”

At the Art Theatre in Long Beach, Sonya, Shani—wearing the white dress and the boots—and the Team watched Waste Land, a documentary about an artist from Brooklyn who went to his native Brazil to the world’s largest garbage dump outside Rio de Janeiro. The artist photographed the catadores, the scavengers in the garbage, who later re-created photographic images of themselves out of the garbage. The artist sold the photographs, and the catadores received the money.

Amazing, John thought. Art from waste. It’s the wrong title, though. It should have been called Saved Land. It may have been a wasteland, but nothing was ever wasted.

They decided to eat greasy pizza at La Rizza’s afterward.

There is something extremely ironic about this, John thought.

Shani, who sat at the head of the table, stood. “I need to test y’all to see if you were paying attention.”

“Why?” Sonya asked.

“This is still part of my challenge, Sonya,” Shani said. “Hush. They embarrassed me. I’m gonna embarrass them. I want to see if they can think. Intelligence is a plus in a man, isn’t it?”

“Of course,” Sonya said.

“Justin,” Shani said, “what did you think of the movie?”

Justin chewed and swallowed. “They were eating what people threw away. Man, that’s horrible.”

“Anything else?” Shani asked.

“I just can’t get those images out of my mind,” Justin said. “Especially because I’m eating now.”

“No exposition of theme?” Shani asked.

Justin looked at John. “Huh?”

Don’t look at me, man, John thought. You’re on your own with this one.

Shani sighed. “Never mind. Tony? Your thoughts?”

Tony smiled at Sonya. “I stopped reading and just enjoyed it. Art from garbage. What a concept.”

“It was amazing, wasn’t it?” Shani said.

“Such beauty from the ashes, you know?” Tony said. “Like a phoenix.”

Shani nodded. “And what about the phoenix, Tony?”

Tony looked at John. “Um, well, there was this bird in one of the Harry Potter movies, see, and—”

“I meant,” Shani interrupted, “the real, mythological phoenix. Any thoughts on that?”

“Um, I don’t … I think …” Tony shook his head. “No more thoughts.”

Shani smiled at Tony anyway. “Nice try. Gary, what did you think?”

Gary shrugged. “I don’t know, um … They were honest people. The movie was honest. It showed the good and the bad but mostly the good and bad about people in a good way.”

Shani blinked. “You mind explaining what you just said?”

Gary nodded. “Yeah. I do.”

“No dichotomies to explore?” Shani said. “No metaphors?”

Gary blinked at John. “None … I could see.”

“Didn’t think so.” Shani turned her attention to John. “Arthur, what about you?”

I guess I’ll just lay it on thick. “I saw the juxtaposition of dignity in the face of despair. Thematically, the film proves that reality can be beautiful, that even filth can be useful on a literal, visceral level in modern society. We can recycle ourselves. We can rise from the garbage, the ashes, the dirt, and the slime and achieve rebirth from what’s been cast away. We are all phoenixes in our primal souls. They say art mirrors life, and sometimes life mirrors art. In this movie, life is art.”

Shani had no further comments and sat, pushing a crust of pizza around her plate.

John smiled at Sonya. That has to mean something. Shani … is silent. And so are the rest of the people at this table. “Who wants the last slice?”

“Yo, Artie,” Justin said. “You deep, man.”

John took the last slice. “I try.”

Sonya rolled her eyes.

And from now on, I have to try harder than my hardest.

While Sonya tried to digest her pizza later that evening, Kim surfed the Internet.

“Geez, these people have too much time on their hands,” Kim said.

“What people?” Sonya asked.

“The online people,” Kim said.

“I’m an online people.”

“Not like this,” Kim said. “You surf. These people submerge.”

Sonya lay on Kim’s mattress. “What are they up to?”

“They’ve been analyzing the order you’ve ‘saved’ them during the last four eliminations,” Kim said. “Gary and Justin are either first or second one hundred percent of the time. Tony is usually third, and Johnny Boy is always last.”

Always? “Maybe I’m saving the best for last.”

Kim coughed. “Yeah, right. Listen to what they’re saying. ‘She should do it alphabetically so Arthur doesn’t have to stand there fidgeting so long.’”

He’s not fidgeting. His old knees are just getting tired.

“‘I feel sorry for Arthur cuz she’s just stringing him along.’” Kim looked at Sonya. “Are you just stringing him along?”

“There’s nothing further from the truth,” Sonya said.

Kim returned to the screen. “‘I hold my breath every show, and when she keeps everybody, I breathe a sigh of relief.’ That’s what I’m talking about, Sonya. There are people out there who are practically living this show.”

“But isn’t that a positive thing to say?”

Kim clicked over to another Web site. “But the critics are starting to turn against you. ‘People only watch to see if she keeps people, not dumps people.’”

“So? At least they’re watching.”

“‘While it’s somewhat interesting that no one wins or loses and that Jazz refuses to break ties,’” Kim read, “‘it’s been two months of the status quo—something has to give.’”

Has it been two months? It has. But I like the status quo. It’s … comfortable.

“Listen to this one,” Kim said. “‘Jazz has turned into TV’s ultimate tease, and the whole show has become a tease.’”

“I am not a tease.” Am I?

“Yeah, you are,” Kim said. “Here’s another: ‘Yes, they’ve all become friends, and that’s a beautiful thing, but the point of the show is for her to make decisions and she’s only choosing not to decide.’”

Am I doing that? I’m making decisions. I choose for them to remain, right?

“Oh, this one is harsh,” Kim said. “‘They should rename the show Hunk because she refuses to see the punks on the show.’”

That was harsh and totally inaccurate. None of my men are punks. “Any more?”

“‘Hunk or Punk is quickly becoming a real-life Friends episode that never ends.’”

“That’s not so bad,” Sonya said.

“Oh, here are some more favorable ones,” Kim said. “‘It’s like chilling with some friends every Monday night and it shows black men can be friends with women and not be all about the drawers.’”

“Amen,” Sonya said.

“‘There’s something magical about the whole thing, something genuine, something real,’” Kim read. “‘Even the laughter is real.’”

Now they’re talking. “Keep reading.”

“‘The Team respects her so much, and she respects them even more.’”

And they deserve my respect.

“Oh,” Kim said. “Here’s one about me. ‘Shani is a trip! She should get her own TV show.’” She giggled. “I have some fans.”

And I’m your biggest fan.

Kim clicked on a few keys. “Why do you always choose John last?”

I honestly didn’t know I did that. Hmm. “Maybe because I know he can handle the pressure, the wait, the anxiety of waiting.”

“Or maybe he’s an afterthought, like, oh, yeah, the white guy. Come on down.”

Does it look that way? “That’s not it.”

“Oh, the Nielsen ratings are in,” Kim said.

Whee. “What did the preselected American TV families watch last week?”

“We came in second.” Kim bit her lip. “Second, Sonya.”

“Okay.” That’s still crazy good according to Larry.

“Except for football games, which don’t count in my mind, we’ve been first for nine straight weeks,” Kim said. “We’re slipping.”

I am not going to get caught up in this hoopla. “What beat us?”

Kim nodded. “It’s not so bad. We came in second to This Is It. Every time Michael Jackson comes on, the world still stops.”

“Being second to the King of Pop isn’t all that bad, is it?” Sonya asked.

“No, I suppose not, but it wasn’t the first time it was on network TV,” Kim said.

“The numbers were still good, right?”

Kim nodded. “They actually went up a few hundred thousand, but NCIS is creeping up on us.”

“We’re fine,” Sonya said. “And when NCIS becomes a series of reruns, we’ll be back on top.”

“Yeah, but …” Kim sighed. “The show is getting stale, Sonya. You really should let go of somebody soon.”

“What do you mean, let go?” Sonya asked.

“You’re holding on to all of them,” Kim said. “Drop somebody. It’s getting boring.”

“No, it isn’t.” Not for me! “More people are tuning in to watch every week. Larry told me our numbers haven’t begun to plateau yet.”

“But the reviews are starting to turn against you,” Kim said.

I didn’t hear that many negative reviews. “Those reviewers are reviewing reality, and they’re not used to reviewing reality. They’re used to reviewing fantasy, and what we’re giving them makes them think too much. Reviewers don’t want to think. Critics don’t want to think. They just want to make snide remarks and criticize and sound important and use big words. I’m not going to give them fantasy so they can gush, ‘It was so magical how they manipulated that scene to be romantic.’”