All About Eva (21 page)

Jake's Country & Western Bar & Grill? We shut it
down.
It was after one in the morning when Vance and I left the bar, and even though we had been given directions on how to get back to Chicago, both of us had been drinking, so it would have been foolish to even try to make it back at that late hour.

Our options for lodging for the night were to either sleep in the car or rough it at the seedy motel up the street.

John, the group representative who had so menacingly approached our table earlier in the evening, turned out to be a big ol' teddy bear, who was as sweet as cotton candy. He saw our dilemma and graciously offered to escort me and Vance to his family's bed-and-breakfast a few miles up the road.

“Thank you, John, how sweet!” I said, sorry that I had completely misjudged him. He was, however, operating under the assumption that I was Whitney Houston, so I'll never know if he would have extended the offer if he had viewed me as just a regular black chick.

Whatever the case, Vance and I had a place to lay our heads for the night, and when we pulled up to the B&B, I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was a large two-story, eighteenth-century, plantation-style mansion that looked like something straight out of
Gone With the Wind
. It was stark white with black shutters, and two humongous columns framed the front porch that was about half a block long.

It felt as if we had stepped back in time, and I half expected to see Mammy come running out of the house, shouting that she needed help birthing a baby.

“Welcome, welcome, what a wonderful couple!” said John's mother, a sweet little old woman whose hair was as white as snow.

She introduced herself as Edna and showed us to our room, which was spacious enough to have its own bathroom, a fireplace, and one king-sized bed.

“Maybe we should have fessed up and told Edna that we're not a couple,” Vance said in regards to there being only one bed.

“Sucks for you,” I said jokingly, “but I have heard that sleeping on the floor is very beneficial for the back.”

“Oh, well, cool! Then you shouldn't have any problem making yourself comfortable.”

Vance and I gave each other the side eye, and then raced to the bed. He was clearly going to beat me, so I jumped on his back, which sent us both tumbling to the floor. I reached over and tagged the bed, claiming it for the night. I lay on the floor laughing, giddy from lack of sleep and too much of the suds. Vance cried foul. “You are such a cheater!” he said. “And you made me bang my knee up pretty bad.”

“Let me see,” I said, scooting over to him. When I got closer, he took my face in his hands and kissed me on the mouth. With tongue. I kept my eyes open the whole time, shocked that he was being so bold, and that the kiss was so damn good. It was electrifying.

With nothing in my head except the passion of the moment, Vance and I continued to kiss as we undressed each other. Once we were both completely naked, Vance slipped on a magnum-sized condom, and then he laid me back on the bed where he entered me with both tenderness and concentrated passion.

Our bodies moved together in a slow rhythmic grind, and fit together perfectly, as if we had been made just for each other.

We made fast, passionate love, then showered together, and lay in each other's arms, talking until the sun came up.

“You know what this means, don't you?” Vance asked, lightly caressing my back with his fingertips.

“No, what?”

“You have to come back to New York. I need you, and I want you in my life.”

I sighed. “Vance, don't do this to me.” I had already made up my mind to move back to Chicago for the good of my family, and while I liked him a lot, one session of amazing sex was not enough to sway me. At least it shouldn't have been.

“I know you think you don't have much to come back to, but how about this: Since Sonya is about to go out for a couple of months on maternity leave, you can take her place at my law firm, and when she comes back, I'll make you my personal assistant,” Vance said.

“And where would I live?”

“As far as living arrangements, you can either live with me or I'll set you up in an apartment, it's your choice.”

“Whoa, slow down, kemosabe! I mean, shouldn't we ease into this?”

“It's not as if we haven't already been living together. The only thing that will be different is that we'll be romantically involved. I mean, that is what you want, isn't it?”

I looked up at Vance, touched by how much he seemed to care for me. Not only was he handsome and sexy, he was also refreshingly sweet, an excellent father, and a good person all around.

“Of course I want to be with you,” I said, ignoring the twinge of guilt I felt for leaving one man, no matter what the circumstances, and moving on to his lawyer.

Technically, me becoming Vance's woman was not a moral or ethnical issue, but it was a move that I had never made before, and it would take some getting used to. Vance and Donovan may not have been the best of friends, but they did have an attorney/client business relationship, and if I didn't already have enough to overcome socially, a romantic relationship with my ex-man's lawyer would really send those wagging tongues into overdrive.

But I have never cared one iota about what anyone thought about me, or my personal business, and I wasn't about to start now.

“I tell ya, it does my heart good, to see young people in love!” Edna beamed, as she served Vance and me a breakfast of strong, freshly brewed coffee, corned beef hash, and biscuits and white gravy.

I wouldn't say that I was
in
love at that moment, but during the time I had lived with Vance I had come to care for both him and his daughter very deeply, and I could certainly see where our relationship had the potential to blossom into a great love affair.

Why is it that the trip back is always much shorter than the trip you took to get there? Vance and I left the bed-and-breakfast, and the small town Ms. Edna said was named Clarksville, early that morning. It took us less than an hour to get back to Chicago.

Vance pulled up in front of Mama Nita's house and wanted to come in and meet my family.

“Some other time,” I smiled, thinking it was best not to scare the man off so soon.

We shared a long kiss good-bye before I got out of the car. His flight to California was later that afternoon, and after taking care of business in California, he planned to head straight to Washington, DC, for the inauguration.

“So, how soon will I see you back in New York?” Vance asked.

“Give me a couple of weeks, all right?”

“Okay, I'm going to hold you to that,” Vance said, “and if you're not back by then, I am going to personally come back and get you myself—caveman style!”

He was so sweet; I wished I could eat him with a spoon. “Okay,” I said, “but just don't club me over the head, and we're cool!”

I used my old key to let myself in the house, and froze in my tracks when I heard exuberant singing coming from the kitchen. “Jesus on the main line, tell him what you want . . . Jesus on the main line, tell him what you want . . . Jesus on the main line, tell him what you want . . . Call him up, and tell him what you want!”

It was Mama Nita.

I ran into the kitchen and found my grandmother at the stove cooking, while Rosalyn, her new nurse, stood by.

“Cast all of your worries and care on Him, because he cares for you!” Mama Nita preached to Rosalyn.

“Amen, Ms. Cantrell,” said Rosalyn, “Amen!”

“Grandma?” I said cautiously, unable to believe my eyes, or my ears. Mama Nita turned around, and her eyes lit up when she saw me.

“Eva! Gwen told me you were in town. Girl, you better get over here and give me some sugar!” It was a miracle. I rushed over and hugged her tight, tears gushed from my eyes.

Mama Nita stepped back to get a good look at me. “I swear, you always were a dramatic little thing,” she said, wiping my tears. “Why are you crying?”

“I'm just happy, that's all,” I said, to which Rosalyn nodded and gave me a wink. “So what are you up to in here?”

“Me and my friend Rosalyn here are just making a little brunch. You still like smoked ham and waffles, don't you?”

She remembered!

“Yes, ma'am,” I said, reaching to break off a tiny piece of ham, only to have Mama Nita playfully smack my hand away. “Not until we say grace. You know better than that,” she said. “By the way, you're glowing. Did you have a big night last night?”

I cringed, totally unwilling to talk to my grandmother about the fact that I had just gotten my boots knocked. “A wise woman used to always tell me never to kiss and tell,” l said.

“Glad to see that you were paying attention,” Mama Nita said. “Was it that Jayson Cooper?”

My mouth hit the floor. Not only was she lucid, but she remembered minute details like Jayson Cooper, my first love.

“Why won't anybody let me live him down?” I asked, incredulous.

“Because you loved that little slew-footed boy to death! All you would talk about was ‘Jayson' this and ‘Jayson' that.”

“Grandma, it's been over five years since I've even laid eyes on Jayson. I think it's safe to say that we can all let that go now.”

“Here are the eggs, Mom,” Gwen said as she walked in the kitchen with a bag of groceries.

“What did you have to do, go lay them yourself?” Mama Nita asked.

“I wasn't gone that long,” Gwen said.

“Now, you know that's a bold-faced lie. You were gone for almost an hour!” Mama Nita said, then grabbed the carton of eggs and got busy scrambling them.

Gwen and I looked at each other and smiled. Mama Nita, our rock, was back to her old self. Praise God!

 

 

Doctor Butler credited the new “cocktail” of medications that he had prescribed for Mama Nita's awakening, although he warned that it would not last. “Once her brain becomes accustomed to the new medicine, the Alzheimer's will continue to progress, but hopefully not as rapidly as before.”

With what felt like a time bomb ticking in the background, we all literally fought to spend one-on-one time with Mama Nita.

I washed and conditioned her hair, greased her scalp, then braided her hair in plaits.

On the days that it was warm enough, we took walks around the neighborhood, and the neighbors marveled that Mama Nita seemed to be doing okay. I slept in her bed with her every night, and told her all about Donovan and the Ponzi scheme and everything that had happened to me as a result.

“I'm gonna tell you like I told your mama when she came home pregnant with Pam at sixteen: It's not what happens to you in life, so much as how you react to what happens to you. Like those announcers used to say on TV, ‘This is a test. This is only a test.' Excuse the expression, but shit happens! It's not the end of the world, though. The key is to pick yourself back up, get your independence, and stay that way. No matter how much a man has, at the end of the day it is his. Get yours, and if he is not supportive of that, then honey, he ain't the one!”

 

 

On January 20th, we made a huge pot of Mama Nita's infamous seafood gumbo and, as a family, watched as Barack H. Obama was sworn in as our nation's forty-fourth president. The mood in the house was celebratory, and the day was very emotional for all of us, as we stayed glued to the television from early that morning until early the next morning.

Visitors came and went exchanging hugs and stories of just how far black people had come.

My grandmother was sixty-seven years old, so of course a black president held a special significance for her. She was born and raised in rural Louisiana at a time when racism was not only blatant, it was a way of life.

There were so many limitations on what black people could have, and do, and be that most working-class black families, and especially those in the South, didn't see the value of keeping their kids in school when they were old enough to get out and work to help support the family.

Mama Nita was forced to drop out of school in the eighth grade, but she was still smart enough to know that education would be the saving grace of her descendants. She took me to get my first library card, and explained to me that everything I ever wanted to know was right within those walls.

It wasn't from lack of trying, but ultimately I was the first college graduate in the family, and I can still see her face on graduation day as she stood in the bleachers dancing a jig and openly praising God.

Mama Nita had been active in politics before her Alzheimer's diagnosis, and had even campaigned for Obama when he ran for a seat in the Senate.

The inauguration was a full-circle moment, and watching my grandmother be able to fully bear witness to the occasion was a gift that I will treasure for the rest of my life.

That was a good day.

A few days later, Mama Nita went silent again. It was gradual, starting with forgetfulness and the inability to put the right names to the right faces, a temperamental outburst here and there, and then complete silence.

Heartwrenching? That's not strong enough to describe my sense of loss and bewilderment.

Almost two weeks after Vance left Chicago, he called me on my little pay-as-you-go cell phone one evening, and said, “They got him.” I didn't know who the “they” was, but I knew he was referring to Donovan.

“How?” I asked. “When, where?”

“A few days ago, at New York-Presbyterian Hospital.”

“What—I mean, why the hospital of all places?”

“Well, I don't know all the details just yet, but apparently he was visiting his grandfather who recently had a heart attack. Someone tipped off the authorities, but he gave them an alias, and even a fake ID. They arrested Donovan anyway, and it's taken them this long to positively identify him.”

“Wow! So he's been in New York this whole time?”

“It's unlikely, but like I said, I don't have all the details yet,” said Vance, “but I need for you to get here as soon as you can. Donovan refuses to talk to anyone until he talks to you first.”

My plans to move back to Chicago had been short-lived, which was why I was so glad that I hadn't formally announced my plans to move back to town. Pam and Gwen were both extremely understanding and encouraged me to go back to New York and do whatever was necessary to put the situation behind me once and for all.

“We're not going anywhere. We'll be here just like we've always been,” Gwen said when she dropped me off at the airport the next morning. I kissed everyone good-bye, and it was wheels up, back to New York City, where I went straight from JFK Airport to the Metropolitan Correctional Center in lower Manhattan where Donovan was being held.

As Donovan's attorney, Vance was there waiting for me in the lobby. He looked excited to see me, and kissed me on the lips with no hesitation. “Are you ready?” he asked.

My heart beat fast and pounded in my ears at the thought of seeing Donovan face-to-face after all the unnecessary hell he had put me through.

He had some explaining to do, but then again, so did I. “Does he know about us?” I asked.

“No. I spoke to Donovan briefly on the phone last night and it was only long enough for him to say he wanted to see you.”

“Well, I would like to talk to him alone if you don't mind,” I said, knowing that just seeing Vance and me sitting next to each other would tell him everything. Of course, he would have to eventually be told that Vance and I were pursuing a relationship, but first things first. I needed to know the five W's and the H of the whole situation.

I had never visited anyone in jail before, but the way they did things around there made me feel as though I were the criminal trying to break
into
the damned place.

First, I had to leave my luggage with the front lobby officer, and then show a valid photo ID. I put my purse on a conveyor belt to be searched electronically, then walked through a metal detector, which beeped when I went through it, so I was then pat searched by a pervy corrections officer who seemed to be getting off on feeling me up between my legs and across my breast. It was intrusive and demeaning, and I fully understood why Diana Ross went ballistic that time at London's Heathrow Airport.
Respectmypersonalspace.com!

After all of that, it was determined that my underwire bra was causing the problem, and I was finally allowed entry into the lobby. Whew! I mean, really? But that was only just the beginning. I then had to fill out an application and information form, and give written consent for a background check to be performed on me, all of which had to be approved by the Bureau of Prisons before I was actually permitted to visit with Donovan. It took a couple of hours to get the go-ahead, but eventually I was escorted in a visitors' room where several inmates were visiting with their families, including teenagers and young children.

I couldn't understand that for the life of me. In my opinion, no kid should be exposed to jail in any way, shape, or form. Hell, I was traumatized just being there, so there was no telling how damaging the experience was to a child's psyche. As requested, Vance respected my wishes and waited outside in the lobby.

When the corrections officer brought Donovan in the room, I gasped so loudly that it echoed throughout the room. I barely recognized him.

“Hey, babe,” he said shyly, and smiled.

Well, at least he still had those pretty white teeth.

As for the rest of him, he had lost about twenty pounds off of an already-slender frame, his hair had grown into a wild, bushy afro, and he had a full, nappy-ass beard caked with only God knows what.

And he stunk.

“I know you were on the run and everything, but didn't they have soap and water where you were?”

“Bad things go on in here, Eva,” Donovan said in a hushed, paranoid voice. “And if these sick bastards think they're gonna take my manhood, they're gonna get some of the . . .

He looked like Pig-Pen and smelled like Pepe le Pew, but even on lockdown, Donovan had thought of everything. Even down to the best way to thwart a physical attack, which was sad, but it was his new reality. Not only did he plan
not
to drop the soap, he didn't even plan to use it. “Oh, believe me, it's gonna be a fight to the death, but if I lose, they're gonna get some of the foulest, shittiest, and most disgusting ass they'll ever have in their life.”

“So you're gonna walk around looking like that and smelling like bullshit the whole time you're in here?”

“It sure as hell ain't pleasant, but hey, if that keeps the rapists off me, then so be it,” said Donovan. “I have to do whatever it takes to survive in here.”

“And how did it even come to this, Donovan? I mean, weren't you making enough money of your own?”

“It just got out of control,” Donovan said, looking remorseful, “and there's really no excuse for it, but you have all these people coming at you wanting to invest a minimum of half a million dollars each. You start seeing other guys in your field and how they roll, I mean the real big billionaire tycoons, and you wanna roll like that too. But you don't have the billion dollars a year salary yet, so you slowly start spending money that is not yours in order to keep up with appearances.

“You know, it takes money to make money, and you gotta look the part to get the part, and all that. And one day you look up and you've spent more money than you intended to, and all of a sudden a client wants to cash out for more than you can give him, and that's when, slowly but surely, that house of cards begins to fall.”

Even his explanation for leaving me in Switzerland was plausible—sort of. “It was wrong and so fucking selfish to take you on the run with me in the first place. I wanted to tell you so badly what was going on, but I figured the less you knew, the less it would appear that you were in cahoots with all this.”

“Well, damn, couldn't you have at least left me enough money to get back home?” I asked.

“I needed for you to be angry with me,” he said. “I know you, Eva, and you're a terrible liar. If I had made things comfortable for you, and left you on good terms, you just might be sitting in a jail cell of your own right now.”

At that moment, I saw a glimmer of the old Donovan.

I thought I would be angry and curse him out, but hearing how scared and vulnerable he sounded made my heart melt. I no longer wanted to rip him a new asshole like everybody else. I wanted to take care of him, and protect him.

“So where have you been?” I asked, genuinely concerned.

“Oh, here, there, and everywhere,” he said wistfully. “Morocco mostly, then I made the mistake of calling Mother to check on things, and she told me about Gramps having a heart attack and all.... I knew they would probably catch me, but I had to come back and see him. I didn't want him to die thinking that his grandson was a coward.”

“I'm sorry to hear about your grandfather. Is he going to be all right?”

Tears came to Donovan's eyes and he was silent for a couple of minutes. Just as he knew I was a terrible liar, I could tell he was willing himself not to cry.

“Yeah, they say he's going to pull through, but the stress I caused, and the shame I brought to the family name, is something—” Donovan sighed heavily, indicating that he didn't want to continue discussing the matter. “But on a lighter note,” he said, “how is Flossie?”

I raised an eyebrow. The only “Flossie” either of us knew was the stuffed gray elephant that he had won for me at Coney Island years ago, and was one of the few things that Donovan's bitch of a mother hadn't tossed out or stolen for herself.

“Flossie's doing just fine. . . .” I said, playing along.

“Good, that's
real good!
” Donovan's eyes were bulging and shining. “Tell her I said hello, and that I hope to see her real soon.”

Right, right . . .
I nodded like I understood, even though I was confused as hell. Either he had left his mind in Morocco or it was a low-key way of trying to tell me something.

“I will definitely do that,” I said, trying to put the pieces together. Donovan and I stared at each other, hoping to somehow communicate telepathically, but since neither of us were mind readers, it was useless.