Cover Girls (20 page)

“I never defy you, Delores. I love you. I want to make you happy. I have loved you since the moment I saw you. I love your strength.” He cleared his throat. “And I can’t imagine living my life without you.” Carl paused, looked at his right hand lying flat on the table. “But I feel strongly about this.”

He looked into her eyes. “I’m prepared to take Claudia and live with her alone.” He looked around the room. “I don’t know where we would go.” His voice pleaded. “I don’t know where we would live or how. I can’t imagine . . . But I feel it’s that important.”

Delores didn’t respond right away. She was angry with Claudia for ruining their lives. For taking away the one person in her life that she could always count on. She was angry with Claudia for forcing her to break Carl’s heart.

“Maybe you’re right, Carl. Maybe our reputations aren’t that important. But while you’re saying this, there’s something you don’t know. There’s something I haven’t told you. Something I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want to hurt you. I’m not the bad guy in all of this. I didn’t get Claudia pregnant, remember that. I’m just the one who has to take care of the mess.

“I don’t want to tell you now, Carl. So, please, let this go. Just let it go. It’s painful now, but we’ll all get over it. Trust me. You love me? Then trust me. Let’s just put this nastiness behind us and move on, Carl. I don’t want to make it any worse.”

Carl looked down and then into her eyes. “I can’t budge on this, Delores. I want to—I tried for weeks now to convince myself. I’m not really sure why, but I can’t move.”

Delores pulled a knife in what had, up until now, been a civilized fistfight. She got up from the table. Carl called out behind her, “Delores, wait.”

She walked to the foot of the stairs and yelled for Claudia. Her granddaughter appeared at the top of the steps. “Come down here.” As Claudia walked down the stairs, Delores could see her life, her marriage, and her happiness tumble down the stairs ahead of the girl.

She steered Claudia into the room where her grandfather sat. Claudia stood at the head of the long table, while Delores returned to her seat across from Carl. She looked at her husband. “There’s still time to stop this, Carl. We can just do what needs to be done. We don’t have to finish this. Let’s just let it be done.”

Carl shook his head. “We have to do the right thing.”

Delores took a deep breath. She had always been the one willing to do the hard thing. “Claudia, tell your grandfather.”

The girl looked tiny standing at the end of the table. Her smile was gone. It had been gone for weeks. She was pale, which made her hair even more stark against her skin. Her eyes looked almost hopeless. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Claudia had stopped calling her
Grandmama.
Now she just avoided her. Now she was just a ghost.

“I want you to tell your grandfather what you told me.”

Claudia said nothing.

“He needs to know. I know I told you to never tell, but your grandfather needs to know.” Delores reached for a magazine that was lying on the table near to her. She flipped it open for effect. She pretended to browse a few pages. Then she turned back to her granddaughter and lowered her voice. “Tell him, Claudia. Now. Tell him about the father.”

She didn’t want to hurt Carl, but he was bringing the pain on himself. He wouldn’t submit. The news about Carl Jr. would be the final blow. It would wrench his heart apart like it had hers. It would knock the wind out of his lungs, just as it had done her. The news would flood his eyes with tears and render him speechless, just as it had her. The news about Carl Jr. would lay her husband out flat on his back, just as it had done to her. Only she was certain Carl wouldn’t be able to get back up.

Carl shook his head. “You don’t have to do this, Claudia.” He shook his head at Delores. She could see it in his eyes. He knew it was something he didn’t want to know. It was something that might kill him—the blow that she was striking might be fatal. “Don’t do this, Delores.”

It was too late. She had pleaded with him before. It was too late now. “Tell him, Claudia.”

Carl looked at his granddaughter. “You don’t have to tell me.” His voice was tender. “It doesn’t matter who the boy is—what he is. We’ll deal with it. You can go back to your room. You don’t have to tell me.”

She loved him. She didn’t want to have to hurt him. She had tried to warn him . . .

She looked at Claudia. Her granddaughter’s eyes were begging. “Tell him, Claudia. Tell him now.”

Claudia began to cry. “I’m sorry, Grandfather. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t tell me, Claudia.” Carl began to cry, too. “Don’t tell me.”

“Tell him, Claudia. He deserves it. He’s trying to protect you and he needs to know.”

“I’m sorry, Grandfather. I’m sorry.” Claudia looked to Delores for clemency, to be spared striking the fatal blow.

“Tell him!”

I’m sorry.
Claudia mouthed the words as her face wrinkled in pain. “My uncle,” she said. “My uncle is the father.”

I’m sorry,
she mouthed again. Her young body crumpled to the floor.

“What do you mean?” Carl choked out a laugh and looked at Delores. “What does she mean?”

She was through crying—she had to protect herself, right now. She had to preserve their way of life. “Her uncle. She’s talking about your son.” Delores delivered the information like a cobra strike.

Carl clapped both of his hands to his face. His shoulders convulsed and a wail shook his body. He writhed in agony. Delores could almost feel the pain of the strike and the venom moving through her husband’s veins. She looked down at Claudia, who lay transfixed on the floor, watching her grandfather with misery in her eyes. Delores felt like ice.

After a moment that seemed like years, Carl slowly lowered his hands and removed his pipe. He looked on the table for something—maybe a handkerchief, tissue, or a napkin. He first wiped his face with his hands, and then yanked them through his thinning hair. He began to cry again. He turned his head and gave Claudia a feeble smile.

“It’s all right, darling. Don’t worry. It’s going to be all right.”

Claudia broke down then, weeping silently with her face pressed to the floor. Carl tried several times to control his sobbing. He slumped forward and then straightened himself again.

Delores would not let herself feel. She was numb inside.

Carl sighed as though he had aged a hundred years. “Go up to your room. It’s going to be all right.” His face was pink and his hair was disheveled. “Claudia, it’s going to be all right.”

No matter what happens, I’m going to be all right.
Delores squared her shoulders and straightened her back. She sat and waited for the end.

Part Four

Spring-Miz Ida

Chapter Twenty-eight

M
iz Ida danced around her kitchen with a jar full of water—a quart-sized mayonnaise jar with no label—in her hand. She sang along with John P. Kee, “I believe.” She shook her head and her hips. No one was watching, so she moved every body part she could. It was her way of thanking the Lord for the activity of her limbs. She even tried to cut a few new hip-hop steps—what she could do without wasting the water. Every foot or so, she stopped to water a plant. More accurately, she incorporated the watering into her dancing.

No one at church knew it—because church people don’t have to know all her business—but when the Spirit hit her, Miz Ida could still kick her right leg up over her head. She danced and waved her free hand over her head. It didn’t matter what things looked like; she knew that God was moving.

Miz Ida planted lots of seeds and her kitchen was full of lots of plants. It wasn’t the season, but the plants didn’t seem to know it. Nothing withered and blooms showed up everywhere. Miz Ida broke into a praise step.

She was a firm believer that everyone needed a little time alone to dance and praise the Lord. ’Course, she left room for those who weren’t as spry as she was. Miz Ida was willing to agree to disagree.

There wasn’t much for an ordinary person to shout about in her old kitchen. The walls and even the refrigerator were old and yellowed. The tile on the floor had cracked. There were only two good eyes that still worked on the stove. Most folks would have said the things in the kitchen didn’t have much use anymore. Of course, many folks would have said the same thing about Miz Ida. But Miz Ida wasn’t ready to give up on the kitchen and she wasn’t ready to give up on herself.

She kept the kitchen clean, but try as hard as she could, every once in a while a roach passed through. She always let each one know not to unpack its bags—it didn’t pay rent, it wasn’t welcome, and she wasn’t fixing it anything to eat. Still, sometimes the six-legged trespassers tried to test her resolve. The bugs were always sorry because Miz Ida had a little something deadly waiting for them.

But she just wasn’t willing to let any of it get her down.
Hallelujah anyhow!
She hoofed around and imagined that she was singing in a gospel video. She moved from side to side and shook her head.

Someone looking in her window—which was of course impossible because her kitchen window and apartment were so many stories up from the ground that someone would have to be a giant, or Tom Cruise hanging from a wire, to see in—would have thought Miz Ida was crazy. But that’s what she did, that’s what kept her fueled when other people said she should slow down—crazy praise.

People who didn’t know her would have thought she was two or three bricks shy of a full load. But people who knew Miz Ida knew she believed that spring was liable to break out any time and all over. Once it broke out one place, it just seemed to spread. Miz Ida believed that just because someone said it was winter that didn’t mean that the sun couldn’t shine and things couldn’t grow.

Miz Ida was a fountain of hope. That, a lot of prayer, a good measure of faith, and a lot of love, she believed, was why her kitchen was always green. In Miz Ida’s kitchen it was always spring.

She watered one more plant and stopped to pray. “Lord, You and me been at this a long time. We’ve seen sinners turned into saints, sick bodies healed, and broken hearts mended. And You know I’m glad about it. Lord, I’m old, but I know You can still use me. It’s good to be on the Lord’s side.

“You said, Lord, if I would delight in Your law—in Your word—and if I would think about You day and night, You would do something special for me. Well, Lord, You know Ida thinks about You all the time.” She laughed to herself. “Some people might get sick of someone calling on them as much as I call on You. I’m glad You ain’t like people. Lord, I love Your word and I can’t get it off my mind or out of my heart. ’Course I wouldn’t try it if I could.

“So, Lord, do what You promised. I’m calling on the favor that You have give me. There so many people all over who just need a new day! They’re tired and worn out. They’re sick of just being sick of themselves. They been hanging on waiting for a change to come. Lord, let this be the beginning of a new day. Let this be the day when the seeds they have planted come into their season and bear good fruit. And make their lives like my kitchen, Lord. Even when it’s winter, let it always be green.”

Miz Ida knew something that Sarah, the wife of Abraham, had known: The winter of a woman’s life isn’t a time for sadness and despair. The winter of a woman’s life is a time to rejoice. Miz Ida knew that winter was the time of miracles, that twice it was mentioned in the Bible that Sarah laughed. The first time, Sarah laughed at God. The second time, in the winter of her life, Sarah laughed with God. The first time she laughed at the impossibility of God’s promise to give her, a barren woman, a child. The second time she laughed because she learned that God is faithful and even in winter He keeps His promises.
¹⁰

People forget, when they complain about winter being cold and lonely, that Christmas comes as a signal of the new day. People forget, when they’re counting all the ways that winter gets on their nerves, that winter ushers in a brand-spanking New Year. People forget that it’s winter’s right to always introduce the spring.

So, Miz Ida laughed with winter. She enjoyed her winter years because winter was just spring painted frosty white. God gave new life, even in the winter years. “Lord, I just get tickled seeing You break out all over. Do Your thing, Lord. Show off if You want to, Jesus, You know Miz Ida ain’t mad at You. Show off, Lord, and let us see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”

The old woman danced, sang, laughed, and watered until the doorbell rang. She stopped and peeked in the mirror, just to make sure she was presentable, on her way to the door. She squinted and looked through the peephole. It was Michelle.

“How are you, baby?” She wrapped the girl—the woman—in a great big hug. There was a time when she’d had to bend to embrace Michelle. Now Michelle was bending to hold her. It was funny how the seasons and the times changed.

“Now you come on in here.” She took Michelle’s hand. “Ain’t nothing like a visit from a real good friend.”

They sat on the couch and Miz Ida caught hold of her hand. “Honey, I was just thinking the other day. Remember when you and me used to play Uno? I remember the first time you told me about that game, I thought you had lost your little mind.” She was bubbling over, just happy to talk to her young friend, until she realized they weren’t conversing. She was talking, but Michelle was having nothing to say.

“Cat got your tongue?” She nudged Michelle playfully, but the younger woman had nothing to say—she barely smiled. “What’s wrong, Michelle? You know you can tell me.”

Michelle stood and walked to a window. She looked outside for several minutes and then turned back to Miz Ida. “Either everything is getting better, or else everything is falling apart, Miz Ida, and I can’t figure which one it is. What it feels like is everything is falling apart.”

Miz Ida patted the couch. “Come and tell me about it, baby.”

Michelle plopped down beside her. She pointed to her face. “I guess you can’t see my eye anymore. Trench walloped me good, Miz Ida. And I thought it was good enough to end it. It was good enough for me to see what you’ve been trying to say to me all along, that I’m following in my mother’s footsteps. Like I’ve just brought to life the same man to do the same thing to me that was done before. I see it, and I thought it was over. I’m a smart woman and I know better.”