Everybody Say Amen (3 page)

R
achel paced back and forth across the living room of the massive six-thousand-square-foot house she’d called home for the last three months. She paused, glancing out the window at a car slowly making its way down her dead-end street. People were always coming into her gated community in Southwest Houston, gawking at the beautiful custom-built brick homes. It got on her nerves, especially right now. She chalked her irritation up to the fact that she was just angry right now and snapped back to her phone conversation.

“I’m telling you, Bobby, you need to get this boy under control before I have to hurt him!” She was squeezing the cordless phone so tightly against her ear, she thought she’d crack it.

Her son was locked in his bedroom upstairs. Rachel hated calling on Bobby, but it was obvious she and Lester couldn’t get through to Jordan’s little bad behind.

“What do you want me to do, Rachel?” Bobby sounded exasperated, which was unusual because he always took an active interest in what was going on with Jordan.

“What do you mean, what do I want you to do? Be his daddy!”

“Every time I try, you won’t let me. Need I remind you that just last month you told me, ‘Lester’s his daddy now.’ ”

Rachel sighed. She remembered that horrible conversation. As much as she tried to walk the straight and narrow, Bobby had a way of bringing out the ignorant side in her. Her best friend, Twyla, said it was because she was still in love with him. Rachel wouldn’t even entertain that idea—it had taken her too long to get over Bobby. She definitely wasn’t trying to backtrack.

“I apologized for that. You know I have no problem with you seeing Jordan.”

“Yeah, when you feel like it. Even though we have joint custody, I can’t ever get him until you say so.”

“I’m just looking out for Jordan’s best interests. You know how stupid your wife can get.”

It was Bobby’s turn to sigh. “Please don’t start.”

“Where is Mrs. Shante anyway? In the kitchen getting something to eat?” Like her sister, Shante was heavyset and Rachel had always taken pleasure in pointing that out even though she’d heard Shante had lost some weight.

Bobby hesitated. “Spoken like a true first lady, Rachel.”

Rachel squeezed her eyes closed. Dangit, there she went again. She and Shante had history, from the time Rachel had tried to cut her with a five-inch blade to the time they’d gotten into a fight—on Shante and Bobby’s wedding day. It had been nothing but bad blood between the two of them. That was a part of her life Rachel didn’t care to revisit.

“Bobby, I’m sorry, that was uncalled for.”

He let out a laugh. “Wow, I never thought I would live to see the day when Rachel Jackson apologized two times in one conversation.”

A small smile crept up on Rachel’s face. “Technically, that first time wasn’t an apology. I was telling you I had apologized the
other
time.”

“Two apologies in one lifetime is more than I ever thought I’d get.” They both laughed at that. After the laughter died down a silence hung in the air. “I’ll come get Jordan next weekend and have a talk with him, see if I can figure out why he’s been acting up lately,” Bobby offered.

Rachel sighed thankfully. She was at her wits’ end with her son. He used to be a perfect angel; for the last six months he’d been a holy terror. “I appreciate that, Bobby. Lester has been trying to deal with him, but Jordan’s being so disrespectful to him I’m gon’ hurt him before it’s all over. So whatever you can do, I appreciate it.”

“No problem.”

They were both silent again for a moment. Finally, Bobby spoke. “Rachel?”

“Yes?”

“What happened to us?”

Rachel almost dropped the phone. She definitely wasn’t expecting him to go there. She’d always felt like Bobby was her soul mate, but she’d accepted a long time ago that what they’d had was gone for good. “Ummmm, wrong time, wrong place I guess,” she replied as she got the phone situated back under her ear.

“Yeah, we were both young,” Bobby replied wistfully. “If only…” He hesitated. “You know you will always be my one and only true love. You know that, right?”

Where is this coming from?
She’d been crazy in love with Bobby, and had tried everything under the sun to get him back, yet nothing had ever worked. He’d broken her heart and married Shante. “Bobby, I…I don’t know what to say.” Rachel felt her heartbeat speeding up.
No, no, no
, she told herself.
You are
so
over him
.

“I’m unhappy, Rachel. Shante and I fight constantly. We’re both miserable. I made a huge mistake marrying her.” He sounded so pitiful.

“Bobby, you’re just going through a hard time in your marriage. It’s hard work.” Rachel knew she should just hang up the phone but Bobby was her first love, not to mention her son’s father. They’d broken up when she was eighteen after he went overseas to serve in the military and Rachel had gotten pregnant by his best friend, Tony, while he was gone. Even though Rachel had had a beautiful daughter, Nia, whom Bobby had come to adore, he was never able to get over Rachel’s betrayal.

“I’m unhappy because I should have married you.” Bobby rushed the words out.

Rachel was stunned. She would have given her right arm to hear those words seven years ago, when she showed up at Bobby’s wedding and begged him not to marry Shante.

Now she weighed his declaration. Her heart wanted to tell him she would always love him, too. She felt her mouth forming the words when she looked up and saw Lester standing in the doorway. When had he gotten home from church?

“Honey, I just stopped by to pick up this book,” he said, holding up Joel Osteen’s latest. “It’s for Sister Taylor. I’m running over there to pray with her. Her mother is very sick.” Lester walked over and kissed Rachel on the head. “I love you. Don’t worry about cooking. I’ll stop and pick us up something on the way home. I just want you to relax. I’ll talk to Jordan when I get back.”

Rachel still had the phone to her ear as Lester walked out of the house.
The Lord will come just when the devil thinks he’s winning
. Her mother’s words of wisdom rang in her ears.

“Rachel, are you still there? Did you hear what I said?” Bobby asked.

Rachel stared at the phone before slamming it down and dropping to her knees. If ever she needed to pray for strength, it was now. She was a happily married woman and Bobby was the devil in disguise.

A
ngela Brooks stared at the legal document in disbelief. She read the heading for the twentieth time. “Petition for joint custody. Jonathan Edward Jackson versus Angela Brooks for minor child, Chase Antoine Brooks.”

This could not possibly be happening. Jonathan could not possibly think that she would let their child live with him for any amount of time. Angela slumped to the floor in her two-bedroom condo. She had started a new life here in Atlanta. One far removed from the devastating lie she’d been living as Mrs. Jonathan Jackson. Married less than a month and pregnant with their child, she’d come home to discover that her perfect husband was far from perfect. After she overheard his conversation with his former lover, Jonathan admitted something she’d never in a million years thought she’d hear: He was gay. She’d been crushed and had moved away in shame.

Too stunned to cry, Angela reread the document. She couldn’t make out all of the legal terms, but there was no doubt about it: This fool thought he was going to get her child on a regular basis.

Anger slowly took the place of disbelief and Angela pulled herself up off the floor. She stomped into her kitchen and snatched the cordless phone off its base. She looked up Jonathan’s cell phone number in her Rolodex, which she only had because he was always sending her checks, checks she never cashed, and he always included his contact information as if she was really going to call. She punched in his number. He answered on the third ring.

“Have you lost your mind!” she screamed.

“Hello to you, too, Angela,” Jonathan calmly replied.

“Skip the formalities, Jonathan. I got your funky little petition. You must be on that crack your brother is smoking if you think for one minute I’m going to let you have my child.”

“First of all, David is clean, has been for several years now,” Jonathan replied. “Second of all, Chase is my child, too. Angela, I never wanted it to come to this, but you won’t even let me see him.”

“See him for what? So you can teach him how to be a man?” she sneered.

“See him so I can let him know his father didn’t abandon him.” His calm tone was truly pissing her off.

“Oh, but that’s where you’re wrong. His father did abandon him when he chose a gay lifestyle.”

“I didn’t
choose
this lifestyle, Angela.”

“Save the explanations, Jonathan. I told you before I’m not letting my child around you and your boyfriend.” Angela stomped back and forth across her kitchen. She was so glad Chase was at school because she never wanted him to see her this angry.

“Angela, can we be civil, please?”

“Civil? You want civil? Let’s see, I come home from shopping for our baby and I hear my new husband on the phone with his male lover talking about how much he misses him! I find out that my husband, the man I loved with all my heart, was using me to try to prove to himself that he was a ‘real’ man. You married me knowing you were gay! So you will have to excuse me if I don’t feel very
civil
.”

“It’s been seven years.”

“I don’t care if it’s been seventy years. That pain doesn’t go away.” In all those years, she’d never seriously dated again because she couldn’t bring herself to trust a man. In fact, the few guys she had gone out with, she ended up dumping at the smallest sign of what she saw as “feminine” characteristics. She knew she was compulsive about it, but she couldn’t help herself and eventually just resigned herself to a lifetime of being alone.

Jonathan let out a long sigh. “You’re trying to punish me, but you’re only hurting Chase by doing this.”

“Look here, Jonathan. Your daddy might have forgotten what the Bible says about homosexuality, but I haven’t. Unh-unh. It ain’t no turning the other cheek for me. And my child will not be exposed to your sinful lifestyle.” Angela had prayed for months, begging God to help her understand why He would do this to her. She’d finally surmised that the devil had simply won the battle for Jonathan’s soul and that God had abandoned her by letting her marry him in the first place.

“But I’m his father,” Jonathan protested.

“And I’m his mother. And I will die before I ever let you have him!” Angela slammed the phone down. Jonathan didn’t know who he was messing with. The old Angela was soft-spoken and wouldn’t hurt a fly. But finding out your husband is gay can bring out the worst in you. And if Jonathan thought he was getting her child, he was definitely about to see the worst in her.

“W
ell, that went well,” Jonathan mumbled as he closed his cell phone. He didn’t know why he’d expected Angela to be reasonable.

“Come have a seat, son.” Simon Jackson motioned toward the living room sofa across from him. “You knew it wasn’t going to be easy.”

Jonathan buried his face in his hands. He thought by coming out of the closet he would finally find happiness. And he had, for a little while. But now he was more depressed than he’d ever been; he knew it was because he missed his son.

“Dad, I deserve to be a part of my son’s life.”

“You hurt that girl, son,” Simon replied matter-of-factly.

Jonathan lifted his head as his eyes watered. “I know, Daddy. But how many ways can I say ‘I’m sorry’? I can’t help who I am.”

Simon shifted uncomfortably in his recliner. Jonathan sighed. All this time and his father still wasn’t comfortable with his lifestyle. They had reached an unspoken agreement years ago, that they just wouldn’t address the issue. Sort of like don’t ask, don’t tell. Jonathan hated that he couldn’t talk to his father about what he was feeling, but he knew his father wrestled with the issue himself on a daily basis. Simon caught flak from people who couldn’t understand how a man of God could accept someone who was homosexual, but as he had told one of the deacons, “How do you just completely disown your own child, your own flesh and blood? I can’t stand in judgment. He’ll have to deal with God on that.”

Coming to terms with his son’s homosexuality had been a daily struggle for Simon, that much Jonathan knew. He looked like he’d aged two decades in the last few years. And Jonathan knew it was because of him. Simon’s hair was now fully gray and he had bags under his eyes. The cancer had also taken its toll, robbing Simon of his youthful appearance and vibrant personality. He’d found out three years ago that he had prostate cancer. At first, he tried to hide it from his family and the church, but after the disease started affecting his ability to function normally, he’d broken down, told his family, and stepped down as pastor of Zion Hill. Although he was supposedly in remission, Simon was now only a shell of his former self. Jonathan also knew a huge part of his father’s aging came from wrestling with his inner demons on accepting Jonathan’s lifestyle. Jonathan had even heard him praying for God to deliver his son “from his gayness.” If only it were that easy. Say a couple of Hail Marys and
poof!
you’re no longer gay. Yeah, right. In the real world it just didn’t work like that. People just didn’t understand that if he’d had a choice, Jonathan would have chosen to live happily ever after with Angela.

After they split up, people kept asking why he’d married her in the first place. He never meant to hurt her. He really and truly thought he could make it work. He chuckled painfully. The sad part was he’d lost his marriage over Tracy and he and Tracy weren’t even together anymore.

Tracy had gotten bored with the relationship two years into it and had taken off with a rich older man who was going to help him “find himself.”

Now Jonathan’s days were spent caring for his ailing father, working at an at-risk youth facility, and dreaming of his son.

“I have to see him. I have to be a part of his life,” Jonathan said wistfully. Since the breakup with Angela, he’d only laid eyes on his son twice: once when he’d found out where Angela lived and had flown to Atlanta to spy on them for a few days and another time when he’d gotten word that she was visiting her parents here in Houston. He’d rented a car and staked out her parents’ home until he saw them.

He’d sent money and short letters over the years to her, when he had her address, to her cousin, Melanie, when he didn’t. Angela had never cashed the checks he’d sent, but she had sent him a photo of Chase when he turned three, along with a note that said, “Please leave us alone.”

“I have gone too long without Chase in my life.”

“But, son, you just have to take it slow.” Simon coughed violently. Although it had been nearly eight years since his mother died, Jonathan couldn’t bear the thought of losing his father as well.

Jonathan was just about to reply when the doorbell rang. He turned to his father. “I’ll get it.”

Jonathan walked over to the door and stared out the peephole. He quickly turned back to his father. “Dad, it’s Sister Maylene. It looks like she’s carrying a dish.”

Simon sighed heavily. “Lord, you’d think the fact that I’m no longer head pastor would stop all these women from sniffing around here.”

A smile crossed Jonathan’s face. Ever since his mother died, his father had had little time for women. But it definitely wasn’t from the women’s lack of trying. Every time he turned around somebody was bringing by a sweet potato pie, or checking to see if Simon needed anything from the store, or just dropping by because they were “in the neighborhood.”

“Dad, I think at some point, one of these women is going to break you down.”

“Hmmph.” Simon snorted.

“You want me to let her in?”

“Well, I guess since you got your eyeball all up in the peephole she knows we’re in here. Let her in.” Simon got up and walked into the kitchen. “I’ll be in the back, trying to look busy.”

Jonathan slowly opened the door. It was obvious Sister Maylene was surprised to see him because the seductive look she had on her face quickly disappeared.

“Afternoon, Brother Jackson.” She cleared her throat and tried to shift her purse in front of her, no doubt trying to hide the fact that she was exposing too much cleavage.

“How are you, Sister Maylene?” Jonathan asked, trying not to laugh. Her face was made up like she was twenty and she had taken down her signature bun; her white hair flowed freely down to her shoulders.

“Blessed and highly favored. Ummm, is ummm, is Pastor Jackson around?”

Jonathan stepped back and waved her in. “He’s right in the kitchen,” he said as he shut the door behind her.

She held out the covered dish. “Well, I was just bringing by supper for him since I know he’s been a little under the weather.”

“I can take it to him.” Jonathan stuck his hands out, still trying not to laugh. He was so glad he’d come over here!

Sister Maylene quickly pulled the dish close to her chest. “Umm, I would much rather give it to him myself.”

I bet you would
, Jonathan thought. He stepped aside and motioned for her to pass.

“I’ll only be a minute,” she said as she sashayed past him.

“Sure.” Jonathan could sense her disappointment as he followed her into the kitchen. It was obvious she didn’t want him around.

Simon was at the kitchen table reading over some papers. He forced a smile when he looked up. “Sister Maylene, how are you today?”

“Just fine.” She looked over at Jonathan like she was pleading with him to leave the room. Simon shot his son a look that Jonathan knew meant he should stay right where he was.

Jonathan sat down at the kitchen bar and he could’ve sworn Sister Maylene looked like she wanted to curse him out.

“Well, I know you don’t get around much and I know it’s not often you get a home-cooked meal, so I just wanted to bring you some of my special meat loaf,” she said.

“Well, I sho’ do appreciate it,” Simon responded. He motioned for Jonathan to take the dish.

Miss Maylene stood like she was waiting on Simon to invite her to stay. “Well, I best get going,” she said after he didn’t.

Simon stood. “Let me see you out. It sure means a lot that you thought enough of me to bring me dinner.”

She smiled as they walked out of the kitchen. Jonathan put the dish in the refrigerator while he waited for his father to return. A couple of minutes later Simon walked back in with a look of exasperation on his face.

“You know she really wanted to stay,” Jonathan said.

“Boy, I don’t have time for all these women. Just no shame, throwing themselves at a man. It’s disgraceful.” Simon gathered up his papers. “I’m going to take a nap.”

Jonathan laughed as his father walked off. Simon would forever be comparing women to his wife, Loretta, who he always called the epitome of class.

Jonathan’s laughter died down as he thought of his father spending the rest of his life alone. It was time for Simon to find someone to fill the void in his life. He paused as he thought about it. Was that what he was trying to do in attempting to win joint custody of his son?

He shook off the thought. The bottom line remained: He was Chase’s father and he’d wasted enough time taking into account everyone else’s feelings. Now the only person that mattered was Chase, and Jonathan wouldn’t rest until he became a part of his son’s life.