Mama B - A Time to Dance (Book 2) (4 page)

No sooner than
I’d changed into some lounging clothes and taken out the meat for dinner,
Ophelia come back to my house.

“Hey, sister. I
didn’t want to discuss this earlier in front of Mother Ruby Simon, but
Henrietta’s got some serious money problems. We got to talk.”

I ain’t never
been Henrietta’s biggest fan, but it did hurt me to see her brought to tears.
Mother Ruby Simon was right about how the people we’re helping are so much
worse off than us. Still, Jesus didn’t refuse to cure Peter’s mother-in-law’s
fever because she was better off than the blind man.

“Exactly what is
Henrietta’s problem?”

Ophelia set her
bottled water down on the dinette table. Chewed on her top lip for a second.
“I’m only telling you this because you might end up being part of the solution.
They’re about to take her house.”

“Who?”

“The city, on
account of her not paying property taxes.”

Hmph.
I knew first hand it could be hard to
catch up on taxes after you fall behind. It’s like a never-ending problem
– can’t hardly catch up for trying to
keep
up. “How much does she
owe?” I asked.

“Forty-five
hundred.”

 A sharp
whistle swept through my mouth. Forty-five hundred dollars worth of debt at our
age was serious business. Required a minute to think through.

“My word, when
was the last time Henrietta paid ‘em?” I asked, still too riled up to sit down.

“She said Junior
paid the taxes every year when he stayed with her. That was his rent, per se. But
he been in the pen, what, three or four years now?” Ophelia calculated out
loud.

“What about her
daughter?”

“Please, B.
Lanetta barely
getting’ by herself. Matter of fact,
I believe Henrietta gives
her
money from time to time, so I know that
girl ain’t got two nickels to rub together.”

Mercy, Lord
. Something wasn’t right, though. I knew
how much my taxes were. Not trying to be funny, but I also knew Henrietta’s
property taxes couldn’t have been more than mine. “She got to be more than
three years’ worth of taxes behind.”

Ophelia
clarified, “The taxes themselves weren’t that much, but when they tack on the
penalties and late fees and interest – all that adds up mighty quick, you
know?”

“Don’t I ever.
Me and Albert like ta almost refinanced this house behind taxes. If the Lord
wouldn’ta stepped in on time, I would still be owing on
this
house right
now.”

Ophelia shook
her head. “Wasn’t nothing but the grace of God kept me and you out of the same
boat with Henrietta.”

I had to agree,
“Amen and amen.”

“Henrietta
gettin’ real hopeless, too, seem like. She was talkin’ foolish. Said she hope
she fall and break her hip so she can be a ward of the state and they can put
her in a nursing home.”

“Aw, naw.” I
sucked in my chin. Anybody our age
hoping
for a fall was desperate
and
touched in the head.  Reminded me of those people who do a crime so they
can go back to prison and get three meals a day.

In the back of
my mind, I started to think about what Mother Ruby Simon had said about those
lotto tickets. She was right. If Henrietta held on to her loose change here and
there, she might have a little rainy day fund. But knowing most folk, a rainy
day fund might as well be a unicorn fund—they both nice to think about,
but don’t nary one of ‘em exist in reality.

Henrietta had
lived her whole
life hand-to-mouth. That’s
just the way it was. And even a lot of us who was used to better times had to
tighten up with the economy so unstable. Shoot, plenty people lost what little
money they
had
managed to save, the way the stock
market trumbled
up
and down like a rollercoaster.

The more I
thought about the goodness and the stability I had in God, I could have broke
out in a holy dance right there with Ophelia.

“I tell you
what, people gon’ have to learn to look to Jehovah Jireh ‘cause all this
dependin’ on the government ‘bout to play out,” I said to Ophelia.

Ophelia sighed.
“So what we gon’ do to help her?”

“I don’t know. I
mean, if we step in and the church steps in to bail her out this mess, how we
know she won’t be right back to square one next year? I mean, she
still
got to pay the taxes in the future,” I reasoned.

“No, she won’t.
Not if she lose this house. We gonna have to take this one step at a time.”

Ophelia was
right. One step at a time. Maybe if we worked together to save Henrietta’s
house, she could sit down with Rev. Martin and he could teach her how to live
within her means and save up something to pay the taxes off at the end of the
year. Rev. Martin been balancin’ the books for Mt. Zion for years. He pretty
good at money-talk.

“Well, let’s
pray,” I suggested.

Me and Ophelia
joined hands, bowed heads, and asked the Lord to tell us exactly what to
do—or not.

I must have
dozed off not too long after Ophelia left because the next thing I remember is
waking up in a world of confusion at the sound of somebody coming into my front
door.

“Hey, Mama B.”

Took me a moment
to remember I had a house guest. “Hi, Derrick. How was work today?”

“Pretty good,”
he said. He slid off his shoes at the front door and walked two steps.

“Uh, wait a
minute,” I stopped him. “Turn yourself right back around and get your shoes and
take ‘em to your room.”

He stood there
for a minute with a blank look in his brown eyes. Like he ain’t never had nobody
give him these type of orders. Then I guess the whole thing registered with
him. “Yes, ma’am.”

“And I want you
to do the same thing tomorrow and the next day. Got that?”

“Loud and clear.
You sound just like Twyla.”

“Well, she got a
three-year-old to look after.”

“Okay, but she
doesn’t even work full-time, Mama B.”

“Don’t matter,”
I fussed. " I don’t know what kinda cleaning arrangements you all decided
on, but whatever they are, you sure ain’t supposed to add to the problem by not
picking up after yourself,” I lectured him like somebody should have a long
time ago. Fussin’ at folks don’t make me happy, but I ain’t had no blood
pressure problems up until now, and I don’t plan on having none thanks to him.

He might have
wanted to talk back, but he knew better. He swept up those shoes and headed on
back to the bedroom without another word.

I started on
dinner—turkey meatballs with green beans and red potatoes. Derrick joined
in the kitchen after a while, and we pulled ourselves up to the table for
supper. I blessed the food, then sat there watching him pick through
everything.

“You don’t like
turkey?”

He snarled up a
bit. “I guess I’m used to beef meatballs.”

“I don’t fool
with beef much these days,” I said. “All that red meat ain’t good for you.”

He sighed like
he was surrenderin’ to me.

“You welcome to
go somewhere and get you something else. Won’t hurt my feelings none,” I told
him. I was quite used to folk turnin’ up they noses at my healthy meals.

He turned and
glanced at the grandfather clock behind him. “No. It’s too late.”

Considerin’ how
late he come knocking on my door, I didn’t know he had respect for time. “You
sound like me. I don’t get out much once the sun starts going down.”

He pushed the
green beans around a little more, took a few bites, and then dismissed himself
from the table.

I heard his
plate clink in the sink and, judging by the time it took him to walk into the
kitchen, I could tell he hadn’t bit more scraped the messed over food in the
trash. “Derrick!”

“Yes?” he
hollered back.

“Scrape your
plate in the trash.”

His footsteps
sounded three times, and I heard a fork crossing the plate. Then he took three
more steps and I heard the glorious sound of the faucet. Well, I’ll be a
monkey’s uncle. He actually rinsed off his plate, too!

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,
Mama B.”

I laughed to
myself. Libby was right. Derrick was still wet behind the ears. Nothing a
little time and prayer couldn’t fix.

He appeared
again in the dining room. “Mama B, the wind must have loosened the wooden side
of the fence, by Otha’s room. You got a hammer and nails? I’m gonna go out
there and try to secure it.”

He didn’t have
to ask me twice. “I most certainly do.”

Five minutes
later, he was a-hammerin’ away. I sat in my easy chair listening to the sound
of a man working on the house. Reminded me of Albert and how much he used to
fiddle around with things until they really broke and we had to call in an
expert to fix the original problem plus whatever else damage he had caused.

Somehow,
thinking about Albert brought in thoughts about Libby’s double-dog dare for me
to return Dr. Wilson’s call. I had to laugh at her, too. I didn’t know why she
was getting her hopes all up for. I guess she was so happy with her husband she
didn’t understand how I can be content without mine, but I was.

Still, I knew
Libby didn’t mean no harm. I also knew she’d probably set up another
“coincidental” encounter with Dr. Wilson if I didn’t take her up on the dare.

I half-heartedly
fished through my purse for my phone, then scrolled back through my call log to
find the one unidentified number in the memory.

My heart started
pumping a little fast. I had to tell myself this was just the same as calling
in to order a veggie pizza. Strictly business.

“Hello, Dr.
Wilson, this is Beatrice Jackson returning your phone call.”

“Yes, Beatrice,
good to hear from you.”

I could hear a
smile in his voice.
Pizza. Pizza.
“How can I help you?”

“Well,” he
chuckled, “if you’d rather go there now…how about a classic? A movie and
dinner.”

Dinner I could
understand. But movies ain’t my cup of tea. I’d rather read a book than sit up
in a dark theater. I could almost hear Libby whispering in my ear to stop being
difficult.

“Dr.
Wilson—”

“Frank,” he
reminded me.

“Frank,” I
started again, “like I said in the text, I do thank you for those flowers you
sent after Geneva’s death. That was mighty sweet of you. But I don’t go on
dates.”

“Who says it has
to be a date?”

I didn’t have no
comeback for that one.

He must have taken
my silence as a cue to keep on talking. “God set it up so we all need to eat
every day, and maybe we could both use a little entertainment every now and
then. Sounds like a win-win to me.”

“Is Libby paying
you to take me out?” I asked to take the pressure off of me.

My tactic worked
because Dr. Wilson started laughing. “No, no way.”

My face and neck
muscles loosened at the sound of his laugh. He hooted like somebody who didn’t
have a care in the world, just living his life the best he could. Like good
people.

“I had to ask.”

“So, what do you
say? Friday? Seven o’clock?”

Goodness
gracious, that’s late.
“Six.”

“That’s even
better. We can catch a matinee. Do you want me to pick you up or do you want to
meet up.”

“I’ll be glad to
meet you there.” Then I said something that might have sounded like I was some
kinda ‘70s feminist, but I had to be sure he wasn’t expectin’ no hanky panky.
“I’m paying my own way.”

“Oh, Beatrice, I
can’t let you do that. What kind of gentleman would I be?”

I insisted,
“You’ve proven yourself plenty-a-gentleman already by asking that question.
We’ll go
dutch
or not at all. And no
hanky-panky stuff, either.”

Before ending
the call, we agreed to meet at the cinema at 5:45 to watch some kind of action
movie I ain’t never heard of, but since Dr. Wilson said Morgan Freeman was in
it, I agreed.

Something about
that Mr. Freeman is alright with me.

Derrick come
back in the house huffin’ and puffin’. “It’s fixed.”

“Good! Thank
you, Derrick. I sure ‘preciate you.”

He wiped the
sweat from his brow with his forearm. “Some woman came looking for you. I don’t
know why she came around to the side door. Her name was Glenda…Gloria?”

“Gwen?”

He nodded.
“Right, Gwen.”

“I done told
her, I don’t know how many times, to come around to the front. Gwen don’t mean
no harm,” I told him.