Some Things I Never Thought I'd Do (17 page)

28

H
E SPOKE SLOWLY, AS IF THE RIGHT
choice of words was all that would keep me from covering my ears and dashing back across the hall to the safety of my own apartment.

“I've been here before,” he said, and stopped.

“In Atlanta?” I prompted him gently.

His voice was very quiet. “I've had other lives.”

“What?”

He sounded sane, but most people don't talk about past lives so casually unless they're psychics or Buddhists or bohemian movie stars or visionary postmenopausal aunts.

“Last time I was here, things were different. I wasn't part of a group of people still trying to get over the effects of slavery,” Blue said. “I was a free black man leading a nation of free black men.”

My mind was whirling. I walked over to the window and looked out to be sure this was still southwest Atlanta.
It was.

“Go on.”

“We created a great civilization. Our libraries were the envy of the world. Our armies were invincible. Our culture was a rich melting pot of all those who found their way to our shores, and our healing powers guaranteed each citizen a long and fruitful life.”

I felt like I was listening to a utopian fairy tale. “Your nation sounds like paradise.”

His smile was sad. “It was as close as men have ever gotten, but that was the problem.”

“Problems in paradise?” I smiled, but he didn't.

“We brought them on ourselves,” he said. “And we ignored them until we were beaten by an enemy who should never have been able to bring us to our knees. And do you know why they were able to defeat us?”

Something stirred deep inside me and I heard a voice that sounded like mine say softly, “Because you wouldn't listen!” But I just shook my head. “Why?”

“We were defeated by an enemy that was able to infiltrate and finally overwhelm us because they had a powerful internal ally we had never considered. And do you know who that ally was?”

“Who?” “Our women. The women we called our wives, our mothers, our girlfriends, our sisters,” he said sadly. “The women we said we loved, but never paid attention to. The women we protected from everybody but one another. The women who had our children and never saw us again. The women we ignored and abused and neglected and underestimated even when they tried to warn us about the inevitable consequences of our foolishness.”

This all sounded so familiar I wasn't sure if he was talking about past lives or present ones. The conversation felt surreal, but not
weird
, and that's a pretty fine line in a conversation like this one when you're talking about past lives and such.

“And did they try to warn you?”

He looked at me strangely. “
You
tried to warn me. It was
you
trying to tell me what was coming if we didn't change our ways, but I didn't believe you.”

“Why not?”

“How could I?
I was the emperor.
”

In men's stories, they're always the emperor or the king or the president. In women's stories, we're always beautiful and smart and loved, not necessarily in that order.

“I told you that what you were suggesting would destabilize the entire nation.”

Somehow I didn't think the person he was describing would find destabilization a bad thing. “What did I say to that?”

He smiled a little at the memory. “You said destabilization was nothing compared to what was going to happen if we didn't get right.”

I liked my past self. She sounded like my kind of woman! “So why didn't you do it?”

He shook his head. “Because, like most men, I was an arrogant fool.”

Good answer
, I thought. “So what happened to me?”

He took a deep breath. “After a series of rapes and child murders, you left the palace and became a leader of the women's revolt against us. When you saw I could not be convinced, you left a letter saying you would never return until women were safe on the streets and in their houses and in the arms of the men they loved, and then you disappeared into the mountains with a small band of warrior women and I never saw you again.”

His eyes were sparkling with regret or tears, I couldn't be sure. I didn't know what to say.
A rebel leader of angry women? Is that what drew me to Beth? The promise of access to women warriors?

“I've been searching for you ever since,” Blue said.

“So you could apologize?”

He took my hands again. “So I could make it right. The war that sent you into the mountains is still raging,
but not here. Not in this house. Not on this block. Not in this neighborhood.
In this neighborhood, women will walk in peace and safety and freedom so you'll learn to trust me.”

“And then what?”

“And then if I am very patient and very lucky, you will fall in love with me again and we can continue our journey through time together the way we're supposed to.”

I stood up suddenly before I knew I was going to.
Was this the plan Flora had been talking about?
I didn't know, but I have my own journey to complete. I have my own house to secure from the weasel. I wasn't here to fall in love with an exiled emperor, I don't care how blue his eyes are and how ancient his song.

“I've got to go home now,” I said, heading for the door before he could say another word. I had asked for it, but I was on overload.

He stood up immediately, his face full of concern. “I didn't mean to frighten you. I know it's a lot to absorb.”

“You didn't frighten me,” I said, smiling. “Maybe that's what's scaring me.”

That made him smile, too. He opened the door and took my hand.

“I hope we can talk about this again.”

“Yes,” I said. “We will.”

“Good night then.”

“Good night.”

I closed my door behind me and then leaned against it until I heard Blue's door click. My mind couldn't even begin to process all that he had told me, so I didn't try. There was plenty of time for that tomorrow. Right now what I needed was some sleep. I hung up my new dress, fell into bed, and pulled the covers up to my chin.

It wasn't until that brief moment just before you fall asleep that I realized Aunt Abbie had been right again. He was
none
of the people he appeared to be.
Or was he?

29

I
DIDN'T GET MUCH SLEEP.
My brain was going a mile a minute trying to make sense of my evening. When I did doze off, my dreams were so vividly real that I'd wake up thinking I was back there with Blue in that past life, a female freedom fighter, prepared to die for the struggle. That's what I couldn't get out of my mind. I admired that woman. I wondered why I didn't remember
being
her. Or maybe she had just made herself known in ways I hadn't known how to read.

Blue said I was part of a band of women warriors who were demanding change. That's exactly why I'd signed on with Beth in the first place. Because she had crafted a movement for change where women were in charge instead of somewhere behind the scenes, servicing whatever charismatic man was up front, reading the speeches we wrote like he had thought them up himself. Beth's movement was female in its heart and soul, and my response to it was so strong and immediate it shocked everybody but me. Is that because Beth was truly wonderful or because I had been looking for those warrior women from my past life and this was as close as I could get? Was I just like Blue, wandering through the twentyfirst century looking for fallen comrades and lost lovers and leaders who died before they had a chance to change and grow and grow wiser?

The idea that any of this could be true appealed to me and made me feel foolish in equal measure. If I opened myself up to the possibilities, my imagination ran wild. I saw myself sitting around the campfire—once you take to the hills, there's always a campfire—talking to my sisters. Planning. Strategizing. I saw myself trying to lobby the emperor for our interests and failing.

The emperor's scenes are always in a palace, not around the campfire. You know the kind of palace I'm talking about. The one with the marble steps and the flowing fountains and the handmaidens (how's that for a job title?). The palace in Hollywood's vision of
Cleopatra
and
Ben Hur
and
The Ten Commandments
. That's where I'd be lobbying the emperor. I'd be wearing some kind of flowing blue biblical robe number and Blue would be there wearing the tux he'd worn last night, but it didn't matter. I couldn't convince him to help us, and neither my arguments nor our long friendship could help us navigate the moment in a way that didn't end in disaster. So, I took to the hills,
and then what?

On the other hand, even if I completely dismiss the possibility ofpast lives and Amazonian insurgents hiding in the mountains, I still had Aunt Abbie's vision to contend with. I had taken a journey I wanted to avoid, and met a man with blue eyes who sang an ancient song and was not who he appeared to be. All of that was undeniable and fit right into what Blue had told me last night,
but what did it all mean?
And what about that dragon and the damsel in distress? When were they going to show up?

The next morning, I walked into the West End News so deep in my consideration of possible past lives that I didn't notice Uncle DooDoo walking in right behind me. I was headed for the cappuccino counter when I heard his voice, too loud. Too mean.

“Where the fuck is that blue-eyed nigga who think he the godfather?” he shouted.

All conversations and motion among the six or seven patrons already there stopped, except for the big man in a dark suit who headed straight for DooDoo, who was still standing in the doorway, poised for flight. He had come to bluster, not to really fight anybody.

“King James say tell him keep his ass on this side of Stewart Avenue or take the consequences.”

The man in the suit reached the door as DooDoo leapt into a waiting SUV and squealed off down the street. Nobody moved. The cappuccino-maker was hissing gently, but the old man who served it remained motionless. Then the man at the door turned to all of us apologetically.

“Please accept my apologies for this disturbance,” he said calmly. “Brother Richard, give these good people what they're drinking on the house.”

I was already standing at the counter, so I ordered my cappuccino and stepped aside as we all breathed a sigh of relief that a meaningless burst of bravado hadn't escalated into something more deadly. DooDoo was bad news. Every sighting or report was worse than the last one. I wondered what had happened across Stewart Avenue that brought DooDoo across the line with a message from King James.

But I guess it's only fitting, I thought, heading home with my cappuccino to go and the Sunday
New York Times
tucked under my arm. Who other than a king would have the temerity to challenge an emperor?

30

I
DIDN'T BOTHER TRYING TO GET
to Beth's Mondaymorning meeting on time. There was no need. The players at this kind of session never change. There's always a contingent of hacks for hire who go with the prevailing wind, offering their expertise to the highest bidder. There are always the bright-eyed professional women in those red power suits with American-flag pins that have replaced the gold-toned American eagles they favored under Hillary Clinton's reign. And, of course, there will be the young would-be movers and shakers in designer suits and IBM top-salesman smiles, hoping for a place in the inner circle based primarily on style, charm, and the vague promise of corporate contributions if cards are played correctly.

I had been in these meetings with Son many times. People whose job it is to notice such things had long been aware of Beth's political potential, but Son always cut them off at the pass. Beth was about as well suited to the down and dirty of Georgia state politics as I was, and Son knew it. But Son was gone now, and Beth was making decisions on her own.

By the time I pulled in behind all those sleek new BMWs and Cadillacs and even a Lexus or two, coffee had been served and those assembled were busily kissing Beth's ass.

“You have no idea what a groundswell of support there is out there,” said one alarmingly slender woman in her forties, whose variation on the red power suit was a burgundy version, and whose lapel boasted an AIDS awareness ribbon cast in gold and decorated with rubies. “We were frankly overwhelmed when we floated your name at the coalition and the response was so completely positive. No one had a negative word to say.”

Jade scribbled in her ever-present notebook and tilted it for my information:
“She's from the Coalition of Conscious Women Voters.”
I nodded my appreciation. Unasked, by me anyway, she was providing a simultaneous translation and a list of speakers as the hyper-cheery group took turns giving Beth reasons to think she could win the governor's race. There were representatives from what politicians like to call “a broad coalition” of groups. In addition to the Conscious woman, there were two state senators, a minister from one of those mega churches with ten thousand tithing members, a councilwoman from Albany, a banker from Macon, and assorted pseudo activists whose party affiliations change like the weather but who are always accorded a spot at these meetings because of the unseen hordes of “community people” whose interests they claim to represent.

I recognized a few Atlanta businessmen who had never been big Son Shine supporters before, and a county commissioner whose one and only claim to fame was that he was black
and
Republican in a state where the GOP has, until very recently, been referred to derisively as “the party of Lincoln.” There were even two young white women who, like Jade, seemed to be staffers, not full participants. I wondered which of the black people present had achieved this peculiar new status symbol: a white woman with a notebook to keep track of who had been promised what in exchange for what else.

“I know it seems a little early to jump out there,” one of the smoothies in a thousand-dollar suit was saying to Beth with a dazzling display of perfect teeth, “but the fact is, we'll be playing catch-up even if we start today. We have to hit the ground running if we're going to mount a credible campaign.”

“'Credible'?” Beth said, raising her eyebrows. “If I thought ‘credible’ was the best we could do, I'd thank you for your time and send you on your way.”

She smiled when she said it, but her tone conveyed exactly who had the power in the room and who did not. As if anybody needed reminding. She was, as usual, seated with her back to the portrait ofher and Son in a big wingback chair that had probably spent its last life in somebody's throne room. Beth's tone froze the smoothie in midbeg, and he smiled his apology for a poor choice of words.

“I'm certainly in no position to pressure you, Ms. Davis. None of us is.” He spread his arms to include his fellow supplicants, who nodded their agreement.
We're not worthy!
“It's just that the possibility of having you on the Republican ticket is such an exciting one that it's hard to wait.”

Republican ticket?
Beth was going to run as a
Republican
? In a state where those guys are on the wrong side of everything she stands for,
or used to
, how could she consider such a thing? Was the GOP the sponsor she had been talking about?
Oh, hell no!

There was a murmuring and a nodding of heads. Beth smiled indulgently and put down her cup. Those assembled leaned forward in unison as if someone had cued them so as not to miss a word.

“I am humbled by your visit here today,” she said. “Some of you have driven several hours to get here, and even those who came from across town had to brave the rush-hour traffic, so that was no picnic either.”

They laughed softly, grateful for the acknowledgment of their efforts.

“Your enthusiasm for the possibility of my entering the political arena is highly contagious, and I don't mind confessing that I'm tempted to give you my response right now.”

They actually held their collective breath, but there was no way she was going to let them off that easy. Their desire to hit the ground running would in no way impact her own impeccable sense of timing. Beth could not be rushed by anyone.

“But how could I make such an important decision without taking the time to deliberate? To consider what I can bring to this race and to this state at this critical juncture in our history. How could I possibly justify your faith in me if I act on impulse rather than intuition, intention, and intellect? And, yes, I say ‘intuition’ right up front because my woman's intuition will continue to be something I will call on during this process just like I always have.”

They murmured their approval, the women a little louder than the men.

“And right now my woman's intuition is telling me it's time for us all to get back to work, but I promise you this: You'll have your answer in the next two weeks.”

More murmuring and nodding, then the mega minister smiled unctuously and spoke for the group. “Sister Davis, you have been more than gracious with your time. If you will keep us in your thoughts, we will keep you in our prayers.”

“Amen,” said the county commissioner.

Beth stood up as they began gathering their things, shaking hands, offering her cheek for a fast, impersonal kiss, and promising them her decision soon, very soon. As she made her way to the door and stood there for her farewells, Jade stood discreetly beside her, scribbling notes and reminders so that each thank-you was specific, each pledge of support was recorded, and no promise could be forgotten in the swirl of the days ahead.

I've been that person. The invisible staffer, making sure no detail is overlooked. Public life, elected or otherwise, is built on the details. Jade was smart, focused, and committed. Watching her, she reminded me so much of
me
, I almost felt protective.
Almost.

When Beth closed the big front door behind the last of her visitors, she was smiling like the cat who swallowed the canary. “I think that went well, don't you?”

“Very well,” Jade said, and they both looked at me.

“Since when are you a Republican?” I said, cutting to the chase. “You hate everything these guys stand for, remember?”

“I never said I was a Republican.” Beth's tone was conciliatory, but underneath there was ice. That tone used to intimidate me. Now all it did was fully activate my instinct for self-preservation.

“Don't play that game with me,” I said. “Are you?”

“I'm just keeping my options open. You might be smart to do the same.”

“What does that mean?”

Beth turned to her assistant, still hovering nearby. “I'll talk with Gina alone for a few minutes. I'll call you if I need anything.”

“Of course,” Jade said, heading downstairs without a backward glance.

Had Beth talked to me in those same curt commands? She probably had, at least toward the end of our association. That's when I noticed it, anyway. In the beginning, I was just happy she spoke to me at all. Shero worship is a powerful thing, and I was fully in its grip during the first five years. Looking at Beth now, it's hard to remember those days, until she smiles, like she's smiling now. That's when it all comes flooding back, and I have to remember to keep my wits about me.

“I know this is a lot to absorb,” Beth said gently, unconsciously echoing Blue's words, “and I know on the surface it might seem that there are a few contradictions in what I'm doing.”

“A
few
?”

She sighed like she was trying not to get annoyed. “Listen to me, Gina. These are perilous times. White folks got more on their minds these days than some raggedy black women in Georgia dragging their kids around asking for a handout.”

I was shocked to hear her categorize her work and her followers that way. “Is that how they look to you?”

“That's how we look to
them
, and that's what important. The days of guilt money are gone, and they are not coming back.”

“So where does that leave us? Blood money or bust?”

Her smile only managed to curl the edges of her lips before becoming a sneer. “Always so quick to judge, aren't you?”

This was getting us no place fast. “Listen, Beth, we don't have to do this at all.”

“Yes, we do. Let's put everything on the table, shall we? I'm getting ready to take things to the next level, and I want you to be a part of it. You're the best, and I want nothing less.”

I looked at her. “No, thanks.”

“Hear me out before you say no so fast.”

“Go on.”

Beth's voice was urgent. She wanted to convince me, and she was prepared to work hard to do it. “Yes, they're Republicans, okay? But does that mean we can't do business with them? Does that mean we can't make the best deal for the women I represent?”

“You mean those raggedy black women asking for a handout?”

Her eyes hardened. “Yes, those same raggedy women who are inspired by my message because it's a message of hope. It's a message of self-determination steeped in sacrifice—”

“You don't have to convince me. I wrote that speech, remember?” I said, cutting her off.

“It was one ofyour best,” she said. “And it's still true.”

“So how can you sell them out to people who you know spend inordinate amounts of time trying to blame them for everything from higher taxes to moral decay?”

“I haven't sold anybody out to anything,” she snapped. “No decisions have been made yet.”

“Still trying to get the best deal?”

“Isn't that what politics is all about?”

“I thought politics was supposed to be the art of the possible.”

Beth sighed deeply and sat back in her chair. The exchange had escalated into unpleasantness faster than either one of us had anticipated. This was as good a time as any to change the subject. I reached into my purse and withdrew the snapshot of Son and the mystery woman.

“Shall we agree to disagree for a moment? I've got something I need to show you.”

“All right,” Beth said, looking relieved. She had achieved her goal. All cards were on the table. She could try to lean on me later, but right now she needed to see what I had in my hand. “What is it?”

“I found this with Son's things.” I handed her the photograph and waited.

She turned it over to see if there was a name on the back. Of course there wasn't. “Who is she?”

“I thought you might be able to tell me,” I said. “Do you know her?”

Beth shook her head. “Not this one.”

“This one what?”

She looked at me, and there was pain in her face. “I told you we've gotten some anonymous calls. Some blackmail attempts. Women claiming Son had promised them this or that. Con artists looking for some money in exchange for not telling lies on my son when he's not around to defend himself.” She shook her head as if to banish unpleasant memories. “None ofthem hold water. Once we put somebody on it, the stories always evaporate.”

“Have there been any other pictures?”

“No.”

Something in her voice made me know she was lying. “Well, so far this is the only one I've come across. I'll keep you posted.”

She was still looking at the picture intently. “How could he be so foolish? Photographs always come back to haunt you. The last thing I need at this point is another stripper claiming to have been my son's lover.”

“Who said she was a stripper?”

She looked up from the picture then, suddenly wary. “You did.”

“No, I didn't.”

Did she know the woman? I could see her casting around for a lie to cover her slip of the tongue.

“I probably just assumed that's what she was because that's what the others were,” she said, thinking fast.

“Right,” I said, getting ready to go. There was no reason to press her. It was none of my business. She was paying me to screen for scandal. I was just doing my job. “I've got a meeting over at Morehouse. Is there anything else we need to discuss?”

“I don't think so.” She stood up with me and tucked the photograph into the pocket of her tunic. “I'll give this to my investigator and let him handle it.”

“Fine. If I come across any others, I'll pass them on.”

“I know you will,” she said at the door. “And Gina?”

“Yes?”

“Let's just try to keep our options open as far as the politics go, okay?”

I wanted to say that my options, open or otherwise, did not include helping her mess over a righteous black politician like Precious Hargrove, but I didn't. The weasel was expecting another payment at just about the time Beth had promised an answer to her new admirers. If part of my job was to let her think I could be convinced to help her if her answer to them was yes, I would just have to string her along until my contract was over and I was a debt-free woman again.

It seemed a small price to pay, so I just smiled. “Fair enough.”

She rewarded me with a big Beth smile and an air kiss in the general vicinity of my right cheek.