The Pastor's Wife

Here I am, on book number nine, and to the part of writing I’ve been dreading—the acknowledgments. These dang things have caused more drama than the actual stories in my books. (My cousin just started back speaking to me after I left her name out of the previous books and nobody at her church believed we’re related.) Oh, and don’t let me forget ______ (insert name here—you know who you are), who raked me over the coals for days because so-and-so’s name came before hers/his.

So having said that, here are my acknowledgments this go-round…

Thank you, God.

Thank you, everybody else.

There, that ought to cover everyone.

Until the next book, enjoy.

ReShonda

1993

T
errance couldn’t get inside fast enough. He rammed his key in the lock, opened the door, and raced in the house. After slamming the front door closed, he leaned against it and tried to catch his breath.

It was the first time he’d been able to think straight in the last fifteen minutes.

“Boy, what have you gotten yourself into now?”

Terrance looked up to see his great-aunt Eva towering over him, the usual disappointed look across her face. Her head was adorned with pink hair rollers, and her canary yellow bathrobe was tightly tied with a blue sash. “And don’t even fix your lips to lie to me.” She wagged her finger in his face. “You sweating like a runaway slave, all out of breath.” She stepped closer, narrowed her eyes at him, then wiggled her nose. “Terrance Deshaun Ellis, have you been drinking?”

Terrance immediately tried to get his story together. “Naw, Auntie. Why you trippin’?”

Eva scooted her large frame closer to him and sniffed. “You
have
been drinking.” She swung her left arm and hit him on the side of the head. “You smell like a moonshine factory!”

Terrance ducked out of the way before his aunt could deliver another blow. “Go on with that, Aunt Eva!”

“I swear to God, you gonna drive your grandma to an early grave!” Eva barked. “It’s Christmas Eve and you got her worried to death because your little narrow behind is out running the streets doing God only knows what. Thinking you grown.”

“I’m almost grown,” Terrance mumbled, rubbing his temple. His head was pounding, his vision was blurred, and he was still sweating bullets over what had just happened.

“Fifteen is far from grown!” Eva took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down. She shook her head as sadness began to frame her pear-shaped face. “Terrance, when are you going to stop causing so much trouble?”

Terrance closed his eyes and groaned. He was not in the mood for a lecture—again. His three great-aunts lectured him nonstop, chastising him for “breaking his grandmother’s heart.”

“We done got you out of jail twice, been up to your school more times than we can count cuz you always fighting. I pray round the clock, and you still won’t do right.” Eva sighed. “You won’t go to church. You won’t listen. I just don’t know what to do about you. My sister is out there right now, roaming the streets at three in the morning looking for your tail. I told her, we just need to turn you loose, because the devil has a hold on you.”

Terrance desperately wanted to ask his aunt if they could finish this conversation another time. It’s not like he didn’t know it by heart anyway. His grandmother and her three sisters had raised him since his mother died when he was just two years old. And he’d been more than a handful for them.

He definitely didn’t feel like hearing a lecture right now because his mind kept replaying the past fifteen minutes.
How had he ended up behind the wheel of a stolen car?
Everything was a big blur. He remembered hanging out with his boys. He remembered the drinks—all of the drinks. Then, the next thing he recalled was the sirens and his ditching the car two streets over and running for his life.

Luckily, Terrance didn’t have to listen to much more because the doorbell rang, and he decided to use that as an opportunity to escape upstairs to his room.

“I’m not through with you, boy!” Eva called out when she noticed him dart toward the stairs. “This is probably your grandmother, poor thing. Probably locked herself out. I know she’s tired…”

Terrance let her voice trail off as he made his way upstairs. He had just taken off his shirt and was getting ready to plop down across his bed when he heard his aunt scream, “Nooooo!”

He immediately raced back down the stairs. Eva was leaning against the doorframe; two sheriff’s deputies were trying to hold her up. Terrance froze. They’d come for him. They’d figured out what had happened and had come to take him to jail. This would be his third arrest and he was sure to do some real jail time.

Terrance was just about to make a run for it when he saw Eva drop to her knees and scream, “She can’t be dead, she just can’t. No, Lord, no!”

Terrance suddenly forgot all about his own troubles. “Wh…who’s dead?” he asked as he slowly walked toward his aunt. He had a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. Eva looked up at him, tears blanketing her face. That in itself told Terrance something was seriously wrong because Aunt Eva was a hard-nosed woman who didn’t even shed a tear when her husband of twenty years walked out on her.

“Who’s dead?” Terrance repeated.

Eva pulled herself up off the floor. “Oh, Terrance.” She held out her arms as she walked toward him. “It’s Essie. Your grandmother was in a horrible car accident. They said she’s dead!” Eva pulled Terrance into her chest and sobbed.

Terrance’s body began to shake as Eva’s words set in. He broke free from his aunt. “No, no, no.” Terrance continued to shake his head in denial as Eva struggled to pull herself together.

“Ma’am, is there anyone we can call for you?” the sheriff’s deputy asked.

“My sisters. I’ve got to call Mamie and Dorothy Mae,” Eva muttered as she walked around the living room in a daze, looking for the phone.

“Why you comin’ up in here with this?” Terrance said to the deputies, his voice shaky. “My grandma ain’t dead. She’s just out looking for me. She’ll be right back.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” the other deputy said. “She hit a tree. She was killed on impact.”

The look on the deputy’s face told Terrance this wasn’t some cruel joke. Suddenly, every bad thing he’d recently done flashed through his mind, including the last fifteen minutes. “Oh, my God. This is all my fault!” Terrance dropped to his knees and buried his head in his hands. Tears began to fall as he recalled his grandmother’s last words to him that afternoon.

“Son, I’m praying that the Lord will change your troubled ways,” she’d said when she caught him going through her purse. “I love you and I’m never gonna give up on you.”

Terrance had blown her off, silently cursing that she’d caught him before he could get some money. What he wouldn’t do now to turn back time.