Saving Ruby King

by Catherine Adel West

  Each steamy droplet clears my mind before I step out and dry off. The color on my neck has gotten worse. I’ll go to my room and grab some clothes, ones with long sleeves and high necklines. I have an anthology of these teachings from Mom.

  I hate looking at my eyes in the mirror because they are His. Contrasting with my deeper skin tone, they are vivid reminders we share the same blood.

  Leaving the bathroom, I walk past the living room and notice a manila folder on the table. It’s something the police left behind. I open it.

  Lebanon stares at me, younger, vulnerable and scared and hurt. A black eye and a swollen bottom lip adorn his skinny face. For a moment, I see me in him, and I don’t want to see that. I don’t want to empathize with him. I don’t want to believe I can reach him because then I’d be like Mom, and I can’t afford her version of hope.

  There are other papers, ones listing a charge for murder, an arraignment, a plea deal to involuntary manslaughter. All of this in 1979. I didn’t know. I didn’t know he murdered anyone. Yes, I knew he spent time in prison. It would have been hard to not know that because people talk. But he killed someone. We were living with a murderer this whole time. This dark side of him was always lingering under the surface like a riptide.

  Violent people do violent things, and in the end, someone pays for it. A smile grudgingly crosses my lips at the picture of his wounded face, knowing he can hurt, but be hurt in return.

  Those bruises, the cause of them, isn’t hard to explain. I’ve only heard about this, from news sound bites and front-page articles in the Sun-Times or Tribune. Men being tortured, being freed after hasty convictions, spending decades of life in a prison cell. These aren’t fantasies made up by a marginalized sect of society. The men are real and the horrors experienced to this day hang over the city. A legacy of law and order remain frayed in the very communities police are sworn to protect. Black people don’t trust the law because there is no accountability for when the law fails us. We know heroes are capable of evil things. Fathers are capable of evil things. Every person on this earth is capable of evil. Maybe Lebanon didn’t commit this murder, but I doubt it. I’m certain he deserved every punch and kick, every wound and cut, every desperate cry for taking a life.

  You reap what you sow. You always reap what you sow.

  I leave the folder on the table and walk past the guest bedroom. We never had guests, so Mom used it as a place to do her crafts, to get away from Him. It was her protection. Her sanctuary away from church. I open the door and for a brief moment, hope to find my mom there. I don’t. I hope to find forgiveness there. But that’s not there either. So I sit down at her desk. My knee bumps against it and I hear the smallest jingle. I open the drawer and see an envelope. I open it and I smile.

  CHAPTER 5

  CALVARY

  People spread out around my sanctuary, brightly colored little beetles, clicking from one pew to the next. Greetings are whispered. Hugs are given and light, lipstick kisses are planted on cheeks with care. Movements are not as they were, there is less freedom and more caution among this group. And though there are many, Alice is not here. This is what the people speak of, her absence, not of how brightly the sun shines, or of how crisp the air is this late in March, but how one of them is no longer here to enjoy these things. How they just saw her. How they can’t believe what happened.

  I always found it odd how the impermanence of life is something that surprises humans though it is something they know with certainty—that death will come for them all. There is still shock among them, sorrow, fear. Their mourning as fresh and distinct and varied from person to person, like snowflakes.

  “It was a good homegoing service they gave Alice,” Sister Ellison says, a blush-colored hat framing her lightly wrinkled face and graying hair. “Everything just laid out so pretty.”

  “Mmm-hmm.” Sister Cullen nods in agreement, an ankle-length lavender dress highlighting her ecru-tinged skin. “Standing room only. Even saw a couple of them news cameras in the back, too. At least they still covering the story. You know most times them news crews do one story on us only when something bad happens and leave. At least they might keep the story up a little while longer.”

  “Just don’t make no sense. We ain’t even safe in our homes,” Sister Ellison laments.

  “You know one of them reporters said something like residents are on edge after what happened to Alice. I almost laughed. We black in Chicago, we born on edge.”

  “You know you ain’t never lied. You ain’t never lied,” Sister Cullen affirms.

  They laugh.

  “Speaking of liars, look who walked through the door,” Sister Ellison announces. She jabs Sister Cullen with her right elbow.

  Lebanon King strolls down the aisle, eyes avoiding the two women’s gazes. A few people gather around him, offering their condolences and both Sisters look on with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion.

  Sister Ellison sits down in the third row of the right-most pew as is her self-designated seat and has been for almost fifteen years. Everyone knows to never sit in this spot. She opens her Bible. Sister Cullen sits down beside her doing the same. It is a code, a tool they both use. Under the guise of appearing to read and debate God’s word, they’re able to discuss other church business and scandals. The pretense of holiness they believe keeps them safe and others unaware of their true and sometimes petty intentions.

  “Now all these reports saying it’s probably a burglar, but Lebanon knows more than he’s letting on,” says Sister Cullen.

  “Maybe he wants to find the man himself. Do justice his way.”

  “Didn’t the Lord say, ‘Vengeance is mine’?”

  “That’s all well and good until it’s someone you love,” counters Sister Ellison.

  “Mmm-hmm, true, but did he love her though? We both saw Alice with them bruises from time to time, and you know no one is that clumsy,” Sister Cullen says with raised eyebrows.

  “Yeah but it ain’t our business anyway and people got enough drama without inviting other people’s into their lives.”

  Sister Ellison lays her Bible down. “Just feels empty, you know? I mean Alice was quiet, kept to herself, but she was good people. Good people. Lord knows we need more of them in the world than we got.”

  Sister Cullen slightly turns her head, to see Layla escorting the Senator and Christy to her family’s pew.

  “Layla, sweetie!” Sister Cullen calls. Layla dutifully marches over to the two women whom she’s known since birth, unsure what they have on their minds.

  “Hey, baby. Is Ruby coming today? How’s she doing?”

  Layla’s stomach churns. Her left arm breaks out in small bumps. Finding ways to answer questions, keep Ruby’s confidence, but maintain respect for elders in the church, is a difficult tightrope walk.

  “No, ma’am, I don’t think she is, but she’s doing as well as can be expected.”

  Both women nod and wait for more, some detail, some tidbit to help them fill out the facts or fantasies playing out in their heads.

  Layla says nothing else. She simply smiles and calculates how much longer she’ll have to stand there for both women to realize all she’s willing to share is what’s left her mouth.

  “You should probably go back and attend them visitors,” Sister Cullen advises.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Layla turns from the two women and exhales.

  A light breeze enters my halls. “Still smells like them gardenias from Alice’s homegoing. I ain’t never seen that many flowers,” says Sister Cullen.

  LAYLA

  The wonderful thing about some songs in the black church is they are simple, repetitive and you can replace one verb with another making for a completely new rendition. The word praise turns to love turns to thank and so on. If the choir director, Levi Morrison, is particularly feeling the spirit, this song can go on and on—and on.
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  A gay black choir director is a stereotype, but it just so happens Levi is gay, but no one talks about that. Everyone knows. He doesn’t swish and sashay. The S’s at the end of his words don’t give him away. But he refuses to cower in who he is, and he has an undeniable gift for music. Everyone knows a church with a good choir puts people in the pews and keeps them there. If anyone can get the choir to hit those notes, Levi can. I asked him why he works at this church or any church, and he told me he serves God, not man, and he’s gonna do what God told him to do. Screw everyone else! This was over dinner one night with him and his partner, Danny.

  Strained vibrations from the organ reveal it’s in need of a serious tuning, but Deacon Baldwin manages to still bring forth semblances of heavenly chords through gifts either bestowed by Jesus or a deal with Satan. The tin and boom of snare and drums; the jingle of tambourines; the firm, melodic thrumming of bass guitar; multihued brown hands clapping on beat; our voices high and low and sharp and soft convey a deep longing. We sing tragedies dredged up from our homes or our ancestors or some faraway and long-ago place; this beauty in who we are and how we worship is inextricable from the music and weaves itself back and forth, to and fro. This congregation of feeling makes the music shake the very walls of Calvary Hope Christian Church.

  A bobbing sea of wide-brimmed hats in pink, purple, orange, yellow and every other color of the rainbow slightly obstructs the view of my father sitting in his high-backed oak chair. He’s moving his head from side to side, metronome steady.

  Sharply arched wood beams seem to rattle just a little, but they will hold. The church will stand. It always does.

  Christy sings an off-key alto and happily claps along, trying to keep the count with the choir in front. She remains slightly offbeat. Senator Sikorska stands next to Christy, stiff and hawkish, something like a smile on his lips. Watching my white friend struggle to grasp movement and tempo and coolness and swagger, something my people possess with ease, I do my best to not feel superior.

  This feeling. This warm deliciousness like melted butter on freshly baked bread—this is pride. It is the kind of elitism I imagine white people like the Senator feel and practice all the time. This thought is insipid at the very least and most likely racist, but I allow myself these moments because I spend so many others feeling less than or proving why I am just as good as the next person by working twenty times as hard. Now the bitterness will settle in my spirit. And these thoughts, these flashes of consciousness, all rotate within milliseconds while I still sing my song and keep the beat.

  I don’t notice much if any discomfort on Christy’s face and that is good. The Senator would smile through a five-alarm blaze if he thought it meant another vote, so his expression means little to nothing. Lebanon King sits one row behind me and I can see him over my right shoulder. His eyes are not on me, but I feel them probing nonetheless.

  Levi masterfully coaxes the last notes from the choir and the fading melody echoes throughout the room. My father always rises from his chair sure and steady. A true shepherd. His voice fills a place like this, commands empty air and measures and shapes it into rapt attention. The timbre of his tone, the poetry of his words, the act of his ministry can mesmerize. That means he’s a good person, doesn’t it? God wouldn’t give this ability, this gift to just anyone, right?

  Not once has my father glanced at his notes, but whatever his inspiration, divine or human, the people are responding. Hands up and waving, Mmm-hmms, Yes Lords and Amens are punctuated by the occasional shouts or brief speaking in tongues.

  After the service, people mill about the church’s halls and pews catching up on gossip or plans for the week. Senator Sikorska glad-hands different people practicing his “I really care what you have to say” face. I half expect a camera to film this; good B-roll for a political ad he’d air in a month or two. Without the minority vote, he’s toast.

  “I’m sorry about your friend, Layla,” says Christy.

  How does she know about Ruby?

  “Geez your eyes got big!” She laughs. “I’m not that out of touch. I saw it on the news. I recognized your dad,” says Christy. “You mentioned Ruby a lot at school. Wasn’t hard to put it together. Are you okay?”

  I stare at Christy, somehow amazed at her kindness and my ignorance of it. She knows what happened and still came when someone lesser might have given a lame excuse to back out. She might not come past 35th Street much, but for her friend, she did so when it counted.

  I hug her.

  “I didn’t wanna say anything in front of Dad to give him an excuse for me not to come. He’d come anyway. Needs the face time, the votes,” she whispers.

  “It’s that obvious?” I ask, surprised.

  Christy gestures to the Senator. “My father is not a complicated man. He wants power. It doesn’t matter how he gets it. It’s what he cares about. People are second. A very distant second.”

  “I know what you mean.” I stare at my father, Reverend Jackson Potter, behind the pulpit speaking with ministers and deacons.

  “Dad underestimates me,” says Christy. “Sometimes, I think you do, too. With him, it’s arrogance. With you...with you, I think you want to protect me in some weird way. Shield me from things you don’t think I’d understand. You’ve done it since we met.”

  “I don’t mean—”

  “I’m not asking for an apology, Layla. It’s just... I know you’re going to try and do everything you can for Ruby. You’re all or nothing, girlie. I adore it,” Christy takes my hand and squeezes it. “Just be careful. Our strengths can be our weaknesses, too.”

  “You sure you don’t want to get up in that pulpit? Sounds like you got a word or two.”

  Christy laughs. “No, no, no. I’ll leave that to your dad.”

  The Senator strolls up, planting himself beside Christy. “It’s time we say our goodbyes now, dear. I have a few other engagements. Layla, so nice to see you again. I’m sure I’ll be back soon.”

  Notorious for courting favor in urban communities during elections, white politicians often look painfully out of place and horribly off rhythm in an ocean of brown faces, uncomfortable being the minority in the room, aching to return to neighborhoods and suburbs where everyone looks like them.

  It’s awkward to watch this. It’s funny too.

  I extend my hand which the Senator takes. His hard smile appears as he looks at Christy, then to me. “Thank you again for the invitation. It was a fruitful experience.”

  My eyes search Christy’s and now I see it, a subtle cunning in those Caribbean-blue orbs, one she hides behind the fake smile she returns to her father.

  When we embrace, Christy whispers, “Remember what I said, girlie. Call me anytime. If you want to grab some coffee, talk, whatever.”

  I know she means this, and I smile. “Same here.”

  CALVARY

  Layla walks back through my wide corridor, and I listen to the resonant tap of her footsteps. Her step is heavy and I easily deduce from her jumbled, heated thoughts she is more than a little reluctant to speak with her father. Through my glass windows, sunlight playfully shapes itself into sparse remains of rainbows on my ugly chipped mint-green walls. If I’d arms and fingers, I’d paint my halls a more cheerful blue, but I remember green was the favorite color of the girl who painted them decades ago with her only two friends.

  A door with a hinge in need of oil gives way to Jackson and his billowing black robe, bestowing the appearance of more girth and height. My friends the shadows and the light enjoy playing games and manipulating perceptions. Jackson’s mind also churns in thought, moments, regrets, words he’d take back if he could.

  Jackson stops and looks at the wall, a shimmering ray of sun carving out the spot on the floor with a raised tile. He steps on it knowing the tile will remain level for a time, but the unevenness of my floors, will cause it to rise again. Layla tripped on th
is tile once when she was four years old. She fell and cut her knee. There was blood and tears. But there was Jackson, too. There was her father who scooped her up into his arms and Layla held on to him as if he were the only solid thing keeping her afloat. And Jackson swore he wouldn’t let anything else harm Layla though he knew it was a futile promise, a whimsical notion. “Daddy’s got you. I’ve got you,” he said to her over and over again until her cries turned to whimpers and then calm. And her smile, wavering, and her deep brown eyes puffy from crying, gazed into his and there was nothing else around them, father and daughter, but love and a bond neither one of them at that moment believed anything could break. They were wrong about that, but most people are wrong about the unbreakable. However, some humans (and this about them I admire) will try to mend their love and heal their brokenness. This is what Jackson wants to do. Layla too.

  But can it be done when two are so far apart?

  Opposing forces, opposing motivations, opposing people, and most of all stubbornness keeping them one from the other at such times it seems they may never come together again.

  Jackson walks through my halls whispering to himself, pleading in all sincerity, “God, just...help me,” he whispers. “It’s too much. All of it and no one knows. No one knows.” Again, his mind drifts to a January night and a boy named Syrus. He thinks of Alice. His mind then turns to Lebanon, about the check he made Alma sign. One thought begets a regret which brings another thought which begets another regret and so on, his mind never loosed from the internal churning of his shame.

  Layla’s steps mirror her father’s, an earnest plea for understanding and acceptance ready to tumble from her lips. She wanted people around while speaking to Jackson so he could exude that false, reassuring humility she needed on display to get out of a church service with a clear conscience and unhurt feelings on either side, but she must meet Ruby soon and there is no more time to rehearse and practice what she will say. No more time to wait for other people’s grace to save her feelings or ego.