With her small hands carving through her wig, Sister Betty smiled wickedly before she suddenly snatched the wig from her head. She sent it flying toward the dresser. And the wicked smile remained on her face, not revealing whether she cared that the wig had landed on the floor or not. She’d already removed her partials when they loosened minutes ago and interfered with her sobbing. It didn’t seem odd that she was wearing nothing but a slip and one house shoe. Her short braided hair had already begun unraveling, and now it made her look wild and crazy, the nappy braids resembling tiny snakes like on the head of Medusa.
Suddenly a pout appeared. It’d happened fast, removing any doubt that she’d taken leave of her senses as she addressed the person in her mirror. Sister Betty bit her bottom lip as she lifted a hand and pointed as she began to argue. “Betty Sarah Becton.” She gave a curt nod to her reflection. “You’ve given almost your entire life to service,” she told her reflection. “Everybody came first—your church, your friends, your family—everybody but you. And you were happy. God met your every need. You’ve got more money than you’ll ever need, and the more you gave away, the more it kept coming back to you.”
Sister Betty spun around, bumping her shin on a chair, and the pain reminded her that it indeed was she who was suffering. She grabbed the Bible off the nightstand and held it out before her with trembling hands. “I know you’re real,” she explained to God before she began thumbing rapidly through the pages of the Bible. “I won’t argue that. But here I am again, standing before you, full of doubt when it comes down to me and what I thought you wanted for me. I know the Word says that you are a jealous God. . . .”
The tears began dropping, and she wondered where they’d come from, because she felt dry and empty. But Sister Betty was determined to say her piece to God. “I know you are a jealous God, and if you strike me dead, then so be it,” she said as she held up her Bible, as though reminding God of what He’d said. “In Exodus thirty-four, verse fourteen, you said, ‘For thou shalt worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.’ ”
Still inside her bedroom, Sister Betty dropped her head and placed the Bible back on the nightstand. Challenging God, she pleaded, “So I need to know who it is that I have put before you.” Her knees began to shake; she went to her bed and sat on its edge to continue. “It can’t be my Freddie, because I never stopped going to church or serving you. Having him made me want to serve and praise you even more.”
Outside her bedroom Freddie cringed at the mention of his name. His head swung from side to side out of desperation. Oh, Lord, what have I done to her?
Sister Betty’s eyes found the picture of her and Leotis taken on the day when the church broke the ground for the Promised Land development. “Certainly not my pastor,” she told God. “You commanded that we serve our leaders, and I’ve done that. I’ve done more than that. I—I—I . . . ” Her voice began to trail off. “I became his spiritual mother. You told me to do that in a dream!” One small hand pounded the other, and Sister Betty’s voice became stronger as she railed against heaven. “I’ve done everything you told me to do, and yet, you’ve not removed one stumbling block between Freddie and me.”
Sister Betty suddenly felt the blood rushing to her head. Pulsating beats from her heart felt as though they would push through the walls of her chest. Beads of perspiration popped on her forehead as sharp stabbing pains shot up and down one of her arms. She felt disoriented as a weak hand shot forward, desperately trying to grab hold of anything or anyone, but she reached out too late, and she collapsed onto the floor, calling on the one name she always had. “Jesus!”
“I thought I told you to wait outside,” Sharvon hissed. She quickly moved to the other side of Sister Betty’s bedroom door frame, blocking him from opening the door farther.
Freddie hadn’t heard Sharvon come up behind him until she tapped him on his shoulder, and at that moment, he’d heard Sister Betty call out the name of Jesus, and she’d complained about him, as well. Now standing there with his strength renewed, he’d had enough of Sharvon ordering him around and interfering in his and his beloved Honey Bee’s business.
“You can’t tell me when I can and when I can’t go inside this house! This ain’t your house!” Freddie’s voice rose, matching the frustration that’d built up. “I’m going inside that room, and if you try and stop me, you’ll find out that I’m just one pistol shot away from removing all the headaches in this house! Now, move out of my way!”
Freddie shoved Sharvon aside and pushed in the bedroom door. Sharvon followed him and gasped when she saw Sister Betty struggling to get up off the floor.
Freddie quickly tossed the bouquet on the floor. He and Sharvon, each with a hand under her armpits, began to lift Sister Betty off the floor.
She shoved their hands away. “I can do it.” She grabbed the edge of her mattress, and after several attempts she pulled herself onto the bed and sat on its edge.
Sister Betty pointed to her wig, still lying on the floor. Sharvon reached it first. She shook it and tried to reshape it before she brought it to her cousin. Sister Betty quickly placed the wig upon her head and tucked in all the natty braids she felt peeking out from under it. Looking around, she found her partials still lying at the bottom of the glass. Reaching inside the glass, she grabbed the partials, shook off the excess water, opened her mouth, and rocked them from side to side until they fitted perfectly.
Neither Sharvon nor Freddie had said a word the entire time Sister Betty tried to regain her composure. She’d put the wig back on her head and the teeth in her mouth, but she still looked crazy wearing a slip and one house shoe. They took turns looking from Sister Betty to each other, wondering who was brave enough to say something.
Finally, Sister Betty broke her silence. Turning to Sharvon, she pushed her shoulders back, crossed her legs, and said, “Sharvon, I want you to leave.”
Sharvon’s lips fell open to protest, but not in enough time.
“I don’t want to hear a complaint or a refusal,” Sister Betty told her. “I’m apologizing for putting you out earlier, but for right now, I need you to find someplace else to be.”
After sneering at Freddie, Sharvon threw up her hands and silently left the room.
Not wanting to anger Sister Betty any further, Freddie began picking up the flowers off the floor. When he picked up the last petal, he refused to let her see the sadness in his eyes, and without speaking, he, too, headed toward the door.
Sister Betty uncrossed her legs. As she sprang off her bed, the one house shoe she wore flew off, hitting Freddie in his behind. She didn’t flinch or apologize. “You stay put, coward.”
“I won’t go nowhere if you don’t want me to go,” Freddie said weakly as he turned around.
Sister Betty and Freddie continued talking. She fussed, and he listened, mostly with his head hung, beaten down with her truth. They shared how each had gone to God and their Bible. Both had operated under the belief that God would show them the other’s true feelings and that God would fix things.
“I guess I expected God not only to give me something but also to put it directly into my hands, without me so much as lifting a finger,” Freddie admitted. “Just tell me what you need.”
“I need you to stop being a liar and a thief,” Sister Betty accused. She walked slowly toward where he stood with his jaw slack and the flowers in disarray.
“I’m no liar and no thief.” Freddie looked at her, his head spinning from how, in seconds, things had changed, refusing to believe what she’d just called him, and thinking that perhaps she was just too overwrought to think straight.
“You lied to me about that so-called high blood pressure,” she told him when she was close enough to slap him, should she want to. “And you stole my heart and my dreams.”
Freddie was speechless. He dropped the flowers and the facade. “I’m sorry, Honey Bee. I didn’t know how to tell you.”
“You knew how to ask me to marry yo
u, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then it would’ve been the same way if you could’ve told me that you had cancer.”
“You mean on my knees?”
“If need be,” Sister Betty told him. “We could’ve both gotten down on our knees and prayed about it. You acted as though you didn’t know that I had favor with God.”
Freddie thought for a moment before he answered. He wanted to weigh his chances of her not going off on him again. He decided he’d trust God to hold her in place. “I hear what you say, Honey Bee. But you didn’t act like you had favor with God.”
“What do you mean?” Against her will, she could feel her hands balling up, as though she needed to hit or lash out at something.
“I mean that if you were all that certain about having favor with God, then you would’ve never believed God didn’t want us to be man and wife.”
It was out there, and no way could he take back the words. The hurt look that spread across her face shook him, and he began to struggle to put together an apology.
“I know that now,” she finally said. “Between God reminding me that without Him I’m at the Devil’s beck and call and me loving you so much, I thought I wanted to just lie down and die. I felt like I’d never had a Christian walk a day in my life.”
“I haven’t been led by the cross for as long as you have, Honey Bee, but God sure knew how to get my attention. I wasted all that time pushing you and others away because I’d forgotten that it’s our faith that pleases God. God was just testing me, because He knew I wasn’t going to need no stem cell transplants or such. Most of the time when I went for checkups, I was telling other folks to look to God, and here it was I’d come home and pop a chemo pill and do just the opposite.”
Freddie stopped and led Sister Betty to one of the chairs in her room. He gathered what was left of the bouquet and handed it to her. “But when it’s all said and done, this is what’s left of my heart when you’re not in my life, just pieces of something once so beautiful.”
Sister Betty took the flowers and looked them over. She stood and tossed the flowers with their broken stems and torn petals into the wastebasket. “I’m not taking no chances, so we’re gonna have to start all over again.”
Freddie’s timid brown eyes suddenly glowed. “You mean, just the two of us?”
“Yes,” Sister Betty replied. “I’m not babysitting grown folks no more. If they can’t get out of their own fixes, then they’ll have to learn to pray their way through.”
“Do you think we should put our foot down with Leotis and Sharvon? I know they’re walking around, feeling a bit guilty about something. Maybe we’ll let them know that they may be pastor and family, but we’ve got our own lives to live.”
“And maybe we just don’t tell them nothing. Let them figure it out, like we had to. I mean it when I say that I’m focusing on God and you. Them others gotta make their own way,” Sister Betty insisted.
“So what should we do first?” Freddie asked as he sat down next to her. “You just tell me, and I’ll hop right on it.”
“Well, Freddie Rabbit,” Sister Betty teased, “we could start by planning this honeymoon properly.”
“That’s a great place to start,” Freddie said, laughing. “At least we can concentrate on that and not have to worry about the wedding reception.”
Sister Betty’s hands flew up to her head. “Oh my goodness, I forgot about that. We still have to stop Bea and Sasha.”
Freddie began laughing again while he patted her hand. “Don’t you worry about that,” he told her. “It’s already taken care of. I’d been working on something with Batty, and I didn’t have a chance to tell you about it before we had our little . . . ” He stopped and took her other hand and continued. “Before we had our little misunderstanding.”
“Well, can you tell me now?” Sister Betty looked at the way Freddie held her hands. He held them tight, as if he thought she’d use them to hit him if she didn’t like what he had to say.
“I’ll tell you, but I don’t want you to get mad or nothing. Just remember that I had gone ahead and done some of the grunt work while you tended to Leotis.”
Sister Betty pulled back, but not enough to get her hands out of his. “Grunt work? What does that mean?”
“It means that when I tell you what I and Batty did about Bea and Sasha’s meddling, you’ll be grunting from holding your stomach tight from laughing.”
Somehow Sister Betty didn’t know whether to believe him or not, but she didn’t want to start again with doubts.
At the same time Freddie doubted she believed him, but he didn’t want to start again with a fight.
While Sister Betty and Freddie were in her bedroom, going back and forth, trying to tie up the loose ends of their wedding planning, Leotis was at home, looking out of his living room window and wondering what was going on inside Sister Betty’s home. When he’d stood earlier on Sister Betty’s porch, Thurgood needed to use a bathroom and Leotis offered to let him use the one in his house.
“Thanks for letting me use your bathroom,” Thurgood said when he returned to the living room. “I’d have held my pee until my eyeballs turned yellow before I went inside my cousin Betty’s house.”
“Not a problem,” Leotis replied without addressing Thurgood’s colorful descriptions or outlook on life. “I don’t hear any loud noises or see police cars pulling up. I guess the trustee is safe inside.”
“Too bad the same thing can’t be said for you,” Thurgood said, rubbing the back of his neck as he stood.
“Do you think somehow I’m involved in whatever is going on over there?” Leotis pulled the window curtains shut before adding, “You must be joking, because I’ve done nothing.”
“Oh, really?” Thurgood replied. The temperature inside the living room suddenly plunged when he made eye contact with Leotis. To also show he was serious, Thurgood planted his feet in a wide stance. “Well, then, let me count the ways.” Thurgood began his sermon slowly. He would take his time so that Leotis could understand it all. “My cousin Betty was always open with you, and yet when it came down to choosing what was best for her, you chose to keep the trustee’s secret about his cancer.”
“He asked me to do it!” Without thinking, Leotis covered his ears with his hands so no further accusations could enter.
Thurgood jabbed his finger at Leotis’s chest, but without touching him, and rebuked him. “I know you a reverend and all, and you got a habit of judging folks that sin differently from you, but I’m asking you to keep your mouth shut until I’m finished.” Thurgood retreated several feet out of Leotis’s personal space, his eyes in a locked position as he delivered his verdict. “All this nonsense with my cousin Sharvon—you pretending to like her like she’s your sister—that’s a load of crap, and you know it. Before you came along, she focused on nothing but being the best damn attorney my family ever had. And then you step up with your ripped muscles and pretty looks, your pretty hair, fast track-running routines, and your fast-talking mouth full of sermons for the spiritually challenged, and now she’s walking around, arguing not only with juries but with herself, too.”
Leotis rolled his neck as though preparing to fight. “You are a guest at this moment, Thurgood, and I’m a reverend who’s heard enough—”
“That’s really too bad, because despite what you’ve heard, I’ve not said enough,” Thurgood interrupted before swallowing hard. Then he lit into Leotis again, this time with a steady, lower-pitched voice and furrowed brow. “That simple but pretty woman child, Ima, is not your soul to save all willy-nilly. Anyone inside of God’s circle who’s called to preach and who stays prayed up oughta discern a hurt person when they see or hear one. Ima’s go around hurting other people because she’s been hurt, and I’m not talking about just recently, looking for love in all the wrong places and from all the wrong people. I’ve known Sasha Pray Onn and that bunch of scalawags she calls a family for as long as my cousin Betty has. That girl
Ima grew up in a world of hurt. It don’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that when you put a pretty flower in some manure, it’s either gonna be a gorgeous blossom or a stinky one, and in Ima’s case, she’s managed to be both.”
“I’ve done nothing to Ima!” His mind conveniently dismissed the way she’d kissed him quickly and where she’d placed her soft lips, and how much he’d liked it.
“Yeah, well, from where I’m perched”—Thurgood pointed his finger again at Leotis—“you ain’t done nothing for her, either.”
Leotis was determined to show that this was his home. He wouldn’t take insults in his own house without repercussions, so he walked quickly to his front door. He opened it and pointed toward the street, telling Thurgood, “I’m sure you know what this action means.”
“Sure I know what it means,” Thurgood replied. “It means you want this whole neighborhood to hear me yell how unholy you’ve been acting. You want everyone on this block to learn how your semi-immature womanizing has disrespected my cousin Betty’s relationship and God in the process.”
“You’re judging me! How are you going to stand here in my house and judge me with accusations that you know nothing about?” Leotis slammed the door and started toward Thurgood, stopping an arm’s length away. “You who spent years in and out of prison and used a gun to do your dirt before you claimed salvation has the nerve to judge me?”
“Listen here, Leotis. I’m talking to you man-to-man and not deacon to reverend. Let’s not get things twisted, and please don’t come all up in my face, talking crazy, just because I had permission to piss in your bathroom.” Thurgood moved aside, leaving Leotis with his mouth agape. “I’m just a man who tells it like it is.”
Chapter 23
Sister Betty Says I Do Page 23
