She stopped smiling. “Is this your bench? I thought it blonged to the bus company.”
“It’s in front of my place of business and I been seein you out here and wondered what a nice-lookin lady like you would be doin down in this part of town if she didn’t have no business here.”
LaMarie looked away. “Maybe I do have business here.”
“I ain’t seen you do none. What you lookin for? What you waitin for?”
“I don’t think that’s any of your business. I’ll tend to my business and you tend to yours.”
“Lady, I don’t want to see nothin bad happen to you and you in a mighty good place for that to happen!”
“Don’t you worry bout me.”
C.C. took his foot down from the bench. “Somebody better.”
“I’m a grown woman. I can …”
He interrupted her. “Anybody can be a fool. Even a grown woman. Stay way from down here. Stay home where you blong.” The bus just happened along at that time. LaMarie got up in a bit of a huff, threw her nose up in the air (to show the nosy man she wasn’t payin him no mind) and got on the bus. He started toward his shop, lookin back a last time. He saw LaMarie lookin through the window at him with a ugly frown and she even had her tongue stuck out at him, but she snatched that back in when she saw him lookin at her and stuck her nose up in the air again as the bus pulled off.
She stayed home for awhile, but after about two weeks LaMarie started goin down there again. About another month passed with her goin down there. One night she was waitin for the bus to go home and C.C. was lockin up the store early. He got in his car and drove slowly to the bus stop … and stopped. He leaned over to the window, said to LaMarie, “Hop in, I’ll drive you home.”
LaMarie shook her head no and said, “Thank you.”
He replied, “I said get in. I want to talk a little business with you.”
This time she said, “No. Thank you.”
He raised his voice a little. “Well, what you out here for? Are you a fool? Get in, you’ll be safe. I own that store over there you always see me in. I don’t want no trade for myself, so I’m not gonna hurt you, and you goin home anyway.”
She turned to look at the storefront then back at him and shook her head slowly, no.
C.C. got out of his car, walked around and opened the car door sayin, “Get in this car. Do I look like a fool? A killer? Don’t make me look like a fool in front of all these people. They see me askin you to get in. So, get in! I will drive you home.”
And LaMarie did.
The car was big, nice and warm and smelled good. She looked at C.C. out of the corner of her eye. What LaMarie saw was a man who needed a shave, with a beat-out hat on. His clothes were good clothes, but they needed cleanin or pressin. She looked down and saw his shoes were good … and shined like new money used to look. But, he was not her type, she thought to herself.
He asked, “What is your name?”
She answered, “LaMarie.”
He already knew how she looked so he concentrated on drivin after she told him her address.
When they got to her house (The car took up the whole space in front of her house. Ms. Winch looked out the window when she heard a car parkin. Her eyes grew big as the car, I know.), he finished parkin and she started to jump out, but he took her arm and held her in. She tried to wriggle free, and he said, “Be still. Act like you a lady.” She sat back to wait a minute.
Then he got out, walked around and opened her door.
She said, “Thank you. Good night.”
But C.C. wasn’t through. “I’m walkin you to your door.”
He did, but when she opened the door and turned to say, “good night” again, he pushed past her into the house. (I was watchin out my window and I saw it.)
C.C. looked around at everything in the house. Walked through the house and came back to the living room and, finally, the front door. She had been followin him, tellin him, “Get out of my house, you don’t have no right to do what you are doin.” Stuff like that.
He looked down at her. “This your home?”
“Yes, now leave.”
“You rentin or buyin?”
“I own this house. Now, please leave.”
C.C. leaned against the door. “Where is your husband? Dead?”
“Yes, now please leave.”
C.C. crossed his arms over his chest. “What you doin on that street all the time?”
LaMarie was exasperated. “None of your business. Now go.”
“How long your husband been dead?”
“Almost a year. Will you please go?”
His voice softened, “You lonely out here, ain’t you?”
LaMarie felt like cryin. “No! Yes! You better leave here now. I will call the police.”
But he still wasn’t through. He took off his coat and reached for her. It was so quick she didn’t realize what was happenin, but she looked up and she was cross his lap and her dress was up and her drawers were down and he was whippin her behind … good! (I know it cause I was standin outside the window and heard it all. She was my friend, I went to see bout her!) I was bout to go in and help her when he stopped whippin her and said, “You keep your ass away from those streets! Every time I catch you down there I’m goin to whip your behind again, til you get sick of me. It ain’t no plaything out there! It’s dangerous! Anything can happen to you. You been lucky! But the better they get to know you, and know you alone, the more things gonna happen to you!”
LaMarie was cryin from anger and indignation, and embarrassed too, with her drawers down round her ankles. She had on a wig this night and it had done fell off. Her makeup was runnin, smeared. She screamed, “Get out of my house! I mean it!”
C.C. opened the door as he turned to her. “Look at all that stuff runnin all over you face. You don’t need all that shit! You don’t need that hair layin on the floor over there either. You don’t preciate what you got! I’m leavin, but I don’t want to have to bring you home off them streets again. Now. Good night!” That big car engine made a big smooth noise and he was gone.
I know LaMarie sniffled and stayed mad for awhile. I hadn’t tried to stop him because he was tellin her the truth, what I wished she would do. I went on home cause she really didn’t need me. I waited for the next episode.
Next day LaMarie talked about how “He didn’t scare me. I’ll do whatever I want to do! I’m grown!” All such stuff as that. Her pride was hurt. But she didn’t go down to them streets for three or four weeks. Then she took to blivin her own words and one night she got dressed up and went. She was back home in about two hours though and she was mad. Seems like he just came up to her with his hand on his hip and looked at her til she got on the bus and left. When I saw her and she told me, she said, “I don’t have to take that! This a free country!”
“Sometimes,” I said.
Bout a week later, I was lookin out the window when C.C.’s car drove up and parked. He sat there a minute, then got out and went to LaMarie’s door. She opened it, then tried to close it, but he went on in anyway. I noticed his clothes looked better this time. I saw Ms. Winch rush out to work in her yard on that side of her house where she could see better. (I went over to sit on LaMarie’s porch, so I could hear if she needs me.) I couldn’t hear it all, but she was hollerin at first.
“Why you comin to my house? I haven’t been down there near your place! You don’t need to watch me! I’m a grooooown woman!” You know, stuff such as that.
I couldn’t hear him cause he was talkin in his normal low voice. But she told me later he said, “I know you lonely over here by yourself. Ain’t you got no friends?” LaMarie didn’t answer. So he continued to talk. “I came to take you for a drive.”
In a little lower voice, LaMarie asked, “Why?”
His voice came up a little, “Now listen, I ain’t lookin for no woman. I am fifty-two years old and I ain’t never been married and ain’t neither plannin on ever bein married. I ain’t never wanted
no trouble and from what I have seen, that’s all a woman is. But I will take you for a ride. It’s a nice day and all. I have put on a suit. My car ain’t too clean, but a ride ain’t gonna do nothin but get it dirty again anyway. So? Let’s go.”
LaMarie wanted to tell him “No! Get out of my house and don’t come back here again!” But she WAS lonely. So she got dressed while he had a cup of coffee and a piece of homemade cake, then they went out, going for a drive. (I ran off the porch.) Later, she told me, “I had a good time, but it wasn’t anything special.”
I could see how some of LaMarie’s plan was workin out. LaMarie was a live woman and she was makin life know it. Now my husband and I been married bout thirty-two years and we used to each other and romance ain’t dead, but it lays over to the side a lot. I decided to go to the beauty shop and do somethin with myself. I know one thing, the next day, I met Ms. Winch at the beauty shop. We was both gettin our hair done.
Bout seven or eight days later, C.C. came back. Had a package in his hand when he went to the door this time. Flowers. They went for another drive, she said, then to dinner! and to a show! “We just friends, but I like him now. He ain’t bad lookin. But he’s never gonna get married and I ain’t never gonna lay my body down side of his cause he really will think I’m too lonely and a hard-up fool on top of that.”
Well, it got so that every time I looked up, he was there at her house at lunchtime. He wasn’t lookin for nothin free cause he always came with a armload of grocery bags. When I would see her, she would tell me what I wanted to know. “We still ain’t done nothin though. I’m too old to be a fool.” I just looked at her, cause there’s a fool on both ends of that stick.
He took her by his house one evenin. His apartment. LaMarie said it was neat and clean, small, but comfortable. “You could tell a woman didn’t have no part in it. But I do think he needs a woman.” I waited for her to tell me they hadn’t done nothin yet, but she didn’t say nothin.
Next day, I went down and bought me some fashion books and the next day after that I went and bought me a few nice clothes. Kinda stylish, but still not to look like I was tryin to catch nobody else. Just to put a little life back in my husband. I was pleased when my husband smiled at me and said, “You should buy more nice things, honey, I like to see you lookin good.” After that, I bought a new bedspread and some fancy, modern sheets with rainbows on em.
I just happen to see Ms. Winch comin out in a few new dresses to go with her new hairstyle on her way to church … or somewhere.
Well, you know I had to notice C.C. when he started comin by after he closed his store. He started out walkin casual and slow to get up to her door. Then he started jumpin out the car and kinda hopped to it, gettin there. When I would see LaMarie she was always lookin better. Skin glowin, her own hair lookin pretty. Casual, but done and all. Eyes so bright. She looked happy. She worked in the yard more. Had the inside of the house painted again, to look more like a home than a harem.
I saw a truck come by and pick up her kinda new twin beds. Then I saw another truck come by and deliver a new queen-size bed. She led em in, showin them the way and where to put it. She was smilin, big, big, big.
Now, I was lookin better. And I noticed Ms. Winch was smilin more now, didn’t look so grumpty all the time. Sometimes we went to the same church and my friends told me Ms. Winch was lookin better and better and was gettin a little attention from some of them old, old men in the church. Said she was comin to the Bingo games. Ms. Winch herself told me that she was goin down to the YWCA for senior citizen exercise classes. Said, “And I ain’t no fool for doin it, cause I feel better. I feel like a million!”
Then … LaMarie told me her and C.C. were thinkin about gettin married. She said, “I know he don’t have nothin but that little apartment and that store he rents where they do gamblin in the back. But he is … he’s excitin, I guess. To me. We talk about everything under the sun. Spencer didn’t talk bout nothin but the news and medicine. C.C. reads. He got me readin more different kinds of books.” She leaned closer. “Even some of them books with dirty pictures.” She leaned back and laughed. When she was settled down, she said, “He likes my cookin and I like his. But he likes to go out to breakfast and dinner and lunch a lot too. He likes to search out interestin things, right here in this city, that I never thought of. He spends his money, always bringin me somethin.” She looked sad a moment, then said, “Spencer never did that, cept on a anniversary or somethin for both of us that we needed.” Then she smiled again. “Me and C.C. play gin rummy … and checkers, when we sit up in the bed. And if I talk about somethin foolish I want to do, like go around the world, he don’t try to kill my dreams. He just lets me have em and gives me a book on some place excitin to go to. He almost a rainbow.”
I didn’t dare compare him to my husband, cause I knew my husband did the best he could and he had made me happy. Maybe it was me that never gave him any new ideas. Maybe we had worn out all the old ones and settled now for grandchildren and a show now and then. If my marriage was not so excitin, it was as much my fault as my husband’s, cause he sure was a good husband and tried to make me happy. I know that.
Another time, LaMarie said, “He ain’t never had a home, I bet. A real one. His mama died and his daddy left him with a girlfriend and never came back. He stayed there til he was twelve, then he set out on his own cause the woman kept tellin him there wasn’t no blood between them. He been alone ever since. No wife. No children that he know of.”
One night, when we were havin a glass of wine together, she smiled that great big smile and said, “Retha, there is more to makin love than I ever knew, girl. He makes love to my whole body. Nothin weird, nothin freakish, just lovin. Slow, good, gentle, sweet, sweet (she closed her eyes), deep lovin. I was lookin to find out about a climax. Sometimes I have two. Two! in one night. (She opened her eyes.) But still, he is more than just that. That ain’t just only why I love him. I’m happy. I’m just all around happy.”
I smiled, cause I know what she means. I asked, “What’s your last name gonna be when you get married, Miss LaMarie?”
She smiled like she had a secret. She said, “His name is Ryder. C.C. Ryder.” She laughed a very deep, sexy, feminine laugh. “I got me a C.C. Ryder, chile!”
Well, you know they got married. And you know what? C.C. didn’t own no property, but he had saved his money. He told LaMarie, “You got a home, so we got a home. We both got cars. I got a business, so we got a business. We gonna take the money I have saved and go see the world and we gonna take our room and board with us, cause I’m too old to be worried with carryin suitcases and lookin for the right place to eat. We travelin on a ship, a ocean liner. First class!”
They went on a round-the-world trip!! Three month honeymoon! A rich man couldn’t a done more. The chile, the woman, was happy! And so was the man! He finally found somethin he could spend his money on, someone he trusted, someone he wanted to live the rest of his life with. That’s heavy!
They came back full of love and life and all the interestin and wonderful things they had seen. My husband and I love our presents from Africa and Greece. Then C.C. went back to work and LaMarie went back to keepin the house up, which she liked to do cause she loved a home. They lived together happily.
Ms. Winch still didn’t find no man. She said she didn’t see none she wanted. She had plenty company though. Men and women, cause she had made lots of new friends that needed friends too! You have to keep makin them regular, cause the older ones die and leave you.
C.C. Ryder and LaMarie went on with their travelin and homemakin for about twelve, fifteen years. I’m not sure cause we were all older and different problems take your attention. I know, as C.C. got older, they traveled less and he would take that money and buy LaMarie a little duplex or fourplex to bring her in a little income cause he was goin to sell that store-gamblin business. He said, “I don’t want Marie to have to go nowhere near down them dirty streets!” She didn’t care. Whatever that man C.C.
did was alright with her. He had done made her happy.
He must have known he was sick a long time, why he was takin care of what to leave Marie, as he called her. (He didn’t like the “La” much.)
Then, C.C. Ryder died. It broke LaMarie’s heart and her life for a long, long time. She kept cryin, sayin, “C.C. Ryder look what you done done.” She played that record all the time.
She was in her late fifties or early sixties now. I don’t remember no more. She looked good cause she was healthy and she had been happy. After two or three months I asked her, as a joke, “Well, you goin on down to them streets again? Find you another husband?” I laughed a little.
LaMarie smiled. “No. I have had the best of two different worlds. A good man who left me secure in my house, even though the rest of my life with him was bare. And a good, good man who showed me the world in more ways than one. Loved me so good he took care me for after he died. He taught me about life. He built me a rainbow and we flew over it. I really know that. I got my rainbow. I don’t want nobody else to touch me. Don’t nobody want to anyway.”
LaMarie slowly poured us a little glass of Dubonnet wine again, in some pretty little glasses. We was older now, it don’t take much. And we was both takin medicine now for high blood pressure and such and we had to watch those things, but whats the hell?
She commence to talkin again after she lowered herself back into her chair. “He left me so many memories, I can coast on them forever. I’m doin alright. I’m satisfied.” She tilted her head and smiled. “And to think he tried to keep me from comin down there! If I hadn’t never gone down there, I never would have met him! Look what I’d a missed! I went down there, but I prayed a lot. I ain’t sayin God found me no husband, but maybe God said, ‘Let me get this fool out of this place fore somethin bad happens to her.’ Cause when I think back on it now, I realize I could have been in serious trouble down there by myself. Wasn’t but one good thing down there, and I got it!” We laughed and finished our wine in silence, just listenin to that low music to “C.C. Ryder, look what you done done.”
Some Love, Some Pain, Sometime Page 6
