After the movies I should have run like Michael Johnson, but I couldn’t leave well enough alone. I had suggested we do dinner. We went to a Black-owned seafood restaurant that has some of the best shrimp creole I’ve ever had in Chicago. The first sign that dinner was also going to be adventure was when she asked the waiter if they had Red Bull in a can. At least she didn’t ask for a forty-ounce! I suggested a glass of wine and she agreed. I ordered a fried shrimp platter, and Chanel ordered the crab legs. While I was digging into the fries and cole slaw, I heard this loud crunching sound coming from across the table. When I looked up, I couldn’t believe my eyes. This woman had the entire crab leg in her mouth. I asked her how her food was, and she said, “Oh, it’s good, but these things sho’ are crunchy.” The waiter was pouring water in our glasses and looking at her like she was a fool, and I think he was going to show her how to use her utensils to eat the food, but I beat him to the punch by grabbing the crab cracker and saying in a very polite way, they might taste a little better if you use this. At least she smiled and said thank-you.
I hope this date and my reaction doesn’t mean that I’m becoming too much of a Buppie. I mean, I’m thinking that I am better than Chanel and that’s the reason I’m certain I won’t ever dial her number again. When I think about it, she was funny. I like my women a little rough around the edges, but this was a little too much for even me! I guess I’m looking for a happy-in-between kinda thing. Somebody who’s not stuck up and full of themselves like my ex, Kelli, but not as around the way as Chanel. Someone who knows what a forty-ounce is but can also appreciate a nice warm bath and the taste of fine wine.
Chapter 8
Sometimes my mouth gets me into trouble. My mother always used to say, “Yolanda, you talk too much.” Mama ain’t never lied!
There I was, enjoying a nice, leisurely lunch at Riley’s a couple of days ago, when she asked me a simple question: What was I working on? I mentioned the new record label I had signed the last time I was in New York. The company had a new male group, Goodfellaz, they thought were going to be big, and I had been contracted to pull together a showcase at Park West, one of the city’s top small concert venues. That’s when my mouth lost contact with my brain. I told Riley how much I was dreading having to listen to all the local Chicago talent in search of an opening act for the group.
Riley seized the moment. “You’re looking for an opening act? Please, please, Yolanda. Let me do it.”
The last of my mango sorbet refused to be swallowed. “Let you do what?” I croaked.
“Let me open for the group. Please, Yolanda, this is the big break I’ve been praying for. To perform at a place like Park West would be just too wonderful. I already have a set prepared. Please, Yolanda, please.”
“Riley, I don’t know. I think the record company wants a group,” I said weakly. The truth was, the record company had left it completely up to me, but letting Riley open would ensure that my first contract with this client would also be my last. I know I should have told Riley right then and there that I didn’t think she could handle it. But I didn’t want to hurt her feelings or risk losing her friendship.
While Riley ran off to find the tape of her latest singing session, I recalled her last public performance—Sally Turner’s funeral.
Sally Turner was one of our sorority sisters who had died suddenly from breast cancer. Now, I don’t do sad, fall-in-the-casket Black folks’ funerals, but the family had requested that Sally’s funeral be a true celebration of her life, so I agreed to tag along with Riley. It was a beautiful and joyous service, and I found myself feeling happy that I’d known Sally rather than sad about her death. That’s when the minister asked if anyone wanted to stand and share a personal anecdote or pay tribute to Sally. Several people got up and offered wonderful memories that brought out the Kleenex. Riley and I gently comforted each other as our sorors expressed our same feeling for Sally and her family.
One of the sisters, Olivia, who had appeared with the New York Metropolitan Opera, got up and sang a brief and beautiful aria. I felt the tiny hairs on my arm stand up as she hit her final note. She could blow! I mean, sister sang us slaphappy. That’s when Riley patted me on the knee and whispered, “I think I’ll sing a song.”
Dear God, not a song. A poem maybe, but not a song. “Are you sure you want to do that?” I asked gently.
“Yes, I think I’ll sing ‘Walk Around Heaven All Day.’ ” I was thinking we might all need a chorus of “Standing in the Need of Prayer.” I gripped her arm. “Riley, you don’t want to sing after Olivia, do you?” But Riley, the diva-in-waiting, had no fear. Next thing I knew, Riley was standing up next to me, singing a cappella.
She sounded like a frog on crack. Everyone was looking around in disbelief. The woman on my left was rocking back and forth, crying and laughing at the same time. “That’s okay, chile, let Him use you … let Him use you.”
People turned to look at me like it was my fault. Like I should just pull Miss Riley back to her seat. I could hear whispers and muted laughter all around us. But Riley heard nothing but her own voice. She couldn’t see the looks on the mourners’ faces because she was singing with her eyes closed. Her hands were clasped in a prayerful pose, her long neck arched and her head thrown back. When she mercifully finished, she bowed toward Sally’s shocked family as though she had just given a command performance for the queen. She even gave Olivia a take-that-diva look.
After the service, several sorors came over and whispered to me. “Is Riley all right?” “Is she on some kind of medication?” A few confided that it took everything they had not to burst out laughing. It was bad. Real bad. But the really sad thing was Riley didn’t have a clue.
“Just have them listen to this,” Riley said as she plopped a cassette down on the dining room table.
“Have who what?” I asked.
“Have whoever’s in charge listen to this tape. I pulled it together with a new producer I paid a lot of money to work with. Please, Yolanda. This is the break I need.” Riley sounded like a small child pleading for a special toy she wanted for Christmas. Did I look like Santa Claus to her?
“I’ll see what I can do,” I lied.
“Yolanda, I know if you just put in a good word for me, they’ll say yes. You’re the best friend in the world!” Riley gave me a big hug. I gave her a half-smile and slid the cassette into my purse. It’s been there ever since.
I called Leland as soon as I got home.
“I think you should tell her,” Leland said.
“Tell her she can’t sing?”
“If that’s how you feel.”
“How I feel? We all know Riley can’t carry a tune in a paper bag, let alone a bucket. I just don’t want to hurt her feelings. Riley is already so emotional, and now with her kids gone and Selwyn being Selwyn, she’s a little depressed. I guess I’m feeling sorry for her,” I said.
“Sorry enough to risk your reputation with a new client? Do we owe our friends that? Aren’t we getting too old for this? We sound like high school kids,” Leland said.
“I do hear what you’re saying, and deep down I don’t think I would ever allow Riley to sing. It would embarrass her and I’d be out of work. I guess what I’m asking you for is a way out. I mean, I could tell her that the record company turned her down, but it’s high time one of us told her the truth about her singing. I just don’t want to be the one to hurt her feelings. And I don’t think it’s high-schoolish to concern yourself with another person’s feelings. Especially someone you care a great deal about,” I said.
“Well, do we owe each other the truth? Or should we always say what we think our friends want to hear?” Leland asked.
“We should tell true friends the truth,” I said.
“Then why hasn’t one of us told Riley she can’t sing?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you consider Riley a true friend?”
“You know I love Riley,” I said.
“That’s not what
I asked. Do you consider Riley a true friend?”
“Is that my answer?”
“It might be, my friend. It might be.”
Chapter 9
“So, did my mama ask about me?”
“Now, Boo, what kinda fool question is that? Of course your mama asked about you. She’s your mama!” Uncle Doc said as he took a long drag on his cigarette. “Boo” was one of the many nicknames he called me, depending on the mood he was in. “Stinker,” my pet name from childhood, still meant Uncle Doc wasn’t pleased with something I did.
“I’m sorry now I didn’t go. How was it?”
“Chile, it was a hoot! A whole lot of food, drankin’, and cussin’.”
“No fights?” I asked.
“Not really. Well, almost. Yo aunt Mayline and cuzin Ruby Jean almost came to blows after they both made the same pineapple upside down cake. Ruby Jean said Mayline had stole her recipe just like she tried to take her husband. Some of your strong young cuzins had to keep them apart. Both of them had been drinkin’, you know.” Uncle Doc laughed. “I had me a few drinks too, and was feelin’ pretty good, so I kept yellin’ ‘turn ’em loose! Let them ole hussies fight!’ It would have been better than that tired ole talent show we keep having. When it’s my time to head the reunion, that talent show is the first thang to go. It’s history. I’m so sick and tired of little nappy-headed children trying to rap about plenty of nuthin’.”
Miss Thing’s Wings was quiet. Almost one in the morning. It had been closed for an hour before I stopped by to get something to take home and to get Uncle Doc’s report on the family reunion I had missed. I had no real excuse. The group had decided to take August off. Yolanda was spending a lot of time in New York, with work she said, and Riley had to take her twins to school. Dwight didn’t say what he was going to do, but he was in total agreement on taking August off. Our next meeting was scheduled for the first Sunday after Labor Day.
I had decided to forgo the reunion and meet up with a man. I was sorry that I had changed my mind, because the man had faked me out. I didn’t think Uncle Doc knew the real reason I had stayed in Chicago, even when everyone was trying to leave because of the Democratic Convention. But then he asked: “So, when are you going to learn that you don’t put trade before yo’ family? Haven’t you learned anything from me?”
“What are you talking about?” I asked, trying to sound innocent.
“Don’t try and pull that mess on me. I’m from the ol’ school. The last time we talked about the reunion, you was telling me to get a suite at the hotel so you could crash with me. I know it musta been some man that kept you here. But to be honest, I’m glad your ol’ rusty butt decided to stay. Gave me a chance to hang out with some of my girlfriends from the ol’ days.”
“You still have friends living in New Orleans?” I asked. What I really wanted to ask was how did he still have friends his age alive and kicking, when all my gay male friends were either dead or sick.
“Yeah, Boo. ’Bout three or four of my friends I used to run with when I was at Southern still livin’ ’round New Orleans. I think the good Lord done forgot them girls still down here, they so ol’. But don’t try and change the subject. Who was he?”
“Who was who?” Uncle Doc gave me one of those chile, please! looks.
But he was right. I had met this guy a couple of weeks before the reunion right there at Miss Thing’s Wings. I had stopped by late one night after one of the Democratic Convention parties in early August. I think it was the JFK, Jr., party. Lots of celebrities but hardly any food that I could get to. I spent time gawking at people like Kevin Costner and Juanita Jordan, Michael’s wife. Yolanda had invitations to all the major parties, and she invited me. I tried to get her to join me for some late-night wings, but she was expecting a call from John and wanted to get home. It didn’t matter that she had already talked to him at least three times on her cellular.
I was sitting at this exact same table I was now sharing with Uncle Doc, when this handsome hunk of a man came over and asked if he could share my table.
To make a long story a short one, Medgar Allen Douglas ended up at my apartment instead of at the Marriott. We had actually been at the same party. It was a wonderful night. The boy had a dick that could change your life. He told me he was an attorney, single and looking. I saw him two more times before he left for home. We made plans for him to return to Chicago the same weekend as my family reunion.
But Medgar didn’t show, didn’t call, and when I called him, I heard the number you have just dialed has been changed, at the customer’s request, the new number is not in my records. When I tried to page him, I discovered that his pager had been disconnected. I had stubbornly waited by the phone, praying that it would ring or that the doorman would buzz me from downstairs and tell me that Medgar was waiting for me in the lobby. But my phone never rang. The doorman never buzzed.
“Just some man,” I said nonchalantly.
“Some man? That ain’t what I heard,” Uncle Doc said with a snide little laugh.
“So what did you hear?”
“Now, Boo, you know that don’t nuthin’ go on in this place that I don’t hear about. Mavis and Thelma can’t hold water, let alone some good gossip. I hear he was a fine, tall thing. Did you give him some of that sweet potato pie of yours?”
“You dipping, Uncle,” I said, blushing.
“Well, I hope he was worth giving your family shade. I ain’t met no man like that in all my years. Family always comes first,” he said firmly.
“I know, Uncle Doc, but I didn’t think it would matter. I’ve missed the last three reunions, and no one seems to care.”
“Yeah, well, don’t blame that on some silly argument you had two years ago with yo’ mama. Who, by the way, was lookin’ good. I tell you, that ol’ Mattie could do an advertisement for good-Black-don’t-crack lotion!”
“You know, you ain’t got a bit of sense,” I said.
“And that’s the way I like it,” Uncle Doc said.
“Mama looked good, huh? Still wearing her hair in that French roll style?”
“Yes! Miss Mother looked real good. And let’s just say the French roll is lookin’ a little more French these days. Got her a man too. She had on those beautiful pearls you bought her for Mother’s Day. Guess we ain’t the only ones in the family that got pullin’ power,” he said. I knew my mother couldn’t out on those pearls without thinking about me. She had cried for days when I gave them to her.
“What? Mama got a boyfriend. Who is he?”
“I ain’t sayin’. But she seems quite taken, and he ain’t bad on the eyes neither. I think yo’ aunt Mayline was trying to make a play. Making sure his plate was full and askin’ him if he had any brothers still living. And, if not, did he have any sons!” Uncle Doc slapped his knee and laughed.
“Does he treat her nice?” I asked, trying to imagine my mother with another man besides Daddy. But Daddy has been dead almost ten years. It’s hard to believe it had been that long. Seems like only yesterday when my daddy died suddenly from a heart attack. The family was devastated, especially Uncle Doc, who was so proud of his older brother.
“Now, you know yo’ mama ain’t going to have it any other way. You could learn a thing or two from her.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You think I got to be this ol’ being stupid, Boo? I can tell from that face of yours that whoever you put in front of your family either didn’t show up or didn’t look as good as he looked the night he swept you outta here.”
“He didn’t show up,” I said sheepishly.
“I figured as much,” Uncle Doc replied. “Don’t tell me yo’ uncle can’t read you like the Bible.”
“How’s my brother, Dennis? Does he like Mama’s new friend?” I wanted to get Uncle Doc off me and back to my family.
“He was fine. He likes Andrew. That fool kept teasing me, callin’ me Uncle Pussy and rubbing his nose against mine like we some kinda Eskimos,” Uncle Doc
laughed.
“So he’s still a fool?” My older brother was a prankster from day one. Whenever he did something horrible to me, I couldn’t stay mad long, because he always had a joke that would make me laugh. When that didn’t work, he would resort to tickling.
“Still a fool.”
“Did you bring me back a T-shirt and some gumbo?” I asked. Our family always had great family reunion T-shirts. I still had some from ten years back. My favorite was Uncle Doc’s WE ARE FAMILY over a portrait of the year-before reunion.
“Maybe and maybe not. You’ll just have to wait and see how I feel the next time you drop by my place.” Uncle Doc smiled.
The group didn’t meet this month, and to tell the truth, Yolanda needs a break. I mean, with all the Democratic activities in Chicago during the usually mild month of August. Trying to stay one step in front of Mr. John Henderson can be more than one girl can stand. I needed some private time and some private thoughts for my own journal.
Last night I had one of the best dates of my life. Date—how silly does that sound at my age? But whatever I choose to call last night, wonderful and magical are the only two words to describe it. John asked me to trust him for twenty-four hours. When I asked him what he meant, he told me he had a special evening for me, but he couldn’t give me the details and all I needed was clothing for an overnight stay. When I asked where we were going, all he would say was it was a surprise. I told him, of course I trusted him—but I still called Leland and told him I was with John, so if I came up missing he’d know where to start looking! When he picked me up at my hotel, he came bearing gifts. Three very strange gifts. The first was a beautiful pair of silver crescent-shaped earrings, which he said was a clue concerning our outing. The second gift was a black silk mask which he told me I had to put on once we got inside the limo that was waiting downstairs. The final gift was a pair of earplugs. I like adventures, so I went along. About an hour later I knew that I was being led on a plane, destination unknown.
If This World Were Mine Page 9
