You Get What You Pray For

by E. N. Joy

  This time it was the pizza man. “Keep the change,” Unique told him after taking the pizza and giving him the twenty. “Mmmm. Smells good.” Unique rushed into the kitchen, making no eye contact at all. She grabbed a couple plates. “Looks like you’re in time.”

  Unique slapped a couple slices of pizza on each plate and carried them into the living room. She sat down on the tan tweed La-Z-Boy chair, which was across from the navy leather couch, while simultaneously placing the plates on the coffee table. She gobbled a bite, still making no eye contact.

  “Sit, sit.” She motioned at the couch with a hand. Good thing she used hand signals, because her mouth was so full, he wouldn’t have understood a word she was saying if she’d spoken.

  The second he sat, she stood, while biting off another huge hunk of pizza. She mumbled something that was unintelligible, then used her hand to lift an invisible glass to her mouth to signify that she was going to fetch something to drink. Once again, had she not demonstrated her intent, he would have had no idea what she was talking about, because her mouth was so full.

  Unique went into the small kitchen. The refrigerator, stove, and sink occupied most of the space, leaving room for only a two-seater table with an extension leaf, which she never used. The space was tight enough as it was. But Unique didn’t need much space. It was just her. She opened the fridge and pulled out two bottled waters. She made it halfway out of the kitchen before turning back around and exchanging the water for two cans of soda, figuring those would go much better with the pizza than some tasteless water.

  “Ahhh, here we go,” she said upon returning to her chair in the living room. She placed one soda can on the opposite side of the coffee table and the other in front of her. She opened the can and began to chug down the soda. Then she placed the can back down on the coffee table and wiped the soda that was dripping down the side of her mouth with the back of her hand. “Napkins!”

  She stood again, picking up her half-eaten slice of pizza as she did so.

  “Please!”

  The sound of his loud plea made Unique freeze in her tracks.

  “Please.” He lowered his tone this time. “Allow me.” He stood. He slowly walked toward the kitchen. Once there he stood in the small space and scanned it. This was his first time ever at Unique’s place, so he wasn’t familiar with where things were.

  From Unique’s vantage point, she could see him standing there and looking around, confused. “Over by the microwave.” She pointed. “There is a roll of paper towels.”

  His eyes landed on the microwave, which sat in a corner of the counter, and as Unique had stated, there was a roll of paper towels on a wooden holder next to it. He walked over, tore a couple paper towels off the roll, and then returned to the living room. He sat and handed Unique a paper towel, eyeing her the entire time.

  “Oh, thank you.” Her mouth was still full, but he could understand what she was saying this time.

  Unique took the paper towel, wiped her mouth, and then quickly finished off the crust of her first slice of pizza. She hadn’t even swallowed the last bite before she was picking up the second slice she’d placed on her plate. Her mouth was wide open, prepared to take a bite, when she felt a pair of eyes staring at her. She looked up over her pizza and locked eyes with him.

  “What? What’s wrong?” she asked, keeping the pizza near her mouth.

  “Oh, nothing,” he replied, leaning back with his arms spread-eagle on the couch. “Figured I’d wait for you to stop with your nervous antics, unless you really are that hungry and thirsty. Then we’ll talk about the nice, big elephant in the room.”

  “Elephant? I don’t know what you’re talking about. There’s no elephant.”

  “You’re right. There’s two. One’s called love, and the other’s called marriage, and you’ve managed to avoid them both. But not to worry. I booked a hotel around the corner.” He crossed his leg over his knee and snidely added, “So I’ve got all night.”

  Unique looked as though all of a sudden she’d lost her appetite. She laid the slice of pizza back down on the plate.

  “Go ahead. Eat up . . . before the elephant gets it.”

  “Sister Unique, have I told you how glad I am that you are back for good?” Paige said, kissing Unique on the cheek as they stood in the church vestibule.

  “Thank you, Sister Paige. I’m glad to be back.” She looked Paige up and down. “And you looking good . . . and after having two babies. Girl, you da bomb!”

  A huge smile covered Paige’s face, causing her dimples to swallow up her cheeks. Then, suddenly, the smile vanished into thin air. “What are you doing here?”

  Unique was baffled as to why Paige’s attitude had changed and her voice had gotten louder. A second ago she’d been expressing in this tender, loving voice how happy she was that Unique was back. Now she was yelling at her, asking her why she was even there.

  “Excuse me?” Unique said, being demure and keeping her cool, because she was genuinely confused about the sudden change in Paige’s attitude.

  Paige was looking past Unique at the church’s entrance. “Not you,” Paige said to Unique. “Him.” She pointed her index finger at the gentleman who had just entered the church.

  Unique turned around and recognized the man Paige was talking about. What was he doing there?

  The man spotted Unique and started walking toward her and Paige. He went to open his mouth to say something to Unique, but Paige stepped around and in front of Unique.

  “Why are you back here?” Paige asked. “I know the devil goes to church too, but—”

  “Paige . . .” Unique tried to calm her sister in Christ, but to no avail.

  “Did you think we wouldn’t recognize you? Humph! We’ll never forget the face of the man who tried to ruin our beloved church mother’s wedding,” Paige spat. “I thought we got all this settled the last time you were here.” Although it had been some years since she’d last seen the man, Paige would never forget his face, not after all the drama he had caused. “We ended things on a pretty decent note, so if I were you, I’d leave it that way and go on back where you came from.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said, looking from Unique to Paige, then back to Unique again. His eyes pleaded with Unique to jump in before Paige pounced on him again. “I uh, came to—”

  “To what? Interrupt another wedding?” Paige interrupted him. “Well, there are no weddings going on here today, buddy, so you’ve wasted a trip.”

  The last time Paige had seen this man was back when Mother Doreen was about to say “I do.” This joker had had the nerve to jump up and talk about how he had reasons why she and her soon-to-be husband shouldn’t be married.

  “I have a very good reason why no man in his right mind should marry that woman,” were the exact words he’d uttered as he pointed at Mother Doreen. It was awful. No one had any idea why this stranger would show up and ruin one of the best days in the life of the church mother of New Day Temple of Faith.

  They would all soon find out, though, that he was the son of the mistress of Mother Doreen’s husband from years ago. He had actually been conceived as a result of the affair and thus had turned out to be Mother Doreen’s deceased husband’s son. He had blamed Mother Doreen for his mother’s mental state and for the fact that she had had to live for years in a nursing home after the devastation she suffered at Mother Doreen’s hands . . . literally.

  When Mother Doreen had caught his mother and her husband, Willie, in a hotel room together many years prior, she’d jumped on the woman and beaten her to a bloody pulp. Mother Doreen hadn’t realized that the mistress was pregnant until it was too late. The baby died, and Mother Doreen served time in jail. All the while Willie continued the affair. Mother Doreen serving a jail sentence wasn’t enough punishment in the opinion of the son whom the mistress would later give birth to, the son of Mother Doreen’s first husband, the son who was now standing in front of Paige and Unique. He’d wanted to sentence Mother Doreen to the same life o
f misery and loneliness that his mother was enduring, therefore destroying her chances of living happily ever after.

  He’d caused such an uproar that day in the church that the women wanted to bash him upside his head with their bouquets. Unique, sure enough, practically had to be held back to prevent her from clocking him. Mother Doreen, always the peacemaker, hadn’t blamed him for his actions. She’d apologized to him and asked that he take her to his mother in West Virginia so that she could give her, too, a long overdue apology. Reluctantly, he did so, and Mother Doreen was able to get the forgiveness she sought. After seeing the positive effect her encounter with Mother Doreen had had on his mother, he was able to let it go and forgive Mother Doreen as well. He also apologized to Mother Doreen for interrupting her wedding. Mother Doreen forgave him, returned to Malvonia, and proceeded with her wedding . . . all in one day.

  As far as Paige was concerned, just because Mother Doreen had forgiven him didn’t mean they had to keep company with him.

  “No, I’m not here to interrupt another wedding,” he said to Paige. He then looked at Unique. “But if I’m lucky, I’ll be here having a wedding of my own.”

  All of a sudden Paige felt as if she was missing something. He and Unique were staring at each other, all starry-eyed. The two looked like long-lost lovers and were acting as if no one else was in the room except the two of them. Finally, Paige began to put two and two together.

  “Hold up.” She looked at him. “You live in West Virginia, right?”

  He nodded, not taking his eyes off of Unique.

  Paige turned to Unique. “And you were in West Virginia for some months.” She didn’t move her head once as her eyes darted back and forth between the two of them. “Wait a minute. Don’t tell me that while you were in West Virginia, you two . . .” Now she was talking solely to Unique. “No way.” She shook her head.

  He cleared his throat. “Go ahead, Unique. Tell her.”

  Unique put her head down.

  “Yeah, go ahead, Unique. Tell me,” Paige said to Unique sternly, her hand on her hip and her foot tapping impatiently.

  Unique was tired of being judged for the decisions she’d made in her life. It always seemed like someone was looking down on her for the choices she’d made. But she’d made a commitment to herself—one that she was trying to keep—that she would never let what other people thought about her keep her from doing what she thought was right for herself. She looked up at the man she’d fallen in love with. Her eyes lit up as a smile spread across her face. If loving him was wrong, no way did she want to be right.

  “Yes,” Unique said with confidence, pride, and authority. “Yes, Sister Paige, we did connect while I was in West Virginia. We’ve been seeing each other and . . .” Unique lost her courage for a moment but then found it. “And last night he proposed to me.”

  After he was finally able to get Unique to stop stuffing her face with pizza and soda, he’d put his feelings on the table, letting Unique know he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her as her husband. Unique hadn’t answered him at the time, because thoughts of what others might think were taunting her.

  Paige stood there, listening in awe.

  But right now, as Unique considered the way this man had come into the church and declared his love for her once again, she knew she had made up her mind. “And this morning I’m accepting his proposal.”

  His eyes lit up in surprise. Last night, when she told him she had to think about it, he’d feared she was going to try to come up with the words to let him down gently. Well, obviously, she was done thinking about it. His fears, which had had him tossing and turning all night, nearly regretting having worn his heart on his sleeve, had been in vain.

  Unique walked over to him, looked him in the eyes, and said, “About last night . . . about what you asked me. In case you need me to spell it out, the answer is yes. Yes, Terrance Casinoff, I will marry you!”

  Chapter 15

  Unique and Terrance sat side by side, hand in hand, in church. They were all smiles the entire time. After service the word spread about their engagement, and the couple was congratulated several times before they even exited the church doors. It pleased Unique to know that people seemed to be genuinely happy for her, but even if they weren’t, she was still elated by her pending nuptials.

  No, she hadn’t been dating Terrance for more than six months. She hadn’t even bumped into him in West Virginia until she’d been there for over a month. She’d literally bumped into him. She was taking his mother, who was a patient at the facility, her lunch one Saturday afternoon. He was leaving his mother’s room after one of his afternoon visits. After opening the door, he remembered something he needed to tell his mother and turned back around to talk with her. After saying what he needed to say, he quickly spun back around and proceeded to walk away, not realizing Unique had walked up behind him. They bumped into each other, and the lunch tray she had in her hands went crashing to the floor.

  Unique looked down at the floor where Ms. Casinoff’s food lay. “Really?” Unique spat without even looking up. She had been having a bad day. Earlier she’d caught one patient’s relatives eating up all his food, so she had waited for them to leave and then had taken the patient another tray of food. Now, for the second time that day, she’d have to fix a patient another tray of food. And the fact that it was that time of the month and she was cramping something awful only magnified things.

  “I’m sorry,” said the culprit responsible for the lunch tray being on the floor.

  “You’re sorry, and blind is what you are,” Unique said without thinking. She’d been able to exercise self-control until now. She bent down and began picking up the mess. She still wore the plastic gloves all the kitchen workers used to cover their hands when around food. As she placed the food on the tray, it took only a few seconds for her to start feeling guilty for speaking such venom. It was an accident, one that she herself could have easily caused. She had no right to take her crappy day out on this man.

  The man bent down to help her. That was kind of him. Even though he was the one responsible for the mess, after the way Unique had just spoken to him, she could understand if he left her there to fend for herself. So now she felt that she was the one who owed an apology.

  “I’m sorry,” Unique said as she reached for the milk carton. He reached for the milk carton a split second later, so his hand landed atop of hers. “Oh,” she said at his touch and then looked up.

  The two locked eyes and immediately fireworks went off . . . or more like grenades.

  “You!” they both shouted at each other, shooting each other vicious looks.

  Unique looked down at his hand, which was still touching hers. He looked down and then immediately snatched his hand off of hers. They both stood up straight like sharp swords, ready to cut one another to pieces.

  When Unique first drove down to the facility in West Virginia with Mother Doreen, she knew it only as the place where Terrance’s mother was a resident during Mother Doreen’s wedding fiasco. Unique didn’t go inside with Mother Doreen to visit Terrance’s mother, and when she returned later to the facility, she remembered only the outside. She had no idea who Terrance’s mother was or if she still resided at the facility.

  Brookside Residence was a little bit of everything: a nursing home, an assisted-living facility, a mental health care facility. They didn’t discriminate against anyone and tried to meet the needs of all their elderly patients. Since doctors and nurses were available twenty-four hours a day, some would even call it a hospital too. Brookside had really taken care of Ms. Casinoff. It had become like her home. So even when her health improved tremendously over time, compared to how it was when she was initially admitted, with Terrance always traveling out of town as an auditor, both he and his mother were 100 percent in favor of her utilizing their assisted-living facility. The staff was like family, and in the short period of time Unique had worked there, she’d become like family to Ms. Casinoff as well. But w
hen she had that first encounter with Terrance years ago back at New Day, he was far from family. He wasn’t even a friend. He was a foe if she’d ever had one.

  “I remember you,” Terrance said to Unique. “You’re that fresh-mouthed ghetto girl from Malvonia.”

  “And I remember you too,” Unique spat back. “You’re that tight-tail, wedding-ruining revenge seeker who tried to wreak havoc in Mother Doreen’s life.”

  “What are you even doing here?” he asked Unique, looking her up and down like she belonged in a doghouse somewhere. After all, she did remind him of a feisty puppy.

  “What’s it look like I’m doing?” Unique replied. “I’m doing what I’ve been doing for the past month. I’m bringing your mother her food.”

  “Oh, Lord. Rhoda at the front desk told me they had a new company servicing the kitchen, but I had no idea . . .” His words trailed off, and then a look of horror crossed his face. “My mother is eating your cooking? Hopefully, no desserts with powdered sugar on them. I’ve heard of that little trick.”

  Was this man really insinuating that Unique would sprinkle some kind of rat poison powder on the desserts instead of powdered sugar? Unique took great offense. “You . . .” She had to catch herself from calling him a name that would make even the devil blush. “You are lucky that I’m saved.”

  “No, you’re lucky, because Jesus is probably the only man who would ever know how to deal with you, anyhow.”

  “Oh yeah?” Unique said, throwing her hands on her hips. “And what makes you think I don’t already have a man?”

  “Because your lips are moving. That alone will send any man packing. You’re as beautiful as can be, but then you open that mouth, and your beauty is only skin deep, for sure, because your surface is pretty bland.”

  Although his intention was to insult her, Unique wasn’t the least bit insulted. She did not miss the fact that he’d complimented her by calling her beautiful. This was the first time in Unique’s life that a man had called her beautiful without trying to get down her pants. This man had said it out of anger. He could have called her the bad B word, but instead he’d chosen the other B word, the one that no woman minded being called—beautiful.