Between Brothers

by C. Kelly Robinson

  Larry knew Mark was right. Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough to keep his father’s genes from taking over. Larry senior had raised him to take no prisoners in life. Who the hell did Kwame think he was? Those rumors he’d heard about Kwame’s hopes of being selected as Winburn’s vice president must have had some truth in them. Damn! Bounding to the lectern, Larry could feel his sense of restraint and calculation shed like a snake skin.

  “Kwame, whoever put you up to that diatribe should be disqualified from this race.” His eyes flashing with fire, he shot an ugly glare at Winburn, letting the accusation sink in. Winburn leaned forward in his seat and blinked back innocently.

  “Anyone who knows anything knows that Larry Whitaker is not motivated by money. For God’s sake, people, you know my background. If I was in this for the money, I’d have dropped out a long time ago. I can get thousands of dollars whenever I need them; why would I take seven hundred bucks from a nonprofit, broke community center? This is a joke. I don’t owe one damn explanation to anybody!” A collective gasp rose from the floor in response to the first four-letter word of the evening.

  His eyes still smoldering, Larry stepped back from the lectern. His mind an angry blaze, he stormed to the table and grabbed up Mark’s manila envelope. “Ladies and gentlemen, I didn’t want to have to do this, but I fear the dirt that is being thrown now leaves me no choice. I have in my hand copies of correspondence between Mr. Winburn and a member of the Highland board of trustees, in which he promises”—Larry paused, shocked to hear himself floundering after the appropriate words to finish his accusations. He realized for the first time that he had failed to review the memos, and the exact way to frame the issue, since going over it with Mark Saturday. He’d hoped he’d never need to use the memos, and now he remembered why. What did a memo really prove? How the hell could he make this argument? “—Well, in short, your undergraduate trustee agreed to limit his activism on the board, in return for favorable treatment by the board . . .”

  Continuing to grasp for words to authenticate his accusations, Larry felt himself losing the balance he had maintained so well all night. After rambling on for what felt like five minutes, he pushed himself to close on a strong note. “In short, don’t think you can question my integrity without looking at all of my opponents in the same light. I will refute—”

  “Mr. Whitaker.” From the wings of the stage, Courtney’s mellow voice startled him. “Your time has expired.”

  As Winburn’s supporters cackled shamelessly at Larry’s inept defense, he trudged to his seat, refusing to meet either of his opponents’ eyes.

  The speakout was over before Larry regained full awareness of his surroundings. As the auditorium began to empty, he pretended to review his debate notes. His mind was heavy with thoughts of revenge. Kwame would get his, but Larry knew he was just a pawn. He would have to tie this to Winburn, and nail him for it. No one so crooked deserved to hold office at his beloved Highland.

  “Nothing to be gained by rehashing the evening.” Mark stood in front of Larry’s microphone, flanked by Janis and several other campaign workers, including Brandon and Terence.

  Larry looked up at his friends wearily. “You’re right, Mark. Listen, everybody, you all did a great job gettin’ us this far. I know we hit a rough patch tonight, but we can come through it. Hope to see you all at our next meeting. We’ll lick this yet!” Larry told himself he really believed that.

  As his entourage began to disperse, Terence jumped onto the stage and leaned over the table. “Something real foul is up, man. We gon’ have to get to the bottom of it. Anyone who would use the center for political gain deserves to be strung up.”

  “We’ll get ’em, brother. You guys get out of here. I’ll be all right for tonight. I’m gonna have a war room session with Mark and Janis, so we can undo this damage. We’ll rap tomorrow.”

  “All right, I’ll let Brandon and O. J. know. Hang tough, Big Dog.”

  Larry flashed a smile he did not feel. “You know I always do.”

  Mark placed a supportive hand on his partner’s shoulder as he removed his car keys from his pants pocket. “Larry, I’m gonna go walk Janis to her car, then we’ll pull around front and meet you, all right? We’ll all get some pizzas and hole up at my place for the night. Ashley comin’?”

  The simple fact that Mark had to ask told Larry all he needed to know. “I’ll talk to her. If she’s coming, she’ll be with me when you pull around.” The men slapped high fives, and Mark leaped off the stage and began to shepherd Janis toward the front entrance.

  “Well, congratulations.” Now that the stage had cleared and the overhead lights were being flipped off one by one, Ashley emerged from the shadows behind him, her arms crossed ominously. The cold stare that met Larry’s eyes was exactly the opposite of what he needed at that moment. “A stellar performance, Mr. Whitaker. You sure as hell got my vote.”

  “You know, Ash, I don’t need this right now. If I want somebody to trample on me, I can always call up Win-burn, Kwame, maybe even your uppity father. I don’t need the woman who claims to love me piling on.”

  “Oh, the woman who claims to love you, that’s all I am now, is it?” The hand was on the hip once again, a routine sight for Larry in recent days.

  “Dammit, Ashley, why don’t you just come out and say verbally what your body is already tellin’ me? I know you don’t expect me of all people to sit here and take your mess like some whipping boy. You send me a message like you’re sendin’ now, you’re gonna get a smart-ass comment, know that.”

  Crossing her arms, Ashley inched closer to the table. “Larry, chill out, okay? I just don’t believe in condoning failure. There was no reason for you to lose your cool like that tonight. Do you know how much that frightens me, how ghetto you sounded when you lost it like that? I need a man who can guarantee me success in life, Larry. Not just another black man who comes undone, or puts himself into an early grave, because he can’t control his temper. I don’t have time for that.”

  Larry felt his teeth grind, and his eyes open wide in shock. “You’re kidding me, right? My personal crisis doesn’t even register to you, does it? This is just another criterion on which to judge me, isn’t it? I don’t believe this! I got news for you, Ashley. Not everybody can live life as coldly as you do. Some of us believe in concepts like unconditional love. I guess your parents forgot to include that lesson when they were buying your Porsche and setting up your trust fund! Do me a favor, and highstep out of here right now, before this evening ends on an even more dramatic note.”

  Her eyes burning a hole through him, Ashley turned and began to descend the steps leading to the main floor. “Larry, you like to make me the villain. Fine. Maybe it’s time you see how you like it when I allow men with more to offer to step to me. There’s plenty of them, you know. You know how to reach me when you’re ready to come at me with some respect.”

  Angrily watching his lady whip her statuesque frame up the center aisle, Larry couldn’t keep himself from replaying their most recent romantic interlude in the shower, just last night. Even when they were on the outs like this, they could do things to each other no one else seemed able to. But in spite of that and the many other perks that came with having Ashley Blasingame as your woman, it was time to admit this relationship was in need of major repairs.

  For a moment he departed the reality of his surroundings and saw himself standing on Highland’s main yard with his father, on the day his parents had dropped him off to begin his freshman year. Larry senior had pulled him aside and instructed him on the type of woman he should date.

  “See, son, that’s what you need,” he had said at the sight of every redbone who walked past. “You want a woman who will make your competitors, be they in business or politics, envy you. Understand me? Envy. Your woman’s appearance says more about you than anything else in your life. If your wife’s tore up, people assume you’re a settler, and nobody who plays to win likes a settler. They want a winner!” He ha
d paused to put Larry through a quick test run as a short, hippy honey with finger waves and a hickory complexion sashayed past. “Would you sport that in public? Don’t disappoint me now.”

  Larry, of course, had already known the drill, even back then. “Well, Pop, she’s cute, and her color’s right—you know, she could pass the brown-bag test. But there’s two problems. Her hair’s too short to make any white man jealous, and her figure’s a bit too sisterly. Big butts don’t make the best display at those corporate gatherings.”

  “Damn straight.” Larry senior had patted Larry on the back like a pleased professor. “Done taught my boy well.”

  Wiping his eyes and clearing his mind, Larry shook his head violently. What had following his father’s advice gotten him? A gorgeous girlfriend who didn’t care about anything but herself. Why couldn’t Ashley be like other women on campus, those who were passionate about causes and looked out for the little guy? Girls like Sheila Evans, for instance. Sheila Evans? Why was she in his thoughts again? Once more Larry reminded himself: she didn’t fit the Whitaker profile. And she’d never make a white man green with envy.

  Squaring his jaw, Larry reminded himself of the more immediate crises he now faced. He decided not to worry about Ashley’s little threat; she’d be there after the election, if he decided to fight for the relationship. Right now he was more obsessed with David Winburn and Kwame Wilson than anyone else. Throwing his suit jacket over his shoulder, he stood and headed out to meet Mark and Janis.

  Who needed a freakin’ love life anyway?

  CHAPTER 21

  . . . . . . . . . . . .

  MIND GAMES

  It had been two long months since Keesa Bishop had moved into the one-room efficiency apartment near UDC’s campus. Located on the top floor of a three-story house split into six miniature living units for financially strapped boarders, the room didn’t make for much of a home. The beige paint on the walls, probably first applied in the early seventies, had peeled off in several large patches, revealing the gummy white surface beneath.

  Keesa was hunched over the humming white toilet in the far left corner of the room, the result of morning sickness.

  “Oh, God!” Nearing the third month of her pregnancy, she was starting to experience all the symptoms that her mother and her friends had warned her about. Every day she could feel a new layer of flesh attach itself to her body, and hurling chunks of her stomach into the toilet had become a frequent ritual. She wondered how some of her friends continued to have baby after baby, as if each new one was just an afterthought. This pregnancy thing was more than a notion. As she steadied herself against the toilet bowl cover, she rose on shaky legs and wondered why she hadn’t stayed home in the first place. Momma had fought her when she insisted on moving out, but she’d had no idea then that pregnancy and living alone would be so tough.

  Momma, on the other hand, had seen it coming. “Chil’, how in hell are you going to live on ya own, when you know you can’t take care of yo’self?” Her mother had seemed more amused than hurt at Keesa’s plans to leave. “What’s so bad about ya momma that you can’t stay up in my house?”

  “Momma, I’ve told you, I can’t get any studying done when you partying all night with your friends.”

  “Oh, you think you slick. This ain’t about my friends, it’s about yo momma gettin’ busy up in here, ain’t it? Baby, just cause men still find me attractive, what, I got to ’pologize and become a nun for your benefit?”

  Keesa had known that the argument, which they replayed on almost a monthly basis, was going nowhere. “Momma, in a place this small, I can hear everything that goes on in your room. With the hours I work and my course schedule, I need to be able to study at night, and I can’t do that when you entertainin’ men over there all the time!”

  Her mother had blown a fresh puff of menthol smoke into her face before responding in her typically deadpan manner. “Girl, you act like you out your mind. You ain’t exactly some Pollyanna yo’self. I done heard enough rumors about you myself, don’t try to play innocent with me. You and me is birds of a feather.”

  “Momma, anything I do where men are concerned, I learned from you. Maybe that’s why I need to get out of this environment anyway.”

  That had been it. “Well, get out then, ho! I don’t know who you think you is, tellin’ me how to live my life, then claiming I’m some environment that you need to escape! Ain’t that some shit! I didn’t have to keep your little illegitimate ass in the first place. I coulda had an abortion if I wanted, your daddy did offer that when I refused to marry him. Go on, get outta here now!”

  Leaning back on the creaky twin bed she had moved out of her mother’s house, Keesa wondered again if she should have told Momma that, through the years, several of her mother’s boyfriends had taken to crawling into her bed in the quiet of night. Granted, some of the sex had been voluntary on her part, but most had not. Not that it mattered; Keesa knew Momma would never believe her anyway. If anything, she would blame the whole mess on Keesa, who honestly believed that her mother could kill her over a man. Her desire to stay at home had not been great enough to risk any more of Momma’s wrath.

  Trying to decide if she should muster the energy to go to campus for classes in a couple of hours, Keesa was surprised to feel her thoughts turn to O. J. By now it had been three weeks since he had delivered his little ultimatum regarding his involvement in her pregnancy, and he had yet to initiate contact with her. Her heart burned with a hatred she had not known existed. She had been duped and dumped by more than a few hustlers, roughnecks, and wannabe players, but none had been as crass as O. J. Peters.

  She recalled, almost fondly, the striking impression he made when she had first seen him officiate at Light of Tabernacle’s morning worship service. She had started to attend Light after graduating high school, in her hope of making a meaningful life for herself and escaping the traps that bogged Momma down in a swamp of self-hate and callous disregard. When the short, dark-skinned young brother with a head full of wave pomade ascended to the pulpit, she had been instantly smitten. He was not handsome in the conventional sense, but his dancing eyes, shining skin, and warm smile outweighed the round paunch and the waxy sheen of his hair. Their paths had crossed naturally when she joined the church’s college ministry. O. J., who obviously had many of the church women in his pocket, had paid her immediate attention. She had been surprised at how forward he had been sexually, even though she knew better than to expect men of God to have clean hands in that area.

  At first he had impressed her as a patient and sensitive lover, sometimes even taking time to bask with her in the afterglow, reading Scriptures to help her get through the coming week. She never expected or asked for an exclusive relationship, but she’d started believing their arrangement would last indefinitely. When he’d ended things suddenly after a Friday-night embrace, her heart had shattered with an intensity that astonished her.

  “O. J., how can you do this? Nigga, you ain’t even gonna give me a reason? At least tell me that you’re cuttin’ ties with all your women now, before you graduate and go back to Atlanta?”

  O. J. had allowed a long pause before responding. “If that makes you feel better, Keesa, fine. I’m cuttin’ ties before I go back to Hotlanta. Feel better? Good. There’s really nothing to explain, baby. I got my hands full with graduation, my seminary decision, classes, and my work with the Ellis Center. There’s only so much of me to spread around, baby.”

  His cavalier attitude had cut her more deeply than their breakup. It had only been a short time later that she’d had to acknowledge the fact that her period was late. Fearing the worst, she’d had her cousin Marcus take her to a doctor friend of his, who confirmed the pregnancy. By the time she admitted to herself the number of times she had let O. J. climb atop her without a condom, whispering assurances that her pills were adequate protection, she couldn’t fix her mouth to ask how this happened. She had simply been a fool, and since that time she had determined to
be a fool no more.

  Feeling her muscles tense at the thought of her baby’s father, Keesa tried to calm her nerves. She would give O. J. a few more days to call. He had promised to help her get a scholarship, right? That would contribute directly to their child’s welfare, wouldn’t it? Sure, he hadn’t given her a straight answer about putting his name on the birth certificate, but if she agreed to his bribe, she could probably extract that as her price. Her mother, all of her aunts, and most of her friends had raised or were currently raising babies without their fathers. Surely she could, too. But that nigga O. J. was going to respect both her and this baby.

  The sudden ring of the phone startled her. Debating whether or not to answer, Keesa finally lifted a shaking hand and grabbed the receiver. “Hello?”

  The deep tenor voice of the caller, obviously a wellmannered brother, warmed Keesa’s fragile heart. “Yes, may I speak with Ms. Bishop, please?”

  “This is her.”

  “Ms. Bishop, I am a fellow member of your church, Light of Tabernacle. How are you doing this morning?” On the other end of the line, Nico Lane hoped he sounded convincing, like a real churchgoing bore.

  “I’d be doin’ a lot better if you told me your name, stranger.” Keesa scrunched her face into an annoyed scowl. This better not be some punk prankster.

  “I’m sorry, Keesa, I can’t do that, my sister. As a respected member of Light, I can’t let it get out that I’m putting the interests of a fellow member over one of the clergy.”

  Keesa shot forward, her back forming a ninety-degree angle with the wobbly bed. “Clergy? What are you talkin’ about?”

  “Ms. Bishop, I think you deserve to know how that rascal of a reverend, O. J. Peters, is doing everything in his power to trash your name.” Nico bit his lip at his use of the phrase “rascal of a reverend”—it sounded so funny he wanted to laugh. But he’d have to wait until he hung up.