by Pearl Cleage
“I don’t care how much you offer me,” I said. “Nobody is going to run me off.”
Jesus! I sounded like a Hollywood western, but it felt good. It felt real good to say it that way.
“If I want to sell it, I will. If I want to live on it, I will. If I want to roam the world just because I can, I will, but as long as my name is on the deed, that house and that garden belong to me and nobody is going to run me off,” I said, heading back out into the hallway and punching the button for the elevator. “Not even you.”
She just watched me through the glass as the doors hissed closed behind me. Walking out to the parking lot, I was exhilarated. I had practically told her to get off my land by sundown. I was just sorry Zora wasn’t here to get it on video. John Wayne would have been so proud.
FIFTY-NINE
Late that night, after our swim when we were sitting beside the pool, wrapped up in our robes, reviewing the day, Zora made a great suggestion.
“You know it’s fine to go shake your fist in Greer Woodruff’s face…”
“I didn’t shake anything in her face.”
Zora looked at me. “Okay. It’s fine to verbally shake your fist in her face, but that’s not going to do much for those old women.”
“Daisy filed a police report.”
“I know,” Zora said, “but I think they need to be a bigger part of the story.”
“Our story?”
“It’s their story, too,” Zora said, turning on her side to face me.
“Aren’t you the one who said people don’t just buy a house, they buy a neighborhood?”
Zora was getting as good as Abbie at casually tossing my own words back in my face. I always made sense when they quoted me, which was part of the frustration. How can you argue your own good sense just because you’re moving through a moment of weakness when it’s hard to keep an eye on the big picture?
“Aren’t you the one who cringed at the idea of trying to save the whole neighborhood instead of just our little piece of it?”
Zora sat up and hugged her knees, gazing into the pool where the mermaid, as always, maintained her mysteriously aloof watch over the proceedings.
“That was before all this stuff started happening,” she said slowly.
“I don’t think they can hold out if we don’t help them.”
“I’m not sure they can hold out even if we do,” I said. “But what did you have in mind?”
“Well, we’re still telling the same story, right? The good guys rescuing this corner from the bad guys? Like the westerns?”
“In a nutshell,” I said.
“And isn’t part of that story the townspeople rising up and deciding to fight back, even when the bad guys are scary?”
She had that right. There’s no payoff in a story where the hero stands up and nobody stands up with him. Or in this case, with her.
“Go on.”
“I think we should invite them to join us. I’ll get some video of them describing what they’ve been through, telling us about their personal journeys from wherever they came from, to this very moment when everything they have is being threatened.”
There was no denying that their story would add some depth and texture to our own. Betty was a great character, and nobody could hear Daisy talking about the break-in and not feel angry and protective, two emotions guaranteed to pull you into the story and refuse to let you go.
“What makes you think they’ll let you tape them?”
She turned to me and smiled. “Don’t worry, Mafeenie. I’ll make them an offer they can’t refuse.”
SIXTY
What she offered them was a great meal in a beautiful setting and a free set of custom-made, sky-blue burglar bars for anybody who needed them, underwritten by Peachy, who told Abbie it was a damn shame that old black women had to barricade themselves in their houses to feel safe. Abbie, never a fan of burglar bars, had made peace with them at her D.C. house after the break-in, but she could only bear it if they were painted blue and installed with a prayer and the hope that they would keep in love as much as they kept out harm. When she told Peachy about the break-in at Daisy Turner’s house and all the things Betty had been through, Peachy immediately told her to order the bars and have the company send him the bill. Abbie said she had never loved him more.
Having the women come to Louis and Amelia’s house was another stroke of genius from Zora. Abbie and Aretha went to pick everybody up. When they walked in, Louie was in the kitchen making magic, Al Green was on the CD player, and there was a sign-up sheet so they could schedule their appointments to be measured for their baby-blue burglar bars. They accepted the wine I offered them and tried to get Louie to tell them what smelled so good. He politely but firmly shooed them out of the kitchen and told me he needed another twenty minutes to get everything on the table.
According to our plan, Zora suggested that we go down by the pool so she could show them the mermaid. A few minutes later, they had accepted her invitation to put their feet in it and sighed with pleasure and surprise at how warm it was. They sat on the blue tiled bench that allowed them to dangle their toes in the water without dampening their dresses, sipped their wine, and relaxed into a moment clearly constructed for their comfort.
“Must be nice,” Thelma said.
“I’m going to miss it when the owner gets back,” Zora said, making it clear that we were all visitors in this particular peaceful garden.
“So tell me some more about this story idea, Miss Zora,” Betty said. “You gonna make us all movie stars?”
Zora smiled. “Something like that. Are you ready for it?”
“Not without some Botox,” Thelma said. “I could use a little help in the close-ups.”
“It’s not that kind of movie,” I said.
“What is it, then? A horror movie?” Daisy said, and they all laughed.
“No, it’s nothing like that,” Zora said. “Let me ask you something.”
“As long as I can keep my feet in the water, you can ask me anything you want.”
“How many of you own your houses?”
“We all do,” Thelma said. “But they ain’t worth the price to put ’em up for sale.”
“But what if they were?” I said.
“What do you mean?” Daisy kicked her feet lightly back and forth in the blue water. The ripples made the mermaid’s curls flutter delicately.
“I mean,” I said slowly so they’d have time to wrap their minds around the idea I was putting forward, “I mean, if we fix up these houses, I believe we can get no less than one hundred thousand for each of them.”
There was a collective gasp of disbelief.
“Maybe more,” I said calmly.
“From who?” Thelma’s voice was dripping doubt.
“From the people who are tired of being stuck in Atlanta traffic every day. The people who want to move back into town to raise their families.”
“Those people never come down here looking for houses,” Betty said. “Besides, I want to keep my house, not sell it.”
“Yeah,” Juanita said. “What’s the point of all those fancy burglar bars if we’re not going to hang around for a while?”
“Listen, ladies,” I said, “I’m not going to kid you. I’m fixing my house up for sale and I want to sell it fast for the most money I can get. The best way to do that is to make fixing it up part of a bigger adventure. Make the whole process a story that potential buyers can follow, then when I get ready to sell, they won’t just be buying a house. They’ll be buying a story. The same will be true when you get ready to sell yours, or even if you don’t sell, the light we shine on this neighborhood will make it impossible for Greer to keep doing the things she’s been doing.”
They liked the sound of that, but they were still not sure what we were talking about. “So how you gonna get ’em down here to see the place?”
“We don’t have to get them down here,” Zora said. “We’ll go where they already are.”
“Where’s that?” Daisy said.
“On the computer,” Zora said, smiling.
Juanita snorted. “I don’t even own a computer. None of us do, so how’s that gonna help us?”
“You don’t have to own a computer,” Zora said. “I’ll put everything we need on my computer and we’ll send it out as part of the same story.”
They thought about that for a minute, then Betty spoke for the group. “So what exactly are you asking us to do?”
“Nothing,” Zora said quickly. “Just be a part of the story you’re already moving through every day. Let me put you on video so people can see you, listen to you, get to know you, the same way people watch their other stories on TV.”
“We ain’t no actors,” Juanita said, but she didn’t sound nearly as skeptical.
“You don’t have to act,” Zora said calmly, just like she had when she talked me into this. “Say whatever you think and show me whatever you want me to see.”
They looked at each other. “So it’s sort of like a reality show?”
“Exactly,” Zora said. “I’ll be taping all the time and I’ll use the best of what we get and erase the rest.”
“You gonna let us see it first?” Betty said.
“Anytime you want,” Zora said. “Don’t worry. I’ll make you look good.”
They all smiled at that and swung their feet in the warm water.
“So what’s the name of this story?” Thelma said.
“It was Rescue on MLK,” I said. “One Woman’s Story. But now it’s all of us, so I think we can change it if you want.”
“Change it to what?”
“Whatever you want,” I said. “It can either be Neighborhood Residents Join Beautification Efforts or, Neighborhood Residents Wish Meddling Actor Would Carry Her Ass Back to Amsterdam and Leave Them in Peace.”
They all laughed at that, including Abbie and Zora.
“How about let’s try the first one,” Betty said, looking around at the others to be sure she spoke for the group. “If it works out, maybe you can stay around for a while.”
“If what Baptiste is cooking tastes as good as it smells, you can stay around as long as you want to,” Thelma said.
“It tastes even better,” I said.
“Well, don’t make me take your word for it,” Daisy said, standing up carefully and shaking the water off her bare feet gently. “Let’s see what Louie is putting down.”
So that was what we did.
SIXTY-ONE
At the end of the evening, after Louie had carefully divided and wrapped the leftovers, everybody piled in with Abbie or Aretha for the ride home. Victor took Betty’s arm on the steps and she smiled gratefully and patted his hand. Zora went to review the video she’d just shot while we were eating, and Louie and I made short work of the cleanup. He wiped the pots down carefully and put each one in its place.
“This is a good kitchen,” he said, nodding approvingly.
“Thank you for doing this,” I said, untying the big apron I’d wrapped around me while I worked. “Everything went so well, for a minute there I thought you might have put something in their food.”
“Neighbors are supposed to eat together,” he said, smiling slowly. “Back home, we ate together every Friday. My mama would boil some shrimp and my aunt Lynette would bring the gumbo. There must have been a dozen cousins running around. Uncles, aunts, friends, there were so many of us. People who weren’t even related would think it was a party and stop off, too.”
When Louie talked about New Orleans it was always with a mixture of pleasure and pain. All of his memories had an artificial endpoint, stopped by a wall of water rolling toward his front porch in the dark. Even when he started a story that began in the sweetness of love and family and food, it would end in destruction and abandonment and madness and death.
“You really miss it, don’t you?” I said, not because I didn’t know the answer, but just to let him know he still had the floor if there was more to say.
“You remember my friend who told me not to come back to New Orleans?”
I nodded. That was the buddy who said the city had nothing to offer any more “broke niggas and stray dogs.” Louie’s attempts to get him to move to Atlanta had been unsuccessful. For him, there was no other city.
“He killed himself.”
“Oh, Louie,” I said, “I’m so sorry.”
“He couldn’t make peace with it,” Louie said softly. “It was like every day when he got up, he still couldn’t believe it. He kept figuring, he’d wake up one day and we’d be right there on that corner again, laughing and talking and drinking a beer.”
“I’m so sorry,” I said again, feeling helpless to comfort him, wishing Abbie were here to say something that would help him make sense of it. I wondered if I should call her.
“Are you okay?” I said.
He nodded. “His nephew called me last night. I’m going to rent a car and drive down tomorrow.”
It dawned on me that he had gone through with all the cooking and presentation and fellowship that helped make the meal we’d just shared such a perfect moment for all of us without saying a word about his loss.
“You should have told me,” I said, feeling guilty, like I should have known. “You didn’t have to do all this today.”
He looked at me a long time and I looked right back. The death of a friend is a profound moment of loss and vulnerability, but also of reaffirmation, celebration, and tenderness. I saw all that in Louie’s sad eyes.
“Yes, I did,” he said, “because that’s the way we do it in New Orleans. We bury the dead, but we always feed the living.”
SIXTY-TWO
The letter came from François by FedEx:
Dear Ms. Evans,
Due to what the board perceives to be the aggressive and adversarial posture you have adopted toward The Human Theatre, both artists and administrative staff, and your unwillingness to answer questions from this body concerning your unwarranted actions and whereabouts, we can no longer extend to you the level of support you have enjoyed for many years as an important member of this company. We are therefore terminating your artistic residency stipend with the enclosed check and requesting that you instruct Howard Denmond to turn over all keys and information pertaining to the apartment you currently occupy by the end of the month. The delivery of the keys and your cashing of the enclosed check will constitute the formal end of the relationship between you and this theater company.
At the bottom of the page, François had scrawled: Josephine, it didn’t have to be this way. He had enclosed a check for five hundred dollars.
SIXTY-THREE
We had Abbie’s blessing of what I kept calling “the leaves and shoots” on the day of the full moon, just as she wanted, but we did it in the morning, so we couldn’t actually see the moon. Our usual crew was going to be in attendance, and Peachy had driven up from Tybee especially for the occasion. Louie was in New Orleans, but I also invited Betty Causey and her neighbors, who had become part of our extended family. In addition to what we were doing at my place, we were also doing a little fixing up at theirs, and they were very grateful. Just knowing we were keeping a more conscious eye on them made them feel a little safer. Thelma had come over a couple of times to talk to Abbie about her garden, and Juanita was toying with the idea of planting some tomatoes in her own yard. Daisy was still staying at Betty’s, but she was almost ready to go back home.
A half an hour before we were due to begin, they all walked over together, wearing their church dresses and Sunday shoes, since Zora had told them we were shooting video and everybody wanted to look their best. They settled into the chairs Victor and Peachy had dragged outside for them and sipped on lemonade that Zora brought from the soul food restaurant.
Abbie had on a purple tunic, a pair of bright green pants, and her trademark Chinese shoes. Aretha brought Joyce Ann who, as always, first made a beeline to the front door to check on her handprints. Zora, wearing a simp
le white dress and her hair pulled off her face with one of Aretha’s red ribbons, was shooting everything. Victor, who was standing on the porch when we got there, giving everything the once-over, was, to my amazement, wearing a dark blue suit.
“Good morning,” he said, looking a little embarrassed when I walked over to say hello. Under the suit he was wearing one of our crew T-shirts.
“Nice suit,” I said. “You look great.”
The pleasure on his face made me glad I hadn’t teased him. I was wearing a pink dress I had borrowed from Abbie. It was too hot for turtlenecks and I was getting tired of all that black anyway. She also loaned me a beautiful pale gray shawl with mile-long fringe. I loved it.
“You look okay, too,” which from Victor was high praise.
“Abbie said she was going to have something green showing by the end of the month,” I said. “Looks like she knew what she was talking about.”
“Miss Abbie has a green thumb and then some,” he said.
Working with Abbie seemed to agree with him. No longer the angry squatter who had first confronted me about being an absentee landlord, Victor had become an integral part of our crew. After a month of seeing him almost every day, I still didn’t know much about him, but I was beginning to consider him a friend.
“Can I ask you something?” he said.
“Sure,” I said, wondering if anybody ever said no to that question, which would, of course, be an answer itself.
“Do you ever miss what you do in real life?”
I smiled at him. “Isn’t this real life?”
“You know what I mean,” he said. “The other part of it.”
I thought about it, as much to give myself an honest answer as to give him one. “Sometimes,” I said. “Not as much lately. I’ve been having too much fun playing in the dirt.”
He nodded, smiling. “Yeah, me too.”
“Can I ask you something?”
