“Either grab a bread stick and go, Thurgood, or go without it. I don’t much care.” Delilah crammed the bread stick into her mouth without breaking it in half. Being nice was proving harder than she’d like.
“I don’t know what good you think it will do to shove that whole bread stick down your mouth. That doesn’t do anything for my juices anymore.” Lord, help keep me from lying. That’s one demon act I ain’t overcome yet.
“What in the hell are you talking about? Are you having a senility moment or something? If you are, please have it someplace else.”
The deacon’s eyes widened with embarrassment, and he would’ve stood and left if his manhood hadn’t grown at the same time. She’s still the same ole Delilah, a tease even in her old age.
Delilah watched the deacon in amusement. She hadn’t tried to do anything but eat a bread stick because she was hungry. He obviously wasn’t as angry at her as she’d thought.
But could she risk asking him about Jessie, with so much hostility present? Delilah clasped her hands together and hung her head slightly. Whether the deacon took it as her ignoring him, she didn’t know. When she needed to consult God, she didn’t care where she was or who she was with.
Okay, Lord God Jehovah, give me a sign. I’ve been praying and asking for a while that I find my husband and my son. You put Thurgood in my face first, but I didn’t necessarily mean it in that order, plus I’m sorry, but this old man pushes my buttons. And I’ve prayed hard to find Jessie, ever since I read the news about him losing his wife. You know I tried the telephone book and the crazy Internet, but Brooklyn is a big place, and I can’t find out nothing. Please give me a sign if I should ask this old fool about my son.
“Amen.” No sooner had she lifted her head than her eyes met his. The deacon was still staring.
“You surprised me, seeing you pray for a couple of seconds. I didn’t know that you and God had met.” Again, his mouth spouted what he should have kept to himself.
“From the way you keep putting me down, perhaps I should take a moment and reintroduce Him to you.” Jehovah, he’s making it so hard to be civil.
“Well, since you’re in such a good mood, while we discuss God’s Word, why don’t we also go back to the subject of our fake marital status.” The deacon thought he saw her shake. Perhaps he still caused a spark. He wasn’t sure if that would be a good thing or not.
Delilah clasped her hands together. Her gray eyes turned almost black, but she was actually very cool and deliberate as she spoke. “Perhaps you need to reread that Bible. You can’t get rid of me with a divorce unless you can prove I cheated on you first. I doubt if you can.”
Deacon Pillar’s fist hit the table. She’d pulled the old Matthew 19:9 card on him. She knew he couldn’t divorce her just because she had a death grip around his last good nerve, unless she’d been servicing outside the marriage. If he did divorce her and remarried, then he’d be the adulterer without a legal marriage before God.
“Damn!” The deacon slapped the table again and sputtered through teeth long turned beige from tobacco abuse in middle age. He tried to bluff. “You left me. I can get one based just on that.”
“Well, why haven’t you then?”
“How do you know I didn’t just think you were dead and didn’t need one to move on?”
“You could’ve had me declared dead, but as you can see, I’m not dead. . . .” Delilah stopped and leaned across the table. “Hold up. What do you mean, move on? You got an understudy waiting in the wings to play my part?”
“Trust me”—the deacon leaned back and folded his hands and laughed—“she’s no understudy. She’s a star!”
Delilah’s mind started racing. If this old coot is really ready to move on to someone else and I’m standing in the way . . . “Tell me something,” Delilah said nonchalantly, “what if I gave you that divorce? Would you do something for me in return?”
The deacon sat up straight. “I’ve got exactly eighty dollars on me. I can get a little more if it’s money you need. Oh hell, I’ll pay for the divorce and a ticket for you to go anywhere on the other side of the earth you want to go.”
“Oh, don’t start doing the happy dance. I haven’t told you what I want yet.”
Deacon Pillar suddenly looked puzzled. She doesn’t seem to want money. The Delilah I know would stampede a buffalo to get it off its nickel. She’s up to something....
“I know it’s a long shot and I know you probably won’t believe me.”
“Let’s not go there, Dee Dee.”
“Don’t push, Pillar.” Delilah was about to get loud, but she hadn’t gotten what she wanted yet. She remained calm. “I need you to help me find Jessie.”
“Say what? Jessie—you want to find Jessie? Why?”
“I don’t know how you could ask such a question. He’s my son. I would think that you’d want to know where he is and how he is doing, too.”
“Don’t pack a bag for me, because I ain’t going on a guilt trip with you. I’ve always wanted what was best for him. In fact, I looked for years to find the two of you. I just stopped looking for you before I stopped looking for him. The better question is, why now? After all these years, Delilah, why do you choose now?”
“He needs me.” Delilah hoped she sounded convincing. She wasn’t certain how a mother would say something like that. The truth was, she needed her son. One had become the lonely number for her. She pulled a folded piece of newspaper from her pocketbook. “Read this.”
The deacon slowly took the newspaper clipping from Delilah’s hand. As soon as he saw the date on the top and the word obituary, he knew. He knew that she knew, too. Seeing Cindy’s death announcement sent a chill through him. He’d helped Jessie write it. But he scanned over the clipping anyway, hoping he’d not given anything away as he handed it back to Delilah.
Deacon Pillar wasn’t ready for that revelation. Delilah obviously knew Cindy was dead and she was asking him to trade their son’s whereabouts in return for a divorce. He’d need time to think it over. Hopefully, she’d give it to him.
“I don’t know what to say. Are you sure this is our Jessie?”
“I’m even more convinced, since you don’t look shocked. Why is that, Thurgood?”
“Trust me. I’ve been in a state of shock for the last three weeks. I need to think this over and figure out what to do and how to do it. I haven’t read the Amsterdam News in quite some time, so you’ve got a head start on me. Please give me a little time to check and see if this is our Jessie. Why don’t you give me your telephone number?” He pulled out a pen and gave it to her. “I’ll call you in a couple of weeks and, if it’s him—then, well, we’ll see where to go from there.”
“I’ve got a better idea,” Delilah replied as she wrote her number on a paper napkin and handed it back. “It’s a beautiful day and we’ve done nothing but argue. Let’s try and be more civil. We need one another, so let’s start there.”
She gave her best happy grin and winked. “Why don’t we just exchange numbers? That way it’ll build mutual trust. . . .”
She tried to continue and failed. All she could do was throw her hands up and laugh.
He didn’t want to join her, but he couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of it all. When their love fled, it took trust as a hostage.
Suddenly the deacon’s cell phone vibrated in his pocket. He continued laughing until he pulled it out and looked at the name displayed. And that’s when his entire body tensed up.
It was Jessie. “Thank you, Jesus,” he murmured. Normally the phone vibrating in his pocket annoyed him. This time he was thankful that he’d left it that way. If he hadn’t, the automated voice would have announced, Jessie Jewel calling.
“Gotta run . . . I’ll be in touch, and keep away from New Hope.” The deacon leapt from his seat and grabbed the bags he’d left on the floor.
She’d tried nice and reason, but she wasn’t about to let him leave without her having the last word. “Please tell whoe
ver that is that just called you, especially if it’s your woman, that I said thank you. They called just in time.”
Delilah held the glass of water in her hands and smiled while she sipped. Jehovah, I thank you for giving me some of that grace and mercy you keep handy. Now all I need to do is stay calm. I can keep Thurgood occupied, with me promising that divorce; that is, if he can help me find our son.
Delilah smiled again. She was proud of the advice she’d just given God. And then, just as she was about to summon the server and order her meal, she was distracted by noises outside the restaurant window. The smile slid from her face faster than a raging mud slide.
The deacon hadn’t left the table quick enough to suit him. The last thing he needed was for Delilah to know he’d already found Jessie several years ago. He zigzagged between tables as he struggled to keep the phone pressed against his ear, using his chin, while he spoke and carried the bags to the restaurant door. “I know I’m late but I’m on my way. Tell baby girl to hold tight. I’ve got the crab cakes and I didn’t forget the special remoulade sauce she wanted..... No, Jessie, I didn’t forget your tilapia with dill sauce, either.... See you shortly.... Marty called? What did she say? Did she say how long she would have to stay at work? Okay . . . I’m walking back as fast as I can.... No! Please don’t you come get me!”
Deacon Pillar had barely gotten the restaurant door open when Delilah sped past, knocking one bag from his hand and slapping his cell phone to the floor.
She didn’t even look back. That ended their truce.
“Oh, you have lost your doggone mind for sure. . . .” The deacon was about to add something more, but instead he scooped up his phone and the dropped bag and took off after Delilah. “You won’t hit and run this time, Delilah.” And even as his spirit screamed to let it go, the deacon pursued her. Bible study or no Bible study, he wanted her to pay; there was a forty-year payment due.
By the time Deacon Pillar caught up with Delilah, she was standing on the curb. Her body shook as though she stood in the middle of an earthquake, and there were tears streaming down her face.
As soon as he reached her side he saw a tow truck. “Dee Dee, what’s going on? Isn’t that your car that’s booted?” He hadn’t meant to call her by that old pet name. Whatever harsh words he was about to use seemed to evaporate when he’d seen her cry. And then he saw her morph right before his eyes. Delilah turned from a helpless female into a pint-sized praying mantis.
Delilah was hot. Her face turned red and her tears dried up. “You know I could just slap the black off you, Thurgood.”
“I guess you could try to carry through on some of those empty threats if your Alzheimer’s and arthritis didn’t ride for free on your arse.”
“If you hadn’t taken up so much of my time back there, I could’ve been paying attention and gotten out here sooner.”
Meanwhile the reasons for the noise that had caught her attention stood. There were folks on the sidewalk who laughed until they cried outside the Blue Fish. Most were just happy it wasn’t them, that time. The other reason for the laughter stood next to Delilah. It wasn’t unusual for the young people to see the repo man place a boot on a car so the driver couldn’t drive it away. But most of the young folks had never seen a jacked-up conk; at least not in the twenty-first century, unless it was in an old movie.
One second she stood on the curb, the next she was climbing up the back of a big, muscular black man. He looked like a ghetto Hulk in filthy coveralls with a chain in one hand and fighting off Delilah with his other.
And then someone in the crowd screamed, “Oh damn, look at pops. He’s going to help his woman.”
More applause and even louder laughter erupted again. The gawkers slapped five. “Crack his head, old playa,” another voice shouted.
But as much as the deacon didn’t want to get any further involved, he found himself butting in again. One minute he was threatening Delilah and the next he was hyperventilating and fighting a definite heart attack as he struggled to keep Delilah, with her wig now flipped out, from whipping the repo man’s behind, or vice versa.
“I’ll kill you if you don’t take that damn boot off my car!” Delilah was clawing and scratching with no apparent effect on the repo man.
“I’m just doing my job, lady. You’ve got three days to come up with the money, and next time pay your damn car note!” He was much quicker than Delilah. In seconds, he’d gently shoved her off and not so gently knocked the deacon off his feet. Before Delilah or Deacon Pillar could string two words together, the man had her car in neutral. With the crowd still laughing, he got into his tow truck and drove off with Delilah’s car bumping up and down as it gave off sparks along the street.
“Delilah,” the deacon pleaded with what quickly seemed like his last breath, “it’s no use. If you keep it up the police will come.”
“Let ’em!” But all Delilah got for her effort was a sad last look at the back of her car. All she could do was stand on the sidewalk wearing her wig lopsided. The sight of it made her look more like a Phyllis Diller than a Farrah Fawcett. She looked a hot mess.
“Jesus, please get me outta here. . . .” Deacon Pillar had barely gotten to the amen of his prayer when it was answered, sorta.
“Hey, Deacon Pillar. You need a ride?” A Crown Victoria Black Pearl cab pulled up to the curb. “I thought it was you, but I ain’t never seen you fight befo’, so I couldn’t be sho,” the almond-colored elderly man called out as he leaned farther out the car window and waved for the deacon to come over. “I was about to head into the garage, but I can take you home if that’s where you’re going. It looks like you’ve torn your bags.”
Deacon Pillar sighed as he looked down and saw that the second bag had burst, too. Have mercy, Jesus. Can this day get any worse? There wasn’t much the deacon could do but accept the offer. “Thank you, Brother Libby. I guess I’ll take you up on the ride. I may need to make a stop before then, but it’s along the way.”
“Well, c’mon then. I’ll only charge you ten dollars instead of the regular fifteen.”
If the deacon had to explain his next move on Judgment Day to keep from going to hell, then hell would be his eternal home. It began when Delilah suddenly started cussing and throwing punches in the air at invisible demons. The next thing he knew, he’d somehow shoved Delilah, albeit as gently as he could, inside the cab.
Of course Delilah didn’t say thank you. She was too busy yelling, “Damn, damn, damn!” Delilah wept as she glared out the cab window and stared at the spot where her Navigator had stood. “All I needed was another couple of weeks and at least a heads-up. I could’ve probably come up with some of the money.”
Delilah’s tears suddenly dried up again. Her mouth clamped shut. She’d said more than she’d meant to. After all, she was still acting the part of a diva and a diva wasn’t supposed to be on a budget.
“Dee Dee.” There it was. He’d said her pet name again. This time the deacon’s voice took on an authoritative tone. “Why didn’t you just say something?”
“Say what, Thurgood? What did you want me to say, and when was I supposed to say it?” She turned and faced the deacon with her hands balled into what looked like two golf balls. “Was I supposed to tell you while you cussed me out two seconds after you laid eyes on me?”
“Stop exaggerating, Delilah!”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Perhaps it was three or five seconds after you hadn’t seen me in almost four decades.”
“Okay, we’re here,” Brother Libby announced louder than he needed. “Don’t worry about the fare. Y’all just go ahead and get out. Now!”
“I’m so sorry, Brother Libby.” The deacon wanted to explain what wasn’t explainable. “I’d meant for you to make that other stop before we got here.”
“Well, there are cabs going in the other direction, too.” Brother Libby wasn’t about to drive another inch with the deacon and the irritated woman battling in his leased cab.
Delilah looked about th
e neighborhood. The sun had already begun to set, so she couldn’t get a real sense of where they were. All she knew for certain was that they were still in Brooklyn. She needed to find a way to get her car back as well as return home.
Brother Libby’s cab sped away, leaving them on the sidewalk. Delilah kept quiet, although she couldn’t figure out why she should.
“Just wait here,” the deacon said nicely. “Let me take these things inside and I’ll take you where you need to go.” He paused, suddenly proud that he hadn’t said more. At least I didn’t say Garden City.
“As if I have a choice,” Delilah muttered. “Just hurry up. For the next two weeks I want to get as far away from you as you need to get from me.”
Delilah fought the tears just as hard as she’d fought the deacon’s kindness. She wouldn’t allow herself the comfort of accepting something as simple as a car ride.
Deacon Pillar gripped the bags by the ends that weren’t torn and climbed the porch steps. He’d already made up his mind to hurry inside and make some type of apology to Jessie and Tamara before leaving again. And if God was truly in the plan, the Master would keep Sister Marty away, too.
Father, please help me to get Delilah away from here before it’s too late. I just need a little more time, Jesus.
And while the deacon prayed his prayer, Delilah stood resting against the porch stoop and began to advise her God.
Well, Heavenly Father Jehovah, this has been one joke of a day. If this is one of those tests, then I sure hope I passed. I can’t take another one. If I need to be praying another kind of way, I wish You’d show me how. I asked You to lead me to my husband, and to my son. Instead, You take away my ride and leave me in the hands of Thurgood. As bad as he’s trying to get rid of me and get a divorce, he’d have said something about Jessie if he knew anything. Why do the tables keep turning on me? Or, if Thurgood does know something, You wouldn’t let him get a head start and turn Jessie against me, would You?
Don't Blame the Devil Page 4
