Blanche Passes Go

by Barbara Neely

  Blanche hesitated. She hadn’t realized fried chicken was the only meat Jimmy’s served. She wasn’t all that eager for what usually passed for Southern-fried chicken in public places—too much grease and not enough seasoning on a piece of chicken old as her mama was usually the case. But what choice did she have? She didn’t want Thelvin to think she was too cute to eat with her fingers, and she was hungry.

  Both Blanche and Thelvin ordered lemonade. She’d considered a gin but felt heady enough without it. She wondered if Thelvin was a teetotaler. She’d find out, of course, but didn’t want that to be the first question out of her mouth. She looked around the place while they waited for their drinks.

  The long bar and tables were dotted with black people—mostly couples at the tables and men at the bar—in various stages of dress-up. Their ages ranged from that young honey across the room in the leather miniskirt and halter top—she couldn’t be more than sixteen, could she?—to the man in the corner with the aluminum three-toed cane and head of pure white hair. He was dressed in a black suit with a pink shirt and flowered tie. Blanche felt the excitement of that special Saturday-night energy created by people hoping for a good time, a new love, at least a good dance partner, but most of all looking to drop for a bit all that worried and vexed them in the everyday.

  “So how was your trip?” she asked at the same time Thelvin asked her how the catering business was going.

  “You first,” he said.

  They laughed over Blanche’s account of her visit to the Hasting twins.

  Thelvin turned serious when he said: “My trip would have been easier if it hadn’t been for you. I kept thinking about you, wondering if…”

  The waitress returned carrying two tall glasses with a straw in each. “Chicken coming right up.”

  “To the best of people,” Thelvin said. They clinked glasses.

  “I haven’t been out this way in a long, long time.” Blanche sipped from her lemonade.

  “My sister lives not too far from here,” Thelvin said. “She and her husband got a small farm. Nice place.”

  “I always loved to visit folks’ farms when I was a kid. All those smells is what I remember most.”

  “We can take a ride out to Ernestine’s one Sunday. You’ll like her.”

  Blanche just smiled. It was him, not his family, she wanted to know.

  “Is she your older or younger sister?”

  “Older. I’m the baby. My brother, Devon, was born between me and Ernestine. What about you?”

  Blanche told him about her one and only sister, dead at thirty-five from cancer. “I already told you about the two children I inherited when she died.”

  “But no kids of your own, hunh?” he asked.

  “Yeah, I know. It’s unusual,” she said, understanding his tone. “I just never really wanted to have any. For all the good that did me.”

  “Wait till you get to be a grandparent! Nothing stranger.”

  “Some folks seem to think it’s wonderful. They say you get to be to your grandkids what you couldn’t always be to your kids.”

  Thelvin didn’t look convinced. “Yeah, maybe. But I ain’t talking about the parent you. What I’m talking about is the deep-down you. See what I mean?”

  She nodded. She knew: the you who looked in the mirror in amazement that that gray-haired person could possibly be the same you that you’d been seeing since the first time you ever looked in a mirror.

  “How do you handle it?” she asked.

  “It handles me. I just hang on and hope I don’t…”

  The waitress plopped two overflowing plates of fried chicken, mustard greens mixed with kale, and candied sweet potatoes in front of them and went off to bring back a plate of white bread, a jar of hot sauce, and a small dispenser of vinegar. To Blanche’s surprise and delight, the chicken’s crisp skin gave way to tender, moist meat that she chewed slowly, trying to identify each of the spices that tingled and swelled in her mouth. They both ate in silence for a few moments, in deep appreciation of their food.

  “Finish what you were saying, about hoping you didn’t…”

  Thelvin looked puzzled for a moment then: “Oh yeah! About being a grandfather.” Thelvin looked over her head, his eyes brimming with feeling she couldn’t read.

  “I just hope I don’t make a fool of myself. That’s what I was going to say.” Thelvin put a forkful of greens in his mouth.

  Blanche waited for him to finish chewing. “Make a fool of yourself how?”

  Thelvin shrugged. “I don’t know. Tell the grandkids my name’s Thelvin, not Pop-Pop, or that the 1960s and ’70s weren’t a million years ago.”

  Feeling old, Blanche thought. “But you wouldn’t really be making a fool of yourself, just telling the truth.”

  Thelvin glanced toward the bandstand. “Looks like the band’s about to start.”

  Blanche toyed with whether to press Thelvin to continue their grandparent line of talk and decided against it. He’d told her enough about his unhappiness with being older, his confusion between honesty and foolishness, and the short distance he was prepared to let her see inside of him right now. That was okay. She had no plans of laying her soul out for after-dinner inspection either. They gave themselves over to cleaning their plates.

  The waitress cleared the table and then came back: “Y’all havin’ dessert? We got sweet potato pie, peach cobbler, and vanilla ice cream.” She looked at them with question marks in her eyes, her pen poised over her pad. They both ordered the cobbler and the ice cream.

  The Bad Boys played the first set alone: a balding man on the drums, a dreadlocked brother on guitar, and one with a close cut and bedroom eyes on bass. The saxophone player wore a tuxedo jacket but no shirt, and looked like chocolate candy. The piano player was a big man whose fingers appeared too thick for the keys but certainly didn’t sound like it. People were on their feet after the first licks of the first song.

  When Little Sister stepped on the bandstand, she was so hot steam seemed to rise from her hips as she switched them across the stage in a sequined silver dress that clung to every crack and curve of her body. She was a firm, fleshy woman with big wide lips, a long nose, and large round eyes. She looked like she’d smell of earth and allspice. During one of her do-it-to-me-slow-and-long numbers, Blanche and Thelvin rose and squeezed themselves in among the gyrating bodies on the dance floor. Blanche could feel the muscles in Thelvin’s thighs as they moved to the slow-grind tempo of the music. Little Sister moaned from somewhere way down deep and Thelvin pulled Blanche closer. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

  “You smell like cake tastes.”

  Blanche purred as though she’d been a cat in another life. Whether it turned out that she and Thelvin hit it off in a long-term way or not, she wanted to see him long enough for her to offer him all the cake he could eat. She eased her hips back from him a little bit.

  When they went back to their table, Thelvin called the waitress and ordered a scotch and water. Blanche asked for a gin and tonic and watched Thelvin’s hand as he tapped time to the music on the tabletop. Jimmy’s was nearly full now.

  “You ever wish you could speed up time?” Thelvin took her hand to lead her back to the dance floor.

  “I know it ain’t smart,” she said, “but I guess everybody does it sometime.”

  “You right. It ain’t smart. But I can’t help wishing we’d already known each other for long enough to…I don’t know…be more easy with each other or…You know what I mean?”

  “I guess that’s another thing people can’t help doing,” Blanche said. “Trying to put their best foot forward when they meet someone they…”

  “Yeah, that’s what I mean.”

  He moved his hand to another spot on her back and left the old spot damp and lonely.

  As the night wore on, they picked up each other’s style
and moved together in a way that made their dancing sparkle. Blanche couldn’t remember the last time she’d had such fun. Thelvin was singing along with Little Sister’s version of “Going to Chicago” as he swung her around. Dancing and the little bit of alcohol he’d consumed loosened Thelvin up just enough for him to open his tie and lie back in his chair like some kind of king or prince being entertained by the masses.

  “Having a good time?” he asked her, and picked up her hand.

  “Oh yes.”

  “Good enough to try it again?” His eyes were serious.

  “Sure ’nuff.”

  “And again, and again?” His voice was as grave as his eyes.

  Blanche frowned. The question was a real one. “If I’m supposed to.” She gently took back her hand, aware that it felt like a rescue operation.

  They were both quiet on the way home. Blanche wondered if Thelvin was thinking ahead to what would happen when they got to her place, or looking back to when they were plastered together on the dance floor, or maybe he was thinking about how his back ached or about calling his mama tomorrow.

  Thelvin slowed his car as it rolled down the hill toward the gentle curve onto Miz Alice Way. Squares of golden light shone from the windows of the one house on the other side of the road. Moonlight lent silver to the deep night green of the trees. Blanche rolled her window all the way down. Frogs and crickets sang backup and warm-up for each other, and the smell of moist earth flooded the car. Blanche’s heat-and-moisture-seeking body could hardly wait to get out into the night.

  Thelvin stopped the car in front of her door and turned off the engine. Blanche shut her eyes for a moment and willed Thelvin not to spoil the evening by treating her like a piece of meat he was bent on beating tonight. She clamped her teeth against hurrying through her thank-you-it-was-fun-goodnight routine and leaping out of the car. She prepared herself to make sure there was no part of no he wouldn’t understand.

  Thelvin reared back in his seat. “Chicken was good, wasn’t it?”

  Blanche burst out laughing. Thelvin gave her an amused and puzzled look. What had made her think he was a pouncer or a beggar, or one of those other dogs you had to beat off with a stick?

  “The company was good, too,” she said.

  Thelvin leaned over and gave her cheek the merest of glancing kisses.

  “I leave first thing tomorrow morning. I won’t be getting back for a couple days, but I’ll call you, okay?”

  “Umm-humm.” She reached for the door handle. “Don’t get out.”

  Thelvin ignored her and got out of the car. He was on the passenger side before she could move. Blanche frowned up at him but Thelvin didn’t notice. He held out his hand for hers. She sighed and took it and let him help her out of the car, even though it was much easier to manage alone. He walked her to her door.

  “Sweet dreams.” He gave her a look that had a bed in it, but no sleep.

  Blanche didn’t know if it was going to be a sweet night, but she had a feeling it was going to be a hot and sticky one.

  She was trying to decide if she wanted a nightcap when the phone rang.

  “I hope you didn’t think I was going to wait till tomorrow,” Ardell said when Blanche answered the phone.

  Blanche settled back in her chair. “It was nice. Real nice. We went to Jimmy’s Place. Danced our butts off.”

  “And?”

  Blanche hesitated, trying to decide where to begin. She thought about the way Thelvin had looked at her as though she filled his entire field of vision; about the ease she felt in his company; the sexual spark between them. “He opened the car door for me when he took me home.”

  “Humm. It still happens, I guess.”

  “You don’t get it.”

  “What’s to get? You mean he leaned over you, opened the door, and booted you out while the car was still moving?”

  “I’m serious, Ardell.”

  “Yeah? About what?”

  Blanche wasn’t sure how to answer. She was talking more from her feelings than from her mind. “Maybe if I hadn’t told him I’d get the door myself it wouldn’t have bothered me so much.”

  “Humm. Most women I know would love to have a man open their car door. Are you sure this ain’t more about David Palmer than it’s about Thelvin?”

  Blanche thought for a few moments: It was true that being raped had made her more suspicious of all men. At first, simply being in their company had made her jaws clench so tightly she could hardly speak. So she’d gone out of her way to spend time alone with men she trusted until she’d regained some ease and as much trust as she was going to. She’d never been big in the trust department and saw no reason for that to change—not until there was intelligent life on earth. But there was something else going on here, too.

  “I’m not saying there’s anything wrong in a man opening doors or always paying for everything, if that’s what you’re into,” she said, “but you ever notice how close being protected and taken care of are to being held prisoner?”

  “Girl, you notice it enough for both of us. This ain’t the first time the subject’s come up. I think you focus on this stuff to keep a man from getting close to you.”

  “Well, I just think there’s a message in all that gentlemanly business.”

  “And what kinda message is that again?”

  “You know what I’m talking about, Ardell. A message that I’m a weak, not-too-bright female who ain’t got sense enough to get out of a car on my own, that I can’t take care of myself and need somebody to protect me.”

  “I know that kinda stuff makes you crazy, Blanche, but he’s just being polite, girl.”

  “You mean like saying ‘thank you’ and ‘please’?”

  “Yeah. Kinda like that.”

  “Well, then, how come it ain’t polite for both men and women to take turns opening the door for each other? How come it’s always the woman who has to be the helpless one?”

  “Humm, well, you got a point there, I guess. But I still think you’re looking a gift horse in the mouth.”

  “Yeah, right. Like you’re any more interested in being treated like a helpless ball of fluff than I am. And on top of that, he asked me whether I was willing to see him again, and again, and again!”

  “So he likes you and wants to see you some more. What’s the problem with that?”

  “Ardell! That ain’t a first-time-out-together question. He don’t even know me, and for all I know, he could have ten dead women stacked up beside his kitchen table.”

  “Give the man a chance, Blanche. Don’t decide he’s a dirty dog just ’cause he pants a little bit. See what I’m sayin’?”

  “So now you do romance counseling. If you know so much about it, how come you…”

  “Forget it,” Ardell snapped. “Just forget I mentioned it.”

  “Unh-unh, time to shut up when we git to your business.”

  “We only got to my business ’cause you can’t stand having me in yours. And you know why? ’Cause I’m right, that’s why!”

  “So you say,” Blanche told her. “I just want to make sure I got some idea who Thelvin is before I…”

  “Yeah, well, you can go too far with that, you know.”

  “Yeah. And you cannot go far enough with it, like that last little fling of yours. What was his name? Lloyd? Floyd? Tell me again what he wanted you to do with his underwear?”

  “All right, Blanche. I got more to do than chitchat about the past. I’ll talk to you later.” Ardell rang off.

  Blanche chuckled, but she took Ardell’s remark seriously enough. Despite what she’d told herself before her date with Thelvin—about not being overly suspicious—was she being too hard on him? She’d had a really good time and enjoyed his company, not to mention his dancing and attention. Yet she’d decided to give Ardell the bad news instead of the good. Why
? Was she doing that thing some Asian people did, calling out “Bad rice!” to convince the gods not to mess with their rice fields? Maybe she was afraid Thelvin was too good to be true and didn’t want to be disappointed. Maybe Ardell was right: she needed to watch herself, even if she wasn’t prepared to admit it out loud.

  SEVEN

  DEATH AND THE HITCHHIKER

  In the next days, Blanche felt weighted down by stories about Maybelle Jenkins’s death. The newspapers, TV, and radio were full of what a nice, upstanding young woman Maybelle had been, even though she came from a family of backwoods rowdies known for petty thievery, heavy drinking, and light work. The newscasters said Maybelle was different: she’d finished high school and had a job in a high-priced dress shop over in Chapel Hill where she was well liked and known to be saving her money to go to fashion-design school.

  But what really stretched Blanche’s nerves was watching Ardell’s prediction come true in the suspicious looks white folks gave the black men who mowed their lawns and delivered their groceries, certain that one of them, dazzled by his desire to defile white womanhood, had dragged poor Maybelle into the woods and played out white folks’ version of every black man’s fantasy, then killed her. Black folks were equally sure some white male, lacking the morals and common decency of a rabid dog, had given into his basest desires and taken what Maybelle wouldn’t give, then killed her. This despite the fact that none of the reports said a word about rape.

  No matter what black folks thought, white folks were in charge of the investigation, which meant, as Ardell had foretold, every black male who had a functioning penis and some who didn’t were hauled downtown for questioning. Stories of strip searches on the sidewalk and men dragged off to jail without shoes or pants gushed through the community like water from a broken hydrant without any sense of how many of the stories were true. Blanche couldn’t stop herself from wondering if there would have been a similar reaction had she reported David Palmer. Would he have been searched or dragged off to be questioned by men who only wanted a flimsy excuse to hurt him? Even she had to laugh at the very idea.