When You Dance With The Devil

by Gwynne Forster

“Right on. You gave the guy what he deserved.” He handed her a piece of paper. “That’s my address and phone number. I know where you live, but I don’t have your phone number.”

  She gave him the boardinghouse phone number. “I’m going to return this cell phone to Gregory. I can afford one myself.” She put the paper he gave her into her pocketbook, looked up at him, and he shifted his gaze, but not before she saw mirrored in his eyes such affection and feeling as she had never seen before.

  She jumped up, nearly knocking over the chair in which she sat. “I’d better go. I don’t want to be late for supper.”

  He placed the container of ice cream on the floor and stood. “Thanks for coming and for this treat. I love ice cream. You made my day.” He walked with her to the door. “When I get back to work, I may not be driving a bus, and even if I do I probably won’t have the same route, and I want to see you again. I don’t mean while I’m driving a bus; I mean socially, man to woman.”

  Her heart seemed to tumble down to her belly. “After all the trouble I caused you, I didn’t think—”

  His arms went around her, his tongue flicked across the seam of her lips, and she opened to him and took him in.

  “You must feel something for me,” he said after releasing her, “or you wouldn’t tremble in my arms. I’ll call you when I get home.” He stared down into her face, and she stared back at him. Poleaxed. Reeling from the shock of what she felt while he kissed her.

  She had to get away. “I’ll . . . uh . . . bye.” With a hand on his chest, she pushed herself from him, rushed down the corridor to the exit and fled down the stairs, forgetting about the elevator or the sign-out notice at the nurses’ station. She left the hospital in a trot, almost running until, breathless, she leaned against a lamppost, gasping. Winter darkness had set in, and the clear moon shining above made the night seem colder and her world lonelier. For the first time in months—since Harper made love to her and then told her why he didn’t want to see her again—she felt like crying.

  Maybe she was one of those women who lost her common sense whenever she was near a man. No. That wasn’t true, because she’d stood her ground with Percy and Gregory and hadn’t let them treat her as if she were a nobody. If only she understood men. If only she’d had a father to teach her those things!

  She walked on to the bus stop and, when the bus arrived, she gave thanks that Jack was not its driver. When Jolene reached the boardinghouse, she didn’t stop in the lounge but hastened upstairs to freshen up and get a grip on her nerves. She was midway up when Percy started down the stairs as if in a hurry. He saw her and stopped, then turned in retreat, but she rushed forward and grabbed his arm.

  “What you want with me? Turn me loose,” he said.

  “Please. I’ve been trying for weeks to thank you, but you won’t give me a chance.”

  He stared at her. “Thank me. For what?”

  “For being so kind to me, Percy. I did a terrible thing. A lot of men would have forced me to . . . you know, but you were such a gentleman, and I appreciate it from the bottom of my heart.”

  “I didn’t look at it that way,” he said, his voice low and tremulous. “I figured you’d be laughing at me.”

  “Oh, no.” She rested her right hand on his arm. “I’m grateful, and I thank you so much for not telling anybody here about it.”

  He moved his head from side to side, seemingly perplexed. “You can bet I didn’t tell anybody about that, and I’m glad you didn’t. Maybe we can forget about it.”

  “Thanks. I don’t do things like that anymore, Percy. When I came here, I’d never had a date with a man in my entire life.”

  He stared at her. “What do you take me for?”

  She told him of her life with her mother and grandmother and her ignorance of the world beyond Emma Tilman’s house. “I’ve learned a lot since I’ve been here.”

  “You lucky you still living. Well, thanks for talking to me. I tell you, I feel a whole lot better about it knowing that I didn’t do nothing bad. I’ll see you down at supper.”

  Inside her room, she closed the door and leaned against it. “That’s taken care of, thank the Lord, but tomorrow after work, I have to go to the library and face Gregory, a man who has no respect for me.” The thought tempered her relief at having restored Percy’s self-esteem, which she did at the expense of the truth. However, she promised herself that she would take that computer training course and help keep the children orderly during their computer training, Gregory Hicks notwithstanding. She washed her hands, replaced her woolen sweater with a long-sleeved red blouse, combed her hair, and headed for the dining room.

  At the bottom of the stairs, she bumped into the Reverend Philip Coles. Caught off guard, she articulated her reaction to seeing him. “Are you here again, for goodness sake?”

  He seemed to shrink, obviously taken aback, but she felt no remorse for her ungracious remark. “Well, it has been several weeks since I was here.”

  “How are things, Reverend?”

  At the sound of Richard’s voice, Jolene whirled around and looked up into his censoring eyes. At least, she thought he censored her. If she had heard him coming down the stairs behind her, she wouldn’t have made such an incautious comment to Philip Coles. After all, she had the reverend to thank for her present state of well-being.

  “Uh . . . hi, Richard.”

  “Hi, how’s it going?” he said and continued to the dining room.

  She had known Philip Coles all of her life, or at least as long as she could remember, and she had never felt hostile toward him, mostly, she supposed, because she accepted her fate and never considered his failure to help ease her plight. Looking back, it seemed to her that he abandoned his role as her mother’s spiritual leader.

  She took her seat between Joe and Louvenia, and greeted them with more cheer than she felt. Philip Coles said the grace, and she made herself bow her head while he did it.

  “You seem down,” Joe said, “and, that’s a pity ’cause you look real nice and fresh like you just came in out of the wind.”

  “It’s cold tonight,” she said and, in an effort to be friendly, added, “I got a raise today, and after the first of the year, I’ll be managing one of my boss’ beauty parlors.”

  “That’s wonderful, Jolene. You oughta be jumping straight up and down. I never saw a person change as much as you have since you came here, and it’s all been for the good, too.”

  She liked Joe, but she’d never found a way to tell him that, and she didn’t want him to think she was coming on to him. “I wish I’d had you for a big brother,” she told him and watched his face crease into a smile.

  “That would’ve been great. I never had any sisters. I . . .” He lowered his voice. “Did I hear Percy ask Judd if he’d like to have some tangerines when he came back from Florida Saturday? I hope he’s coming out of that cocoon he’s been living in.”

  She glanced toward Percy and saw that Judd had locked his gaze on her. “He can only guess,” she said to herself. To Joe, she said, “I wonder where Francine is tonight.”

  Jolene was tempted to go to her room after dinner, but she knew Fannie would take her to task for ignoring Philip Coles. However, to her surprise and satisfaction, he did not approach her but sat with Judd and Richard.

  “What a night!” she said to Joe when Percy walked into the lounge and took a seat.

  “Yeah. I’d give anything to know what’s come over Percy all of a sudden. He’s like his old self.”

  Richard looked at his watch. So this was what his life would be like, wondering and worrying about Francine whenever he wasn’t looking at her. She’d said she had to go to Ocean City and would be late getting home, and he couldn’t call her because the ringing phone might alert someone to her presence. He sighed and accepted Rodger’s offer of a cup of espresso.

  “You know, this is an odd coincidence,” Judd said to Richard and Philip, “they’re not a bit of kin, but they sure do look a lot alike.”

/>   “Who’re you talking about?” Richard asked him, as if he didn’t know.

  “Fannie and Jolene. I noticed it when Jolene first came here, but with both of them wearing red tonight, they could be mother and daughter.”

  “Well, I can assure you that Jolene’s mother is dead,” Philip said, “because I officiated at her funeral.”

  “That’s right,” Judd said. “I believe Jolene did tell me that you were her mother’s pastor. What do you know of her father? Jolene said her mother never told her who he was, and I think that’s the least a person should know. Don’t you?”

  “In most cases, I’d say, yes. From what I can tell from casual conversations with her, Jolene seems to be making wonderful progress. She’s developed into a charming woman.” He didn’t look at Judd while he spoke, and neither that nor what appeared to be an attempt to change the subject was lost on Richard.

  “You’re right,” Richard said. “She’s blooming in spite of the wreck she was when she came here. I can’t imagine that none of Jolene’s teachers, the members of your church or even you didn’t call her mother down about the way she treated Jolene. She came here knowing less about life than the average fifteen-year-old girl, and she paid for it.”

  “And she paid a lot,” Judd said. “Seeing what she’s done with herself since she came here and the talent she’s got, it’s difficult to imagine what she could have amounted to if her life had been different. Somebody’s got a lot to answer for.”

  “Yes,” Philip intoned, “but we shouldn’t speak unkindly of the dead.”

  Judd stared into the man’s face. “The dead? I never said a word about the dead.”

  “Would you like more coffee?” Rodger asked.

  The man looks as if he was drowning and someone threw him a lifeline, Richard said to himself.

  “No, thank you,” Philip said. “Coffee keeps me awake. Well, if you gentlemen will excuse me, I’ll have a chat with Fannie before I turn in.”

  “Where does he sleep?” Richard asked Judd after Philip left them.

  “In Fannie’s sitting room, no doubt. That man’s a hypocrite. What are you thinking?”

  “Something very similar. If you don’t mind, I think I’ll take a short walk.”

  Judd locked his hands behind his head and rocked. “Stop worrying about Francine. She can take care of herself, and if she told you where she’d be, that ought to satisfy you.”

  He couldn’t tell Judd why he worried about Francine, because he wouldn’t dare expose her even to his friend. He ran up the stairs, got a coat and headed outside into the bracing wind. She told me she was going to Ocean City, but I have to make sure she’s not down here on that beach by herself tracking Ronald Barnes. He tightened his coat collar when he turned off Ocean Road and started up Rhone Street. Seeing the elongated figure in front of him, he turned and looked back, then walked on when he realized that it was his own shadow. In the bright moonlit night, he saw the Milky Way. What a scene, he mused as he wiped the wind-induced tears from his eyes. White foam at the tips of the waves sprang out like flashes of light in darkness. Standing alone on the beach, he spread his legs to anchor himself against the force of the wind and stood transfixed while stars shot through the heavens and clouds raced over the moon, momentarily subduing it, but never fully obscuring it. He didn’t know how long he stood there, dazzled by nature’s gymnastics.

  The cold began to seep into his body, and with reluctance he started home, thankful that he hadn’t found Francine risking her life on that beach and wondering what life with her would be like, but exhilarated by the salty air and the night’s brilliance. As he entered the boardinghouse, Francine stepped from the lounge into the hallway.

  “Richard! Judd told me you’d gone for a walk. In this weather?”

  For an answer, he lifted her and twirled her around. “You’re going to drive me loco,” he said, locked her body to his, and lowered his head. As far as he was concerned, anybody who wanted to could watch; his joy at having her unharmed, with him, and in his arms was so great that he didn’t care about convention.

  “Hmm. The times are changing,” Fannie said, misquoting Bob Dylan.

  “Not to worry,” Francine replied. “We’ll keep it between the lines.”

  “Humph. Doesn’t look like it, but you make sure that our senior ladies, Miss Louvenia and Miss Arnetha, don’t give me a hard time about what this house is coming to. I remember how it was with me and my dear husband, God rest his soul. Too bad I couldn’t get something going between Jolene and Gregory Hicks. He’s such a fine man.”

  Richard draped his right arm across Francine’s shoulder. “Fannie, these things work themselves out. Jolene will do just fine. She’s a very gifted, very attractive woman; in fact, she looks a lot like you.”

  Fannie patted her hair. “You think so? In my younger days, I didn’t doff my cap to no woman.”

  Well, well, he said to himself. When you lift the lid, there’s no telling what you’ll find. To Fannie, he said, “You don’t have to do it now, either.”

  Her smile eclipsed her whole face. “Oh, you go way from here, Richard Peterson. I do declare!” She rushed off, her color bright and her spirits high.

  “She surprised me. I thought she’d start spouting one of her rules,” Richard said to Francine.

  “I did, too, and if we took it any further, I expect she would. Did you find a place for us to stay in Miami?”

  “I did, indeed, and the plane tickets are upstairs in my room. I couldn’t possibly overlook a thing like that.”

  Jolene greeted Richard and Francine when she emerged from the lounge on her way to her room. “Hi, you two.”

  “We didn’t get a chance to talk,” Richard said, “but I want to hear about that corner you turned. Perhaps we can speak tomorrow at breakfast.”

  “I’ll get down here a little earlier,” she told him. Maybe she should explain to Richard her rudeness to Philip Coles, but somehow she didn’t feel compelled to do it. The more she learned about people, the lower her estimation of the preacher became.

  Chapter Twelve

  On her lunch hour the next day, Jolene bought a cell phone, and when she went to the library after work, she asked Richard to program it for her, explaining that she hadn’t had time to study the manual.

  “Did you lose the one you had?”

  “No. Gregory gave me that one when I first came to Pike Hill, and I’m giving it back to him tonight.”

  Richard looked hard at her, but she was neither embarrassed nor inclined to protect Gregory. “Because he presumed too much, and it’s my way of straightening him out. I bought my own phone.”

  “An angle of the corner you turned?”

  She nodded. “Harper wants us to be friends. He leaves the hospital today, and he wants us to see each other.”

  “How do you feel about that?”

  “Like . . . maybe I’ll finally have a normal relationship with a man. He’s—”

  “Are you attracted to him?”

  “Uh . . . the last two times I’ve been with him, things have been . . . he just sort of swept me away. Richard, he’s the one man I ever felt anything with, and he’s always been respectful, even when he told me he didn’t want any part of me.”

  “You told me.” He handed her the cell phone. “Do you remember my saying you were pining for the wrong man?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Open your eyes, Jolene. When a man cares for a woman, and if she’s available, he’s not likely to hide it. Will you be at the children’s class?”

  “Of course.”

  She stood at the door while the children filed in, addressing them by name and patting their shoulders, letting them know she was their friend as well as their disciplinarian.

  “You’re doing a great job with these children,” Gregory said to her at the end of the class. “You make teaching them easy.”

  Thank God, she didn’t need his compliments or his approval. “I respect them, and they know that,�
�� she said, looking him in the eye. “Every human being deserves respect. Good night.” She left him standing there, and went to the reading room to find Judd. How sweet it was!

  Before she could reach Judd, she felt the weight of Richard’s hand on her shoulder. “Gregory said he’d drive us home. Is that all right with you?”

  “Rough as that wind is? Sure. And thanks, Richard.” She had done it. She had faced Gregory Hicks with her head high and her shoulders straight. “From now on, nobody’s dragging me down,” she said to herself. “Not even me.”

  That resolve prevented her from rushing to her room after supper and telephoning Harper on her new cell phone. Instead, she joined Judd, Francine, and Richard for coffee and the chocolate fudge that Marilyn had announced would be served after supper. She didn’t talk but sat quietly and observed the interplay between Francine and Richard in an effort to learn how a woman behaved with a man.

  They just act . . . normal-like, she said to herself. Natural, like they’ve always been together.

  “Jolene,” Fannie called. “Telephone.”

  She told herself not to run. Maybe it wasn’t Harper, but her boss. She remembered that her boss never called her at home and knocked over a chair in her haste to get to the telephone, which hung in the hall across from the lounge. She didn’t want him to know how excited she was, how impatiently she’d waited for his call, so she took a second to catch her breath and slow down her heart beat. “Hello. This is Jolene.”

  “Hi. This is Harper. I’m home, and I ought to have my car by the weekend. Will you go to a movie with me?”

  She hadn’t expected that. So much activity days after his release from the hospital didn’t make sense to Jolene, and she indicated as much. “The weekend? Aren’t you pushing it?”

  “No. My doctor said the sooner I get back to a normal life the better.”

  Maybe her ship had come in, and she would have a normal life with another person. “Harper, I’d love to see a movie with you.” They talked for a while, and then she said, “I bought my phone today, and I enjoyed giving Gregory’s back to him.” She gave Harper the number. “You can call me on my cell phone now.”