“I think she never tell you when they bring Gordo to Washington, DC. They have him at Walter Reed for almost a month now. He’s very serious. No visitors except family. Shelly and Trey, they drive me all the way to Baltimore to see him. It was a long trip — very terrible. Gordo suffering too much. He’s not glad to see us. He tell us to go home. We just pray.”
“Sorry, Suleeta. I know that’s hard.”
“Very terrible,” she said again. “They bringing him to San Diego. We got the papers from the government. Shauna is upset. She don’t want him to go to San Diego VA Hospital. She want him to go to San Antonio. She say San Antonio have much better rehabilitation. But Jerry and me, we think Gordo need to be close to home. He need his family.”
“I see,” Truely said.
“They fly him to the hospital here on Friday — on a U.S. military plane.”
“That’s good news then, I guess.”
“Yes,” she said. “Is Arnold still there with you?”
“He is. Just a minute.” Truely covered the phone and said, “Arnold, get up, man. It’s Suleeta. She wants to talk to you. She says they’re bringing Gordo back to California.”
Arnold was already awake. Some nights he liked to sleep with a wave cap or a nylon stocking on his head to keep his hair from going nappy, as he explained it. He stumbled to the phone wearing a pair of Truely’s boxers and a ripped T-shirt. “Everything okay?” He whispered the question to Truely.
“Here, talk to her.” Truely handed him the phone.
Arnold took the phone hesitantly, like someone who understood that the telephone was invented primarily for the purpose of delivering bad news. “Hello?” he said quietly.
Truely stood nearby but could not hear the conversation. He simply heard Arnold utter a series of single words, “Fine. Good. Yeah. Really? Okay. Sure. Yeah. All right. When? Yeah. Yeah. Maybe. Okay,” and then Arnold handed the phone back to him. “She wants to talk to you.”
“I tell Arnold that Gordo asked for him,” Suleeta said. “He don’t ask for nobody — but he asks for Arnold.”
“Good,” Truely said.
“Maybe you can bring Arnold back home then? Is it too much trouble?”
“We’ll work it out,” Truely said. “Sure.”
“Also Truely …” Suleeta paused. “I’m sorry for your trouble with Shauna. Pablo too. I hope it don’t turn you against the Mackey family.”
It was an awkward subject. “No,” he said. “Of course not.”
“It might help Gordo to see Arnold. It might encourage him, yes?”
“Yes,” he agreed.
“So you bring Arnold back home then?”
“Of course. We’ll come whenever you say.”
After Truely hung up he and Arnold were stunned into near silence. Arnold finally said, “We been waiting for Gordo to come home. Now here he come.” He got a glass of water at the kitchen sink and went back into his tent, pulling the sheets closed.
Truely had no idea how long it took Arnold to go back to sleep, but in his case it was nearly morning before he was finally able to drift off.
THEY AWOKE to Truely’s cell phone ringing. He slapped for it on the bedside table. “Damn,” he whispered, knocking the phone to the floor. When he finally managed to grab and silence it, he barked into the receiver, “What?”
“Truely, it’s Shauna.”
He sat up in bed like a man jabbed with a cattle prod. “Hey,” he managed to mumble.
“I’m sorry to call so early. Mama just told me she called you last night. I wish she hadn’t done that, Truely. I specifically asked her not to.”
He remained silent. He had no idea what to say. But the awkward silence only served to urge her on. “There is no need for you to get involved in our family issues, especially after — you know — what happened. I know I should have been the one to tell you about Pablo, Truely, and I was going to, but Mama beat me to it. She had no right to speak for me. And she has no right to pull you into this now.” Shauna sounded genuinely distraught.
“I’m not pulled into it,” he said flatly. “Suleeta thinks it would help Gordo to see Arnold. That’s why she called.”
“I disagree,” Shauna said sternly.
“With what?” Truely was losing his way in the apparent antagonism of the conversation.
“I don’t think it would be good for Gordo to see Arnold. I think Arnold is the last person in the world Gordo needs to see right now.”
Truely was taken aback, unsure how to respond. “Why?” he asked.
“Mama has always had a soft spot for Arnold. But just because you have a rotten childhood doesn’t mean you’re a good person just waiting for a chance. That’s what Mama thinks. But the truth is Arnold is trouble, Truely. Mama probably failed to mention all the trouble Arnold has caused us — well, caused Gordo. And therefore all of us. He’s a little con man, Truely. In case you haven’t figured that out.”
Across the room, Arnold’s tent was trembling and twisting. He stuck his head out from behind the sagging sheet. “Who is that?” he asked.
“Nobody,” Truely answered. It was instinct on his part — to lie.
“Truely, are you listening?” Shauna asked.
“Sorry,” he said. “Can you tell me the purpose of your call?” He was trying to sound businesslike because he knew Arnold was curious and listening hard.
“The purpose of my call” — Shauna sounded highly irritated by the way he had phrased the question — “is to tell you not to bring Arnold to San Diego. Mama should not have asked you to. It would be a mistake all around. So, if you really care about Gordo, then you’ll just stay out of this. Believe me when I tell you the two of you showing up will only make matters worse.”
“How is that possible?”
“There is history here, Truely. Did Arnold tell you he was arrested a couple of years back? That he went to juvenile detention?”
“He told me.” But the truth was he had barely mentioned it — and Truely knew none of the details. He had never bothered to ask Arnold about it either.
“He stole money from Mackey’s Construction, Truely, a sizable amount, and then lied about it. He tried to blame Gordo. But they had him on surveillance tape — it showed the whole thing. He didn’t know Daddy had installed a video camera system on the property. If he’d been a little older he probably would have done prison time. Mama and Gordo forgave him — they always feel sorry for him. Poor Arnold. But Daddy and I never will. He’s used this family enough — caused us enough heartache. And now thanks to Mama he’s using you the same way.”
“I’ll have to get back to you on this.” Truely sounded oddly detached, even to himself.
“You don’t need to get back to me, Truely. You just need to tell Mama you’re not coming and you’re not bringing Arnold.”
“I’ll get back to you,” he repeated. By this time Arnold was up and obviously listening while he looked through the refrigerator for something to call breakfast. “I’ll call you later,” Truely said again.
This time Shauna seemed to understand. “Is Arnold there with you? Is he listening?”
“Possibly.”
“Truely, I don’t care if he knows it’s me. I don’t care if he hears what I’m saying to you. It’s all true. He knows it’s true too.”
“I see.”
“I’m not trying to be hateful, Truely. I’m trying to be helpful — to Gordo.”
“I know you’ve been through a lot.”
“You don’t know,” she said. “You don’t. You have no idea.”
“I’ll have to call you back.”
“Don’t bother.” She hung up the phone.
Truely let out a long involuntary whistle. “Whewwww,” he said.
Arnold was standing at the kitchen counter, pouring Cheerios into a bowl. “Who was that?” he asked again.
“Nobody you know,” Truely said. Lie number two.
“Even if I don’t know them, I still want to know who was it.”
/> “Why? What does it matter?”
“Because you lying. You don’t want to tell me who it was — and that make me really need to know all the more.”
“I don’t ask you who it is every time your phone rings, do I?”
“You ain’t me though. I got the need to know. I know it’s somebody that knows me because I heard you say my name.”
“Maybe you should become a lawyer,” Truely said. “Or a damn detective.”
“Maybe I will too, if I ever pass the GED Courtney so crazy about.”
“Not if — when,” Truely corrected. “It’s a shame that the need to know is not the same as the love of learning.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“So just tell me then — who was it?”
This was why Truely hated secrets. They were like mosquitoes, swarming, swarming, circling your head, biting, just annoying the hell out of you. There was no way he could keep this secret for long. So why waste time trying? “It was Shauna,” he said.
“I thought so.” Arnold poured milk on his cereal. He grabbed a banana and was searching the drawer for a knife. “Shauna don’t like me.”
“I gathered that.” If he was going with honesty — then by damn, he’d go with it. “You want to tell me why?”
“She thinks I stole some money from the Mackey business office.”
“Did you?”
“Yes.” He scooped a spoonful of cereal into his mouth.
“Then she thinks right?”
“She don’t know the whole story. Wouldn’t believe it if she knew.”
“Did you try to tell her the whole story?”
“Part of it.”
“Why just part of it? Why not all of it?”
“It make Gordo look bad.”
“What are you saying, man?”
“I don’t want to be talking about this,” Arnold said. “Don’t do no good to talk about it. It’s done. I served my time in juvenile. Paid my dues like they said.”
“What has Gordo got to do with this?”
“Gordo the best friend I ever had. Gordo try to look out for me when I was a messed-up kid running the streets. I owe Gordo big-time.” Arnold was spooning cereal into his mouth as he talked.
“Okay,” Truely said. “And what else?”
“Nothing else. That’s all there is to say.”
“What happened to no secrets among friends?” Truely asked.
“I got to get my shower and get out of here.” Arnold turned up his cereal bowl and drank the last of the milk. “Ima be late, man.”
“We’re not through talking here, Arnold,” Truely said. “You go ahead to your job. Just make sure you understand that this conversation is not over. We’re going to finish this discussion right here. Count on it.” His voice was stern in a way he didn’t quite intend. It was the voice he sometimes used in a confrontational business setting. Jaxon referred to it as his take-no-prisoners tone. It was generally effective in the corporate world.
Arnold nodded and put his dishes in the dishwasher and went to the back bathroom, his office, to take a shower.
AFTER ARNOLD LEFT for the furniture warehouse, Truely called the attorney he had hired to defend Arnold’s mother. As long as he was running a tab he might as well get some questions answered. “Look,” Truely said when he got the guy on the phone, “as long as you’re handling Keesha Carter’s case, I’d like you to research her son’s problems with the police. His name is Arnold Carter.”
“DOB?” the attorney asked.
“Don’t know,” Truely said. “I think he’s sixteen. Maybe seventeen. Some of his trouble involved Mackey’s Construction — if that helps.”
“I’ll get his DOB from his mother,” he said.
“Good. Maybe she can tell you Arnold’s arrest history.”
“Keesha Carter doesn’t have a good relationship with the truth,” he explained. “Besides, she lives her life like she never had any kids. She never mentions them. Her mother is the one who raised them.”
“Ask his grandmother then,” Truely suggested. “Maybe she knows.”
“I’ll get one of the clerks on this,” he said. “I’ll get back to you.”
After Truely hung up the phone he had the feeling maybe he had taken the lid off something that was better left closed. On the other hand, one of the grave mistakes of his life was believing what people told him — because he usually wanted to. It was easier that way.
NEXT HE CALLED Shauna back. She answered the phone with the same abrupt tone she had used earlier. When she realized it was Truely she offered an explanation but not an apology. “I thought you were the Walter Reed medical officer calling back. He’s been trying to avoid talking to me. He’s a useless paper shuffler who calls himself a medical professional. He doesn’t care what’s best for Gordo — or anybody else. He’s filling vacant slots. That’s his job as he sees it, forcing square pegs into round holes. But that’s a different battle.”
“A different battle from this battle?” he asked.
“I’ve already made my feelings about Arnold clear,” Shauna said.
“Funny, you never mentioned any of this to me before. You’d think maybe this might have come up at some point in the last few years, Shauna. I didn’t ever hear Arnold’s name spoken. And now it seems he’s somehow at the center of this Mackey family crisis. I don’t get it.”
“I think we hoped Arnold was out of Gordo’s life. He probably would be too, except that Mama keeps drawing him back in.”
“She says Gordo is asking to see Arnold. That Arnold is the only person he’s asked for.”
“Good Lord, Truely. Gordo is not Gordo. He is not of sound mind. Do you understand what I’m saying here? He might just as well ask for Santa Claus or Satan or God knows who. Sometimes he makes no sense at all. Mama thinks she understands what he’s saying, but she doesn’t. She translates his jabber into requests that he isn’t even capable of making.”
Truely didn’t respond.
After an awkward silence Shauna said, “Gordo might not even remember Arnold if he saw him. One minute he knows who he’s talking to, the next he isn’t sure. He’s known Pablo most of his life, right? And sometimes now Pablo comes into his room and he has to introduce himself — like a total stranger, over and over, day after day. Gordo’s memory comes and goes. You know how much Gordo weighs, Truely? A hundred and eighteen pounds. Less than I weigh. He’s not himself. That’s the point I’m trying to make.”
“Look.” Truely finally spoke. “I’m going to take Arnold down to San Diego when Suleeta calls. I promised her that. Once we get down there we’ll decide whether or not it will be good for him to see Gordo. Okay? If we decide it’s not the right thing, no problem, we’ll leave and come back.”
“I can’t believe you’re doing this, Truely. Is this your way of getting back at me? Is that it?”
“Come on, Shauna. I think you know me better than that. But maybe you don’t.”
“Please don’t do this, Truely. Just stay out of it.”
“Maybe you’re right and Gordo doesn’t know what he’s asking for. I don’t know. But if by some long shot he does — then I don’t want to be the one who kept him from getting what he wanted. And besides …” Truely paused.
“Besides, what?” Shauna demanded.
“I don’t know their history, granted. But I do know this —Arnold loves Gordo. I know that much.”
Shauna’s laugh was bitter and caustic. “God, Truely, you’re such a fool.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I think that’s been established.”
DESPITE ALL THE DAMN DISTRACTIONS, this was going to be a good day. Nothing could ruin it. Truely had an afternoon meeting in San Jose. The latest prototype of their new product was being unveiled. Already it had been revised maybe a dozen times — including a new name. From Not Your Daddy’s Desk, to Not Your Father’s Work Space all the way to the Techno-Chair for a week or two. Now condensed to the tChair. Perfect. The renderings
were pure space age, complete with red leather samples and imported Italian fabrics. The tempurpedic underpinnings conformed to your body shape, supported your lumbar region, and provided what was referred to as chiropractic comfort. The tChair rotated on a pedestal base. A twenty-two-inch computer screen tucked into the chair arm à la the tray table in the arm of an airline seat — along with a foldout lap keyboard. Movies, music, games, Internet, cell phone, whatever you needed, at your fingertips. The tChair leaned back into a reclining position for napping and included a sleek pull-down apparatus similar to what you saw on a baby stroller, so the occupant could sleep in privacy — with a fan to circulate and purify the air and provide the white noise of his choice — ocean waves, singing birds, quiet heartbeat. The tChair had push-button massage treatments, heat settings and vibration capabilities. Damn, Truely kept thinking, if only George Jetson could see this chair.
The exciting thing was that Truely and Jaxon were meeting with Global Airlines this afternoon — an emerging U.S.-China-owned company. They had invited them to the unveiling of the prototype tChair — and the implications were huge. Global Airlines was contemplating a savvy new fleet of business-class jets seating from 24 to 50 passengers on the commuter line and upwards of 100 to 300 on a new full-service line. They were doing a feasibility study on the possibility of using the tChair in place of the standard airline chair. There was a revolution at hand in the workplace — and if all went well, in the world of air travel too. And that might be just the beginning. It was invigorating for sure. Truely felt alive and totally competent in the work world. He was happiest when he was immersed in a go-for-broke project.
Courtney had teased him when he showed her the latest batch of sketches and enthusiastically described the chair’s revised design and newest name. “The tChair? Would that be short for the Truely-Chair?” Now both she and Arnold fondly referred to the tChair as the Truely-Chair.
“How that Truely-Chair coming along?” Arnold asked from time to time.
ON HIS WAY over to San Jose he called Courtney to meet him for coffee. After her odd mood on Sunday he wanted to check and see how she was doing. She met him at a Starbucks on El Paseo. She arrived with a smile on her face, wearing jeans and a sequined T-shirt with the word Jose on it. She kissed him hello. “So today is the big day?”
Eat, Drink, and Be From Mississippi Page 29
