by Dijorn Moss
With a 9 iron in his hands, Quincy parted through Karen’s coworkers like the Red Sea, ignoring the greetings and the chatter. He started to shake as he got close to Karen’s office. He wanted to kick down the door, but settled for a more civilized approach, and knocked.
“Yes,” Karen said from inside her office.
Quincy opened the door and slammed it shut behind him.
“What’s wrong with you?” Karen stood up and took off her glasses.
Quincy reached into his pocket and pulled out the cell phone. The look of shock on his wife’s face gave him all the confirmation he needed. Quincy threw it at Karen. She ducked, and the phone just missed her head as it ricocheted off of her glass window.
He then pulled out the cuff link and chucked it toward Karen; the cuff link landed square on Karen’s shoulder.
“Baby, I can explain,” Karen said.
“You had him in my house, Karen! My house! You’ve been creeping on me behind my back.”
Quincy watched her whole being crumble, and he knew she could not even search the rubble to find an explanation that would suffice. For once, Quincy needed her to find an explanation. He needed her to say something that would make sense.
He needed her to win. Instead, what he found was a diminutive will that could not even go on to fight.
“I’ve forwarded the messages to my phone. Tomorrow I’m going to see a lawyer,” he told her.
“Baby, we just need to talk. Let’s not let our emotions get the better of us,” Karen said with tears in her eyes.
“I left my emotions at home. Now all I have is my resolve to send you to Wal-Mart to shop from here on out.”
“I’m so sorry.” Karen’s voice quivered.
“You know I wasn’t particularly happy in this marriage. I haven’t been happy for a long time, but I know that I promised to be faithful and loyal to you. I’ve kept my vows despite countless opportunities to break them.” Quincy took a moment to catch his breath and grip his 9 iron.
“What are you going to do with that?” Karen looked at the golf club her husband gripped in his hand.
“I haven’t decided. Is he someone I know?”
Karen’s silence admitted her guilt.
“He is, isn’t he? It has to be someone from that church.” This time, Karen’s tears admitted her guilt. “Who is it?”
“Listen, baby, we can work this out.”
The levees that held back Quincy’s anger broke. He swung the golf club down on her glass table like an axe, and shattered a piece of glass.
“Have you lost your mind?” Karen yelled.
“Who is it?” Quincy voice had a demonic rage to it.
He turned toward her picture display case. He hated to have to destroy their wedding pictures. Quincy looked real good in his black tux with the buttercream-colored tie, but that picture represented the sham that had become his life, so it had to go. With one swing, he started to destroy the pictures on Karen’s shelf, including the high school graduation picture of their daughter, Sasha, who was now a student at UC Berkeley.
He knew he would regret his actions, but he was too caught up in the sounds of broken glass and Karen’s screams. The two entities sounded like thunder. Two men wearing navy blue blazers entered the office.
“Sir, you have to leave right now!” one security guard said while pointing toward the door.
“What you going to do with your flashlight, your clip-on tie, and a jacket that’s two sizes too small?” Quincy now raised his bent 9 iron like a samurai sword.
The second security guard emerged from behind the first. He was almost a foot taller than the other security guard.
“I guess you choose to do this the hard way,” the second security guard stated.
With that said, both security guards rushed Quincy before he could get a good swing, and wrestled him to the ground. They lifted Quincy off the ground, and he kicked his feet up to try to get loose.
“Get your hands off me!” Quincy yelled, but to no avail. The men escorted him out and he endured the dropped jaws of his wife’s coworkers.
The elevator doors opened, and then sealed in Quincy and the two behemoth security guards.
The compacted space and elevator music did nothing to loosen the guards’ grips around Quincy’s arms. This would be the part in the movie when the hero disables the guards and walks out of the elevator, with the guards left unconscious on the floor. This would not be the case for Quincy, because these guys were pretty strong.
The elevator reached the bottom floor and the doors slid opened. The two men carried Quincy out on the tips of his toes.
“We could let you go if you were going to go in peace,” one of the security guards said.
“No, I still want to do things the hard way,” Quincy replied.
“Suit yourself,” the security guard said.
There was light foot traffic in the lobby, and Quincy was too furious to be embarrassed. If he got a second crack at Karen, he would cause more damage and the real police would be escorting him out. The guards released their hold from Quincy as soon as they passed through the front sliding doors. The sky was still beautiful, but Quincy’s soul was cloudy. He’d heard about out-of-body experiences. Up until this point, he viewed the notion as a load of crap. Quincy had to come to grips with the fact that he just might be having an out-of-body experience. Karen? Karen having an affair?
Quincy could not begin to fathom that his wife of twenty years was capable of such actions, capable of being unfaithful. Quincy had had his share of perspective rendezvous that he reneged on at the last moment for the sake of his marriage. He thanked God for the fact that he had not engaged in infidelity. Now that very same God had betrayed him. There was only one thing Quincy could do: call up a friend and borrow a G-5 jet. He needed to leave town.
Chapter Two
Chauncey pulled his champagne-colored Cadillac into the parking lot behind the baseball field. His New International Bible, just a touch lighter than his chestnut skin, seemed like an extension of himself. As he exited the car, Chauncey was greeted by a gust of wind that pushed the autumn leaves into his path. After locking the door, he turned and started his walk along the cemented path of the park.
Chauncey passed by an empty playground. He could remember a time when this playground was full of children at play. That was another time. In the distance Chauncey could make out a group of thugs, petty neighborhood gang-bangers, hanging out under a tree, blasting god-awful rap music.
They, he surmised, were the reason there were no longer children at this park. Drinking, smoking, cussing, and carrying on. Well, that stops now. Chauncey was mighty and strong in the Lord. He was going to take back the park by reclaiming some lost souls. As he continued down the path, he passed a derelict water fountain. It stood in the middle of the park between the soccer field and the basketball courts.
In the old days, kids would take a break from shooting hoops or kicking around the ball, and gather here. Now it just stood idle. The fountain had a two-step platform. Chauncey walked over and positioned himself on the second step. He opened his Bible. The wind blew the pages over, but the Bible was more for the look and less for the actual message. Chauncey knew the passage by heart, knew every line and the cadence it deserved.
“Oh yes, Jesus! Thank you, Jesus! Lord, you declare in your Word that you’re the way, the truth and the light. Those who believe in you shall not perish, but have everlasting life. I pray that everyone under the sound of my voice will choose life today,” Chauncey prayed.
Chauncey’s voice must have carried over the sound of their music; the thugs underneath the tree were now eyeing him.
“Those who practice sin shall not inherit the kingdom of heaven. You have to be born again.” As he said this, Chauncey felt his voice crack. It was their attention that he wanted as he tried to project his message over the din of their music. “I’m that voice that cries in the wilderness, ‘Make it straight!’”
“Make it s
traight with the Lord,” a homeless man shouted from behind him.
Chauncey turned around. The man had salt-and-pepper dreads that caked his shoulders and reached down his dirty army jacket. He was pushing a shopping cart filled with bags of cans and plastic bottles. As he approached the fountain he continued to speak, but it was low and slow and sounded like gibberish. The smell of caked-on liquor was oppressive, sweet and sour at the same time. It stung Chauncey’s nose.
Chauncey did not have time for this deranged man. So he broke from the fountain, walking in the direction of the thugs under the tree. Halfway there, he spied a young black girl who lay on top of a blanket. She wore sunglasses and a tie-dyed bikini top with white shorts. Chauncey maneuvered around her to step in her shade, and the girl immediately used her hand as a visor.
“Hello,” she said.
“Hello, God bless you. I saw you from over at the fountain,” he replied. “Enjoying this beautiful weather?”
“Yeah, I’m supposed to be studying.” She pointed to a casually opened philosophy textbook tattooed with garish highlighter and random notes.
“I would like to talk with you about making Jesus your Lord and Savior.”
“No, thank you,” she said, curtly picking up the textbook.
Fair enough. Chauncey did not feel any desire to press the issue. He wasn’t here to witness to some college student. The group of thugs who hung out under the tree needed his attention more than some blasé undergraduate.
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil,” Chauncey muttered under his breath as he arrived at the group and broke the circle the gang had formed.
The group started to reposition themselves to size up Chauncey. One guy was as big as the tree. Shirtless, he showed off his coil skin and stretch marks. With a pot belly, his physique was not desirable. Chauncey set his sights on the young man who appeared to be the leader, since he was the only one who did not move.
“Could you turn it down?” Chauncey asked.
“What?” the leader said.
“I said could you turn it—”
“Speak up! I don’t like all that mumbling,” the leader said.
The leader who commanded this motley pile of thugs looked to be no more than eighteen. His body was like a memorial: tattoos of “rest in peace” followed by the names of what Chauncey assumed were his fallen comrades covered most of his golden skin.
“I just want you to know that you should be ashamed of yourselves for doing the devil’s work,” Chauncey said.
His comment caused a nod from the leader, at which point one of the other thugs reached over and turned the music off.
“Say that again, old man?” the leader urged, spitting out the last two words.
“I said you’re doing the devil’s work and you need to repent. I have the Lord on my side and I refuse to be intimidated by you thugs.”
Chauncey felt an object press against his temple. He held on to a fool’s hope that it was not a gun until he turned ever so slightly and caught a glimpse of the muzzle.
At that moment, Chauncey’s raven-like eyes burst out of his skull.
“Oh, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus!” Chauncey’s facade crumbled as he cried out the words.
“You better get up out of here with that church crap before I have the homie bust a cap in you,” the leader warned.
Chauncey backed away from the group and started to walk as fast as his heart beat. Even the wind terrified him, as if at any moment he would be shot in the back. These gang members are ruthless cowards, Chauncey thought, not noting the irony.
As he got back into his car, Chauncey peered out of his front window. In the distance he could see the gangsters laughing at him.
He was jolted back to attention by his cell phone vibrating in his coat pocket. The caller ID showed that it was his sister, Nicole. She lived in Sunnyvale, a small city in Northern California. It was about an hour away from Monterey, where the Men’s Retreat would be held this weekend. Chauncey planned to get to the Retreat on Thursday evening, a day before the official start.
He wanted to help set up and spend some quality time with his pastor and some of the brethren. Of course, there was also a professional matter that Chauncey needed to secure. Pastor Dawkins had been reviewing applications for the minister’s class. Chauncey’s application was among them. When Chauncey was twelve, a prophet had spoken about him becoming a preacher, and how yokes would be broken by his testimony. Chauncey believed that his time had come to become a minster, and being at the Retreat would show Pastor Dawkins his commitment.
“Sis, thank God you called. I just wanted to tell you that I love you,” Chauncey said.
“Did you forget that you’re supposed to visit your brother today?” Nicole asked.
“No hello…just right into criticism. Sister, you would’ve made a great Sadducee, because you love to judge people,” Chauncey said.
“So now you think you’re Jesus?” Nicole snapped back.
Whatever excitement Chauncey felt to talk to his baby sister had left by the time she started talking. He had just escaped a life-or-death situation, and his sister’s accusatory attitude was not the response he needed or wanted.
“Oh no, I’m supposed to see him, I just had something more important to take care of,” Chauncey said.
“Just get over here. You know how bad traffic is on the 405 around this time,” Nicole said.
Chauncey hung up the phone as he sped away. He wondered how in the world he would ever truly be able to do God’s will when his family was in constant need of his help.
Chapter Three
“Not the response that I expected.” Melvin, Jamal’s boss, adjusted his platinum Day-Date Rolex.
Jamal began to loosen his tie and unfastened his top button. “I am happy. I’m ecstatic. This is what I want.”
“I remember when you sat in that chair five years ago, nervous and scared. It was like your entire future rested on you getting this job. But day in and day out I’ve seen you hustle your butt off to get results.”
Jamal had worked for that promotion every day for the past four years. To become a senior marketing exec for Pinnacle Sportswear was his goal. He was sick and tired of living from dime to dollar. Jamal’s family raised him on the idea that if a person wanted something, he had to be willing to work harder than the next man to get it. That meant that when everyone else was asleep, he needed to be at work.
So he made a solemn promise to work while everyone else was at the water cooler, engaged in gossip. Jamal would work while his coworkers complained about their salaries. He never lost sight of his goal and purpose. With his faith in God, he now had everything he wanted career-wise, but his mind could not allow him to savor his victory.
Jamal thought about his son, Jamir, and how every day Jamir resembled him less and less. His life was at a crossroads, and with so many life-changing decisions at his feet, Jamal turned to the only one who knew what the best course of action was for his life.
“Father, open my eyes so that I might see the wonderful plan you have for me. I don’t want to be outside your will, and I pray that the results today will bring you honor and glory. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.” Jamal prayed.
“If I had your wisdom at my age, I would be a billionaire by now. But understand we are not going to pay you this salary for a nine-to-five, forty-hour workweek. We are going to need you to be a machine. Can you live with that?” Melvin asked.
Jamal locked into his problem: a $100,000 salary in exchange for time with his most precious resource, his son Jamir.
“Can you?” Melvin asked.
“I know I can, I just need a minute to get my affairs in order.”
Melvin pulled the cigar out of his mouth. “I’ll tell you what, take until next week to think about it, and on Monday I expect your answer.”
“Thank you, Mr. White.”
This weekend was the Men’s Retreat, and Jamal would have a lot to think and pray abou
t. He walked back to his cubical, where he had a decent view of the parking lot. He also had a view of his car: a white Honda Civic with a dented front bumper. This is where he was. Mr. White’s offer was where he could be.
“How did it go?” Mylessa asked, interrupting Jamal’s thoughts.
Mylessa was a five-foot-six-inch-tall, chocolate-complexioned beauty with a curvaceous frame. She commanded the attention of every man in the office, including Jamal.
“It went great. He offered it to me.” Jamal leaned back in his chair.
Mylessa wore a smoky gray skirt that was sprayed to her hips. Her complete body of work was punctuated by the sound of her four-inch stilettos. “Well, that’s great. So you’re going to celebrate, right?” Mylessa tossed some of her shoulder-length hair behind her shoulder.
Jamal was certain that it was a weave, but with the advancements in hair technology, it was becoming more and more difficult to differentiate real hair from a weave; such was the case for Mylessa.
“I might do something, I don’t know yet,” Jamal said.
“Well, a couple of us from work are heading over to Club Infusion tonight, and I would love to see you there.” Mylessa finished her pitch with a seductive licking of her lips, as her eyes scanned Jamal from head to toe. Jamal was feeling her. She was beautiful, intelligent, and had a great body. Jamal was certain that by the end of the night, they could be at his place eating cheesecake while listening to Sade, right before they headed to the bedroom and made some music of their own. The thought alone awoke some urges within Jamal.
“I would love to, but I’ll have to pass,” Jamal declined.
Mylessa slumped down from his news. “Well that’s too bad. Maybe we could get together for a drink one day?”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t drink.”
“Oh, so you’re just a good little church boy.”
