21
“C’mon, Lula, have some fun!”
“I am havin’ fun, Beany. You go on and dance, I just enjoy watchin’.”
Lula, Beany, and ET were in Hollywood Del’s, a nightclub on the outskirts of Savannah. Beany had been dancing with ET to Felix Mendelssohn and His Sepia Cats, a band that specialized in ’60s soul music. Just now they had launched into “Shotgun,” the old Junior Walker & the All-Stars tune. ET went to the bar to get himself another beer and Beany plopped down in a chair next to Lula’s.
“I like they’re playin’ oldies, Lula, honey, ’cause I can’t get into this hip rap, or rap hop, or whatever they call it. Whew! It’s a wonder I can even move out there on the dance floor. You catch me tryin’ to do the skate?”
Lula laughed. “You’re amusin’ and amazin’, Beany, you truly are. Somebody’d knock into me, I’d go flyin’ and end up in the hospital with a busted hip.”
“Lula, I know I’m an old lady, but d’you think it’d offend ET if I asked him to go to bed with me just once?”
It took Lula a few seconds to realize that Beany was deadly serious, then she said, “Hard to say. I know the very thought kinda offends me.”
“Why? I ain’t expectin’ a miracle, only it’d be sorta sweet to have some affection of the intimate type.”
“Beany, it might could take a miracle for that boy to get an erection in your presence, and even if he did you’d break apart soon as he squeezed you.”
Beany took a swig from her bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon and shook her head. “It’s embarrassin’ to be horny at eighty,” she said.
“Ladies, meet Jamilla.”
Lula and Beany looked up to see ET with a dark-skinned young woman.
“She’s from—Where is it you’re from again?”
“Nazareth,” said Jamilla. “That’s in Israel. I’m an Arab Israeli.”
“ ‘And Joseph came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets. He shall be called a Nazarene.’ That’s from Matthew, ’course. Nice to meet you, Jamilla. I’m Lula and my friend here is Beany.”
Beany gave Jamilla a tiny wave. “World’s oldest teenager.”
“We’re gonna go dance,” said ET, taking the girl by the hand.
“Well, I guess that answers my question,” Beany said. “Look at her, she sure is shapely. Shoot, I hate bein’ ancient.”
“Beany, you gotta try to get comfortable with it or you’ll be miserable all the rest of your days.”
“What you think of all these female teachers seducin’ their boy students lately? Some are even havin’ babies by ’em.”
As Felix Mendelssohn and His Sepia Cats segued from “Shotgun” into “Green Onions,” Lula watched Jamilla and ET take it down a notch and slither easily into scratch ’n’ sniff mode.
“I don’t think the world is so wild at heart any more, Beany, just weird on top. Probably each generation on its way out thinks what’s come after them is missin’ a bulb and dimmer for it. Then again, maybe it’s just us old folks can’t see so good and it hurts us to admit it.”
“Lula, stop.”
“Stop what?”
“Sayin’ ‘us old folks.’ I plain can’t stand it, even I know this is true.”
Lula placed one of her hands over one of Beany’s on the table. Tears rolled down Beany’s cheeks.
“When the angels call and ask me to recall the thrill of them all, then I shall tell them I remember you.”
Beany smiled and used her free hand to wipe away the tears.
“What part of the Bible’s that from?” she asked.
“Ain’t. It’s words from an old song Mama and Dal liked.”
“Thanks, baby, but it’s Sailor you’ll tell the angels about, not me.”
Beany picked up Lula’s hand and kissed it, then looked for ET and Jamilla on the dance floor. They weren’t there.