CHAPTER 5

YOUR VIBE ATTRACTS YOUR TRIBE

February 4, 2024

Della’s teatimes with Ricki were sacred. And she appreciated that her de facto granddaughter deferred to her schedule, which wasn’t the most convenient for a new shop owner. It was the highlight of Della’s week: chatting with Ricki while sipping the latest blend from her True Serenity Tea subscription box as The Great British Bake Off played softly in the background.

In just a short while, Ricki had become far more than a tenant to her. She was family. Della treated her with a warm, overprotective, bossy spirit and, like any A-plus grandmother, always stocked a sensible pocketbook with Werther’s caramels and Life Savers, which were Ricki’s favorites. Though, Della’s idea of “sensible” was 1950s Pierre Cardin. Della had no children or grandchildren, and Ricki had never had a living grandmother—until now.

They weren’t blood related, but when it came to kindred spirits, there were no hard and fast rules about how they were delivered into your life. Sometimes your tenant became your granddaughter, and it was a gift, and that was that.

Ricki added so much vitality to her days. Of course, Della’s life was pretty damned charmed, anyway. Before her beloved Dr. Bennett passed, he’d ensured that she’d be as comfortable as possible. He’d installed an elevator so she wouldn’t have to deal with stairs, hired a weekly housekeeper, and arranged a grocery delivery service for her. To manage her lifelong bouts of the blues, he’d made sure he’d scheduled a weekly call with her Atlanta therapist and arranged for CVS to auto-deliver her antidepressants.

Due in part to all these provisions, Della enjoyed a deliciously active life. There was the aforementioned swim aerobics, but she was also treasurer of her Links walking club and took Zumba Gold on Sunday mornings before church. Even as she entertained Ricki from her living room couch, Della was doing light biceps curls with three-pound weights.

“It was surreal, Ms. Della,” said Ricki, taking her usual place on the amethyst-colored wing chair. Della had decorated her triplex with eclectic pieces: zebra and mahogany woods, mirrored finishes, and jewel-toned everything.

“Certainly sounds it,” responded Della, resplendent in her at-home look, flowy silk pajamas and her signature oversized geometric specs. “Dr. Bennett and I went to a wedding in London once. I couldn’t get the hang of driving on the opposite side of the road. Turns the world all cattywampus. Also, the traffic signs are nonsensical.”

“Such a good word, ‘cattywampus’…” Ricki was barely hiding her distracted, fidgety energy, and Della wondered how long it would take her to address what was bothering her.

“Drink your tea, sugar.”

Obediently, Ricki took a huge gulp and burned her mouth. “Sorry, ma’am, I think I’ll skip the tea today. My stomach’s in knots.”

And then Ricki launched into a breathless recount of everything that had transpired at the Sweet Colette party after Della left. To be honest, the tale was a bit hard for Della to follow. Which part had sent Ricki into such a tizzy?

“So, a woman bought Ali’s painting for an exorbitant amount of money,” she repeated carefully. “That’s a blessing. Why so much carrying on?”

“Because the entire encounter was so mysterious. Why did she seem like she knew me? Who’s her boss? I feel like I’m in a ’90s psychological thriller.”

Della tsked at this. “Sounds like you’re looking for trouble. Unexpected money is a gift, looks like to me. Not everything needs investigating.”

Leaning forward in her seat, Ricki responded, “But weird, surreal things have been happening to me lately.”

Weird, surreal things happen all the time, thought Della.

In the months since Dr. Bennett’s passing, she’d been dreaming about family she hadn’t seen in years and friends she’d known a lifetime ago, as a child. Sometimes, in the vague, neither-here-nor-there moments before waking up, she’d imagine seeing her favorite playmate, Jean-Marie, sitting on her bedroom floor in pigtails and a pinafore, with a bandage on her scraped knee, as clear as if it were 1931. No doubt, it was her brain’s meditation on loss, a way to still the current of sadness that had run under her surface ever since losing her husband. It was lovely in the moment, but when she fully awoke, all she felt was emptiness. As sweet as the subconscious reunions were, the one person she’d give anything to see was her Dr. Bennett, but he was never there.

She started to tell Ricki all of this but decided against it. Della was an orderly woman. Everything in her world had a place. Her tea set stayed on the bottom right shelf of her china closet, and her private thoughts stayed in her head. Plus, that girl was fantastical enough as it was. No need to exacerbate her condition with more outlandish tales.

“Speaking of Ali,” Della said, smoothly changing the subject. “Thank heaven you finally broke up with him.”

“Ali might be the most incoherent person I’ve ever met. What was I thinking?”

“No telling. His corn bread isn’t done in the middle, I know that much.”

“Ha!” Ricki guffawed. But then, slowly, she sank into preoccupation, her brow stormy with concentration. “I just can’t let last night go. It’s funny—before I left Atlanta, my dad said something that stuck with me. He said that I let things happen to me. That I end up in crazy scenarios that I need to be rescued from.” She shook her head. “No. I’m not going to passively accept these odd encounters. I’m going to figure this out, myself.”

Della set her teacup back in its saucer, attempting to steady her trembling hands. “You idolize your daddy, don’t you?”

“No, he’s horrible,” said Ricki, too quickly. “Well, no. I sort of look up to him. Everybody does. I don’t know—I’ve always felt connected to him in an inexplicable way. He’s tough and definitely not… a big talker? But sometimes we share a look, a silent acknowledgment when something absurd or funny happens. He’s not like that with anyone else. Sometimes I feel like he’s on my side. More than my sisters and mom, at least. Who knows? In a different life, or maybe if I wasn’t his daughter, he’d believe in me.”

“Ah. So that’s what you’re doing here, with Wilde Things. You’re creating a different life. So he can see your worth.”

Speechless, Ricki stared at her for a few beats, her always-expressive eyes widened to comical proportions.

I’m so good at this, thought Della. I was born at the wrong time. If I were a modern woman, I’d be a brilliant psychologist. Maybe I’d write a few self-help books. I’ve been told I have the eyewear of an intellectual.

“Listen here,” Della continued, on fire. “You uprooted your whole life. You’re starting over in a new city. You opened the prettiest flower shop I ever did see, and built most of it with your own bare hands. Are these not big risks? Your father seems like an impressive man, but I disagree with him. You are not a woman who lets things happen to her.”

Ricki sat there, seemingly stunned by this information. Della wondered if she’d ever had anyone build her up before. Underneath the twenty-eight-year-old woman, she saw a neglected kid. And Della knew what that looked like. She’d never known her parents, and she was raised by her Reconstruction-era grandma. The daughter of formerly enslaved people, Nana was a rigid, strict woman who worshipped God, cleanliness, and silence. For safety’s sake, kids were to be seen, not heard—though on second thought, they weren’t even meant to be seen. For little-girl Della, Nana’s approval was somewhere beyond a dangerous curve in the road: a route too tricky to navigate.

She wished she could tell her newfound granddaughter that the smartest thing she could do for herself was set her own standards for living. Her father be damned. But Ricki would have to learn that lesson on her own.

“Enough about me,” exhaled Ricki, waving a hand in the air, as if to wipe the conversation away. “How are you doing? I haven’t even asked you how you’ve been coping lately. Is your therapist helping you manage your grief?”

With a resigned sigh, Della slipped her hand into the pocket of her pajama pants, whipped out the TV remote, and turned it off. She swiveled to face Ricki. “I dozed off during our last call.”

“No! Tell me you didn’t.”

“I absolutely did. I might be in Jane Fonda’s shape, but I’m old, after all. Jane could probably tell you that the older you get, the harder it is to stay awake when you’re bored.” Della shrugged. Actually, she was starting to feel a bit drowsy right now. “Besides. How’s a stranger going to tell me how to grieve for my Bennett, my love that she never even met? You can’t cheat grief, Ricki. You have to work with it. Accommodate it.”

Her eyes went misty, and a shadow of a smile lit up her face. “You know, Dr. Bennett was one of the first Black neurologists in the country. He used to go to medical conferences all over the world. He knew I loved silk pajamas, and he’d buy me a pair wherever he went. I’ll have to show you the snake-print ones he got me from Hong Kong; they’re terribly eccentric. Right up your alley.” She sipped her tea. This was a compliment. “I tell you, I’d known him since I was sixteen, and it never occurred to me that one day, one of us would go. And the other would be alone. We were peas in a pod.”

“The kind of love that makes you ignore inevitability, right?” Ricki went and sat next to her, holding her hand. “It sounds so rare, outside of movies or books. I’ve definitely never seen it. My parents act more like coworkers than lovers. The happiest I ever saw my mom was when she was seeing that energy healer.”

Della scoffed. “That foolishness works?”

“No, I mean she was seeing an energy healer, as in sleeping with him. He worked out of a mall kiosk at Phipps Plaza.”

“Well, I’ll be.”

“When Dad found out, he ran him out of town. Mom’s been drunk ever since.” Ricki sighed and fluffed her hair. “Anyway. You and Dr. Bennett sound like a dream.”

Della smiled softly. “I talk to him every day. Just before bed, I tell him everything that’s on my mind. The day he answers, I’ll know I’ve finally lost my marbles.”

And then, with a curt nod, she effectively ended the conversation. She’d exposed a bit too much emotional truth for her liking.

“Oh, Ricki! Did I tell you about my widow bucket list?”

“You haven’t. And I insist that you tell me everything, immediately.”

“It’s a few things I always wanted to try. I was happily married, of course, but a woman always has her secret wants.” She traded out her usual glasses for reading specs and then scrolled through her iPad, the font size positively mammoth. “Ah yes, here we go.”

1. Dye my hair fluorescent pink.

2. Date a woman. Preferably younger.

3. Visit one of those nude Russian bathhouses.

4. Ride a helicopter over Manhattan.

5. Bury a grudge.

Ricki clapped with glee. “Date a woman, Ms. Della? Do you think you might be bisexual?”

“No label, I’m just curious.” She paused, for effect. “What I am not, is polyamorous.”

Ricki giggled as she glanced down at her phone on her lap. She finished her cup in two huge swallows. “I love this for you! But I really am sorry, Ms. Della. I’m going to have to run. If I don’t figure out the mystery behind that assistant, I’m going to disintegrate. And I’d like to live long enough to meet your girlfriend.”

To Della, it was clear that surrounding herself with drama and chaos made Ricki feel safer than standing still did. As a person who’d spent a lifetime preoccupying herself with her husband’s needs—without time to ever examine her own—Della understood this. And she was touched by Ricki’s vulnerability.

And she would protect her, as much as Ricki would let her. As Della prepared herself for a midday nap, she dimly wondered why the universe had brought them together. She’d never believed in coincidences or chance meetings. But it was surprising to find such kinship in her advanced age. Especially with someone so young.

Slipping into sleep, she decided not to fuss over why they’d met. If she’d learned anything over the years, it was that answers to tough questions usually revealed themselves when you least expected it.

Ricki closed Wilde Things an hour early, which probably wasn’t an excellent business decision, given that her business needed the money. She needed the money. That morning, she’d had to force herself to mail the $5,000 in cash to Ali (along with his toothbrush, condoms, and crystals).

The more her calls to Mysterious Benefactor went unanswered, the deeper her obsession became. It was a Rubik’s Cube of confusion, the unsolvable conundrum. Over and over, she pored over every detail, trying to understand what had happened. It was clear that the assistant knew her from somewhere, but she just couldn’t imagine how, or from what. Ricki had no roots in New York. And her only two friends were a scandal-plagued actress and a frisky nonagenarian, neither of whom had ever met that woman. Ricki knew this for a fact because she’d asked them both, several times.

There was nothing left to do but to call an emergency meeting with Tuesday, who was now perched on Ricki’s bed. The ancient radiator clanged out near-tropical heat as the two attempted to sleuth. It was the only other sound in the room besides Stevie Wonder’s deeply obscure instrumental 1979 album Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants. She played it every evening for her flowers. In her soul, she was convinced that the songs made them brighter, happier, and livelier. Like audio Miracle-Gro.

“Respectfully, what the hell is this avant-garde-ass album we’re listening to?”

“Stevie.”

“Nicks?”

“Wonder. He wrote it as the soundtrack for a botanical documentary. The songs activate the spatiotemporal consciousness of my flowers.”

“Thank God you found me,” Tuesday muttered, absentmindedly running a jade roller across her cheekbones. “Okay, let’s go over it again. When you asked the weird lady who her boss was, she responded, ‘I’m not at liberty to say.’ That’s oddly formal.”

“And she sounded a little pissed off. Like, annoyed that I kept asking her questions.” Ricki was perched in her comfort spot, the bench at the antique piano.

She’d furnished her microscopic studio with a clever mix of stoop sale and IKEA finds, but despite creating a cozy-as-hell space with tons of soft surfaces, Ricki’s absolute favorite place to sit, create, and think was at that piano. Sometimes, after a long day at Wilde Things, she’d plop down and fall asleep there, her cheek resting on the smooth lid, inhaling the musky scent of old wood. To Ricki, the piano was as comfy as the softest bed.

Tuesday thought it looked like a kitchen island, and actually, it did. But Ricki didn’t care; she loved it.

“You called the number, and nothing?”

“I’ve called so often I wish I could block myself.” Ricki tucked her foot under her thigh. “But this brings me to motivation. That painting was good, but five thousand dollars?”

“That painting is sexy. I’m telling you, Mysterious Benefactor has a crush. He must’ve seen your portrait on the flyers that were all over the neighborhood. And then sent his assistant to buy it. Please, this is a person playing chess, and now it’s your move. Mysterious Benefactor wants to be found. I feel it.”

“Why are we so sure it’s a man?”

“Intriguing point,” said Tuesday. “It could be anyone. ’Cause if a man’s spending thousands, he’s not sending an assistant. No matter how busy men are, if they’re feeling you, they show up. Look, B2K was in the middle of a world tour, and yet every member attended the premiere of my ABC Family Halloween film, Witch Way to Heaven.”

“The entire band? Even Omarion?”

“Well… no. Just Lil’ Fizz.”

“Make it the whole band in your memoir.”

“Bet,” she agreed, jotting down notes in her phone. Then abruptly she shot up to a sitting position, knocking three pillows onto the floor. “WAIT. Ricki, what’s their phone number? Like, the area code?”

Ricki grabbed her phone off the piano top, scrolling through contacts. “It’s 212. Why?”

“That’s a New York City landline. A landline! Do you know what this means?”

Ricki gasped. “The person didn’t pick up because they’re probably just not home! Maybe they’re on a business trip or something? Who even has a landline in 2024?”

“The point,” said Tuesday patiently, “is that we can trace a landline. To an actual location.”

“You know how to do that?”

“Chile, I used to be so toxic. Gimme your phone.”

A mere twelve minutes later, Tuesday landed on an address.

“592 West 152nd Street. That’s Sugar Hill, expensive as hell. There’s no apartment number, so the person lives in the whole townhouse. Mysterious Millionaire Benefactor.”

Every instinct, every impulse, was telling Ricki to go to the address. But wasn’t that the old her? Hadn’t she uprooted her entire life to start a new chapter?

Her mom always told this story about how on the first day of Ricki’s tadpole swim class, all the other two-year-olds were terrified and clinging to their babysitters, but Ricki was outraged that she wasn’t allowed to swim on her own. Later, at home, when no one was watching, she sprinted outside to their backyard pool and belly flopped into the deep end. Absolutely no hesitation. Luckily, seventeen-year-old Rae saw this play out from her upstairs bedroom window, but by the time she’d frantically fished out her baby sister, Ricki was losing consciousness. After Rae’s frantic mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, Ricki came to, sputtering and coughing like crazy. And then, maddeningly, she fell over on the grass, giggling with delight. It was an adventure!

Ricki still got yearly ear infections from that adventure. She couldn’t afford to risk more consequences. Especially since she had no health insurance.

“Maybe… maybe we shouldn’t go,” she said, backtracking. “Really, Tuesday, what will I gain from finding out who Mysterious Benefactor is? I know my true crime podcasts—what if it’s an elaborate ruse for some sick fuck to lure me out there to my death? Honestly, none of this matters anyway. We’re all just specks stuck to a floating rock hurtling through space.”

“Mysterious Benefactor might, in fact, kill you. But we all die of something.”

Incredulous, Ricki stared at her friend. “See, what I really need right now is a sane person to discourage me from these antics.”

“Your vibe attracts your tribe, babe.” Tuesday shrugged. “I didn’t invent science.”

As badly as Ricki needed to solve this mystery, she recognized this feeling of attraction to a man with an impossible situation. She was battling with herself. That was the old her, and she’d moved a zillion miles from home to rebrand her personality. To be more disciplined, focused.

Ricki looked at Tuesday. Tuesday looked at Ricki. They hopped up and snatched their coats from her closet.

It was 7:30 p.m., Ricki and Tuesday were still camped outside of 592 West 152nd Street, and Mysterious Benefactor had not appeared. From behind the massive oak across the street, they’d surveilled the elegant limestone townhouse for the better part of two hours. Every twenty minutes or so, they’d circle the block to avoid looking like the creepers they were. The shades were drawn, and their only hope was that they’d catch Mysterious Benefactor entering or exiting the house.

The sun had gone down, and now they were freezing, stomping their feet to stay warm.

“Should we just come back another time?” asked Ricki, warming her gloved hands on her third to-go cup of steaming coffee from a nearby bodega. Fifteen minutes ago, she’d asked the lady behind the bodega counter if she knew who lived at the address, and received a stony glare.

“You wearin’ a wire?”

“No! I’d never work with cops,” insisted Ricki. “Abolish and defund, am I right? Fuck the police.”

The woman cracked her gum, bored. “Where you from?”

“Georgia.”

“It shows,” she said. And then looked beyond her. “Next.”

Back at the tree, Tuesday huddled up to Ricki for warmth. Tuesday’s teeth were chattering, but she refused to abandon their quest.

“We can’t surrender now. We’re in too deep!” she whisper-shouted. “Life is a funny thing, girl. Just think, if you’d never met Ali, he’d never have painted you, and we wouldn’t be out here catching pneumonia.”

“You know what? I’ve decided that Ali was a mistake I had to make,” said Ricki, shivering. “The universe was like, you wanna keep sleeping with clowns? Let me present you with the king of clowns and have him embarrass the living hell out of you in public so you really learn the lesson.”

Ricki paused, because Tuesday was suddenly, silently tugging on her arm. Whipping her head around, she saw the front door was opening.

A man. So it was a man. But the darkness obscured his face.

Leaving the door of the stately house open behind him, the guy stormed down the stoop and across the street, headed straight for Ricki. Before she had time to breathe, think, or speak, he was right in front of her. And then she really saw him.

She took in his chiseled features. The breathtaking fire in his eyes. It was him.

Mysterious Benefactor was Garden Gentleman.

“Go,” he commanded in a melodic, deep voice. “Stop trying to contact me. Stop staring in my windows. And get out of Harlem, now, while you still can.” His eyes bore into hers, his expression a silent flash of lightning, a force too tremendous to distill into one feeling.

And then he lowered his voice to a desperate rasp. “Please. Go.”

Thunderstruck, she stood her ground and locked eyes with him. And then something shifted. His expression went from alarm to aching tenderness. In one blink, he’d softened.

Ricki felt a punch of emotions in her chest, almost knocking her off her feet. She didn’t know this man, his name, or why he was so insistent that she leave. Or why, for one unmistakable moment, he’d gazed at her with unbearable, bone-melting sweetness. Maybe he was an unpredictable stranger and she was possibly in danger. But her instincts buzzed louder than that thought. Ricki wanted to go to him, a feeling as sure and natural as surrendering to gravity.

Her whole life leading up to this breath felt inconsequential, sepia tinted: before.

“Go!” he repeated, louder, as if to startle them both back to reality.

Ricki snapped out of her daze. She grabbed Tuesday’s arm, and they fled into the night.