CHAPTER 22

BURYING A GRUDGE

February 27, 2024

Della didn’t like podcasts. Or at least, she didn’t like the one she was currently being subjected to, which was also the only one she’d ever heard. Being lectured at by a stranger was no fun unless it was Joel Osteen or Oprah doing the talking.

She was resting on her chaise lounge, her chenille blanket pulled up to her chin. Naaz had put on the podcast for her, and the host’s singsongy northern British accent softly lilted through the nurse’s portable speaker. The series, called Normalizing the Great Transition, explored death rites from around the world.

In the past fifteen minutes, Della had learned that (1) Rastas avoid dead bodies because it makes them unclean; (2) the Malagasy people of Madagascar open up tombs every few years to dress up the corpses in new fashions; and (3) the Tinguian people of the Philippines sit their deceased in a chair, pop a lit cigarette in their mouth, and then party all around them.

That last one sounded like a good time, actually.

Della was waiting for Ricki and Ezra. She’d called Ricki this morning and invited them both to an early lunch. She’d needed some time since Ricki’s last visit. It was a lot, being expected to believe these tall tales. But she missed her granddaughter. The call must’ve startled Ricki half to death; the poor thing practically wailed in relief when she heard Della’s voice. Della had put on her most luxurious silk pajamas and ordered from Sylvia’s. The food was for Ricki and Ezra, of course. She hadn’t had an appetite in days.

Della wasn’t feeling like herself. Actually, that wasn’t true; her brain was exactly the same as it had always been. Her inner voice was the same one that had spoken back to her at fifteen, twenty-nine, forty-two, and now ninety-six. It was her body that was beginning to feel foreign. Same product, unrecognizable packaging. Yes, she’d been elderly for a long while, and over time, she’d even started to enjoy the scent of the muscle-soothing Tiger Balm she massaged into her hands.

But lately, when she looked in the mirror, it seemed as though her face had acquired thirty more wrinkles. Her figure was so stooped, she couldn’t stand up straight even when she tried. She was weakening, more and more.

Now she shuffled when she walked (well, when she felt like walking, which was rarely). Her left eye, cheek, and shoulder drooped a little. Her Zumba and water aerobics classes? Off the table. She hadn’t joined her Links Elder Steppers Walking Club on their biweekly jaunts around the Upper West Side in almost a month, though she saw the girls yesterday when they stopped by with a vat of somebody’s daughter’s gumbo.

You know your lights are going out when folks start bringing you home-cooked meals, she thought.

In lieu of meaningful physical activity, Della beat off boredom by doing small-scale things, like dusting her Lladró figurines. Combining tea leaves to concoct new flavors. This morning, she wore a new Fashion Fair lipstick she’d read about in her Essence magazine subscription (Naaz had helped her paint it on with a lip brush). Della was determined to live as vibrant a life as she could until her last breath. Even if on some days, the most she could do was swipe on a dazzling lipstick.

Naaz had moved in to provide around-the-clock care, and her only job was to help Della feel as comfortable as possible in her final weeks or months or whatever. The “whatever” was the worst part. Della just wished she had a say, some control. It seemed undignified, sitting around waiting for death to claim you. It seemed passive, meek. And she loathed not being in control. Everything else was okay. She wasn’t really in much pain, so she didn’t want to depend on the morphine. She just felt exhausted.

When the doctors told her that she needed around-the-clock palliative care, her one request was knowing exactly where her pills were, and how many of them she was supposed to take and when. This dying business was infantilizing enough as it was; she didn’t want to be at the mercy of Naaz for her pain management. She was a lovely girl, but sweet fancy Moses, sometimes her relentless cheeriness was like a screen door slamming in the wind.

Suyin had stopped by to make her a batch of terrible corn bread, which she pretended to adore. Last week, Della and Su had amicably ended their romance as they soared over Manhattan in an hourly rental helicopter she’d chartered (bucket list item number four completed!). Their breakup was both picturesque and unavoidable. Della was too tired to go on dates, and sometimes even too weak to sit up on the couch and watch their baking shows. But they maintained their friendship. Su loved to laugh and tell stories, and Della soaked it up. The days were so long now—she welcomed the company.

She needed Ricki’s company, too. But until today, she couldn’t face her. She hated that she’d iced Ricki out for days, but if she’d learned anything in her ninety-six years, it was that taking action before one was ready was unwise. When Ricki spun that yarn about Ezra, Felice, and the curse, she’d written it off as pure delirium. Clearly, Ricki had fallen hard for an unhinged man who’d sucked her into his fantasies. Wasn’t that what she’d always said her family experienced with her? Perhaps Ricki was as nutty as her family had always alleged.

But Della knew that wasn’t true. Ricki had flights of fancy, to be sure, but she was sane, sensible, reasonable. And she was serious about being taken seriously, in life and in business. No person so red hot on being seen as capable would come up with a story so ludicrous. And yet it was ludicrous, of course. It was.

It isn’t, thought Della. You know you always heard whispers about Mama. How many schoolyard scrapes did you win, fighting the daughters of ladies who’d grown up with her?

Unholy conjure woman, they’d said. Loose morals. Born with a caul, hot from hell. Heard tell she put the roots on my mama, for letting her beau walk her to Broussard’s Dry Goods. Hexed my aunt for laughing at her burlap dress. Laid with any fella who paid her mind. Spent more time playin’ than prayin’. Be careful who you take a shine to, Della—might be your brother.

Whenever Della came home with scraped knees after defending Mama in another tussle, she’d beg Nana for the truth. But she would refuse to confirm or deny. Nana barely spoke two words about her gone-too-soon daughter. Instead, she’d thread her old rosary through her fingers, solemnly praying over the beads. Della always wondered what she was praying for. Felice’s soul? Della’s? Her own? Or maybe she was simply grieving.

As she grew into a teenager, Della tried to see it from her grandmother’s perspective. Nana was religious in the extreme, and the only man she’d ever loved had abandoned her before marriage, leaving their daughter a bastard. And when Felice grew up to be “fast”—and, by all accounts, a witch, no less—she ran off to pursue Harlem’s devilish delights, leaving behind a baby daughter. Yet another bastard baby for Nana to raise. Another failure in the eyes of the Lord. And then Felice’s suicide. The ultimate failure.

The Fabienne women were wired to be sad. Nana got the blues, the kind that kept her in bed for weeks at a time. Sounded like Felice was the same way. Made sense, because Della was, too. And the blues took forever to abate. Della was familiar with how… hopeless it felt to live in fear of your own emotions. Flattened by their strength.

Whatever emotional ailment she and Nana had, it sounded like Felice had it worse. But instead of sticking it out, she’d abandoned her daughter, left her alone to defend Felice’s honor and reckon for her alleged sins. The weight of Felice’s reputation was stifling, and because of it, Della’s childhood was miserable. And she wasn’t just angry about it. She hated Felice for it. It was a grudge she carried around with her every day.

Yes, Ricki’s story about Ezra’s curse was unreasonable. Crazy talk. But the truth was, Della had always felt that there was something explosive about Felice. The suspicion that those schoolyard rumors were true lurked in her mind: unproven but powerful. It was in Nana’s absolute refusal to discuss her daughter; the small-town stories turned into myths that outlived her mother’s short life; the mystery surrounding her suicide.

Della had lost seven babies to late-term miscarriages, and she could feel the emptiness in her womb long after they were gone. With each loss, she’d had to wonder: Had Nana felt it when Felice jumped off the roof? Had she felt that same eternal hollowness? Could a mother’s body perceive the loss, no matter how old her baby was, or how far away? Was it a messy, unwieldy grief, or as neat and clean as a bullet hole? And was it more harrowing to lose a child than to lose a mother too soon?

As far back as she could remember, Della had searched for her mom everywhere. In her friends’ mothers’ faces, in her teachers, in Ethel Waters’s movies. What would it have been like to know her scent, her laugh, her voice? The trajectory of her life would surely have been different. She may not have met Dr. Bennett at that Christmas church social when he was just a young college student visiting his cousins on the bayou. Della had gone to that damned social to spite the popular girls in town, who’d always said she was “witch spawn” and had no business stepping foot in the Lord’s house. If she’d known her mother—if she hadn’t had that chip on her shoulder—maybe she wouldn’t have been so hot on proving those wenches wrong.

But she’d never know. There was so much she didn’t know. Wasn’t that why she’d bought 225½ West 137th Street? To absorb Felice’s energy, try to understand her better, and hopefully get some answers?

And yet, she thought, when Ricki came to me with answers, I turned her away.

Della didn’t want to believe Ricki’s story, because it sounded like the truth.

There were a few short knocks on the door.

“Hiii! Ricki! Long time no see! What’s it been, five days? A week? And you must be Ezra…”

Naaz’s bell-like voice rang out throughout the house. Della’s stomach flip-flopped at the sound of his name. Before, Ezra was simply Ricki’s crush, fling, love, but now, if he was who he said he was, he was also the last person to see her mother alive.

She was propped up on pillows on her velvet chaise lounge when Naaz came bounding into the living room. “Ms. Della, your visitors are here…”

Ricki entered the room, followed by Ezra. The moment she saw Della, she froze. Her bright smile fell and she stood there, caught in a stare of surprise.

Lord, thought Della, do I really look that peaked?

After a beat, she dropped Ezra’s hand and rushed over to her. Gently, Ricki pulled her tiny, stooped shoulders into an embrace. And then, with great effort, Della raised her arms and hugged her back.

“Ms. Della, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry for everything. I know you’re angry with me; I know everything I told you sounds insane. And I never wanted to hurt you. But I had to tell you. I couldn’t go… without telling you Ezra’s story, the curse, all of it. It wasn’t my place to speak to you about Felice. I shouldn’t have even said her name.”

She blurted this out, barely pausing to take a breath.

“It’s all right, baby. I know, I know.” Della quickly patted her on the back twice, signifying that the hug was over. Breathing was difficult, and Ricki was cutting off her air supply. With one final squeeze, Ricki stood back up. Her granddaughter looked lovely in a puff-sleeve maxidress that Della had made for herself fifty years before. The handmade hand-me-down had been her Christmas gift to Ricki, who’d been so touched when she’d opened it that she’d burst into tears.

“I’m sorry for being unreachable, sugar,” continued Della. “I just needed to sit with myself for a moment. You understand,” she said, and it wasn’t a question.

Della peered past Ricki and saw that Ezra was standing across the room at a respectful distance. One hand jammed in his pocket, his expression unreadable. She hadn’t seen him since she and Ricki inexplicably ran into him at a bodega a few weeks ago, and she could barely remember what he looked like. If Ricki hadn’t left so many messages and letters mentioning him, she wasn’t sure she’d remember him at all. Which was especially curious after seeing him. This was not a forgettable man. His was not a forgettable face.

Is it one worth dying over? she wondered. Mama thought so. But that isn’t fair, is it? Felice’s troubles started long before she met him.

Della was so lost in thought that she didn’t see Ezra was holding a bouquet of sunflowers and yellow roses until Naaz took them and went to find a vase. Della gestured at him to come join them.

“Pleasure to see you again, ma’am.” Ezra pecked her on the cheek, looking dapper in herringbone trousers and an open-collar shirt. Della felt that if he’d worn a hat, he would’ve tipped it. “I appreciate the invitation. I imagine… well, I know I’m the last person you want to see.”

“With all due respect, you don’t know me at all, Mr. Walker.”

Ricki flinched, her eyes darting to Ezra.

“You’re right about that, Ms. Della,” he said with a courteous nod. “Beg pardon.”

“No need. Sit down, you two,” she said, gesturing to the love seat. “And eat this food—I ordered so much. I certainly can’t eat it. I just here recently rediscovered the delights of Cream of Wheat. That’s about all I can stomach.” She attempted a smile. She knew she had to tell Ricki the truth. “I know I don’t look well. I’m not well. There’s no easy way to tell your loved ones you’ve got terminal cancer.”

Ricki turned ashen. Ezra, still silent, grasped her hand. She held on for dear life, her knuckles turning white.

“I’ve been ailing since 2016. It comes and goes. But this time’ll be the last time, let the doctors tell it.” She delivered this news matter-of-factly. “But don’t you worry. We all die of something, and my life has been good. I’m happy. I’m not scared of dying—I’m actually curious about it. Besides, life sits shoulder to shoulder with death. It’s around us all the time.

“Lately, I’ve been receiving visitors in my dreams. People I’ve known and loved that’ve passed on. They’re the sweetest, most welcoming dreams. Oftentimes, I even wake up disappointed to be awake. I just want to go with them, as silly as it sounds. But maybe that’s the idea. Our people visit us when it’s time to go, to help us transition and not to be afraid of death. And I’m not. The one thing that bothered me was that I’d seen everyone but my Dr. Bennett. My beloved.”

Her voice cracked on “beloved,” but she moved on. Della had barely said two words in the past couple of days, and now she couldn’t stop. Held rapt, Ricki and Ezra sat across from her—Ricki stricken, and Ezra solemn—and they didn’t try to interject. So she kept going.

“Last night, he finally came to me. Handsome as the devil, in his fedora and oxfords, and his tickled smile, the one so big his eyes disappear. Oh, I liked to pass out from relief. And, without saying it, I knew wherever I am going next, I’ll be safe with him. I’m lucky to have love like that. Some people don’t, you know. Some people go before they’re loved correctly, or even at all.” She looked Ezra in the eye, a piercing yet kind look. “Do you love Ricki?”

Ezra drew up a little taller in his seat. “Yes, ma’am.”

“With your eyes or your heart?”

“With everything.” Squeezing Ricki’s hand, he held Della’s impenetrable gaze. “For a long time, I thought I knew what my calling was. My grand purpose. But when I met Ricki, I knew I was wrong. I was a fool, thinking that I was born to do anything grander than loving her.”

They heard a sniffle, and all three turned their heads. Naaz stood in the archway, tears streaming down her face.

“Naaz, if you don’t find some business!”

The nurse waved and, patting her eyes with a Kleenex, headed back down the hall.

“If you love her, why did you tell her this malarkey about a curse? Immortality? My mother, Felice?”

“Because it’s true,” confessed Ezra quietly.

Della’s eyes narrowed. She was testing him. “Did you love my mother? Answer fast, now. Don’t think up a lie.”

“No,” he said, his voice low. “I didn’t. I couldn’t love at that point in my life. I was full of grief, I was turned around and lost. It looked like I had it all, but I was dulled by all the loss. And Felice… Being with Felice pulled me out of it. She was bright and unafraid, and her strength was contagious. Her energy was intoxicating at times, but I didn’t love her, and she knew it. Her death was my fault. I accept full responsibility. She wanted me to come back with her to Louisiana, and I couldn’t. I wasn’t who she needed me to be.”

Della studied Ezra, unsure if she could trust him. She trusted Ricki, but who would have thought in the final chapter of her life, she’d be called to believe something so outlandish? Here she was, staring into the very young eyes of a man who’d apparently known her mother, the only person who’d ever given her real details about Felice. She had to be sure he wasn’t just insane or delusional. She wanted to do her mother justice.

“Did you make her think you were in love with her?”

He paused, in thought for a long time. After a few moments, he said quietly, “Yes, I suppose I did.”

“’Cause you liked feeling needed, I reckon?”

His mouth twitched. Ezra looked ashamed. He looked exposed, yanked out of his hiding place.

“Thing is, men stay thinking that women are the supporting characters in their story. Ever think you were just a character in hers? I suppose she just wanted a family, a father for her daughter, a man to legitimize her. Not saying she was right to want those things from you, but you were the man who let her down, on the wrong day.”

“So… you believe him?” Ricki asked.

“I didn’t say that,” Della said haughtily. “I’m speaking in hypotheticals.”

“I brought something for you.” Ezra took an envelope out of his coat pocket. Rising up from the love seat, he handed it to Della.

Steadying her hands, her heart beating fast, she opened the envelope and unearthed a small, delicate, and yellowing photograph. It was an almost totally faded picture of a girl covering her breasts and sitting with her legs crossed on the stump of a tree. She was barely visible under the shadow of a moss-hung oak. Her hair rippled in chin-length waves. Her eyes were wide-set, round, yearning. She looked heartbreakingly young.

“When Felice was dancing at Eden Lounge, one of the chorus girls somehow got ahold of this photograph. She’d taken it when she was younger, back in your hometown. The dancer passed it around, and Felice was ashamed about it. So I bought the photo from the dancer. This was the only copy. I tracked down the photographer and bought the film. I wanted to help her. I just… wanted to help her. One of the last things she said to me was how much she missed you and she loved you. And wanted to be with you.”

Della swallowed, a dry lump forming in her throat. She’d waited forever to hear these words.

Blinking back tears, she peered at the photo. It was her mother, undeniably. It was the same face of the woman in the Eden Lounge promo shot Felice had sent back home to Nana. It was Felice. Della’s heart sank at the desperation in her mother’s eyes. The vulnerability peeking out from the tough exterior.

That’s the girl whose honor I defended in the schoolyard, she thought. I was fighting for this lost, misunderstood girl who used the only powers she had to get ahead. A hungry girl who wanted more. I was fighting for her. I wasn’t the only one.

Ezra had fought for her, too.

She knew that now.

“I believe you,” she said.

Ezra and Ricki looked at each other and then at Della. They sat back in their seats, relief flooding them both.

“Thank God,” breathed Ricki.

Yes, Della believed them. But, with growing horror, she realized that meant Ricki really did have only a few more days left. Della might have been at peace with her own passing, but she couldn’t bear it for Ricki. Her granddaughter had things to do! So much beauty to pour into the world. So much good love to bask in.

It wasn’t her time.

“Now,” Della said, her voice weak from talking. “What’s to be done about this curse?”

“There’s nothing we can do,” Ricki said, resigned. “Felice sacrificed herself to activate the curse. The only way to reverse it would be to sacrifice someone else. Which is impossible.”

“Listen to me. And I truly believe this—you’ll be fine,” Della said with a sigh. “Between the two of you? I got a feeling you can fix anything that comes your way. Hex or no hex. But I’m tired; I need to go to bed. Ricki, take that look off your face. This isn’t the last time we’ll see each other. And Ezra?”

“Ma’am?”

“Thank you for this,” she said, holding the photograph to her chest. “Thank you.”

After they left, Della lay on the couch for hours. She kept thinking of what Ezra had said. She missed you and she loved you. And wanted to be with you. As Della reflected on this, she reminded herself that she had no regrets. She’d loved hard and well and been loved in return. And she’d checked off almost every item on her bucket list.

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.

Bury a grudge.

Her heart began to thunder in her chest. Without thinking, she fished a ballpoint pen and Ricki’s wildflower seed note cards out of the coffee table drawer. The ones that Ricki said were plantable. In her now-almost-unreadable scrawl, she wrote:

Dear Mama,

I understand. And I love you.

Always,

Your Adelaide

Using all the strength she had, she rose from the chaise lounge. Naaz helped her down the stairs and outside, to the front of Wilde Things. Along the footpath in front of the shop, Ricki had plotted a small garden of lush greenery. With Naaz’s assistance, Della dug a small hole with her hands. She buried her note in the rich soil. Patting dirt over the hole, she said a silent prayer that the paper would birth a colorful array of wildflowers. From her forgiveness, a permanent flowering would grow in tribute to a woman born at the wrong time and in the wrong place—a doomed girl who, with the right care, love, and support, might’ve learned to use her unfathomable powers for good.

Della buried her grudge. And now she was at peace.