I didn’t know how Ester was going to react when I told her I was moving out, and I didn’t care. She and I both knew that sooner or later our relationship would either end or change drastically. But Ester had her own agenda, and that was something I’d realized long before now. I’d never met this Manny dude she had told me about. From the way she smiled and the way her eyes lit up when she mentioned his name, I knew that she had already laid the groundwork of her own to break away from Clyde. I was glad she had decided to have her baby.
“And I hope it’s a little girl,” Ester squealed, sounding more like a little girl herself. I had never seen her look so happy. Her beautiful cameo face was glowing, her eyes sparkling like jewels. I felt her. I had experienced the same jubilance when I was pregnant.
“If so, I hope she turns out a lot better than her mama and gets herself a real job, you worn-out ho, you,” I teased, trying to hide how nervous I was. Every time we heard a car outside, we both almost jumped off the couch. “Does Clyde know?” I asked, ignoring the margarita in my hand. I didn’t enjoy drinking as much in front of Ester now, since she couldn’t join me. I set my drink on the end table, planning to finish it when Ester left the room.
Ester nodded so hard her hair fell across her face. “I had to tell him. He got suspicious anyway when I barfed in front of him. He wasn’t happy about it.”
“Well, I don’t owe Clyde nothin’,” I snapped. “It was good while it lasted, but I have to get away from all this shit now, before it’s too late. I’m beginnin’ to feel like a robot sex machine.”
Ester nodded, giving me a thoughtful look. “I hear you. So what you gonna do?”
I hadn’t told Ester about my plan to move in with Richard. I didn’t want to take a chance on her telling Clyde where to find me. Not after the way Clyde had reacted to Rosalee’s disappearance. I had just decided that morning to take Richard up on his offer to move in with him, and I was still not sure I could go through with that. Sure, I had enough money to get a place of my own, but the truth was, I didn’t want to be alone. I wanted to be with Richard. I felt that if I didn’t do it now, I would probably never have another chance. I knew I was bringing a lot of baggage to this relationship, with him knowing about me fucking for money and all. But that was the thing. He already knew about that, and he’d already gotten beyond it. Besides, if everything he told me was true, he had just as many skeletons in his closet as I had in mine. We could release them together.
Clyde showed up ten minutes later wearing a white suit and a white hat. He looked like the Lone Ranger. The only thing missing was a black mask.
“Evenin’ ladies. I ain’t seen too much of y’all lately,” he greeted in a dry voice, strutting across the floor. “Ester, get me a beer.” He plopped down hard on the couch next to me. “Lula Mae, it sure is good to see you again, girl.” He put his arm around my shoulder, but I pulled away. Clyde smelled like he had bathed in a tub of alcohol.
“Clyde, there ain’t no easy way to tell you this, but I want to get it over with,” I said as Ester handed Clyde the beer he’d requested.
I could already feel the tension filling the room like thick black smoke. Ester was standing in the middle of the floor, staring blankly from me to Clyde.
Clyde turned the bottle upside down and took a long drink. His Adam’s apple bounced up and down like a rock tumbling down the side of a hill. “I’m listenin’,” he said, his eyes on me. He let out a great belch and thumped his chest with his fist.
“Clyde, I’m gettin’ out of the business. Me and you, we can still be friends, but I can’t hang with you like that no more. I can’t do no more tricks,” I said evenly, surprised that I was able to get it all out in one breath.
First, Clyde just looked at me and blinked stupidly. Then he rubbed the back of his neck and gave me a sharp look. “So that’s why you been duckin’ and hidin’?”
Ester cleared her throat and took a tentative step toward Clyde.
“Clyde, you been real good to all of us. But things are different now. I mean, look at us, man. We both tired,” Ester said, her voice shaking. This was the first time I’d seen fear in Ester’s eyes. “Even if I wasn’t pregnant, I’d be quittin’, too, papi.”
“Uh-huh,” Clyde said, nodding. “I guess it bees that way sometime.”
“Clyde—I’m…me and Lula, we really tired now, man.”
“Tired of what?” he mumbled, glaring at Ester. Then he whipped his head back around so hard to face me, his hat fell off. He had the desperate look of a wounded beast. “Things was fine ’til I got caught up with your country ass, Lula Mae,” he boomed, giving me a mean look so extreme his eyes crossed. Just like Bo’s. “I tried to help you out when you ain’t had nobody else to turn to,” he declared, almost whispering. I thought about that scene in the Wizard of Oz where the wicked witch melted. Clyde seemed like he was melting away. I knew it was just my imagination, but everything on him was getting smaller and smaller.
“Clyde, it ain’t like that,” Ester said, moving toward the couch waving her arms. The glow was gone from her face. She looked as desperate as a trapped mouse. “Lula met somebody, too.”
“Oh, so that’s it.” Clyde was blinking so hard, his eyes looked like balls of black fire. “Y’all done both found you some more suckers to play, like y’all done me. Well, I don’t appreciate that shit!” He stood, pulling me up by the arm. “You black-ass bitch.” I don’t know why he laughed; he looked mad as hell. “You had it good with me, now you think you can just walk out on me? And I bet it was you who talked Ester into gettin’ pregnant.” Clyde pointed his beer bottle at Ester and waved it. Then he turned back to me. “Ester was in my corner all the way before you got in the picture, Lula.”
I didn’t like the way he was squeezing my arm. And as hard as I tried to pry him loose, I couldn’t. “Clyde, get your hand off me, and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll get the hell up out of here or—”
“Or what?” With his other hand, he snatched his gun from its clumsy hiding place. He did it so fast and rough, he popped the button on the waistband of his pants.
Ester and I were used to Clyde pulling that Glock out and waving it at us. One night after we’d all been drinking, it went off accidentally and blew a hole the size of a grapefruit in the base of one of Ester’s lamps.
“Put that gun away, Clyde,” Ester said, stumbling across the floor until she was backed up against the wall. “You put that thing away right now! Go sober up, and let’s talk about this tomorrow. You want some coffee?”
“Oh, y’all scared now, ain’t you?” He grinned, waving the gun high above his head. “Let me say somethin’ right here and now. You bitches ain’t gonna have nothin’ but bad luck from now on!”
Clyde still had a grip on me. Each time he swayed, I swayed with him, trying as hard as I could to pry his fingers from around my arm. His breath was hot and sour. His eyes looked like they wanted to explode. He would grin one moment, scowl the next. Sweat was pouring off his face and neck. A dark ring had formed around the collar of his white jacket. With the wide black circles around his eyes, he looked like a panda.
All the other times that Clyde had played around with his gun, I hadn’t been afraid. I wasn’t really afraid now, but I was mad. I didn’t like the way he was responding to our announcements.
If I had had time to think about it, I probably would have reacted some other way. Maybe I would have taken back what I’d said about leaving him or offered him all the money I had stashed away. But I was not thinking straight when I grabbed his hand.
Before I knew what was happening, I was wrestling with him, trying to shake that gun out of his hand. I didn’t want Clyde to hurt himself, or us. We fell back to the couch, then to the floor in what felt like slow motion. My mind was a complete blank, but I still heard that damn gun go off. Just like it did the night Clyde accidentally blew a hole in Ester’s lamp.
But this time the hole was in Clyde’s head, and the gun was in my hand.