CHAPTER 27
Theresa knocked twice on Maxwell’s door and then pushed it open.
“Hey, baby, I was just…”
She stopped short when she saw Yolanda sitting at Maxwell’s desk. He was leaning over her, apparently explaining something on the computer screen. The fact that Maxwell was so close to Yolanda was unnecessary and inappropriate. He used to help me like that, always finding an excuse to get near me. Now he keeps his distance like he could catch a fatal disease just by touching me.
She could almost hear Carol’s words chanting; “That Yolanda girl sure is pretty. Thin as a blade of grass, innocent as a newborn baby. Nothing like you, you café lookin’ whore…” Theresa’s blood began to boil. Maxwell was hers. True, they were no longer engaged, but that would change soon. She had sensed his resistance breaking down. He wanted her back, and she needed him back. This time she would handle things differently. This time she would be honest about everything.
Theresa coughed discreetly.
Maxwell jumped back, his guilty expression making it appear that he had been caught red-handed doing something off limits.
“Was I disturbing you guys?”
“No, not at all,” Maxwell said, clearing his throat. “Did you need something?”
“There are a lot of things we need to discuss, and I was hoping we could have a working lunch? I need to bounce a couple of ideas off you.”
“I don’t know; I’m kind of swamped here.”
“It doesn’t have to be right now. It could be a late lunch, maybe around two?”
She was begging and she knew it. It was out of character for her to ask any man for anything, but if this is what it took to get him back…
“That would be fine. I’ll meet you downstairs at two.”
“Great,” Theresa said, looking at Yolanda. Thin as a blade of grass, innocent as a newborn baby…“Oh, Yolanda, I need to see you in my office before you leave today.”
“For what?” Yolanda asked.
Theresa’s left eye twitched. “Don’t worry about what, just come to my office before you leave,” Theresa said, her tone threatening.
“Look, Theresa, I wasn’t trying to be rude…”
“Being rude would mean you would have to think, and we both know you have a problem in that area. Now, meet me in my office later today or I’ll be forced to talk to Dee Dee about your attitude. That’s something you don’t want, right?”
Yolanda stared blankly at her.
“Right?” Theresa asked again, her voice rising.
“No.”
“Good. Maxwell, see you at two,” Theresa said, closing his door.
She walked into her office, her hands trembling violently. She grabbed a bottle of water on her desk and tried to open it, but her hands were shaking so badly that she threw the bottle down in disgust. Her plan to get Maxwell back wasn’t going as well as she had hoped. She didn’t mean to behave that way in front of him, but just looking at Yolanda made hot anger rise in her chest, and she felt she needed to take every opportunity to remind her how small she was. She wanted Yolanda to hate herself as she had hated herself all her life. She sat down behind her desk and tried to slow her breathing, but quick tears left her eyes and she knew this one was going to be a bad one. She reached in a side drawer on her desk for her pills, sweat pouring from her chin. The phone rang and made her almost jump out her skin.
“Hello?”
“You called me?”
That voice. Her voice. Theresa’s heart began to beat out of her chest, and she gripped the receiver so tight her knuckles turned white.
“Yeah, but that was a couple of days ago.”
“What did you want?”
“I wanted to speak to Daddy. Is he around?”
“He’s around, but I ain’t allowing him near the phone. That negro called himself talking back to me this week, so he won’t be talking for a while.”
Chills ran up Theresa’s spine and her body quaked from fear. What damage had Carol done to her father this time? She tried to pity him, but she remembered all the beatings she had endured, crying out for her father’s help and not getting it. He would close the door to his bedroom and pretend not to hear her screams. She couldn’t pity him; he had created his own prison.
“Did you hear me, girl? What did you want?”
“Nothing. Just tell him—tell him I’ll call him back later.”
“You must be back in Houston. When’d you get back in town?”
“I’ve been here for awhile. Listen could you just tell Dad I’ll call him—”
“You back working at that salon again?”
“Yes. In fact, I got promoted.”
Silence.
“Carol, did you hear me? I got promoted.”
“I heard you.”
“So? Don’t you have something to say?”
“No, not really. We both know what you did to get the job.”
“What do you mean?”
“Who’d you sleep with this time, Theresa?”
“What? I can’t believe you asked that.” Theresa could believe it. There was nothing that her mother didn’t think she could or would do for more money.
“Well, with your history, I can’t put nothin’ past you. You’ll do anything for money.”
“Carol, it’s not like that! You always thought that I was up to no good. Why can’t you just recognize that I didn’t turn out to be what you thought I would.”
“You just gettin’ older. You probably just don’t have the energy you used to have, sleeping with all those men.”
“This is ridiculous! I don’t sleep around, Carol! I never did—”
“Not in my house you didn’t. Them hot showers would burn the hussy right out of you—”
“Hot showers?! You burned me with scalding hot water for starting my period!” Theresa screeched, rubbing her shoulder and feeling all over again the scalding water permanently marking her with a third-degree burn.
“What ten-year-old you know start her period at that age? In my day, girls didn’t start to cycle until they were in junior high. You was sleeping around then, and some little boy popped you open and got you to bleeding too early. You was a liar then and you a liar now. Talking about getting a job promotion. Hah. You wasn’t nothin’ but a prostitute then, and you ain’t nothin’ but a prostitute now. You are a disgrace—”
Theresa slammed the phone down on Carol’s vicious words.
Carol would never think anything else of her, would never recognize that having a curvy body and pretty face didn’t necessarily mean she was a slut. Theresa couldn’t help the way men looked at her, no more than any woman could. She wanted to relish the looks, but Carol’s words would bounce around in her head and she would find herself terrified and shaking. Like now. She found her pills and popped two in her mouth, letting them dissolve into her bloodstream, changing her back into a sane thinking woman instead of the sniveling mess she was now.
I am a new woman now, I am a new woman now.
She repeated the words until the drugs took effect and she was calm. She was a new woman now, and soon Carol would see it and Maxwell would, too. He was her ticket home. He’d almost succeeded in making a decent woman out of her last time, she was determined that this time she would make sure he succeeded.
* * *
“You ready?”
“Sure,” Theresa said, blowing her nose. “Just let me close this document.”
“You okay?” Maxwell asked, walking closer to her desk. “You coming down with something?”
“No, no, I’m fine. Would it be all right if we left for a while, though? I’m not really in the mood for being around a lot of people at work.”
Maxwell saw a faint trail of dried tears on her cheeks and decided not to press the issue. She obviously needed to talk, and he would oblige her this one time.
“Sure, I have some time. Where you want to go?”
“The usual?”
“No,” he said quickly.
“Oh, come on, Max, do you think a little pizza is really going to rekindle our relationship? If it could, I would have asked you to eat there every day!”
She was teasing him, and he laughed, remembering the ease he used to feel in her presence. California Pizza Kitchen was walking distance from the salon, but in this heat they would be two puddles by the time they got there. Maxwell had the sense of history repeating itself as they left the salon with him driving.
They arrived in minutes, passing people on barstools facing floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out into Galleria traffic. The shiny, canary yellow floor tiles gave the place a sunny and fresh look that Maxwell knew would lift Theresa’s mood. It’s hard for a Texan to give credit to something called California, but Maxwell had to admit he loved the food and rarely had any complaints. He ordered his usual, Cajun pizza, and Theresa ordered hers: original BBQ chicken. They found a small table in the spacious dining room and dug in.
Maxwell laughed as he saw mozzarella cheese stretch like glue from her pizza to her mouth, finally landing on her chin.
“The more things change, the more things stay the same,” he said, wiping her chin with a paper napkin.
“Thanks,” she said, “I needed that.”
“No problem.”
“No, I mean, thanks for bringing me here. I really needed this.”
“Like I said, no problem.”
“I hate to ask this, but, Max, do you think you’ll ever forgive me?”
The sun from the huge windows danced on her hair, making it sparkle. He remembered sitting here with her, running his hands through her hair and thinking he could do that forever.
“I forgive you, Theresa. I told you that.”
“But do you understand why I did it?”
“Why you lied? No, I don’t get that.”
She sighed.
“You didn’t grow up the way I did.”
“Everyone has a tough upbringing, Theresa. You can’t keep using that as an excuse.”
“Who is using that as an excuse? I’m just trying to get you to understand why I felt I needed to lie—”
“See, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. We loved each other. There was never supposed to be a reason for you to need to lie. How can I marry a woman who would never tell me the truth? Who based our relationship on a lie…no wait, lies? You were never honest with me—”
“That’s not true…”
“Oh, yeah? Your last name is one. You couldn’t even tell me that McArthur was your ex-husband’s name, one of many names, in fact. Your real last name is—”
“Bryant.” Theresa said.
She sighed wearily.
“If you were born with that name, you wouldn’t ever want to keep it.” She shook her head. “Let’s just drop it, okay? I’m sorry I even brought it up.”
“I’m sorry, too.”