Chapter 10

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Saturday, one month later

As the March winds blew, Betty and Evander traveled the interstate south. It was a weekend Betty had decided not to work because Evander had asked her to meet his mother. In spite of the increased caseload at the firm, being with him was something she looked forward to. Evander’s family lived in Freemont, which at one time had been a prosperous black suburb of Orlando. It now stood as just another red-light district. A part of the city where no one jogged the streets, but people constantly ran them.

Her life had changed drastically since Evander had walked into it. There were times when, if she was not in the midst of a case, she would walk in her door after work, pull off her shoes, and chat with people on the Internet for hours—even at times eating her dinner while gazing into the screen. Many guys would proposition her, but none piqued her interest except for the one with the DLastRomeo moniker. But finding anything more than a friendship on the Net was the last thing she was looking for, because already Evander had made so many of her dreams come true.

The invitation from Evander came as a surprise and flattered Betty because it was a major step in their young relationship. She wanted to see another side of this man she had become so enamored of. They had made love almost every night for the past several weeks and each time it seemed he attempted to stretch the envelope. If she wanted to take this relationship to the next level, meeting the tree from which her mighty oak had fallen was essential.

The trip to the magic city could not come at a better time for Betty. Each day the tension and office politics intensified at the firm. It had been a little over a month since Mr. Murphy’s heart attack, and although his condition had improved, the word was he would relinquish his interest in Murphy, Renfro and Collins. Since Renfro was running the concern single-handedly, everyone depended on rumors to determine in what direction the firm would travel. By most accounts, the feeling was that the following week a partnership would be extended.

After losing several contracts based on their exclusive white middle-aged brotherhood at the top, Bert Collins had spearheaded a nationwide task force to recruit a top minority candidate into the fold as a partner. But after reviewing the list of candidates who would consider the position, Agnes Murphy had informed Betty over coffee that she had both superior credentials and growth potential. She’d also added, “This is one time when your being a double minority will make you a shoo-in. Dear, I’m not at liberty to tell you where that came from, and you didn’t hear it from me.”

Two days after she’d spoken with Mrs. Murphy, five associates had been invited to interview over a three-day period, and according to Lisa, who’d sat in on the panel, Betty was by far the top partnership candidate. On the eve of what could potentially be the most important week of her career, Betty rode down the interstate with the wind in her face, holding Evander’s hand and listening to Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme” ooze from the speakers.

As they arrived in the old neighborhood, Evander made a point of identifying for Betty each significant landmark, or at least the ones important to him. “See that boulder over there?” Before Betty could answer Evander said, “That’s where I use to catch the school bus when I was in middle school. One time when we were standing there in the rain,” he reminisced with a faint smile, “a couple of white boys drove by in a red Mustang with their asses out the window. And over there at that intersection, I was driving my first car, a 1978 Camaro Berlinetta mind you, and this lady ran a stop sign and broadsided me. She was driving an Olds Ninety-eight and I doubt she scratched the bumper.”

Each street had its own story, its own special memory for Evander, and Betty was taken by the sound of his voice. These places, which would mean nothing to the average observer, meant so much to him. She was honored he wanted to reminisce with her.

“Hey, Beep, I forgot to tell you. Mom invited a few of the family members over for lunch. I hope you don’t mind. I just found out about it last night.”

“No,” Betty replied with a heartfelt smile. “I don’t mind at all.”

As they drove up to his mother’s house, they were beset by a couple of children who shouted, “Vander! Vander’s here!” He jumped out of the SUV and swept both of them off their feet as if he were their father who had returned from a long day at the office. Betty checked her face in the rearview and applied a touch of lipstick before she exited the truck. There were a few people already in the house, and from behind it music blasted from a car trunk so loud it vibrated the metal with its thump.

“Who tat is?” the little boy asked Evander, staring at Betty.

“This is my friend. Betty.”

Friend? Friend, huh? Betty thought, and tried not to read too much into the words.

“Tell Betty what your name is,” he continued, while he attempted to get the little boy to stand in front of him. With a smile void of a tooth, the little boy shook his head no and ducked behind Evander with his face in between Evander’s legs.

The little girl said, “My name is Anna Janay.”

The little boy, now not wanting his sister to one-up him, lost his fear and said, “My name is Jake and I’m four years old.”

Evander took the kids by the hand, and he and Betty walked toward the house. As Betty got closer, she noticed a tall, imposing woman at the door. She looked to be in her late sixties, stood at least six two, and had a distinctive streak of gray in the center of her hair. She had a small trace of a mustache, the kind people never notice, and large forearms a little out of proportion even for her.

“Well, look at my baby,” she said, and walked out to Evander, who was at the base of the steps. Betty was in awe at the sight of the two large individuals embracing. “Why didn’t you call, boy,” she said with a raspy voice, “to let me know you were on the road? Had me worried sick. I tried to call you three or four times this morning and didn’t know where you were.” Evander gave his mother a boyish smile, not unnoticed by Betty. It was obvious he loved her, and she could see the love was returned. One of Jacqui’s rules was “The way a man treats his momma is the way he will treat you,” so the sight brought comfort.

Mrs. Jones looked at Betty, who smiled up at her. “So how are you? Evander’s told me so much about you.” And she spread her arms wide enough to give Betty a hug. Betty, who was several inches shorter, stepped up to accept the embrace. In spite of her size and slightly masculine features, Mrs. Jones had a warm, feminine, motherlike feel, with just a hint of Skin-So-Soft to her scent.

As she embraced Mrs. Jones, Betty thought, I could feel comfortable calling her Mom. Oh my God, I know I did not think that. I did not consider how it would feel to call this lady . . . Mom? But after they parted, she smiled, because it felt right. It would feel right to find out from her what Evander liked to eat and how he’d learned to ride a bike and why he was such a decent man in a sea of dogs.

“Y’all come on in here,” she said, and headed up the steps as she retied her apron. “Let me introduce you to everybody. We got some more coming soon.”

Evander looked at Betty and smiled as he reached for her hand. “Are you ready for this?” Betty nodded her head yes as they entered the home.

The semifull house at the end of the cul-de-sac was like most houses in the neighborhood. Constructed three decades earlier, it had a skirt around its frame structure and was painted a mustard color with black trim around the doorway and on the shutters. The ceiling was stucco with bright accents that looked like glitter, and roach bates were evident in the comers. On the living room walls there were stiff, browned, Olan Millsesque shots of family and friends of family, from at least four generations of Joneses. In the corner Betty saw a dusty picture of MLK, JFK, and RFK with the words “Freedom Fighters” inscribed beneath it, and a large fish tank with one lonely fish. The house was cooled with an underpowered AC unit in the eastern window. The ice blue shag carpet matched nothing in the house, yet it all fit together perfectly. In modern interior decorating magazines the look would best be described as eclectic. The Joneses just called it home.

“Let me introduce you to everybody, sugar,” Mrs. Jones said to Betty. “This is Uncle Elmo. This is Alexandria and her little sister Araxá. Now, this is the newest member of the family over here. Her name is Bre—Bre—BreNushia, I think is how you say it. I don’t know why that child momma named her that crazy mess in the first place.” And then she looked at Betty and said, “Why is it people naming babies such foolish names? If I see another baby named Jordan or Kenya or Shenequasetta, I don’t know what I’ll do. What happened to names like Robert or Percy or Dorothy? You know what I mean?”

Although Betty could see a look on her face requesting a response such as No ma’am, I would never name our child a name like that, she opted to just nod in agreement.

“Now, that’s my nephew Eric over there. His wife, Ling or Ding or something, couldn’t make it.” And then she whispered, “She’s Vietnamese, you know.”

“She ain’t Vietnamese, Auntie!” Eric said in a huffy tone.

“Then what is she?”

After a pause and a glance at the family members who stared at him, he said in a muffled tone, “She Chinese.”

“This is my sister Gladys and her husband, Ben,” Mrs. Jones said as she ignored the comment. “Gladys!” she said, and kicked Gladys, who was half asleep, in the foot. “Evander got himself a li’l cute girl, doesn’t he?”

“Yeah, Evander’s got a cute one, all right,” Gladys said, and rocked back and forth while she fanned herself with the back of the phone-book cover she had ripped off to stay awake.

With a look around the room, Mrs. Jones said with her hands on her narrow hips, “I guess that’s just about everybody. There’s a few fools in the backyard, but you don’t need to know them yet,” she laughed.

In the La-Z-Boy in the den was one last family member who stared at the TV without acknowledging the houseguest. As he watched TV, he fiddled with the beaded twists of hair on top of his head while talking on the phone.

“What’s going on, Shawn?” Evander said, and gave him a playful smack on the back of the head as he pushed in the cordless phone’s antenna.

Shawn ducked late and said as cool as a fan, “Yo! My name Red Dog now. You better recognize!”

“Red Dog? Oh . . . I’m sorry . . . Red Dog. Boy, please,” Evander said, and palmed his head with his large hands. “How old you now—Shhhaaawwnnnn!”

“Yo,” he said, “you can chill with that Shawn stuff,” and then he noticed Betty and said, “Unk, I feel you trying to front for your honey and all. But if you don’t know, you besta ask somebody. I’m seventeen.”

“Seventeen what?” Evander asked in fake astonishment. “Seventeen what, Shawn? Not years old.”

“Yep, my birthday is June twenty-eighth, 1980!”

“Boy, you lying. That would make you nineteen!”

“I mean eighty-one. I mean eighty-two! You didn’t let me finish, I was gonna say eighty-two!”

Evander and Betty laughed as Mrs. Jones shouted from the kitchen, from which floated the aromas of grilled onions and pure calories, “Y’all come on in here!” As they walked in, she said “Bobby Jo will be over here soon, Evander, with them bad-ass chums of hers.”

“How’s Jo doing nowadays?” he asked, and hopped up on the kitchen counter. As he grabbed a bag of Crunch ’N Munch out of the cupboard, Betty sat at the dinette table. Bobby Jo was his youngest sister, and more than thirty years later, the umbilical cord was still attached.

“She’s fine. Just crazy as a bag of dirt and worried about that good-for-nutin’ husband of hers who will-not-work-to-save-his-life, and is still beating her in front of dem chum. I’m getting sick and tired of her running over here all time of night,” she said, and stirred a pot of mustard greens full of fat ham hocks, okra, and dumplings. The aroma itself made Betty’s mouth water.

“That’s messed up, her getting you involved,” Evander said.

“Oh, I’m not worried about that fool husband of hers coming over here starting anything,” Mrs. Jones said, and looked Evander in the eye. “I still keep my little friend in the dresser.” Although the words did not come from her lips, the assumption was clear. Mom had firepower in the bedroom. “Besides, Bobby Jo ought to clean up that nasty house of hers.” And then Mrs. Jones lowered her voice so the others in the house would not hear. “She’s the only person I know that had that Sears once-a-year pest-control treatment, and they gave her money back.”

“What?”

“Child, dem folks were spraying that nasty-ass house every three, fo’ weeks. They finally just said the hell with it, gave her a full refund, and said don’t call us no more.”

They continued to chat while Mrs. Jones put the finishing touches on the enormous lunch. It was easy to see that the Joneses’ house was the house in the neighborhood, the house where everybody dropped by. A house where one could come just to use the phone or catch up on all the latest gossip in the neighborhood. People would walk in without knocking, speak, and walk out as if the house were publicly held property.

Evander’s mother caught him up on the local news, such as his best friend from high school who was now in the marines but had come out of the closet, as well as the twins up the street who both got pregnant by the same kid down the block. She talked about the pastor who preached more on tithing after he bought a Navigator. “If God gave him that damn thing he’s driving,” she whispered with her hand cupping her mouth, “let him give God the payment book.”

Then in the distance they could hear the rumbling sound of a lady hollering at her children. The sound was so loud, it could be heard over the conversation inside the house.

Put that down, ya bastid! Okay, I done told you about that, Chandra, you li’l hooker. I’m gon slap the shit out chu. Jamale! Jamale! Stay outta my purse, you li’l-ass thief! You ain’t gon be shit just like your daddy!” Betty and the rest of the guests looked out the window as the commotion drew closer to the house and then Bobby Jo came in with all her children. She had one on her hip and another still in a diaper, which begged to be changed. The other children scattered, looking for toys, paper to write on, or anything else they could get into.

Shawn sought refuge in his bedroom as he shouted at one of the little boys, “Yo! Don’t come in here!” and locked the door.

Bobby Jo walked into the kitchen, fussed about how her husband was or was not doing something for the kids, spoke to a few relatives, then gave Evander a peck on the cheek. “You must be Betty,” she said. Since she knew Evander was not close to his sister, Betty was surprised she knew her name at all. The gang, disguised as children, were on a rampage and hit the house like looters after a verdict. Evander’s mom looked at Betty and Evander with her lips as straight as an arrow and an expression that said, See what I have to put up with?

“Damn, Momma,” Bobby Jo laughed, “it’s so hot in the living room, I saw the devil himself sitting by Aunt Gladys wearing hot pants. The air ain’t working again? You know Freddy Lee got kicked out of school again, don’tcha?” She then sat at the dinette next to Betty with her legs spread like a construction worker on lunch break and checked the baby’s diaper to verify what everyone in the room knew.

“No,” her mother said with little expression.

“Yeah, that boy steal so much it’s a shame. He kept stealing my money, so I told him that food stamps was the new kinda money. At least if he stole them, I could get some more at the end of the month. I know I shouldn’t have lied to him like that, but, child,” she said, and looked at Betty, “y’all just don’t know! So he out to the school throwing dice for food stamps! Damn fool.”

Betty widened her eyes and wanted to laugh, but noticed no one else was, so she muted the sound. Mrs. Jones’s lips were as straight as the Statue of Liberty as she looked at her son, speechless.

After the kids were sent outside, the adults sat around the living room on the plastic-covered furniture to chat before the meal. Bobby Jo continued to talk about her favorite subject, and thirty minutes later Betty felt she still had not even begun to uncover just how sorry she felt this man was. This went on until Mrs. Jones served the meal and raised her palm to Bobby Jo as if to say, Enough.

Once Mrs. Jones summoned the children inside, everyone ran for their place at the table. Evander protected the seat at the head of the table for himself and the one to its right for Betty.

“Evander, say the prayer, son,” his mother said as she showed her proud smile. As Evander began to pray, Betty felt a smile inside that forced its way to the surface. She smiled because in her mind she had been transported to another place. A place where it was late November and there was a slight chill outside. Where she had prepared her first full holiday dinner and where Evander’s mom and Shawn were now guests in their home. Her foster parents were there, as well as a couple of children who favored her and Evander. At a special place at the opposite end of the table were her natural mother and stepfather, who had not aged or changed clothes since she last saw them as a child. In this place, Evander was grayer as he said grace, and she was just as proud to be with him then as she was at that very moment. Stop thinking like that, she scolded herself. But she could not resist and continued to smile. As Evander finished the prayer, she watched him, and as his eyes opened, he looked at her as if he had entertained similar thoughts to hers. Betty Anne Robinson-Jones, she thought. Naw, that still sounds too cumbersome. Betty Jones. I just can’t get use to that. Betty . . . Anne . . . Jones? That is so plain. But I guess . . . umm, not too bad. Not too bad at all. Attorney Betty Anne Jones, Esquire. I could work with that.

Then the hands started to flail as each person maneuvered for dish position. Evander interceded for Betty since he was a veteran of such wars. They enjoyed smothered pork chops, greens, sweet potato pie, southern fried chicken, and Mrs. Jones’s own made-from-scratch biscuits. There was no doubt they were made from scratch, because they tasted delicious and she repeated to anyone who would listen, “These were made from scratch, you know. These were made from scratch.”

After the late lunch, the women staggered onto the front porch for light gossip, the kids pulled out board games, and the men went through the back door to the yard.

“Baby, I need to go to the store for Momma to pick up something for dessert. Would you like to ride with me or hang out here?” Evander asked Betty.

“I don’t know,” Betty said with a shrug of indifference and a smile. “I guess I could stay here and meet everybody.”

“Are you sure?”

Walking toward the bedroom, Mrs. Jones said with a smile in passing, “Boy, you can leave. Won’t nobody eat her!”

As family members went either to the backyard or the front porch, Betty was unsure as to which way she should go until she heard Mrs. Jones call out, “Betty? Come here a second.” Betty walked into the back room toward Mrs. Jones, who sat in the dent of her four-poster double-mattress bed. “Close the door, sugar, and have a seat.” Okay, what’s this all about? Why is she sending him off and calling me back here?

“Betty, I just wanted to say I am so happy you came today.”

“Oh. Well, the pleasure is all mine. I’ve wanted to meet you and the rest of the family for some time now.”

“Good,” she said with a smile. “Evander’s a good boy. You know that? And the reason I called you back here is because I know he’s serious about you. He may not have let you know that yet, and the reason I got rid of him is because he would get upset with me for dipping into his business, but I know he has feelings for you.”

Betty was unsure as to what to say. She wanted to reveal her heart to someone, but now was not the time, nor was this the place.

“If he has called me once in the past week, he has called me ten times to talk about you,” Mrs. Jones continued. “He’s proud of everything you’ve done. Actually, he would call me up every day you worked on that case just to tell me what was happening with it. I know more about Mrs. Lopez than I know about Kato Kaelin.”

With a laugh Betty replied, “Really?”

“Like I said, he’d get upset if he knew I told you this, but he cares for you. He cares for you a lot. Momma can tell.”

Betty smiled but could not come up with a reply.

“I guess the reason I am telling you this is because he was in a bad relationship. A very bad relationship,” Mrs. Jones said, and looked away. “You know about his little boy, don’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am. He’s mentioned him. I spoke to Junior on the phone a couple of times also.”

“He’s a cute kid. Looks just like his daddy. I always knew the boy’s mother wasn’t worth a cold glass of spit, but how do you tell that to someone in love? This heifer used him about ten years ago, and I don’t think he ever recovered.” And then she looked at Betty and said, “Until now. It was the first time I saw him cry as a grown man. I mean,” she continued with her mouth curled and her hand rubbing the sheet of her bed, “break right down and cry in this room. The heifer took all the money out of the savings, took the baby, took everything and left him with nothing. He was in construction at that time. Did drywalling. But he couldn’t work for three weeks. They were engaged and she slept with his neighbor. He respected this old hooker so much he would get mad if I said anything about her. But I knew something was up with her. She could sweet-talk him. She couldn’t sweet-talk Momma,” she added with a tongue cluck. “But you see, I raised a good boy. A decent boy. He walked in on them one Sunday morning with her on her knees and him watching ESPN. I did try to tell him a couple of times she wasn’t any good, but you know how y’all are when you get something stuck in your mind. So I went along with it. But now I wish I had stepped in to do more.”

“I’m so sorry to hear that. He’s never really talked about her to me, but I know he misses his son.”

“Yeah, it was rough all the way round,” she said, and looked out the window at the men who played dominoes and laughed out loud in her backyard. “It was rough on both of us. September the eleventh was the day he caught them. I’ll never forget that day because every year on that date he would be messed up something awful. I would either have to drive to Gainesville to be with him or have him drive home for a couple of days.”

And then the air stilled in the room as Mrs. Jones looked into her palms as if she spoke only to them and said, “He once even talked about killing himself. Went through counseling for about a year or so. When I was your age, Betty,” she continued as her voice creaked like an unoiled door “I hurt when I broke up with a guy. But I never imagined men hurt when they had breakups. Not real men like Evander. I just thought they were like ‘Oh well, off to the next one.’ But going through that with him changed me. I could sorta see for the first time why some men treat women like they do. Sometimes they don’t know how to deal with the pain.”

Outside there was laughter as a child’s knock on the door was ignored. “I guess that’s true. I never really thought about it like that,” Betty whispered. “But I must say, Mrs. Jones, Evander has been the best thing that ever happened to me, and I could never imagine hurting him.” As she spoke, Mrs. Jones sat up and gave her her undivided attention. “I mean he’s attentive and thoughtful and has gone out of his way to be supportive.”

“Well, I’m glad to hear that. That’s what I wanted to know. He’s a good boy deep down inside. He had a couple of other girlfriends since Yolanda, but since he wasn’t over her, they didn’t work out. I could tell he wasn’t letting himself get too wrapped up. But I can also tell he feels different about you. You’re the first woman he’s brought home since Yolanda. Remember when he sent you the flowers at the firm?” she said as her smile returned. “He called me up and told me he was nervous about approaching you. Said he didn’t think you would be interested in a common everyday person like him. But I told him to call you up. To give you a chance. And the night he called you, he phoned me afterwards and told me how relieved he was and how nice you were.”

Betty softly bit the inside of her cheek to keep from saying, Mrs. Jones you just don’t know how happy I am to be with Evander. How I am already trying to decide if I should hyphenate my name. How I love this man so much it is scaring me. But this was not the time, nor was it the place.

Six-month-old BreNushia’s mother, Wa’Kanesha, arrived to pick her up while her friend sat outside in his pink and white Cutlass, which sounded like a dance floor on wheels.

“Nesha, I been meaning to ask you sumthin’,” Mrs. Jones said. “Why you name that pretty red baby that crazy-ass name?”

Wa’Kanesha, who had obviously answered the question many times before, said, “Well, I wanted to name her after my best friend Brenda, but there’s a lotta Brendas running around, so I named her BreNushia. I was going to name her BreNeissy, but I know a lotta Neissys too, and besides, I didn’t want Aneissa Clark to think she had anything to do with my baby name. ’Cause she use to go with my baby’s daddy in high school and stuff.”

“Well, you damn sho won’t have that problem with a name like BreNushia,” Mrs. Jones said, and folded her thick arms tightly. “Giving that child a name she won’t even be able to spell before she in high school. I bet you can’t even spell it—can you!”

“Ah, excuse me,” Wa’Kanesha said, and with the baby on her shoulder and her hand on her flexed hip she began, “My baby’s name is spelled B-r-e capital N—”

“Shut up and get out there to that crazy boy making all that noise with that loud music. Make me sick!” Finishing the sentence, Mrs. Jones looked at Betty as her brow unfurled and her smile reappeared.

Betty had walked outside to play with Anna and Jake when Evander drove up, and for a split second she felt like a housewife who awaited her husband’s return. After he hugged the kids again, Evander walked over to Betty and asked if she would like to take a walk to digest the meal. She nodded her head yes and he gave the package from the store to Anna to take inside while Jake tried to wrestle his uncle’s leg.

As Evander and Betty left, they could still hear Bobby Jo’s voice clear above all the others. “And then he told me dem his sister’s drawers in the backseat! He must think I’m a fool! Cynthia’s ass way bigger than mine!”

Evander walked Betty through his old neighborhood with pride. As they walked, he held her hand and occasionally sang songs he didn’t know the words to and told her jokes he had heard that he felt would top Jacqui’s. When they returned hours later to the Jones house, it seemed everyone had departed except the old men guzzling malt liquor, smoking reefers, and still playing dominoes in the backyard. Inside the house, Mrs. Jones was on the phone talking to a friend and watching Betty and Evander walk up the driveway through the blinds.

Before walking inside, Betty stood in place on the porch and said, “Vander. I just want to say thanks.”

“For what?”

“For so many things. But mostly for getting me away from the office. I can’t tell you how much better I feel not to be working today. It just occurred to me as we were walking that this was the first time I’ve not worked on a Saturday in about three years.”

“You’re welcome.”

“But I really wanted to say thanks because you’ve shared so much of yourself with me today. No other man has ever done this for me, and it means a lot. I know you’re serious.” And then, looking into his eyes, she stepped closer and continued, “And so am I. I just want to say—” And then Betty was ready to finally say the words she felt deep inside when Evander covered her lips with a kiss that was as soft as candlelight.

“I love you too, Beep,” he said with an understanding tone. “I love you too.”