It was that sound in his voice that always made Michelle reconsider walking away. She stopped scribbling on the pad. Who was she kidding anyway? What did she care about what the wannabes thought? She had to take care of this with Todd once and for all—to get this monkey off of her back! Her coworkers shouldn’t be minding her business anyway. If it offended them to hear a real woman handling her business, too bad for them! Michelle swiveled in her chair so her back was to the telephone police and to most of the others in the pit.
Todd kept talking. “You don’t expect me to just walk away, do you? You don’t expect me to not fight for the one true love of my life, do you?”
Michelle imagined Todd’s face as he spoke. When he was passionate like this, the muscles near his temple rippled. It still surprised her that a man so gentle could be so full of fire and strength.
“You can pretend all you want to, Michelle, but I know who you really are and what’s in your heart. Don’t mistake my patience and my faith for foolishness.”
It was a strength she still did not understand. It was a kind of love she still did not understand, that she still did not trust.
His voice lowered. “Remember, baby, I’m not the one who hurt you years ago. I’m not that man. You’re a gift from God to me, Michelle. And if I have to fight my way in and out of hell to get you back, that’s what I’m prepared to do.” He cleared his throat. “If I have to endure your hurting my feelings, playing mind games, and testing my love to see if it’s real—then okay, that’s what I’m prepared to do. I’m in this for life.”
Michelle’s face was hot. She unbuttoned her jacket. When she swiveled back around in her seat, it seemed that at least half the people in the pit—including Tonya—were staring at her and hanging on her every word. She took a deep breath. “Look, Todd, I can’t talk about this, now. We’ll have to talk about this later.” She nodded as though he could see her. “Call me later.”
For an hour, without interruption, Michelle worked her way through the stack of papers and requests in her inbox. She worked Todd out of her mind. Besides, she wasn’t a slacker. She got her work done. It just didn’t take her all day like it did
some
people.
What was the big deal anyway? The work didn’t require her to use her mind. She didn’t have to be creative. It was just the same old routine over and over again. While she was doing the work, plenty of ideas came to her about how to do it easier, better, and faster. But no one asked her, and Michelle had found that people’s noses got out of joint and they seemed to feel threatened when she made suggestions. So, okay, she would serve their plates the way they wanted it. No reason for her to sweat up her suit or break a nail. They didn’t pay her to think. They didn’t want her commitment or her enthusiasm. So she gave them what they wanted—in abundance.
When the in box was empty, Michelle went back to what made the day pass, what kept her from falling out of her seat with boredom. She lifted the telephone receiver and used the other manicured hand to press seven buttons.
A
sweet, elderly voice answered the phone. At least it sounded sweet to Michelle. She didn’t hear the raspiness or the quivering. She didn’t hear the heaviness. She didn’t hear any of the things she had heard others describe, just the voice of the woman who had been her angel. “This is the day that the Lord has made! And this is Miz Ida. What can I do for you, baby?”
Michelle was always happy to hear Miz Ida’s voice, even when she said stuff that was hard to swallow. If there was a woman full of God in the world, Michelle knew that Miz Ida was that woman. She could always count on Miz Ida. Miz Ida was her deliverer.
“How did you know it was me, Miz Ida?” Michelle could hear the innocent, little-girl excitement in her voice. It didn’t sound like she talked to Miz Ida regularly. But she did.
“Oh, it’s my baby, Michelle! How are you sugar?” No matter how many times she called, Miz Ida always sounded just as pleased to hear from her.
“How did you know it was me, Miz Ida?”
“I didn’t, baby.” Miz Ida chuckled.
“But you said ‘baby.’ Did you get caller I.D. or something?”
“Old as I am, everybody’s a baby to me. And no, chile, you know I don’t have no caller I.D., or whatever it is.” Miz Ida laughed, again. “For goodness sakes, Michelle, I’m still using the same old telephone I’ve had for years. I don’t have no pennies to waste, so it’s good enough for me.”
Michelle could just imagine the bright pink rotary-dial telephone—affectionately known as “the Princess”—that Miz Ida kept on the lamp table in her living room. It was a phone the older woman had found at some thrift shop a couple of years back. True enough, Miz Ida was one of those people that the answering service recordings referred to when they said, “If you have a rotary dial, please remain on the line . . .” Miz Ida always stayed on the line.
Her ice-age phone sat on the table right next to the ceramic praying hands and right in front her big, ancient family Bible—not the tattered and frayed one she used every day—but, the decorative one she kept on display.
Miz Ida was what church folks call a prayer warrior. Between praying and visiting Jose, her border baby, Miz Ida’s hands were full. “How’s your little friend, Miz Ida?”
“Oh, he’s coming along. Jose is coming along. He’s a sweet baby and I’m going to love him as long as he’s around to be loved. But I tell you who’s not coming along. That young man that’s always hanging around outside the door of this building. People keep telling me to leave him alone. Michelle, somebody’s got to do something about our children that have been thrown away. People keep telling me I’m too old—I better leave that young man alone, that he’s probably on crack. But I tell you one day I’m gone get hold to the boy, or my name ain’t Ida. You mark my word.”
“Miz Ida, you better leave that hop head alone.”
“Somebody’s got to do something, baby. That’s one of my sons lying at the front door. I may not have birthed him, but he’s still my son. Everybody can’t keep walking by people that need help. All the women can’t keep walking by. I might as well be the one.”
“Miz Ida, you can’t save the whole world.”
“But I can sure try to help that what’s in front of me.”
Michelle thought back to the times before Miz Ida even had a phone, to the times when she came to use Michelle’s mother’s phone, to the time when they had first met. She was much younger, her hair still in little girl’s braids.
Miz Ida lived in an apartment in the same building in which Michelle grew up. Miz Ida still lived in that very same apartment. Michelle had heard stories about Miz Ida— stories that she had overheard when her mother Cassie talked to her best friend, Twana. Miz Ida had just been gossip, until the old woman appeared at Michelle’s mother’s apartment door.
Without thinking, Michelle had opened the door wide, even wider when she saw the peculiar-looking old lady.
“Hey.”
Recalling her mother’s warnings, Michelle closed the door to a crack. “Oh, I forgot. My mama always told me to ask who is it. I can’t talk to strangers.”
The old woman nodded. “You know, your mother’s right to some degree. But you know the Bible says, ‘Be careful how you entertain strangers, for you may be entertaining an angel unaware.’”
“Huh?”
The funny-looking woman kept smiling and she kept talking. “You’ll understand soon enough.”
The old woman was strange. Michelle closed the door even more. “Momma said I can’t talk to strangers. I’m sorry.”
“Child, everybody know me. I’m Miz Ida.”
Michelle spoke before she thought. “Miz Ida? Oh, I heard Momma talking about you. She says you’re crazy.”
Miz Ida’s smile was rich and deep. It was not broad, but it made Michelle feel something. “You think I’m crazy?” She stared into Michelle’s eyes.
“No. But you dress kind of funny with all them different patterns.” She waved her hands at Miz Ida’s clothes.
Miz Ida chuckled and looked down at the clothes she was wearing. “If you want to know real answers, just ask a child.” She laughed again. “You think your mother would mind if I use the phone?”
Michelle shrugged and opened the door to let Miz Ida enter. Something about the woman’s presence made her feel safe. “I guess not since you live next door. It’s right over there.” She pointed toward the phone.
Miz Ida kept talking to her as she walked toward the phone. She looked at her as though she cared. As though she was concerned. “What is your name, child?”
“Michelle.”
“Michelle? Such a pretty name for such a pretty little girl.”
“Pretty? You think I’m pretty? My mama doesn’t think so. She tells me all the time, ‘You so ugly. You look just like your no-good daddy.’”
Miz Ida reached out her hand and touched Michelle’s face. “See, when your mother looks at you, she looks at the sin that made you and not the beauty that came out of it.”
Michelle shook her head and moved her face away from Miz Ida’s hand. She quickly changed the subject. “Do you have any children?”
Miz Ida held the receiver in her hand and smiled. “All my children are older than your mother.”
“Oh, that’s too bad. I was hoping you had kids my age so that I would have someone to play with.”
Miz Ida beamed at Michelle and slapped one old knee. “Child, I’ll play with you.”
“Really?”
Something about Miz Ida stopped looking like an old woman and began to look like a little girl. “I play jacks, I play Uno, and I play Scrabble.”
“Well, what about video games?”
Miz Ida frowned, then lifted her thick eyeglasses. “Now what you say? Who do— Child, you speaking in tongues.”
“Speaking in what?”
The old woman shook her head and smiled. “Never mind.”
“Well, maybe I could show you how to play it sometime.”
“I’d like that.”
“Great.”
Just then Michelle’s mother yelled from the back bedroom. Momma sounded tired and irritated. She was fussing as she came up the hallway. “Who is that in my house?” Michelle’s heart pounded when she saw the anger on her mother’s face. She didn’t want to hear the yelling. “Michelle, what are you doing letting somebody up in my house this time of night? Have you lost your last mind?”
Miz Ida spoke right up. “No harm done, Miss Cassie.” Michelle was surprised that Miz Ida knew her mother’s name. Miz Ida spoke to her mother with respect, but she was firm. “I think you need to change your tone of voice talking to your child.” She wasn’t afraid. Michelle wasn’t sure how to feel—no one had ever defended her.
Momma’s voice softened, though she kept frowning at Michelle. “Nothing personal, Miz Ida.” She nodded in the old woman’s direction. “But she does this all the time. I’m just trying to teach her a lesson.”
Miz Ida stood her ground. “Some lessons have too high of a price for a child to pay.”
Michelle smiled at the memory. Miz Ida had become her friend that day long ago. She was still her friend; more than a friend, she was a mother to her. Miz Ida’s voice still had the ability to settle and protect her. She was more of a mother to Michelle than her own mother had ever been.
“So, Michelle, have you talked to your mother?” Miz Ida was obviously still reading minds.
“It’s been a while since the last time I’ve seen or heard from her—Momma—I mean,
Cassie.
” Michelle began to hit the stapler she was using with the flat of her hand. It seemed like she was having a harder time than normal getting the staples to go through the four page groupings. She cleared her throat. “Miz Ida, you know how I feel. I don’t hate my mother. I love her, but I can’t forget what happened to me. I tried . . . I even thought I had. But the memories keep coming back.” Michelle lowered her voice. “What she let happen to me . . . that man putting his hands all over me . . . I can’t forget that.”
“You mean can’t, or won’t?”
“Miz Ida, I don’t mean any disrespect, but I really don’t want to talk about this, okay?” She hadn’t called for this. If she wanted a headache, she could have kept talking to Todd. “Please, not now. You know what I’ve been through. How it messed up my whole life.”
Michelle’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Because of my mother and her loser, dopefiend boyfriend I went to jail when I finally stood up for myself. And she let it happen when she knew what he was doing to me. He was raping me, Miz Ida. Over and over again. She saw the bloody sheets! She was my momma and I was a child, Miz Ida! She knew what he was doing and she didn’t do anything about it. She chose him over me. Over her own daughter! I was a child—I couldn’t make any choices. The two of them were making choices for me.”
“Michelle, baby, your mother made bad choices, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t love you. That she didn’t love you back then. It’s no excuse, but sometimes there are no good choices for a single woman with a child.”
“Choices? My mother chose to look out for her own needs. She may be saved, and she may have made it up with Jesus. But it makes me sick to think of her sitting up in church somewhere like Sweet Polly Purebread when she knows good and well what she let that man . . . that dog . . . do to me. She let me sit and rot in jail to protect that scum’s reputation—to protect her reputation. What about me, Miz Ida? I’ve tried to let it go—I thought it was over—but, I can’t.”
Michelle could feel Miz Ida’s presence on the phone, but there was silence for a while. Then she spoke. “I know it’s hard, Michelle. You’ve still got little girl scars that you are carrying around. Little girl scars are hard to heal.”
“Well, I’m grown now and I’m doing just like my momma taught me. I’m looking out for Number One. I’m going for myself. I’ve got a right to be angry after all that was done to me. She didn’t talk to me when I needed someone to talk to, so I’m not talking to her now. I’m not going along with the little fake show like everything’s okay. I love you, Miz Ida, but . . .” She continued to pound the stapler even though the palm of her hand was now bright red.
“Michelle. Michelle. You’re right. You’ve been through more than any child should have to suffer. You had your childhood ripped away from you. I wouldn’t be telling the truth if I told you that I know just how you feel. But I know that every child needs to feel safe in her own home.