Authors: Mary Monroe
“De wife is in de bedroom,” Otis told me, slurring his words. “You look d’licious, m’lady.” He jabbed Bully in the side with his elbow.
“Eh, mon? Irie?”
“Irie!”
Bully yelled, smiling, nodding, and looking me up and down.
“Irieeeeee . . .”
“Thank you,” I mumbled. I didn’t have a clue as to what
irie
meant.
But from the way Bully and Otis were eyeballing me, it had to mean something good. “And irie to you both, too,” I added, smiling and nodding back at them.
I had met a lot of Otis’s Jamaican relatives and other island friends.
I had to admit that the men from that part of the world held women in very high regard. Even women who didn’t deserve to be held in any regard at all. I knew that because when I was a muu-muu-wearing GOD AIN’ T BLIND
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plain Jane at my heaviest, Jamaican men still treated me like I was something good to eat.
I was glad to find Rhoda alone in the master bedroom. Like every other room in Rhoda’s house, the bedroom looked like a showroom.
Since Otis still slept in the same bed with her, I wondered how he felt about everything in the room being frilly and pink and white.
It wouldn’t have mattered what he thought. Everybody who knew Rhoda knew that she could crack the whip as well as Captain Hook.
I stopped in the middle of the room and admired her. “Girl, you look fantastic,” I offered.
“So do you. Is that outfit new?”
“Something like that,” I muttered.
She was dazzling in a light blue silk dress, with her hair in a French roll. But she looked completely flustered as she sat on the edge of her bed, sliding her feet into her panty hose. A pair of low-heeled blue pumps sat on the floor in front of her tiny, beautifully pedicured feet.
“Oh, I’m so glad you’re here,” she squealed, giving me a desperate look. “Girl, I had to send the tablecloths back to that fool of a dry cleaner twice to get them as white as they are supposed to be.
And then that damn fool spilled some blue shit on the damn things—
after he’d cleaned them! Holy moly! I swear to God, people just don’t take any pride in doin’ a good job anymore! He finally cleaned them right, though.” Rhoda waved her hands above her head.
“Is there anything you want me to do?” I asked, hoping she’d say no. I folded my arms and shifted my weight from one foot to the other. My fear was that I’d have to deal with Jade more than I wanted to before everything was over. While I wanted to be at the wedding to support Rhoda and Otis, I had almost changed my mind at the last minute.
“Could you please do me a favor? Go to the dinin’ room and check to make sure that everything is goin’ well with Louis, uh,
our
sexy caterer.
” She paused and gave me a conspiratorial wink. Then she let out a loud sigh, looked at her watch, and groaned. “He’s been here for an hour, and I haven’t had a chance to spend much time supervisin’ him and his people. Oh! I just want to make sure we are all on the same page!”
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“Rhoda, you need to calm down some. This is only a wedding,” I whimpered.
“Yes, it is
only
a weddin’, but it’s for my
only
daughter,” she reminded me, giving me a hot look. Then she got quiet, and a pensive look crossed her face. I bowed my head submissively as she continued. “Jade’s my only chance to be a grandmother,” she said, almost whispering. Rhoda’s twenty-eight-year-old son, Julian, who lived in Alabama with his partner, was gay. And he had always made it clear that he wanted nothing to do with raising kids. Her other son, David, had died when he was a baby. I was the only person who knew that Bully had fathered that child. It was easy for me to understand why Jade’s wedding was so important to her.
“Let’s concentrate on today, Rhoda,” I said in a gentle voice. “This is supposed to be a happy day.”
Rhoda sniffed and blinked rapidly a few times. Then she glanced at me with a faraway look in her eyes. “You’ll know what it’s like in a few years with Charlotte.” She shook her head like she was trying to shake something loose. “Oh shit!”
“What’s wrong now?” I asked, rolling my eyes.
“You smell that?” She turned up her nose and sniffed the air.
“Whatever it is, it smells good,” I told her. We both looked toward the door.
“Chicken wings! And
fried
chicken wings at that! Aarrgghh! I forgot to tell Louis to take those damn chicken wings off the list. I wish I had not let Bully talk me into includin’ chicken wings on the menu! Jade almost had a cow when she found out. She said she didn’t want anything too ethnic. And she’s the one who told me to add tacos, chili peppers, refried beans, and Spanish rice so Marcelo would feel more at home. Now if that’s not ethnic, I don’t know what is. Can you believe that girl?” Rhoda paused long enough to catch her breath and shake her head some more. “And poor Louis.
I’ve been ridin’ his back all week over that damn menu! After this is all over, I’m goin’ to apologize to him and give him a huge bonus.
You can take care of the rest for me. . . .”
“The rest of what?” I asked, with a dumb look on my face.
“Makin’ him feel good.” Rhoda gave me a mischievous wink.
“You stop talking like that! Somebody might hear you,” I warned, looking toward the door again.
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Rhoda tilted her head to the side and shrugged. “Well, as long as everybody is happy with the food, that’s all that really matters, I guess.”
“Well, you don’t have to worry about Louis. He always does a good job. I can vouch for him,” I said with a few vigorous nods.
Rhoda jumped up from the bed, stumbled across the floor, and stood in front of the full-length mirror on the back of the door of one of the two large walk-in closets. She gave herself a critical look as she patted the side of her hair. “Did I tell you I found another gray hair the other day?” she said with a groan.
“Well, we are middle-aged women, Rhoda. Graying hair comes with the territory. But as long as they keep making hair dye, we don’t have anything to worry about,” I said, patting my own hair.
“Yeah, but we have to remember to keep our hair appointments, and I missed the last one. I forgot all about it.”
“Well, memory loss is another thing we have to deal with. It’s all downhill from here. . . .”
“Please stop remindin’ me that we’ve tumbled over the hill. I can feel it in my bones every day.”
I took it upon myself to lighten up the conversation. “How’s the groom-to-be?” I had not seen the mysterious Mexican up close since that disastrous day at the mall. I still didn’t know what to make of seeing him sitting on Rhoda’s front porch the other day, looking like a lost boy.
“And that’s another thing! Poor Marcelo is so nervous. Did you see him out there? He went to get a haircut three hours ago.”
“I didn’t see him,” I answered, looking toward the window.
“Well, maybe he stopped off somewhere to have a drink alone.
Poor thing. That boy is so nervous about all this. You’d think that a man who fights bulls for a livin’ would have more balls. And that’s another thing. I don’t know what kind of money bullfighters make or how often they work, but he’d better brace himself. It’s not goin’ to be easy for him to keep Jade happy for the next forty or fifty years. That girl is more high maintenance than the Concorde.
Do you know what she did last week?”
“There’s just no telling,” I replied, tuning my ears up to hear yet another horror story about Jade.
“She had maxed out her credit card, so Otis gave her a new one, 220
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with a ten-thousand-dollar line of credit. Twice the amount that we allowed her to have before. She maxed the new card out in one weekend. I just found out that she treated all her friends to extrav-agant dinners, bought a bag of weed and some new clothes for Marcelo, gave one of her friends a cash advance for a down pay-ment on a new car, paid for one of her friend’s upcomin’ Caribbean cruise, and God knows what else! Remind me to get in her face after she returns from her honeymoon in Paris!”
I gasped so hard, I almost swallowed my teeth. “Honeymoon in Paris? She just decided to get married, but she had time to plan a honeymoon in Paris?”
“You know Jade. She’s always bookin’ ahead. I have a feelin’ she and Marcelo started cookin’ up this shit the day they met. By the way, what do you think about my future son-in-law?”
“I met him only briefly, but Marcelo seems pretty well grounded,”
I replied. “I don’t think you have to worry about him.”
“He’s so quiet, though. I never know what he’s thinkin’. And that worries me. My daddy used to say that still waters run deep, and it always scared me when he said that about somebody.” Rhoda blinked and gave me a curious look. “Maybe Marcelo is just . . . you know . . .
shy.”
“Maybe he feels out of place. You told me that this is the first time he’s been outside of Mexico,” I reminded her. “This is a whole new cultural experience for him.”
“Latin people are so complicated! They are as complicated as we are. Why can’t black folks and Latinos be more like Asians or Jews?
They’ve got it all figured out, and that’s why they are so successful in just about everything they do! I swear to God. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear that God was havin’ a bad day when he created blacks and Latinos. Half of the time, most of us don’t know if we are comin’ or goin’.” Rhoda laughed. I was glad to see that she was in a jovial mood. That was going to make it that much easier for me to get through the day.
“Rhoda, you should be ashamed of yourself!” I scolded. “That’s an insensitive, racist point of view—especially coming from a sister.” I had to pause to catch my breath. “However, since it comes close to hitting the nail on the head, I won’t argue with you about GOD AIN’ T BLIND
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it.” We both laughed. “Anyway, I am sure that Marcelo misses being around his own kind.”
“Well, I introduced him to that Puerto Rican couple across the street. Unfortunately, that didn’t help his mood much, because they think that with that blond hair on top of their dumb-ass heads—
which is obviously dyed—that they are lily white. Remind me to introduce Marcelo to my banker. Javier is from Cuba. He hates blond hair so much, he won’t even wear yellow clothin’. Poor Marcelo.
None of his family could be here, and he’s been bendin’ over backwards to keep Jade from goin’ off the deep end.” Rhoda gave me another curious look. “All I want is for the child to be happy. I know she can be a bitter pill to swallow, but she’s still my baby girl, and I love her to death. You know what I mean?”
“I know what you mean,” I said, looking away. “I’ll check on the caterers,” I added, slowly moving toward the door.
“Did my boy Pee Wee change his mind about comin’ to the weddin’?” Rhoda yelled.
I had my hand on the doorknob. At the mention of my husband’s name, my entire body stiffened. “No. Uh, he wasn’t feeling well,” I said, shaking my head.
Rhoda gave me a blank look and shrugged her shoulders.
“Rhoda, I don’t know how you do it, but I don’t think that I could stand to be in a house with my husband and my lover at the same time. I’d be a nervous wreck!” I hollered. “Every time I see Bully and Otis together, they act like they are best friends.”
Rhoda narrowed her eyes and gave me an incredulous look.
“What’s wrong with you, girl? They are best friends,” she snapped, talking so fast her lips trembled. “You know they’ve been best friends forever. Otis is the one who introduced me to Bully.” She stopped talking for a moment, but her lips were still moving. Her words couldn’t keep up with her mouth. “How are things between you and Louis?” she asked in a much lower voice, with her hand cupped around her mouth. Then she continued in a whisper. “Is Louis feedin’ that kitty cat like he’s supposed to?”
“You mean Sadie? He’s feeding that cross-eyed creature too well, if you ask me. He just bought her a collar that could fit around
my
neck.”
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“I was talkin’ about the kitty cat between your legs,” Rhoda told me, still whispering.
“Everything is fine,” I whispered back, glancing toward the door again.
“Good, good! That’s what I was hopin’ you’d say. I can’t say it to you enough. Enjoy it while you can.” Rhoda chuckled and shook her head. “This may be your last time to get this loose.”
C H A P T E R 4 4
I had been in Rhoda’s bedroom only for a few minutes, but by the time I got back to the living room, almost all the guests had arrived. I was glad to see that Otis and Bully had removed themselves from the living-room sofa, and I hoped that they were off somewhere getting dressed.
There was such a mob in the house now, I had to squeeze through bodies to get to the spacious dining room. Louis and two of his male employees, all three in tuxedos, were in the dining room, jug-gling large pans and bowls. They were scurrying around like bees, organizing things on a long table with a tablecloth that was such a bright shade of white, it hurt my eyes to look at it. I knew about the dreaded chicken wings, but I smelled all kinds of other wonderful things in those pans and bowls, too.
I walked toward Louis, taking slow, tentative steps. “You look so nice,” I said as soon as I got close enough for him to hear me. I glanced around to make sure his employees were not listening or looking in my direction. I didn’t want them to hear what I had to say or see me give Louis a playful tap on the chin with my fist.
“Hi, honey,” he replied. “I’m glad you think so.” He made a face like he was in pain. Then he rolled his eyes. “Wearing this monkey suit was not my idea. But since this is what the hostess wanted us to wear and she’s paying such a pretty penny for it, what the hell?”
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Louis smiled, and then he gave me a
dirty
look, his eyes bugged out, and he licked his lips. “Baby, you look so good to me. You just wait’ll I get you alone again,” he whispered.
“And I can’t wait for you to get me alone again,” I assured him, giving him another playful tap on his chin.