Chapter 25
A
fter only a week into the Dottie's Throwbacks movement, we had more business than we could have imagined. The new cell phones had been the clincher. So many things converged at just the right time to propel Cassandra's marketing plan toward successâAunt Dottie's absence, the tower, the cell phones. Totaling each day's sales with Cassandra was fast becoming a drum roll experience.
“Girl, fazooshi!” she exclaimed when I showed her the final numbers Friday night. “You sure this ain't somebody's social security number?”
Bayford residents, along with people from surrounding towns, appeared and reappeared throughout the week, snapping up the bargains at record speed. No sooner than Cassandra sent out the mass texts, people came pouring in.
Cassandra, of course, was practically dripping with pride. Her passion for Dottie's spanned the long hours she worked to make sure every customer had the throwback deal as well as any complementary items they might need to make the purchase complete. I was almost ashamed that I'd suppressed her efforts for weeks. We could have been raking it in sooner.
“Oompa Loompa doopity doo!” she sang one Saturday evening after closing.
“No!” I screamed. “Not
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
!”
Elgin dropped his broom and exploded with laughter, clapping both hands on his knees.
“That's a good one, Sandra!” Virgie added.
We must have all been delirious from working so much at the store because it took us half an hour to regain our composure. “Oooh, I am so glad we're closed tomorrow, I don't know what to do,” I exclaimed.
“Gotta get ready for
next
week's throwbacks,” Cassandra advised. “Monday is flour for a dime.”
“Save me a few,” Elgin requested.
“Oh, no, my brother. You've got to buy your own.”
Elgin and Virgie doubled over in laughter again. Cassandra laughed at her own joke. Must have been a country joke. “What's so funny?” I asked.
Cassandra squinted her eyes. “Oh, Tori, you remember that commercial for the
Hey Love
soul music compilation? The one where the guy asks to borrow a record so he can seduce his woman?”
“Never.”
“Never?” Elgin asked. I repeated.
Virgie angled her head down. “Even I know that one, Tori.”
“You poor deprived black child.” Cassandra tsked. “Didn't you watch black shows growing up in the city?”
“Sure, I did.”
“What did you watch?”
I listed on my fingers, “
Get Christie Love!, Good Times, That's My Mama, What's Happening!, A Different World,
after I moved to Bayford.”
“What about black
movies
?” Elgin started in on me.
This was a little harder. “Ummm . . .
Stir Crazy
?”
“Nope. Gene Wilder.” Cassandra discounted my attempt. “I mean an all black cast.”
Virgie threw me a line. “Did you see
Mahogany
?”
“No.”
“
Sparkle
?” from Elgin.
“Nope.”
“Okay.” Cassandra called our attention. “Now, if you didn't see this next movie, you're going to have to leave.”
I braced myself. “What?”
“The Wiz.”
“The Wizard of Oz?”
I asked.
“No,” Cassandra yelled, slapping her hands together. “
The Wiz
. Diana Ross played Dorothy. The late, great Michael Jackson was the scarecrow?”
“Sounds like a good movie,” I tried to redeem myself.
“Oh my gosh.” Cassandra reeled. “You cannot carry on like this! I'm going to have to help you, my sister. Like Reeeer! Reeeer! Reeeer! Here comes the ambulance. What you doin' tonight?”
Virgie chimed in, “Probably seeing that handsome Jacob Junior.”
“No,” I quickly refuted. Our relationship had, by all appearances, become almost as popular as Dottie's Throwbacks. “Jacob's at a revival, thank you.”
“You didn't want to go?” Virgie inquired.
I balked at her suggestion. Sunday morning and Wednesday night services gave me enough spiritual homework to last all week.
“You'd better get used to traveling if you plan on marryin' a preacher man,” Elgin piped up.
“Who says I'm getting married. Ever?”
Elgin lowered his gaze, sweeping the floor again. “All I'm sayin' is, a halfway-decent-looking guest preacher runnin' a revival brings all kinds of Jezebels and Delilahs out of the woodwork. I seen that with my own eyes back when I was a deacon in my hometown.”
“Hey, I'm keeping my nephews tonight,” Cassandra said. “If you want to bring DeAndre and Aunt Dottie over to the house, we can watch at least one good black movie. Catch you up to speed. Can't be up too late, though. Church tomorrow.”
After a long day alreadyâup at seven to review NetMarketing matters, DeAndre's baseball game at ten, then working at the store all afternoonâI should have been pooped. But Cassandra had infused me with her Oompa Loompa energy. “Sounds like a plan to me.”
“You're invited, too, Virgie. Elgin, I would invite you, but I know you've probably got two dates lined up for the evening.”
He smiled so widely, the space where his back teeth should have been showed. “You know me well, Sandra.”
“Don't break too many hearts, Elgin,” I ragged.
“Oh no, oh no. I don't break hearts. I just bend 'em.”
We all had to crack up then.
Quickly, we finished our closing routine. I called DeAndre to let him know he'd have a little excitement in his life tonight. “We goin' to see Fred and Vernell?”
With one hand over the phone, I asked Cassandra her nephews' names. She confirmed and I passed the news on to DeAndre.
“Yes! Ooh, they got Legos and everything.”
I didn't even know kids still played with Legos. From the news reports, seemed like all the boys were stuck on video games.
When I dropped by the house to pick up my two housemates, I found Aunt Dottie fast asleep in bed with the Bible laid flat against her chest.
“Aunt Dottie,” I whispered, shaking her gently. Her lids parted slightly. “DeAndre and I are going to Sandra's. Will you be all right by yourself?”
“Mmmm hmmm.”
“You need to go to the restroom?”
She frowned “no.”
“There's something else I wanted to tell you.”
Her eyes widened slightly. She was awake now.
“The store almost doubled business this week.”
“Yeeh!” She raised her left hand for a high five.
“Cassandra's marketing plan worked beautifully. If things continue this way, you should have no problem remaining viable after the Walmart comes.”
She aimed a pen at my lips, then heaven, signaling a phrase I'd heard many times before. “I know. From my lips to God's ears,” I said.
She winked at me.
DeAndre scrambled into Aunt Dottie's room with a backpack full of toys. “You ready, Cousin Tori?”
“Give me a second to change clothes.”
“What's wrong with the clothes you got on right now?”
“The clothes I
have
on right now need to be washed. I've been around meat and packages all day. I really need to take a showerâ”
“Awww,” he groaned. “We won't have a lot of time to play.”
I relented. “So just let me change clothes, capiche?”
“Ommm! You said a super-bad word.”
“Capiche means âyou understand.'”
“Oh. Okay.”
The car's gear barely hit park in Cassandra's driveway before DeAndre hopped out of the backseat. Rather than fuss at him, I took a moment to set the child safety lock. There were so many things to remember with kids, I had a new appreciation for parents. Single parents, especially.
As I sat there kid-proofing my car, the reality of DeAndre's plight hit me. Aunt Dottie would be back on her feetâor at least her wheelchairâsoon. Once she regained the ability to speak, she'd be able to take care of herself reasonably well.
Cassandra could, obviously, handle the store. With God's help, Dottie's would take care of itself.
But DeAndre would be at the mercy of Joenetta and Ray-Ray again. They wouldn't take him to the library or check his homework. They rarely came to any of his baseball games. Bottom line, they didn't care about him.
Watching
Sparkle
wasn't the best therapy. The story line actually depressed me even more, made me remember how my mother and I drifted apart. I excused myself a few times to “check on the boys,” stopping off at the restroom to dab my eyes.
DeAndre, Fred, and Vernell busied themselves with a three-foot Lego castle. “Nice!”
“Thanks, Cousin Tori,” from all three.
Since Cassandra cried at the end of the movie, too, my tears flowed unchecked.
“
Sparkle
is, like, one of the best movies ever made,” Cassandra commented, removing the DVD from the tray. “They tried to remake this movie a while back, but the attempt flopped sorely. Caput!”
“Remakes never live up to the hype.”
Cassandra made no bones about her bedtime. “Girl, you and DeAndre gotta scattle. I'm ushering tomorrow morning. Have to be at church by eight o'clock in my white.”
I pushed myself off the couch. “I hear you. Getting Aunt Dottie together adds another hour to my morning.”
“How is Aunt Dottie doing? I stopped by the house the other day. DeAndre said you were gone with Jacob, whichâzippy newsâis
always
where you seem to be when I drop by the house these days.”
In Bayford, Jacob and Tori sightings equated with paparazzi reports. “Sometimes I am with Jacob, other times I think DeAndre just assumes I'm with Jacob.”
Cassandra grabbed a comb from an end table and proceeded to wrap her long, black hair as we spoke. “I ain't mad at you. Like I said, my cousin deserves a good woman like Miss Tori Henderson. Woot! Woot!”
“You think I'm good?”
As in good enough for him?
She looked me up and down. “Sure you are. Why
wouldn't
you be good enough?”
“I don't know,” I struggled. Maybe Cassandra could give me a better perspective. “He's a minister.”
“He's also a man,” she countered. “Don't be scared of Jacob. He doesn't bite, and he's not wearing an invisible halo.”
“I feel like a spiritual baby around him. You, too, for that matter.”
“When did you say you accepted Christ? Last month?”
“Yeah.”
“You are a spiritual baby. Don't get mad at yourself because you can't drive yet. Thing is, you don't want to be a Christian for twenty years, slurping up strained carrots because you still haven't cut teeth yet. Sloop! Sloop!”
This girl had missed her calling. “Cassandra, have you ever thought about moving to Houston or any other big city?”
“Whyâso I can pay a house note? No, thank you. I like visiting places, but I love to come home to a paid-for residence even more.”
She had a point. “Well, if you ever decide to move my way, give me a call. Your creativity could really be put to great use.”
She tied the knot on her hair rag. “I am putting my ingenuity to work. At Dottie's.”
“I mean, like, for a bigger company.”
“Nothing wrong with Dottie's. Nothing wrong with Bayford. No offense, Tori, but when you first came to Bayford, you were uptight. Worried about everything and everybody, wondering how you were going to make your life work. But once you got in and started hooking up with peopleâlike moi, of courseâyou calmed down. This is the most relaxed I've seen you since you arrived in town.
“I wouldn't trade my life here for the world.” She placed both hands on her hips. “Now, how many people working at those big fancy corporations in Houston can agree?”
“Touché, my friend. Touché.”
DeAndre was so weary from his travels through Legoland, he fell asleep during the short drive home. In the absence of a decent radio station, watching DeAndre's head bobble with every lump in the road provided minimal entertainment.