The Preachers Son (7 page)

It was a little after ten when I walked out of the house and stepped into a waiting cab. I decided to go in to work to take my mind off the fact that Dante had canceled our date to be with another woman. Maybe making some money would take my mind off the fact that I was hurt. I hated to admit it, but I was really feeling that brother, and it wasn’t just his looks. I would have bet money that he was one of the good ones, but I guess I was wrong, because he sure made a fool outta me. I just wish I hadn’t spent all my money on a new outfit and begged my boss to give me the night off. Trust me, he had not been a happy camper when I told him I wasn’t coming in. Saturday was our busiest night at the club, and the last couple of weeks we’d been short-handed. I thought he was gonna give me a hard time when I called in and told him I was coming in after all, but he was so happy I thought he would jump through the phone and kiss me. Well, at least somebody cared, even if he was a fifty-year-old, overweight, balding white man.

“Where to, miss?” the driver asked.

“Take me to the F train at the corner of Hillside Avenue and 168th,” I replied as he headed toward Merrick Boulevard. We hadn’t gone two blocks before my cell phone started ringing. I fumbled through my bag to find it.

“Hello?”

“How’s it going?” a female voice whispered.

It was my friend Natasha, the head bartender at work. She was probably the closest girlfriend I had, despite our ten-year age difference and considering I didn’t get along with women too tough. I’m sorry, but they’re just too petty and catty for me. My grandmother used to have a saying before she died: Where there’s a woman, there’s bound to be trouble—especially if there’s a man around—so stay as far away as you can. And she was right. Ever since I was a teenager, whenever I got close to a woman, there was trouble. I’ve had four best friends in my life, and I’d lost all of them because of something to do with a man. I lost one because she thought I liked her man, another because her man liked me, the third because she liked my man, and the last one…well, I’m not proud of it, but I liked her man and he liked me too, so we ended up sleeping together. I know I shouldn’t have done it, but I got mine in the end. Not only did I lose my best friend but I lost the man, too. They got back together, and I think they’re happily married now. From that day on I learned a lesson about other women and myself. We just don’t mix. Nevertheless, Natasha and I were cool, even if I still tried to keep my distance. I just didn’t wanna meet her man, and when I got one, I wouldn’t want her to meet mine.

“How’s what goin’?”

“Your date. How’s your date going?” she asked.

I wanted to lie and say it was fine, but if she saw me at work later on, she’d know I was lying. She’d come over and helped me fix my hair that afternoon and I’d made the mistake of telling her how excited I was to be going out with Dante.

“What date? Girl, that nigga had the nerve to come over to my house and cancel five minutes before we were supposed to go out.”

“Get the fuck outta here.”

“For real. Oh, and get this. While he was there, he got a phone call and told some other bitch that he’d be there in five minutes.”

“No he didn’t!” I could imagine Natasha’s expression.

“Yes he did. And then after he was busted, he had the nerve to try and change shit up by telling me she was his coworker, and that he had to meet her at the church.”

“At the church? What kinda job he got at the church?”

“He said he runs the Bingo game. Imagine that.” I laughed.

“A Bingo game?”

“Uh-huh, a goddamn Bingo game! Can you believe that shit?”

She laughed. “You know, Tanisha, that story sounds so crazy, it could be true.”

Natasha was all right. She knew Dante was a dog just like all the rest, but she was still trying to make me feel better. I just wasn’t in the mood. Sometimes you just wanna be miserable.

“At a church? Running a Bingo game? Come on, Natasha. Now I know why you got three baby daddies, ’cause you’ll believe anything these niggas tell you.”

“Now why you gotta go there?” Natasha barked half-jokingly. She was very sensitive about and protective of her children’s fathers. I was about to apologize until my cab pulled up to a light at the corner of 109 and Merrick and a huge sign across the street grabbed my attention. It read:
BINGO, THURSDAYS AND SATURDAYS
, 7:30–10:30
PM
. The sign was in front of a huge church I’d passed a thousand times before, but this was the first time I paid any attention to it.

“You know, that was wrong, Tani—”

“Hold on a minute, Natasha,” I told her as I read the sign for the second time.

I leaned forward and asked the driver, “What church is that?”

“That’s Bishop T.K. Wilson’s church. Everybody knows him. He’s the man running for borough president.” He pointed at a campaign billboard.

“I didn’t ask you who the preacher was, I asked you the name of the church.”

“Oh, sorry. I think it’s called First Jamaica Ministries.” I glanced at the sign again and my stomach did a flip. Was it possible that Dante had been telling the truth? Had I kicked him out of my house for no reason? Did he really have to go to work? There was only one way to find out.

The light turned green. When the cab started to move I said, “Pull in there. I wanna see something.” Then I placed the phone against my ear and told Natasha I’d call her back. “I gotta check something out.”

A few minutes later I was following a series of Bingo signs that led me to a short flight of stairs and the side entrance of the church. I took a long, deep breath. As much as I wanted to walk down those stairs to find out if Dante was inside, part of me was afraid that he might not be there and I’d have to relive his lie again. Another part of me was concerned about what he might say if indeed he was inside. After all, I did call him a liar and kick him out of my house.

Finally, after standing there like a fool for five minutes, I walked down the stairs and opened the door. The Bingo hall was much larger and more crowded than I had expected. I’d never seen so many old people in my entire life. There had to be over five hundred people in that room, and all their eyes seemed to be glued to the colorful Bingo pads in front of them as they waited for the next number to be called. I felt like I was at a grandparents convention. I scanned the room twice, but there was no sign of Dante. Finding him, if he was there, was going to be much harder than I thought.

“Can I help you? You look a little lost. Are you here to pick someone up?” a woman asked.

I turned toward the voice and saw an attractive woman in her thirties sitting behind a desk to the right of the entrance. I’d been so fascinated by the number of people playing Bingo and my search for Dante that I hadn’t even noticed her or the older, one-armed gentleman sitting next to her.

“No. I’m not picking anyone up. I was wondering if there’s a man named Dante who works here.”

The woman gave me the once-over with her eyes then asked, “And you are?” She had a little too much attitude in her voice for me and the way she was looking at me was just as rude. I tried to keep my cool. I was in a church, after all.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m his friend Tanisha,” I replied with a smile. “Are you his mother? I can see where he gets his good looks.”

“I am not his mother,” the woman snapped angrily. She was halfway out of her seat.

“Calm down, sweetheart. She didn’t mean any harm.” The man reached up and gently pulled her back down to her chair.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

I was lying through my teeth. I knew the woman was too young to be Dante’s mother, but I wanted to put her nosy ass in place. From her reaction, I’d succeeded. She just sat there and glared at me evilly with her mouth open. I know this sounds crazy, but she was giving off this hostile vibe like she considered me her enemy, but we’d never even met. From the way she was looking at me, I was sure that if we were in any other place, she’d have had plenty more to say.

“Dante’s over there, young lady.” The man pointed with his one arm and my eyes followed his hand until they were focused on Dante’s handsome face.

Well, I’ll be damned. He really is one of the good ones
. A big smile crept onto my face as I observed him sitting at a table on a small platform, calling the Bingo numbers into a microphone. I didn’t recognize his voice at first because the cheap church speakers were distorting it.

“He should be done in about ten minutes. We only have two cards to go,” the old man told me. The woman was still glaring at me.

“Thank you,” I said as I walked toward an empty seat. I sat down and watched Dante as he called the last two cards. When he was finished, I let the majority of the people exit the building, then walked up to the platform where he was cleaning up. When he saw me, his eyes got wide and he rubbed them with both hands as if he wasn’t quite sure if what he was seeing was real.

“Tanisha.” His tone was neutral. I couldn’t tell if he was happy to see me or upset about the way I’d acted before. Either way, it was probably good that we were in a church so he had to stay calm.

I walked up two steps to the platform and leaned against the table where he had been sitting.

“What are you doing here?” I still didn’t know if he was happy to see me, but he was definitely confused.

I didn’t reply at first. I just shrugged my shoulders, trying my best to avoid eye contact. It was awkward for a moment, until I finally built up the courage to look at him and say, “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you.”

A timid smile crept upon his face as he responded. “It’s aw’ight. I thought about it, and I probably wouldn’t have believed me either.”

I let out a sigh of relief. “So we’re cool?”

“Yeah, we’re cool.”

He nodded, then surprised me by wrapping his arm around my shoulder, pulling me in for a hug that I didn’t resist. I wrapped my arms around his waist and closed my eyes briefly, taking in the sweet, masculine scent of his cologne. He lowered his head and I was hoping that he would kiss me, but things never got quite that far, because we were rudely interrupted by a woman’s voice.

“Dante! What are you doing?” I opened my eyes and there was the woman from the desk. She had her hand on her hip and was staring at me like I was holding on to her man. “Get your hands off of him, you, you little…don’t you have any shame? This is the house of the Lord.”

We both dropped our hands to our sides. I was upset at the fact that she had the nerve to blame it on me so loudly. After all, Dante was the one who wrapped his arms around me first. Thank goodness we were the only ones left in the church.

“Anita, leave them young people alone. They weren’t doing anything wrong. Don’t you remember what it was like to be like that?” The one-armed man walked over and placed his arm around her. “I seem to remember us doing a lot more than that upstairs in the church pews,” he teased.

“Hush, Deacon. That’s not the same. And they’re not in love.” She removed his arm from her shoulder.

“So you and Anita were doing your thing up in the church, huh, Deacon Emerson?” Dante asked. Damn, people were nosy around here.

“We had our share of fun before we were married, young fella, but some things we saved till after we were married.” He winked at Dante then smiled at his wife. “You ready to go, dear?”

She nodded, but something about her expression told me she really didn’t want to let Dante and me out of her sight. “What about them?” she asked. “We can’t just leave them here alone.”

He looked at us, then at her. “Why can’t we? He’s the one with the keys.”

She was no longer staring at me. She was looking directly at Dante. “You gonna be all right? We can stay until everything’s locked up.” She was trying to sound sweet, but the way she was staring at Dante, I was sure something else was going on in her head.

“We’re gonna be fine, Anita.” Dante placed his arm around my shoulder and I thought I saw a smirk pass across his face for a second. “Go on home with your husband. I’ll take care of everything here.”

“See there, now come on,” the woman’s husband said. “Let’s go home. I wanna see what’s on HBO.” We watched the two of them walk out. Every few steps the woman looked back at us until they were finally out the door.

“I take it that’s the Anita you work with?”

“Yep, that’s Anita,” he said flatly. He stepped down from the platform and gestured for me to follow.

“So how long you two been fooling around?” I asked.

Dante stopped abruptly. His shoulders tensed and his face became flushed. It was clear from his body language that I’d hit a nerve. He turned, trying his best to sound innocent. “What do you mean? We’re not fooling around. She’s a married woman.”

“Yeah, right. Don’t play stupid with me, Dante. That woman looked like she wanted to scratch my eyes out. It’s pretty obvious something’s going on between you two. The only one who can’t see it is her husband.”

“We’re not fooling around.” I gave him a skeptical look and he fessed up. “Well, not anymore. I ended it about a year and a half ago. Right before she got married to him.”

“
You
may have ended it, but it sure don’t look like she has.”

“That’s not my problem.” He placed his hands around my waist and looked at me as if Anita was the last thing on his mind. “She made her choice. She married him. Now she has to live with it.”

“You sound like you’re over her.”

He lowered his head until his lips were inches from mine. “Let’s just say I’m ready to move on.”

“Well, why don’t I just help you with that?” I gently pulled his head toward mine then I closed my eyes and kissed him like I’d never kissed anyone before. I was determined to make him forget that Anita ever existed, and if the way he kissed me back was any indication, I was well on my way to my objective.

A few moments later he broke our kiss and smiled. “The poetry reading is over, but we can still hit Red Lobster if you want.”

I looked up at him with a disappointed half-smile. “That sounds good, Dante, but I can’t go tonight.”

He loosened his hold on me. He must have thought this was my way of getting back at him for breaking our date earlier, but that couldn’t have been further from the truth.