Forever Friends (13 page)

Charlotte put the stack of photographs on the floor beside her chair. She leaned toward Jessie, her white face drained and afraid. She asked, “And?” It was just that word, offered as a question, innocent but pleading.

“And, it didn't happen,” she answered.

Charlotte sat back.

“I felt that the place had forgiven you.” She continued. “I thought the ground would cry out like it did when Cain killed Abel, that it would demand your blood, your children's blood, my vow to despise you. But it didn't.” She paused. “It sang.”

Louise pulled out the small quartz stone and held it in the palm of her hand, noticing its lightness, its smooth pink shell. The other women watched as she rolled it between her fingers, thinking how it looked like the flat pads on the paws of a cat, the inside lip of a flower, the edge of the sky farthest from the setting sun, a blushing of clouds, surprised that a small thing could claim such color.

Louise passed the stone to Margaret, who held it closely to her eyes, noticing all its angles and textures. She then dropped it in Beatrice's hands, who rolled it across both sides of her face and gently touched it with the tip of her tongue, tasting the saltiness of sweat and the soil of Africa; then she passed it on to Charlotte.

The pastor held the rock in her hands, sliding it along the center of her palms, feeling its gloss and polish, and doubted that the earth was capable of such a difficult thing as forgiveness, an act that seemed to escape the hearts of most people.

She thought of the injustices people had done to the land, the mutilated rain forests and razed mountains, the torn ozone layer and the acid-lined clouds, the oil spills in the ocean and the shrinking deserts. She fingered the small stone and then gave it to Jessie.

“You really think it has the power to do that?” Charlotte asked. “That dust and springs of water and old trees can do such a thing?” She seemed unconvinced. “That the land can forgive savagery and the hands that chained and hanged and killed its children? Do you really think the earth has that much power or even the right to offer mercy to an enemy?”

Jessie took the stone and thought deeply before she answered. She considered what the young minister was asking, the depth of her question, the simplicity of what she had offered them. She too studied the small, pink stone, a rock mined from the quarries that were dug into the necks of brilliant hills, ravines cut into the valleys and severed from the forests.

She considered the hands of greedy engineers, the burdened backs of the workers, and the lined pockets of government officials, all collaborating to destroy the land and scar the earth just so one small pink rock might be uncovered and sold.

“I don't know if it has the right to give my mercy, my ancestors' forgiveness.” She handed the quartz to Louise. “But it did it anyway.”

She stood up to go into the kitchen and refill the teapot. The women waited.

“The grass and the shrub, the woodland and the savanna, the strands of wheat and the tender buds of cotton, the coffee beans and the desert scrub, they all had peace.” She picked up the pot of tea and headed out of the room.

The four women slowly began flipping through the photographs and studying each other's gifts, contemplating the notion of forgiveness and whether their friend was as changed as she professed.

“And the land gave this peace to you?” Louise asked as Jessie returned to the room with a new pot of tea.

“Yes,” Jessie replied. “The land, Africa, the ground of my people, the dirt that they brought buried beneath their fingernails and woven in their hair braids, the dirt they rubbed across their bodies as they were being roped and exiled, the dirt they had hidden in tiny leather bags that they wore around their necks along with the cold chains, this land, this earth, gave me peace.”

She poured herself another cup of tea and held up the pot, an offer for anyone else who might want more.

Charlotte raised her cup and Jessie moved toward her.

“Well, I wish I had it,” the preacher confessed as the older woman poured the tea in her cup. “I wish I could go somewhere and find that kind of peace. I wish my soul felt that unpolluted.” She reached for the pitcher of milk.

Margaret handed it to her. “I don't know that you always have to travel to get it,” she said to Charlotte. She thought of
the recent peace she was only beginning to experience, the relief and the new ease with which she now faced life. “And it's not always about forgiveness,” she added. “Sometimes it's about healing.”

“Sometimes it comes,” said Beatrice. “When you finally get the thing you never thought you'd get, when somebody trusts you.” Beatrice turned toward Louise, who was facing her with a look of warmth and satisfaction.

“What do you think, Lou?” It was Jessie who asked.

“It came with acceptance for me, not from anybody else but from me, who I am, who I'll never be.” Louise held out her cup to Jessie for more tea.

“I think peace comes when everything in a body and mind and soul is lined up, when the elements in a person's soul are sorted and undisputed,” Beatrice added.

“And that takes what everybody's mentioned—trust, forgiveness, healing, acceptance.” Margaret spoke to Charlotte. “And time.”

“You're talking to a bunch of old women, Charlotte. It took us our whole lives to get where we are.” Jessie poured the tea in Louise's cup and sat down next to her.

“You're young,” Louise added. “A person doesn't find all her answers in the beginning.” She thought of her own experiences, her own bereavement, her losses, her disappointments. “Sometimes it takes a while to figure out exactly what a heart needs to get uncluttered, and then it takes even longer to figure out how to make it happen.”

“A lifetime,” Beatrice said as she raised her cup.

Charlotte leaned against her seat and closed her eyes. She paid attention but was displeased with the suggestion. She wasn't interested in waiting thirty years to find peace.

Beatrice was sorting through the photographs, trying to figure out which stack of pictures went to Margaret and which stack went to the pastor, confused by the double direction of the photograph line, when the front door opened and Lana walked in. The women looked up.

“Oh, I'm sorry,” she said as if she had broken up a meeting.

“It's all right, honey,” Jessie replied. “We're just going through my pictures, hearing my stories.” She did not speak of the suitcase her granddaughter-in-law tried to hide behind her legs.

The other women nodded their greetings.

“Here,” Louise said to Beatrice as she leaned across the table and took the photographs from her friend, “give them to me.” And Beatrice handed her both stacks.

“Would you like a cup of tea?” Jessie asked Lana.

“No, ma'am. Is Hope asleep?” She headed toward the bedroom.

“Yes. James put her down before he left for town.” She studied the young woman, trying to understand if she was returning from somewhere she had been or if she was on her way to somewhere else.

“Did you have your exercise class?” she asked, remembering her weeknight schedule.

Lana nodded her head and walked out of the room. Margaret lifted her eyes up to Jessie. The two of them shared a
look of concern, and Margaret got up from her seat and followed Lana to her bedroom. Louise continued flipping through the pictures.

“You okay?” Margaret asked the young woman as they stood in the hall.

Lana opened the door to the baby's room and peeked in. Hope was asleep. Her mother quietly closed the door. She faced Margaret and then walked to the rear of the house to the bedroom she and Wallace shared. The older woman followed.

“I wrote the letter almost two weeks ago,” she said as she threw the suitcase on the bed and handed Margaret the unopened letter that was sitting on the dresser. “Got money out of the account, even bought an airline ticket.”

Margaret shut the bedroom door.

“Tampa,” she added. “I was going to Tampa.”

Margaret leaned against the wall. She had no response.

“I picked today because Mr. and Mrs. Jenkins were home and I knew they would give Wallace a lot of support, help him with Hope and everything.” She sat on the bed, knowing that the older woman was waiting for an explanation.

“I was standing at the boarding gate.” She kicked off a shoe. “I was chosen to be screened by security.” She paused, remembering how they asked her to step aside, how nervous she had been. “Of course they didn't find anything; and trust me, they looked.” She said this with great animation.

Margaret smiled.

“But after they handed me back my suitcase, after I had
seen all my stuff taken out and handled by these strangers, after everything was replaced, I don't know.” She pulled off her other shoe. “I started thinking about all the things I forgot to pack.” She tugged at her socks.

“I didn't have sunscreen or tampons. I forgot my yellow sundress and that cute pair of sandals I bought at the end of summer last year.” She pulled her long hair back and twisted it around her hand. “I just didn't have any of the right stuff,” she concluded.

Then she looked down at her watch. “I'd be there now, had I gone. I drove around some before I came back.”

There was a pause.

“Why did you come home?” the older woman asked. “You could have bought the things you needed when you got to Florida.”

Lana turned around on the bed and examined her suitcase. “Tampa's already eighty degrees. I checked the weather before I left.” She unzipped her bag and pulled out one of Hope's stuffed toys.

She twisted around to face Margaret. She thought before she spoke. “I don't know, Mrs. Peele. It just didn't seem like the right time to be gone, is all. I guess somehow thinking about flying into that heat made me long for a little more winter.”

She got up from her bed, her daughter's toy in her hands. “It's her favorite; she probably missed it.” She walked behind Margaret out of the room and down the hall.

Margaret stood at the door and watched as the young mother went into the room where her baby was sleeping. She
heard the child being lifted from her crib, soft words quietly spoken, and then finally the sound of the creak and pull of a chair rocking back and forth.

The older woman left the bedroom, quietly passing the closed door, and returned to the den with her friends. She didn't ask for any more answers. Having left a marriage once herself, she understood that most of the time just the act of coming home is explanation enough.

She caught Jessie's eye as she sat down, her smile slight yet confident.

“Now, then,” she asked, “what have I missed?”

“Just the pictures,” Louise answered, handing her a pile.

“And the tea,” Beatrice added as she took the teapot off the table and filled Margaret's cup.

“A few delicate moments of friendship,” Jessie replied. “But we have plenty more of those.” She took the pot of tea from Beatrice, placed it on the tray, and picked up another stack of photographs. “Yes,” Margaret repeated, “plenty more of those.”

A
re you sure it's full?” Charlotte stood behind the mechanic, leaning over him as he worked beneath the hood of her car.

“It's fine, see?” And he pulled out the dipstick and showed the minister the tip, which was black with oil completely up to the line that marked the tank as full.

She examined the stick as if she knew what it meant. “Well, okay, if you're sure.” And she stepped away from him and walked around to examine her tires.

It was a cool autumn day, and the morning breeze stirred the dust at Charlotte's feet. “They got enough air, you think?”

The mechanic, a regular visitor at church, watched as the young woman moved around the car, scrutinizing the tires on her car. “Didn't you just get a new set?” he asked.

“A couple of months ago.” She had circled to the front of the automobile. “So they should be all right?”

“Yes, ma'am, they should be fine.” He used his handkerchief to shut the hood and then wiped his hands. His fingers were stained with grease.

He studied the minister.

“I never got to tell you, but that was a real nice service you had for Vastine last spring.” Then he lifted his eyes and noticed all the cars and car owners waiting for his attention. “I hadn't ever been to one that was outside.” He stuffed the handkerchief in his front pants pocket. “I think that's what I'd like to have too.”

Charlotte nodded politely, opened the car door, and reached in for her purse. She handed the man her credit card to pay for the gas and the quart of oil and sat down in the driver's seat. As he left the car and walked inside the station,
she closed her eyes and recalled the conversations she had had with Lamont and later Peggy when it was decided to have a graveside service for Vastine.

 

A warm day in spring, it had also been the day she had decided to resign.

After the anticipated death, arrangements were made. Even though Vastine's condition had been terminal for quite some time, there had never been any discussion about the funeral. So it wasn't until two days after the death that she met with the family to talk about what the service would entail.

When the pastor arrived at the house Lamont was by himself, the others having gone to the funeral home for a private viewing.

“Hey,” Charlotte called out when she got out of the car and saw him sitting on the back steps. “How are you doing?”

“I could use a little something to deal with Mama.” He was putting out a cigarette. “She is a pistol these days.”

“You been to a meeting?”

“Last night,” he answered. “I even told my story.” He moved over so the young woman would have room to sit down. “Hey, I'm Lamont and I'm a junkie.” He stuck out his hand for her to shake.

“Hey, Lamont.” She smiled and sat down. She had been to AA meetings with her mother. “You staying clean?”

He faced her and shook his head at being asked again about his sobriety. “Clean and sober, three months, three weeks, and four days,” he answered proudly.

Charlotte nodded in approval, but she knew that amount of time was no real record to rely upon. She knew that it took more than a couple of months to decide to stay on the wagon.

“Hey, you still taking sticks to the Cigarette Lady?” He glanced in the direction of her car.

“Why, you out?” She noticed the empty pack next to the door.

“Yeah. Grandma won't buy me cigarettes, and I ain't got paid this week.”

Charlotte smiled and motioned toward her car. “It's unlocked.”

Lamont walked to the car and found the cigarettes in the glove compartment. She noticed that he only took one, and she yelled at him, “Just take them all.”

Lamont came back with the pack in his front shirt pocket. “You sure you don't want one?”

Charlotte laughed, shaking her head.

For a few minutes they sat on the steps without speaking. It was surprisingly warm, and she enjoyed the chance to be outside. Finally, she began the conversation.

“Where were you when he passed?” Charlotte had been there the entire day when Vastine died. Lamont's absence was clearly noticed.

“I had to work.”

Charlotte knew that Lamont had been helping out a few days a week at the local car dealership washing cars and cleaning up the place. He and Peggy had decided that he
needed to get out of the house once in a while. A friend had recommended him for the job.

“You didn't know he was dying?” Charlotte didn't mind asking the young man the hard questions. For some reason, she was comfortable with him in a way she wasn't with the other church members.

He shifted uncomfortably. “Yeah, I knew he was dying.”

Charlotte waited for more.

He lit a cigarette and flipped the used match in the old cup he had beside him.

“I made my peace with Granddaddy a week ago.” He did not hesitate to answer. “We said our good-byes.”

Charlotte slid her hands up and down the sides of her arms. “You want to talk about it?”

He blew out the smoke. “Not really,” he answered. “Why, you wanting to be all preacherlike and help me with my grief?”

She laughed at that. “I'm just saying you can talk about it if you want to.”

He shook his head. “I've done a lot of stuff wrong,” he replied. “I'm working on all that, trying to get right.” He took a long hard draw. “But I don't feel bad about things here.”

He balanced the cigarette between his fingers. “Me and Pop, we were cool.” He looked away from the minister, stretching his long legs out in front of him.

Charlotte watched Lamont as he spoke.

“I sat up with him every night the week before he died. He was a little scared of the dark.” Lamont turned to face the
pastor. “We talked about a lot of things.” He tapped his cigarette beside the steps where they were sitting. “His mind was sharp all the way up until a couple of days before he died. He told me a lot of stories about when he was young, how he lost his business one time and went bankrupt.”

Charlotte realized she had never heard this story about her parishioner, and she became interested.

“He said a man gets a lot of chances to mess up his life, and he gets just as many to make things right.” Lamont took another draw off the cigarette and waited before blowing out the smoke.

“I don't know if that's true or not.” He studied Charlotte to see if she would answer. When she didn't, he continued. “I do know that if I do anything right it's because of them.” He motioned with his chin toward the house. Charlotte understood he meant his grandparents. “They make me think I can do better.”

Charlotte watched a flock of swallows as they flew high above their heads. A black cloud dancing, they moved steadily across the sky. There was a pause in the conversation and she considered the power of love.

“So how is your mom doing, really?” she asked.

“She's cried and made a lot of noise, but I guess she knew he was going to die.”

Charlotte nodded.

“I worry about Granny, though, her being here all by herself.”

“You're here, aren't you?”

The young man faced the minister. “My trial's in less than a month,” he answered. “The lawyer asked for extra time because of everything, but all that hasn't gone away just because I'm trying to do better.” He finished the cigarette and put it out in his makeshift ashtray.

“No, I guess not,” she said. She thought she heard a car in the driveway. “Well, why don't you wait to cross that bridge when you come to it?” she added.

“Wait to cross that bridge?” he asked grinning. “You can't come up with anything better than, ‘wait to cross that bridge'? That's the best you got? What kind of sorry preacher are you?”

Charlotte elbowed the young man and they laughed together. And when Peggy and the others drove up, the young pastor was feeling good about things in the DuVaughn household, pleased that Lamont had found peace at the home of his grandparents and that he was straightening himself out. She was even angry at herself that she had considered asking him about the missing CD player.

After everyone got out of the car, Peggy invited the pastor inside. The others stayed on the porch with Lamont while Peggy and Charlotte went into the kitchen and began discussing the funeral. The young minister pulled out her pad of paper to write things down that Peggy wanted to have in the funeral service. Charlotte had merely assumed that since the DuVaughns had been active church members most of their lives it would be a typical church funeral service. She had already notified the musician and the choir, asking for
volunteers to sing. She had already designed the bulletin and had contacted the janitor to make sure the sanctuary was clean and in good order.

Because of Peggy's age and her more conservative leanings and since it was only early spring and the weather was so unpredictable, Charlotte had never imagined that her parishioner would want a nontraditional service, held completely outside at the graveside. She had never considered that Peggy had already made such a definite decision.

“Did Vastine ask for a short service?” Charlotte, still unsuspecting, asked the widow as they watched Lamont talking to his mother and aunts outside the window.

Peggy nodded her head, but it was obvious to the minister that there was more to the story than just a dead man's request. She also found it odd that the dying man had never mentioned it to her since they had often talked about matters of importance to him.

“Is this what the family wants?” She knew something wasn't right, and she kept pushing for the real answer.

Peggy slowly nodded her head again, still watching her family on the steps outside and still unwilling to explain.

It wasn't that Charlotte had been against the outside service. She actually preferred the more intimate funerals, the ones without all the pomp and circumstance. But the nontraditional idea seemed artificial somehow, as if it was forced upon Peggy, unchosen by the family, placed upon them by somebody else.

“Has anybody said anything to you?” she finally asked the
older woman. “Did somebody say something about Lamont?”

“His trial's in a couple of weeks,” Peggy responded, her face expressionless. “I'm so glad they were able to postpone it, with the funeral and everything.”

Charlotte sat in silence, waiting to hear more. The parishioner answered phone calls and kept going outside to speak to her daughters. The pastor waited through lunch and visitors, a conversation with the funeral home personnel and the departure of the grandson. She was determined to hear more from Peggy about the reason for her decision.

Finally, when the children went out to buy their father a shirt and tie and the house grew uncomfortably quiet, Peggy sat down at the kitchen table next to her pastor and confessed.

“Grady and Bill Stevens came over a couple of months ago.” She kept her eyes lowered while she explained. “Not long after Lamont came home,” she said. “They said they had talked to the hospice nurse.” She shook her head as if she still had trouble accepting what had happened. “They called the main office and told the head nurse that Lamont had a drug problem and that they should make sure they kept an eye on him.”

The older woman was tired. “Everybody acted so different after that.” She pulled apart the tissue she had in her hands. “They started counting the pills, asking me all these questions about Lamont being alone with Vastine, about whether I had noticed changes in my grandson's behavior, when he was going back to jail.”

The tears filled her eyes. “I felt like a criminal.” She reached to her face with part of the tissue and wiped her eyes. “No, worse, I felt like an imbecile. The nurses and Grady, the women from the church who visited, the social worker, they all treated me like I couldn't take care of myself or Vastine and like Lamont was going to rob us blind or take all of Vastine's drugs.”

Charlotte did not know what to say. The words felt like hail stinging her skin, her eyes. She wanted to run for cover. She was angry at the church members and angry that Peggy had not told her before now.

“He's a good boy,” the older woman added, trying not to cry. “He's been working so hard since he got home.” And then without another word she took on an air of resolution, walked out of the room, and returned with a list of her chosen pallbearers and a couple of songs she wanted to have sung at her husband's grave.

“I just would rather not go inside,” she said as she handed her pastor the paper.

And Charlotte took the list of requests without having anything more to add.

After spending most of the day with the DuVaughn family, Charlotte went home and in anger wrote a letter of resignation, announcing her disapproval of the church members' behavior, her shame at being their pastor, and her relief at the thought of no longer having to serve them. She wrote it and almost delivered it but waited, deciding instead to talk to her counselor about it before she went through with her plans.

Charlotte sat in her car, waiting for the mechanic to return. She checked her watch and wondered if something was wrong with her credit card. She looked around the station but didn't see the man. She leaned back and remembered the session she'd had with Marion. It was a clear memory since she had never seen her counselor appear so provoked.

To her surprise, Marion had not supported her decision but rather had informed her that such an act was unprofessional, knee-jerk, and beneath the young woman's character. “This can't be the reason you leave,” the therapist had said, her criticism sharp and unswerving. “You've got some very important people in that congregation, people who have nurtured you and loved you, people you have loved.”