God Ain't Blind (11 page)

“By the way, I am glad to see you wearin’ makeup on a regular basis now,” Rhoda said, smiling. Her eyes rolled up to the top of my head. “And keep the braids,” she advised, with a wink.

I wobbled up from my seat and walked her out of my office. As soon as we reached the main floor, everybody stopped talking and tried to act like they didn’t see me. That was what they always did when I approached their work area, and I didn’t like it one bit. It made me feel like an outsider.

I let out a loud sigh. “You see what I mean,” I said in a low voice as Rhoda and I headed to the nearest exit. I was glad that our company was on the ground floor of the midsize gray building, which we shared with several other businesses.

“The first time you cater an event with Louis Baines, you get a ten percent discount,” Rhoda mentioned. “And free beverages.”

We stopped as soon as we got outside.

“You sure are trying hard to get me to work with this guy. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear that there was something in it for you,”

I teased.

“There is. I get an event catered for free each time I send him a new client.”

I gave Rhoda a pensive look. “Let me think about it. But before I do anything, I’d like to sample what this dude has to offer. Maybe you and I can have lunch there one day soon so I can check him out,” I suggested. “Personally, I am always interested in sampling somebody else’s down-home cooking. But you do know that I don’t have just black folks and whites working for me. I don’t know if my Hispanic and Asian employees like greens and fried chicken.”

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“That’s another thing,” Rhoda chirped, waving a finger in my face. “Even though Off the Hook is a black-owned restaurant, they offer a variety of cuisines. Tacos, spaghetti, and fried rice to die for, just to name a few.” Rhoda pursed her lips and shook her head. I shook my head, too, because this conversation was bringing back too many memories. The items she had just mentioned used to be music to my ears. “Just tryin’ to help, girl.”

“And I appreciate that. I’ll call you,” I said, giving Rhoda a hug before I turned to go back inside.

Before I went back to my office, I strolled over to Gloria Watson’s cubicle, which was located across the hall from the ladies’

room. I cleared my throat to get her attention.

“What’s wrong now?” she asked as soon as she looked up from her cluttered desk and saw me standing in her doorway. There was a scowl on her face, which was normal for a pit bull like Gloria. She was one of the most confrontational women I knew. For reasons she kept to herself, she was mad at the world. My predecessor had abruptly resigned because of all the stress Gloria had caused her.

Even our boss, Mr. Mizelle, was terrified of this sister. For the sake of my nerves, I addressed her only when I had to.

“Do you have a few minutes?” I asked. Even though I had approached her in a nonthreatening manner and with a smile, her body stiffened. Within seconds her perpetual scowl intensified.

From the way she reared back in her chair, I could tell that her neck was ready to roll. I diffused that with an even wider smile. She still asked me in a guarded tone of voice, “What did I do now?”

“Nothing’s wrong, Gloria. I was just wondering if you could do me a favor.”

She hesitated and eyed me with suspicion and exasperation.

“That depends on what it is.” Her voice was already on the husky side, but when she was not in a good mood, she sounded downright masculine. Like now. It sounded like I was listening to Darth Vader.

Even though Gloria and I were close in age, she looked like somebody’s grandmother. Most of her frizzy hair was white at the roots.

She had permanent frown lines around her mouth and on her forehead. Now she was the one wearing muumuus to work three or four times a week. Last year I had occupied that role, and she used 78

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to offer comments of pity on my attire from time to time. Had she been nicer to me, I would have donated some of my fat clothes to her, instead of to Goodwill and the Salvation Army.

Gloria didn’t even attempt to hide her impatience. She moved a Snickers Bar wrapper and a half-eaten scone on a napkin around on her desk until she located a pen. “What is it?” she asked, tapping the tip of the pen on her desk.

I took a very deep breath before I opened my mouth again. “Gloria, I . . . Girl, that’s a lovely blouse you have on today,” I told her, clapping my hands together like a seal. “Is it new? Red looks so good on you. But then you look so nice every day. . . .”

Gloria was the kind of person that you had to use a lot of butter on if you wanted to bring her up to an acceptable level of civility. I didn’t like to be insincere or phony, but I had come to believe that you had to do what you had to do when it came to people like Gloria.

As soon as I stopped talking, she seemed to soften right before my eyes. The generous helping of butter that I’d just offered her melted in her mouth. A wide grin immediately replaced her trademark scowl.

“Oh? You like my blouse?” she replied, twisting around in her seat so I could see the blouse better. It really was a lovely blouse, but it didn’t do much for her. For one thing, it was so small that the thread around each button had already started to unravel. I guess I didn’t respond fast enough with another compliment, because Gloria wobbled to her feet, brushing off the sleeve of her blouse, still grinning. “I got it at the Tiger’s Den the other day. I go there all the time. I’ve seen you in there before, too, so I know
you
know how hard it is for big oxen like us to find something cute.”

She smiled. I was disappointed to hear that she still thought of me as a big ox.

“Yes, I do know,” I said. I felt so abruptly defeated that my shoulders slumped, and I shifted my weight from one foot to the other.

Her assessment of my appearance was a veiled insult. Apparently, I had not used enough butter on her.

Her next comment caught me completely off guard. “But you are blessed because you don’t have to go to the fat women’s store no more since you lost all that weight. And I’ve been meaning to tell you how sharp you look these days,” Gloria said, with a nod. I GOD AIN’ T BLIND

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was pleased at the way she looked at my outfit with admiration and envy.

“Thank you, Gloria.” I stood up straighter and cleared my throat.

“Now what favor did you want?”

“I know you are busy, but could you please check around and see who all is available for lunch next Monday?” I said. “And let them know it’s on me.”

Gloria’s jaw dropped, revealing a mouth full of cavities, even though we offered all our employees an insurance plan that covered 90 percent of their dental needs. “Lunch? Are you taking us to lunch?”

I nodded. “Yes and no. I’m going to have lunch brought in and served in the break room. You all deserve it, and, I’ve been meaning to do it for a while now.” I didn’t like telling that lie, but it was such a small one, it didn’t bother me that much.

“All right,” Gloria said, picking up a notepad. “I know I’ll be available for lunch next Monday. What kind of food are we talking about?

Please don’t include fried chicken wings. Black folks done worshipped chicken wings so much, it’s a wonder we ain’t all sprouted feathers and wings ourselves.”

“We won’t be having any chicken wings,” I said, with a chuckle.

“But when and if we ever do have chicken, you don’t have to eat any of it. I will make sure you have a lot of other things to choose from.”

“But I do love me some chicken breasts and thighs, so don’t cross chicken off your list yet,” Gloria said, holding up her hand like she was trying to defend herself.

“I am going to check out Off the Hook, that new place I keep hearing about.”

I could tell from the look on Gloria’s plain, round face that my choice pleased her. Her eyes got wide, and she smiled even more. I was tempted to tell her that she should smile more often. Despite her cavities, she still had a fairly nice smile. When she smiled, she looked a lot more attractive and younger. But I didn’t want to move too fast.

This sister was the kind that you had to approach with extreme caution.

“What you say!” she shouted, with a look of pure ecstasy on her face. This time she was the one clapping her hands like a seal. “That’s 80

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some good stuff, girl. My godchild Gootie had Off the Hook cater her wedding last week. I will get you a list of names for lunch right away.”

Gloria was so excited, she almost knocked me down while trying to get out of her cubicle so fast. She wore a black, floor-length skirt that fluttered and flapped like a bedsheet on a clothesline with each step she took. The tail of it swept the floor like a whisk broom.

From her body language and reaction, I knew that I had hit on something good. Now all I had to worry about was this Louis Baines and me hitting it off.

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Iknew that Gloria liked to eat. That was obvious. And it was no secret that I had not missed too many meals. At least half of my other employees were carrying around more meat on their bones than they should have, too. Food was obviously the drug of choice in my workplace. Therefore, I was convinced that the lunch proposal was a brilliant idea. Work would be a lot more pleasant if my employees were more cheerful and more cordial to me. And the way things were in my personal life, I needed something to boost my morale.

I felt so good the rest of that day that I didn’t even think about the fact that my husband was giving me the cold shoulder on a regular basis, with no explanation.

When I got home that evening around six, Pee Wee was already slumped in his La-Z-Boy, snoring like a moose. The TV was on, and there was a ball game on that he had taped a few months ago. My daughter, Charlotte, had taped a note to the front of the microwave oven to let me know that she was across the street, having hot dogs and baked beans for dinner with one of her little friends. It was a Wednesday sleepover. She had school tomorrow, but she had taken a change of clothes with her, so I didn’t have to worry about that.

There was some leftover baked chicken in the refrigerator, which I had planned to serve for dinner.

Charlotte was growing up and anxious to spend even more time 82

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with her friends and their families. Since I’d led such a sheltered life and had so few friends, I was pretty lenient with her in that area. But I thoroughly checked out each family that she associated with. The only friend I didn’t allow her to sleep over with was a girl named Lonna Trapp. Lonna had an alcoholic stepfather and three teenage brothers, who had already fathered a few babies. I knew that I wasn’t God and that I could not protect my child from everything, but I did everything I could possibly do to keep her from being vic-timized by some predator. I didn’t want her to repeat my history.

I didn’t even bother to remove my black leather jacket. I looked at my watch and turned back around and went outside. I didn’t realize I was walking on my tiptoes until I had stepped off the porch.

There was no reason for me to be so quiet and cautious. Armaged-don would not have disturbed Pee Wee, with the state of unconsciousness that he was in. But I didn’t want to take that chance. I didn’t want him to wake up, because I was not in the mood for another brush-off. Before I knew it, I was driving toward Louis Baines’s restaurant.

I was greeted at the door by a fairly young brother, with a body that immediately made my mouth water and my crotch itch. “I’m Louis Baines, your host and head cook,” he told me.

I didn’t see any reason to tell him my name yet, so I didn’t. But I told him that it was nice to meet him. He was balancing a large silver platter in the palm of one hand as he smiled at me. The whole scene seemed symbolic. Here was a gorgeous man coming in my direction, about to serve himself to me on a silver platter. He was not that much taller than me, but he was built like a linebacker. He had smooth light brown skin and long, thick black hair, which he wore combed back like a duck. He reminded me of Ron O’Neal, the man who had starred in that gangster movie from the seventies called
Super Fly.
His eyes were so black, they sparkled when the light hit them. He had nice full lips and a nice smile, even though his teeth were a little dingy and crooked. But he was so fine, he could have had fangs like Dracula’s hanging out of his mouth and it wouldn’t have mattered.

“Sister, will you be eating here, or would you like to order to go?” he asked, handing me a menu with his free hand.

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The platter that he was balancing contained a meat loaf in the shape of a heart. I couldn’t tell if that was gravy or sauce flowing from the top of it like lava. But whatever it was, it belonged in heaven. I had planned to get a plate to take home, but I felt so comfortable, I decided to stay.

“Uh, I will be eating here. May I have a booth?” I asked, giving him one of my biggest smiles.

“Follow me,” he ordered.

I trailed behind him like a puppy. He stopped abruptly and turned to face me, still balancing that platter in one hand. Without a word of warning, he draped his arm around my shoulder and led me to a booth in the back of the small main room. He gently helped me sit down, guiding me as if I was an old woman. But he wasn’t looking at me as if I was an old woman.

It was a small restaurant and nothing to write home about. Plastic curtains covered the windows, and the floor looked like it had not been waxed in weeks. There were six dull brown vinyl booths along the wall and several tables in the center of the room. Despite the fact that the tablecloths looked cheap and outdated and the place mats were made out of paper, the restaurant had a nice, homey feel to it. My host must have been reading my mind.

“I hope to have this place looking like a showroom in a few months.

But I was warned that it would be a struggle to get a new business off the ground. If we survive the first few months and make a decent profit, I will be happy.”

“Well, I hope that you will,” I told him.