Up at the College (39 page)

Obadiah thought about what Danesha had told him and made it his business to watch Rico with those children. He didn’t like
what he saw. Rico was frowning when they walked through the door, he snapped and scowled at the kids, and he scolded Marquita
when she got the kids settled and took her seat next to his. About the only thing that made Rico stop scowling was when that
Tracey Parsons woman walked her Stewie-shaped-head self past their seats and then stopped to take a second look at Rico. Obadiah
definitely didn’t like what he’d seen and made a mental note to run this by Lena.

The musicians switched over to the choir’s processional song for the morning, and all the young people in that church hopped
up and started getting excited. The mass choir, which had folks from the ages of five to sixty, and today had to number roughly
sixty people, started moving from side to side to the beat of a gospelized version of “Crank That,” or the “Superman Song”
by the rapper Soulja Boy.

They started singing gospel lyrics that had to have been written by one of the teenagers in the group, and when they sang
out, “Who’s the real Superman … you know,” the little kids raised their arms up, called out “Jesus,” and waited for the
older teens to pick them up and swing them up in the air like they were Superman.

By this time all of the teenagers, including D’Relle, Tiffany, and Danesha, were singing with the choir, smiling and dancing
and having the time of their lives. But what put the icing on the cake of this processional was watching the older choir members
sing and do the Superman dance. Every one of those older choir members knew every single move to Soulja Boy’s Superman dance.

Trina leaned over and whispered to Yvonne, “They are throwing down and having a good time.”

“They are not the only ones,” Yvonne said and hopped up and started singing and doing the Superman with her kids. This song
was so much fun. And even though she knew it was something totally different in its original form, she loved this adaptation.
There were a lot of people here this morning being moved and touched by words set to the music of a song they recognized and
loved. Sometimes you had to make folks understand just how crunked Jesus really was.

The choir took its place in the choir loft, waited for the last chords of the song to be played by the musicians, and sat
down. Apostle Grady Grey stood up at the podium. He was in rare form this morning, dressed in a red silk clerical robe with
a black brocade collar and cuffs, and a huge platinum chain with a large black diamond cross set in platinum. His curl was
newly done and glistened under the overhead lights in the pulpit.

“Do you think that Linda does his hair?”

“She has to,” Yvonne whispered back to Rochelle. “I don’t think he could go to Elaine to get his hair done.”

“Speaking of Elaine,” Rochelle said, “did you remember to remind her about today?”

“Yeah, I did. But she is down in Atlanta at a hair show this weekend.”

“Okay, ’cause you know that Elaine loves herself some Grady Grey.”

“Umm … humm,” Yvonne murmured.

“Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!” Grady Grey said with a smile lighting up his entire face. “I don’t know what y’all came to
do on Friends and Family Day,” he said, “but I …” Grady Grey put a hand to his ear and leaned his head in the direction
of the congregation, as if to say “I can’t hear you.” “I said I don’t know what you came to do but …”

“I CAME TO PRAISE THE LORD!” the congregation yelled back at him.

“Now that’s what I’m talking ’bout. Looka heah. You all are blessed and highly favored. Now look at your neighbor and say,
‘I’m blessed and highly favored.’”

Folks turned toward one another and said, “I’m blessed and highly favored.”

“I’m telling you people that you just don’t know how blessed you are. Is there anybody who is blessed up in here? If there
are, jump up and give the Lord some real praise.”

Folks got up out of their seats and started cheering.

“Is that all you all got for Jesus after all that He’s done for you? Come on, you can do better than that.”

This time everybody got louder and they cheered and jumped up and down for a good fifteen seconds.

“That’s what I’m talking about. You need to pump it up when you giving God the praise. Because whether you know it or not,
God has really blessed you. Even when you don’t feel you are being blessed, you are. Is there anybody out there who is having
trouble with what I’m talking about?”

Two teenagers stood up and raised their hands.

“Anybody else?”

An older man and his wife stood up, along with three young men in their early twenties.

“Just one more, two more,” Grady Grey said. “People, it’s time to get saved. Is there anybody out there who is tired of the
world? Anybody out there wondering how to have a better life? Annnyyyyyy … eeeee! Body out there,” he went on in a high
and melodic falsetto voice, “who wants to know what it really feels like to know the Lord?”

Twenty-three more people stood up ranging in age from five to seventy-five. Mr. Tommy looked over at Miss Hattie Lee and nudged
her to get up with the rest of the folk. She shook her head.

He said, “Sugar, you sure you don’t want to stand with the people? You know you need to do this and soon. ’Cause, baby, you
are running low on decades.”

Miss Hattie Lee shook her head again and Mr. Tommy left her alone. He would continue to pray for her. The baby needed to get
saved.

Grady Grey surveyed the sanctuary one more time and had perfect peace that this was the final count for the morning. He looked
back at Reverend Quincey to make sure it was okay to proceed.

All Obadiah did was nod. If Grady Grey could get all of these people down to the altar to get saved, and at the beginning
of service, he could do backflips out of the pulpit for all Obadiah cared. Sending as many people to Heaven as possible
was
the business at hand.

Grady Grey came out of the pulpit and stood at the base of the altar. He turned back toward Obadiah and said, “Can we get
some anointed saints down here with some oil?”

Obadiah nodded and looked out at The Prayer Warriors. They all made their way down front, vials of oil in hand, and began
to anoint the people at the altar.

Grady Grey said, “Do you all want to get saved?”

Everyone standing at the foot of the altar said yes loudly and with great enthusiasm. Grady Grey led them through the Sinner’s
Prayer and then laid hands on each one and anointed them with the Holy Ghost.

After that he said, “I want each one of you to find a permanent church home, if you don’t already have one. This is the first,
and an extremely important step. You all are babies and need the milk of the teachings of the Word to grow and flourish and
be close to the Lord. It’s a wonderful journey but you must be determined to take it and stay on it.”

Then he went and took each person in his arms, wrapped them in a hug full of the love of Christ, and blessed them.

Yvonne sat there thinking that watching Grady Grey on his TV show could be very entertaining. But experiencing the apostle
firsthand was a blessing beyond anything she could describe. And if that Jheri curl made it work better, then she was more
than willing to tithe him a box of curl activator. Reverend Quincey had once told them how God loves to use the most unlikely
folk to do His work. He was right.

Apostle Grady Grey ran back up to the pulpit and said, “Well, church, I know you all want to hear some more music after that.
And I want to ask my Uncle John Lee Grey to come down with his ensemble, The Holy Vocalaires.”

An old man in a light blue three-piece suit, white shirt, light blue bow tie, and matching light blue gaiters rode his scooter
to the foot of the altar with his electric guitar resting in his lap. He was followed by four old ladies, who could have only
been The Holy Vocalaires, because they were the only people in the church wearing light blue cotton knit culottes with elastic
waistbands, white ruffled shirts worn tucked inside the calf-length culottes, white stockings, light blue pumps, and white
turbans on their heads with light blue butterfly pins anchored in the middle of the turbans.

“How did we miss them coming in?” Maurice leaned over and whispered to Curtis. “I mean, I would have seen that. Wouldn’t you
have seen that, man?”

Curtis nodded. He couldn’t believe he’d missed that, too.

Uncle John Lee Grey waited for one of The Holy Vocalaires to plug the guitar into the amplifier and set up the microphone
for him. Then they took their places behind him. He tinkered with the guitar for a moment, stomped his foot on the floor of
the scooter, and opened his mouth wide. He hit a few bluesy chords and then sang, “Chirrens,” into the microphone.

As soon as D’Relle, Danesha, and Tiffany saw the gums in Uncle John Lee Grey’s mouth, framed by two front teeth off to the
side on the top and the bottom (four teeth total), they bent down under the pews, shaking with laughter. Yvonne absolutely
refused to look at Rochelle and Trina, and then noticed that her parents were texting each other and laughing.

“I sayed, chirrens,” he called out and plucked on the guitar some more. He reached down to the floor of the scooter, pulled
up a jar with brown liquid in it, spat in the jar, and was about to put it back when Grady Grey frowned and ran out of the
pulpit to where his uncle was.

He held out his hand and said, “Give me that.” Then he hurried over to the side exit door, set that snuff jar outside, and
hurried back to his seat next to Reverend Quincey.

The congregation was fighting hard not to lean over and ask the million-dollar question. How did that old man have that snuff
jar and not spill any of it when he was driving that scooter and doing all of that stomping on it? Reverend Quincey was so
tickled that he had tears in his eyes trying to keep from laughing out loud. And he absolutely refused to look at Lena. He
knew that one look at that girl and it would have been over for him.

Uncle John Lee Grey massaged his gums with the inside of his lips for a few seconds, and then called out the key the song
was in, started in on the melody, played a few riffs so that the other musicians could catch up with him, and it was on. That
church got to jumping like they were at one of those old school Durham liquor houses folks used to sneak off to on Friday
and Saturday nights and then tried to act as if they had not been to on Sunday morning.

The musicians lit into the vamp of Alvin Darling’s “Nothing but the Lord,” and got folks up on their feet. Uncle John Lee
started singing the lyrics and it was getting good to him. He sang through those four teeth as if he had a mouth full of high-quality
dentures. And he could sing, too.

But the best part of this song was when The Holy Vocalaires started singing the chorus, “Nobody, nobody, nobody but the Lord,”
in such tight and perfect harmony, the congregation had a new respect for those old ladies in the light blue culottes and
white turbans.

And then they kicked it up another notch. Uncle John Lee Grey told the musicians to quiet down and carried the tune with his
guitar. The Holy Vocalaires were on fire now, and they started dancing and singing like nobody’s business.

Those old ladies could dance, too. They were lined up side by side like a 1960s R&B group, and every move was synchronized
and precise. When they turned to the side and did a smooth dip-and-swing movement, the entire congregation hopped up and started
dancing with them. Everybody, including Reverend Quincey, who was usually cool with his movements, was doing The Holy Vocalaires’
dip-and-swing dance.

Uncle John Lee Grey brought all of those musicians back in and the music was so hot and jumping the folks were now coming
out of those pews and were all over that church dancing and singing “Nobody, nobody, nobody but the Lord.” This was definitely
an old school gospel number and The Holy Vocalaires were working it until the church was on fire with praise for the Lord.

The song ended but the congregation wanted more. So Uncle John Lee started plucking out that universal and easily recognized
Holy Ghost shouting song with his guitar. The musicians were on fire and added their part to this song, heating things up
several more notches.

Folks were up and doing the Holy Dance all over the church. Reverend Quincey knew his church was hot for Jesus when two things
happened. First, his boy Phil Cousin came out of his seat and cut a smooth step. And second, the man in the back of the church
with his right leg four inches shorter than the left one started running around the church, and then lit into the Holy Dance.
Obadiah marveled at how even the man’s dance steps were—it was as if his legs were perfectly synchronized in length.

Never in a million years would anybody in the church, other than the folks from Jubilee Temple Holiness Church II, have believed
that an old man in a motor scooter, a snuff jar, and four teeth to his name, along with four old women in some culottes, would
turn this church out—and they still had a good hour of service left to go.

T
uesday came on them so fast that Curtis had a weak moment and asked himself if they were ready and could really do this thing.
Then he remembered how Jesus had to check Peter when he jumped in the water with Jesus and then wavered in his faith when
he started focusing in on what he saw happening around him instead of keeping his eyes on Jesus.

Curtis knew that fear was the opposite of faith. You couldn’t be afraid and expect to find your way to a place of rest in
faith in God. If you asked God to work it out, then your job was to please God by trusting Him to do just that, no matter
what your circumstances looked like. As Gran Gran always said, “We see crisis, peril, and trouble, and God sees a miracle
waiting to happen.”

So Curtis had to choose. He could operate out of fear and lose this game. Or he could have the kind of faith that paid no
heed to the circumstances, and let God use them to roll right over Bouclair College and put Sonny Todd Kilpatrick in his place.