Playing Hard To Get

While Troy had sat at the altar during Sunday service on many occasions, this Easter her presence beside her husband atop the throne of grace was much more sweet. This time, she’d been elected, appointed, and approved to occupy the recently coveted seat by the women of her church and that act made her feel, for the first time ever, that she was truly the First Lady of First Baptist. She had her big hat, white gloves, two-piece violet suit with shoes and purse to match, a wide smile, and a heart that was so full, even her few remaining enemies forgot the events of the previous evening when she entered the church alongside Kyle and waved into the congregation like it was a Miss America pageant. Though some members frowned, a few did laugh and wave back, and years later, as they recalled the experience, they’d say, “That was just our First Lady being herself.”

What made the auspicious celebration of resurrection even more marvelous for Troy was the fact that it presented one of the few times each year that she could get her grandmother to attend Sunday service at her church. In the first pew sat Lucy, arms and legs crossed, smiling congenially as if she was awaiting the opening curtain at the opera. Troy had invited her parents, but both declined for fear they’d run into the other at the church. Troy waved at Lucy and got a return wink and nod, a showing of support she wasn’t aware she’d need in just a few minutes. Gravity was the only thing keeping Troy from floating to the ceiling. With Kyle happier than a squirrel in a nut house, Lucy in the front, and the church finally coming to her side, it seemed the Lord was smiling down at her and saying, “You better go, girl!”

And then it came.

After a series of readings and testimonies that almost made Lucy forget she’d had three mimosas before going to church and consider giving her life over to the Lord (for, like, three minutes), a tearful Sister Myrtle Glover, who was also wearing lavender, bowed before Kyle on the altar and took position at the speakers’ lectern. Lucy, who’d taken to carrying a pocketknife in her purse long before she became a respectable woman of high society, moved her purse from her side to her lap.

“I asked our dear pastor if I could speak to you today, church,” Myrtle started, and as she continued into an emotional address that praised the church leadership for guiding the members of First Baptist away from the snare of the devil and into the arms of the Lord, Troy actually felt bad about admonishing Kyle for giving her airtime. Myrtle’s words made Kyle seem like the next Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and First Baptist a holy ground of renewal. Members were shouting hallelujah and a few walked down the aisle to lay early offerings on the altar.

“…but, church,” Myrtle went on just as Saptosa stood up to read her portion, “where there is praise, there must also be penalty. And while I’m proud of everything we’ve done in the church, in the name of the Lord, having crawled the aisles of this sanctuary before I could walk them, I can’t sit idly by when I know that the same evils that sent our savior to the cross now seek solace within our midst.”

Had Troy been looking at Kyle, she might’ve seen his Adam’s apple quiver a bit at this transition, but she was too busy managing her own discomfort. And while some of the other listeners seemed to share this position, a few, namely Elizabeth, pushed Myrtle on, cheering, “Say it!” and “Shame the devil!”

“Now, I’m no saint, but I know a sinner and when I see one, I say I must say it!” Myrtle shouted in a way that made Saptosa step up behind her and lay a hand on her back to signal that her time was up. “Evil is here. Right among us. And, First Baptist, I can no longer sit back and watch.”

And with that little performance, Troy’s big day ended with big problems. After ten minutes, Saptosa had to pull Myrtle to her seat. Anyone who was in the inner circle at the church was there and knew exactly what Myrtle’s bitter, verbal rant was about. Any members who were still upset about the pastor’s decision to marry someone from outside the church were excited that Myrtle’s less than subtle appeal was given airtime. Others who really didn’t care suspected that perhaps the naysayers now had a point. And the few who were beginning to like Troy and accept her as one of their own were suspicious as to what Myrtle was talking about. Troy and her grandmother fell into the latter group and as Troy sat through the rest of the special sermon, she thought of what would come next.

Myrtle had said she was comin

g for her, and she’d selected the perfect place and time to do it. But that couldn’t be it.

?

“You need me to make a call?” Lucy whispered in Troy’s ear after the service had ended and she’d pulled Troy into the backseat of the Rolls.

“No, Lucy.” Troy sighed, watching through the tinted car windows the little girls walk out of the front of the church in their new Easter dresses.

“The nerve of her!” Lucy went on. “She’s hard. Much harder than I thought. You sure you don’t want me to make a call? I can. Even if you say no, I can know you mean yes, but you don’t want to be tied to it. I can arrange that.”

Troy looked at her grandmother.

“Are you crazy?” she asked. “I can’t do that. I won’t even consider it. I—”

“I know,” Lucy said, broken. “And I wouldn’t let you. But you know you need to do something about her. I told you, you needed to do something about her before and now you have to do something about her now.”

Troy wanted to lament with Lucy, but her ears were filled with Myrtle’s harsh words: evil, sinner, evil, sinner. The more she replayed the tape in her mind, the more she began to believe it.

“And that husband of yours—I didn’t want to say anything, but he should’ve done something. He should’ve stopped her. There’s no way your grandfather would’ve heard of anyone speaking about me in such a way. No. No. Not in his presence.”

Troy gave Lucy a look. The cat had long emerged from the bag, saying Lucy’s husband was not Troy’s grandfather.

“Don’t get on Kyle,” Troy said, watching Kyle walk out of the church with one of the deacons. His eyes were red and he looked around sadly. Troy knew he was looking for her. “He’s just trying not to play sides.” While Troy meant what she was saying to her grandmother, she couldn’t help but feel alienated from and by her husband. She had been open with him about her issues with Myrtle and asked him not to put her on the program. He’d failed to protect her. But she couldn’t say that to Lucy. Once her grandmother hated someone, that was it. And she knew sharing her hurt feelings with Lucy could only lead to the old woman making a phone call.

“Not trying to play sides?” Lucy asked. “You make it sound like he’s trying to appease both of you.”

“It’s about me and her,” Troy said, watching her husband and knowing what must be worrying him. “It’s about him and the church. He knows what Sister Glover can do. He was trying to stop it.”

“Well,” Lucy said, grabbing her granddaughter’s hand and squeezing it, “if he can’t stop it, then you have to. You have to stop her. You have to confront her. Now, I know you’re not a fighter. You’ve always chosen a smile over a fist. But you’re Mary Elizabeth’s child and my grandchild, and that means, dear, there’s fight in you. You’re going to have to find it—if you want to save your marriage, and yourself.”

?

Nothing in Tamia’s world carried weight. Everything was light. Everything had the ability to change or be changed. A pen. A pillow. A piece of Brillo pad. She would sit for hours thinking about how each thing was a part of the universe, created by the Creator and thus a part of the cycle of change.

Now she was sitting in her office, contemplating how her door was changing. It opened. It closed. It let people in and out.

“You okay?” Naudia asked, standing in the doorway.

Tamia blinked. She hadn’t noticed she was there. Her focus had become so direct, her mind so encased that she could meditate anywhere for any amount of time.