“And by the way,” I started (I was on a roll), “why don’t you try worrying about your own life—about your own students and what you can do for them—and stop sweating me!” Not bothering to wait for a response. I dropped my hand from my waist and sashayed the rest of the way to the car.
I was about to drop my purse and hightail it when I saw a certain somebody standing with his back to me between Billie and Evan at the car. It was the silhouette of a body I’d looked at thousands of times as I played babysitter and kept his head from hitting the hard edges of the wooden pews as he toddled around at church.
“Justin!” I hollered, extending my arms before he could even turn around to see me.
“Big sister!” He turned and ran toward me, ready to embrace.
I stood there, locked in my baby brother’s arms for at least a minute before I would let loose. I hadn’t seen him since Christmas when he and my father got into a huge fight after my father asked why he wasn’t married yet and what in the hell was he doing with his life in Atlanta anyway. He was almost accusing Justin of being gay, and for once I just wished he’d come out and say it. Just say it and stop allowing the whispers and secrets to make him lie about who he really was to everyone he knew and loved most. But Justin stormed out, and just as he did almost every holiday, he swore he’d never come back to my father’s house again.
He looked good. He’d clearly been putting on some weight in his hips, but he looked good. Like a younger and more strikingly handsome version of my father and Jr, Justin had a strong, almost Anglo angle to his jaw line, high cheekbones and a dimple in his chin that made him look like he belonged on a runway in Paris. In fact, when he was a little boy, his features were so pure and almost pretty that everyone thought he was a little girl. My mother, who doted over Justin hopelessly, always connected his handsome genes with her grandfather, a full-blooded Choctaw, who married her white grandmother.
“Baby brother,” I said, welling up again. “I can’t believe you made it.”
“You know I had to come home to see the baddest choir in the land!”
“And they did sound like that today, too,” Billie jumped in, coming over to hug me as well.
“They were good,” I added. “I was so proud.”
“You worked hard enough,” Evan said.
“And then when everyone started singing,” I said, “that was amazing.” I wouldn’t let go of Justin. It was like I was afraid he’d just disappear. I had so much to tell him. So much to share about what had been going on with me.
“Yeah, Mama was crying,” Justin said.
“Where are they?” I asked. “Mama and Daddy?”
“They went back to the house, so they could make sure Ms. Cobb and Fanny had everything laid out like they like it,” Justin answered, referring to the two cooks my mother always hired when we were expecting guests at the house for a barbecue. They knew how to cook, but my mother liked things organized a certain way and my father was pretty particular about his barbecue. He seasoned everything himself the night before and insisted on working the grill. “I told them I’d hitch a ride with you.”
“I guess we’d better head over there, then,” I said. “I’m starving.”
“Actually,” Billie said, frowning, “I was coming over to say I wasn’t going to make it over to your parents’. I’m going to Clyde’s family barbecue.”
“Wait a second, guys.” I excused myself from Evan and Justin and pulled Billie to the side. I couldn’t believe she was obviously still considering marrying Clyde. After the prom, I finally got the nerve to tell her everything Evan said about seeing Ms. Lindsey and Clyde fighting at the mall. This had to matter in her decision.
“Are you still going to do this?” I asked. “I mean, after everything he’s put you through?”
“I love him,” she replied.
“I know you love him, but it’s just not right. He’s not going to change just because he asked you to marry him. He’s still the same Clyde.”
“And I’m still the same Billie and I don’t know how to love anyone else. So I’m going to take this chance and see what he’s talking about. After all that’s happened, that’s the least I can do.”
“But you can do better than be with a man who only wants to be with you because he thought you were with someone else ... someone you hired,” I whispered so Evan and Justin couldn’t hear me. “Do you really want that to be how your marriage begins? That he came to you because of that and because Karen left him?”
“I don’t even know anymore,” she said. “I just know I have to try. You don’t know what it’s like to want someone to love you like this for so long and then to finally get it. I know it’s not all right, but it’s just ... what I got. And I have to know if it’ll work.”
“I got your back,” I mouthed.
“Good or bad?”
“Good or bad.”
We hugged and Billie looked down at her ring.
“Now if I could only get this fool to give me a mansion, we’re onto something,” she said. “That and my red drop top!”
As Billie headed to her car and I rejoined Evan and Justin, I said a prayer that she finally got what she wanted from Clyde all these years—true love. And while I knew it was a shot in the dark, if she was strong enough to still have hope, I had to hope, too.