His Last Wife

“You’re crazy,” she said, laughing a little

.

“Yes. I am. I was crazy thirsty sitting here waiting for you to show up with another one of your busters,” Ernest said.

“And what were you going to do if I did? Beat him up?”

“If that’s what it takes.”

“And what if there’s some new buster every night?”

“Then I’ll fight every night.” Ernest kissed Val on the forehead, like she was something precious, and tears she didn’t expect and couldn’t control fell out of her eyes.

“You can’t be serious,” she said, “about me.” Her voice quivered in anxiety.

“You bring more busters here and you’ll see how serious I am,” Ernest said. He then swept Val off of her feet and carried her to bed for restful sleeping.

Mama Fee, of course, saw this from her perch.

Chapter 9

Thirjane wasn’t resting easy. Though she’d taken a little Prozac, had her evening sip as she watched the news, had lain in bed and closed her eyes, her sleep was less than restful.

Somewhere between real life and a real nightmare, Thirjane tossed and turned under her sheets, reliving a past she wanted to forget.

From his bedroom down the hallway, Tyrian could hear her crying, “No! No!” and “Stop! Stop!” He sat up and thought to go and wake his grandmother, but he’d done it before and gotten two licks on his backside for getting out of bed without permission. So, instead he did what had become a kind of directionless hobby with his grandmother’s odd actions: He climbed out of bed, grabbed his iPad, and went to sit outside of her bedroom to record the strange cries. But what he couldn’t record were the heartbreaking memories his grandmother was forced to visit in a lifelike retelling of her history with his mother.

“I’m so sorry, Zachary, but my Kerry can no longer chat with you. We have to leave. Come along, dear.” A young Thirjane was sliding on her overly prissy day gloves and beckoning for Kerry to gather her things and follow her out of the Fullerton house, just doors away from their summer home in Oak Bluffs, Martha’s Vineyard. Kerry, just seven or eight at the time, had accompanied her to an afternoon tea at the Fullertons’. Mrs. Olivia Fullerton was the wife of a respected surgeon from Old Westbury, New York, whose family had been vacationing with Thirjane’s family in the Bluff before Labor Day weekend for as long as either family could remember. While Olivia was a newbie to the group and had none of the legacy of either the Fullerton or Jackson clans, her marriage to the good doctor, with his lineage and impeccable training, made her at least acceptable in the vacation enclave, where the ilk of Martin and Coretta King and later Bill and Camille Cosby made friends with other black elite and, more importantly, new family ties. As Thirjane’s mother had told her, “A woman ought to marry above her station, Janie. Never equal. Never less.” As such, when the Fullertons announced that they were expecting a boy when Thirjane and her husband were expecting a girl, Thirjane couldn’t have been happier. She delighted at the idea of connecting her Kerry with their Zachary. Of course, he’d go to Morehouse when Kerry was studying at Spelman. He’d follow in his father’s footsteps and go to Morehouse Medical School, become a surgeon, and then marry her daughter. The teas the women had were to casually bring their children together as friends first and then, over the years, through strong suggestion and careful planning, a romance would develop that would lead to a ring and a wedding at the Summer White House.

This sensational scenario came to a hard halt that afternoon, when Thirjane had to so expeditiously fetch her daughter from the Fullertons’ parlor and escape at once. Just seconds before, Thirjane had been sipping Darjeeling on the back porch with Olivia. The two were laughing and talking about the ways of their growing children, when Olivia had consumed just a little too much brandy in her tea and asked if she could open up to Thirjane—who accepted such an invitation, knowing full well the woman was drunk and probably about to tell a secret she should never tell another soul—especially not in the Bluffs. But, Thirjane wasn’t one to pass on the opportunity to hear juicy gossip, so she assured Olivia of her sincere secrecy and listened up. Olivia Fullerton was having an affair. She’d been sleeping with the gardener. She blamed the blues of being a housewife in boring Long Island and an afternoon brandy habit. She was certain her husband either knew or was about to figure it out. She didn’t know if she could stop—if she wanted to stop. She wanted Thirjane’s advice.

On the surface, Thirjane was a pillar of support for her Bluff buddy, but inside, the little Janie who’d been coached by her mother never to involve herself in such activities that could ruin not only the family’s name, but also the chances of good connections moving forward, was screaming that she needed to get herself and her daughter out of that house as soon as possible. The Fullerton ship was about to sink and she wasn’t going to allow her child to go down with it. Marry some Zachary Fullerton who’d soon be from a broken home and raised by a single, pedigree-free, drinking mother.

Thirjane nearly dragged Kerry out of the house.

“Why do we have to leave now? Zachary and I were having fun,” Kerry said, pouting, as they made the short walk back to their smallish bungalow.

“Never mind that boy. You’ll never see him again, girl, so don’t ask me another word about him,” Thirjane said in her strict voice that was pretty much the same as her relaxed voice.

“But he’s my friend. My only friend in the Bluffs. Why won’t I see him again?”

“I said, don’t ask me about him. Now, that’s it. You are never to talk to him again. You hear me?” Thirjane stopped and turned to Kerry. “Do you understand?”

“But he’s my friend. He’s my—”

Thirjane stopped Kerry’s back talk with the back side of her right hand up against the little girl’s soft lips.

She pointed her index finger between Kerry’s eyes.

“You bring that boy up again and I’ll tell your father. You hear? You don’t understand it now, but he is not good enough for you. He never will be. One day your mama will find a husband for you and he will be suitable and he will be perfect. Do you understand?”

“But he’s my—”

Thirjane cut in with, “Answer me yes or no, girl, or I swear I’ll spank your behind right here, right now.”

A spring of tears erupted from Kerry’s eyes and she sobbed out, “Yes, ma’am,” like a good Southern child.

Thirjane grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her the rest of the way home.