As we approached the home bleachers, Merrill extracted a quarter from his pocket. “Heads or tails?” he asked.
“Tails,” I said.
Merrill flipped the coin into the air, caught it with his right palm, and slapped it on down on his left.
“Tails,” he said, “you win. What will it be, eighty or twenty?”
For as long as I could remember, the bleachers had been divided up into eighty-twenty. The first eighty percent was the unofficial white section, and the last twenty was the unofficial black section. Merrill and I, when we came to the games at all, always sat together, which meant that one of us would be in the minority. I won, so tonight I got to call it.
“Twenty,” I said. “Let’s sit with the colored folk.”
“We be honored to have you, missa’ Jordan. You a important man, suh.”
We walked along the narrow sidewalk at the front of the bleachers past the white section, where a few people spoke to us, down to the black section, where a few more people spoke to us.
We sat by a heavy black woman whom everybody called Miss Tanya. She said, “Boys, how y’all doin’ tonight?”
“Just fine, Miss Tanya. How are you?” I said.
“Honey,” she said in about five syllables, “I am so blessed. God is so good. ’Course you know that. You still preachin’?”
She asked me that every time she saw me, like she expected me to quit at any minute. “Yes, ma’am,” I said.
“Oh, honey, I’m so proud of you.”
“Thank you.”
“Mer Mer,” she said to Merrill, “how is school coming along?”
“Slow. I figure to be finished about the time Jesus comes back.”
“Well, you hang in there shuga’. You makin’ us all so proud. When I win the lottery, I gonna finish payin’ for you schoolin’.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said patronizingly.
When the game started, Miss Tanya yelled, “Come on, Tigers. Kick some butt!” Her whole body, all three hundred pounds, bounced up and down as she yelled.
Miss Tanya continued to talk to us and to the players throughout the first quarter. Mer Mer and I were quiet-he watching the game, I looking for Laura.
Near the end of the second quarter I spotted her. She was on the other side of the field helping the jamboree court prepare for it’s halftime program.
I could see that all of the young ladies on the jamboree court and most of the women helping them had on corsages, but Laura did not.
“Idiot!” I exclaimed.
“That was stupid,” Merrill said. “The whole left side of the field was open.”
“No, not that. I forgot something. Miss Tanya,” I said looking over at her, “where did you get that corsage?”
“From the school this afternoon. Shaniqua bought it for me.”
“Are they still selling them?”
“I don’t think so, baby. What is it?”
“I’m meeting a girl tonight and I forgot to get her one.”
“Here,” she said and began to pull the pin out of hers, “you take this one, baby.”
“I couldn’t,” I said.
“Don’t you argue with Miss Tanya. Now go on-take it, boy. Go on now. Take it to her.”
“Thank you,” I said and gave her a hug. “I’ll see you in a little while,” I said to Merrill.
“If things don’t go well, you’ll see me in a little while. If things go well . . .”
“I’ll see you Monday.”
As I walked over to the visitor side of the field, I thought about how generous Miss Tanya had been. Every time I wondered why I was living in a place like Pottersville, something like this happened to remind me.
Laura was straightening the corsage on her sister when I reached her. She wore a peach sundress with shoulder straps and light brown sandals. Her tan skin set the peach color off beautifully. I quickly glanced at her feet. I’ve always thought that feet say a lot about a person. They were beautiful-not too small, and her toenails were painted to match her dress. Her light brown hair, roughly the color of her sandals, was held in a ponytail by a peach bow. She was lovely- the first serious competition for Anna I had ever seen around here, maybe anywhere.
“Certainly the prettiest woman in the county needs a corsage, wouldn’t you agree?” I whispered when I was right behind her.
She spun around, her brilliant, deep brown eyes twinkling flirtatiously. She was breathtaking.
“The county?” she said. “The county? It’s a pretty damn small county.”
“I meant the state,” I said. “May I?” I asked as I held up the corsage.
She hesitated, then looked around. “You seem to be my only suitor. Go ahead,” she said in mock exasperation.
As I pinned it on her dress, I said, “I seriously doubt I am your only suitor.”
“Well, maybe not my only one. Watch your hands there, Priest. I wouldn’t want to be an occasion of sin for you.”
“More like an occasion of grace,” I said almost to myself.
She let that one go. Then she said, “Speaking of priests, you don’t look half-bad without that silly collar on. I might just dance with you tonight.”
“Now that you mention it, you look lovely, not that you don’t in your FedEx shorts, mind you, but even lovelier tonight.”
“Thank you,” she said softly. Then, “How long is this going to take?”
“I’m almost finished.”
“Poor priest. Is this your first time?”
I looked up with surprise.
“Pinning a corsage on a woman,” she said. “Is this your first time pinning a corsage on a woman?”
“Of course not, but it has been a while.”
“I’m sorry I’m giving you such a hard time,” she said.
“No, you’re not. You’re loving every minute of it.”
“Are you finished playing with my breasts yet, Preacher?” she said rather loudly.
Before I could respond, Laura’s sister walked back from where she had been giggling with some of her friends.
“This is Father John,” Laura said. “He’s the priest who wants to have an illicit affair with me.”
I smiled-I could do nothing else. “Hello, I’m John Jordan, and I’m not a priest. As to the affair, well let’s just say that your sister is the one who keeps mentioning it.”
She laughed. “I’m Kim,” she said. “And she likes you.”
“She has a funny way of showing it.”
“Well,” she said and then hesitated, “she just needs someone to settle her down a bit.”
“Have you tried Ritalin?”
Kim laughed.
Laura punched me in the arm.
“Hey, JJ,” Ernie yelled from where he stood with the rest of the kids waiting to enter the field.
“Well, I’ve got to go,” Kim said as the last seconds of the first half were ticking down.
“Good luck. You look great,” I said.
Later that night we danced slowly to Boz Scaggs’s “Look What You’ve Done To Me” and to other songs, most of them unfamiliar to me. It reminded me of high school-distant dances and young love. She danced close to me, but not too close. Actually, not nearly close enough.
“I think your dress is overpowering me,” I said as we danced to a ballad Richard Marx had written for his wife.
“Why do you say that?” she whispered, seemingly in some sort of trance herself.
“Because I would swear that your hair smells like peaches.”
She smiled.
Still later that night, I took her home and kissed her good night-a perfect first kiss: gentle, slightly lingering, and hinting of more, much more. It was a perfect night.
Even later that night, I went to bed with a smile on my face and dreamt of picking peaches in what must have been paradise, maybe even the Garden of Eden, but I assure you they were not forbidden fruit.
They were fruit from the Tree of Life.
Chapter 23
The great fiery eye in the sky was covered in a thick asbestos blanket of rain-threatening clouds. Relief. It was the coolest morning in weeks-still, it never dipped lower than ninety. Many of the Native Americans in our area had been doing a ceremonial rain dance for weeks. Had we known how to do it, many of us Other Americans would have joined them. Perhaps today our prayers and dances would be answered.