sister. Or even worse, my sweet little niece had bumbled out the scene as only a toddler can.
Two more steps brought me to my door, now shaking like plywood instead of oak. Who knew Dahlia’s skinny butt could hit so hard?
“I’m coming already. Cut it out. You’re going to break it down.” I shook my head. Only man-wrath could give that kind of strength.
I pulled the door back.
Rochelle stood, livid, on the other side. I swallowed, realizing the one thing more powerful than man-wrath was inches from me….
Mother love.
When I vowed to take Shemika to see “that boy” and his mother, I didn’t know what I was getting into. Nothing had prepared me for seeing my strapping nephew cry like a baby trying to explain to his mother what he’d done. The rage flashing in my best friend’s face shocked me just as much. I’d expected her to be disappointed, upset, but this? Every few seconds I wondered if she’d turn green and tear out of her dress. That it was purple didn’t help.
Rochelle paced the floor, swinging both arms. “I saw it coming,” she said, making an abrupt pivot at the end of my sectional. “I asked you again and again. But noo-oo-oo. ‘Mama, I ain’t doing that. Mama, why you always on my back. No,’ you said. ‘No!’”
“Rochelle.” I touched her arm, lightly at first, then firmer when she didn’t respond. “Calm down. We can talk later. Let’s pray now and back off. Get to church.”
Her head swung around what looked like three hundred and sixty degrees. “Church? Church?” Her tone made me feel as though the word itself was absurd. When I’d lost everything with Trevor, she’d been the one who prayed me through. Was I this bad? Would I be able to stand up to her and tell her the truth like she did for me? My shoulders slumped.
She sucked her teeth. “Church. Girl, what are you talking about? I’ve given God everything I have. And what did it get me?”
Jericho shook his head, pinching his eyes shut. “Mama, please. Don’t say that. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. It’s just that—”
Rochelle threw her head back like she did on Sundays when the choir ended up on the floor with everybody else. When she threw her head back like that, there wasn’t any use in fanning yourself, ’cause in a few minutes you’d be sweating for sure. This time though, the sway of her head scared me more than the sight of Trevor’s smooth skin last night.
Almost.
“I have nothing,” she cried in a haunting voice. “Nothing!” She turned to Shemika. “And here you are, running up behind me trying to get a piece of nothing, too.”
It got still then, almost like the air had thinned. I tried to muster words, but it was all I could do to breathe. Shemika walked to the balcony and slid back the glass door, ushering in the roar of morning rain. Lightning danced on the downbeat, offering the only flash in the drab darkness. All seemed lost, until a precious sound sliced through our silence.
“Be still, my soul…the Lord is on thy side. Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain…”
Without thinking, I picked up the note, adding body to Daddy’s low, sweet voice. “Leave to your God to order and provide…in every change, He faithful will remain.”
He took my hand first, then Rochelle’s. And we sang. To each other, to the rain, to God. My voice creaked on most notes, especially when I felt the current of my father’s baritone holding me up. Hadn’t he been singing this last night? He’d seen the storm coming long before it had broken forth.
After the last refrain, Daddy waved us to the dining room table. I followed, smiling through my tears. At each chair was an outfit for everyone, crisp and ironed. One of Jordan’s old suits for Jericho—never underestimate the retro potential of ugly clothes—one of Mama’s sweater sets for Shemika that must have been maternity. Was Mama ever that big? There was a royal blue wrap skirt and blouse for me, and for himself, a seersucker suit that I’d never remembered seeing before. My jaw swung open like a trap door.
Daddy tapped it shut. “That’s what attics are for, baby. Rainy days.”
We were all there. I hadn’t been to church with Daddy in over ten years, and besides the fiasco a few months back when Jordan first arrived, I hadn’t seen my brother there either. On any other day, I’d