SUNDAY AFTERNOON, EDWINA and Roscoe stopped by the house to visit with Ruby. As twins, they always seemed to be together. Edwina favored flashy colors and had on a teal, magenta, and lemon-yellow nylon wind-suit that crinkled when she moved, whereas Roscoe wore black polyester Sans-a-Belt pants that had been buffed to a shine by years of dry cleaning and a short-sleeved white dress shirt with a too-short, too-wide navy blue striped tie. Apparently, that one chromosome that kept them from being identical twins skewed them into different universes, hers flashy and opinionated, his meek and agreeable.
"Derek, what is it you do out there in California?" Edwina spoke to me, but looked at the muted television as if I would appear on the news to answer her.
"Edwina?" I tried to catch her eye with a snap of my fingers. She refocused her attention to me with a lazy turn of her head. "Is there something on TV you want to see?" I sat up straighter in Walterene's wingback chair.
"Derek," Ruby scolded, "Edwina is a very visual person. She's looking all the time, but she hears everything you say."
"Right you are, Ruby. Young man, I'm waiting to hear about your job and," she glanced back to the television, "I'm looking to see if Vernon is going to be on TV shaking hands and kissing babies."
Roscoe perked up. " Vernon 's good at shaking and kissing."
A rough, gravelly laugh erupted from Edwina like it was the funniest thing she had heard. Ruby looked at me and shrugged. " Vernon thinks," Edwina continued, "his next stop will be Washington, leaving those boys in charge of the company." With a crinkle of fabric, she folded her plump arms across her pumpkin body. "If he thinks I'll stand by and let him put my money in the hands of those wild boys, then he's got another thing coming." She ended the sentence with a sharp nod of her head, as if she had typed the final period with her chin.
"They're grown men," Ruby offered, "and they have been in the company all their lives…"
"Don't matter, don't matter one bit. Vernon has been president since Daddy died. Hell, Roscoe should take over if Vernon doesn't want to run it any more, not some snot-nosed kids."
I looked over to Roscoe on the edge of the couch, cleaning his fingernails with his pocketknife. "Roscoe, do you want to run the business?"
"Maybe," he glanced at his sister. "I could do better than the boys."
Tiring of this subject, I offered to go to the store for Ruby. I drove toward East Boulevard for the few groceries she had on her list. The dogwoods bloomed like white puffy clouds in yards along the way with burgundy and pink azaleas lining driveways and sidewalks. I pulled onto Dilworth Road -one of the neighborhoods where few of the aging old money of Charlotte still held on against the younger affluent banking executives. I passed Latta Park and rounded a corner to see my grandparents' home. A three-story brick mansion sprawled across an acre of green lawn and towering oak trees. Porticos flanked either side of the house. I remember the older kids, Tim, Margaret, and Mike, had claimed one side for their headquarters, leaving the other side for the younger kids, Mark, me, and a neighbor girl named Alice. The older ones claimed we couldn't steal their "magic geranium," but we did and ran as fast as we could around the house to the safety of our headquarters. That summer, the geranium must have circled the house from portico to portico at least fifty times.
My grandmother, Eleanor, still lived in the house, but Mother and Father had moved in "to take care of her." Knowing Gladys the Bitch, I wondered what taking care of her meant. A vision popped into my head of Gladys slipping strychnine into her mother's coffee, then grabbing the will, hopping on her broom, and flying out the attic window to the lawyer's office, cackling the whole way.
Deciding to come back to visit Grandma when I knew Mother wouldn't be there, I pulled the car back on the road and headed on to the grocery store.
EDWINA AND ROSCOE had ambled on to their next relative's house by the time I came in with the groceries. Ruby said Mark had called and she'd told him I was staying for awhile. "He said he and Kathleen wanted you to come over for dinner tomorrow night."
"I can't."
"Yes you can," Ruby insisted. "You need to see your cousins while you're here. Anyway, I already told him you would be there-eight o'clock. They live downtown on Church Street in one of those new buildings."
"Ruby! I can decide if I want to have dinner with Mark."
"Go, go, you can't stay huddled up here with me the whole time.
I'm okay. Go have fun."
Fun? Yeah, right. But I knew she had made up her mind, and I was a little curious about Kathleen.
THE NEXT DAY I drove Ruby to the lawyer's office to finalize some of Walterene's affairs. We had lunch with Valerie. She said Mother attended a book club on Monday afternoons, so Ruby and I decided to drive back to Dilworth to visit Grandma. I pulled into the circular driveway and parked in front of Grandma's door, then helped Ruby out of the car.
"I could get used to this kind of treatment." Ruby smiled as I offered her my hand up the steps to the front porch. Ferns swung in the warm breeze along the porch, near wicker chairs arranged in groups for evening gatherings after dinner. I rang the doorbell and Martha, Grandma's maid, answered.
"Mister Derek, how nice to see you." Martha had to be almost as old as Grandma. She had always been so sweet to all of us, even in the seventies when Margaret and Valerie tried to liberate her from white elitist dominance. Margaret had even convinced Martha to wear her hair in an afro; that lasted about one day before she combed it out.
We walked into the entrance hall, and I could still smell my grandfather's pipe and grandmother's Chanel No. 5. A staircase curved gracefully up to the second story. The living room to the right had the same furniture and pictures I remembered; even the carpet held the same straight tracks from the vacuum cleaner. Grandma hated to see footprints on the carpet.
"Your grandmother is feeling good today," Martha said. "She has her good days and bad days."
"Bad days?" I asked.
"Well, sometimes she gets stuck in the past." Martha led us back to the sunroom where Grandma sat reading the newspaper. Grandma's hair was thinner than I remembered, but she sat up straight with her diamond rings and in her designer dress, hose, and pumps as if she waited to go to a church luncheon. Her beige hose sagged around her ankles and her rings slumped on her thin fingers; they had been bought for a more robust Grandma than I saw seated at the wicker table.
"Aunt Eleanor," Ruby called as we walked in. "Look who is here to see you."
She turned and smiled. "My little Derek, come here."
I leaned over to hug her. She seemed so fragile and small, a far cry from what I remembered from childhood when she would chase me across the backyard being the "tickle monster." Mother and Valerie would sit on the back porch and laugh as I would turn on Grandma and run after her. "Grandma, I'm glad to see you."
"Little Derek," she patted my hand and winked at Ruby, "he's as big as Papa was, but he's still our baby."
"Yes ma'am," Ruby agreed, settling into a rattan couch; a potted banana tree's leaf hovered above her head.
I sat next to Grandma at the table because she still held my hand. "How are you feeling?" I asked.
She pushed the newspaper out of the way and looked into my eyes. "I remember the spring this house was built; Papa designed it himself." She stopped for a moment, lost in her memories. "Erwin and Edward helped build it while Ernestine and I took care of our baby brother Earl." She smiled a faint smile down at the table, then looked at me again. "You remind me so much of Earl. He moved to New York; you know he went to work for William Henry Belk as a buyer. I don't hear from him as much as I used to."
I couldn't remember if Great-Uncle Earl was still alive and didn't want to ask Ruby in front of Grandma, in case he wasn't.
Ruby added, "I remember Daddy talking about building this house. Derek, he met Mama that summer."
"Oh, yes," Grandma fired up, "Erwin was oldest and handsomest; Edward always tried to outdo him. Guess being the second boy is tough. Edwina acts just like her daddy." She patted my knee. "Erwin and Rebecca would sneak off to Latta Park and kiss on the bench that used to be behind some pine trees." She looked at Ruby with great concern. "Are there still pines in Latta?"
"I think there's a few," Ruby answered respectfully.
"Well, anyway, that was around the time of the war. Camp Greene was over on the west side." She looked at me and winked. "Many a young Charlotte girl was courted by a pilot trainee from the camp."
"Grandma," I acted shocked. "Did you date a pilot?"
"Lord no, I was way too young. I couldn't have been more than six or seven."
Ruby brought her back on track. "What about Daddy and Mama courting in Latta Park?"
"Oh, yes. Erwin must have been fifteen and smitten with Rebecca. She walked by every day while this house was being built to see him. In the late evening, he would go to her house to sit on the swing or walk to the park or ride on the trolley." She thought fora moment. "Do you know the trolley is running again?"
"Yes, ma'am," I answered.
"Us kids loved riding the trolley downtown with Papa and Mama. They took us to our first movie at the Academy-seems like it was about the Confederates and Yankees, and about the Klan saving a family from the Negroes."
"What?" I couldn't believe I heard her right. "The first movie Great-Grandpa Ernest took you to was Birth of a Nation?" I had seen clips of the historic film in a class I'd taken in San Francisco; technically, a groundbreaking film because of the director's innovations, but the subject matter was pure anti-black propaganda. "Birth of a Nation," I repeated, not believing my great-grandfather would have taken his children to it.
"Scared the you-know-what out of me," she giggled. "I was sure a black man would grab me before we got back home, but Papa assured me that his friends-"
"Aunt Eleanor," Ruby interrupted. "Did you know that Mark and Kathleen have asked Derek to come to their house for dinner tonight? Derek and Mark always got along so well when they were younger. I'm glad they're still friends." She took a breath and continued, "And Derek will be here for a few days. He's been such a help to me. He mowed the lawn. We're going to replant the-" She turned to look back toward the door. "Oh, hi, Gladys."
Every muscle in my body tensed at the sight of my mother; I stood up quickly, ready for a fight.
Her eyes took in the three of us in quick jerky movements. "Mother, what nonsense have you been boring Derek and Ruby with?"
"Just talking about Papa and this house. What nonsense should I bore them with?" Grandma shot back, "I can always talk about you-that should bore them. Leave us alone, Valerie."
"Mother, I'm Gladys," she corrected.
"I know." Grandma seemed to be getting tired.
Ruby pushed herself out of the chair and grabbed my hand. "We should be leaving." She pulled me toward the door. "Goodbye, Aunt Eleanor. Bye, Gladys."
I wanted to stay and hear Grandma zing the Bitch again, but Ruby insisted on our leaving. I hugged Grandma and said, "I'll see you later. I love you."
She squeezed my hand and smiled.
I walked past Gladys without speaking.
I DROVE DOWNTOWN to Mark's condo in the TransAmerica building on Church Street. The building took up an entire city block; offices and restaurants faced Tryon Street, and the residential part lined Church Street. The building encircled a courtyard of fountains and sculptures. Even at eight o'clock on a Monday night, people still lingered in this space. I found Mark's condo on the top floor; a shimmering green marble hall echoed my footsteps as I approached the door. Sweat broke out on my upper lip, and I wiped it away before ringing the bell.
"Hey, Derek." Mark shook my hand with a firm grip and slapped me on the shoulder in the tradition of straight male bonding.
I wasn't sure what kind of home I had expected, but this one overwhelmed me. The columned foyer continued the marble flooring and led to a living area that soared two stories; floor-to-ceiling windows framed a view of the Charlotte skyline and Crowder's Mountain in the far distance with the last of the crimson sunset flowing on the horizon. Huge leather couches, a mahogany armoire, and flat-panel television on the wall caught my attention before I saw her. Kathleen stood in the doorway to the kitchen, wiping her hands on a kitchen towel. My God, I thought, it's the Junior Leaguer from Hell-heels, little black dress, gray pearls, and a silver Neiman Marcus-logo apron.
Mark guided me toward her. "Derek, this is Kathleen."
She extended her right hand, fingers drooping a little; I didn't know if I should shake it or kiss it. I reached out and held her delicate hand with both of mine, no shaking. "It's so nice to meet you, Kathleen. I wondered what kind of woman could tame this tiger."
She giggled, "Oh, Mark's a dear."
I giggled back, "Yes, he is."
She smiled.
I smiled.
Mark smiled.
"So," I began, "I see by the apron you've been cooking. You really didn't need to go to all that trouble."
"No trouble at all." Kathleen hugged Mark's arm. "We love working in the kitchen."
"You mean cooking?" I asked.
"Yes, exactly." She rubbed Mark's stomach. "Mark is getting so fat; he's losing all definition in his abs."
Mark pulled away from her. "I'll get drinks."
Fat? Mark appeared in prime shape to me. I scrutinized Kathleen; her black hair hung to her shoulders in sleek perfection; pale emerald eyes stared from beneath a long canopy of lashes; her thin face held no lines; her plunging neckline revealed her breastbone- no cleavage, her tits seemed no more than nipples. Her champagne-flute figure complemented their stylish penthouse decor.
"Mark looks like he's holding up well. How long have you been in Charlotte?" I asked her.
"Since college. We met at Duke. I'm from Charlottesville, Virginia. You know, where the University of Virginia is?"
"What made you choose Duke over UVA?" I asked, but didn't really care.
"My mother was a Delta Zeta at Duke when she met my father; I wanted to continue the tradition." She reached for a boiling pot on the stove, lifting her right leg as she leaned in. "Hope you like spaghetti, it's my specialty."
"Sounds wonderful," I lied.
Mark sat the wine glasses on the coffee table. "Come have a seat; Kathleen will be a little while."
"Yes," she insisted, "you boys relax. I'll be there in a jiffy."
Damn, why this walking, talking mannequin? I took a gulp of the wine before sitting down across from Mark.
"It's a Chianti. We bought a case when we went to Tuscany two years ago." He waited for me to say something.
"Nice," I took a sip this time, "very dry."
"Derek, how long do you intend to stay?" Mark asked.
"Not long." I took another sip of wine. "I just wanted to spend some time with Ruby."
Silence fell between us. I listened to Kathleen's high heels clicking across the kitchen tile.
"Dad's running for Senate." Mark smiled.
"I heard that. Democrat or Republican? Oh, dumb question, Uncle Vernon was always a big Jesse Helms supporter. So, who is he scaring the public with to get into office: welfare mothers, liberal democrats, social security fraud, released prisoners, gays?"
His look told me that "gay" had never been said in his palace. "His platform is to reform the tax system."
I took another swig of wine, and my head swirled like the wine settling back in the glass. "Great platform-a millionaire wanting to cut taxes. So, who's he going to cut funding from?" I counted on my fingers, "Welfare, education, the arts, AIDS research…"
"Maybe we shouldn't talk politics. Tell me about California." He filled up my glass again.
"I live in the Castro district with my roommate, Emma. Strictly platonic, if you know what I mean. She's a model." I leaned in and whispered, "Frankly, she's anorexic and just a couple pounds heavier than Kathleen."
"Kathleen's an athlete," Mark defended. "She runs marathons."
"Really?" I knew my sarcasm was out of control. Maybe it was the wine. Maybe it was seeing him in this perfect little life. Maybe I just hated everyone. "She cooks spaghetti and runs marathons, quite a woman. You did well."
"Okay, that's enough." I knew he'd reached his limit. "Kathleen is my wife; you show her some respect." His face flushed.
"Sorry." I meant it. "I didn't expect everything to be so perfect in your life. I'm working hard to make ends meet and so are all my friends back home, then I come here and everybody is rich and living the good life. And then, there's our history. I'm a little bitter about the past."
"A little bitter?" He laughed.
I had to smile, too. "Does it show?"
"Only when you open your mouth." He sat back and asked, "Do you think we are all without worries? Work is hell with the family feuding over every little decision; we can't get anything done. Dad's running for Senate, and reporters watch our every move and monitor everything we say."
"But," I had to ask, "how's your life?"
"Honestly? Confusing."
I waited for more, but he didn't continue. Kathleen walked up behind him and announced dinner was ready.
We dined on a pretty good spaghetti sauce and drank more wine. Mark relaxed, and Kathleen laughed at my jokes. We drank more wine. She kicked off her shoes, he loosened his tie, and I drank more wine. By the end of the evening, I genuinely didn't hate Kathleen. Or maybe it was just the wine.