can’t sit in the back today, Tracey. I forgot to tell you. We need to sit in the front, at least until after the announcements.”
A rapid succession of blinks from me followed this insane information. “When you say front, just exactly how far front do you mean? Ninth row? Eighth?” All of a sudden I wished I had a paper bag in my purse. This was enough to make me hyperventilate.
“Third row, babe. With Mom and the other ladies. Don’t look at me like that. It’s one Sunday, okay? I know that my mother gives you fits, but she’s my mother. Help me out. Just for today.”
Famous last words. I knew better than to believe them. For one thing, whatever this front-row business was about, it wasn’t just for today. Ryan dealt with things on a need-to-know basis, especially when it came to the Queen and I. I had a feeling that I’d be needing to know this same information next week as well. Still, she was his mother and he was my husband. “Okay. Just promise me that you won’t let her clown on me in front of all those people. You know I hate that.”
He kissed my hand and took a bow. “No problem, Your Majesty. Your wish is my command,” he said as we passed one of the older deacons, who readjusted his glasses after we went by.
So, he’d been in my bathroom after all. He was so dead when we got home. For now, though, it was time to face the Queen. Wearing a prepregnancy skirt for the first time since the baby, I was feeling pretty good, too. It had elastic in the waist, but the Queen wouldn’t be able to tell that. Okay, so she would, but I didn’t care.
Ten minutes later, we were on the third row and far enough from Liz to keep things civil without having a fight.
Or so I thought.
Even with a hat more than a foot in diameter, three-inch heels and two-inch nails, Queen Liz managed to squeeze through twenty people to get to us before I could escape. And she had the nerve to drag a friend along for the ride.
I waved goodbye to the confused people who’d just been reassigned farther down the row without their permission. If only I could get off as easily.
“That skirt is cute, but frumpy. Did you get my e-mail?” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “You know. Jenny Craig. No one has to know. I promise.”
My eyes could have worn a hole in Ryan’s shirt from the way I stared at him, but he was so caught up in his own distress (over what, I wasn’t sure) that he left me defenseless. “Hey, Mom. You look good this morning. Nice shoes.”
Obligatory or not, that was more than any compliment I’d been given in a long time. I took a deep breath, reminding myself not to be jealous. That was just what she wanted, to set us against each other.
“Thanks, son. You look good, too.” She paused. “So does my sweet little grandbaby.” She moved in for the baby kidnapping, always her ultimate goal. “Here, I’ll take her.”
My mother-in-law’s hands came toward me in a flash of pink and green. My eyes focused on the pearl insets on the designs on her nails. She was in rare form today.
Instead of clutching Lily to my chest as I usually would have and trying to explain that in a few minutes she’d need to eat and I didn’t want to disturb the service with Lily’s crying, I let go. I let God. If the baby cried, she cried. Nobody would die. For whatever reason, Liz needed to make her friends think that she had me under control. (I knew enough from the dynamics between my friends and me to know when a woman, even an older woman, is showing off for her girls.)
My husband looked relieved. It had been a long week for him at work and at home. Though this seemed more serious than any problems Ryan had dealt with before, I still wanted to help. The difference now was that he didn’t confide in me or ask my counsel the way he did when we were dating and first married. It was as if he thought I’d break since I’d had Lily, like he had to protect me from everything.
That, and the orchid climbing out of the lady’s hat two rows in front of me was really starting to get on my nerves. Okay, so I had a baby. Women have been doing it since time began. I admit that it’s more challenging than I thought it would be. Okay, a lot more challenging than I thought it would be, but God is helping me do it. Sure, there are days when I’m so tired that I fall asleep while I’m typing, wakened only by the blare of my nursing alarm, but hey, life goes on. I appreciated the way people looked out for me when I was pregnant, now I’m wondering if I’ll ever be Tracey again. Not that I don’t like the sound of Lily’s mom….
I was doing it again, letting my mind wander in church of all places. Ryan took my hand and gave me a smile. Very nice. Now if I could just concentrate and stop making menus and to-do lists in the margin of my bulletin, I’d be making progress. I didn’t know why, but ever since I’d had Lily, some of my most creative moments had happened in church. Usually, though, I was holding Lily, so I didn’t get to write any of it down until I got home. Right there, as the choir was finishing, I thought of a concept for the logo for CurlyDivas.com, a site for black women with natural hair. I was enjoying that project a lot, even picking up a few tips for my own tresses.
Today I was wearing my half-ro in twists, set off by a middle part and sporting the copper highlights that my former hairdresser was kind enough to come to my home and put in. I’d tried to make appointments with her several times, but something always came up with the baby. And as much as Queen Liz wanted everyone to think that she was the perfect grandmother, outside of church and other public events, she didn’t want to fool with Lily at all. When I asked her to babysit so that I could get my hair done, she suggested I call a friend or switch Lily to formula so that she could be sure that she’d sleep most of the time.
I got that my choice—our choice—to breast-feed made things a little unconventional for everyone. That was why I pumped my milk, too, so that the Queen didn’t have to worry. It didn’t matter, though. If I could just make it through the first year, things would get better. They had to. The good thing was, I was never, never doing this again. Ryan would have to play catch with someone else’s son, because another baby in this body just wasn’t happening. As soon as I was fertile again, I was going to—
“Here.” Lily dangled from my mother-in-law’s arms like a little golden dishrag. Her face was red from crying. Was I so into my thoughts that I hadn’t heard my own child? The music was loud, but still….
She felt warm against me, pushing her face into my shirt. For all the hard times, there were good ones, too. I loved my baby in a way I hadn’t known it was possible to love anyone. Tapping my foot to the music, I cradled Lily in the crook of my arm and pulled a blanket up over her. My nursing shirt was like some sort of James Bond contraption and with one flip of a button, all the goodies were flowing and totally out of view.
“’Lizbeth? Is that child pulling out her breast-asssissss? Lord have mercy. I do believe that I have seen it all.” One of my mother-in-law’s friends, Miss Bea, looked as though she was about to faint. She grabbed a mortuary fan from the back of the pew in front of her and started fanning so hard that I had to close my right eye.
I should have closed the left one, too.
Maybe then I wouldn’t have seen the Queen’s face coming at me like some sort of eighties 3–D movie. She wasn’t smiling. She didn’t even scream, which was what I expected from the look of her. What she did do was something new, something inexplicably terrifying.
She whispered.
And not to me.
“Son, get your wife up from here and take her to the nursing room. Now.”
