“You’s a bold-faced lie, Faith,” Dad says. “Stop lying to Brix like that. Son, don’t listen to your mother. It was smooth sailing.”
“It was not. We hit some turbulence, and your father, I lie to you not, Brix, ran to the lavatory like being in the bathroom is going to save you when you plummet to the ground from thirty-five thousand feet in a missile.”
She’s riotous with laughter, falling across the back seat to further indulge in her own amusement.
Dad shakes his head.
BRRRIIING!
Her phone screams, making its presence known. She must have the volume dialed all the way up. Leave it up to Faith LaSalle to choose the loudest, factory ringtone possible. The sound is enough to drive a sane person mad. AKA, me.
BRRRIIING!
“Will you answer that darn phone?” Father snaps. “I told you to cut that volume down before we left the house.”
“Stop your griping, old man. I’m looking for it.”
BRRRIIING!
“She got so much junk in the purse, she probably can’teenfind it,” Dad grumbles.
“Shut up, Dean.”
“Ma, you need some help back there?” I ask, glancing through the rearview again. She’s elbow-deep in her purse.
“Nah, I got it, Brix, but I appreciate it, baby.”
BRRRIIING
“It don’t sound like you got nothing,” Dad says. “That bag of yours is chock-full of junk.” He shakes his head and, in a lower tone, says to me, “She got a small bag of Rold Gold that’s been in there since last year.”
He chuckles.
BRRRIIING!
“Where is your phone, woman?” Dad asks, his agitation growing.
She finally finds the phone and says, “Oh, it’s Pearl!” She answers, “Hey, Pearl, girl! We made it, chile…umm hmm…I’m in the back of Brixton’s car right now. He got a new SUV…looks expensive, too. Hey, Brix, it’s Pearl. You remember Pearl, don’t you?”
“Yep. Sure do,” I say unenthused. How could Inotremember Pearl? She’s my mom’s creepy friend who came to my first college graduation and said if I wasn’t married by the time I was thirty, she was gon’ put a bid in.
“Pearl said hey, Brix. Well, she didn’t say Brix. She saidsweet cheeks.” She erupts in laughter.
My dad leans closer to me and says, “You ain’t gotta say nothing to that old bat.”
For a second, I wasn’t sure if he was talking about Mother or Pearl. The fact that I don’t know has me tickled.
I say, “That would be rude, Dad.”
I glance in the rearview mirror and say, “Tell her I said hi.”
“Oh, Pearl, Brix said hi….” she cackles and continues her conversation, saying, “You know he’s married, right? Cynnamon gon’ whoop your tail if she finds out you got a crush on her husband…nah, not a chance! Cynnamon ain’t leaving him. When you marry a man like Brix, you don’t let go. Trust me on that, honey! I raised a king.” She laughs again. “What you say, Pearl? What you say–you gon’ replace his Cynnamon with some nutmeg? I ain’t messing with you, girl. You hear what Pearl said, Brix?”
“Now, why she asking you that, like she got the phone on speaker?” Dad asks. He turns around and says, “Nah, he ain’t heard nothing. Can you hang up so we can talk to our son in peace? We just got here. You can talk to Pearl later.”
“You heard that, right?” Mom says in a gossipy tone, still on the phone talking to Pearl. Lips pursed, she continues, “Mmm, hmm–call himself putting his foot down. Girl, the whole time we were flying down here, he was on pins and needles—thought the plane was gon’ crash.”
“Didn’t nobody—”
