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“Settling?”
“I wouldn’t say that he’s settling. Think about it: if he marries Scarlet, he can still have you in his life. While she’s out in Ghana or wherever the hell she’s going, and modeling and saving the world, he’ll still be home with you. Lunch. Stopping by the office. Using his key to get into your place. Foot massages. He’ll have two wives—one he’s sure he can have and another he’s sure he wants. You said it yourself a while ago—whenever he wants to talk politics, and culture, art and music, his heart and soul, he comes to his equal. When he wants to have someone on his arm, someone to sweat him and beg him to stick around, he goes to his girl.”
“Well, I didn’t exactly put it like that, but that’s some deep old shit, J!”
“Girl, please. Don’t go listening to me. I’m just trying to figure this here thing out. Who knows what’s going on in his mind. You’re just going to have to wait and listen. Watch for the signs. If he comes to you, let him. If not, remain committed to not being in love with him.”
“I’ll take the latter for five thousand, Journey Trebek!” I said. “I don’t love no damn Ian Dupree. That’s my boy! OK? You got that? Capisce? Can you hear me now?” I got in close on the camera so she could see the silly expression on my face.
“I hear you. I’m just wondering if you hear yourself.”
Journey rocked Apache back to sleep on her shoulder. The baby’s tiny body went limp and every limb looked so heavy I wondered how Journey held her up.
Grammy Annie-Lou had been leaving messages on my voice mail for days. But between getting the front staging of Ian and Scarlet’s wedding in New Orleans together (reservations in, Web site up, and invitations out) and Alarm Clock and Donnica to actually set a date (Alarm Clock had been growing cold on the idea of losing his bachelorhood to the nail technician he’d been ready to kill over in my office), I hadn’t had time to call her back. Grammy Annie-Lou liked talking on the phone for hours—and all about nothing. And I knew that if I called her back, I’d end up on the phone listening to intel about some woman at the church who was making moves on the pastor or her recent doctor’s appointment. I figured I could bypass all that by waiting until she was a little more specific in her voice-mail message. She was old and didn’t really understand the concept of the voice-mail system, so when she actually left a message, it was short and direct: “It’s your grandmother—Annie-Lou. Call me. Hear?” She’d pause and then I’d hear every noise in the background before she figured out how to hang up the phone. In contrast, when it was important, she’d push herself and actually let me in on the purpose of her call and leave explicit direction. Such purpose and direction came on the morning of the day most single women dread more than Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, and their birthday combined....
On February fourteen, I woke up ready to do what any other reasonable single sister did to ensure the day would be a forgettable success: take the back streets to the office to avoid seeing anything red, mylar, or flowery; go into my office and shut the door; refuse all calls, e-mails, and texts from anyone who might acknowledge what day it was; take the back streets back home from the office; call the pizza man and order a light-cheese flatbread pizza; take two doses of NyQuil, and pass out on the couch while watching reruns of Law and Order: SVU—all to pretend it wasn’t Valentine’s Day.
Because I’d been blasting Nina Simone’s Little Girl Blue while I was in the shower that morning, I didn’t hear the phone ringing, but when I got out and checked the voice mail, it was Grammy Annie-Lou with purpose and direction: “Hey, baby. I done called you so many times. Guess you too busy in that city to call me. Well, I was calling about King. Think he need to be put down. He old. Been acting funny the last few days. Won’t eat. Last night he done climbed under the porch and won’t come out. I left some turkey necks on the stoop after dinner last night and come out here this morning. They is still here. I was going to take him out in the yard later to give him rest. But he your dog. I’ll wait for you to come see about him. Hear? It’s your grandmother—Annie-Lou. Call me.”
I called her right back. By “give him rest,” she meant that she was going to shoot him with a shotgun. King was old as hell, but he probably just had worms, an easy fifteen-dollar shot at the vet would cure that. Grammy Annie-Lou was from a different time. She didn’t believe in walking dogs on a leash, keeping them
in the house, or feeding them anything but scraps from the table—which was probably how King had gotten sick (that and he was the oldest dog in Georgia). I told her that I’d be there in an hour and then called Krista to tell her that I wouldn’t be in.
In the car on the way to Social Circle, I forgot that it was Valentine’s Day. Red and mylar balloons and flowery bouquets were set up in storefronts and riding in the backseats and butts of delivery trucks, but I noticed none of it. I kept thinking of King sleeping under the back of that old red Ford. He seemed to love and appreciate the truck more than anyone else. At night in the summer, when it was cool outside and what seemed like millions of stars in the sky were shining bright over Grammy Annie-Lou’s old farmhouse, King would climb up on the hood of the truck and howl at the moon. Sitting on the front stoop beside me, my daddy would always say, “Even the laziest country dog in the world can’t ignore the beauty of the moon.” He’d put his arm around me and we’d listen to King’s song.
“Morning, beautiful,” Ian said after I picked up the phone. “Happy Monday.”
“Very funny,” I replied. He knew I didn’t want to hear anyone say the words “Valentine’s” and “Day” together on February fourteen.
“I figured I’d give you a call before you went into the office. How are you? You’re already out of the house? Sounds like you’re in your car.”
“Yeah. On my way to Social Circle.”
“Oh. You’re going to see my boo Annie-Lou? You think she’ll make me one of her boysenberry pies?” Ian said. “Let me call my grandma on the other line.” (He was seriously about to click over. Grammy Annie-Lou seldom sent me back to Atlanta without a pie for Ian.)
“I doubt it,” I said.
“What? No pie? Damn!” Ian laughed but stopped quickly when he noticed my silence. “Everything OK?”
“She thinks something’s wrong with King. Wants to put him down.”
“Well, he is five hundred years old,” Ian pointed out.
“That doesn’t mean he has to die,” I protested.
“Rach, are you crying?”
“No.” (Lie.)
“You need me to meet you there?”
“No.” I wiped my tears. “It’s probably nothing. I’ll just take him to the vet and get him a shot. Probably worms. You know how that old woman just feeds him anything! I put five hundred dollars worth of organic dog food in the shed and she feeds him turkey necks from her greens. King is fine. Just need to get him to the vet.”
“You sure?”
“Yes,” I said. “Anyway, I know you have a bunch of stuff to do. Scarlet probably has you putting in some work.”
“Nah. We’re just having dinner at this vegan spot in the West End. She wanted to use the day to support a black-owned business.”
