outside the train station. Listen, I’ll be there in a few minutes to pick up my package. If my mom happens to drop by, don’t let her see it! And please don’t open it!”
CHAPTER 3
I was standing in my doorway when Jade stumbled up on my front porch ten minutes later. She paused and roughly wiped the soles of her brown suede boots on my well-worn welcome mat.
“Auntie, what are we going to do about that stray dog who likes to leave his calling cards all over your yard? Eeeow! My boots are practically ruined! And how am I going to get rid of this unholy stench?” she asked, screwing her face up like she was in pain.
Jade gently brushed past me and entered my living room, her huge green eyes darting from side to side. She crept across the floor like a burglar, her long black hair swaying down her back like a horse’s tail.
Jade worshipped her body and so did a lot of the horny little boys she ran around with. She liked to show it, and she liked to share it. She had on a snug-fitting, pale pink halter top that didn’t even come close to hiding the nipples on her firm, perky breasts. Her jeans were ripped on both knees and on the sides of her crotch. And if the rips were not provocative enough, the jeans were so tight I could see the split in her busy little pussy.
“I’ll get some warm water and some rags for your boots before you leave,” I offered, following Jade to my sofa, wondering how she could breathe in such tight clothing. I didn’t have a problem with females wearing sexy clothes. I wasn’t even jealous. But I had a problem with the ones who chose to “advertise” and then complained when men came on to them.
“I would have been here before now, but this dirty old man who was waiting to use the pay phone tried to pick me up,” Jade complained. She rolled her eyes, but I rolled mine even more.
“Oh, really? I wonder why,” I said with a smirk. I lifted the package addressed to Jade off my coffee table and handed it to her. With wide, anxious eyes, she snatched it out of my hand so hard the wrapping ripped in several places. Just like her jeans.
I don’t know why Jade had ordered me to not open her package. She finished opening it right in front of me. I almost fainted when she shook out the long, plastic battery-operated vibrator. It was curved on one end like a sword. And from the size of it, I decided that it probably felt like one, too. I didn’t want to think that a petite young female like Jade required such an ominous-looking device.
“Girl, you ought to be ashamed of yourself!” I exclaimed. I looked around my living room to make sure my nine-year-old daughter, Charlotte, had not snuck into the room. She was also a sneaky little devil, a habit she had picked up from Jade. “Do you really need that damn big-ass thing?” I hissed, hands on my hips.
Jade blinked and looked at me like I was speaking Greek.
“It’s for a friend, Auntie. I babysit for her. You know that White girl Jimmy Lipton met and married when the navy sent him overseas? The girl with the buck teeth? Poor Jimmy. What a shame! Married to a girl who looks like a talking mule!” Jade paused and shook her head. “I know the boy could have done better. He’s no Eddie Murphy, but he didn’t have to settle for such a dull frump. Especially with all those pretty girls up for grabs down there in Australia where he’s stationed now.” Jade paused just long enough to sniff and catch her breath. “I feel so sorry for that poor girl, too. A plain Jane like her never learned how to look out for herself in an emergency. Anyway, me and a couple of my friends put our money together to buy this for her,” Jade said, holding the vibrator up in front of my face, shaking it back and forth like a pendulum.
“Did this girl ask you and your friends to buy this thing for her?” I asked. I gave Jade a puzzled look before I frowned.
“No,” Jade said with an indifferent shrug.
“Well, don’t you think that giving somebody something like this, when they didn’t ask for it, might offend them?”
“Why?”
“Maybe she’s not into things like this, Jade,” I said, nodding toward the vibrator, glaring at it now like it was a bomb. “I would scream if somebody gave me one of these damn things,” I added with a shudder.
“You’d scream? That’s right.” Jade nodded vigorously, clapping her hands like a seal. “That’s the right idea, Auntie. That’s what it’s supposed to make a woman do,” Jade said in a voice too serious for a child of her age. I gave her a horrified look and my mouth dropped open, but before I could speak again, Jade continued. “Oh, I don’t have to worry about offending Plum. See, she’s from France so she’s very broadminded.”
Jade unzipped her yellow canvas backpack, designed by a European designer with a name I couldn’t pronounce. In addition to a platinum American Express card in her own name, the yellow backpack was one of the things that she never left home without. With a loud sniff, and the tip of her tongue parked in the corner of her mouth, she stuffed the vibrator into the backpack. Her eager eyes shone like diamonds.
“If you want one, let me know. I can get the next one for half price,” Jade said with a giggle and a wink. “But a great big woman like you would probably want one of the great big ones, though, huh?” Jade paused again, tilted her head to the side, and gave me a serious look. “But a bigger one will probably cost more. Now what color—”
I cut Jade off. “Girl, I don’t need anybody’s fake dick!” I hollered, waving my hands, forcing myself not to laugh. Then I slid my knuckles along the side of Jade’s head and chased her back out the door.
I returned my thoughts to the present moment, the Frederick’s of Hollywood catalogue still in my hand. I laughed out loud before I tossed it aside, so that I could sort through the rest of the mail.
The only thing that made the envelope stand out was the fact that it was pink and small. Like the kind used to send invitations or cards. I guess that’s why I’d decided to deal with it first. I was impressed to see that the sender had taken the time to type my name on the envelope, but it seemed odd that the person would not include a return address.
My birthday had just passed a week ago and belated birthday cards were still trickling in. The day before, I had received one from my half sister in Miami. And the day before that, I had received two from Miss Nipp, my first-grade schoolteacher. She was senile and in a nursing home now and I was the only one of her students she still remembered. Miss Nipp couldn’t even remember the names of her remaining family members. It gave me a good feeling to know that there were people who still acknowledged me after almost forty years.
I plopped down hard on the new living room sofa that had just been delivered a few days ago. It was the best birthday gift that I had received, and the most practical. It was the kind of gift that only a mother would give. Especially a mother like mine. But at least this was something I could use. The canning jars that she’d given me last year were in my basement, still in the box.
At forty-five, I needed very few things that I didn’t already have. My husband made good money as one of the three Black barbers in town and my promotion to supervisor at the Mizelle Collection Agency had moved me up to a tax bracket that was downright scary.
I loved my job as a bill collector, but it had taken me a while to get used to it. Now it was almost as entertaining as Jade. I never thought that I would benefit so much from people not paying their bills. And getting them to pay their bills was another story. The excuses that people gave were outrageous, like they couldn’t find their wallets, somebody had stolen the money that they had planned to use to pay their bill, or they didn’t have a stamp to mail their payment. I had heard every excuse but one about the family dog eating the money. Some people even swore that they’d paid their bill, but that they’d misplaced the receipt and would fax it to us as soon as they located it. That bought them a brief reprieve, and it also meant job security for people like me. I had to laugh to myself when I thought about all the times my mother had made me lie when I was a child when mean bill collectors called our house asking for her. Now I was one of those bill collectors who often had to get mean with folks, hoping that