I shrugged and gave her a confused look. “And that bothered you?”
“Not that much. What bothered me more was her telling me that I was lucky I didn’t have to worry about men pestering me in public.”
“Oh. Well, I can see why that’d make you feel bad. In a roundabout way, she was calling you homely—which ain’t true!” I reached across the table and grabbed Joyce’s hand and kissed it. “You still the most beautiful woman in the world to me. And, I don’t want you to be having hard feelings toward Yvonne. She can’t help being so pretty. I’d still like to see you and her become real good friends. With them living just one house over, it’d be real uncomfortable for all of us if we didn’t get along. Especially after all the collywobbles we went through when the Copelands lived in that house.”
Joyce bit her bottom lip, and then a mysterious smile slid across her face. “That’s true, but let me finish what I was telling you.” She swallowed hard and shifted in her seat. I reached for her other hand and squeezed it as she continued. “She told me they got jealous of us the first night we visited them and talked about how wonderful our marriage is and how well we’re doing.”
I released Joyce’s hands and leaned back in my seat. “Well, jealousy is one of the worst of the deadly sins. In the Bible some jealous person was always selling somebody into slavery or having them locked up in a dungeon, and doing all kinds of other mean shit to get back at them.”
Joyce snickered. “Odell, get a grip. I don’t think we have to worry about anything that serious.”
“Well, the bottom line is, jealousy can be a dangerous emotion,” I insisted.
“They don’t feel that way now. She even said they want to be more like us. A compliment like that goes a long way with me. Anyway, I told her about the cookout before we went shopping. Besides that, I had already told Mama we were having them over for the holiday so I have to go through with it—whether I want to or not. I’m going to try and not let petty things like her getting a lot of attention from men bother me too much. And, I don’t think she really meant to imply that I’m homely.” Joyce exhaled and shook her head. “Besides, we can’t overlook the fact that they let us have drinks on the house.”
“No, we can’t, and I’m glad you feel the way you do because I feel the same way. I’m still feeling a little guilty about the way I treated them on Friday when they asked me to give them a ride home. But we have to keep in mind that Yvonne and Milton is involved in a shady, illegal business which makes them criminals. If we do get closer to them anyway, we should always feed them with long-handled spoons.”
It rained all day Tuesday so nobody in our neighborhood had a backyard cookout. But we invited Yvonne and Milton to have supper with us that evening and it turned out to be very pleasant. The only thing was, while Yvonne and Joyce was in the kitchen doing the dishes after we’d eaten the ribs we’d cooked in the oven, Milton asked me for another loan.
“Just a dollar,” he whispered, looking toward the doorway. “And please don’t tell Joyce because she’ll tell Yvonne and I don’t want her to know I ain’t managing my money right.”
“I advise you to start managing your money right, man. It don’t look good for a man your age to be so irresponsible. And I don’t want you to get too dependent on me.”
“Oh, you ain’t got to worry about that. I know when to quit.” There was a glint in his eye when he grabbed the dollar bill out of my hand.
I knew it wouldn’t be long before he hit me up again. But I was not going to let him get too carried away. I knew when to quit too. Even if it ended our friendship.
Chapter 39
Odell
AFTER THE FOURTH OF JULY, ME AND JOYCE GOT REAL BUSY. Wednesday evening, I cut the grass in our front and back yards, pruned our pecan tree, and hand-washed the car. She washed two loads of clothes and hung them on the line in our backyard, and she got down on her hands and knees and scrubbed our kitchen floor. After we’d finished our chores and ate supper, we visited a white couple we’d been friends with for several years. We hadn’t seen Yvonne and Milton since they’d eaten dinner with us on Tuesday. But they had people beating a path to their house almost nonstop the rest of the week. Thursday evening Willie Frank pulled up in his pickup truck with several other white folks riding shotgun in the back, including an elderly man they hauled into the house in a wheelbarrow. It seemed like every time Willie Frank visited, so did Aunt Mattie and one or two of her prostitutes. Milton had made a few comments on this subject during dinner on Tuesday. According to him, Willie Frank felt more comfortable in a colored neighborhood when he wanted to spend his money on a colored woman. “Our house is much more fun than Aunt Mattie’s poon palace for Willie Frank to get his ashes hauled. Me and Yvonne treat our guests like friends, not tricks,” Milton had said at the same time he was chomping on Joyce’s world-beating hush puppies. Later that night when we was alone, Joyce asked me, “What does ‘get his ashes hauled’ mean?” I giggled and poked her crotch. When I told her that the phrase meant doing “the big nasty,” she pinched my hand. “I figured it had something to do with intercourse!” she snapped.
On Thursday when her parents returned from their retreat, we had supper with them. Friday evening I picked Daddy up
