Authors: Pat G'Orge-Walker

No Ordinary Noel (13 page)

BOOK: No Ordinary Noel

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Just as one of the church mothers was about to rumble, the door to the fellowship hall opened.

Sister Betty stood closest to the door and it took a moment to realize who stood there. “Oh my Lord!” She didn't mean to yell so loud, but she had. Naturally, all eyes left the BS fight and turned to see what had caused the fear in her words.

“Reverend Tom?” Sister Betty didn't have to finish the sentence. He entered with his coat unbuttoned and his face unshaved, and looked as though he'd already been in a fight and lost badly.

Cheyenne leaned on her cane and whispered to Sister Betty, “This is how a fool looks when he thinks too highly of himself.”

Chapter 20

“P
astor!” Further words were unnecessary as Sister Betty's feet moved ahead of her mind. She wasted no time in rushing toward the door. It was hard to tell by her stride and the way she knocked over a few chairs if she even realized she'd dropped her Bible onto a table and the blessed oil canister on the floor.

While the others stood dazed and undecided, Trustee Noel quickly put aside his displeasure with his pastor and made a move. His skinny body wound through the crowd like a snake. In just a few seconds, he joined Sister Betty, who'd already reached the reverend's side.

“We weren't expecting you,” Sister Betty said as she led the pastor to an empty seat. She wanted to say more, but by that time, Cheyenne had joined them.

“It makes no sense at all,” Sister Betty whispered. “He said he wouldn't come. He was on a shut-in.”

Trustee Noel paid no attention to what Sister Betty questioned. His pastor looked terrible. Grabbing a water glass off the table, the trustee filled it and offered it to the reverend.

Reverend Tom accepted the water and after taking a few sips, he looked around the room and waved his hand over the crowd, but he still did not speak.

Trustee Noel stepped back a few feet to see what would happen next. He wasn't too certain about his pastor's reaction once the man realized who'd given him the drink of water.

It wasn't that Trustee Noel thought his pastor would flip over a cup of something cold to drink, as he had over a twenty-five million dollar tithe offering, but Trustee Noel had seen enough drama for the night. He turned and galloped to the other side of the fellowship hall. All that did was place him with the ones he least wanted to be near, Bea and Sasha.

The only way to stop the gawking was to start the Bachelor Auction. The seniors began to bid on hope, faith, and some of the most uncharitable bachelors around. Sasha had promised some of the single women she'd stack the deck in their favor and she did. It wasn't ten minutes after the bidding closed and the winners were announced that Sasha placed high on the top of their hit list.

One of the singles, Miss Vickie, who was also a Christian comedienne, had flown all the way from Dallas for a shot at matrimony. Perhaps she wasn't specific enough about the man she wanted. Miss Vickie was all of five feet nine. Her bachelor was shy of five feet by about five inches. Miss Vickie accepted the additional sky miles added to her winnings, hoisted the short fella onto her shoulder and carried him out of there.

Meanwhile Sister Betty and Cheyenne took the reverend into the hallway. Walking toward the elevator to his office. Sister Betty spoke. “Glad to see you did come,” she said for the second time. She was surprised he finally answered.

“I only came because Miss Cheyenne called and said you needed me.”

“I needed you?” Sister Betty turned from her pastor and looked at Cheyenne, who walked away and pressed the elevator button without saying a word.

“You don't need me?” Reverend Tom's face was a mask of silent questions. He looked worse than he did ten minutes ago.

The elevator door opened and Sister Betty, Reverend Tom, and Cheyenne entered.

When they were in the study they sat for a moment and allowed their minds to clear. The music was still a little loud and they could hear murmurings from the seniors below. It wasn't enough to interfere with a conversation, but was just enough to let them know there was a party going on.

Cheyenne finally admitted that she'd called Reverend Tom even before Sister Betty and Trustee Noel had approached her table. The reverend hadn't seemed agreeable when she first asked him to counsel her about a problem she supposedly had. However, as soon as she threw Sister Betty's name into the mix, he agreed to show up. She apologized for using trickery to get him to come and prefaced it by telling him it was for his good as well as his church.

From the way the reverend appeared, disheveled and out of sorts, they could only guess that his fast and prayer hadn't gone quite the way he'd wanted.

“You don't have that glow that comes from being alone with the Lord,” Sister Betty observed. “I don't hear the shout of victory coming off your lips or see the glint of favor in your eyes.”

“That's because it's not there.” The reverend hung his head. “I'm only trying to do what's right.”

“Do what's right for whom?” Cheyenne wasn't a member of Crossing Over Sanctuary but her question cut and when she asked she looked the reverend square in his eyes. She spoke as if her tithes paid the mortgage.

“Cheyenne,” Sister Betty blurted. “This is a man of God.”

Cheyenne never took her eyes off Reverend Tom. Her defiant look dared him to speak. “This man may be a man of God,” she snapped, “but this man is a fraud.”

Chapter 21

T
ime passed since Cheyenne's accusation, yet no one made a sound inside Reverend Tom's study. Only the outside grunts of old buses warming up to await passengers filtered through the closed windows.

Sister Betty had wanted to confront Cheyenne earlier to learn what she meant when she made that same claim in Belton, but with everything going awry at the prom, she hadn't done so. Now, in the midst of her pastor's worst moments, her dear friend had delivered an accusation so close to an impeachment that Sister Betty thought she'd faint.

If Reverend Tom wanted to remain a pastor in good standing and of high spiritual fiber he should've just kept his mouth shut like he'd done since he arrived. But he didn't. Cheyenne had pushed his hot button and he let go.

“Miss Bigelow,” Reverend Tom said slowly, “I'm not accustomed to having disagreements with my senior membersâ”

“Liar,” Cheyenne replied. “You don't know nothing about your seniors to disagree or agree with them.”

He clenched his teeth and his fists. His eyes swept around his study for something to toss before she became that something to toss. “Woman, you know nothing about me!”

“I know more than you think I know about you!” Cheyenne rose, using her cane for support. She put one hand on her hip and whipped her long braid around as though it were a karate move. “I know your grandmother Lillie Sinclair was a whore! I know Lillie Sinclair left your family well-off. And I know Lillie Sinclair's money sent you to that fancy divinity college.”

A swooshing sound went through the study and sucked out all the air along with it.

“You're a liar!” The reverend's pecan-colored complexion darkened and his eyes turned into ebony orbs. Since the woman didn't respect his anointing he decided he'd lay it down for a moment. Reverend Tom used words that came close to cussing and laid her out. It seemed that over the past few weeks he'd become good at it.

While Reverend Tom and Cheyenne Bigelow went at it, Sister Betty retreated to a chair in the corner. Her eyes darted from side to side as she waited for someone to rush in and holler, “Cut, it's a wrap.” It all seemed like a movie and a very bad one at that.

But if it was a bad movie there were plenty of folks to take the credit. Cheyenne made sure that they did.

“Well, I see you inherited Lillie's filthy mouth and her combative spirit. That's good. Perhaps, you'll use both when you take your stubborn self-righteousness and deposit them along with that twenty-five million dollars that you ignorantly refused.”

“The Devil is a liar!” The reverend tossed a few books against the wall, nearly slapping Sister Betty upside her head with them.

“Oh, that's good, too. Lillie had that same fire. I remember when she'd cut a John if he was a penny short.”

Reverend Tom began to lose moral ground with every accusation. First, it was Bea and her claim that most of the tithes had some sort of tainted beginning. Now this woman claimed his grandmother was a whore. He knew his grandmother Lillie to be a very successful businesswoman who'd died of a stroke when he was a young boy. He refused to believe she'd left him money from prostitution or that it had sent him to the pulpit. There was no way that all these years he'd preached and pastored God's untarnished word was embedded in tainted money.

But what if Miss Cheyenne was wrong, he thought. Sister Betty and she are friends. Surely, my spiritual mother would've said something, especially since she sided with the trustee about his money.

Somehow, Sister Betty's silence gave him hope. Cheyenne Bigelow, on the other hand, was an old politician relic.

The reverend's angry face morphed into one that smiled. He apologized. “I'm sorry for my bad choice in words. I'm asking you and God to please forgive me.”

“It didn't bother me none,” Cheyenne replied. “I know some preachers who come through the door cussing and don't stop until they say amen.”

“That may be with some preachers, Cheyenne, but that's not how my pastor runs God's church.” Sister Betty had finally found her voice. She'd heard enough to understand what Cheyenne had tried to tell her back in Belton. But what she didn't have was the proof. Cheyenne would need to prove those accusations to her.

Sister Betty looked at Cheyenne and Reverend Tom. Both seemed resolute. Did they both know just a little of the truth, but not all? She felt a headache coming on and then her left knee started twitching. It hadn't twitched in a few days and it happening now was not a good sign.

As if Cheyenne read their minds, she said, “I guess y'all probably wondering who else would know about Lillie's money-making skills and her benevolent spirit.”

“That would help.” Reverend Tom had already decided he'd humor the woman because something about what she'd revealed bothered him. Not all of it had to do with his grandmother. Some had to do with him.

“Well, you'd better buckle up, son, because if anyone knows about your grandmother's wanton ways, I certainly do.”

Cheyenne stopped speaking and motioned to the reverend that she'd like one of the Vitamin Waters he had off to the side of his desk. “Could you make mine a pomegranate and blueberry? I'm trying to keep what little health I got at my age.”

The reverend did as she asked and after he took off the cap and handed it to her she produced her flask and poured the water in it.

Cheyenne threw her head back and in an instant, she'd wrapped her long braid about her head and swigged from the flask. “From what I've read and heard, you've been acting like you are about to lose your mind and the Promised Land, too.”

She leaned forward on her cane and narrowed her eyes in his and Sister Betty's direction. The way she'd done it was more conspiring than she'd meant, but she would have her say.

“You sir, Reverend Leotis Tom, need to come down off your high horse before that same high horse tosses your butt and tramples you. Even your grandmamma, a bigger whore than me, didn't act all highfalutin. The difference was she made her money on her back for those fancy pants in Charleston. I made mine on my back serving up those sleazy geezers on Capitol Hill. Lillie made more money than me, too.”

If there'd been a fireplace in the pastor's study, the flames couldn't singe Sister Betty more than Cheyenne's hot words of accusation about the reverend's grandmother. “You mean Reverend Tom's grandmother truly was a . . .” Sister Betty couldn't say the word.

Cheyenne chuckled and took another swig from the flask. Replacing the cap, she turned toward the reverend.

“Poor Reverend Tom. Here you are unable to suspend your disbelief. You probably didn't know that about your grandmother. If memory serves me I believe Lillie died while you was still crapping in diapers and both your parents followed each other to the grave soon after.”

Cheyenne rested the cane against the chair's armrest and sat back. “I'm getting ready to tell you a story. And the best way for me to do that is to tell it to you like you wasn't Lillie's grandbaby. It makes it a little easier to tell it that way, especially since I don't have too much animosity for you.”

“Yes ma'am.” The reverend felt as whipped as when he'd fought that angel in his living room. He couldn't raise a fist if his life depended upon it. What had he done to God to deserve this?

“Reverend Tom,” Cheyenne said softly, “why don't you turn on your security monitor and fix it so it shows the fellowship hall and those seniors. That way if anything crazier than what's already happened pops up, you'll know about it. And that way you can pay attention to what I'm about to say, too.

“Sister Betty, why don't you move a little closer so I don't have to raise my voice or repeat something. If the clock on that wall is correct the fellowship hall should be shutting down about now.” Cheyenne waited until the reverend turned on the monitor and set the split screen to show inside the hall and outside in the parking lot.

“Well,” Cheyenne said as she took another swig from the flask, “I don't hear any police sirens so I guess nobody pulled a weapon on anybody, but Bea and Sasha fought tonight.”

Nervous laughter filled the space words left empty, and Sister Betty moved her chair closer and sat down next to Reverend Tom.

“Lillie Sinclair was the absentee mama of Leotis' mama, Helena. I believe there wasn't too much of a maternal relationship between Lillie and Helena.” Cheyenne spoke directly to Reverend Tom as though she were continuing from where she left off. “Helena never raised Leotis but Helena's sister-in-law Mabel Tom did after Helena passed away.”

Cheyenne stopped and laughed softly. “Who am I kidding? The truth was that Lillie Sinclair was a whoring hustler who made Jezebel, Delilah, and me all look like angels. Lillie Sinclair put whoring on the map back in Charleston and made a ton of money for a lot of folks when she'd done it.”

If Cheyenne noticed that the reverend flinched every time she mentioned the words
whore
or
whore's money
, she didn't show it. She just kept right on telling the story as though narrating about somebody they didn't all know.

For the next ten minutes while Sister Betty and Reverend Tom sat shocked, dismayed, and yet amazed, Cheyenne gave a history lesson on the Reverend Tom's family, especially his maternal grandmother Lillie.

“My father's people raised me after my parents died.” Reverend Tom rose and paced. “No one has ever once mentioned anything negative about her family. They were mostly college-educated and very religious.”

“It don't surprise me none,” Cheyenne replied. “I'm sure those uppity Toms tried to rewrite your history. They'd sooner have you believe that you were a test-tube baby than tell you about your Grandma Lillie's scandalous ways. But those Toms were the biggest hypocrites of all.”

“Why would you say that?” Sister Betty had learned so much in such a short time she wasn't sure why she wanted to know more.

“Why would I say that?” Cheyenne's eyes narrowed and she pointed at Sister Betty and then to the reverend. “Let me tell y'all something. When I was a whore I was a proud one. I didn't try to hide who or what I was. Now those Toms, they didn't just try to hide stuff, they buried it all the way down to China.”

“I don't understand where you're going with this. What does it have to do with me?” Reverend Tom asked.

“I know this is your office, but please don't interrupt. I'm honestly having too much fun, if not mixed with a little anger in revealing this.”

Cheyenne reached over and snatched a handful of Christmas Kisses from a candy dish before she continued. She spoke as she unraveled the silver foil in much the same way she unraveled the truth about Reverend Tom.

“I don't know how to make this any plainer, but let me sum this up for you. You, reverend, are who you are and where you are because Lillie Sinclair laid on her back, then willed her wealth to her only grandson. Lillie's prostitution paid for your education and all the other nice stuff you've gotten. Those Toms didn't have a dime until Lillie died and left her grandson wealthy. They lived off you and Lillie's ill-gotten gains like roaches at a picnic.”

Sister Betty's jaw dropped and her knees started to shake. What was God trying to do to her? She was about to spiritually overdose on too much information.

“It don't matter to me none whether you accept the truth or not. You are still a fraud. You won't lift your congregation or community out of this economic mess because of your pride. You've done preached yourself into a corner of self-righteousness and you won't come out of it for your people's sake.”

“How can you say that? I've just learned all this in the past hour.”

“I can say it because you've said it. You don't wanna accept the trustee's so-called tainted money for God's business yet you are in God's business because of tainted money.”

Cheyenne signaled for Sister Betty to help her from her seat. “I'm tired, so if you don't mind I'll accept your invitation to spend the night at your house. I'm ready to go as soon as you are. I can't wait to pass out in one of those fancy bedrooms.”

Cheyenne yawned, then spoke as if the reverend weren't in the study. “Sister Betty, just remember to handle that hardheaded, self-righteous pastor of yours sitting over there. I don't cotton to nobody messing with the church whether it's from the outside or the inside, or whether I belong to it or not.”

Sister Betty's mind raced as she asked the question that lingered on her and the pastor's minds. “Does anyone else around here know about Lillie Sinclair?”

“Bea âBaby Doll' Blister probably does. She and I are the last of the really high-class players from the Charleston and D.C. days.”

“Mother Bea Blister! Baby Doll?” Sister Betty thought she'd flatline right on the spot.

BOOK: No Ordinary Noel

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