Someone called my house.
It was the wrong number, but we struck up a conversation.
Nice voice.
As a result, I was invited out to dinner.
I graciously accepted the offer,
For I am always hungry; and I let everybody know just how much.
So I got dressed to the nines,
I mean sharp as a tack,
And waited for my date to arrive.
And I waited…
And waited…
Finally, I got a call.
He was on the way.
So, I waited some more,
Looking at the clock on the wall.
Surely, any restaurant was closed by now,
But I hadn’t taken off a stitch of clothes.
If anyone had mastered the art of foolishly waiting,
It was me.
I just waited,
And waited some more.
My stone-like pose was interrupted by the doorbell.
He's here!
My blood rushed.
My heart leaped.
My stomach remembered her hunger.
My date was at the door, and I could take my life off pause.
I could live again,
For my every bodily function depended on this man.
I opened the door to find a man, thinking,
What was his name again?
A man, yes, but more of a creature.
He had the most bulbous eyes any human could have
without them falling out of the sockets.
Must have thyroid problems.
His skin was a grayish-brown color,
you know the pasty color dead Black folks look.
Not enough vitamin E in his diet.
He wore a loud red and orange Italian silk shirt with shiny burgundy pants,
and a goldish-greeny medallion lie in a pool of nappy chest hair.
Well, he can hold on to a dollar. He sho ain’t spending it on clothes.
He opened his mouth to say, "hello,"
and I had a flashback of an old war movie.
Certainly a grenade went off in his mouth.
No excuse for this one; his mouth is just tore up!
Poor thing.
“You ready? You look nice.”
How could such an ugly man have such a beautifully resonant voice?
“Yes,” I purred,
like the man was Denzel’s younger and more handsome brother.
What was his name again?
We got to the restaurant, way off the road, and a dirt one, at that.
He wasn’t worried about it closing because this was one of them
momma and ‘nem Disco/Meeting House/Barber Shop/Restaurants.
Ooo, he really wanted to impress me!
He gently held my hand, and led me to a table in the corner, next to the kitchen,
Where I could get a good look
at the greasy, obese man in a brown wife beater dropping sweat into the food.
Drip, drip... hey. They make brown wife beaters?Ummm...no. No, they don't.
A blond, Black woman who looked like Bobby Womack in the face,
Came off the dance floor, puffing, grabbed something,
and handed us an oily menu with food caked in the crease.
“Just tell Rufus what you want when you is ready.”
Big girl threw the menu at us and went right back to dancing.
Apparently she was off work already.
My date didn’t even look at his menu.
Just asked, “Ru! Man, what you got left?”
“Gots some pig feets and rice, man.”
He looked at Rufus like he had just said filet mignon.
“That’s what we want!”
WE! Are you French? Thanks for asking, fool.
My body was beginning to do what my sick mind wouldn’t.
It was trying to leave that place,
Trying to convince my mind that it had had enough
and it couldn’t stand another minute.
My stomach began to roll,
My hands began to wring each other.
My eyelids began to droop from sheer over-use,
reminding me that they had been stretched open most of the evening,
Peering out the window to see if the man was coming.
Widely staring at him with every mile we ride on the crazy train.
One arm hung limply by my body--I don't know why--but it was
as if I had had a mini-stroke from his
troll-like image offending my pupils
and continuing the offense down the optic nerve
to my overwhelmed and exhausted brain.
I tried, but I couldn’t make it work to save my life.
I was losing the battle of staying seated, but I had to hold on, right?
It would be so rude to leave. Just rude.
And, I don’t know if a taxi could find this place.
I noticed that under the music
and over the spattering of boiled juices in the kitchen,
This man had been incessantly speaking to me.
“Um-hmm,” I dryly responded.
I had no idea what he could have said, but I answered affirmatively, anyway.
He seemed pleased by my answer, which scared me a bit.
Just then, I felt a spooky, looming presence behind me.
It was a plate of food, jutting out of the window to the kitchen,
Offered by chef Rufus,
Who shook the plate as if it were 1000 pounds, and was looking at me like,
“Take the damn food!”
I stood up and grabbed the plate, mostly with one hand,
Because the other one was still inexplicably numb.
I swirled around to find my date had not moved a muscle to reach
toward the plate, and was waiting for me to serve him.
This was too much. Too much!
I usually had a high threshold for crazy,
but my body’s plea was about to be heard.
As I stood holding the plate of heart disease and a stroke or two;
The smell of cigarettes;
The look of gelatinous pig feet and soggy, overcooked rice swimming in pork juice;
The red, pleather walls of the disco with its broken mirrors and velveteen pictures;
The feeling of icky-ness from seeing hair laying on the matted carpet
of the “barber shop” just off the dance floor,
and on the tables of the restaurant;
All the old, rusty, married hustlers
just in there, drinking and eating, cheating, gawking—
I had to go.
I had to get up out of there.
I had to come out of myself, and think better of myself.
I put the plate on the table,
Watching the grease slosh off the plate
and eddy between the folds in the plastic tablecloth.
I looked at my date, squinting my eyes, as if to say,
You bet’ not say one word.
I got my purse and walked with my asthma through the wall of smoke
to the graveled parking lot.
Walked through the parking lot, down the road.
Down the road, to the asphalt.
Along the asphalt road, to my house.
I dropped my shoes,
My purse,
My clothes,
My undergarments,
At the door.
Took a longgggggg, hot shower and Purell'd myself after.
Got out, and went to the kitchen.
Wasn’t having no more leftovers after tonight, so I broiled me a steak,
Baked me a potato,
Threw together me a salad,
And poured me some wine.
Sat my naked tail on my leather couch,
And ate like a queen.
The next day?
I made a covenant to check my caller ID before answering, and got a therapist.
No more wrong numbers will be tolerated here.
Enough.
