Don't Blame the Devil by Pat G'Orge-Walker Page A

see—no, feel —his anxiety and pure hatred. Then again, she wasn’t sure if she knew it was hatred for certain. She wasn’t even sure if what she was feeling was some sort of maternal feeling. Could it be that God had thrown some mother wit into the mess?
    â€œDeacon, this has nothing to do with who you bring or don’t bring to where you pay rent. But do you know who you just let into my home?” Jessie’s voice sounded as though he spoke from within a cave. It was just that loud and seemed to reverberate around the room.
    The deacon realized that he needed to remain calm during what was certainly turning into a very dangerous verbal showdown. He’d have to chew crow and get Delilah out of there and back to Garden City before his own mess went on display.
    With one hand fingering his suspenders, he replied simply, “Yes, I know her. Pretty much—”
    At that moment Jessie needed more than simplicity. He needed something to throw, much the same way he needed to believe he’d misheard the deacon. “You’re standing here in my home telling me that you actually know this woman?”
    Deacon Pillar nodded toward Delilah. He needed to quickly turn things around. So he tried to sound more confident. “More than forty years, I believe. We used to run in the same crowds back in Harlem where she sang in a few bands. I even played in some of them, too.” Deacon Pillar stopped. He was sure to tell a bigger lie if he spoke another word. It was bad enough tiptoeing across a thick carpet of lies.
    It took Delilah’s inability to shut up when she should to break her awkward silence. She didn’t care if it saved the deacon from himself or not. But she did enjoy a conversation about her that was positive, and she’d not heard anything positive. She raised her head and barked with indignation, “Are you two gonna stand here and talk all over my head like I can’t hear?”
    Whether he meant to do it or not, Jessie used his hand to hit a nearby wall. The hand immediately started to swell and turned from a pecan color to almost blue right before their eyes.
    â€œThis demon dressed up like a woman…” Jessie’s mouth began to twist. He felt almost dizzy as the pain in his hand shot up his arm and landed upon his tongue.
    Oh, Lord, he’s recognized her. The deacon shuffled a little closer to the door. He hadn’t meant to do that. He’d done it on instinct.
    â€œRepeat that, Jessie.” Delilah leapt off the couch and now stood with her hands on her small hips. This was not how she’d envisioned their first meeting, but she’d be damned if he was gonna come at her in such a manner. Now it was her time to glare and she used it to the maximum. “I’m a little older and perhaps I don’t hear so good anymore.” Delilah stopped and yanked her hands off her hips and shook them at Jessie. “Now when the child I birthed, after more than forty hours of damn hard labor, tries sassing me—”
    â€œDeacon Pillar,” Jessie interrupted, ignoring his pain as his anger mounted. Jessie’s eyes narrowed and issued a silent warning to the deacon before he turned back around. He was saving his next words of rebuke for Delilah.
    At that moment his need to put Delilah in her place outweighed his pain. “Maybe you are hard of hearing, ’cause you sure ain’t no kind of mother.”
    From across the room Tamara stood with her arms dangling by her side. She’d been in the basement and heard all the yelling. After racing upstairs it was as though she’d flipped to a bad movie on television and couldn’t change the channel. It took another moment before she could speak. “Daddy, what’s going on?”
    Waves of spasms attacked Jessie’s mouth, causing it to twist even more as he ignored Tamara’s question. Since he’d buried Cindy he’d kept all his sane and insane