Zora and Nicky: A Novel in Black and White (23 page)

“Yep.”

“You have brothers and sisters?”

“Nope. I’m an only child. All bets are on me.”

“Is that why you’re on Prozac?”

“Nah. That’s why I
need
Prozac though.”

“Were you lonely?”

“All the time. Especially at night.”

“I had two brothers and a little sister, but I used to be lonely too. If we
were neighbors, we could have strung two cans from out our windows and
talked even though I lived far away. Mine would have once been a can of
collard greens.” She winks at me.

Princess probably didn’t even have canned goods. We did! “Mine would
have been a string-beans can. And we could have talked a lot because I’d have
had plenty of those cans.”

I lean against the doorway. I like the thought of us being kids together.
I take her hand again, and she lets me. “What would we have talked about,
little Miss Zora?”

“Horses, since you were a cowboy.”

“And what would you have told
me
about?”

“I would have told you all about princesses, of course.”

“I so wouldn’t have talked to you anymore after that.”

“You would have if you were lonely.”

“No, I wouldn’t have. You probably would have made me pretend to be
the prince. I can tell.”

“Whatever. I would have thought you had cooties anyway.”

I rub her hands and am struck by the contrast. Her skin is so dark. Mine
so fair. But we keep holding hands. Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream. I don’t
want to let her go. I don’t want to stop seeing this black and white of us
together, the stark contrast of our intertwined hands.

I can hear my family come in with Rebecca. “They’re here.” I have an
impulse to snatch my hand out of hers as if we’ve done something wrong. I
resist it.

Her voice sounds full of longing, the same longing stirring within me. “It
was so nice just being kids up here, wasn’t it?”

“Maybe we could stay. I really do know places we can hide. I could tell
you some of those stories I mentioned.”

“They’d think we found a bedroom and were gettin’ busy.”

“Yeah, especially with
your
reputation.”

She hits me with her free hand.

“This is going to be all right, Zora.” I know it’s a lie, but I want to believe
it.

“Okay, Nicky.”

I don’t think she believes me. “I’m with you, okay?”

She smiles at me. “You be here for Rebecca.”

But I want to be here for her. Rebecca has her team.

And at that, she lets go of my hand.

I lead her back downstairs, and everybody glares at us, especially my
grandfather. What? Do they think we got a quickie in since we left the church
fifteen minutes ago? I just want to get her out of here. I can tell by the obscene
way they look at us together this is going to be even more of a nightmare than
I imagined, and I’m beginning to get the feeling she knows it too. That lawn
jockey knew what was coming.

I didn’t get to introduce her to my grandfather at the church. Now he’s
standing there with my parents, freakin’ leering at her, the old pervert.

“Who’s this, Nick?”

“This is my friend.”

Rebecca offers her up like a lamb to the slaughter. “Her name is Zora.”

He gives me this look. It’s the look he gave my cousin Robbie when he
shot his first deer.

“Where’ve you two been?” he asks.

“I showed her mom’s sewing room.”

“You mean your old bedroom?”

Dirty old …

“It’s not my bedroom anymore.”

Mom whisks Zora off for a tour of the house, and I follow them, even
though I know Rebecca wants to ask me what Zora and I were up to. I’m
trying to scope out any more signs of white supremacy in the house, and I
don’t have a clue how. Now I’m freakin’ hypersensitive, and worse, I don’t
even know what I’m supposed to be looking for. We don’t have lawn jockeys
in the living room. I feel a little sick to my stomach, and the smell of the pot
roast gnaws at my gut.

Can’t they ever serve chicken for heaven’s sake? Spaghetti? Veal? Turkey? I’d
take a can of Spam! A bologna sandwich on stale bread with no condiments.

After what seems like six weeks, we finally settle into the dining room,
and my grandfather parks himself right across from Zora. I sit beside her.
Rebecca beside me. Of course.

I don’t think this dinner could feel more ill at ease if we were all trying
to sell each other Amway. There are a lot of uncomfortable silences between
awkward questions like …

“So, Zora, what do you do?”

“I’m unemployed.”

Endless silence.

“So, Zora. How are things going over at Light of Life?”

“I don’t know. I’m not going there anymore.”

Pindrops. Crickets. Silent screams.

Then Rebecca gets nosy. “So, uh, Zora. You and Nicholas went out to a
restaurant Friday?”

Oh, man.

“Yes. He took me out after he went shopping for me. He bought me a lot
of things.” She sees Rebecca’s stunned expression and becomes more nervous
and information pours out of her. “I mean he just got me things I needed
mostly. He got me some outfits. I guess I didn’t need the jewelry. That was
just kind of him. It was innocent.”

And of course my dad says, “It sounds innocent. Nicholas buying you
jewelry.”

“Then he came over late Saturday with art supplies for me.”

Rebecca squeaked. “After you left me you went back to her with
more
stuff? And all I got was this necklace?”

I shove a fork full of pot roast in my mouth to keep from speaking. Don’t
even bother to look at Rebecca because what Zora described
sounds
far from
innocent, regardless of the real facts.

My father gets interested. “Why, you certainly have taken an interest in
Zora, Nicholas.”

“She’s had some losses, Dad. She needed help. She and some other
Christians I know have been helping her. Zora lost everything. We’ve helped
her.”

“It’s true, Reverend Parker. It’s all been Christian charity.”

He snorts at her.

“I don’t think a man buying a woman jewelry is charitable. Neither is
giving her
art supplies
.”

“It is if she’s an artist. Zora is a painter. She did an amazing sketch of me.
I happen to think her doing her work is healing—and good for her soul.”

My dad gives me the contemptuous look I’m so accustomed to. “What
would you know about what’s good for the soul, Nicholas?”

“Good point, Dad. Not much. I wasn’t taught about that, was I?”

He opens his mouth to say something to me, but must think better of it.
After all, we have company. He turns to Zora.

“So you’re an artist?”

“Yes, sir.”

“She’s very good,” I say.

“Nicky’s quite an artist in his own right,” Zora says.

My mother chimes in. “What do you mean by that, Zora?”

“Nicky is a wonderful writer.”

Rebecca seems to find the way Zora says my name bothersome. “Why do
you call him Nicky?”

Zora leans over me and looks her in the eye. “Why do you call him
Nicholas? That sounds rather formal for his girlfriend.”

Of course my mother comes to Rebecca’s rescue. “We find the name
Nicky rather juvenile.”

I wonder if Zora is going to be rude to my mother. My mouth goes dry.
But she sits back in her seat. “Really? To me it’s playful and charming, as
delightful as he is. He was introduced to me by older, wonderful people as
Nicky, and he seems to prefer it. I like it. I think he likes it. I certainly don’t
mean any disrespect to any of you, but if Nicky enjoys it, that’s what I’ll call
him.”

My mother clears and touches her throat as she does when she is losing
control of a situation. My father comes to her aid.

“You were saying something about Nicholas’s writing.”

“I think he has a wonderful sense of joy and sorrow, whimsy, reverence,
and beauty in his work. And I’ve only seen one thing.”

“And what was that?”

“It was a poem.”

Rebecca huffs. “I’ve never seen any of his poetry.”

“I have,” my father says, his face reddening. “It’s a waste of time. He spent
all that money writing poems and short stories when he should have been
going to seminary, or at least getting a degree that could prepare him for the
real world.”

“Isn’t being an artist real work?” Zora asks.

“They don’t think so,” I say.

My mother speaks. “I think creating art is one thing, like what you do,
Zora. I think God can use that, like that wonderful painter—what’s his name,
honey? We always see his work at the Christian bookstore.”

Oh, no. Don’t let them say it.

“Thomas Kinkade,” my father says.

Dear God. They said it. Rebecca squeals. “I love his work. Are you familiar
with him, Zora?”

I can’t even look at her.

“Yes, I am. The painter of light.”

“He has light,” I say.

“And paint,” Zora adds.

That’s it. I’m really, truly, madly in love with her.

Zora goes on. “But Nicky makes art, too. When he writes poems, or
novels, or even his own version of Psalms, he enters into the human drama
and records the beauty and terror, all of it. Unflinchingly. He’s going to turn
the world on its ear.”

Rebecca adds, “I think he will too. He’s going to be just like Max Lucado.”

I think I’m going to have a heart attack when she says that.

Zora looks over at Rebecca. “Max Lucado?” She actually laughs. “Girl,
my father is a preacher. He’s got nine books out, and hasn’t written any of
them. Max is a preacher. Maybe he writes his own books. I hope he does, but
whether he does or doesn’t, those aren’t the kind of books Nicky’s going to
write. Nicky isn’t a Max Lucado. He’s a J. D. Salinger, full of righteous anger
and sadness and longing for authenticity. He’s a Rilke, full of beauty and God
hunger. He’s a King David, singing his prayers, his praises, his penance.”