The Future Has a Past (26 page)

Cool pointed his finger in her face as he said, with a sneer, “Oh, hell! They all do that to get what they want! You just a fool to go for that mess! Patient?! Hell, yeah, he was patient! Tryin to steal my woman on the sly!” Then he changed his tactic. He leaned in close to Irene’s face, she didn’t move, just looked straight in his eyes. In a low, husky-soft mannish voice, he said, “Irene, baby, you know what we have. We got love, true love. You know ain’t nobody like me . . . for you, but me. We togeeeeether, baby. Toooogether. We got babies . . . together. My sons. Listen to me, we a family. You got my sons, baby. You a fool to go for whatever he layin on your mind.” He leaned back in his chair; satisfied that he had done his good job on his woman.

Irene looked at Mr. Summer, at least it looked like she did to me, as she said, “I don’t think he is foolin me. And I know he is patient because I know he wants his family together and he didn’t press on me when I had the first baby because he knew I still had some feelings for you. And he still didn’t change. Even after the second baby. He still treats me in every good way . . . and it’s been seven years now.”

Cool stood up and the chair went over again. “Seven years! You been goin with me more’n that! You been foolin round with somebody else for seven years! I oughta kick your ass!”

Mr. Summer stood up and Joe come from round the bar headin for Irene’s table. Joe told Cool, “Okay, Cool, don’t want no mess in my club!”

Cool raised his hand for Joe to stop, “Ain’t no mess, man! This bitch here . . .”

Then Mr. Summer said in his mannish voice, “Watch your language, boy.”

Cool turned to Mr. Summer, sayin, “Sit down, ole man, this is my business. I ain’t gonna hurt her, not now, anyway!”

Mr. Summer answered in a hard, strong voice, “See that you don’t. It’s my business to make very sure you don’t.”

Cool turned his back and waved Mr. Summer away, grabbed his chair and sat back down (smashing his lucky hat under his chair) at the table where Irene waited, patiently. Joe, slowly, went back behind the bar. He looked back at Cool a couple of times. I know he was thinkin bout that gun. And it’s a wonder he didn’t stumble over Tan-Tan’s eyes cause they was stuck out all the way to Cool’s table.

Cool took out a handkerchief and wiped his face as Irene asked him, “Cool? How many women have you had in six years? One year, even?”

He was breathin hard when he answered her, “That’s different! I’m a man! But why did you do this to me? Me!”

Irene’s eyes slid over to Mr. Summer just as easy, and she almost smiled at him, but I guess it wasn’t the time just then. But, in a voice that was makin love to whoever she was talkin about, she said, “Because he showed me what it felt like to be a woman. To get Valentine cards and boxes of candy, birthday presents, soft underwear and nightgowns we could enjoy together. Somebody to rub you to sleep . . . to . . .”

Cool broke her reverie in a high voice I hadn’t heard before, incredulous, “You been ‘sleepin’ with em?!”

Irene must didn’t hear him, cause she smiled in a dreamy way as she said, “Somebody who make love to you like you’re both there. Thinks of you . . . for no reason at all and stops by to see if there is anything he can do for you.” She laughed lightly as she said, “Buys you perfume, not because you need it, but because he knows you like it, or pretty toilet paper even, not because you need it, but because he knows you use it. Makes you feel like you both somethin . . . not just him bein somethin.”

Cool suddenly grinned, said, “Who is he? Who . . . is . . . the . . . sucker? The somebody-else’s-woman stealer! Tell me who he is, cause I’m gonna tell him who ‘I’ am!”

Irene returned her gaze to Cool. “He knows about you. I told him about you a long time ago. How I wished you and me would get married . . . a long time ago, before the babies, and have a life together. After the first baby, I still thought maybe I wanted that, thought I could wait . . . until you had your runout.”

Cool leaned back, satisfied, and you could see him feelin better as he glanced to see if Joe and Tan heard those last words. “What the fool say to that?!”

Irene looked at Mr. Summer again, “He never said one word about us, no matter what I said. I liked him for that. In fact, Cool, over the years . . . he’s been there when the kids were sick, when they had to do somethin or, oh, just whatever came up about our sons . . . so that I piled up so much likin for him that it turned into love, kinda good and strong and . . . easy, without my even realizin it.”

Cool came forward in his chair again and the high voice came from him in disbelief, “You love him?!”

Irene nodded and shook her head all at the same time and grinned, “I love him. Very, very, very, very much.”

There was a moment’s silence as Cool looked at Irene, then he asked, “You just think you love him cause I ain’t been around . . . too much. But . . . I’m gonna be! Anyway, what you gonna tell my kids? My sons?”

Irene looked at Cool and smiled as she said, “I don’t have to tell my sons anything, Cool.”

Cool was silent a moment as he looked at her, his face all frowned up. Then he said, “I want them to know damn well who their father is.”

Irene looked at Cool a moment, then her gaze passed to Mr. Summer. “They have always known who their father is. Their father knows them and they know their father. It’s my fault they have been apart.”

“What you mean . . . your fault?”

Now Irene sat up straight in her chair, looked into Cool’s eyes and placed her hand over one of his. “Cool, I never told you those were your children. Your sons. You just thought they were because you thought you were the only man in my life. If you really look at them, they don’t even look like you. You see what you want to see. At the time I had our first son, I should have told you then. But . . . I knew what kind of life you were livin, so I didn’t feel like I was cheatin you any more than you thought you were cheatin me. And I just didn’t know if I still wanted to marry you or not. And . . . their father told me to wait until I was sure what I wanted to do with my life, cause he could still love them and do for them whether you knew it or not. I waited, years, until I knew you were entirely out of my mind.”

Cool stood up, lookin like he was goin to go out of his mind, chile. Yes sir! He was almost cryin, least his voice was when he was shouting at Irene. “Woman, Irene, don’t you . . . shit on my life! Don’t you take everything good from my life and leave the shit!”

Irene started to stand, but changed her mind and remained calmly in her chair. “But, we aren’t your life, Cool.” I could tell she was a little scared now, but still tryin to be kind. She went on talkin in a easy kind of voice, she never did holler. “Your life is out here where the . . . shit is. You brought the . . . shit into our lives. I didn’t. You didn’t even know my sons knew who their father was because you’ve never been close to them. Huggin and kissin is fine for a quick minute, but it does not put clothes on a child’s back or food in a child’s stomach. Or stand over them all night when they are sick or hurt. Or take them to a doctor or a dentist or even to school.” She slowly shook her head and said, “We have a whole life apart from you and you didn’t think enough of us to look and see it.”

Mr. Summer was standin again and Joe was comin back round from the bar. Cool shouted at Irene, “You lyin! Why you take my money?”

Irene just shook her head slowly, “Because I had let you take my body at one time and I was still feedin you years later.”

“You lyin bout my kids! Them’s MY sons!”

“No, I’m not lyin, Cool, as God is my witness.”

“Them’s my kids, Irene. My sons.”

Shakin her head sadly, she repeated, hard on each and every word, “No. They are not your sons. They are my husband’s children. His sons. Our sons. They carry his name on their birth certificates. He was there when we made them and he was there when I gave birth to them.” Irene took a deep breath and looked at Mr. Summer, then finished speakin to Cool. “It was more than a year since we had made love before my second son was born.”

I can tell you this, and it’s a fact! That woman was tellin the truth! Yes siree mam! And I could tell by the look on Cool’s face that he couldn’t remember when he had last made sex with her because he had been makin sex with so many women all his grown life. Even went out of town for em when he was out of em in town.

Cool lunged at Irene and struck her! Mr. Summer was round that table like a lightnin flash and Joe was there right after, holdin on to Cool, who was so mad that slobber was sprayin from his mouth as he screamed at Irene, who he thought was destroyin his life and now . . . his pride, in front of his friends. He shouted, “Don’t you do this to me! Don’t you do this to me!!”

Mr. Summer was lifting Irene up, brushin her off and talkin low to her while Joe held Cool. But she still stood up to Cool, still didn’t holler back at him. That woman sure got patience!

Irene stepped back from the table as Mr. Summer picked up her chair and said to Cool, “I didn’t do nothin to you, Cool. You always do everything to yourself. I have done told you now, so . . . I got to go.”

Cool is so angry he is almost cryin, “You ain’t goin now! You done come in here and . . . and strip me of everything in my life!”

Irene had started away from the table, but now she turned back and her voice had a little anger in it this time. “Everything in your life?! You never been IN our life. We wasn’t nothin to you!”

The anger was leavin Cool’s voice and a little pleadin was comin in as he said, “Yes, you was! Yes . . . you . . . was. I was goin . . . to spend my old age with you and them kids. Irene, Irene.”

In a sad little voice, Irene said, “But they wouldn’t be kids anymore, and I wouldn’t be young anymore. The love wouldn’t be the same because it’s already gone from me to somebody else. Our dreams, if we had any, would be died out . . . or lost at some woman’s place where you had laid em down and forgot em. Or you’d probably be sick, or wore out and through livin. I want to live . . . now.”

Mr. Summer took Irene’s arm and she turned, again, to leave, then turned back to Cool and said, “Take care of yourself, Cool.”

But Cool lunged for Irene again and when Mr. Summer tried to pull her out of the way so he could step in front of her, Irene stumbled and fell to her knees. Cool raised his fist to strike her, Joe reached for his arm, and Mr. Summer pulled out a gun and put it to Cool’s head!!! Jesus!! And said, “Don’t hit her again, man.”

Mr. Summer didn’t seem mad and he didn’t raise his voice, but . . . in a low, sure-serious voice he said, “I mean what I said, don’t . . . put . . . your . . . hands on my wife ever again in your life.”

Cool heard him, and backed up a bit, but he was hysterical, I guess. He could only see Irene. He screamed at her, “You bitch! You musta had everybody laughin at me! Whorin round callin it housecleaning! You don’t know who the daddy of them bastards of yours is!”

Mr. Summer steps between Irene, who looks frightened and shocked, and Cool. Cool finally registers Mr. Summer in his mind. I don’t think he has seen the gun good. He says to Mr. Summer, “Get the hell away from here, man, I’m talkin to my woman!”

Mr. Summer holds the gun up closer to Cool’s head and answers, “You are talkin to my wife. And I am not goin to let her be called another bitch out’a your mouth or I will put something in your mouth to stop it up.”

Cool saw the gun then. He steps back, disbelievin, and says to Irene, “Your wife?!” Then he laughs at her (but he don’t say “bitch”), “You married this old man?”

Irene answered right up, “Yes! The good Lord blessed me and my heart with a real Man!”

Cool must be crazy because he starts to reach for Irene again, sayin, “If I catch you with—”

Mr. Summer cocks his gun and even in all that noise, we ALL heard it. Cool, too. Mr. Summer said, “You gonna have to catch up with your head first, cause if you make one more move to hurt my wife . . . you gonna be lookin up at yourself from the floor through a hole in your head.”

Cool is very aware of that gun . . . now.

Mr. Summer kept the gun cocked and kept talkin, “You need to pray that when you get my age . . . in a few years . . . you do as well as I have done. I have the woman I love . . . and my sons.” Then he turned to Irene and said, “Come on, Irene, lets go get our sons and go where there is peace.”

As they begin to leave, Cool hollers after Irene, “I’ll marry you now, Irene.” He reached his arms out to her, still shoutin, “Tomorrow morning, today! I’ll marry you right now! Irene, don’t, please, don’t take my sons.”

Mr. Summer has put his gun away, but he turns back to say to Cool, “We don’t have to take our sons, they are already at home at their father’s house. You need to understand, they . . . are . . . not . . . your . . . sons.”

Before they get completely out the door, Cool shouts at Mr. Summer, “Take her then, old man. I had her first.”

Mr. Summer stops and smiles, a little, as he says. “That’s right. You did. But you didn’t have the best of her. You didn’t have sense enough to know how to get it. You didn’t have sense enough to hold on to her. You maybe coulda had my sons, too . . . and I’m glad you didn’t have enough sense for that either! It really was all your choice for the first year or so. But all that is pass. It’s history now.” Then he went on out the door to his wife, Mrs. Irene Summer, mother, wife and property owner. Now!

But Cool tried to get the last word. “Get on out’a here! Get on out’a here! You think you got somethin, but you ain’t got nothin!”

Everything was dead quiet in the bar. Joe and Tan were dead still. Me, too. But, I heard Tan say softly, “He got somethin, Cool. It’s you that don’t have nothin.”

Cool, in his extremity, does not hear anything, but he does remember Joe and Tan were witnesses to his loss and the beggin. So he says, “You see that bullshit, man? I didn’t want to hurt that ole man! Shit! Who needs her? But them are my sons . . . my sons. She lyin, man! She be back. She gonna think of me and all them good lovin times we had. She gonna need me! But . . . I’m a loner, a player!”

His voice begins to break and his eyes are tearin up, still . . . he can’t let anyone see that he is hurt. So he says, “But she be back! But I don’t need her! I ain’t gonna take her back! When them kids grow up, they know who they real daddy is! Where is my lucky hat?”