Who Do I Lean On? Read online

  Both Sammy and Keisha were afraid to wade into the lake farther than their knees, but they found plenty to do digging in the wet sand with a plastic Big Gulp cup someone had left behind. Soon Paul was showing them how to pack the wet sand into walls and forts, decorated with rocks and sticks. Even P.J. got involved, scooping out an inlet that captured Lake Michigan’s small tide creeping up the sand—who knew the Great Lakes had tides?— into their man-made moat.

  “Can we go to the beach tomorrow, Miss Gabby?” Keisha begged, hanging on to me for dear life when I brought them back to Manna House.

  I shook my head. Mr. Bentley had invited the boys and me to go to the zoo with him and DaShawn. “Maybe next week, okay?” I should have known that was as good as a promise as far as Sammy and Keisha were concerned.

  Mr. Bentley picked us up at two thirty sharp the next day in his RAV4.

  P.J. had balked that morning when I reminded the boys we had a date for the zoo that afternoon. “Aw, Mom, do I hafta go? I mean, a zoo’s a zoo, I’ve seen a gazillion of them.” Hardly true, though Philip and I had taken the boys to the Metro Richmond Zoo numerous times when they were small. “And it’s not like we’re going with someone my age,” he fussed. “DaShawn’s just a little kid.” Which was true, though DaShawn would surely protest the label. And then the zinger. “Don’t you know any white kids my age? We didn’t have to hang out with black kids back in Petersburg.”

  Half a dozen snapbacks fought for airtime as I whisked breakfast dishes through the sudsy dishwater, my back to P.J. so he couldn’t read my face. What was going on here? Was I raising a teenage bigot? But hanging around people like my boss, who calmly dealt with several crises every week at the shelter, must’ve been having a good effect on me because I maintained my composure and decided not to make it a big deal.

  “I’d really like it if you came with us, P.J. It’s supposed to rain tomorrow—this’ll give us something to do together while the weather’s nice. We won’t have time to explore the city once you’ve got homework every day and cross-country meets on the weekends. I’m sure you’ll make friends your age once school starts. But until you make your own friends, guess you’re stuck hanging out with mine.” Mustering a grin, I grabbed a dish towel, whirled it into a rope, and snapped him with it.

  “Okay, okay,” he said, backing off. “Just don’t expect me to entertain the twerps.”

  As we piled into Mr. Bentley’s compact SUV later that day, I almost offered to sit in the back with the “twerps,” but Mr. B gallantly held the front passenger door open for me, so I let the boys sort out the seating arrangement for themselves. Once we hit Lake Shore Drive, it didn’t take long to find ourselves at Lincoln Park Zoo, situated at the south end of Lincoln Park, which ran alongside the Drive going toward the Loop. As Mr. B pulled up to the entry booth and fished for his wallet, I dove for my purse. “I thought you said the zoo was free!”

  “It is.” Mr. Bentley winked at me. “They just gouge you for the parking . . . Now you put that away. This is my treat. It’d be the same for the car whether it was just DaShawn an’ me, or a carful.”

  “Hm. Maybe we ought to ride bikes next time—right, boys?”

  Only groans from the backseat. But I was half-serious. A bike trail ran the full length of Chicago’s lakeshore. It’d be fun to bike it one of these days.

  We got zoo maps and let the boys pick what areas they wanted to see. “Gorillas!” DaShawn shouted. Paul voted for “big animals like giraffes and stuff.” P.J. shrugged and managed to look bored. But I noticed that Mr. Bentley shut one eye and squinted with the other, holding the map at different distances, as if he was having difficulty reading it.

  He caught me watching him and quickly stuffed the map in his pants pocket. “Okay! Big animals first. They’re at the north end, and if we’re lucky, the polar bears might be swimming. Then we can work our way down to the Gorilla House.” Before DaShawn could complain, he herded the boys over to one of the food vendors and bought hot dogs and lemonade for everybody.

  As we trailed the boys past the rhinos, ostriches, and camels, I decided to just out with it. “Are you having trouble with your eyes, Mr. B?”

  “Nah. It’s nothing. Just got this weird blind spot in my left eye.”

  “A blind spot! You should get it checked out. An ophthalmologist might be able to do something before it gets worse.”

  He shrugged. “Yeah, already did. Doctor’s hoping it’ll just go away. Me too!”

  “Grandpa! Grandpa!” DaShawn was yelling at us from the bottom of a ramp that led to an underwater window in the polar bear exhibit. “Come see!”

  Sure enough, one of the polar bears was in the water, his massive body passing by the underwater window like a silent surge of raw power. A crowd quickly gathered, but we held our front row places, mouths open, as the big brute turned and swam past again and again, paws as big as dinner plates, long gray-white fur rippling.

  “Beautiful,” I breathed.

  Nothing else in the zoo quite matched the polar bear water dance, since most of the other animals lay comatose in the muggy August heat or hid away in their dens, but we dutifully wandered toward the south end of the park, taking in the Gorilla House and some of the other indoor exhibits. P.J. actually forgot to be bored when we ducked into a building that featured snakes, bats, and other creepy, crawly things.

  My feet were tired, and I was glad when the boys caught sight of paddleboats for rent on the lagoon at the far end of the zoo. “My treat,” I insisted. “You guys go.” Anything for a chance to sit down for a while.

  Even though the paddleboats were four-seaters, Mr. Bentley waved the boys off and stayed with me. “Whoo-ee,” he huffed, sinking down onto a bench. “I must be crazy thinking I can raise a nine-year-old.” He tipped his chin toward the paddleboat, where P.J. and Paul were pedaling furiously in the front two seats and DaShawn was squealing with delight behind them. “How you doin’ with the single-parent thing, Firecracker?”

  I sighed. “I don’t know. I’m afraid I let Philip take care of a lot of things, never thinking I’d have to know stuff—like how to buy a car. And I need one, like, yesterday! But a savvy car salesman could sniff out in two seconds that I’m a sucker.” I looked at him hopefully. “You got any advice?”

  Mr. Bentley chuckled.

  “You really askin’? Buy used. Just a year or two old can save you some big bucks, and it’ll still have a lot of miles left on it. Less of an invitation to car thieves too. But you gotta know what to check out so you don’t get a lemon.”

  I deliberately raised my eyes upward at the treetops waving in the slight breeze coming off the lake across Lake Shore Drive, tempering the muggy heat . . . and cleared my throat. “You know what I’m going to ask you, right?”

  I drove the rental to work the next morning under cloudy skies with Mr. Bentley’s promise to help me look for a good used car this weekend. But before then, I had to write up a proposal to present at the Manna House board meeting on Saturday morning— and it was already Friday! Decided I’d have to miss Edesa’s weekly Bible study today, even though she was starting something new—something about Bad Girls of the Bible. Ought to tickle the curiosity of our cast of shady characters coming off the streets anyway.

  Armed with a cup of coffee from the coffee cart in the multipurpose room, I unlocked my office door, dumped my bag on the desk, and pulled the desk phone toward me. Lee Boyer had left phone numbers on my voice mail for the real estate agent handling the sale of the six-flat I lived in, as well as a number for the current owner. I needed some hard facts for my proposal, and time was running out.

  But before I could make my first call, the door opened and Sammy peeked in. “Didn’t Paul come today, Miss Gabby?” The door swung wider, revealing three more anxious faces—siblings Trina and Rufino, ages seven and six respectively, and ten-year-old Keisha.

  “Sorry, kids.” Paul had elected to stay home that morning to play around on his new keyboard. “Paul is practicing his mu
sic today. But he’ll be back next week.” I hoped. It was a volunteer job, after all. I hoped Paul’s enthusiasm for entertaining the younger kids at the shelter hadn’t run out yet. “Keisha, you know how to work the DVD player in the rec room, don’t you? Why don’t you put on some of those VeggieTales movies we got last week?” Someone had donated a whole shopping bag full of DVDs, some of which were so violent and R-rated, I had to trash them. But I pulled out the good ones, including some VeggieTales that should keep the kids entertained for a while.

  An hour later I heard the familiar banging of pots that announced Estelle Williams had arrived and lunch-making was in the works. Grinning, I came out of my office and leaned across the counter dividing dining room and kitchen. “Guess what we did yesterday?”

  Estelle, dressed in her usual hairnet and roomy apron covering a loose white blouse and black baggy Capri pants, dumped large cans of tomato soup into a big pot on the stove. “Don’t have to guess. You went to the zoo. And didn’t invite me.”

  I blinked. That hadn’t even occurred to me. “Oh, Estelle. I’m sorry. Mr. Bentley invited the boys and me . . . I mean, we were his guests, so it didn’t occur to me to invite someone else.”

  “Humph. Not blaming you. But Mister Harry Bentley could’ve invited me.”

  “Wait a minute. Yesterday was Thursday. Didn’t you start a cooking class on Thursday afternoons?” I scooted over to the activity sheet posted on the wall beside the counter and hooted. “Yes, there it is! You couldn’t have come anyway, so what are you fussing about?”

  “Humph. Doesn’t matter. He could’ve asked. Then I could’ve said no.”

  I laughed out loud. “Estelle Williams! You usually bend over backward to deny any romantic interest going on between you two—which doesn’t fool anyone, by the way. But here you are, pouting like a jilted lover that Mr. B took us to the zoo without you.”

  “Am not.” Bang. Another pot went on the stove.

  “Besides, his car only seats five.”

  “Well.” But she looked sideways at me and her tone changed. “Did he say anything about me yesterday?”

  “Uh . . . nope. Nothing.”

  “Humph.”

  “But I asked him about his eyes.”

  Now she stopped completely. “You didn’t tell him I told you anything, did you?”

  “Didn’t have to. He was squinting and holding the zoo’s visitor guide at all angles. I just asked. And he said the doctor hopes it’ll go away.”

  Go away?” A cloud passed over her face. “It’s been weeks, “and Harry’s not tellin’ me much of anything anymore. Stubborn old goat. I’m worried about him. Gotta help me pray, Gabby.”

  “I will. And I’ve got something for you to help me pray about.” I handed her the proposal I’d just printed out.

  Wiping her hands on a dish towel, Estelle leaned on her elbows on the counter and read through my proposal. Her eyes widened. “Girl! You full of surprises. What’s this House of Hope idea? You want to buy the building you livin’ in and turn it into apartments for some of our single moms here?”

  I looked around to make sure we were alone and lowered my voice, hardly able to contain my excitement. “And look what I found out. Somebody in 3A is moving out the end of August, which means Tanya and Sammy—or Precious and Sabrina, whoever needs it most—could move in September first! Well”—I backed off—“maybe not September first. I think all the apartments need some repairs and refurbishing. And the board has to agree to help get rent subsidies from the city.”

  Estelle started to laugh, her shoulders shaking as she handed back my proposal. “Gabby Fairbanks. This idea is so crazy, it’s gotta have God’s hand all over it.”

  I grinned. “That’s exactly what Jodi Baxter said.”

  But the moment I said her name, I clapped my hand over my mouth. Jodi Baxter! Mabel told me I needed a prayer partner, and Jodi had been part of this House of Hope idea from day one. Here I was telling Estelle, and I hadn’t even told Jodi about the board meeting tomorrow morning!

  I made a beeline for my office. What made me think this crazy idea was going to fly without prayer?

  chapter 8

  Jodi Baxter picked up on the first ring. “Gabby! I was just thinking about calling you. Haven’t talked to you since the birthday party last weekend. Oh, guess I saw you at church on Sunday. What’s going on? Everything okay?”

  “Yeah, it’s been a good week.” I gave her a quick rundown of how I’d been keeping the boys busy. “But I called to ask you something.”

  “Sure. Fire away.”

  “Well.” I took a big breath. “I talked to Mabel about our House of Hope idea, and she’s actually letting me present a proposal to the board tomorrow morning.”

  “Oh, Gabby! That’s wonderful. I’ll definitely be praying. What time is the board meeting?”

  “Ten. But, uh, that’s what I’m calling about. Mabel encouraged me to find a prayer partner to pray with me about this, and I’m wondering if you—”

  “Of course! Oh, Gabby, I’d love to be your prayer partner! On one condition. That we make it a two-way street. I mean, if you’ll pray for me too.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say. I mean, that made sense. “I’m not sure exactly how prayer partners work, but—”

  “Well, one thing I’ve learned by praying with the Yada Yada Prayer Group. Praying for someone or for their requests is all well and good, but there’s nothing like praying with each other. So . . . hm. Tell you what. Denny and I are driving Amanda down to Champaign on Saturday afternoon, but I’ve already told them I can’t leave until after I teach my typing class there at the shelter. Why don’t I just come early, say . . . nine thirty? That’ll give us half an hour to pray before the board meeting at ten. Sound okay?”

  “Oh, Jodi. Could you? I wasn’t going to ask you to make a special trip. Just thought we’d pray, you know, over the phone or something. But I’d really love to see you before the board meeting. I could show you my proposal too. Except your class doesn’t start until eleven. You’ll be there a whole hour and a half before your typing class.”

  She snickered. “Don’t worry about that. That’ll get me out of Amanda’s hair tomorrow morning. Otherwise I’ll be nagging her about what she’s packing or fussing because of all the last-minute stuff she’ll just then be ‘remembering’ she has to have in her dorm room. Know what I mean? So, see you tomorrow . . . Oh, wait a sec.”

  Jodi must have muffled the speaker, though I still heard two voices in the background. Then she was back. “Amanda wants to know how Dandy is.”

  “Dandy? I presume he’s okay. Lucy stopped by with him on Monday, and he was fine. Almost his old self. But I haven’t seen either of them since.”

  Jodi turned away from the phone, but I heard, “Gabby says he’s fine. He’s still with Lucy . . . I know, honey, but I’m sure Gabby knows what she’s doing.” Her voice came back to my ear with a slight chuckle. “Amanda disapproves of you giving Gramma Shep’s dog to Lucy, in case you haven’t figured that out. But I think it was a very kind thing.”

  “Well, tell her she’s not alone. My Paul is upset about it too. Can’t blame him. I have my own doubts about the wisdom of it, especially when it’s raining. And I presume it’s going to get cold in a few months.”

  Jodi laughed. “That’s right. You haven’t been here for a Chicago winter yet. But I’m sure Lucy will figure it out. She’s been on the streets a long time.”

  I glanced at my watch. “Yikes! I’ve got to go pick up P.J. See you tomorrow at nine thirty . . . and thanks, Jodi.”

  I’d meant to tell Jodi about my conversation with Lee Boyer but decided it could wait until tomorrow. That’d be a good thing to pray about anyway. Who was I going to get for a lawyer now? Even more, I wanted to tell her about him wanting to take our friendship to another level. At least, that’s what I thought he meant . . .

  I’d managed to set aside my conversation with Lee for the past two days. But all day Friday it distracted me so
much that when the apartment door buzzer rang later that day and I pulled the door open to see Philip standing in the outer foyer to pick up the boys for their overnight, I felt guilty. Caught red-handed. A married woman thinking about another man.

  I left him standing in the foyer, called for the boys, and headed back to the kitchen. But a moment later I heard Paul saying, “Dad! Dad! Come in and listen to the song I wrote!”

  Oh great. Why can’t they just leave? I didn’t want to talk to Philip just then. But a few moments later I heard Paul on the electronic keyboard, playing a jazzy little number he’d created that morning. I couldn’t help but smile. He’d played it for me as soon as I got home after work. It was good.

  Five minutes later P.J. poked his head into the kitchen. “Bye, Mom. We’re leaving now. No surprise parties when we get back tomorrow, okay?”

  I grinned at him. “Promise.” I headed for the front room to say good-bye to Paul too. But as I came into the room, I saw Philip standing by the window seat in front of the bay windows in the sunroom reading a sheet of paper he held in his hand. My heart somersaulted into my throat. The proposal! When I got home from work, Paul had been so eager for me to hear the song he’d made up, I’d dumped my stuff on the window seat and sat down to listen . . . and never put it away.

  In four giant strides, I snatched the paper out of Philip’s hand. “Nosy, aren’t you?”

  “It was lying right here. Couldn’t help seeing it.” His eyebrows lifted curiously. “I see you’re planning to buy this building. Where’d you get that kind of money?”