Sinful Read online

  “So, all you’ve done is hurt people who’ve tried to help you. Chandelle is your own cousin. She’s your blood. She took you in, and this is how you repay her?” Marvin’s eyes landed on the black nylon bag and bottle of perfume resting on the bathroom counter. “You’re finally going to get what’s coming to you. The games end tonight.” He clutched her belongings in his left hand and held tightly to her with the other one. As he marched toward the front door with her draped over him, Dior panicked.

  “Ohhh, no, you’re not throwing me out after what we just did. Marvin, stop! Don’t put me out there,” she begged.

  “Shut up!” he fired back. Marvin fought to pull the door open.

  Dior was stomping mad, cold, and naked when he shoved her outside. “You’re wrong for this,” she asserted angrily, peering around to see who was getting a look at everything she had. “This is wrong, Marvin.”

  He threw her dress out on the sidewalk with her shoes and purse behind it. “Here, take what’s yours and go. Don’t ever come around here again or so help me I’ll…” Marvin caught himself, well aware of the last time the police showed up at his apartment.

  Dior tramped down the stairs after her clothing. “Go on and threaten me. I’ma tell Dooney and you know what he did to Kevlin.”

  “I don’t care. Go on and tell Dooney,” Marvin barked, insisting that he could give less than a flip if she did. “You think I’m worried about your brother? You’d better think again,” he yelled, recognizing that Chandelle’s opinion and feelings were the only ones that meant anything to him. Then, it hit him. If his wife had to hear about a sexual encounter with her cousin, it had better come from him. Marvin had the truth on his side, he figured, as long as Chandelle didn’t hear lies from someone else beforehand. “Yeah, I told Chandelle you were trouble,” he shouted at Dior. “Now she’ll believe me.” Marvin ducked back inside and slammed the door.

  Dior slinked down the stairs and snatched her dress off the ground, cussing and ranting about not letting Marvin get away with putting her out like trash after having hooked up for the first time. She rammed her feet into her shoes and searched the immediate area for items that might have fallen from her purse. Boiling over with resentment, tears of anger spilled from Dior’s eyes. “Ain’t nobody gonna treat me like some of jump-off piece,” she ranted. “Uh-uh, I’ve worked too hard to give up now.” She threw her purse inside the car and hopped in the driver’s seat. Dior was oblivious to the number of people spying from their bedroom windows, while she stared at her haggard appearance in the rear view mirror. “Putting me out after hitting it…I don’t know who he think he is,” she hissed to her reflection. She continued her tirade until she noticed Marvin hustling down the stairs from his apartment, dressed in jeans, an athletic jacket, and running shoes. Dior started her car and hurriedly backed out of the parking space, fearing he may have come out to cause her bodily harm. She lowered the car window and waved her middle finger in the air. “I’ma get you, Marvin. You’ll see.”

  “Chandelle’s going to deal with you,” he answered, his tone dripping with confidence. He climbed in the SUV and whipped into reverse. Dior realized he was serious about telling the whole sordid story to Chandelle. Marvin was headed there to reveal her escapades at that very moment. Dior burned rubber out of the parking lot, spinning her wheels and spitting white smoke behind her.

  Marvin gave chase, following her down back streets through dangerous intersections and red lights. He appeared at Chandelle’s address just as Dior hopped from her parked car. It was odd the way she stood in the middle of the street daring him to expose what she had tried to get away with. Marvin thought she’d be halfway up the walk and shouting to the mountaintops about their romp, but she didn’t. “What’s up, you lose your nerve?” he grunted. “You’re about to lose more than that.”

  He was so self-assured that the table had turned he didn’t notice that there was a Mercedes parked in Chandelle’s driveway. Dior hadn’t missed it, though. She felt ambivalent about Marvin finding out about Tony, but quickly determined that it added leverage to her master plan, tearing Chandelle’s marriage apart to give her unfettered access to her husband.

  “Marvin, there’s something else,” Dior said, trailing behind him toward the front door. “You need to think about what you’re doing. There won’t be no way to get past it if you ring that bell.” Dior darted in front of him as he approached the house. “Listen to me,” she whined, slapping at his hand as he reached for the doorbell. “Ten seconds. Please listen for ten seconds.”

  “You ain’t even worth that,” he grumbled.

  “Please,” Dior said, as soberly as she knew how. Marvin huffed but agreed to lower his hand. “Marvin, before you ruin all of our lives, you need to consider everything. You think Chandelle will believe that you never knew it wasn’t her in the bed with you. Think about it now. Marvin, you had to have known that what I put on you wasn’t hers.” Dior tried to read his mind by gazing into his squinted eyes. He had begun to give it serious consideration when the lights came on in the house. Marvin and the cunning manipulator stood on the porch, expecting Chandelle to investigate the noise, discover them when answering the door. You could have knocked Marvin over with a feather when Tony opened it instead.

  “Dior, that is you?” Tony said, wearing damp slacks and an opened dress shirt. “What are you doing here this late?”

  “Hey, Tony,” she answered with a surprisingly keen grin. “Where’s Chandelle?”

  “She’s upstairs sleeping,” he replied slowly, eyeing Marvin’s clenched teeth. “Who’s your friend?”

  “He’s my husband,” Chandelle said, appearing behind Tony wearing practically nothing at all.

  Tony turned to Chandelle, then back at Marvin to size him up. “I thought he was in lockdown.”

  Marvin’s hands contracted into two huge fists. “I was, but I’m out now,” he said, glaring back at Tony.

  Chandelle placed both hands over her face. “Dior, what did you tell him?”

  “I didn’t have anything to do with this,” Dior offered.

  “I didn’t intend any of this,” Chandelle said, her sad gaze fixed on Marvin. “This cannot be happening.”

  His eyes glassed over, filled with pain and betrayal. “Funny, that was the thing I was just thinking,” he growled before nailing Tony with a stiff right jab. Tony’s knees buckled as he fell back into the house. Marvin dashed inside to tear him apart, but Chandelle’s terrified expression stopped him. He remembered his short stint in the county jail and the last thing the giant tyrant, who was due to stand trial for murder, said as the state corrections officer took him away in chains, “Don’t ever let your love for no female get your freedom papers revoked, College Boy.”

  Suddenly, Marvin heard Chandelle screaming, he blinked several times and then peered up at the screwdriver he’d raised above his head. He had no idea how it got there, but he was so close to plunging it into a stranger’s chest. During a blessed moment of clarity, Marvin got up and threw the sharp tool to the floor. He gathered how it must’ve looked, him standing over Chandelle’s late-night houseguest. Dior and Tony were silent, both hoping he’d leave for obviously differing reasons. Chandelle’s hand was holding her mouth closed, sensing correctly that in spite of what she said or how it came out, there was no remedy for what Marvin stumbled onto that night. The hurt ran too deep.

  Tears ran away from Chandelle’s eyes. “Marvin, please don’t go,” she cried, stepping over Tony to run after her man. “It’s not what you think, Marvin! Baby, come back and we’ll talk about it. You’ll, you’ll see that it’s nothing!” she yelled. Defiant and disturbed beyond reasoning with, Marvin lit out as fast as he could.

  Tony pushed past Chandelle on the front walkway as he hurried to his sedan. “Y’all deserve each other, Chandelle. You, him, and Dior, you deserve each other,” he proclaimed bitterly, after seeing his past and future with Chandelle collide. “Dior, don’t even think about getting me mixed up in someth
ing like this again. And if you ever come by the café, I’ll have you arrested for trespassing. Believe that!”

  “Come on in the house and put something on,” Dior said, nudging Chandelle inside. “You’re gonna catch a death of cold.”

  “What was Tony talking about, Dior? Did you get him mixed up in something?” Chandelle interrogated harshly.

  “Nothing, I…” she tried to explain.

  “Shut up!” Chandelle spat, poking her finger in Dior’s face. “It’s because of you Marvin came over here tonight. If you hadn’t told him Tony was here, he wouldn’t have known. How could you sell me out like that?”

  “I…I…didn’t say…” she stuttered, when confronted with too much of the truth to handle.

  “Shut up!” Chandelle snapped again. “Everything that comes out of your mouth is bound to be a lie. Now you’ve ruined it for me. I hope you’re happy, home wrecker. How does it feel? You got what you wanted. I didn’t see it until you actually showed up on my doorstep with my husband. You’re jealous of Marvin,” she’d concluded wrongly. “It must really mess with you that I love him. Well, Dior, you need to grow up. I can’t live for you and look after you like I’ve done since we were kids,” she sobbed. “I want you to get out of my house.” Dior’s feet didn’t move. She stood there undecided on what to say, if anything. “I said get out!” Chandelle hollered louder than before. “You’re no longer welcome in my home. Marvin told me you were nothing but trouble. I should have believed him and chased you off like a rabid dog. Look at what you’ve done! It’s over now. My marriage is over.”

  Dior made one last attempt to appeal to Chandelle’s sense of family, but she had nothing else to say and desired to hear even less. Dior backed away and closed the door. She meandered down the pathway to the curb and was filled with mixed emotions. On the one hand, her well-devised plan had rolled off famously. On the other hand, she hadn’t imagined ending up without Marvin or Chandelle in her life. Giving it a lot of thought, Dior spent the waking hours wondering what she was going to do next.

  28

  Knee Mail

  November came and went without Marvin returning Chandelle’s calls. She spent Thanksgiving with Grace’s family, bouncing Nicole off her knee and loving every minute of it. Dinner was superb, but it wasn’t the same as at home. The psychologist Chandelle had been seeing on a weekly basis told her to focus her energies on pushing ahead, charting the next twelve months, and preserving her sanity. While it sounded like sensible advice, there were too many stones that remained unturned. Chandelle’s future was so uncertain that it was inconceivable to map out the next week of her life, much less try to forecast the following year. She was battling mounting stress and guilt stemming from her reactions to circumstances that had been initiated by Dior’s meddling. Her mortgage and car notes were a drain on her bank account. Enduring the holiday season without Marvin to share her favorite time of the year placed an immeasurable strain on her heart.

  When Chandelle finally realized she had nowhere else to turn, she made a conscious effort to look inward. She felt bad about flying off the handle when seeing Marvin with Kimberly, and having his furniture snatched from the apartment. Chandelle was even kicking herself for falling prey to good times and sweet love that too many happily married women took for granted. Her prayer life suffered incredibly because real life before Marvin’s arrest had been so blissful that she’d forgotten to pay reverence to the one who had made it so.

  Tears of sadness were transformed into tears of joy during a church service one Sunday morning as the minister’s sermon on God’s knee mail address made her dilemma evaporate into thin air. Grace, sitting in the same pew when it happened, leaned forward to catch a better look at Chandelle, who was holding her sides and giggling like it was going out of style. Peculiar behavior was at times commonplace from members of the congregation when their awakening refused to wait. Chandelle rocked back and forth, bursting at the seams as the choir belted out, “I am resolved no longer to linger.”

  Shortly after they took their seats, she strolled to the front of the sanctuary, with a congregation numbering 1,700 looking on. Normally too private and too proud to approach the masses in personal prayers, Chandelle stood boldly with the microphone in hand. She dabbed at her cheeks with a tissue, but it didn’t affect the flow dribbling down her face.

  “I’m Chandelle Hutchins, and I’d like to give honor to God, and my Savior Jesus Christ this morning. See, some of you may not know this, but I’ve always sat out there wondering why a person would come way up here and broadcast their business, but today I have my answer. Prayers of the righteous availeth much, says the Bible. While I believed that, I was scared to let anyone know I needed somebody to pray for me.”

  She fought back sniffles as the minister shouted, “Amen, sistah!”

  Chandelle panned the area Marvin had shared with her, but didn’t see him. “Well, I’m up here, I am no longer ashamed. Y’all can talk about me all you want because my marriage is a mess, but that’s not enough to stop me from asking my church family to pray…that my man comes back home. Thank you.” Her testimony and frankness fortified several other women and a handful of men to go forward and bare their crosses publicly, each one in desperate need of prayers as well.

  After the church service ended, Chandelle was barraged with married women who carried in their hearts similar words that hadn’t reached their mouths yet, although she read it in their eyes clear enough. Feeling their pain convinced her that she was a lot like them, not hopeless or alone, just lonely, and that was a whole ’nother thing altogether. Grace passed her daughter to Wallace so that her arms could hold Chandelle tightly.

  “You’ve finally caught on,” Grace whispered. “Caught on to what you’ve been turning up your nose at. You don’t have to go through anything by yourself. There is power in prayer for those who believe. Today you’ve humbled yourself and God requires that of us who follow him. You know what you’ll get acting like you don’t need to go to Him?” Chandelle shook her head slowly, insinuating that she didn’t. “Nothing worth having,” Grace answered. “Remember this, when you’re down to nothing, He is up to something.”

  Feeling as if a ton weight had been lifted from her, Chandelle drew up the courage to do the one thing she’d asked others for but tussled with until that very day. She drove home, kneeled down beside her bed, and prayed like a child whose father had the power to respond to it. “God, I don’t know how long it’s been since you’ve heard my voice. Too long I know, but I’m here now, and despite not knowing the proper words to tell you how sorry I am, I feel it necessary to say it anyway. I’m asking your forgiveness for the harm I’ve caused myself and my marriage. You’re more than familiar with my ways,” she said, as a rush of emotion overcame her. “And…and you know my heart. I’m not used to asking for much because you’ve been so good to me already but…I’m praying not only today but every day that you mend my heart and tell Marvin how much I still love him and want him in my life. Father, I don’t know if that’s enough, but I do know you’re listening. I pray that it be your will that my husband finds it within himself to see past the woman I am and recognize the Christian I’m trying to be. Father, please hear my cries, forgive my sins, and hold me close to you. In Jesus’s name, I ask all things. Amen.”

  Chandelle slipped off her dress and climbed beneath the covers. Within seconds she drifted off to sleep. She dreamed of children playing in the yard, building a world around them, and making her house a real home. Blissful visions of a love deferred with a houseful of babies danced in her head and continued their ballet even as she awoke, refreshed and at peace for the first time in many months. However likely that the answer to her prayer would be a resounding “No,” Chandelle was content on pouring it on until she got the answer she wanted. What she’d once taken for granted was worth pleading over, and she was more than willing to beg in order to get it back.

  Dior was begging, too, in a passive please-don’t-hate-me manner wit
hout actually having to speak it out loud. She’d sent a stack of I’m Sorry greeting cards, with hopes of persuading Chandelle to forgive her. None of the envelopes had been opened, but she couldn’t deny the box of Godiva chocolates and the cutest black faux mink teddy bear on the planet that Dior had couriered to her door.

  Chandelle held the stuffed animal closely to her chest every chance she got. The teddy came with a name tag, which Dior printed the word Amnesty on, thinking it just might help her cause to be granted sometime soon.

  Chandelle tabled that idea to make an overseas phone call. She spoke with her mother, Maryland, who was a nomad by nature and retired military personnel moving from city to city while soaking up the culture and putting her government pension and relative health to good use. Maryland suggested that Chandelle not count on her making it home for Christmas again this year because a little village, in the south of France, had run amuck with handsome single men who thought she favored Diana Ross and she wasn’t one to argue. She couldn’t say when she planned on being stateside again but wished her daughter and son-in-law Happy Holidays. Chandelle didn’t see any point of rehashing what she’d gone through, so she merely reciprocated her mother’s good wishes and said good-bye.

  “Frenchmen, huh?” Chandelle chuckled as the doorbell rang unexpectedly. It was Dooney going out of his way to stop in and see about her. “Hey, Dooney Bug,” she sang, like she did while in her youth, when he’d shown up at just the right time then too.

  “Ahhh, there you go,” he said, smiling and laughing. “I haven’t heard that name in a long time. You drunk?”

  “No, silly, I’m high on life,” she asserted. “Come on in here.”