Flamethrower - Maggie Estep [42]
“What are you doing here so early?” Coleman asked.
He was walking slowly, and there was a little hitch in his step.
“I’ve got a bunch of stuff going on today,” Ruby said. “Just wanted to get my chores done in case the day got away from me. You okay?” Ruby motioned toward Coleman’s leg.
“My new woman’s wearing me down,” he said slyly.
“Oh,” said Ruby. She briefly envisioned a strapping vixen keeping Coleman prisoner in her bedroom.
“You get on that horse today?” Coleman had actually caught Ruby riding Jack two days earlier. He’d been as pleased as he’d been shocked.
Ruby shook her head. “Not today, no time.”
“Why? What you doing now?” Coleman knew a little about what Ruby’d been up to recently, but she didn’t feel like explaining that she was on a wild goose chase for her psychiatrist.
“I’ve got to do a favor for a friend. That’s all.”
“Uh,” Coleman grunted. “Well, I got some horses to ride,” he said. He nodded at Ruby and walked into the barn.
RUSH HOUR WAS HIDEOUS. Ruby remembered how only weeks earlier she’d vowed never to drive in intense traffic. So much for vowing.
It took close to an hour to get to The Crone’s neighborhood, and all Ruby wanted was to get out of the car and stay out. She found a spot on St. Nicholas Avenue. It took her a while to actually park the damned car though. She’d passed the parallel parking portion of her driving exam, but just barely. She was inching the car forward for the fifth time when she noticed a pack of kids on a stoop pointing and laughing at her. When she finally got out of the car, Ruby waved and smiled at them, and they laughed some more.
The Crone’s block wasn’t one of the more gentrified blocks of Harlem, and it seemed to Ruby that her white face was drawing attention as she walked slowly, looking at the building numbers. It reminded her of the time she and Ed had looked at a crumbling brownstone for sale in the heart of Bedford-Stuyvesant. It was a gorgeous old building with soaring ceilings, ornate moldings, and wide-plank floors. A little bit of hard work would have restored it to its former glory. But as Ruby and Ed walked down the block, everyone stared at their white faces. Ruby didn’t feel unsafe, but she didn’t want to live like that, sticking out as the white girl. That seemed a few lifetimes ago. A lifetime when Ruby had felt sure of Ed and of what was between them.
Ruby found The Crone’s building, a brownstone that had seen better decades and coincidentally resembled the one she and Ed had looked at in Bed-Stuy. The stoop’s steps were chipped, and weeds were sprouting from holes where a railing had once been. There were three old-fashioned doorbells. None marked. Ruby couldn’t decide which she wanted to do least, use the cell phone to call The Crone or ring all three doorbells and invoke ire from strangers. She opted for calling The Crone even though she thought it might give the woman a last-minute chance to back out.
The Crone grunted a hello, then grunted again when Ruby told her she was downstairs. A few moments later, a boxy woman lumbered to the door.
“Hiya,” she greeted Ruby.
“Hello, I’m Ruby.” Ruby tried to sound sweet.
“So I gathered.” The Crone emitted a short, sharp, barking sound that Ruby guessed was a laugh. “I’m Millie.”
Millie was about Ruby’s height, five-four, but considerably wider. Her dark, dense hair was cropped close to her head, her eyebrows were bushy, and she had no lips to speak of. Not that you’d want to speak of them if they’d been there. She was wearing a huge purple T-shirt over a pair of red sweatpants. The Crone’s enormous breasts hung down to her waist.
“What can I do for ya, Ruby?” The Crone asked as she