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By Root 813 0

the steamy bathroom, I was beginning to get clearer. I had been bargaining with Karen. I was doing and getting rather than loving unconditionally. She had shown up at a time in my life when I was in need. She was a tool being used by God to fulfill a need; she was a sign of God’s love. I didn’t owe Karen anything but love. And I did not have to be hurt to give her love. She was loving me in the only way she knew how, and it was up to me to determine whether or not it worked in my life. If it didn’t, I could love her and let her go, without malice or anger. I did not have to feel bad or get hurt in order to get what I wanted. All I had to do was love. Now I understood how that related to Rhonda and Daddy, and even to Karen and myself. What I didn’t understand was John. What in the world was Rhonda doing with John? I let my body ease down into the hot water in the tub before starting down that path.

The white clothes Rhonda wore during her first years in the priesthood always attracted people’s attention. Drunks on the street asked her to pray for them. Catholics asked if she were fulfilling a “promise.” Many of her Christian friends said they would pray that she didn’t burn in hell. Her colleagues in law school were too busy writing briefs or studying for the bar to notice what she was wearing. Rhonda was adjusting well to being back in law school. Nett was getting stronger, and the children were doing well. She was studying spirituality and feeling good in the process. And Rhonda had a new beau.

Adeyemi was Rhonda’s childhood sweetheart. She had fallen in love with him when she was thirteen years old. He was dating her girlfriend at the time, and Rhonda had learned to let her love for him lie dormant, believing they would never be together. Rhonda had kept up with Adeyemi through the years and knew that he was married and had five children. He had created a life of community work and political activism. He and his wife had been separated for about a year when Rhonda and he began working on a project together. Their working relationship soon developed into something more intimate. Adeyemi knew Rhonda was a priestess and sought her spiritual advice and counseling for his situation at home.

They sat in Adeyemi’s car one night after he had driven her home. He asked if he could kiss her. No one had ever asked! “I cannot be in your head and in your bed,” Rhonda explained. If he wanted her to counsel him, kissing was out of the question. It took him only a few seconds to choose. A few days later, as they were walking along, he reached out and took her hand in his. No man—not Daddy, Gary, John, or even Ray—had ever held her hand. Rhonda was thirteen again; all the love she had suppressed for eighteen years came rushing to the surface.

Adeyemi’s work brought them to Albany, New York. Rhonda was sitting at his desk in the State Capitol, when a secretary told her she had a telephone call. Thinking it was one of the children again, Rhonda answered, “What’s the matter now?”

“John is dead,” the unknown caller said.

“What?” Rhonda asked.

“I’m sorry. This is Pat, how you doin’? I’m sorry to bother you, but the kids gave me this number.” Pat was married to John’s cousin Paul.

“You’re not bothering me. I just can’t believe what you’re saying.”

“He died yesterday afternoon. He had an asthma attack on the A train.”

Rhonda knew that in many ways this was a tragedy. John was only thirty-six years old. He had a new wife and a two-year-old daughter. John was also the father of Rhonda’s daughter, Nisa, and he had helped her raise her children. But Rhonda had an irresistible urge to laugh. And as soon as she hung up, she did. When she told Adeyemi why she was laughing, he told her she was a disgrace. So she stopped laughing and started dancing. It was absolutely disgraceful. A priestess dancing all over the hallway of the State Capitol because the man who beat her for seven years was dead. Rhonda’s only regret was that she couldn’t throw a parade.

By the time she got home, she had regained her composure. She told the children and had difficulty