If Memory Serves Read online

Johnnie Mae leaned in closer to him. “You’re soaking wet,” she said.

  “Yeah. It’s called sweat. That’s why I’m taking a shower.” He hugged her tighter. “Oops. I guess that makes you wet now.”

  She pushed him away from her in a playful manner. He stopped walking, leaned down, and gave her yet another kiss.

  Chapter 9

  Put Me in remembrance: let us plead together: declare thou, that thou mayest be justified.

  Isaiah 43:26

  Thirty-five-year-old Theresa Jordan married forty-three-year-old Maurice Greene on June 22, 2002. It had been quite sentimental, with her and her mother, Lena, marrying on the same day in a double-wedding ceremony. Mauricia, Theresa and Maurice’s baby girl, had been born on September 11, 2001. Almost a year after they wed, Theresa learned she was pregnant again. A healthy, seven-pound-six-ounce baby boy was born to the two of them on February 16, 2004. She and Maurice had disagreed from the start what his name would be. Maurice wanted him to be a junior or the second, and Theresa didn’t think that was such a great idea in the least.

  “Then we’d have Mauricia and Maurice. People might mistake them for being twins or something,” Theresa had argued.

  “So,” was all Maurice had said in defense of it. “Who cares what other people think? This is my son, and I’d like him to be named after me. Who knows when we’ll have another boy,” he said as his counterargument.

  “Oh, I can tell you. This is it for me. I’m getting too old to be running around behind children,” Theresa said.

  So the baby was named Maurice Gilead Greene the Second.

  Now the sixteen-month-old toddler, whom they most times called M-double-G or MGG, was being hurriedly placed in his car seat as Theresa rushed to leave for Asheville, North Carolina. Theresa had asked Maurice to come with her, but he couldn’t get Monday off from work. If he went with Theresa, they would have to return on Sunday night. Theresa wasn’t certain of all that was awaiting her at Sarah’s house, so she didn’t want to be obligated to come home that quickly in case there was a need for her to remain longer.

  “Didn’t you tell me your parents are there?” Maurice asked.

  “Yes,” she said, wringing her hands.

  “Look at you, Theresa. You’re a nervous wreck,” Maurice said. “I really don’t want you driving to Asheville alone, not when you’re like this. So here’s what we’ll do. I’ll drive you up there, and if you decide you need to stay longer than Sunday night, I’ll leave you there. You can either ride back with your parents, or I can come back and get you next weekend. Flexibility—yet another advantage to being a stay-at-home mom.”

  “You’d do that, Maurice? Because I really don’t want to go up there alone. I honestly don’t know how I’ll react to seeing Memory again.”

  “I know. I saw you almost falling apart when you hung up from talking with your mother after she told you Memory was there.”

  “I don’t understand how she could just show up without warning like she did.”

  “Well, Theresa . . . now, your great-grandmother has been searching for her. This is what Sarah’s been praying a long time to happen.”

  “Yeah, but Memory could have called and prepared her by letting her know she was coming instead of just showing up on her doorstep the way that she did. All I know is that if Memory serves to hurt either her or my mother again . . . I just don’t understand what motivates Memory to do what she does. That’s all. I just don’t understand.”

  Maurice threw enough things in a duffle bag to last the weekend, and off they went to Asheville. They arrived late Saturday afternoon.

  “Hi, Mama,” Theresa said to Lena as the two of them hugged at the door. “How are you holding up?”

  Lena shook her head. “Let’s not ruin this moment just yet.” She hugged Mauricia and made a fuss over her before reaching for the baby to come to her. “Look at both of you! You’ve both grown just in the past few weeks since I saw you last,” she said.

  Maurice Senior kissed his mother-in-law on the cheek, then carried their things upstairs to their usual bedroom.

  Lena and Theresa exchanged pleasantries, and Lena got to spend a little more time fussing over her grandchildren as they sat in the parlor. Maurice came downstairs and sat next to his wife. M-double-G toddled over to his father and scrambled up into his lap.

  “Do you want to go up and speak to your great-grandmother now?” Lena asked Theresa. “She’s awake.”

  “How is she doing?” Theresa asked.

  “The doctor says she’s much better. It wasn’t bad enough for him to have to put her in the hospital. She just got a little too excited, I guess. It put a strain on her heart and the rest of her system. He wants her to take it easy and not overdo it. They’re closely monitoring her blood pressure, as well as other things. She’s getting top-of-the-line care.”

  “And Memory?” Theresa asked, looking as though she’d eaten something nasty.

  “She’s upstairs . . . with Sarah.”

  “Of course. And you left Great-grandmother alone with her?”

  “Yes,” Lena said. “It’s what Sarah wants.”

  Theresa began shaking her head. “I just don’t believe this.”

  Lena touched Theresa’s knee. “It’s not like we weren’t expecting one day for this to happen. Sarah has paid tons of money to find Memory. This day was inevitable.”

  “Yeah, I know. But I guess, deep down, I was hoping . . .”

  “What? That Memory would never show up?” Lena asked as she smiled and cocked her head to the side.

  Theresa rolled her eyes and sighed. “No. I wanted Great-grandmother to get to meet her. I’m sorry, Mama, but I just don’t trust Memory. Okay, there—I said it. I don’t want Great-grandmother to end up hurt.”

  “You mean like you and I ended up hurt?”

  Theresa leaned her head back and placed her hands on her face. “Yes, like you and I ended up hurt.” She looked at Lena. “Mama, we put ourselves as well as our hearts out there for Memory, and look what she did to us. Look what she did to you, her own child. She left you when you were a child. And when you needed her most, she came back after your grandmother died . . . or should I say Mamie—”

  “As far as I’m concerned, Mamie was and always will be considered a grandmother to me. I’m not disrespecting Sarah in any way by saying that. Mamie raised me. People say that blood is thicker than water, but love is thicker than them both. Big Mama loved me. She loved Memory, too, in spite of all the awful things Memory did.”

  “I still can’t believe how they pulled that off,” Maurice said, chiming in. “Sarah having a baby on the same day Mamie Patterson had hers. In order to save Sarah’s baby from Sarah’s half-brother, Heath, Sarah’s mother, Grace, got Mamie, a stranger, to pretend she’d given birth to twins, a boy and a girl, and then raise Sarah’s child as her own. Truth can definitely be stranger than fiction.”

  “And that’s the point here we must remember. Memory is Sarah’s child,” Lena said. “There’s no denying it. My goodness, you can look at the two of them and see that.”

  “Great-grandmother has gone through so much during her lifetime,” Theresa said as she picked up MGG, who was standing before her with his arms raised high. “I just can’t sit back and allow somebody like we know Memory to be to come in and possibly do the exact same thing to her that Sarah’s family did all of these years.”

  “Memory claims she’s changed,” Lena said.

  “Yeah? Now where have we heard that before? Oh, that’s right. At my house. Right before she lied and stole the Alexandrite necklace right out of our safe-deposit box from a bank vault, no less! I can’t possibly fathom why we wouldn’t believe her now.”

  “Theresa, there’s no need in you getting all upset about it. Sarah is fully aware of what Memory did and how we feel about her for that. But the bottom line is that Memory is her daughter . . . her only child . . . her flesh and blood. And we know how a mother can be when it comes to her own.”

&nb
sp; “Oh, yes. Tee, of all people, should identify with how motherhood changes you,” Maurice said, using the name he sometimes still called her. “She lets our two darlings get away with all sorts of things.”

  “I do not,” Theresa said as she continued to turn her face away from the hard pats MGG was inflicting on it simultaneously with both his little hands.

  “M-double-G, stop that,” Maurice said sternly. Maurice the Second turned, looked over at his father, and started laughing as he unexpectedly reared backward. “See what I mean?” Maurice said, pointing at Theresa. “There’s no way Theresa would have ever stood for something like that before she had Mauricia and Maurice. No way.” He laughed.

  Theresa put MGG on the floor. He ran over to Mauricia and started trying to take away a toy she was playing with. “I suppose I really need to go speak to Great-grandmother,” Theresa said. “But honestly, I don’t feel like seeing Memory just yet.”

  “Well, hello, Theresa,” a voice said softly from the arched entranceway.

  Theresa looked in that direction. “Memory,” she said, acknowledging her grandmother with barely an audible word and a nod.

  “It’s good to see you,” Memory said as she came closer. “And these two beauties must be my great-grandbabies.” She headed more in the direction of the children. “They are beautiful!” Memory said, smiling at them. She glanced over at Theresa.

  Theresa found herself just staring at Memory. The closer she was getting to her and her children, the more Theresa’s jaw had tightened. The rage she thought she’d gotten under control was rapidly beginning to make its way to the surface. Theresa turned away from Memory and looked at Lena, who, she quickly discovered, was watching her.

  It was all but apparent to Theresa: being around Memory, in the same room with her, in the same house with her, in the same city with her, in the same state, was going to be a lot harder than she ever thought. A lot harder!

  Chapter 10

  Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.

  Isaiah 49:15

  Theresa stood up, leaned down, and kissed Lena. She picked up little Maurice, grabbed Mauricia by the hand, then walked toward Memory. When she reached her, she turned back to look at Lena and Maurice. “We’re going up to see Great-grandmother now.”

  “Theresa,” Memory said as she reached out and touched her arm.

  Theresa looked at Memory’s hand. “Please don’t ever do that again,” Theresa said.

  Memory removed her hand. “I’m sorry. Theresa, I’m sorry about everything.”

  Theresa laughed and shook her head. “Yes. I’m sure you are.” She then left and went upstairs.

  When Theresa reached the top of the stairs, she let out a long sigh. She took her hand and wiped away the tears that, despite her best efforts to keep them at bay, had somehow managed to squeeze out and down her cheeks. She took a deep breath, knocked softly on the door, and walked in with all smiles, into Sarah’s bedroom.

  “Well, well. Look who’s here,” Sarah said. “Gayle told me you all were here. I was wondering how long it would be before you would come up to see me. Come give Grammy-grand a kiss,” Sarah said with a smile. Grammy-grand was what her great-great-grandchildren called her.

  Mauricia didn’t talk much. She was shy and, most times, had to be coaxed into interacting with others. “Mauricia, give Grammy-grand a hug and a kiss,” Theresa said, giving her daughter a little push toward the bed.

  “Hi, Grammy-grand,” Mauricia said as she gave Sarah a halfhearted hug and a carefully placed kiss on the cheek.

  Theresa leaned MGG down so he could kiss Sarah. “Mmmm-mmmh!” MGG said as he kissed her.

  “Wow! That was some good sugar,” Sarah said. “I have a present for you two.”

  “You do?” Mauricia said, her face lighting up now. “What is it? Where is it, Grammy-grand?”

  Sarah laughed. “Oh, so you’re only as quiet as you want folks to believe you to be, I see,” Sarah said to Mauricia. “Miss Gayle, will you take them down to the playroom and give them their presents from me?” Sarah said to her nursemaid.

  “Sure thing, Miss Fleming. Come on, kids. Let’s go see what Grammy-grand got for you,” Gayle said, knowing Sarah was really trying to garner some alone-time with Theresa.

  After the room was cleared out, Sarah motioned for Theresa to sit down in the chair next to the bed. “Why so much sadness? Why the down face?” Sarah asked.

  “I’m sorry. I must be tired from the ride. I didn’t realize I appeared down.”

  “Oh, you don’t. In fact, you’re doing a terrific job faking that smile to show just how peachy keen things are. You forget though . . . I have a gift to see beyond all of that. So tell me. What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing really.”

  “Theresa, I know you’re not happy about Memory being here. I know Lena isn’t, either. I’m sorry about that. You both brought your cases against her to me from the very beginning. And believe me, it’s not that I’m being insensitive to your and Lena’s feelings or discounting what she did to you both. But she’s still my child—my only child.”

  “Great-grandmother, please don’t let the way I or my mother feels affect you and your happiness. We truly don’t mean to dampen this joyous occasion for you.”

  Sarah smiled. “I’m well aware you don’t trust Memory any farther than you can throw her. But Theresa, in loving Memory I must move past the things she may have done in her past. For this to work, I have to give her a fair shake now. I want to know her for however much time I have left on this earth. I have to do all I can to make every second of our time together count for something good. Do you understand?”

  Theresa took her great-grandmother’s hand. “I understand, and I won’t ruin this for you. But will you do just one thing for me?”

  “What’s that?”

  “Be careful. Memory may be trying to convince everyone that she’s changed, but I don’t want her to hurt you. That’s all. In loving Memory, I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  Sarah squeezed Theresa’s hand slightly. “Theresa, what can Memory do to hurt me? Honestly? What do I have that she can take that’s not already hers? I know I just met her today, but she’s the true heir to all of this,” Sarah said, making a sweeping gesture with her hand. “She doesn’t have to take what’s already hers. All I want is her heart and to give her mine. That to me is more important than these temporary material things.”

  Theresa relaxed in the chair and sighed. “You know, you are so wise. You almost make me feel bad about being angry with her about a thing.”

  “Be angry, but sin not. Theresa, you know you weren’t really angry at her about that Alexandrite necklace. The necklace was a mere symbol, that’s all it was. Both you and your mother were hurt because she took your heart and your love, and to you, she stomped all over it without any regard to what she was doing. She made you feel your love was nothing to her. That’s the thing you and Lena will have to find your way back from. You trusted Memory with your heart, and she didn’t take care of it the way you thought she should have. You gave her your love, and it appeared she didn’t return that love or respect back to you.” Sarah began coughing uncontrollably.

  Theresa immediately jumped up and poured water into her glass. She handed it to Sarah and helped her hold it as she drank. “Do I need to get Gayle for you?” she asked.

  Sarah sipped the water and released a sigh, then a smile. “I’m okay. Maybe a little tired now. It’s been a long day, to say the least. A good one, but a long one nevertheless.”

  Theresa took the half-empty glass and set it back on the nightstand. “Do you need me to get you anything else?”

  “Would you mind sending Memory back up here for me?” Sarah said as she closed her eyes. “I’d like to see her again.”

  “Of course, Great-grandmother.” Theresa leaned down and planted a kiss on the matriarch’s forehead. She appeared in s
uch perfect peace. “Of course,” Theresa whispered so as not to wake her.

  Chapter 11

  I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron....

  Isaiah 45:2

  Memory had gone in and sat in the light pink wingback chair near Lena. She looked at her, then smiled. “So, you had plastic surgery done on your face?” she asked.

  Lena looked at her, shook her head, and smiled. She still found it hard to believe just how insensitive her mother really could be. “Yes, I had plastic surgery. But not for the reason you may think.”

  “How could you possibly know what I’m thinking?” Memory asked. She could see the tightness in Lena’s demeanor. “I think you might be a wee bit too sensitive still.”

  Lena laughed. “See there, the same old Memory.”

  “I’m not the same, Lena. I told you that. At least I’ve tried to tell you that, but you refuse to spend any time in the same room with me long enough to hear me out.” Memory leaned forward. “I’m not the same person I was the last time you saw me.”

  “Yeah. Well, I find it interesting how pleased you seem to be about my face.”

  “I’m pleased because you’re so beautiful.”

  Lena began to nod her head and prim her mouth even more. “And I suppose I wasn’t so beautiful when you saw me last.”

  “Look, Lena. I’m sure you still have a lot of mental issues about your face. But I haven’t done anything to merit your attacking me like this. Frankly, I didn’t care what you looked like the last time I saw you.”

  Lena shook her head slowly and smiled. “That’s right. You didn’t care what anybody looked like the last time we were together. You were only interested in getting your hands on that Alexandrite necklace. Well, I hope it was worth it.” She looked right in Memory’s face. “And for your information, I had the plastic surgery not because I cared so much about how I look, although I’m sure you have a problem with that statement. I had it done because of medical problems it was causing with my eye and that side of my face. It was for health reasons, not vanity.”