Read Online Second Sunday by Michele Andrea Bowen - Free Book Online Page B

house.”
    Sheba frowned. “I thought she and I had gotten past all of that.”
    “It’s not Katie Mae this time,” Nettie said. “It’s Cleavon. He’s mad about the way things are going with hiring a pastor.
     And when that jackass is upset about something, he gives Katie Mae a hard time.”
    “Yeah,” Viola added, “that man would die a thousand deaths if she came over to your house.”
    “Well, I for one am glad the girl stayed home,” Sylvia said between bites. “Cleavon would just butter her up to get information
     he don’t need to have. And that man know how to put it on Katie Mae when he want something.”
    Sheba secretly wondered how Cleavon Johnson managed to do all of that. He was too mean and selfish to “put it on” a woman
     good enough to turn her head.
    “So,” Nettie said, watching her ice cream melt over the cobbler, “what y’all thinking on Rev. Wilson?”
    “He the one,” Viola said. “We don’t need to interview anybody else. Rev. Wilson is the pastor we need. I know it in my heart.”
    “I agree,” Sylvia said. “What about you, Sheba, since you’ve had the most contact with the man.”
    Sheba smiled kind of dreamy-like and said, “I think Rev. Wilson is absolutely perfect.”
    “Huh?” Nettie said.
    “I mean, I think he’ll make a very good pastor—good enough to make me think about coming to church on Thanksgiving and Palm
     Sunday.”
    “That good?” Viola stated. “Umph, he really have it going on, for you to add some extra days to your worship schedule.”
    “Yeah, Rev. Wilson got a whole lot going on for him,” Sheba responded with a soft sigh.
    “I’ll talk to Bert,” Nettie said. “He likes Rev. Wilson a lot and wants to hire him.”
    As soon as the search committee sat down to discuss hiring Rev. Wilson, Cleavon jumped in with his objections.
    “You all practically had heart attacks over hiring Rev. Clemson because he wasn’t trustworthy with a street woman. And now
     y’all just chompin’ at the bit to hire a man who ain’t even married. Now, if a married man couldn’t be trusted to behave,
     what do you think will happen with a man who ain’t got a wife warming his bed on a nightly basis?” Cleavon demanded, and then
     answered his own question, “I’ll tell you what’ll happen. The Negro will go runnin’ through the women in this church like
     he runnin’ through a puddle of water.”
    “And Pastor Clydell Forbes, the biggest two-timing dog on two feet, was more trustworthy than Rev. Wilson, right?” asked Mr.
     Louis Loomis. “Next thing I know, you’ll be trying to tell me that those two women who climbed up in his coffin hollering
     and screaming ‘Please, Big Daddy, don’t leave me’ were his cousins.”
    “What does the late Clydell Forbes have to do with all of this?” Cleavon said defensively.
    “Everything,” Mr. Louis Loomis answered. “Because if that Negro would have left all those women alone, took better care of
     himself, and avoided that heart attack, we wouldn’t be sitting up in this room without a pastor before our anniversary. And
     there ain’t nothing wrong with Rev. Wilson, Cleavon, other than you can’t run over him and run this church through him.”
    “He could be one of those men who don’t like women,” Cleavon countered. “What would you say about that?”
    Turning away from Cleavon, Mr. Louis Loomis addressed Bert. “Hire George Wilson. He’s the right man for the job, and you and
     most everybody with some sense on this committee knows it.”
    “Over my dead body,” Cleavon jumped up shouting.
    “That
can
be arranged, you know,” Melvin Sr. said.
    “Talk ’bout a blessing in disguise,” Wendell half-mumbled.
    “Cleavon,” Bert said, “Rev. Wilson is my choice, plus the women want us to hire him.”
    “That’s because that pansy promised he would do stupid, idiotic things like appointing a woman to our Finance Committee. He
     even had the audacity to say that he would ordain