Jezebel (2 page)

But seemingly overnight,
something snapped. Ever since the
y
left
St. Louis, she’d done a complete three sixty. She barely
made
it
through
last night’s performance, missed this morning’s practice
and tonight’s double
performances
altogether.

Grown folks could do what
they wanted, but when it affected
Tookie’s
profit margin something had to give. She’d turned a blind eye
long enough! With each circuit, Celeste’s antics had become all
too common and tonight she’d become a liability.

M
olly,
one of Celeste’s many enablers, waited for her outside the
girls’ dressing room.
T
ookie
snorted, as if a lookout would soften her friend’s impending
coup de grace
.
Upon spotting her, the girl shoved away from the door with the grace
of a dancer.

Tall, lithe and
light-skinned, the New York native could have easily found herself a
spot within the higher end clubs
in
Manhattan
like
the Plantation Inn or even the Cotton Club.

But one couldn’t
remain
static and
outrun
an abusive husband. So she’d chosen the circuit three years
ago. All her girls were running from something or someone,
T
ookie
mused. Still
,
her
past
didn’t
dissuade her from punishing her right along with her friend.

“
Hey, Ms.
T
ookie,”
M
olly
gushed. The pink
staining
her high
cheeks made her look much younger than her twenty-nine years,
which
was way
over
the hill by show business standards. “I was looking for you.”

T
ookie
ignored the girl’s effusive greeting and b
old
-faced
lie. “I’m docking you
for missing
tonight’s show. Now scram.”

Sputtering
over the pay cut
,
the girl stepped aside.

Unmindful of the costumes on
the floor and dressing tables dusty from too much powder,
T
ookie
picked her way to the rear of the dressing room. Out of habit,
Celeste usually took a space in the back.

“
T
hat
pay
cut isn’t
fair, Ms.
T
ookie,”
M
olly
protested
,
finally catching up with her
.
“We were just trying to help. You see—”

“
Save it! I’m
fed up to here,”
T
ookie
waved her hand above her head for emphasis
,
“with excuses for that gal’s behavior.”

“
Who
would
replace
her? She’s the star of the show
.
”

T
ookie
hadn’t become a successful business woman without some cunning
or at least a plan B
or C
.
“She
was
one of the stars
,
but
I planned
on replacing her.”
With
the
well-guarded secret lifted from her shoulders,
T
ookie
exhaled
.

On the other hand,
M
olly
looked like she was about to suffer an epileptic seizure. “W
-w-w
ho
are you replacing her with?”

“
I’ve had Wilma
secretly learning all of Celeste’s moves.” Yes, she was
a
n
ass
, but
business was business and her backup plan would save hers.

While
M
olly
digested the news,
T
ookie
returned to her mission. The sooner she got this over with, the
sooner they could all move on.

T
ookie
rounded the last dressing table. And her bravado immediately fell by
the waist side at the sight of her star. Garbed in a white silk
dressing gown, she lay
prostrate
over a dressing table. Figures
.
She
was stone
cold drunk.

T
ookie
reached out, but she stopped, arrested by the sound of muffled sobs.
In her haste, she
’d
missed
the
entire
picture.

Celeste’s jet black
hair partially covered her sweetheart-shaped face and her slim
shoulders shook. Del
i
la
h
,
another enabler, sat beside her, rubbing her back and cooing words of
comfort.

T
ookie
took a deep calming breath. She could not and would not break. Not
even for a few crocodile tears and her genuine
fondness
for the girl. When not drinking, Celeste could be an absolute angel.
Hardworking and compassionate, she never spoke an unkind word and was
generous to a fault.

Once, when they came across
a Negro family
stranded
on the
highway
,
Celeste didn’t hesitate in giving them money
for
food and
repairs
on their
car.

Remembering the girl’s
charity and how it galvanized everyone in the troupe,
T
ookie
softened her approach.
Her
approach altered, s
he
pulled up a chair and sat down.

For good measure,
T
ookie
reached inside her dress pocket and pulled out a handkerchief
embroidered with yellow daisies. Her sister Ethel mailed it and
several others to her for her birthday
last
March. Not
wanting to stain the fine linen with boogers and what not,
T
ookie
shove it back into her pocket.

Unfortunately, Del
il
a
h
had
witnessed
T
ookie’s
gesture of momentary kindness because she swiped the handkerchief and
thrust it into Celeste’s hand.

Met by more muffled sobs,
T
ookie
looked to Del
i
la
h
for answers. Celeste never mixed tears with booze. Loud and
boisterous under the influence of alcohol, she
remained
the life of any party. There
had
to be
something
more to this than simply falling off the wagon.

“
Celeste, honey, why
don’t you tell me what’s wrong? What’s got you so
down
?”

Sniffing, Celeste sat up and
cupped her chin in her hand. Despite the dried up tears staining her
high cheek bones and the bags underscoring her dark almond shaped
eyes, she remained traffic-stopping gorgeous.

When Celeste blew her nose,
T
ookie
noticed the yellow paper balled in her
fist
.
Stepping out on a limb, she asked, “This doesn’t have
anything to do with that telegram you received
the
other day in Columbus
?”

“
Everything,”
Celeste sniffled
.
“My
daddy’s dead.”

T
ookie
reached out and placed her hand over one of hers.
“My
condolences, Sugar Foo
t.
It hurt me
something awful when my daddy pass—”

“
That’s the
thing,” Celeste
pulled
her hand free and
jumped
up
.
She
executed
a step heel turn to the center of the room. For someone whose por
e
s
reeked of King Kong liquor, she was pretty light on her feet. “I’m
not sad.”

Tasting lemons of the
sourest kind,
T
ookie
pursed her lips. She should’ve heeded her ex-lover and mentor
Beau River
’
s
advice and taken on an all male revue. The return on a mostly female
revue was huge, but when
she
figured in all the drama and tears, she barely broke even.

“
Then why were you all
over town singing the blues at the bottom of a mason jar? And why
did you miss tonight’s performance
s
?”
T
ookie
reminded
her
, shelving
the compassionate act.

Celeste rocked back and
forth to a private melody. “Am I blue?” she asked in a
sing-song tone.

“
I don’t know
that’s what I asked you.” Before she even finished her
sentence,
T
ookie
knew she’d been set up.

Celeste confirmed it by
performing a soft shoe combination consisting of a scuff dig ball
change. “Am I blue

am
I blue,” she sang in perfect pitch rivaling Ethel Waters
herself, “maybe, but so would you, if your
d
addy
hated you.”

Her
star’s
smile lost its bravado and turned watery.
She
opened her mouth and her words ended in a ragged sigh.
Despite
her shenanigans,
T
ookie’s
heart went out to the girl. “Don’t you think hate is a
little harsh, Sugar Foot?”

Celeste’s slippers
slowed to a soft scrape back and forth. “From the day I
screamed my way into the world and stole my mama’s last breath,
my
D
addy
made it his business to make my life a living hell. Nothing I did was
ever good enough, which meant I wasn’t good enough.”

“
What about your
career?” Del
i
la
h
asked. “You’re one of the best on the circuit, a
headliner
.
”

Celeste snorted. “He
especially didn’t like my dancing. According to Cecil
“Reverend”
Newsome, I was a harlot

a
jezebel for dancing in public. When I scored
my
first professional
gig
at the Plantation Inn, he threw me out of the house.” Celeste
stopped dancing altogether. In the ensuing silence,
T
ookie
could hear the sound of her heartbeat. “I was only fifteen,”
Celeste whispered.

Both Del
i
la
h
and
M
olly
gasped
.
T
ookie took
the dancer’s confession in stride. In this line of business,
tales of woe came with the territory.

Celeste started up another
combination, her feet
scuffing
out
a solemn
rhythm
which
rivaled her sob story. “In all honesty,” she continued.
“I’m mad at myself for running away all these years. And
I’m mad I never
told
that Holier than thou son of a bitch to go to hell.”

“
Everything happens
for a reason,”
M
olly
countered.

“
And there’s
always a rainbow at the end of a storm,” Del
i
la
h
chimed in.

Tookie rolled her eyes.
She’d fallen into a sappy melodrama.

Celeste paused in the middle
of a riff, landing on the ball of her foot. “I do have a reason
to be happy,” she acquiesced. “I’m finally going
home.”

The way she worded ‘going
home’ lifted the hairs on the back of
T
ookie’s
neck. On one hand, she welcomed the news. On the other, the dancer’s
departure would leave
T
ookie
with only one star attraction for the rest of the season
.
And t
hey’d
only completed
the
first leg
of a
twenty-two city tour
!