“Is your grandmother from wealth, too?” She grinned at me. “Did your grandparents have an arranged marriage to keep the wealth in the family?”
“Kinda sorta,” I admitted.
She clapped her hands together. “I knew it! I knew it! Georgia Israel just seems like one of those stuck-up debutantes who was groomed to marry into a ritzy-titzy family.”
I chuckled at her characterization of my grandmother. “Uh, before my great grandfather, Zion Israel, started Grand Aviation, he was a scholar. He was naturally gifted with brilliance. His family was lower-middle class. His father worked on the railroad, and his mother was a talented seamstress. My great grandfather was able to go to school for aeronautical engineering, working on airplanes. He worked as the lead technician at Eastern Airlines. He had a good job and was able to give his son, my grandfather, all of the same advantages he was given, Apparently, when the debs came out the year that my grandfather, Judah Israel, turned eighteen, he was one of the hottest commodities.”
“Your grandfather’s name is Judah?”
“Yeah. The tradition of naming the Israel offspring after biblical locations goes back to my great grandfather. My great grandfather was Zion. My grandfather is Judah. My dad is Jericho, and I’m Kaynaan.
“Anyway, the way my grandfather tells it, he only had eyes for Georgia. But Georgia was busy spending all her time with some other cat, whose father was the first black judge in the county.
“Judah chased her and chased her, but Georgia wasn’t on that type of time. Finally, Judah gave up. No sooner than he gave up was old boy Georgia liked drafted into the war. All of a sudden, she was on Judah’s dick.”
She cracked up. “I can’t believe you said that about your own grandmother.”
“Listen,” I said with a shrug, “the truth is the truth.”
“So, was Judah still interested?”
“He was. But in the interim, when Georgia was still chasing dude who died in the war, Judah started running around with some other chick.”
“Okay. Okay. Well, if she wasn’t interested and he was an eligible bachelor . . . I see nothing wrong with that.”
“The problem was that Judah apparently didn’t take Georgia’s affections as being sincere. I mean, she jumped off of dude’s dick and onto Judah’s pretty quickly.”
“I wish you would stop saying that.” She giggled.
“He maintained his . . . relationship . . . with the other woman, Sylvia. Now Judah, rumor has it, that he was laying it low and spreading it wide.”
She howled with laughter. “Oh my goodness, shut up! This story is so good. It’s like a soap opera.”
“Uppity ass Georgia was pregnant after less than a year of dating. Pregnant and unmarried. It was a disgrace. Judah’s parents and Georgia’s parents got to putting together a very hasty but ostentatious ass wedding. As soon as the announcement came out that Judah was engaged to marry Georgia Arlington, Sylvia cornered Georgia at the dime store.”
“Not the dime store, Kaynaan! Are you making this up?”
“Nah. I’m telling you my family history. The Israels ain’t always been squeaky clean. That’s why it bothers the fuck outta me that my grandmother tries to portray us like we’re perfect. It’s dumb as hell, when the family name’s been scandalized since the beginning of time. Anyway, Sylvia’s ass was pregnant, too.”
“What?”
“What, what? I told you Judah’s ho ass was laying it low and spreading it wide.”
“I didn’t know that was what you meant. I didn’t know he had two women pregnant. Ooh! That’s so YN of him.”
“Say word. Ghetto ass family.”
She cracked up. “Your family is far from ghetto, Kaynaan.”
“You’re saying that, but you haven’t heard the rest of the story.
“Continue.”
“Long story short?—”
“Don’t shorten it. I wantallthe details.”
I had to chuckle. “Anyway, when Judah’s mother found out that Sylvia was pregnant, she was pissed. Sylvia’s family was poor and known for cutting up in public. You know, being drunk, being unruly, stuff like that. Anyway, before a scandal could erupt about the double pregnancies, Sylvia conveniently fell down a flight of stairs and lost the baby.”
