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Sins of the Past Nathasha Brooks-Harris
Xpress Yourself
Publishing, February 12, 2009
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Sins of the Past:
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t's 1964 in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, and the Robinson sisters—Ernestine, Annie Mae, and Viola—are making a way out of no way. Times are hard for the three maids who accept their plight, thinking they can do no better. But not Ernestine. She's a beauty; and says hell no, she wants more. She sets out to get it. Every Thursday is maids' day off, so the three come back to their brownstone apartment to eat some good country cooking and party the night away at Teensey's Sugar Shack. But for some reason, Ernestine refuses to join them in the revelry. She gets dolled up and goes out alone. The feisty Viola accuses of her trying to "pass" and sneaking around to see a secret lover she has stashed in parts unknown. However, there is a reason for Ernestine's disappearing acts, and she sets out to make her dreams come true. Meanwhile, the sisters get a call to go home to Alabama because their mother is gravely ill. Mama Rob begins to make a deathbed confession to them, but dies before she finishes. Fights between them ensue, and the only thing they agree on is that whatever Mama Rob was trying to tell them has to be in her beloved old steamer trunk. They sift through it and find a letter she wrote to them revealing a secret sin of the past. From then on, the sisters are at war, and refuse to accept what they've learned. Will the secret tear the estranged sisters apart, or bring them closer together? Will they learn how to forgive everyone involved and lean on their love for each other to get them past the drama and the pain? Read Sins Of The Past, a tale of secrets, lies, and redemption.
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Brooks-Harris the former Editor-in-Chief of Black Romance, Bronze Thrills, and True Confessions magazine. In addition, she continues as a Contributing Editor at Today's Black Woman magazine. Brooks-Harris writes the popular monthly departments called "Career and Money News," "Career Savvy" and a women's general information column called "FYI." She has written relationship, travel, and entertainment articles for Today's Black Woman and Black Man magazines for the past nine years. She has written similar articles for Black Elegance and Belle magazines. Formerly, her confession stories and novellas for True Confessions Magazine received enthusiastic response from the publications' loyal readers. She also completed long stints as Music Editor of Metro Exchange newspaper, Senior Editor of New York Trend and Sunday Morning newspapers, Gossip Columnist at Chocolate Singles magazine, and Editor-In-Chief of Black Hair Digest, Word Up Special and FLY Magazines. Throughout her career, Brooks-Harris has been a freelance journalist for numerous publications in the United States and abroad. Beside her fiction and journalism work, she is a book reviewer for QBR magazine, SORMag, Romance In Color, and The Romer Review websites. She also writes articles about romance writing and the publishing industry for SORMag. Recently, she has become a contributor for the Gumbo For The Soul website, where she writes about breaking into writing and getting successfully published. She is the co-founder of the romance writing website devoted to women romance authors of color, The Wonderful Women of Romance” a part of The Belles & Beaux of Romance, where she was formerly a reviewer. |
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Brooklyn, New York 1964 “What the hell do you mean you’re not going out with us tonight, Ernestine?” Viola quizzed, placing a hand on her ample hip. “You’ve been canceling out a lot on us, lately. You got a man stashed away somewhere or something?” “Where I go and who I see is my business, which you need to give me back, Viola,” Ernestine retorted. Pulling a peach polka dot sundress over her head, and then she sat down at the small vanity table and applied her makeup. “And that goes for you, too, Annie Mae. I see you cutting your eyes at me.” “Just remember whatever you do in the dark will eventually come to the light, Ernestine,” Annie Mae interrupted, “and it might come back to bite you.” “Get out of here with all that backwoods country talk. Annie Mae. You sound just like Mama Rob.” Ernestine scolded, brushing her curly shoulder-length hair so it would fall naturally around her face, accentuating her cream-colored complexion. “I don’t listen when she says those things, so I’m surely not going to listen to your lecturing me. Just leave me be, and you and Viola go about your business and do whatever it is you two do on our Thursdays off.” “Just listen at her, Annie Mae, slinging around those pretty, high falutin’ words. Do what-ev-er-it-is–that-you-two-do,” Viola slowly mocked, enunciating every syllable. She closed in around Ernestine, invading her personal space, causing her slight discomfort. Responding to this sudden intrusion, Ernestine backed up a few inches. However, Viola’s feet remained firmly planted to the spot where she stood. “You so proper since you’ve been working for that rich doctor up in Scarsdale. It’s almost like you want nothing to do with us talking all that white talk.” “How did you figure that out, Viola?” Ernestine’s voice was laced with obvious condescension. Backing away from her overbearing sister, she returned to her comfort zone near her vanity table. “You’re right about that. I don’t want to be seen with either one of you non-dressing, countrified women who don’t even have sense enough to lose some of that extra weight you’re carrying around. Those clothes you’re wearing are nothing more than your madams’ hand-me-downs, and you can’t even match them up right. Stripes and flowers don’t go together. Perhaps they’d be okay down in Shorter, Alabama, but not here in Brooklyn. And we’re not even going to talk about how you two massacre the English language. Why would I want to go hang out with a bunch of corn-fed, razor-toting, hooch-slinging, moonshine-drinking barflies at Teensy’s Sugar Shack, when I can go to classy places in the city and act like the refined, cultured lady I am?” “Refined cultured lady, my ass, Ernestine,” Viola shot back, squaring her broad shoulders, walking toward Ernestine, wagging a stubby finger in her face. “You’re a sleep-in maid who cleans up behind white folks just like us. You got nothing no different to brag about, so don’t be trying to be such a big shot like you don’t get your high yella ass on the back of that bus headed to the suburbs at the crack of dawn with all of us maids. This high siditty city slicker mess you’re putting down is all a front because we know who you is, and it ain’t ‘one of the family’ like your white folks tell you. That’ll never happen. Their pets have more rights than you. You may be living in this fine house on a beautiful tree-lined street in Brooklyn, but don’t forget who you are. You are and will always be nothing but a Negro—even though you can pass for white. You’ll never be white, so save yourself some heartache and stop trying! Wake the hell up before it’s too late!” “And what’s so wrong with us hanging out at Teensy’s Sugar Shack every Thursday night, Ernestine?” Annie Mae inquired in a tone that was more an interrogation than a question. “We love going over there on our Thursdays off and whooping it up with our home folks. These New Yorkers don’t know how to have fun like us Alabama people. We can be ourselves and get just as loud and ‘country’ as we want to, and nobody will say anything about it. It’s nice to go somewhere where we can put aside our citified manners and be who we are. If we wanna drink hooch from a Mason jar, we can. If we wanna eat rib sandwiches and lick our fingers or take off our shoes, we don’t have to worry about what these stuck-up city folks will say. Teensy’s feels so much like home.” “See, that’s exactly what I’m talking about,” Ernestine cut in, “I have no desire to drink hooch out of jars, eat gigantic rib sandwiches slathered with sauce, or to play cards, or get a little bit in Teensy’s back room.” “Uh . . . uh . . . how do you know about the back room, Ernestine?” Annie Mae asked, her face glazing with shock. Her sienna eyes widened in astonishment, and a tiny gasp escaped her full, bow-shaped lips. “I hear things!” Ernestine gloated, secure in the fact that she caught her know-it-all sister off guard for once. “Just because I don’t hang out in that bucket of blood doesn’t mean that I don’t know what’s going on there. “I do stay in the know.” Ernestine locked gazes with both of them before continuing her diatribe. She hoped to get their full attention. “I want things: a good husband, a home, children, a good job in one of those big skyscraper buildings in Manhattan, fine clothes, and whatever else life has to offer. Don’t hate me just because I don’t act like I just got off the bus straight from Alabama. I think that I deserve more than a life as a farm girl living in a two-horse town far away from anything civilized. So what if I changed my country ways to become more sophisticated like these classy New York City women? I did what I had to in order to help me get to where I want to be. If you two want to continue being country bumpkins who still behave like you’re back in Shorter and don’t want to change with the times, go ahead, I won’t stop you; but you damn sure better not try to stop me! I am going to achieve my goals any way I can. I’m going to live my life my way—and I could care less who likes it!” Grabbing her Italian leather purse off her bed, Ernestine threw it on her shoulders. She huffed in triumph as she walked off and slammed the door behind her—further validating her stance. Viola and Annie Mae went to the top of the stairs and spotted Ernestine, whose getaway wasn’t quick enough. They looked at each other and shook their heads. “Be who you are, Ernestine. You can’t run from it. Don’t ever forget were you came from.” “New York has sure changed our baby sister, Annie Mae, Viola observed, shaking her head with disgust. “I took care of things when I came up here first to get everything set up, and I wound up finding this nice brownstone apartment so we’d have our own place to come home to every Thursday when we’re all off. Somewhere we can enjoy ourselves and do whatever we want without our madams telling us what to do and when to do it. Now, this is how Ernestine’s ungrateful ass thanks me?” Viola switched on the radio and heard a news story about several Ku Klux Klan shootings in Selma, so she called her mother to check if there was any Klan activity in Shorter and if she was okay. One to pinch pennies and live within the confines of a strict budget, Viola spoke with her mother for exactly three minutes to keep the cost low. Although satisfied that all of the Klan violence was concentrated many miles away from Shorter and her mother hadn’t been harmed, something didn’t sit quite right with Viola. I can’t figure out what’s wrong, but there’s a catch in Mama Rob’s voice that I never heard before. It’s almost like she wants to tell me something, but won’t or can’t. She’ll get around to it when she gets ready, I guess. She just doesn’t sound like herself at all, Viola thought. Viola had just turned off the pot of lima beans and pigtails when she heard Annie Mae come in. They prepared fried okra and battered several butterfish and deep-fried them golden brown in hot, melted lard. Viola dished up heaping helpings of everything on each of their two plates, then they sat down, and said grace. “…And Lord, if I may be so bold, Annie Mae interjected at the end of Viola’s blessing, “please do whatever You have to help our poor baby sister, Ernestine. The girl done lost her mind, and we just want her to realize that she has to stay in a Negro’s place and stop trying to be white like she’s doing. Lord, we’re depending on You to help her remember who she really is and where she came from. Thank You. Amen.” They both felt better knowing that the Lord had Ernestine’s fate in His hands, and they didn’t have to worry about her as much as they had been. They couldn’t help it because she was obviously going through some things that she couldn’t share with them, but they loved her, anyway, because that’s what sisters did. No matter how much they disagreed, fought, or argued, blood was thicker than mud as their parents taught them, and they’d keep right on loving each other—no matter what. They would do anything to help Ernestine—if they only knew what she needed.
Sweat poured from Ernestine’s forehead as she ran the four blocks from the train to the Thursday love nest she shared with her boss, Dr. Joshua Hirsch. She’d be lucky if he didn’t send her away as he had done several times in the past when she was only several minutes late. This time, it couldn’t be helped. She used the key he left for her under the welcome mat to let herself in. “Dr. Hirsch, I’m so sorry I’m late,” she explained in gasps as she entered. Her heart thudded in her chest, and her pulse pounded as she waited for his response. “You’re late, Ernie, “he chastised, tapping his watch for emphasis, “and you know how I deplore people wasting my time because of lateness. I’ll let you off the hook this time, because there’s a more pressing issue we need to discuss. But you’d better stay in your place and watch that tone with me. I’m not one of your equals.” “Actually, I have something I need to say to you, too, and it’s rather important.” “You’ll have your turn when I’m done,” he barked, pacing around the perimeter of the large living room like a caged panther. “You need to do something about your appearance. You look like a—” “A what? A Negro?” “Yes, a Negro, and that’s unacceptable if we’re to continue our little ‘rendezvous’ and that other arrangement.” “I am a Negro, Dr. Hirsch,” Ernestine emphasized. “You knew that when you first started an affair with me.” “Be that as it may, the way you look now is totally unacceptable.” He dusted off his tailored cashmere suit with a whiskbroom, straightening the jacket in the process. “What do you want me to do to change my appearance?” “Well, start with that mop on your head.” He sighed, letting out a long breath. “You can straighten it so it’ll look more presentable, and stop wearing that candy apple red lipstick. Only hookers wear such a loud shade!” “So in other words, you want me to look more—how should I put it—white?” “If that’s how you want to put it; yes, that’s what I want.” “And what will happen to me if I refuse?” Ernestine asked, challenging him. “Well, you won’t have that cushy job as my head housekeeper and ‘events planner,’ ” he intoned. “I’ll demote you, and you’ll go back to scrubbing my floors on your hands and knees.” Further accentuating his arrogance, he played with his solid gold cufflinks, twisting them around and around. “I can make life very hard for you. I’m still your boss, so you’ll have to do whatever I say.” “Okay, you’ve said your piece; now, it’s time for me to say mine,” Ernestine advised him. She positioned her firm, trim body closer to him. “I got a letter from my school, saying that I’ll be kicked out if they don’t receive my tuition for this semester.” “And? What do you want from me?” “You shouldn’t have to ask me that,” she sparred. “I need you to take care of my tuition just as you’ve been doing all this time. You know how important it is that I get my Associate’s degree and become an executive secretary or office manager in a big company in Manhattan.” “I’ll make you a deal. If you change your looks and I like the new you, I’ll pay your tuition. If it’s unacceptable, then you’ll be on your own and you’ll have to pay it yourself—the best way you can.” “Okay, Dr. Hirsch.” You smug bastard, she thought. If changing my looks is what it’ll take for you to pay my tuition and help me get my degree, I’ll do whatever’s necessary.” “Now, what are you going to do for me today, love?” He whispered in her ear as if he had that right—as if he hadn’t made such an unreasonable request of her.
Over the next few Thursdays, Ernestine perused a number of fashion magazines for the newest, most stylish hairdos women wore. After going through that ritual for several weeks, she finally made a decision, and she made an appointment with Ms. Mary at Hattie’s Hair Heaven, the best beautician in Brooklyn. If she didn’t know much else, she knew how to hook up some hair and make all her customers feel like royalty by the time they left her shop. And that’s exactly how Ernestine felt when she checked her new look in the mirror. Her mouth curved into an unconscious smile when she saw her flowing blond tresses and her manicured to perfection coral-colored fingernails and toenails. An expression of deep satisfaction showed in her hazel eyes. Continuing her makeover, she stopped downtown at Abraham & Straus, her favorite department store, and chose several conservative outfits from the Misses department, instead of the casual Juniors department to complete her new, sophisticated look. This particular Thursday, she arrived home heavy laden with boxes from her shopping spree. She trudged up the stairs to the fourth-floor walk-up, dropping a box or two here and there. Hearing the commotion, Viola ran to the door. “What the hell is going on? Who’s making all that blame noise?” she fired off machine gun style, not waiting for a reply to any of her questions. “It’s me, Viola,” Ernestine answered, retrieving her bags from the floor. Viola stood over her baby sister, looking at her as an aristocrat would a peasant. She shook her head over and over. “Lord, ham mercy,” she muttered, noticing her teased flip hairdo and “white lady colored nails.” You done gone and lost your ever-lovin’ mind!” “I got myself a new look, that’s all. The old one wasn’t working too well,” Ernestine volleyed. “Maybe you two old hens should try it. If you did, you might get lucky.” “Enough to do what?” Viola inquired, walking over to the mirror to smooth out the off-black seamed stockings she was pulling onto her legs. “There’s nothing wrong with us, is it, sister?” “Not a thing,” Annie Mae put in, hoping to quell any disagreement about to brew between Ernestine and Viola. “I say since it ain’t broke, don’t bother fixing it.” “Hush, Ernestine,” Viola instructed her, meaning it for Annie Mae—judging from the sideways glance she cut her. “All I want to know is why you made yourself over to look like a white woman? All that blond hair ain’t gonna make you any difference. You’re still a Negro, and frankly, you’re in need of a good whupping. You can be just as uppity and siditty as you please; but it won’t change a thing. Remember who you are and where you come from cause it’ll take you a long way.” “I won’t even try to make you understand why I did it,” Ernestine spat. “My new look will help me get to where I want to—no, need to go. Now, get on about your business and just leave me alone.” “That’s okay,” Viola lectured. “You’ll need us before you we’ll need you. Just remember your roots, baby sister.” |
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