"Okay, I'm taking one step at a time trying to change my evil ways, but I guess I'll just have to start again tomorrow. . . ." "No you won't," I say. "Have a seat, Paris. And relax."
"Right on, Daddy!" Janelle say.
Paris sits on down and crosses her legs like them people do who meditate.
"For your mama's sake, and mine, which of y'all kids will have Thanksgiving dinner at they house next year?"
Charlotte say: "Well, me and Al is, are, thinking about building a house big enough for all y'all, but we positive the foundation won't be dug by next November, and, plus, it's too damn-I mean, it's just too doggone cold in Chicago."
"How big do a house have to be to eat in it?" I ask.
"Bigger than our litde duplex, I'll tell you that much," Janelle says. "Our place is so small, Shanice and I bump knees under the table. But, if all goes well, and Orange Blossom and I manage to branch out in two years' time, hopefully it won't be."
"That said, I wish you the best of luck in your new career, Janelle. Now, your mama had asked that y'all meet at each other's house, but since everybody seem to have a reason why they might not be able to, me and Brenda is buying us a nice spread in Vegas and it'll be ready in six weeks, and since we never did have the family reunion like we was supposed to, we wouldn't mind if everybody was to come spend it with us, would we, Brenda?"
"No, we wouldn't mind one bit," she say through the door.
"We can have it at my house next year," Lewis say.
Everybody turn and look at him like he some kinda alien or something. But not me, I'm smiling.
"What house?" Charlotte asks.
"Yeah, what house?" Paris say.
"The one I'll have by next Thanksgiving," my son say, and we all know he mean it. "And, Daddy, thanks for the gesture, but I think there's quite a few other weekends we'll find to come visit you. Is that all right?"
"That's all right," I say, and his sisters walk over and give him a high five, and then he come over to me and we look each other in the eye and smile for the first time in years, and I give him some skin, too, but on the black- hand side.