This is a novel by: deartra d. Boone. This novel talks about how gossip destroys people in a church setting, specifically, but how it destroys people in general.
5.31.2018
5.23.2018
From Today's Work
Tammy Andrews
Tammy Andrews leaned back in her chair and stretched her
5-foot 6-inch body as far as she could.
She had been sitting at her desk for over two hours. Her light beige face was half red from the
frustration that she was feeling towards her friends. She wasn’t even sure if they were her
friends. She blinked her light brown
eyes and stared at the computer screen.
She tried to think of what to write, but nothing came to her at that
moment.
She brushed a string of her brown hair back behind her
ear. She was tired. Ever since lunch with her friends, Angela,
Helen, Mary, and Karen, she hadn’t spoken to any of them. She was sure that they were all mad at
her. She didn’t even really care at this
point. They were all gossips and they
needed to be on the altar on Sunday.
That wasn’t going to happen because she was the only one that thought
they needed to be delivered from their gossiping spirits.
She thought about Highway of Glory Non-Denominational
Church. She wondered what the pastor, Bishop
Anthony Powers would think if he knew that several of his members were out
gossiping about the fellow pastors in town.
She thought, “He probably wouldn’t think much because he was
one of her sources.”
She either verified or got her information from her
pastor. How had she gotten caught up in
this whole mess?
No one knew that Bishop Powers was her third cousin or
something like that. The Bishop never
made it point to mention it, so she didn’t mention it either. They had met at a family reunion a few years
ago. Once Bishop found out that she had
just moved to Collier City, he invited her to the church. He had preached such a dynamic sermon at the
family reunion that she went to his church.
It was wonderful at first. The
services were on fire. The choir sung
the glory of the Lord down from Heaven.
Bishop preached sermons that convicted you to the core. Lately, though, she very rarely felt anything
when she was at church. After she had
gotten in good with the Café Sisters (as she called her friends that she
gossiped with), she hadn’t felt right about a lot of things in her life.
She shook her head.
That caused that annoying strand of hair to fall from her ear. She put the hair back behind her ear. Tammy took a sip of her coffee and went back
to typing the letter to God that she was working on.
***
Lord,
Forgive me for being a
gossip. I’m tired of being a
gossip. I’m tired of gossiping. I don’t know how to quit. I can’t seem to quit either. I’m tired of feeling like I feel. I want to stop gossiping. I need Your help. Please help me.
***
She paused for a second.
She heard her grandmother’s voice say… “Lord, put a bad
taste in her mouth whenever she starts to gossip.”
She smiled and wrote some more words in her letter.
***
Whenever I go to gossip,
Lord, put a bad taste in my mouth. Lord,
I’m tired of being friends with the Café Sisters, especially if they are going
to keep gossiping. Lord, help me to
break those ties without any mess. You
know how they are. They will be mean and
vindictive. I just want out of this
mess. Help me, please.
-Tammy
***
Tammy read over the letter once more. It sounded good to her. She printed it out and put it in her
Bible. She prayed silently that God would
answer her prayer quickly.
She saved the letter to God that she had just written. She opened a new document and started typing
a letter to the Café Sisters.
***
Dear *,
I’m writing this
letter to do several things. First, to
apologize for telling all of y’all’s business the other day. I shouldn’t have done that.
Second, I no longer
want to be a part of this group. Of the
past few weeks, hanging out with y’all is not fun. All we do is talk about people. I’m tired of talking about people. It was fun at first, but now it is just down
right wrong. I’m at fault, too. I should’ve never told y’all the things I
told you. It felt good to be the one
that knew everyone’s business, but now, I don’t even want to know my own
business much less anyone else’s business.
I took a long look at myself in the mirror and I didn’t like what I
saw. This will probably cause me all
kinds of trouble, but I’m willing to take that chance because I want my soul to
be saved.
I wish only the best
for y’all. I mean no harm by this
letter. I will not cause y’all any
harm. It is my hope that y’all will
cause me no harm. I’ve asked God to
forgive me. I’m asking each of you to
forgive me.
Be Blessed,
Tammy
***
She opened her email program. She sent out four individual emails; one to
each of the Café Sisters. She wasn’t
sure how they were going to react, but she was half expecting something crazy
to happen.
She went to the restroom.
She needed a break. She had put
so much effort into writing her letters that she needed a moment to relax. The walk to the restroom seemed longer than
usual. Her feet seemed to get heavier
with each step. She walked by her
manager. Her manager smiled at her. She forced herself to smile back at her
manager. She didn’t want her nosey
manager bothering her right now.
She shook her head as she thought, “I’m surrounded by nosey
gossiping people. This does not make any
sense. Lord, I need help.”
She finally made it to the restroom. She walked into one of the stalls. She leaned up against one of the walls. She wanted to slide down and sit on the floor,
but she didn’t know how clean the floor was.
Her body gave way to the weight that she felt. Before she knew it, she was sitting on the
floor with her head in her hands, crying harder than she had ever cried. She sat on the restroom floor and cried for
over 5 minutes. When she finished, she
felt so much lighter. She even felt
happier. She was glad about that.
Gossip
Tammy sat at the table and listened as the four other women
sitting with her gossiped. When the five
of them got together, all they ever did was gossip. They talked about everyone that they could
think of to talk about. She wondered
what the others would think of each other if they knew that they all gossiped
about each other when they visited one on one.
Paul was right, “The tongue was an unruly creature.”
How many sermons had they heard about the tongue being a
source of mess?
She wanted to ask them, “Are y’all sure we’re Christians?”
Angela, Helen, Mary, and Karen were currently gossiping
about a gospel singer in the city. It
had been alleged that the singer was cheating on his wife with a female pastor
in a neighboring city. She was waiting
for her friends to ask her for her side of the story. She knew the whole story. She usually knew the latest gossip. She knew someone, who knew someone, who knew
a person who knew everybody who was anybody’s business.
She couldn’t believe how she had gotten caught up in
gossiping. She never grew up
gossiping. Her mother was always the
last one to know anything of interest.
Her mother had always told her, “Honey, it’s enough just to
know your own business. You don’t need
to be worrying about anyone else’s business.”
It was easy to get caught up with the gossip though. Once she met Caroline Franklin, gossiping
became a part of her life.
Caroline Franklin knew someone who knew everybody in the
gospel world. She had never met this
friend of Caroline. She wasn’t even sure
that Caroline’s friend existed. Caroline
got her hooked by talking about Carver Boone, one of her favorite singers. Apparently, Carver was fooling around with
his manager’s 19-year-old daughter. She
stopped her thoughts. She couldn’t
believe that she was gossiping with herself.
Lord, she needed help.
Angela touched Tammy’s arm, “Girl, did you hear me? What do you know about Oscar Eastman?”
She didn’t answer Angela.
She was trying to resist the urge to gossip. It was hard though. All four of the ladies who were sitting at
the table with Tammy just stared at her, waiting for a response. A rush of adrenaline raced through her
body. The roof of her mouth salivated,
and her heartbeat raced. Every fiber of
her flesh wanted to spill her guts. Her
spirit told her to keep her mouth shut.
She wasn’t sure what to do.
Karen said, “Well, are you gonna tell us? I know you know. You need to quit tripping and gone and tell
us.”
She smiled, “Y’all know I got my sources. Yeah, I know the story.”
She paused and then said, “Apparently, Pastor Callvar’s
husband walked in on Oscar and Pastor Callvar in the middle of it. He almost passed out. Pastor Callvar’s husband cussed them both
out, called the police, and blocked the door so that Oscar couldn’t leave.”
“Girl, you know you lying.”
“Who was on top?”
“Did anybody go to jail?”
“Is Pastor Callvar’s husband ok?”
Tammy shook her head.
She told herself that she wasn’t going to gossip, but she had done it
again. She felt tears welling up in her
eyes. She was tired of feeling like
this. Excited while she was spreading
the gossip, but shameful after she had opened her mouth, that was no way to
live. She often prayed that she wouldn’t
gossip when she got together with her friends, but it never worked out for her.
Mary said, “Is that all of the story?”
Tammy shook her head, “No.
But it’s enough of the story. We
don’t need to be gossiping anyway. None
of that’s our busy anyway.”
Helen made a face, “Oh, Lord, here we go again. You act a fool every time you say something
about somebody. Why don’t you just quit
saying stuff about folk, instead of bothering us?”
Tammy lamented, “If I didn’t tell y’all what y’all wanted to
know, I would be ostracized and y’all know it.”
Angela rolled her eyes, “If you don’t want to gossip, then
why do you always know the latest gossip?
Seems like you want to know the latest info, but you don’t want to share
it. That ain’t right.”
She sighed, “It ain’t like that. I’m just tired of getting together with y’all
and all we ever do is talk about people.
That’s all we do. That’s not
right. We even talk about each other
when the groups are separated. Angela,
didn’t you tell me that Mary was looking at porno sites? Karen, didn’t you tell me that Helen had run
over her neighbor’s rose bush? We all
gossip and no one, I mean no one is off limits.
God only knows what y’all have said about me.”
Angela made her mean face, “You’re such a witch. I can’t believe you said some mess like
that. You just messy.”
Karen added, “That was cold-hearted. You didn’t even have to go there. That was just messy.”
She lowered her head.
She wanted to cry. She couldn’t
believe that she had been that callous and cold. She didn’t usually act that way. She just wanted to get out of there.
The women ate their food in silence.
Helen interrupted the silence, “Tammy is telling the
truth. We do gossip about each other
like we ain’t even friends. I mean Mary
may only be looking, but one of us has actually participated in some
porno. I ain’t saying who, but that’s
what I heard.”
All the ladies looked at each other, trying to figure out
which one of them was the guilty culprit.
Tammy shook her head.
What had she done? Had it come
down to this? She wanted to quit
gossiping so much that she would jeopardize her friendship with the four ladies
sitting at the table with her.
She stared at Helen.
Helen gave her a wicked smile because Helen knew that she knew who the
culprit was.
She wondered, “Which one of the two women would be the first
to reveal that Helen was the one who had participated?”
Table of Contents
GOSSIP
- The Gossip
- Gossip <-- Read this chapter
- Tammy Andrews <-- Read this chapter
- Angela Hines <-- Read this chapter
- Helen Ware
- Mary Regal
- Karen Valwood
- Collier City
- Tammy & Helen
- Transformed
- Another Convert
- Confrontation
- Highway of Glory Non-Denominational Church
- Restoration
- The Gossip Aftershock
- The Truth
5.22.2018
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