Gullah Secrets

by Susan Gabriel

  She goes outside and greets Rose and the stranger on the porch. Some people are like storms and create chaos wherever they go. A trickster, the Gullah people would call her. Someone who turns things upside down and often deceives. Caution is required. Old Sally asks her ancestors for Rose’s protection.

  “Did you have a nice nap?” Rose asks.

  Old Sally nods, not taking her eyes away from Heather.

  Rose introduces them.

  “I know who you are,” Old Sally says. “I be praying for you for a long time.”

  “You’ve what?” Heather turns to Rose as if to confirm that the old woman is demented.

  “Old Sally is the matriarch of this house,” Rose says. “None of us would be here without her.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Heather says, not offering her hand.

  In her imagination, Old Sally sees Iris Temple as a little girl hiding under her bed waiting to see how long it would take for her mother or father to find her. Her parents never noticed she was gone. Nobody even came looking except for Old Sally. That little girl became someone who insisted on attention of every kind. This young woman feels the same. Confirmation lies in how much she looks like Iris. The ancestors are offering another attempt for the Temple family to heal and choose something different.

  “Can I talk to you?” Old Sally says to Rose. “In private.”

  Rose follows her into the house and closes the door.

  “Something about her makes me tired,” Rose says.

  “You must be very careful,” Old Sally says. “She drains your energy to use for herself. She doesn’t do it on purpose, but the Temple wound be so deep you must be careful not to get pulled in.”

  “The Temple wound?” Rose asks.

  “Edward abandoned this girl. Never acknowledged her existence. So, as a Temple, she be looking for you to do that. You’re the only one left.”

  “Can you believe how much she looks like Mother?” Rose asks.

  “Traits often skip a generation to remind us there still be stuff to deal with.”

  “I feel horrible that I don’t like her,” Rose whispers.

  “It be history weighing on you,” Old Sally says.

  Iris Temple was unrelenting in how she criticized Rose. All to mold her into what she considered to be a true Temple. Edward was treated this way, too. Standards impossible to live up to. Rules that weakened instead of strengthened the Temple family. It surprises Old Sally the burdens parents put on their children when their only job is to love and protect them. And notice them.

  “Should I tell her to leave?” Rose asks.

  “These old energies never move on unless you take time to acknowledge and understand them,” Old Sally says. “You can either do it now or wait until it shows up again.”

  Rose gives an exasperated sigh. “I thought I’d dealt with this already.”

  Old Sally removes a small burlap sack the size of a deck of cards from the pocket of her dress. The bag contains a root that looks like a gnarled knuckle, a rough pearl the size of a marble, and a piece of indigo-blue fabric.

  “Take this,” Old Sally begins. “My grandmother gave this charm to me when I was a girl, and I’ve carried it every day of my life since. It will protect you from anything harmful.”

  Rose tries to refuse it, but Old Sally won’t let her. “You must take it,” Old Sally says, closing Rose’s hand around it. “If I need it back, I’ll ask for it.”

  Rose finally agrees, and Old Sally hugs her, telling her everything will be all right. Something still to be seen.

  “Do you know where Katie is?” Old Sally asks. “We were supposed to meet after the reception.”

  “She may be napping,” Rose says. “She does that a lot these days.”

  I do, too, Old Sally thinks.

  Births and deaths take place at the same threshold. Old Sally’s grandmother said that one is God’s inhale and the other is God’s exhale. Old Sally likes thinking of it this way. Each of us a part of the breath of our Creator.

  Old Sally and Katie spend time together every day to get ready for the birth. If Rose is her soul daughter, then Katie is her soul granddaughter. Everyone is connected. Blood family and spirit family. Now she needs to make sure that everyone she loves stays safe for whatever is to come.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Rose

  All afternoon, Rose’s unexpected niece has hovered around her like a mosquito looking for a place to bite. With Old Sally off to find Katie and the small charm in her pocket, Rose now feels emboldened enough to tell Heather that their family reunion will have to wait until another time.

  Earlier, Rose gave Heather a quick history of the Temple family—it would make Rose’s mother proud to know how much Rose has remembered. However, Heather showed only a vague interest in what Rose told her. Had she already researched the Temple family? That would be easy to do these days with the world wide web.

  Rose returns to the front porch to find Max and Heather sitting together. Max makes friends easily these days, having traded in his cowboy boots for flip-flops. Sometimes he says more in a day than he said in an entire week at the ranch. Rose doesn’t know what brought on this transformation, but it has taken some getting used to.

  “We were wondering what happened to you,” Max says to Rose, patting an empty rocking chair beside him.

  “Old Sally needed my help,” Rose says, aware that it was actually Old Sally who helped Rose.

  “Heather was asking how we could afford such a beautiful house,” Max says. “I told her it was a matter of combining inheritances and—” He stops. The look on Rose’s face tells him that he has already said too much.

  How is it that the quiet cowboy I’ve been married to all these years now overshares?

  For all Rose knows, Heather is here to collect whatever Temple money she feels entitled to.

  “Max invited me to stay the night,” Heather says to Rose. Her eyes sparkle like a child receiving precisely what she wanted for Christmas.

  When Heather isn’t looking, Rose tosses a wary glance at Max. The last thing she wants to do tonight is to have Heather reminding her of her mother and everything wrong with the Temple family.

  “I’m sure you have family or pets to return to,” Rose says to Heather.

  “No, it’s only me. No family. No pets.”

  “But you don’t have any of your things with you,” Rose says.

  Heather smiles as though moving her knight into position to take Rose’s queen.

  “I packed up some things in the car before I left.”

  Rose’s suspicion may be a direct result of being a Temple. Whenever people in Savannah find out who her family is, they often become intimidated, enamored, or sometimes greedy. Meanwhile, the tip of her little finger throbs and weighs in on her hesitation.

  Max excuses himself to go to the kitchen. He knows he’s in trouble and food will fortify him to face the fallout.

  Heather excuses herself to get her things out of the car. Her profile reveals how much she looks like Rose’s mother.

  Rose shivers and removes the charm from her pocket.

  “You were supposed to protect me,” she says aloud with no one to hear.

  With the wedding finally over, Rose had planned to put on her pajamas and curl up with a good book. A nice stress-free evening. Now it seems the mystery novel will have to wait, replaced by the mystery of why Heather is here and what old energy, as Old Sally would say, needs to be resolved.

  She glances at the sky. It’s been hours since she’s heard a weather report. Is her mother’s storm still out there somewhere? A double dose of trouble, counting Heather’s unexpected visit?

  Violet walks through the dunes to go to the house, leaving the rest of her family on the beach.

  “What’s going on?” Violet asks Rose.

  “It turns out Heather will be spending the night,” Rose says.

  “You’re kidding.”

  “I wish I were.”

  “How did—�
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  “Max invited her.”

  Violet mirrors how Rose feels. A stranger in the house means they won’t get to fully relax.

  “Dinner is fend-for-yourself,” Violet says. “I’m too tired to come up with anything else.”

  Rose agrees. “Have you heard anything about the storm?” Rose refuses to call it Hurricane Iris. The irony is too perfect. Rose’s entire childhood was spent avoiding her mother’s larger-than-life nature. She thinks again of Heather, whom she hasn’t yet figured out how to avoid.

  “The hurricane is still in the Caribbean,” Violet says, looking unconcerned.

  But Rose wonders if her mother is staging a little karmic revenge.

  “What did you find out about Heather?” Violet asks.

  Rose glances to the left, where Heather’s car is parked, to make sure she isn’t coming. “I’m not sure why she’s here,” Rose says. “It appears she wants to know things about her father, but there’s something else going on, too. Old Sally thinks she’s here to resolve something from the past.”

  They exchange a look that reminds Rose of how long they’ve been friends.

  “Why do I feel like Mother is messing with us again?” Rose asks.

  “It’s weird, but I’ve been feeling the same,” Violet says.

  “Do you think it’s possible for history to bubble up?”

  “I do.” Violet looks out to sea.

  As girls, Rose and Violet were good at putting puzzles together, and it feels like they are putting a puzzle together now. A giant one that includes strangers coming to visit, history bubbling up, and Gullah spells.

  “Something about the whole situation feels troubling,” Violet says.

  Rose’s shoulders tense. “Do you ever feel like you’re the only one left in your generation to deal with things?”

  “I do,” Violet says. “I never dreamed I’d be the keeper of the Gullah secrets.”

  “Just like I’m the keeper of the Temple secrets,” Rose says. “Except I don’t even know where the Temple secrets are anymore.”

  “Maybe it’s time to go find out what that key opens. And soon,” Violet says.

  Queenie and Spud emerge from the far deck and the mood shifts. Spud’s bow tie is askew, and it appears he has a copper-colored rash on his face from Queenie’s lipstick.

  “I wondered where you two were.” To Rose, mature love seems so much more hopeful than young love.

  “I think I’m going to like being married,” Spud says to them, causing Rose and Violet to laugh.

  The newlyweds go inside. Seconds later, Heather rolls a large suitcase up the front walk, as if she might stay for a month instead of one night. Storm clouds gather in Rose’s thoughts. Whatever happens next, she hopes the charm works.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Violet

  Tiny brass bells jingle to announce another customer coming through the door. First-timers are easy to identify. Violet often catches a moment of delight in their eyes, as if surprised to find her small tea shop tucked away off a side street behind a tiny courtyard full of tea roses. The large front window has fancy purple-and-gold lettering that reads: violet’s tea shop.

  Earlier this morning, Violet carried a heavy sandwich board out to the corner of the main street and set it up. A giant arrow below the name points down the alleyway—with the same purple-and-gold lettering—so that people won’t miss it. Like most of the structures in downtown Savannah, the building is historic, meaning ivy covers the brick, the water pipes talk to you on occasion, and everything smells like the most ancient of mildew when it rains. But this seems a small price to pay for a sense of history.

  When it comes to storms, however, downtown Savannah isn’t an ideal location. Even a heavy thunderstorm can flood the street and courtyard. It is hard for Violet to imagine what might happen during a hurricane.

  “Don’t borrow trouble,” Violet tells herself, which is something Old Sally reminds her often.

  The next customer through the door makes Violet hesitate, a ghost from the past brushing by her. It is Heather. The Heather who spent the night at the house last night, much to Rose’s dismay. Violet was so exhausted after the wedding she went to bed early and was out of the house this morning before anyone was up and about.

  Heather glances at the African violets in the large front window. A jungle of purple blooms in clay pots are stacked on bricks at different heights. Bricks that at one time made up the exterior of the Temple mansion and that Violet gathered and carried in the trunk of her car for this purpose. Her only reminder that the estate belonged to her, if only for a short time. Seeing Heather makes Violet wonder if Miss Temple would approve.

  Whether at a wedding reception, like yesterday, or a downtown tea shop, Edward’s daughter seems somehow out of place. Violet wonders why she isn’t at work somewhere or going to college classes. It is eerie how much she looks like Miss Temple.

  Violet wonders if Heather will gravitate toward the small tables for two around the edges of the shop, where she’ll have more privacy. Or if she will choose the openness of the main tea room, where bigger tables are set up so that people can gather and talk. Heather picks a seat on the fringes and puts her umbrella on a chair.

  “Nice to see you again,” Violet says when Heather approaches the counter.

  “You, too,” she says, though neither of them seems to mean it.

  Why does Violet feel like she should be wearing her outdated maid’s uniform? The one Miss Temple insisted she wear.

  “Did you sleep well last night?” Violet asks, pushing the past from her mind.

  “I did,” Heather says. “Rose told me about your tea shop this morning, so I thought I’d visit.”

  Is that a dull pain pinging Violet’s shoulder again or does she imagine it? She doubts Heather came here only to have a cup of tea. Her entire demeanor is of someone who wants something much more substantial than tea.

  “What can I get for you?” Violet asks.

  She often tries to guess what people will order. Are they the English breakfast type? Earl Grey? Herbal tea? She has difficulty pinning Heather down.

  Heather eyes the pumpkin bread in the glass case.

  Too many calories, Violet can almost hear her say.

  “Coffee, black,” Heather says.

  “Of course,” Violet says, remembering this is how Miss Temple drank her coffee, too. If she drank tea, she insisted that Violet use two tea bags to keep it from being weak.

  If Queenie were here, she would quip something funny in response to Heather’s request for black coffee. Something like, Yes, I am black. Been this way since I was very young.

  But Violet has never had Queenie’s sense of humor. If anything, Violet is much too serious. Jack tells her sometimes that she should lighten up. Although Violet has been slow to embrace all the changes of the last couple of years, she has also welcomed them. Violet and Queenie have weathered the storm of Queenie’s secret maternity quite well, though she doesn’t think she will ever be able to call her anything other than Queenie. As a girl growing up without a mother, Violet would have given anything to have had someone to call Mama, but it feels too late for that now. Maybe that will change over time. A lot of other things have.

  Violet asked Tia and Leisha to look after Old Sally this morning while Rose went to the bank. Not that Old Sally needs looking after, but at the end of April, they celebrated her one hundred and second birthday. Something about the largeness of that number prompted them to always have someone around if she needs anything. Besides, Violet likes the influence Old Sally has on her girls. After spending time with her, they seem more grounded and thoughtful.

  Heather digs into her sizeable purse, as if on a search for buried treasure instead of two dollars and some change.

  “It’s on the house,” Violet says.

  Heather stops digging and thanks her. For a moment, Violet wonders if she uses this ploy often.

  Violet was good at reading the moods of the ghosts who haunted t
he Temple mansion and is learning to read the energy of living people, too. But this young woman is not so easy to understand. If Violet had to guess she would say Heather is, underneath all the pretense, desperate for something. A sense of belonging, perhaps. Or a way to fill her emptiness.

  “A fresh pot of coffee will be ready in a minute. You can have a seat, I’ll bring it to you,” Violet says.

  Without thanking her, Heather returns to the corner near the window. A table that people often pick their first time in. Violet arranged the tables to accommodate every type of personality. The shy, the outgoing, the college student, the elderly couple, singles, and groups.

  As soon as it’s ready, Violet brings over the coffee. She refuses to use paper cups except for to-go orders. A person should have a nice cup of tea or coffee in a container that won’t begin to disintegrate as soon as hot water hits it. Violet also brings Heather a small slice of pumpkin bread. A slice small enough to not evoke much guilt.

  “Oh, I didn’t order that,” Heather says.

  “I know,” Violet says. “It’s on the house, too.”

  Heather looks at her as though wondering why Violet is so nice. She doesn’t appear to trust easily. Or perhaps at all. Another attribute of Violet’s former employer.

  “Rose told me that owning this tea shop is like a lifelong dream or something?”

  “It is.” Violet doesn’t mention that before she fulfilled her dream, she was a servant to the Temples, and therefore to Heather’s biological father and look-alike grandmother. Violet was someone who wore a uniform to work, lived in a small apartment, and drove an old car. But that has changed.

  Violet excuses herself, telling Heather to let her know if she needs anything else.

  Most of the morning crowd are older and retired. People who become invisible in the culture after a certain age. Yet, Violet sees them all. At times, Violet thinks she should hang out a shingle. But she isn’t so much a psychologist as she is a reader of tea leaves. From Old Sally, Violet has learned to see the invisible clues of who people are. Tea leaves left behind in their cups reveal short journeys. Long journeys. A new romance. A sudden illness. Their lives revealed under their noses and at the bottom of their cups.