She sounded half-asleep when she said, “Hey, honey, what’s wrong?”
“Hey, Aunt Ruth.”
Her voice became more awake. “Sonny, everything okay?”
I hadn’t thought about the fact my sudden phone call might send her into a panic. “Everyone’s fine, nobody’s hurt. I just wanted to tell you something.”
“My word, you gave me a start.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What’s the matter?”
“Mama. And Mr. Fowler.”
There was nothing on the other end. Maybe the line had been disconnected.
“Aunt Ruth?”
“I’m here. What’s going on?”
“They went out to eat supper tonight. They left at six and they’re still gone.”
I could hear her sigh.
“Sonny, remember what I said? About trust?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“She knows what she’s doing.”
“I don’t like him.”
Aunt Ruth said, “I didn’t care that much for him myself. That, we can agree on.”
“What do you think will happen?”
“All I know is your mama’s got a lot to think about, a lot of responsibility.”
“I know.”
“Honey, whatever happens, your mama loves you, you know that, right?”
I said, “Yeah.”
Aunt Ruth sighed and said, “It’ll be fine. Don’t worry. Night, sweets. Sleep tight.”
“Night, Aunt Ruth.”
I hung up, and didn’t feel any better. I looked at the clock. Almost nine. Ross was sprawled out on the couch and Trent was on the floor, both of them asleep. At ten, headlights looking like two huge pale yellow eyes crept up the drive real slow. The light was off in the kitchen so it was easy to spy on them as the car moved to the spot under the oak tree where he usually parked. I leaned forward so I could see through the screen better. The window was still open, and the night air held that first of the season coolness, while tree frogs still chirped, as did the crickets. The longer they sat, the more agitated I got. I could see two tiny orange circles go up, then down. They were having a smoke.
I went rigid with anxiety, my eyes locked on the car’s dark windows, barely able to make out the shape of them. I urged Mama to get herself out of the darn car. Finally, the interior light came on and he exited. Would he walk her to the door, and try to kiss her? I squeezed my eyelids to slits, distorting my view while I held my breath. I almost wanted to shut them completely so as to block out what I was petrified to see. He held his hand out, and she took it, and that didn’t set well either. Soon as she was standing beside the car, she pulled her hand from his. I let my breath out. They came toward the house, and while she was talking, Mr. Fowler listened with his head bent in her direction. I noticed Mama kept her hands occupied with her wrap, and her pocketbook. He came up the porch steps and I had the impression he wanted to come in.
Mama said, “Good night,” and he went back down and out to his car. I scooted away from the window as she opened the door.
She flipped on the light, and jumped when she saw me. “Jesus, Sonny! What are you doing here in the dark?”
“Nothing.”
Mama made a sound as if she found my answer lacking. “Hm.”
To try and prove I wasn’t snooping, I said, “I was just getting some milk,” and then I cleared my throat and asked, “Where’d y’all go?”
Mama put her pocketbook on the counter, and crossed her arms. “To a steak house.”
“Oh.”
Gosh. He took her for a steak. Course there wasn’t any sort of place like that around here to eat, only the local diner. I tried to imagine the two of them together. All that came to mind was what I was most familiar with, the sight of her and Daddy instead. How they used to sometimes tease each other during supper. How he used to hug her from behind while she stood at the sink washing dishes. How they’d sat at the kitchen table, ashtray overflowing, coffee cups at their elbows, the bills they’d spread out, working out finances and plans for the future. How we’d gathered in the living room and watched TV together, sitting crammed together on the couch with our hands blindly dipping into a big bowl of popcorn and peanuts while watching a Western movie. I couldn’t imagine her and Mr. Fowler in that same way any more than I could Daddy being bit by a snake and dying from it.
She picked up her pocketbook, and yawned.
Subdued, and tired sounding, she said, “Where’s Ross and Trent?”
“Asleep in the living room.”
She poked her head in to look at them, stared for a few seconds before turning back to me. I tried not to look as bothered by her night out as I felt. As she studied my face, she reached out, and touched my arm.
She said, “Don’t you worry none, Sonny.”
Mama’s attempts to ease my mind were useless ’cause for her to say “don’t worry” only troubled me more.
I followed her outside and down the dogtrot, and she whispered, “Good night,” and disappeared into her room, leaving me standing in the cool hallway, worrying and worrying some more.
Mr. Fowler was back the next morning like nothing had happened the night before and nothing was any different. Business as usual. He got Mr. Johnson started in one of the fields at daybreak. He’d brought around a wood-sided truck with a scale, and normally it took about one acre to fill a wagon with at least twelve hundred pounds of cotton, which was the minimum weight needed to go to the gin. In our case it was looking like it would take two acres, maybe even three. Ross, Trent, and I set out with our picking bags and began. They had nine-foot bags and I had a six-foot. A handful of other pickers Mr. Fowler hired were already bent over like bizarre humped animals moving down the rows.
The familiar weight of the bag on my shoulder dragging the ground made me sad as I remembered picking cotton with Daddy. At first my fingers were cold, stiff, and clumsy as I carefully worked to pry cotton away from the opened boll. I kept at it, waiting for the smoothness of the routine to settle in. I sucked on the ends of my fingers, as they were pricked, and as I moved from plant to plant I noticed I was only spending about half the time on them as was usual. In many instances, the cotton was so strung out and discolored I hesitated to get it. A lot of the bolls hadn’t opened at all.
The most I’d ever picked was forty pounds, while Trent and Ross could usually get up to seventy or so. We weighed in around midmorning. It had warmed up some by then, and I’d shed the lightweight coat I’d been wearing, tossing it into the back of our truck. I went to the wagon with the scale, and handed Mr. Johnson my bag. He doubled them up so they didn’t touch the ground, then he’d add either a one-pound or four-pound weight, called “peas,” to the other end of the hook to level things out. Mr. Fowler stood nearby and he gave me a “look” that conveyed what I’d done wasn’t hardly worth it, while Mr. Johnson was nice.
“Every little bit helps,” is what he said when he tossed me my empty bag. Thirty pounds, even though I’d covered a lot more rows than normal.
Noon we had another weigh-in and the wagons were only halfway. We stopped long enough to eat our dinner, and while Ross and I used the tailgate of Daddy’s truck to sit on and devoured leftover biscuits stuffed with fried eggs, Mr. Fowler sat on his with Trent. We ate fast, while Trent ate slow as he could, then laid back and put his hat over his face like he might take a nap. I drank some water from the jug being passed around and then I was ready to get back to work. Ross went by and slapped Trent’s boot.
He said, “Come on, Trent. We ain’t done yet, not by a long shot.”
Trent made no move. Ross looked at Mr. Fowler as he talked to Mr. Johnson about what the wagons were weighing in at. He slapped Trent’s boot again, and Trent sort a kicked at him. Ross grabbed hold of his feet and yanked him so hard he pulled him off the tailgate, and Trent landed on the ground with a hard thump. Trent jumped up and next thing I know, they’re fighting. Everyone stopped working and when Mr. Fowler came running over
, I was certain he’d pull them apart.
But, no.
He yelled, “Git’em!”
I yelled, “Stop it, you two!”
Mr. Fowler said, “Hit him in the gut!”
I didn’t know who he was encouraging. It was like he just wanted them to fight. A circle of workers gathered around as they rolled in the dirt, getting bits of cotton on their sweaty skin, their faces flushed as they tried to best one another. Mr. Fowler actually made boxing-like motions and called out advice as they went at it again. And here came Mama, carrying more jugs of water and a big paper bag that probably held cookies or some other sort of snack.
She walked at a fast clip while yelling, “Ross Lloyd Creech! Trent Walters Creech! For shame! Look at you!”
Mama’s voice penetrated their stupidity. They quit tussling and separated, breathing heavy, clothes covered in soil, cotton, and defoliated leaves. She dropped the jugs of water on the tailgate along with the bag.
Hands on her hips, she said, “What have you to say for yourselves?”
Panting, neither one spoke.
She pointed a finger at them and said, “What would your daddy say?”
There was shuffling of feet, and downcast eyes.
Mama said, “He’d be ashamed of you, that’s what!”
Everyone, even Mr. Fowler, was as quiet as when somebody got up to testify at church. She glared at those who’d come to watch and they drifted away and got back to picking.
She gave a look to Mr. Fowler, and he said, “It’s just boys being boys.”
“My boys don’t do this.”
“Boys gotta know how to fight, how to stand up for themselves.”
“Not brother against brother.”
Mr. Fowler leaned his head back, his eyes almost sleepy looking and said something more surprising to me than the fistfight between my brothers.
“Dang it, darlin’, of course you’re right.”
Darlin’?
And worse, Mama softened up like butter left out of the fridge.
She said, “We ain’t got time for this sort of tomfoolery.”
Mr. Fowler continued to smooth things out. “We sure ain’t. All right, boys, you heard your mama.”
We went back to work. I went to the other side of the field to pick so I wouldn’t have to see Mama and Mr. Fowler sitting on the tailgate of his truck. All that happened made for a long afternoon.
As the sun went down, we had the last weigh-in, and Mr. Johnson announced, “Got about thirteen hunnert pounds.”
Mr. Fowler motioned for the tractors pulling the wagons to head for the gin located down Highway 58, about a mile or so past Slater’s. It was owned by Morris Strickland, a man I remember Daddy saying ate like he had a tapeworm. His coveralls fit him no better than a scarecrow’s would. The gin was in a brick building, longer than it was wide, with a sign on the side that said, Quality Cotton, Inc. Mr. Strickland and seven other men worked inside. One in the engine room, one in the office, three at the gin stands, and three who worked the press boxes to compact the cotton into the appropriate size, a government-regulated rule in order to transport by train. More workers were in the yard managing the suction, and taking finished bales off to the warehouse. Ross drove the tractor while Trent and I rode in the full wagon like we used to do when Daddy was alive. It didn’t escape me that Mama and Mr. Fowler rode together in his truck. When we got to the gin, Trent and I bailed out of the wagon, picking bits of cotton off our clothes. I hurried up to Mama, chattering about this and that, about nothing really. I kept talking so they couldn’t. I didn’t care to hear any more “darlins” coming from out of his mouth.
Fifteen minutes later, Ross pulled the wagon forward, last of the four with our cotton. Mr. Strickland went by, arms waving and directing, while chewing on what looked like beef jerky. He motioned for Ross to get into the back of the wagon since his other guys were busy. Ross grabbed hold of the big giant suction hose and sucked out all the cotton, and that was it. Twelve acres had been cleared today, and I quickly calculated in my head and figured it would be three weeks to get it all in, maybe less. We’d do it all over again until all three hundred acres were done. After the first pass, we’d go to what was called scrapping, meaning we would go back for any “scraps” left behind. That was all that would be left anyway.
* * *
We went through the entire crop in two weeks, only making one additional pass. It was mid-October, and the only thing left was considered waste, tiny shreds of dirty white fiber, not worth going after. Ross looked discouraged and Trent, who’d been in his usual cotton-picking sour mood, looked relieved when he realized it was almost over with for another year. He kicked at a dirty clump lying at the edge of the field.
He said, “Ain’t worth making another pass.”
Ross said, “I guess not.”
I stood between them, my burlap bag at the ready. There had to be more. This wasn’t enough! I started back out to the field again, but Ross put a hand on my shoulder.
“It’s a waste of time.”
I looked down at my fingertips, reddened and sore. I contemplated what Ross had figured we’d harvested. About a hundred and fifty bales total when we usually got something like seven hundred and fifty. If I’d found water, we wouldn’t be in this predicament. I said as much, and Trent made some grumpy noise.
Ross said, “It ain’t your fault.”
“But, we’d have a lot more cotton.”
No one said anything and we started back to the house. Mama was on the phone with someone from Jones County already asking about taxes, when they had to be paid, and if there was a way to delay. The buzzing sound of a voice on the other side went on and on.
Mama repeated the information, her voice low-key. “That much interest? Okay. Well. Thank you for your time.”
She hung up and looked at the table covered with various bills, organized into piles of must pay, and what could wait. The pile of must pay was a lot bigger than the other. She chewed on the pencil the way I chewed my nails.
She picked up a sheet of paper and said, “I found some things still owed I had no idea about.”
She held out a couple pieces of paper, and Ross took them.
He said, “Oh yeah. This is the bill from when Daddy bought that new disc.”
She put her head in her hands and said, “Well, this is when the rubber meets the road.”
I said, “Mama, you want I should fix supper?”
She barely glanced at me, continuing to read the numbers, and said, “I don’t care.”
I looked in the refrigerator. There was some hamburger meat wrapped in white butcher paper. I got it out, and made hamburger patties, cooked some rice, made gravy, and opened up ajar of crowder peas we’d put up last year. When I put food on a plate and stuck it in front of her, she ate, but never stopped adding, and erasing, and adding again. We’d got our cotton samples, each a foot long and wrapped with a strip of brown paper, like the yarn Mama would buy from the store. It came in the mail with a card telling us the grade. It had been classified as “strict low middling,” or SML, the lowest. The highest grade, M or “middling,” was going for thirty-two cents a pound. We wouldn’t get that.
By the time we finished eating, Mama put the pencil down, rubbed her reddened eyes, and said to Ross, “Them cotton samples, I knew when I saw them it wasn’t good. With only twenty cent to the pound, it’s as bad a crop as we’ve ever had.”
He looked glum while Mama drummed her fingers on the table, then reached for her cigarettes.
She said, “I could pay the taxes, and give half what I owe Frank, and some on the disc. That would give us a few months toward the light bill, groceries, but nothing else until harvest next year except what we could scrape together here and there. We could maybe plant some winter vegetables to sell.”
Ross leaned forward, dangling his hands between his knees as he thought. I stared down at my plate, pushing a pea around on it. I couldn’t recollect having money problems like this
before. We’d had a small Christmas a time or two, but Daddy had always found ways to get around the tough times. I’d never worried when he was here.
Mama said, “I’ll pay the taxes so we don’t lose this farm. Then I’ll have to see about how to manage the rest.”
That simple statement soon turned into the unexpected.
Chapter 22
Mr. Fowler got somewhat scarce after the cotton was done, but then he started calling. Mama would always disappear around the corner to talk. I suspected she was arguing about money ’cause the sound of her voice would rise, and then drop. After she hung up, her face was always flushed, and her eyes glittered with some emotion I couldn’t pin down. I’d peeked at her scribblings on the notepad, saw the total of what was in the bank, what we owed, what we needed month to month, and thought about telling her we ought to get ourselves on back to church and pray hard. She’d not mentioned a word about returning since Daddy passed. She might have been struggling with the idea God allowed such hardships.
Preacher Moore’s wife had always said, “Lord only gives you what you can handle.”
Ross got a part-time job as a bag boy down to Wells’ Grocery. I was in the kitchen with Trent and Mama when he came in from work and told her when he’d get paid.
“First paycheck comes next week.”
She said, “How much you reckon it’ll be?”
“He’s paying me seventy-five cents an hour. I’ve worked about twenty.”
“At least we can buy some groceries, maybe some gas. That’s real good, Ross.”
She’d gone back to calling around for anything she could get her hands on to sew, iron, or mend. There was always plenty of that sort of thing with the holidays coming. She agreed to press and starch pants, shirts, tablecloths, fix broken zippers, reattach buttons, and hem things. She tried not to let us know she was upset, but sometimes her red nose and eyes gave it away.
She looked at the three of us and said, “You all hungry?”
We nodded. She got up and did what Mama loved to do when she needed to think. She dipped a cup of flour into a bowl and worked in some lard and water for a pan of biscuits. She got souse out of the fridge, sliced it, and set the pieces in the frying pan. My brothers and I sat at the kitchen table like we’d done since we were little, quiet, watching her every move. On occasion as she turned the meat, and checked on the biscuits, she’d turn to look at us, like she wanted to know we were there. She got to talking about Daddy, and that made me feel better. She set the food in front of us, then sat and watched as we ate, her eyes gone dreamy and satisfied, as if feeding us soothed her frayed nerves, and proved she could care for us.
The Forgiving Kind Page 20
