The Summer We Got Saved

by Pat Cunningham Devoto

  The boys were delighted to get such a rise out of her, whooping and hollering to their friends. “This one done forgot she ain’t supposed to do nothing.”

  Dominique was holding her arm suspended, hand wrestling her in midair. Then she slammed it back in her lap and there was nothing Tab could do but sit there as her heart raced and tears rolled out from under the cat’s-eye sunglasses. She might faint or she might start crying hysterically, but no one would help her no matter what she did, the black or the white, and the Elvis boy had grabbed a catsup bottle. She could be finished with breakfast by now, would probably be back in her room changing to go swimming. He was unscrewing the top.

  She stared at the huge mirror as she might a Norman Rockwell or a Grandma Moses. Home for Thanksgiving, The Country Fair, or maybe this, A Day at Woolworth’s. Rampant colors spilled onto the canvas. Red catsup, a blue dress, brown suits, a yellow necktie. The clapping white hands of the girls come to cheerlead, their matching sweater sets in pale pinks and blues, their pink lipstick lips, smiling. Bright red Coke signs on either end of the mirror, and in the background the blue blur of uniforms. Dark brown people seated at the counter dressed in their Sunday best, staring back at themselves. A gigantic wood frame held the mirror that reflected the image that captured the moment at the lunch counter of the Nashville Woolworth’s in the morning hours of a new day.

  She saw the sunlight on the water as they swam out to the floating dock. The catsup poured on her head, trickled onto the angora collar, dribbled down her sweater front. This is your fault, she was thinking. Why couldn’t you be happy with us swimming in the lake? Why couldn’t you be happy giving me a black eye, telling me I was past ignorant, not knowing what you know, n’est-ce pas?

  The Elvis boy slammed the empty catsup bottle down on the countertop. The others laughed at the noise, at the catsup, at anything that humiliated. He took the pack of Camels out of his pocket and lit one. “That should do it.” She watched the tobacco glow red and turn to a gray-white ash, which he deposited on top of her head. More laughter. She watched the glowing red center, knowing that he might get the idea, and he did—holding the end close to her face. “I think you need a tattoo to remember me by.” She squeezed her eyes shut, waiting. She heard the voice of one of the girls doing what girls did, cajoling him out of it. “Now Dwayne honey, she ain’t worth it.”

  He must have been sweet on her. He brought the cigarette back slowly away from her face and took a big drag. “Yeah, you’re right.” Instead, he put it out on the top of Dominique’s hand, jamming it into the dark flesh that gripped the counter. She never moved. She shuddered, but she never moved her hand, never gave any other indication there was pain. Tab had been the only counter person to see. The others were too busy dealing with their own catsup, their own taunts. Tab thought she heard skin sizzle, and took faint pleasure.

  “Teach you to go grabbing a white girl’s arm,” the Elvis boy said.

  Replacements arrived, edging their way into the crowd until they were standing behind them to take their places. The crowd was renewed. Fresh meat.

  Mr. Spivey helped Tab lift herself off the counter seat and walk out, most of her weight on his arm. She hoped she didn’t look that foolish—catsup and tears. She tried to stand up straight, to look dignified like Dominique, who was walking out in front of them, stiff-backed, arms at her side.

  They passed by the blue uniforms leaning up against the candy counter. “Arrest ’em? Why arrest ’em? They got comeuppance enough.” The gun belt scraped against the glass case that held the lemon drops. “What a mess. You wanta have catsup all over the patrol car?”

  They were outside and climbing on the bus. Mr. Spivey let her down in a seat near the front. Dominique had gone straight to the back.

  Somebody had brought paper towels. They were passing them out. No one was saying anything. Mr. Spivey tried to wipe away some of her catsup and then gave her extra towels and began on his own head and neck. He took off his red-streaked yellow tie and wadded it up, depositing it in his pocket. Silent minutes passed as they busied themselves with cleaning. She didn’t look around to see where Dominique was. She didn’t care.

  They hadn’t realized the bus had started. Reverend Calder was having a hard time pulling out. The patrol cars had parked too close in the front and he didn’t dare touch a bumper in order to get out. He was slowly moving up and back, gaining inches of space with each try. When the front of the old Blue Bird finally pulled clear, it was their release. A cheer went up. They were free again, and everybody began talking at once. Relieved laughter broke out. Dora, the Fisk student, sitting in front of Tab, turned around and patted her on the knee. “You did good, girl.” And then back to the others. “Did you see that white trash with the leather jacket trying to unnerve Tab here?”

  “Did you hear them cops?” another one said. “Believe this catsup saved us from the pokey. Wasn’t gonna mess up their patrol cars with catsup, much less niggers like us.” The laughter was out of control, hilarious. People were holding on to the sides of the bus seats, trying to catch their breath.

  “Thought for sure we was all going to jail when I saw them police come in.”

  “Lucky, we’re lucky dogs. Had my toothbrush, ready to stay the night in the Nashville jail.”

  Tab wiped her hair. She was taking off her catsup-soaked angora collar when she realized the others had thought they would be going to jail, had thought they would most probably be spending the night in jail, and still Dominique hadn’t warned her. She was sitting in the back, looking out the window. Catsup dribbling down her neck had settled into her Afro, making her head look flat and distorted. She held napkins in her hands but wasn’t moving to use them.

  “TAB DON’T SAY NOTHING. SHE JUST SIT THERE.” Mr. Spivey was talking and laughing at the same time. They all were. The release of hours of anticipation and then the ordeal, and now everyone was edging toward hysterics.

  “Didn’t serve us, but they didn’t serve nobody else.” Bursts of laughter, slapping of shoulders, stomping of feet. “And we used up all the catsup supply.” More laughter, loud and high-pitched, and Tab found herself doubled over, tears running down her face. The funniest thing she had ever heard. She looked back at Dominique sitting alone and laughed even harder. She felt euphoric, as if she had run some mighty race.

  “I”—she had to catch her breath, “I, I felt like, like a hamburger.” She could have said anything and they would have laughed, and they did, some rolling around in their seats with relief.

  “At first, when I was sitting there, I coulda killed Dominique for tricking me into coming along.”

  More laughter. “Get outta here, girl.”

  “Yeah, I was sitting there thinking, I’m gonna kill you, Dominique.”

  “Go get her, girl, lying to you.”

  “Now, now that it’s over, I feel great.” She jumped up out of her seat and did a shuffle on the aisle floor. “We did it,” she shouted, not really knowing what they had done, only feeling that they had been in some deep, dark place and had emerged victorious, vindicated.

  The bus had stopped at a light. Reverend Calder put the gearshift in neutral and pulled the brake up before turning around and, in a low voice, “What do you mean she tricked you?”

  Tab was standing in the aisle, still ecstatic about being out from under. “Oh nothing,” smiling at her group and they back at her.

  “No, you just said she tricked you. What did you mean by that?” Reverend Calder got up out of his seat slowly. The light was still red.

  Embarrassed at her own ignorance now but feeling too much a part of them to try to hide it or somewhere in the back of her mind remembering how she had hated Dominique when she was sitting at the counter. “I”—she was grinning at them—“I didn’t know we might go to jail.”

  The others were losing their smiles, knitting eyebrows.

  “I didn’t know I was gonna get catsup on my head.”

  Again, smiles. “Ain’t that the tru
th.”

  “Dominique told me we would go in and order a hot dog and maybe get served or maybe not and that would be the end of it.” She laughed at herself, shaking her head and inviting the others to do the same. The others were glancing at Reverend Calder and then back at Dominique. Tab was still explaining her naïveté. “It was all supposed to be over in just a little while. Can you imagine I thought that?”

  “Is this true?” He had forgotten Tab. He was directing his attention to Dominique now, had stepped a few feet down the aisle, moving closer to her. “Is it true that you let this child come along not knowing what might happen, that she hadn’t an idea we might all end up in jail?” He looked down at Tab. He was almost standing over her now. “Weren’t you listening in the meetings? Didn’t you pay attention?”

  She tried to shrug her shoulders. “It’s over now anyway. I’m fine now.” And in a smaller voice: “Anyway, it’s over.”

  A low, ominous tone from the back of the bus, “Just like you to say that—just like you, Tab.” Dominique was braced up against the backseat, half-standing, her shoulders pressed against the window glass, her legs stiffened. “Just like you to say it’s over when it’s never over, like stepping in and out of the rain just when you please.” She made a face in imitation of Tab and spoke with a flat southern twang. “It’s ova, Raveren, and Ah kin go hame naya.” She went limp, sinking back down into the seat and giggling. “It’s ova, Raveren.” Sweat had beaded on her forehead. She hugged herself, arms glistening with perspiration.

  When she looked at them again, the face was menacing. She was the preacher she had seen him be so many times, shouting from the pulpit. “It’s never over.” The others were silent, looking at her. “You think it’s over? It’s never over.” And now raging at them: “It’s never overrrr.” She pushed up out of her seat, walking toward them, holding out her fisted hand—the burn mark not that visible on her black skin, but Tab knew.

  Her eyes were wild with searching, “You don’t know that? You people, you people are so, so stupid.”

  “See this? Do you see this?” She fanned her fingers and held her hand spread out to them. “He had a chance to do it to her. But he did it to me. He had a chance to do this to her.” Her hand whipped back in and hit her chest. They could feel the sound, a dull thud, pushing air out. “But he did it—to me, to me, and she, she was sitting right there. Right there . . .” Her voice trailed off. She was up to Tab now and grabbed her shoulders, turning her around to face her father. “See this? See this? They had a chance to do it to this, but they did it to me.” She pushed Tab forward into her father. Her voice tried to regain some normalcy, her eyes on the verge of spilling over. “I did like you wanted. Don’t say you didn’t want it.”

  “I didn’t. You are mistaken, as usual.”

  She looked down at her hand, brought it to her lips in a long kiss, her chest stuttering in and out as if she were crying, but she wasn’t crying.

  Car horns were sounding from the rear. The light had gone green and red and green again. One of the students said, “Reverend, you want I should—” Reverend Calder waved him off. “I meant that you were a natural leader, that you had the best of both worlds,” trying to explain, not necessarily to her. He looked around at the others. “I meant that she—”

  “I know what you meant. You’ve said it every day since she left.”

  He tried to take her arm. She began backing away.

  “Reverend, the cars behind us.” The student eased past him, slipped in the driver’s seat, let off the brake, and shifted into first. He inched forward and, to anyone who might know, “How do you get out of here? I’m not from around here.” No one heard him.

  Reverend Calder stepped forward again, pushing Tab aside. She fell back in Mr. Spivey’s lap. Dominique’s head was down, looking through furrowed eyebrows—cornered and daring him to come closer. “You didn’t even see, did you?” She dangled her hand in front of him, trying to show what she had suffered, what he had missed, kept missing. She backed up and he came closer. “Don’t touch me. Don’t touch meee.”

  Each time he moved toward her, she stiffened and moved back, giving ground one bus seat at a time. Horns were blaring from outside. The new driver was getting impatient. “Where do I go?” he shouted at anybody. “Where in the hell do I go? We’re gonna get arrested for a traffic violation if somebody doesn’t help me.” One of the other students got up and went forward to help. The older woman, Miss Wilma, stood and put a hand on Reverend Calder’s shoulder. “Clarence, why don’t you go on back up there and get us outta here. Lemme see what can I do about Dominique.”

  He jerked around and spit out at her, “Don’t you see how she has it confused in her mind?”

  “Sure I do, Clarence. Now why don’t you go on back up to the front of the bus and help us get outta here. Else we gonna be in more trouble than before. Here”—she gestured to the others—“y’all take Reverend back up to the front.” Two of the students came forward. He twisted his shoulders to loosen their hold, but Miss Wilma raised her eyebrows to them and their grip held. “Come on, Reverend. Hear those cars? They gonna have the police on us if we don’t get outta here. We need you in the front.”

  “You see how she has it confused,” he said back over his shoulder.

  “Yes, sir, we see, sure do.”

  And Dominique was greatly amused, watching them pull him away, pointing her finger and laughing at him.

  “Here baby, let me see to your hand. Didn’t nobody know you was hurt. Let me see, baby.” Dominique backed away like a child, whimpering and holding her hand cradled at her chest. Miss Wilma followed, but kindly, moving forward slowly. “Dora, bring me that thermos of water. We gonna clean Dominique’s hand. Lemme see it, baby.”

  Now the bus moved forward with a purpose as Reverend Calder gave directions. The others were talking quietly among themselves, looking alternately up at Reverend Calder and back at Dominique, whispering their individual thoughts, the feeling of euphoria faded and gone.

  Tab got up out of Mr. Spivey’s lap and sat down in the seat across the aisle.

  There was the sound of bus gears grinding forward as they picked up speed, and a small whimpering noise that could have been Dominique. She wouldn’t turn to see.

  CHAPTER 29

  The Gift

  LORD, WHAT IS GOING ON up there in Nashville? Seem like peoples getting crazy and the police don’t do nothing.” Miss Laura clicked off the radio she and Maudie had been listening to while they washed Sunday dishes. “Nice to be here where everything quiet, everybody friendly. Don’t know as I’d wanna get myself messed with, just so I could drink the white water.”

  Maudie and Miss Laura were the only ones left. Jessie had gone on back to his house. JD was out in the yard, playing. “Let’s us sit out on the porch awhile.” Miss Laura folded the damp dishcloth and hung it on the peg by the window. “Usually a good afternoon breeze by this time.”

  She followed Miss Laura outside, taking a seat in the swing at the end of the porch. Miss Laura sat in the metal lawn chair she preferred and picked up a cardboard fan to encourage the breeze. Maudie used her crutch to give herself a push. The scent of petunias, red, white, and pink, cascading out of the coffee cans drifted around them. Off in the distance, the noise of a car as it crested the hill. “You sure Jessie wants us out here in the front where everybody can see me?”

  “Aw pshaw, don’t pay Jessie no mind. His bark worse than his bite. Besides, that was when you first come and Jessie didn’t know you.” She waved as the car passed by the front yard. “Now I think he’s getting so he’s partial to you, going to voting school and all.”

  They both sat in silence, breathing in the day. A hawk circled up over the pastures that spread out across the road. Another car passed and scattered rust-colored dust up on the black-eyed Susans at the road’s edge. They could hear JD out back, playing soldier, swinging from the rope attached to the hayloft pulley.

  “You know, I remember talking t
o your aunt Carrie before she pass. Say you was in that polio place down there in Tuskegee for a long time. Say something ’bout you must be on the right side of the Lord on account of you surviving all that polio business and a big storm to boot. Say they was even some folks killed in that storm.” Aunt Laura looked at Maudie and, getting no response, turned her attention to the scenery.

  “I was lucky.”

  “That right?” Aunt Laura searched the pasture again. “Look at them crows after that hawk. Must be after a nest of eggs.” She pointed her fan.

  Maudie continued sitting there, but suddenly her heart was pounding. She was hearing the howl of the night wind in Tuskegee. People were yelling, glass was flying. Nurse Betty was calling to her; Yolanda was begging. Just as suddenly, she was watching the crows again. She said, in what she hoped was a normal tone, “Yes, there was an acquaintance, a little girl named Yolanda. She didn’t survive.”

  “Oh my, didn’t know ’bout that.” Aunt Laura had stopped fanning and was looking at her.

  “Well, as I said, she was just an acquaintance, not kin. I suppose I need to be leaving now.”

  Miss Laura looked at her watch and said probably she should.