I FRETTED about Minnijean as I plunged into my birthday party plans, but the more I tried to console her, the less she listened. She was the only one of my eight Central friends I had invited to my party, because I wanted to escape all thoughts of being an integration person. I made her promise not to talk about Central in front of our Horace Mann friends.
Not inviting the others made me feel guilty; but had the eight come, I knew I would have been separate—one of the Little Rock Nine and not just plain Melba—a member of my old group. I counted on reconnecting to my friends from my former school. I wanted them to accept me, to take me back into their fold. I had personally called or left messages with the parents of all the people on my guest list.
On the morning of my birthday, Saturday, I felt relieved when Minnijean called to say she couldn’t come after all because she had a family event that day. Maybe with only me there, I could fade into the group and just this once be one of them.
Vince was the first to arrive, looking a little ill at ease. “Good evening, birthday girl,” he said, handing me a small box with a bow. I hadn’t seen him in a while. I’d almost forgotten how light-skinned he was. With his dark shiny hair piled high and his sideburns, he resembled those sideburners at Central.
“Thanks, I’m glad you came,” I said, as my mind worked hard to separate the way he looked from the images of the boys who treated me so badly at Central. Vince is one of my people, no matter how white he looks, I told myself. I tried to think about the first date we had and to focus on how much I had liked being with him.
“Long time no see,” Vince said as I led him into the living room. “You never return my calls.”
He was right. Somehow the whole integration thing had even dulled my desire for daydreams about him. He had become lost in the shuffle—an afterthought, but I couldn’t tell him that. “I think about you,” I told him, “especially when Grandma goes to the wrestling matches. I wanted to call.” He nodded his head, but he didn’t look like he believed me.
As we continued polite but strained talk I kept my eyes on the clock. I unwrapped his gift, squealing with delight at the tiny gold hoop earrings. Mama and Grandma made several trips to bring food in, then take it out for warming, then bring it back. After an hour, when no other guests had arrived, Conrad insisted we begin eating.
The explanation came when my old friend Marsha phoned to say she wouldn’t be coming, but she’d drop off my birthday present the next day. I had counted on Marsha’s coming, she was kind of the leader of the group. If she didn’t come, I worried that nobody else would either. Then she confirmed my worst fears. She explained that another friend, Ann, was giving her annual Christmas party, and most of the people I invited would be going there. But I knew that wouldn’t begin before eight. When I asked why they couldn’t stop by beforehand, there was a long silence, and then she said, “Melba, the truth is we’re all afraid to come to your house.”
“Afraid,” I mumbled nervously.
“Sure, some of us get those same calls you get from those crazy white people saying they’re gonna bomb your house. One of you’all already got bombed; what’s her name, Carlotta, had a bomb under her porch. And that Mrs. Bates, she’s had several. What’s to keep them from bombing your house tonight while we’re all there?”
“Why didn’t you say so earlier, when I called?”
“I didn’t wanna hurt your feelings. You gotta get used to the fact that you’all are just not one of us anymore. You stuck your necks out, but we’re not willing to die with you.”
“Marsha, I thought you were my friend.” I heard my voice get loud as anger rose in me. “At least you could have told me there was another party going on,” I shouted into the receiver, slamming it down.
My feelings were doubly hurt. No one bothered to tell me to move my party to another date, and worse yet, they were having the biggest Christmas party of the season without inviting me.
Even though I felt so embarrassed I could die, I kept smiling, trying to pretend to Vince that I wasn’t brokenhearted about the empty room we sat in with all those balloons on the ceiling and all that food getting cold on the dining room table.
“Let’s turn on the TV now, since nobody’s coming. That just means more food for us.” Conrad’s voice sounded like he was speaking through a booming microphone as he burst into the room. I felt myself cringe as I watched Vince’s face turn red.
“Shush your mouth, boy, and get back into that kitchen.” Grandma was trying her best not to look disappointed. But I could see she felt sad for me. I moved toward the dining room and started taking things to the kitchen. I caught Grandma unaware. I could see there was moisture in her eyes.
“Don’t worry about the party, Grandma. It doesn’t matter,” I said, touching her shoulder.
“You just sit yourself down and entertain that young man.”
“He doesn’t want to be entertained. He wants to go to Ann’s Christmas party where everybody is. He’s asked me to go with him.” I was hoping that since it was my birthday they would make an exception and allow me to go with Vince.
“How can we allow you to go out that way, in public? Don’t you see those two white devils parked in their car across the street? Mutt and Jeff are just waiting for us to make a mistake so’s they can hang you. We couldn’t rest easy with you out at night that way.”
“Even on my birthday?”
“Especially on your birthday. This day reminds us of how important you are to us. Now, you invite Vince to sit a while. We’ll have a nice evening playing games and all.”
But Vince clearly wanted to move on to Ann’s party. He had promised he would go, and he wanted to be with our friends—only they weren’t our friends anymore. They were his. I saw him to the door and stood in the doorway looking at Mutt and Jeff’s car parked beneath the streetlight. Grandma was right. It wasn’t safe. The integration had stolen my sixteenth birthday.
Later that night before I sobbed into my pillow, I wrote:
Please, God, let me learn how to stop being a warrior. Sometimes I just need to be a girl.
STEP UP IN RUMORS, INCIDENTS, COMPLAINTS NOTED AT SCHOOL
—Arkansas Gazette, Saturday, December 14, 1957
ARMY TO CUT GUARD FORCE AT CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL BY 432 MEN
—Arkansas Gazette, Saturday, December 14, 1957
WITH four days to go before the Christmas holidays, we were very aware of a last-minute drive to get us out of school before the new year. Flyers and cards appeared saying “Two, four, six, eight, we ain’t gonna integrate—no, not in ’58.” There was lots of talk about how we wouldn’t come back when the new semester started.
Meanwhile, Minnijean continued to bang her head against that stone wall trying to get permission to participate in the Christmas activities. She could not explain why, but it was as though she were driven. When Principal Matthews once again turned down her request to sing with the glee club in the Christmas show, she balked.
Her mother requested a meeting with assistant principals Powell and Huckaby along with Principal Matthews and Mrs. Bates. Even after that confrontation, they turned her down, but she refused to take “no” for an answer. Students used all the flack over Minnijean’s persistence as another reason to taunt us and to escalate their campaign against her. She had shown herself vulnerable by displaying her temper and her pain, and by letting them know how badly she wanted to participate. That was all they needed. They worked hard at getting her to blow her fuse.
By that time, we were all suffering from extreme fatigue as we marked our calendars and counted down the moments before the blissful two weeks of Christmas vacation. Most of all I looked forward to feeling safe, to having fun with maybe a party or two, and lots of lounging in front of the television—that was my plan.
Grandma had already begun shopping, hiding gifts, and testing the Christmas lights so she could replace burnt-out bulbs. She had also begun making dough for Christmas cookies and placing it in the freezer. Mother Lois wa
s eyeballing trees so we’d choose the perfectly shaped one.
On Tuesday, December 17, when we had one more day to go before vacation, five of us entered the cafeteria. Lunchtime was always a hazard, and recently even more so. I had been avoiding the cafeteria, eating my sandwich alone in any safe place I could find. The cafeteria was such a huge place, with so many of our attackers gathered at one time. There were no official-looking adults or uniformed Arkansas National Guardsmen inside the cafeteria. Without fail, we knew we could expect some form of harassment.
As always on Tuesday the hot lunch was chili, which Minnijean loved. So while I took my seat with the others, she went to get in line to buy her chili. Ernie emerged from the line ahead of her and sat down at our table. As Minnijean made her way back toward us, her tray loaded down with a big bowl of chili, we saw her hesitate. She had to inch her way through a tight spot where mostly boys sat at tables on either side of her path. She had stopped dead in her tracks. We all froze, realizing she must be in real trouble. We could see two boys near her—one directly in her path. Something awful was happening, but there was no way any of us could do anything to rescue her. We had been instructed that in such instances we were never to move toward the person in danger for fear of starting a riot.
I was panic-stricken. Minnijean was being hassled by those boys. Snickering among themselves and taunting her, they had pushed a chair directly in front of her. For a long moment, she stood there patiently, holding her tray high above their heads.
It was all I could do to hold on to my chair and not go to help her. Like a broken record, the words played over and over in my head—intervening on her behalf would blur the lines between who was the victim and who was the person at fault. If other white students joined the melee to rescue the other side, we’d have a brawl. They outnumbered us at least two hundred to one. Still, I wanted to go to her, move the chair, take her tray, tell her to back up and go another way, do something, anything.
As more and more people realized something was brewing, the chatter in the cafeteria quieted down. I could tell Minnijean was trapped and desperate, and very fast running out of patience. She was talking back to the boys in a loud voice, and there was jostling all around her.
Frantically I looked around to see if there were any adults nearby who could be trusted to help. We had come to believe that the vice-principal for girls, Mrs. Huckaby, made some efforts to be fair during these situations, but she was nowhere in sight. I beckoned to Minnijean to go around her hasslers, but she was standing perfectly still. It was as though she were in a trance, fighting within herself.
Later, she would explain that the boys had been taunting her, sticking their feet in the aisle to trip her, kicking her, and calling her names. But we were not close enough to see details of the dilemma she faced. All we saw was her wavering as though she were trying to balance herself—and then her tray went flying, spilling chili all over two of the boys.
Everyone was stunned, silent for a long moment. Her attackers sat with astonished looks on their faces as greasy chili dripped down over their heads. All at once, our people who were serving food behind the counter began to applaud. This was greeted by an ominous silence, and then loud voices, all chattering at once, as the chili-covered boys stood up. I wondered whether we’d ever get out of there alive. Suddenly, a school official showed up, and Minnijean was whisked away, while we were hustled out of the cafeteria.
Word got around school immediately. I could tell there was an undercurrent of unrest among the student body. More clusters of people gathered along the hallway chanting, “Two, four, six, eight, we ain’t gonna integrate.” Some were applauding and laughing. I wondered why some students were jubilant, almost celebrating. I especially noticed that some of the segregationist leaders seemed very pleased with themselves.
As I went to my afternoon classes, I couldn’t help being very anxious about what was happening to Minnijean that caused such a jovial uproar.
“Looking for your little nigger friend?” one of the students said as I walked down the stairs to study hall. “She’s done got herself suspended. She can only get back in if the superintendent lets her, and you know what that means.”
“One nigger down and eight to go,” was the cry we heard as we left Central High for Christmas vacation. I could hear those declarations shouted even above the festive Christmas carols being played: “One nigger down and eight to go.”
21
NEGRO GIRL IS SUSPENDED FROM SCHOOL AFTER INCIDENT
—Arkansas Gazette, Wednesday, December 18, 1957
MY hopes for a blissful two-week respite from Central High over Christmas vacation had been dashed by the dilemma we all faced because of Minnijean’s suspension. By dumping the chili over the white boys’ heads, whether accidentally or not, she had opened a door through which segregationist leaders announced they would eject all of us. It was the beginning of the end of Little Rock school integration, they said. Immediately, cards and flyers appeared all over town reading: “One nigger down, eight to go.”
Her suspension notice stated Minnijean could not begin the process to apply for readmission until six school days had passed. Classes would resume on January 3 of the new year. Our greatest fear was that Superintendent Blossom would use this opportunity to get segregationists off the school board members’ backs by refusing her reentry. Segregationists had long been threatening a recall of the school board. If the board denied Minnijean readmission, they might stave off that recall and save their jobs.
So instead of the peaceful, happy, safe Christmas vacation I had dreamed of for months, I was embroiled in integration meetings and worry. It was that nagging kind of problem that stays at the back of your mind, no matter what else is going on. Will they or won’t they let Minnijean back in school, and if they don’t, what will it mean to the rest of us?
LOCAL and national NAACP officials were alarmed because they saw the incident as the first sign of significant progress in the segregationists’ campaign to get us out of school. It jeopardized the progress they had worked for so many years to realize. The outcome of her case could affect not only the Little Rock case, but all integration efforts across the South. If expulsion were a way to stop integration, segregationists would make it their weapon.
As I entered the living room early one evening, Grandma was setting up the manger scene, gingerly placing each of the crudely carved wooden figures that had been handed down from her mother. She wouldn’t allow any of us to help for fear we’d drop a piece. What with all her baking and decorating and gift making, this was her favorite time of the year, next to spring planting.
“Did you see that nasty letter on the front page of the Gazette telling businesses to stop advertising in that paper?” Grandma asked.
“I sure hope nobody listens.”
“It’s a sign the segregationists have begun their campaign on a whole new level,” she said. “They’re gonna dig in folks’ pockets now.”
“I guess they’re pretty hopping mad at the Gazette,” Mother Lois said, breezing into the room. “They’re accusing that paper of breaking down segregation laws with its attitude.” She made a funny face as she continued. “I don’t know how they figure that.”
“Well, anyhow, that great lambasting in the paper ought to prepare you for what they just might plan for Minnijean. You’ve got to get ready for it,” Grandma said.
I wondered what awful thing they could possibly have in store for us. “You’ve been a bit down-spirited lately,” she went on. “When did worry ever make anything happen your way? Minnijean either is or is not going to stay in school. Worry won’t fix it.”
I took a deep breath and sank into the couch, waiting for Mother Lois to get dressed for a party we were to attend to honor the Little Rock Nine.
“Where are you going?” Conrad asked.
“Mama and I are going to a grown-up Christmas party,” I answered. I didn’t want to make too much of it because I figured he was beginning to feel left ou
t, what with all the fuss being made over me in newspapers and magazines and now a party planned in our honor. The National Organization of Delta Sigma Theta, a professional women’s sorority, had decided to give us a Christmas party at the Dunbar Community Center. It was the first time some of my own people were saying a public thanks to us. It lightened some of the pain I felt for all those who were critical of our going to Central.
As I entered the Community Center, sorority women, showing off their high fashion and high spirits, greeted us as though we were very important. They had made us their secret project, with members of the nationwide organization mailing gifts and loving notes from across the country to be presented to us that evening.
I was bursting with pride as people said nice things about my courage and about what we nine were doing for future generations who would be able to attend integrated schools. It wasn’t the kind of party where you have teenage fun, but it was wonderful just the same, especially because I had so few opportunities to socialize.
Warriors Don't Cry Page 24
