The Upper Room

by Mary Monroe

  “Honest to God, the door to the upper room’ll stay shet till yall come back home,” Loomis promised, crossing his heart with his finger.

  Irene came out on the porch just as Roscoe and No Talk were walking back up the steps.

  “How long yall goin to be gone?” she asked Ruby, stepping aside so Roscoe could pass and go back inside.

  “Huh?” Loomis asked, turning to face Irene. She frowned at him and shook her head in exasperation.

  “Loomis, I ain’t talkin to you. I was talkin to Mama Ruby. I axed her how long her and Mo’reen was goin to be gone?”

  Loomis turned back to Ruby.

  “Mama Ruby, how long you and Mo’reen goin to be gone?” he asked.

  Ruby sighed and turned her head mechanically to face him.

  “Just a couple weeks. Mo’reen got to get back here for school. I . . . I don’t want her to grow up to be a fool or nothin . . . she . . . she need her book learnin.” Ruby’s voice was weak and barely audible and had been for three days, since the word had come that Virgil had disappeared in the jungles of Viet Nam and was feared dead.

  No Talk, standing at the side of the glider, reached out and touched the top of Ruby’s head and she started sobbing.

  “Mama Ruby, don’t worry about nothin,” Loomis sniffed. Seconds later he was sobbing as hard as Ruby. No Talk touched his back and patted him gently. “I’m OK, No Talk,” Loomis mumbled. “Now, Mama Ruby, like I just said, you stop cryin. . . . Me . . . Me and No Talk and Fast Black and Big Red ain’t goin to let no maniac mess up your house. . .. I . . . I . . . I declare we ain’t.”

  Ruby wiped her eyes with the tail of her duster and laid her head on Loomis’ shoulder.

  “Yall so good to me. You’ll be blessed, Loomis, on account of you is a righteous man to the end. I never thought I would be took to the bosom like I been with yall. Me bein from Louisiana and not Florida and all. Yall folks treat me good as my mama. I declare, I got some true-blue friends.” Ruby forced herself to smile.

  “And I intend to see that No Talk feed your hens. I’m goin to keep them kids out your yard scatterin rib bones and other mess,” Loomis said.

  “Thank you, Loomis,” Ruby sighed, rising.

  Roscoe came to the door and leaned his head out.

  “Mama Ruby, you about ready for me to carry you and Mo’reen to the train station?” he asked.

  “Yeah. Let me get Mo’reen from the upper room.”

  Ruby eased past Roscoe and stepped into her living room, where Fast Black, Bishop, Reverend Tiggs, Zeus, Big Red, and a knot of children moved about noiselessly. Suddenly Fast Black ran to Ruby and threw her arms around her waist.

  “Lord in heaven—I got a feelin we ain’t never goin to see you again, Mama Ruby! I got a feelin you goin off and ain’t never comin back!”

  “Fast Black, you stop that nonsense! I ain’t never leavin Goons. I wouldn’t leave Goons to go to heaven . . . lest the Big Boss call me. And the way I been servin Him, he liable to let me live forever!” Ruby shouted.

  “Ain’t it so,” Bishop interjected. “Fast Black, ain’t nothin goin to stop Ruby from comin on back here where she belong. She was sent here to us for a reason.”

  Fast Black removed her arms from Ruby’s waist and leaned back to admire her face. Ruby smiled at her.

  “You sho nuff belong to us, Mama Ruby? What about your folks in Louisiana? What if they take a notion not to let you come back?”

  “Girl, ain’t nothin can hold me down. Not a rope. Not a slab of concrete settin on my bosom. Not a court order. I’m comin back here like I said. This is my home,” Ruby declared.

  Zeus started to cry. He snatched a large, dingy white rag from his pants’ pocket and blew his nose.

  “Oh Lord!” Catty wailed. “I want to go to Louisiana with you and Mo’reen!” She stomped her foot and put her thumb in her mouth.

  “Mama Ruby, how come you got to go anyway?” Yellow Jack asked.

  Ruby walked to the center of the floor and stopped.

  “Yall listen. Yall all know I ain’t been out of this state since I come here. Eight years ago. I ain’t seen my mama and daddy and sisters in a coon’s age. It’s time for me to go home. I need em right now. I’m goin to need all the help I can get in my hour of need. We all got to pray. And the more of us knockin on the Lord’s front door, the easier it’ll be for Him to hear. We got to get Him to find Virgil and send him back home! I been a child of God all my life!” Ruby shouted.

  “Amen!” someone said.

  “On account of the Lord, I had a choice to eat from either a picnic table or a hog trough—I been picnicin like a hog! One reason yall all livin so well since I come here is on account of my good credit on God’s bill. Don’t worry none about me. Can’t nothin harm me, cept lightnin—even then it’s got to strike me ten times!”

  “Sister Ruby, you is a saint to the bone,” Reverend Tiggs said with a wide-mouthed grin.

  “Can’t you leave Mo’reen here to keep me company, Mama Ruby?” Catty asked, tugging at Ruby’s arm.

  “Have mercy on your soul, Catty! Mo’reen is the Lord’s gift to me and she must accompany me everywhere I go. Just like I carry the Lord with me everywhere I go, I must carry Mo’reen.” Ruby moved across the room to the steps leading upstairs.

  “Mo’reen, come say good-bye to everybody, darlin. Yoo-hooo—come on down, sweetie. We fixin to haul ass,” Ruby yelled, fighting back more tears.

  Within seconds Maureen stomped down the stairs hugging a shopping bag.

  “Lord, Mama Ruby, I hope I don’t have to come back to that ole scarey upper room,” Maureen said seriously.

  Ruby gasped and had to be held up by four of her friends to keep from falling to the floor.

  25

  “Mama Ruby, how come you lookin so sad? You ain’t no fun no more,” Maureen complained.

  “I’m tired. My blood pressure done run up hog high. And I got a lot of things on my mind,” Ruby replied weakly. She lay half sprawled across a bench in the Shreveport, Louisiana, Southern Railways train station with one hand on her chest, breathing with some difficulty.

  Maureen stood in front of her looking into her eyes.

  “What’s wrong, Mama Ruby? You just keep on cryin.”

  “Mo’reen.” Ruby stopped and attempted to smile. “I tried to tell that hardheaded boy of mine not to run off to that army. He just done it to spite Fast Black.”

  “Virgil said he was joinin the army to get away from you, Mama Ruby. He told Loomis that,” Maureen revealed.

  Ruby looked at her for a long time. More tears flowed.

  “Why would anybody want to get away from me?” Ruby whispered.

  “Cause you crazy, I guess,” Maureen shrugged. “Virgil said he wanted to get away from you so you wouldn’t drive him crazy. Mama Ruby, is you goin to drive me crazy?”

  Ruby removed her handkerchief from her bosom and wiped her eyes and nose.

  “Stop cryin, Mama Ruby.”

  “Mo’reen, as much as I’ve done for you and Virgil, why would yall think I’m crazy?”

  Maureen shrugged.

  “Everybody say you is. Loomis. Zeus. Bishop. Yellow Jack. Big Red. Catty. Bobby Boatwright. Bobby Boatwright’s daddy. Everybody.”

  Ruby considered what Maureen told her.

  “Is there anybody what ain’t said I’m crazy?”

  “No Talk. And I guess that’s on account of he can’t say nothin. But I bet he think you crazy too.”

  “I’m different.”

  “I know,” Maureen said. “Loomis said if God made another one like you, she up there raisin sand in heaven cause this planet wasn’t big enough for two of you.”

  “Ain’t nothin wrong with me. I ain’t crazy. I’m just a little tetched cause my boy gone. He ain’t had no business joinin no army.”

  “Virgil was a growed-up man,” Maureen reminded Ruby.

  “That ain’t had nothin to do with him leavin home. I didn’t want him to go.”

  “Yo
u don’t never want me to go neither? Nowhere?”

  “Girl, Virgil runnin off is one thing, but you ain’t never ever goin nowhere, lest you goin with me. You is my gift from the Lord above.”

  Maureen gave Ruby a critical look.

  “I don’t want to stay with you forever, Mama Ruby.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, I want to be like other girls. I want to move in a house in Miami or somethin. Fast Black say if I ever was to want to have me a good time, I should go live in San Francisco. She went there when she was fifteen and stayed for a whole year. She say ain’t no place in this world like San Francisco.”

  “San Francisco is the most wicked city since Sodom and Gomorrah. A girl with your upbringin ain’t got no business in no San Francisco. Don’t you never let me hear you mention that place no more. Only way you’ll go to San Francisco, is if I was to die. And I ain’t got no plans to die.”

  “OK,” Maureen mumbled, moving back a few steps. She was close enough to see out the window. “I see a cab. I think it’s ours, on account of we the only ones left in here.”

  Outside, a young black cabdriver groaned when he saw the gigantic black woman emerge from the train station. The large footlocker she carried was one thing. That would take up enough space. He would probably have to put it in the trunk. But the woman herself had to weigh at least three hundred and fifty pounds. He wondered if the springs in the backseat of the old taxi would survive the long ride from the train station all the way out to Thelma City, a black residential area in Shreveport. Ruby slid the footlocker down on the ground next to the cab and the driver quickly got out and put it in the trunk. She smiled at him, then snatched open the back door and fell into the vehicle. Her flesh, now loose and saggy, seemed to spread over the entire length of the seat.

  “Where I’m goin to sit?” Maureen whined. “You so big and fat you take up all the room, Mama Ruby.” Ruby had left the back door open for Maureen to get in, but there was no place left for her to sit.

  “Let me try and scoot over,” Ruby offered. She tried to move but there was very little room for Ruby to arrange herself in such a limited space. She struggled as she continued to try to move over. “I declare . . . I can’t barely move. Must be all this heat.”

  “Must be all your fat,” Maureen declared.

  “You can sit up in the front with me, lamb,” the driver said to Maureen. He smiled and tickled her chin. She climbed in and immediately started to meddle with the cab’s radio. “Now you behave, darlin. You might lose me my job,” he said as he took the mouthpiece from Maureen and called in his destination.

  “Wasn’t that a mess, President Kennedy gettin hisself shot last month?” he said, making conversation.

  “Devil’s work. Satan’s got a toe-hold on half the folks in the world. Me, I been holdin him back the best I could.” Ruby sighed and shook her head. “But he’s a low-down, funky black dog with the strength often bulls. You a Christian?”

  “I was raised in the church.”

  “Just think what a mess we would have on our hands without the Lord,” Ruby moaned, shaking her head.

  “Don’t I know it, ma’am.” The cabdriver shook his head too and sighed. “Yall just get off the ten twenty-eight in from Jacksonville?” he asked, as the taxi pulled out into traffic.

  “We just come in from Goons in Miami,” Ruby replied.

  “I got a off cousin in Miami. Ain’t seen him in three years. I been meanin to drag my tail to Florida to see him someday. I don’t know though, them niggers out in Florida is sho nuff mean! Wooo weee! Every time I talk to my cousin on the phone, he just gettin out either the hospital where some maniac done cut him up or shot him up, or he just gettin out of jail for cuttin up or shootin somebody. What’s wrong with them folks in Florida? Them white folks must put somethin in the water, huh?”

  “See, Satan workin his way from the bottom up. Meanin, he started actin a fool in Florida. The thing is, he done got there and took up residence.”

  “I declare, you got more religion than a little bit. I feel shame to be settin here amongst all your glory, miss,” the cabdriver said with embarrassment.

  “My prayers is with you, son. I got a boy round your age. Went and got hisself caught by them Japs in V-Eight Nam and they done hid him somewhere where the U.S. Army can’t find him.”

  The driver looked at Ruby through his rearview mirror and bit his lip, feeling sorry for her.

  “Ma’am, two of my brothers got kilt over there. I tried to join up but they wouldn’t take me on account of I got flat feet and a nervous condition on account of I seen my own mama get kilt. She involved herself with a sailor and he shot her down like a dog when she tried to break off with him.”

  “Devil’s work. I see I’m goin to have to go up to that low-down, funky black dog again. Devil.”

  “I prayed till I was blue in the face. Seem like God done fell asleep on me,” the driver said sadly.

  “I will include you in my prayers, boy,” Ruby promised.

  “You know, I feel better just from talkin to you, ma’am. You seem different. I can’t put my finger on it, but you ain’t no regular lady. There’s somethin about you.”

  Maureen turned to face Ruby, looking her over thoroughly. A stern look from Ruby discouraged Maureen from speaking.

  “What brings yall to this part of the South?”

  “I’m visitin my family. I’m originally from Shreveport and I ain’t seen my family since nineteen and forty-one,” Ruby explained.

  “Woo wee! That’s a coon’s age! That’s more than twenty years ago. You been away all this time, what possessed you to come home, if you don’t mind me axin?”

  Ruby sighed and shook her head slowly, looking off to the side.

  “The devil separated me from my family. The devil chased me out my daddy’s house. But with God, I done found my way back home!” Ruby exclaimed, waving her hands high above her head.

  “I see,” the driver replied, looking at her again through the rearview mirror. “You reckon your folks ain’t done forgot you? You been gone a long time.”

  “I ain’t no easy person to forget,” Ruby replied.

  The cabdriver bit his bottom lip, not knowing how to interpret the smile that suddenly appeared on Ruby’s face.

  As they rode through downtown Shreveport, Ruby noticed how much the old city had changed. On the corner of Main and Reed streets, Murphy’s five and dime had become Archie’s Soul Food Kitchen. A block farther, Doctor Mason’s Ear, Nose, and Eye Clinic had become Leroy’s Poolroom. A crowd of shabbily dressed black men, their ages ranging from eight to eighty-eight, wandered about, looking lost. Some had blank, bored expressions on their faces. Some looked bitter and suspicious. Young boys, wearing thin T-shirts and with bare feet, threw dice on the sidewalk in front of Leroy’s Poolroom.

  As the cab passed a rib joint with a long line of hungry people standing outside, Ruby stared out the window with interest.

  “That rib joint use to be a Baptist church,” she said.

  “I know, on account of I use to go to it. My mama use to scrub me with lye soap and rub my whole face with vaseline till I shined like new money, then she would drag me off to that Baptist church,” the driver laughed.

  They passed a crowd of buxom black ladies wearing chiffon dresses, cursing at the men wandering about the streets.

  “Black folks sho nuff like to fuss with one another,” the driver lamented. “I guess that’s why we always got some kind of mess on our hands.”

  “We Ham’s children. That’s why we always got a mess on our hands. Not only that, we bear the mark of Cain,” Ruby explained. The driver looked at her again, wondering what the smile on her face meant this time.

  The cab finally stopped in front of a large, dusty, red-shingled house located at 123 North Easly Street.

  “That’ll be five dollars and a dime,” the driver informed Ruby.

  She searched the contents of her flimsy purse, shaking it first, then turning it
upside down. Two coins, a penny and a nickel, fell out on her lap.

  “Wonder what happened to all my money,” Ruby mumbled. “Mo’reen, you got any money?” she said, without looking up from her purse.

  “Naw,” Maureen shrugged. “Where would I have got any money from? You took back that dime you give me before we left home.”

  “Just a minute, sir.” Ruby reached down inside the front of her dress and pulled a knotted handkerchief from her bosom. Fussing, she undid the knot with her teeth. Unwrapping the handkerchief, she revealed a crumpled one-dollar bill, four more pennies, and a stick of bubble gum. “I guess I was pickpocketed on that train,” she mumbled, looking up to face the driver as her eyes filled with fresh tears. “There’s so much dishonesty among us. It’s gettin so a Christian can’t go nowhere without gettin molested. I guess I’m lucky I wasn’t raped on that train too. . . .”

  “What about the money you took from Roscoe’s wallet before we left home? Remember how we broke in his house when he was asleep? Me and you and Fast Black and Loomis. His wallet was on the coffee table,” Maureen said, rising up from the seat and pointing at Ruby’s leg. “You stuck it in your sock.”

  Ruby glared at her before responding.

  “. . . Oh . . . I had plumb forgot about my sock money,” she grinned sheepishly. The embarrassed driver scratched his head and looked out the window.

  After Ruby paid the man, he unloaded the footlocker from the trunk, set it upright on the sidewalk in front of Ruby’s parents’ house, and quickly got into his taxi and sped off.

  Ruby immediately turned to Maureen, anger in her eyes.

  “You ain’t had no business tattlin on me in front of no rank stranger! Come on, girl!” Ruby shouted. She lifted the footlocker with one hand as if it weighed nothing, and Maureen fell in behind her as Ruby stomped up onto her parents’ front porch, pushed open the door, and walked in.

  “Mama, Papa! Yoo-hooooo! It’s me, Ruby Jean! I done come home,” Ruby called out as she stopped in the middle of the living room floor. Maureen hid behind her.

  An obese, dark-skinned man of about sixty with a pie-round face entered, carrying a spittoon and a package of chewing tobacco.