The Truth About Grace

by Cassie Dandridge Selleck

  “I was not,” she said.

  “Then you’re a liar, too.” Grace pronounced this as if it were a simple fact.

  “I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t,” she said without a trace of rancor. “Or maybe damned if I will and damned if I won’t. I hadn’t planned on it, Grace, but I might have once I knew you.”

  “But you’ve known about us all this time,” Gracie said. “Why didn’t you come find us?”

  Tressa threw up her hands in defeat. “I can’t answer that one, other than to say that it never occurred to me. It’s true, I knew my father had another family in Mayville. But I had no idea they did not know him as their own. Hell, I knew nothing of his arrest, nor his arraignment, nor his guilty plea. I only found out he was in prison when he wrote me from his cell. That’s how little communication I had with the man for most of my life. I rarely worried about him and never reported him missing because he always – eventually – showed up. Or at least one of the money orders he sent on a fairly regular basis would arrive and I’d know he was still around. When I was in college, I cashed them right away and took them as my due. As I grew older, I saw the sacrifice for what it was. He had no court-ordered child support; my mother never divorced him. He gave what he could, and I was glad to get it. I’m not sure that I ever thought much about my father’s life beyond that. God, that sounds awful…”

  “Hmmph,” was all Grace allowed.

  Tressa sighed and leaned forward. She dropped her forehead a bit and peered intently at Grace from beneath her eyebrows. “I will tell you truthfully…right this minute I am very grateful Mrs. Beckworth took the decision out of my hands. I mean that.”

  I hadn’t seen my aunt cry once since I’d met her, not even at the funeral of her father, but she got teary in that moment, which seemed to fluster her. She looked around for a tissue, I assume, and finding none, pressed at both eyes with the sides of her index fingers.

  “Don’t cry, Aunt Tressa.” Danita was immediately off the couch and kneeling at her feet. She took both of Tressa’s hands in hers and tried to console her. “We’re glad, too. It’s kind of like getting a piece of Mama back. We’ve never had an auntie before. Please don’t cry.”

  Danita’s sweetness made her cry in earnest, and she reached for her pocketbook and dug through it. That’s where she found the packet of photos and letters Mrs. Beckworth had given her before the funeral. The photos were wrapped in a photocopy of some sort. I could tell by the stark white paper and the slightly rounded folds. She opened them instinctively and caught her breath.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “A letter from Eddie, I guess. This is his handwriting,” she pulled the pages apart and scanned them quickly.

  Grace leapt from her chair and snatched the paper from Tressa’s hands.

  “Gracie!” I was horrified, but she was already reading the letter out loud.

  5 - Eldred Mims

  October 14, 1999

  Dear Miss Ora,

  If you’re reading this, I must be gone. I’m feeling my age now, and I’m weary. I’m looking forward to going home. There was some talk of a new parole hearing, but I know they won’t release me. I’m talking about going home to the Lord. I know he has prepared a table for me there, and isn’t that a comforting thought? I pray for you and the girls a lot. It just about killed me not to go to Blanche’s funeral. Patrice still comes by to see me now and then, and that’s a blessing. I guess you’re wondering why I’m writing this letter. I got to thinking about what they would do with me when I die, and where they’d put my stuff, what little they is of it. So I told Mr. Chip to please pack everything up and take it to your house. Including my ashes if that’s what they inclined to do. Maybe they’ll bury me, and that’s fine, too. I just don’t want nobody bearing the cost of it, you neither. I read my Bible a lot in here. It’s the one you give me right after I came out to the prison. I don’t take to the trash they pass off as books in this place. Bible got all the stories I need now. But it got me to thinking about things I done over the years. Remember I told you this one time before, sometimes the debt you pay ain’t exactly the one you owe, but it works out just the same. I done a lot wrong, and I know God forgive me. I know He do, sure as I know the sun rise every day.

  They’s something I need to get off my chest, though, and I’m disinclined to talk about it before I die. But I don’t want it dying with me if it brings the truth to light. People gots a right to know from whence they came, even if they already know who they are down inside.

  Miss Ora, I done bad things in my life. Real bad things. I run away from not one daughter, but two, and only one of them even knew I was they daddy. I left my family for the bottle too many times to count. I left two women who was good women. Way too good to take up with the likes of me, and yet both of them was faithful and true and loved me more than I deserved. And I repaid them by leaving them to raise babies by theyself. What kind of man is this? A broken man, that’s what. And yet God’s gonna make me whole again soon. And it’s that kind of grace and mercy makes me want to do better. I don’t know if this is right, but I know it’s true. I’m leaving this confession in your lap, and I hope you’ll forgive me, too, but I’m leaving it on your heart to do what you will with it. Blanche Lowery my daughter. I’m them girls’ granddaddy. That’s why I done what I done. If I was the man I should have been, ain’t none of this would’ve happened. May God have mercy on my soul.

  October 20, 1999

  I had to stop writing for a while, but I come back to it now. That took it all out of me. I was shaking too hard to even hold my pen. I left Blanche’s mama when she was just a few days old. I was young and stupid and mostly scared half to death, but I was also mean-hearted. We wasn’t married and not even living together, ’cause she didn’t care to live in sin. How was I to know who that baby father was? But I did know. I just gave myself a pass to leave it all behind. I heard about the Tuskegee airmen over in Alabama, and I hopped a train first chance I got.

  They ’bout didn’t take me, but I knew engines and motors and fixing broke things from working on farms and in the orange groves most of my life. I drawed a diagram of an idea I had to convert an old steam tractor to gas and they finally agreed to test me for service. I wanted so bad to fly, but my eyes failed me there. I was happy to be around those airplanes, though, and it didn’t take long to just plain forget about that baby and her mama. You want to know the sad truth about that? I never even knowed her name until I met her that day on your porch. I didn’t know she was my daughter then. I just knew she looked mighty familiar.

  Anyway, I had me a new life out in Alabama and it was mostly good. I was feeling pretty good about myself working on them planes. Kind of a hotshot I reckon. I met Tressa’s mama and she wouldn’t give me the time of day ‘til she had a ring on her finger. We was married ’fore I knew it, and Tressa borned a year later. I was good for a while, but there was a lotta drinking on that base. Lotta drinking. I ain’t going into all them details. Tressa knows that story and she can tell you what she likes. I helped her when I could. I didn’t half the time have a roof over my head when the war was over, but I sent her what I could manage. She was set on going to college and I was gonna help her get there. I would have gone myself if I could have, but we was still under Jim Crow down here and the G.I. bill didn’t do me no good when they wasn’t a college would take me. But I was proud of Tressa, just like I’m proud of Patrice, and I want her to know that.

  I reckon I gone on long enough, Miss Ora. I don’t want you feeling guilty about nothing, you hear me? What’s done is done. Blanche is gone and I’ll be gone soon, too. If you gone before me, Mr. Chip knows to give this to Patrice in your stead. They’s one more thing I’m gonna ask you, though. I done worried myself sick about little Gracie. That child got thrown asunder in all this. I ain’t faulting you or Blanche for it, but it ain’t that child’s fault neither. And it ain’t her fault she all wrapped up in them drugs. She needs help, Miss Ora. She needs h
elp like I shoulda got long ago myself, but she needs it worse than I ever did. I want you to tell her she a good child. She got the best heart of them all, and she ought to know she mean everything to her ol’ granddaddy, for whatever that’s worth. Please tell her I love her. Please tell her I’m sorry for it all.

  Eddie

  6 – Patrice

  I took one last look at the prison where Eldred Mims died, and felt an overwhelming mix of sadness and anger. So many things make sense now. I rested my forehead against the steering wheel and wept for the third time in a week. I don’t usually give in to emotions; they don’t work in my favor in a courtroom. But, damn it all, I could have fixed this. Maybe not in the beginning, but certainly before it went this far.

  I found a clean napkin in my center console and blew my nose. I’m not one to complain. What good does it do, anyway? My life, despite a few hardships, has been blessed. I had the love of a good, strong mother, a brother I adored, and three younger sisters to laugh with over the years, and cry with when we suffered those terrible losses. I had a benefactor who made sure I got through college – Miss Ora hounded the hell out of me if she thought I was making bad choices. I did make a few of those over the years, and still made it out virtually unscathed.

  I put my car in drive and pulled away from the chain link fence I’d been staring through. I had twenty minutes to get back to Miss Ora’s house and that’s about what it would take. I got the fleeting thought that I would see Mama when I got there. I haven’t gotten used to those little blips in the brain, and the muscle memories, that make you think and rethink in an instant. Before you can even smile you remember that she isn’t there anymore. And then your brain fully engages and you remember everything.

  I have watched my sister, for years now, make one bad decision after the other. My mother rationalized every single one. While I was buying Mama a new washer and dryer, or clothes for Shawn and Rochelle, she was sending Grace money for drugs. In her mind she was helping her daughter pay bills, or go to the doctor, or put food on the table; she was doing for her child what Miss Ora did for me. Except, she was not. It was not the same, and I couldn’t convince her of this. She quoted the Bible at me when the truth hit too close to home to argue.

  “All y’all spend too much time judgin’ the other,” she said. “So busy pointing out the speck in your brother’s eye, you can’t see the log in your own.”

  “What log, Ma?” I screamed at her one time. “Show me the log!”

  I hated arguing with my mother, and now that she is gone, I regret it even more. I’ve forgiven her, of course, but it’s not that simple with my sister. Knowing what she went through makes it more complicated, for sure, but it doesn’t take away the anger. She caused turmoil in my family, and she is not blameless. At some point, you have to recognize that none of the pain inflicted on you gives you the right to hurt others. At some point, you have to step up and take care of yourself, instead of abdicating all responsibility for your actions and their consequences.

  I am so sad knowing what Gracie went through. I can’t even imagine what it has been like for her. And yet, I can imagine, because I know firsthand what it’s been like for us. And it has been hell. Pure hell.

  So, despite my anger at her, last night, when Gracie broke down over Eddie’s letter, I totally got it. She was distraught. So was I, and so were my sisters – knowing what Eddie did for us. His sacrifice was astounding. It comes with a weight that is almost too much to bear.

  And Gracie’s wailing was proof of the unbearable. It woke Miss Ora and she rushed into the room still trying to tie her robe around her waist.

  We had swaddled Gracie in one of Miss Ora’s blankets and she lay curled in an almost fetal position between the twins on the couch. Her eyes were closed, but tears poured sideways down her face and her wail had reduced to a soft moan. I was kneeling in front of her trying to make her sip some water; Tressa was sitting in the recliner not saying much at all.

  “Gracie, listen to me,” I kept saying. “You have to snap out of this. Drink this water. Drink it, Gracie. Drink the water.”

  Danita was stroking her head and whispering something I couldn’t hear. Re’Netta had her hand on Grace’s leg and was pushing her back and forth…almost like rocking a cradle.

  “What is it?” Miss Ora asked by way of announcing her presence. “What in the world happened?”

  Tressa stood then. “I found Eddie’s letter and she read it. I think it was just more than she could take.”

  I was getting more frustrated, which only made Gracie moan louder.

  Miss Ora tried to diffuse the situation. “Patrice, honey, why don’t you go make some coffee and just let her be for a minute?”

  Something in me snapped. I spun my head sideways and looked up at her over my shoulder.

  “Are you kidding me?” I asked.

  “I…I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I just thought... She needs to rest a minute, Patrice. Maybe if you just let her alone –”

  “Please don’t tell me how to handle my sister, Miss Ora. Please don’t. I’ve been handling her all my life without your input. I think I know what I’m doing.” I stood then and faced her with my fists balled up tight and resting on my hips.

  “It isn’t working, though.” She trailed off and pulled at her belt again.

  “You don’t have to tell me it’s not working, Miss Ora.” I flung one hand behind me and pointed at my sister, still huddled on the couch. “It hasn’t been working for years now, because she makes everything about herself.”

  “Patrice, don’t,” Danita said, covering Grace’s exposed ear with one hand.

  I wheeled to face my sister. “That’s what Mama always said. Patrice, don’t. Ain’t nobody saying ‘Grace, don’t,’ though. Nobody is saying ‘Grace, don’t expect everybody to take care of you and your children. Grace, don’t kill yourself with those drugs.’ They say, ‘Patrice, don’t make a fuss. Shawn and Rochelle need you.’ Well, I know they need me. But they need me because their own mother won’t take care of herself, much less them.”

  I started to feel weak then, and my heart was pounding in my chest.

  Tressa spoke up then and, for a second, I wondered if she was just confused and calling me by the wrong name. “Mrs. Beckworth, are you okay?”

  “I don’t feel well,” Miss Ora said.

  I squinted my eyes and examined her face.

  “Miss Ora, you’re white as a sheet,” I came to my senses and took her by the arm.

  “Take her upstairs,” Aunt Tressa ordered, as if she’d been doing it all of our lives. “I’ll be up in a minute.”

  I did as I was told, and carefully guided her up the stairs to her bed. I got her a glass of water and sat with her until she said she felt better.

  “I’m sorry I yelled at you,” I said after a while.

  She shook her head. “You didn’t yell.”

  “I know, but I wasn’t very nice, and I really am sorry.”

  She reached up and laid her hand on my arm. It was cold and so pale, I could see right through her skin. Her veins were purple and one of them bulged up near her wrist and split into a Y at her ring finger. It was such a contrast against my dark skin, that I couldn’t help taking notice of it. I covered her hand with my own and tried to warm it.

  She squeezed my hand in response. “Patrice, you have nothing to apologize to me for. Nothing at all.”

  “I’ve been doing this a long time, Miss Ora. I’ve been the fix-it person for so long, and I don’t know how to fix this.”

  “Let it mend itself, honey. You didn’t break it,” she said.

  I nodded and fell silent. We sat like that for a long time more, until Tressa came up to tell us she had given Gracie something to make her sleep and tucked her into bed.

  7 – Grace

  I wasn’t sure exactly when Patrice and Aunt Tressa would arrive the next morning, but I dared not make myself too comfortable. I’d never hear the end of it from Sister if I was in bed when s
he got here. She wouldn’t believe I’d already been up. She don’t believe anything I say anymore.

  I took a quick shower and put on the same clothes I wore to the funeral yesterday. They clean enough, I guess, but I’ll be glad to get a few things from Mama’s house when I can. Aunt Tressa brought me a pair of pajamas with the sleeping pill she gave me last night. Must be Miss Ora’s ’cause they fit just fine. Tressa’s way taller’n me, so they couldn’t be hers.

  When I went back to the kitchen, the backyard caught my eye and I stepped outside to breathe. I hated seeing that yard in such a state. Everything was overgrown. I went to the garage and found a pair of pruning shears that still had sharp edges. Then I got busy. The camellias were long past just dead-heading. I cut them all the way back. The azaleas around her oak tree were halfway up the trunk, though, so I thought I’d better go find a pair of loppers before digging into that mess. That’s when I saw Eddie’s chair pushed over in the corner of the garage and half-covered by a blue tarp. I made a lot of noise walkin’ up to it, just in case some little mousies were keepin’ house under there. I pulled back the tarp and dust rolled in waves through the light streaming in the side window. It’s still a beautiful thing, that old barber’s chair, even though it’s covered in a half inch of dust and the base has gone all rusty. I remember helpin’ Mr. Pecan polish this thing. He woulda never let it get this bad.

  I thought about that letter I read last night. I never cried so hard in my life. Not even when Mama died, which I still ain’t over. I never knew Marcus killed that white boy until Miss Ora told us yesterday. I always thought Mr. Pecan did it ’cause why else would he confess? So now, on top of all this mess of lies and plain trippin’ in my head over what’s dream and what’s real, I gotta wrestle with knowing that old man went to jail for something he ain’t even done. I never knew love that big.