I sat down on the steps and started to cry again. Why had I been made to know all of this, to be the only one to meet Ella Mae, to remember so sharply every wrong that had ever been done to me? Maybe it was true. Maybe it was Granmama who taught Mama how to be deaf and blind to what somebody was doing to hurt her daughter.
In the distance I saw Ella Mae approach, and I tried to dry my tears to make it look like I was wiping sweat. Her blue jean jacket was finally gone, leaving her in a short-sleeved T-shirt that hugged her muscular arms. Her steps were slow, rhythmic, but wide. Each one brought her much faster than I expected.
She was black and Indian, and she did look wild. When I looked at her, I felt the same for her that I did for the Missouri tornadoes that we hid from in our basement, all of us too excited to be afraid. Mama told us to shut up so she could hear the wind. I imagined escaping the basement and running to the schoolyard, where the tornado came roaring and gutting everything in its path, and I would be afraid of losing my life but would sacrifice it to see something that awful and beautiful.
Ella Mae was awful and beautiful. I could feel her steps in my chest, her presence in the gut of my stomach. Feeling this, and knowing my mother, I knew how the Ella Mae story came about. She was differenther skin redder than Granmamas, her head large like a mans, and hair so dark it showed blue and green like a dragonflys wings.
When she sat down next to me, I felt my heartbeat catch up with hers. Childone thing for sure, you as good a runner as I ever was. I would have brought you out here to this old church had you said thats where you wanted to go. Myself, I dont come around here except to tend Mothas grave. This place, they need to go on and knock it down. This is where your mama and them ought to be talkin about ghosts comin from. Sho-nuf, Im tellin you.
Her face was shiny with sweat, and she was careful not to touch me. Sorry if I got you upset about your granmama. I really aint got no business tellin you certain things, whether you ask or not.
I yanked a whole handful of wild onions that were growing up high with the other weeds. Thats okay. Im not any more upset knowing the family stuff that I didnt know than I am knowing all the stuff Ive grown up with. I guess Mama and Deddy didnt get how they are by themselves, they must have learned it from someplace.
I pinched the end of the onions between my knees and started braiding them so I didnt have to look at her. Ive seen Deddy kill his own brother, Ive seen Mama and Deddy try to kill each other, I been in Deddys way more than once and got hit by a drunk fist.
I moistened my chapped lips. Giant tears fell out of my eyes and splashed on my onion braid. I been done-it-to by Deddy . . . twice.
There was a long silence. She grabbed her own muscular arm like she was suddenly cold, and squinted up at the sky. She grunted, like someone had punched her in the gut. Then she looked at me like I was a map she couldnt make sense of.
She unfolded her rigid arms and put them around me.
I said, crying into the sweat of her solid chest, I remember you taking me to the front of the church to see Granmama in her casket. I remember you telling me I was her favorite granbaby. But I didnt even understand who you were, and I didnt understand Granmama was dead.
Her heavy voice was more tenor now, watery. Child, theres so much pain in this family. I wasnt supposed to even be at that funeral. Everybody act like it was my fault Motha was dead.
I been hurt too, Odessa. Folks aint supposed to be connected in the way Im connected to people. Me and Motha having the same deddy, and me and you both been soiled by Loni.
I pushed away from her. I was dizzy from the heat, and tried to focus. He did it to me, and Gretal, and Ella Mae.
She grabbed my stiff body. Hot air swirled in the pit of my stomach, and I struggled to get out of her gripLet go. Please let me gobut she wouldnt let go until I calmed down.
I dont know what to tell you, child. All I can tell you ismy own story. But I aint even willin to tell that if you gone run off and treat me like a liar, like you did back at the house. I been having folks tell me I aint nothin but a liar for the things I say all my life. I sho dont need that from you too. You caint be cryin and fightin me, I aint done you no harm.
27
Bone Teeth
The sun had come back out and was even hotter on its fall toward early evening. She grabbed my hand and said, "Come on to the back, where it's shady. If you ain't scared a graves, I'll show you where some bodies lay."
Behind the church was a graveyard fenced in by a brick wall only high to my thigh. A huge oak reached its limbs over the graves. Its roots pushed the wall up in places, leaving crumbled brick. Empty plastic flower baskets, satin ribbon, and the wire to wreaths long since withered littered the small plot. In the shade of the tree shiny grass had pushed up through last year's fallen leaves. Some of the graves had wooden crosses, some stones were made of poured cement, and a few were smooth granite with machine-engraved letters. Granmama's was one of these.
Ella Mae bent down to dust the caterpillars off. "This is where your granmama is buried."
The two of us stood on either side of Granmamas headstone. I spoke quietly over my granmamas grave. I remember the burial. I can still smell the way the earth was, all dug up and damp when they lowered her casket.
Her stone read:
ELIZABETHLACEY
19141967
HEMAKETHME TOLIEDOWN
IN THEGREENPASTURES
Ella Mae pointed to a little grave that rested next to Granmamas. Stones mapped out the tiny plot.
And this is my babys grave. I dont really know where the body lies, though. When the baby died, Motha wouldnt tell me where they buried it. But when they stopped using this old church, I was sittin around here at Mothas grave, thinkin about how funny love is. You could love somebody who didnt hardly know how to be good to you, like I love Motha. And you could love somebody you only seen once, like I love my baby. Thats because it mostly aint about love, its about needin folks to be what they supposed to be. This was supposed to be my mama.
Ella Mae pointed to Granmamas grave. She was supposed to believe every word I say above somebody else. She pointed to the little mound. And this supposed to be my baby. Dont make no difference how it had to come in this world, or who the daddy was, it was supposed to be my baby.
I asked her who the babys father was. I wondered if Deddy made her pregnant.
Loni, she answered. Sho-nuf it aint right, and I didnt expect no child to be born out of somebody hurting me. But thats the way it all come down.
I wasnt surprised, numb now to Deddys sins. I asked her if she could tell me the rest of her story.
I reckon I can tell you the rest, if you up to it.
I want to know. I sat down and pulled weeds to keep from being too nervous.
She sat down, between the two graves, her legs stretching the length of Granmamas grave.
Well, first of all Bernice and them was dead set on gettin either Loni or Leland to stop playin ball long enough to pay them some attention. Bernice was the first to make it, so she got Loni to start taking her to the colored folks dance house every weekend. Leland was a different story. After the game he wasnt studying about hangin out with them gals. All he wanted was to be askin Bo this and that question about how to make white lightnin, and Bo kept him busy with wrong ingredients.
She stopped and started laughing. I swear, Leland ended up makin everything from vinegar to rubbing alcohol.
Neither one of them could play ball as good as me. Both of them talkin about how they was gonna get good and be the first colored men to join the St. Louis ball team. Said theyd be movin up to the city and comin back in a fancy car. Leland worked hard and got right good at ball after a while.
Bo paid by the number of home runs you made, or number a times you struck somebody out, or caught a fly ball.
I didnt get paid. Bo said, The roof over your head is your pay.
Afta while Leland got himself a old junky truck and said sho-nuf he had enough money to go on about
his business to St. Louis. Your deddy liked to try to kill himself somebody. While he was messin around seein who he could make look at his muscles, Leland had done gone on and fixed himself to leave. He must have known just how your deddy would act, sohe didnt tell nobody, just showed up for the ball game with his truck packed and his Sunday white shirt and good shoes and said, real city like, poppin on some chewin gum, Im goin on to St. Louis. I dont have time to be messin around here in the dirt. Then he turned to your deddy and your mama and said, Little brotha, when you can get out your own way, come look me up. He pulled off, rocks and dirt makin a whole commotion while everybody just stared.
Loni quit grinnin up in Bos face then, kept sayin Bo had give Leland the money to go rather than him, and it didnt have nothin to do with the ball game. About that time, Loni tried to make like your mama was the only one he knew who could see what kind of good he say he was.
If it was one thing Bo didnt like, it was being called a liar or a cheat. He would say, Aint a nigga gonna be caught dead callin me a liar. He kicked Loni off the team, and a couple of times Loni came to the game anyway, drunk.
Must have been your mama who told him I was really her sista Ella Mae, not some half-black Indian name Jim Dandy, because one day he showed up cussin Bo right in the middle of a winning game, embarrassin Bo in front of the other team owners. One of the men said, Caint you control that nigga, and Bo liked to got so mad at Loni that he ran, which he hated to do, back to the house and got his shotgun.
About the time Bo got back, Loni had ran up to me and ripped my jersey open, showin my teats to them white men and everybody. He was shoutin, This motha-fuck been whuppin your teams with a Indian bitch. Look, teats and all! I didnt even botha to button my shirt. I got my glove off and used these fistsElla Mae shook her fist over Granmamas graveand I tried to kill his ass.
The game was forfeited. Bo went up to Loni and told himhe was lower than horseshit, and he didnt ever want to see his black ass around the ball field no more. Bo wasnt mad because Loni ripped my shirt open and showed everybody my business, he was mad because Loni made him out to be a cheat in front of them white men who he was in good with.
That night Bernice was supposed to be goin with Loni to the end a high school dance in West Point. Far as Bo knew, she was gonna abide by what he said and go by herself, and he told me I had to take his good car and drive her. Well, I didnt hardly like that. I got into a big screamin fight with your mama, told her none a this would have happened had she kept her big mouth shut. But Bernice and Bo and everybody else was actin like it was my fault that Bos team might go down for cheatin.
Well, your mama got all dressed up in her party dress and white gloves and everything, and that was that. Motha said just go on and drive her and get it over with. She told me that when she was growin up she spent a lot a time arguing with her mother, and lookin back, she wish she had just done what she was supposed to do. She said it wouldve been easier.
This didnt really satisfy me none, but Motha was the only one in the family who would show me in any kind of way that I was human. Even if it only was when nobody was lookin that she treated me right, it was still better than nothin. So when she said I ought to try and just not be makin Bo mad all the time, I always did try.
There the two of us was, headin up the road. Bernice decided after a while to tell me that she wanted me to drop her off up near Ms. Bernadettes old schoolhouse because she was meetin Loni there. And I just let her talk, and didnt even look over at her. There I was in a old T-shirt and work pants because thats all I had to wear. Last new thing anybody had bought for me was my baseball shirt, and that no-good bastardhad tore that open and made me to be like somethin from the carnival.
Your mama was gettin treated like she wasnt no kin to me, gettin chauffeured around in Bos car that he aint never before that day let me lean on let alone drive.
We was approachin Ms. Bernadettes old schoolhouse that had been vacant for five years, and closer we got, I could see Loni standin there leanin against his old raggedy truck, just waitin for me to do what the two a them thought I was sposed to do. Nobody ever had any consideration for my feelins whatsoever.
I was really just plannin on scarin him and keeping on down the road to West Point where I was supposed to be taking Bernice. But that aint what happened. I swear I go to do one thing, and look like to me the situation always get worse.
She was looking out past my head at the fields. Her eyes were heavy with pain, and red from holding back tears. I was ashamed now. And I knew that whatever else there was to the story, Ella Mae had been made to suffer for lots of stuff that other people had done wrong. I knew that Mama and Deddy, and Granmama and Grandeddy, had just taken whatever they didnt want of the past and heaped it on Ella Mae.
She took a deep breath, tucked her hair behind her ears, and started up again. Well, I swerved to play like I was gonna hit him, and my wheels stuck in the water ditch on the side of the road. I went a few yards tryin to get the tires to catch back up on the road, but it was too late. I ran headlong into a tree. About the time I came to, I felt like somebody had took a sledgehammer to my ribs. Glass was everywhere, and Bernice wasnt even in the car. She was laid out in the field with Loni cryin over her. To hear that man cryin was somethin pitiful. Sounded like a cow gettin branded.
We both laughed a little. I managed myself out the car and we got Bernice into the back of Lonis truck. We drove straight to the hospital in West Point. Yo mama had a concussion, glass stuck in her face, mostly her forehead, and a missin tooth. All and all, she wasnt too bad off considerin. The doctor checked me for broken ribs but they was just big bruises from the steerin wheel.
Afta that day the real things that happened with the accident was me and Bernice and Lonis secret, cause Bernice didnt want Bo to know she had gone behind his back. Bernice and Loni claimed I was jealous of the two of them being together, and said that I wanted Bernice lookin toothless with her face all scarred up.
Wasnt no use tryin to tell Bernice it was a accident, that I just was gonna scare him a little. Bernice sat up in that hospital and said to me, You gonna have to do a whole lot more than that to take away my God-given beauty. I swear before God and anybody else who can hear me, Ill rot in hell before I see your heathen ass have any kind of a boyfriend. I told her it didnt make me no never mind. Wasnt nothin I was gonna do with no man that I couldnt do for myself. She took that to mean I didnt need no man to satisfy my urges. You should have seen the way her face twisted up like she smelled a skunk lettin loose or somethin.
Yo mama always did have a real smooth beautiful round face, and only time I ever thought she was ugly was when she sat there with that bandage around her forehead and looked at me like I stunk.
She said back to me that I better stay away from her and her sisters and all they girlfriends. That aint nobody funny gonna be callin herself kin to her. She say she hated me and couldnt stand lookin at my weird ass. I guess thats why shedidnt show one bit of mercy for me when Bo saw what I did to his new car. He picked up one of his baseball bats and cracked me up beside the head.
Motha let me rest my head in her lap while she used her own needle and thread to stitch my skin together. She said to me, I told you about drinkin Bos liquor! She held my head still, and started yellin this over and over. And it was obvious to me, since she knew that I wouldnt never drank nothin made by Bos hands, that she was screamin for all her own sins and just usin words that seem to fit Bos satisfaction.
That whole next week went by, and Bernice came home from the hospital with a bandage still over her forehead. Everybody hovered over her, all the sisters and brothers waitin on her hand and foot. Her, Geraldine, Gladys, and Flora like to constantly be huddled up whisperin somethin then lookin at me like I was crazy when I walked by. You would have thought the way they kept me away from Baby Sis, thats your Aunt Nell, that I was gonna eat her up or somethin.
And Bernice, she aint wanted nobody that wasnt kin lookin at her toothless mouth. Bo bragged a
bout how he was gonna take her to get a gold tooth to replace what had been took away.
When they went for her tooth, there was all kinds of showin out by her. Motha did her hair all around the bandage, and she got dressed up in the party dress from the accident. Motha spent three or four days at the washtub fixin it.
On the way back from gettin her tooth, Bernice made Bo stop by the fillin station and take her picture in front of his crumpled-up car.
I aint never seen no need for somebody to be walkin around with gold sittin up in they mouth, but Bo sho did like tellin folks that he replaced his childs bone tooth with a gold one.
I didnt have much need to be hangin around the house no more. Didnt seem like nobody like me, never did, and it seem like Motha was just turnin inward on herselfsewin or cookin or fussin over Bernice and them who was talkin about gettin married and goin up North.
Time passed, winter came and all, and didnt nobody seem to take notice that Loni was comin back around for Bernice. Look like Bo just forgot about what he was mad about, and look like the white men for the other teams forgot too, because come spring they was all back out behind the store playin ball and drinkin. Loni and Bo was all of a sudden like best friends. Look like Loni was gettin smart enough to know who to be good to and how to keep his mouth shut when Bo was talkin.
28
Omens
Over the years Mama, Deddy, Grandeddy, and all my aunts and uncles had begun to dry up like the apple-head dolls we made from leftover Christmas apples. But in Ella Mae's story, they were like characters in the soap operas.
The sun beamed down heavy on the spot where we sat and heated up the plastic flowers, leaving a dry odor that reminded me that I was thirsty and hungry. Ella Mae looked at me with her hand shielding the sun and pulled a Slim Jim from her back pocket.
"You hungry?"
I forced myself not to hesitate in answering yes. Until this moment, I hated beef jerky like I hated sardines and Spam; all the foods that made my parents seem country. Ella Mae broke it in half and finished her story.
Fifth Born Page 14
