Mama Day

by Gloria Naylor

  “Since when have Reverend Hooper and the principal been close friends of ours? And Dr. Smithfield and Mama Day are rarely on speaking terms—he says she steals his patients. The only real close friends we have are Dr. Buzzard and—”

  Miranda cuts her off. “Ignorance is a mighty ugly thing to watch in action. It’s worse than spite and envy. You bring yourself home once a year in the last eleven years and you’re gonna sit there and tell your grandma who we got for friends and who we don’t? And besides, nobody was talking to your little yellow tail. If you got better plans for Friday, you can go off and we’ll have the party without you. But everybody else is gonna be here so you’ll be kinda lonely in them honky-tonks, patting your foot and shaking your …”

  “Shaking my …?”

  “Yeah, shaking whatever will move!”

  Cocoa whirls around in her seat, ready for Freddy, as Abigail grabs the hand that’s tightening around her water glass. That’s her own grandma’s good crystal.

  “Please, y’all, not the first night.” Tears spring up into Abigail’s eyes. “If you both want to kill me, go ahead. You done shamed me enough to die already.”

  “Abigail, why you going on so dramatic? We was just having us a conversation.”

  George done sat there smiling through the whole thing, and he’s smart enough not to let nobody catch his eye as he splits open another corn muffin.

  “Miss Miranda, Friday sounds good to me if it’s good for Ophelia.”

  “Yeah, it’s fine. I’ll be able to catch up on what all our old family friends have been doing in the last year besides running moonshine and—”

  Abigail gets her prayers answered ’cause there’s a loud knocking from outside.

  “Miranda, you mind going to see who’s at the door?”

  “You know it ain’t locked. Just call for ’em to come in.”

  Ruby is in red and fills up the doorway. When she steps inside they can see that Junior Lee is with her and he’s carrying a whole bushel basket of peaches. He ain’t brought it no farther than from the trunk of his Coupe de Ville, but he drops it down like it weighs a ton and straightens up, such as he can, grinning from ear to ear. She’s had him dress up for the visit: a shirt and tie, good suit pants, his alligator shoes.

  “How do, everybody,” Ruby says.

  Miranda leans forward and don’t say nothing, head cocked and hands locked under her chin, as the rest of them all greet her. Abigail offers them a sit-down and a bit of supper.

  “We ain’t staying long,” Ruby says, pulling up a chair. “But I thought it would be nice for us to meet Cocoa’s new husband.”

  “It’s a pleasure,” George says.

  “Doubly mine,” says Ruby. “And this here is my new husband, Junior Lee.”

  “Pleasssurre.” Junior Lee manages a nod. “Hear you a big railroad man.”

  “No, I’m an engineer.”

  “That’s what I hear. Ain’t never been on the railroad myself, except hopping a few freights.”

  “No, baby, he’s an engineer.” Ruby pats Junior Lee’s arm.

  “I said, that’s what I hear. Job must take you all over the country.”

  George knows when to give up. “Not really. But what do you do?”

  “Little as posssibbble.”

  Junior Lee is about to fall out his chair with laughing, not seeing that he’s the only one in the room to find that funny. He done slumped all down with his head laid back. “Yeaah, little as posssibbble.”

  “Don’t let him tease you.” Ruby done drawn her mouth into a tight, tight line. “He’s looking for work now. Place he was in a few years ago beyond the bridge closed down.”

  “It’s happening all over the country,” George says. “Decent people just can’t find work.”

  “Other kinds, too.” Miranda says.

  “So how’re you finding us?” Ruby asks George.

  “Well, we just got here—or rather, I just got here. But it’s a beautiful island.”

  “It’s a friendly place,” Ruby says. “And that’s what we stopped by to tell you. You’re one of us, ’cause you married one of us. And Cocoa is our own.”

  “Well, I feel like you’re family, Miss Ruby,” Cocoa says. “You watched me grow up.”

  “Indeed I did. And look at us now—we’re just two married girls.”

  “Yeaah, you’re girrrls.” Junior Lee finds that’s even funnier than before. “’Cepting one of you got to touch up her hair with shoe polish.”

  Nobody has the heart to look at Ruby until Cocoa snaps, “Putting up with you could turn anybody gray,” and gives them all a chance to join in the laughter.

  “That’s telling him.” Ruby smiles. “It’s good you ain’t lost your tongue—like some done lost their manners.”

  “I ain’t wanted to come anyway.” Junior Lee sulks. “And I got businesss if you throughhh.”

  “Just a few more minutes, baby.” Ruby pats his arm again, but Junior Lee snatches it away and gets up.

  “If you stay, you’re walkinnng home.”

  “My boy loves to tease,” Ruby says. “But we do gotta be going. Mama Day, them peaches is for you.”

  “Thank you kindly, Ruby.”

  “Yes,” Ruby says, getting up, “you didn’t take hardly enough when you came by this afternoon. And after thinking about it, I didn’t wanna give you no reason to make that long hike back up the road again.”

  “I appreciate it.” Miranda nods.

  “Ruby, if y’all ain’t doing nothing this Friday,” Abigail says, “we’re having a little get-together for Cocoa and George. I know you don’t get out much, but—”

  “I’ll think on it,” Ruby says.

  “A little fun? While she’s thinking, I’ll be here.” Junior Lee opens the front door. “And while she’s taking twenty minutes to say goodbye, I’m goinng onnn.”

  The total quiet in the room is broken only for a little while by the gunning of Junior Lee’s motor before it creeps on back in.

  “We got us a decision to make right now,” Miranda says to George. “Either you’re company or you’re family. ’Cause if you’re company, we’ll be right polite and wait until you’re out of the room to talk about the disaster that done just left here. But if you’re family, we’ll get to it right away.”

  “Every man in Willow Springs ain’t like Junior Lee,” Abigail says.

  “No man in Willow Springs is like Junior Lee,” Cocoa says.

  “Why don’t you make that the world and be done with it.” Miranda shakes her head. “I can see why she don’t go anyplace with him—big or not. But for the life of me, I can’t see why she believes any other woman but her would want him.”

  “How long have they been married?” George asks.

  “About as long as we have—four years, right, Mama Day?”

  “Give or take,” Miranda says.

  “Well,” George sighs. “It’s sort of flattering when a woman is jealous of her husband, if he’s worth it or not. I wouldn’t mind if my wife was a little jealous of me.”

  “Not that jealous.” Miranda is looking off in space, so she don’t notice Abigail trying to catch her eye. But she ain’t about to say nothing else.

  “What was all that business about you needing peaches?” Abigail asks. “You’re loaded down at the other place.”

  “I know. But then I figured with folks coming over Friday I didn’t wanna run out of pies.”

  “I hope you don’t think I’m staying in all week to be baking.” Cocoa sucks her teeth.

  “I hope you don’t think I’d ask you,” Miranda says. “It ain’t no secret to anybody at this table the way you cook.”

  “George, you don’t have anything to say about that?”

  “Yeah—this is really one beautiful island.”

  Who would have thought that with me growing up in a city, the noise here at night would keep me awake? The sound of silence: the deep droning of marsh frogs, a million crickets pressing in against the window scr
een, way off the cry of a whippoorwill, farther off the eternal whispering of the surf. I thought, perhaps, it was the strangeness of the bed, but how could any bed be strange with your body moving so predictably in the spaces left by my own? I only needed to nudge a leg under yours and place a hand on your back for you to turn and spoon yourself into my arms, your gentle breathing to be just under my ear. It would be that way anywhere in any bed. The sound of silence: the ticking of the wall clock out there in the sitting room, the steady dripping from the bathroom, the creaking of the floorboards. You would hear none of it, and suddenly I felt intensely alone. If I could have dissolved myself within you at that moment, I would have, and I fought the rising urge for second best. You would have responded, thinking it renewed desire, not fear. Why wake her up for that?

  I did something I hadn’t done since a child. When you can’t sleep and you know there is no one to call down those long corridors, you close your eyes and tell yourself over and over again, I can’t find it because it’s waiting in my dreams. A slow, rhythmic chant. The “it” could be anything, and I would drift off to sleep, more often than not, to dream of a new bicycle, a good test score—my mother’s constantly changing face. But that night I dreamed of you. You were calling me and calling me. And I was swimming across The Sound. I couldn’t see you on the other side, but your voice kept getting louder, the water heavier, and the shore farther and farther away. If I just try harder, I thought, but my increased efforts made it all the more impossible. Your cries were desperate now and my strength was giving out. In my struggles I saw Mama Day leaning over the bridge. Her voice came like thunder: No, Get Up And Walk. She’s a crazy old woman, I thought as I kept swimming harder toward the receding shore. A wave of despair went over me as I began sinking, knowing I’d never reach you. Get Up And Walk. I was fiercely angry at her for not helping us. With my last bit of strength I pushed my shoulders out of the water to scream in her face, You’re a crazy old woman! And I found myself standing up in the middle of The Sound.

  I slept through the night and woke up very early the next morning refreshed. For some reason the memory of that dream was not unsettling. And now I could really talk about noise. Those million crickets must have been eaten up by the thousand birds outside our window and a rooster started crowing to be answered by another and another. But to stretch and smell that air—the mixture of salt and topsoil, pine needles and honeysuckle—went into the pit of my stomach and increased my erection. I put my arms behind my head, thinking I’d count to ten and if the tented sheet between my legs was still there, I’d wake you up to admire it along with me. I did, and you turned your back and told me to go to hell. So last night I walked on water for you and this is the thanks I get? You clutched the pillow over your head, murmuring that I should take my twin brother along for the ride.

  I decided to get up and take a walk instead. I opted against my regular shower, with your grandmother’s bedroom just on the other side of the door. She had really knocked herself out for us, and one look at those pipes told me that they would resist water pressure loudly. You could sleep through an atomic explosion, but I didn’t know about her. So it was a quick splashing and my pill before heading outside. It’s only seven miles long; I’d be able to cover this place a few times before going home. But New York seemed so far away as I stood on the front porch, surveying the road through a veil of heavy dew splattering from the eaves onto the toe of my sneakers. It looked so fresh and clean, I was almost tempted to stick out my tongue and catch a drop. No one was around to see me—the shades on the silver trailer across the road were still drawn. How would dew taste? God, I was acting like a kid. But something about this place did that to you, it called up old, old memories.

  Me and Bernie Sinclair, arguing about how to get better grades, studying in morning air or night air. I liked to do my homework in the early morning before any of the other boys woke up. Breathing in “unused” air, I said, kept your brain cells from being dirtied up by everybody else’s carbon dioxide. But he liked “leftover” air—How do you know it ain’t Einstein’s carbon dioxide you miss breathing into your head? As I began walking south on the shoulder of the road, I had an intense longing to see Bernie again. I wondered how he turned out, the kid with enough rage—and guts—to spit in Mrs. Jackson’s face? I remembered that she finally insisted that he go into the carpentry workshop, and my last image of Bernie was his pounding and pounding away at the heads of iron nails.

  Unused air or leftover air, back then none of us could even imagine an atmosphere like this. More than pure, it was primal. Some of these trees had to have been here for almost two hundred years, and the saltwater feeding into the marshes dated back to eternity. A lot of this land and open space could be put to good use: nothing parasitic like resorts or vacation condominiums, but experimental stations for solar energy, marine conservation. I could even see small test sites for hydraulic power. It would bring much-needed income to the island, new people. A beating of wings and a high screech as a snow-tipped heron flew up from the marsh grass. I stopped and shook my head—beautiful. But what kind of people? How had that large woman put it last night? You’re one of us because you’ve married one of us. No, even I don’t really qualify as their kind. And they’d never give up this land to anyone but. They know that even well-meaning progress and paradise don’t go hand in hand. Well, I thought, at least this place is unique or I’d soon be out of a job. If I’d followed Mrs. Jackson’s philosophy, I could have straddled both worlds: Don’t redesign water systems, she would have said, become a plumber.

  When I reached the little L-shaped section of stores in the junction of the road that heads toward the bridge, I saw the blue truck belonging to the man who had picked us up from the airport. I thought he was asleep in the back. He had one blanket rolled up under his head and another pulled over him. As I was about to pass by, he sat up and waved to me.

  “Morning, George.”

  “Good morning, sir.”

  “I guess you done forgot me. I’m Dr. Buzzard.”

  How could you forget someone like him. But I felt totally stupid addressing the man that way. He had to have another name.

  “No, of course I remember you. And it was awfully nice of you to drive down to Savannah and pick us up yesterday.”

  “Well, Miss Abigail wouldn’t trust just anybody hauling Cocoa around. Naw, when it’s something important they all know you can call on Dr. Buzzard.”

  I simply had to ask. “Is that your real name?”

  “Naw, it’s what you might call my professional name. Most folks here don’t know me by anything else.”

  “Oh, I see. What line of business are you in?”

  “You mean, Mama Day ain’t told you? It don’t surprise me—we have us a little professional rivalry going on. You see, some folks just can’t stand it when other folks’ glory leaves ’em spellbound—not that I’m saying anything against your people and all, you being married into them. But Mama Day ain’t never appreciated my magnitude. I guess you can’t blame her none, it’s hard for a woman to have the right frame of mind to encompass something like Dr. Buzzard’s work. But you ask anybody else around here about me and it ain’t no secret what I can do.”

  It was still a secret to me, but he seemed so satisfied with his answer, I didn’t have the heart to ask him what he had said. I nodded my head and made the appropriate sounds in my throat. He hopped down from the truck, shook out his blankets, and folded them up neatly. A washcloth and toothbrush came from under the driver’s seat. He went over to the water spigot by the general store and began cleaning up.

  “I see your business must get you up early.”

  “Naw, I wouldna been up now, but I saw you coming by. Parris don’t open up his shop till about ten.”

  “Oh, you work out of here?”

  “Naw, today’s the day to get my hair cut. I likes to be the first one in—that way I can make sure he sweeps up that floor real good after me. And I carry every shred of it away.” H
e gave me a slow wink. “In my line you can’t be too careful, you know what I mean?”

  Clearing my throat got me through again, but I had to change the direction of this conversation. “I’m up early myself, just taking in the lay of the land.”

  “You ain’t gotta walk, I’ll be glad to show you around.”

  “No, I really enjoy it. I do a lot of walking at home.”

  “In New York City—with all them cutthroats? You’d never catch me walking up there.”

  “It’s really not as dangerous as people think. You have your good and bad everywhere.”

  “Don’t I know it. This place was wide open before I hit here. And look at it now—that hellish element don’t raise their heads.”

  I wondered if perhaps he could be in some form of law enforcement. But he couldn’t be kept terribly busy. People here didn’t even see the need to lock their doors at night.

  “It seems like a very peaceful place.”

  “Looks is deceiving.”

  “I suppose you’re right. But I’m sure they’re glad to have you here.”

  “Some is, some ain’t. Now, Reverend Hooper, he’s always preaching against me. But that don’t make no never mind. Been here before he came and I’ll be here after he’s gone.”

  “I don’t see why you shouldn’t.”

  “You know, I like you. You got a lot of understanding for a city boy. You play poker?”

  “I’ve done my share.”

  “Well, why don’t you come on around some night. This time of year, there’s always a friendly little game over by me.”

  “You have a house here?”

  Obviously, I couldn’t hide the surprise in my voice. He looked at the toothbrush in his hands and threw back his head and laughed. “Yeah, I got a home. And it sits on the seventy acres my uncle left me. I was the only boy child. See, my sisters and cousins, them, they married on off beyond the bridge.” The morning light was growing stronger, playing off the thousand tiny lines in his burnished skin. His head was turned to the road leading to the bridge in a way that said his mind was traveling miles beyond it. He ran a callused hand over his gray stubble of a beard. “I got married too. But some folks can live here and some can’t. And with seventy acres and a house … Somebody had to keep it.” He seemed to remember that I was there—“Did I tell you I was in vaudeville?”