Gumbo

by E. Lynn Harris

  Mr. Hopp pulled up in front of city hall and sat still, looked at the building a while, then went around the block, into the alley, and stopped behind the building. Fumbled with his keys. Where were they going? October couldn't imagine what punishment lay waiting—she knew only that Aunt Frances had thought it up, and it would be pretty bad.

  “Okay, let's see what might be waitin in there for this one,” Mr. Hopp said. Aunt Frances got out of the car and held the back door for October.

  “Come on,” she said.

  Long hallways waited. And echoes. Two white policemen took Mr. Hopp aside to talk, then left. Aunt Frances followed close on Mr. Hopp's heels and October followed close on hers, down another long hallway that led to an iron door. Mr. Hopp unlocked the door and they entered.

  When Aunt Frances pushed her forward, October saw the cells, eight or ten, side by side. In the half-dark she could make out lumps of bodies sleeping in some of the cells. And one cell door standing open. Mr. Hopp walked over to it, motioning for her to follow. Aunt Frances nudged her.

  “You want to sleep in here?” Mr. Hopp said.

  October shook her head no. Up close, she could see the measly cot with no sheet, the stinky slop jar, the dirty stone floor. She wondered about the police—what would they care about a fight between her and Vergie? But she couldn't guess how far Mr. Hopp could go at the jail, and there was no way to know how far Aunt Frances's wrath would go.

  A cold, stone floor at night, being locked away, having to lie on that cot and use that slop jar—would Auntie do that to her? Was she finally just an orphan?

  Aunt Frances had then opened the cell door farther and nudged her inside.

  “This must be where you want to end up,” she said. Then she said, “This is where your poppa ended up. He died in a place just like this. He started out just like you, fighting all the time.”

  She stepped out of the cell and clanged the door, leaving October inside the bars.

  “Franklin may have given you his sister's name,” Aunt Frances said, “—that's something you can't help. But you'll not have their ways and live with us, I promise you.”

  Dazzling. So her name really did come from those people—people she knew only as too lowdown and dirty to be mentioned. And what else? Her father had been a character in a storybook, banished to never-never land. She had always thought of him as put away forever. The end. It had never occurred to her that he could die.

  An aunt, someone named Lillian, the woman who had raised him? No one had ever bothered to mention this. The whole day had turned into a new life. Her blackberry skin was a given, but until that day the only other family resemblance October had ever taken into account had been the way she favored Carrie or Aunt Frances or Aunt Maude or Vergie. With one word, she had a life times two. She had hurt Vergie more than she had had intended. Just happened. And then Vergie had opened a sewer with all kinds of gullies and gutters feeding it. Such a secret. All this time everybody had known.

  October, even at the age of nine, had understood then that she was someone other than herself. That she was different from Aunt Frances and Aunt Maude. Different, too, from Vergie. Unwittingly, Aunt Frances had held a mirror in front of her, and even if she couldn't yet make out what she saw, she knew this: in more ways than one, the reflection coming into focus looked like a leper.

  After that night, slowly at first, then whenever it wanted to happen, then with a vengeance, the name Lillian had become an accusation. Vergie's way of drawling out “Lil-yan” could be an excruciating jab or a pin-stick, depending on how raw October felt at the time.

  Aunt Frances and Aunt Maude would step in a little with “All right, Vergie, that's enough.”

  But they, too, had got in the spirit of the curse. “Lillian” was the epithet when October's attitude became the stubborn cliff their reason couldn't climb. They tiptoed, never used the name unless they were put out with her. Otherwise they started calling her “Lily” or “Lily Ann.”

  But she called herself October to herself. October, for the month their mother had died. October, for the lack of any other name that she could put on to say how it felt to become another, stranger person.

  Over time, though, she hardened. Turned her secret into a plan. When she got to seventeen, that was it. Old enough. She learned not to flinch so, and Vergie got tired of trying to use a dull weapon. Aunt Frances and Aunt Maude got tired, too, or guilty. However it happened, at some point they all dropped “Lillian” from the list of words they could use when they were mad, and replaced it with a permanent “Lily” for all occasions. Which sure enough proved that the name had kept some evil thing alive for too long. For a time anyway, October was Lillian to the world, Lily at home, and October to anyone who would go along.

  It was always with a good feeling that she remembered the long swoon of puberty. A for-real-new person, starting with her body and going on to the music of her own voice, every single nerve ending exposed in every single moment. Without telling anyone, she had fallen in love, first with the deciduous drama of autumn, the pungency of blade and leaf giving up the ghost. Fallen in love with poems, any poem, and with the sound of the flute, or a bird, or train whistle.

  She had fallen in love with the boy who worked in Ford's grocery store, and because she never caught that boy's name, she had switched her love to the Reverend's son, home from Wilberforce College. Because he had never been around for long and had never noticed her, she ventured to speak to a boy in the twelfth grade who said hi to her once. He didn't need a name. They didn't need to talk.

  Each night before bed, like the leper in The Good Earth, October had inspected every inch of her new body for white freckles. She was convinced that the brown would return, and since no other spots had appeared, she got it in her head that the sun had protected her, and spent more time outdoors.

  When she had turned seventeen, old enough to give herself a new name, with two aunts who were only relatives, not parents, October found an accomplice. The Reverend's daughter, Dainty Bonner.

  Dainty wore her hair twisted around a hair-rat, the way women did, in a crown hoop that she set off with jeweled combs. She smoked and had a boyfriend twenty years old. October had fed Dainty bits of the whole orphan story and the evil family she didn't want to be related to. Tortured friend. And Dainty had agreed that “Lillian” had never been a name that suited her, and that “October” stood out. And Dainty had known exactly where, in the courthouse, they had to go to do the thing right.

  October had never done this before. She went to the courthouse unprepared. How could she have known about things like the proof of her birth or birth name, and how much money she would have to pay, and a fail-proof reason for a name change, and the six-week wait for it to be official. And so, on another not-so-brave day, she and her Dainty friend went back to the courthouse. This time she had rifled through Aunt Frances's cedar chest for papers and emptied her own secret stash for the notary's fifty cents. This time she had announced her intention to Aunt Frances, who had dared her to leave. This time, with her shortie slung across her shoulders, and her hand on the doorknob, she had disowned the only mother she had ever really known.

  Under “Justification” on the form, October wrote a version of the truth. Instead of pointing to the bloodline, she wrote that Lillian was the name of the mother of the man who had killed October's own mother: No one would dare refuse her then.

  Her mother had died on October 26, 1931. As she sat with Dainty on the bench outside the notary's office, a feeling came over her. She had finished something important, and something else had begun. Finally, she could hold on to autumn no matter what the season was, and have the perfect memorial to Carrie. She could have the perfect way to separate herself from her namesake forever—the perfectly unique name for a girl with a dramatic blight on the brown of her cheek, October.

  On the fifth day after Aunt Frances had suffered the stroke, Gene brought Vergie to relieve October at the hospital. Reverend Carter had prayed his arden
t prayer, and as they all stood around the bed, a nurse came in with a needle and syringe.

  “We need to check her catheter,” the nurse said. “You-all won't mind stepping out into the hall for a minute, would you?”

  Out in the hall, October tried to sound like she knew what she was talking about and at the same time not scare Vergie.

  “Vergie, I know that miracles can happen,” she told her, “but remember, we have to be realistic, too.”

  It seemed to October that until she had entered Aunt Frances's hospital room that day, her own life had not been pinned down. As if at any moment she might be able to put her life in reverse and move into the life she wanted. Redeemable, she thought. But now she was beginning to see that Aunt Frances's death would nail things down. Up until then she had seemed to have a “real life” waiting somewhere, and one day she would wake up and be in her real life. One where Franklin Brown had not killed Carrie. Carrie was not in the cold ground. Franklin had not died in jail. She and Vergie had not been orphans. In a sense, up until then, Aunt Frances and Aunt Maude had been aunts, not parents. And in some part of her, October had always held out for the possibility of “real” parents. All of it, even the David chapter, could have been a dream, and there was time for it all to be corrected.

  But now Aunt Frances would be the real mother who would be dead and buried, gone forever. Nothing could be changed. October's messed-up life would be the only one she would ever have.

  Vergie said, “The doctor said that it may take a long time for her to pull through.” October knew Vergie dared not think she might die.

  October thought she ought to make it clear to Vergie. “And, Vergie,” she told her, “it's possible that she might not be able to pull through—I mean, she might not make it. We don't know.”

  Fear blazed in Vergie's eyes. “How can you say that?” She stepped closer to Gene and grabbed his hand.

  “I'm just saying might, Vergie. We have to be prepared for the worst. If there's anything you want to say to her, you shouldn't wait. That's all I'm saying.”

  “Darn it, October, you never look on the bright side. The doctor never said that, and he ought to know.” She wiped a tear with her thumb. Gene put his arm around her, and they went back inside the room.

  On October's watch the next morning, she had the sense to take her own advice. Say what needs to be said.

  Auntie's eyes were closed, and October took her time forming the right words. Auntie's eyes opened and October gave her a chip of ice from a spoon. Auntie stared, and after a few minutes, October could see recognition in her eyes.

  October went into how well she remembered the years, the sacrifices, the fevers soothed, the battles Auntie had mounted against the world for her and Vergie, whether they were wrong or right. As well as she could, she said how bad she felt about bringing a child into the world without a father, and giving him away, and fighting with Vergie. And still she couldn't find the words to say what needed to be said.

  Auntie never relaxed her gaze.

  October tried again. “There is one thing I want to tell you . . .”

  Auntie's eyes burned.

  “. . . something I said to you once, a long time ago. And I never apologized, I never took it back. I know you know I didn't mean it, but I want to take it back now, anyway.”

  Auntie pressed her fingers lightly into October's palm. She could hear.

  Looking into her mute face, October said, “I just want to thank you.”

  Auntie then made her little humming sound, but kept her eyes fixed on October's face.

  “Thank you for being my mother.” The tears came then, but October refused to lose the one chance to have it said. “You were a better mother than I ever gave you credit for—better than you ever knew,” she said.

  Auntie pressed her palm, and October knew a smile was in there.

  October wasn't at the hospital that evening to see Vergie reading the Bible to Auntie, or to see the pain in her sister's eyes when Auntie had another stroke. She stood next to Vergie, though, all through the next day, as Auntie's heart marched weakly on.

  It was then that I stood by and held for Frances, my sister. She never opened her eyes or pressed their palms again.

  Like Trees, Walking

  BY RAVI HOWARD

  Those of us already gathered along the beach check the wind. With matches cupped in our hands, we watch the smoke rise into the breeze that comes off the water. The conditions have to be right. The wind has to be blowing east. Rising tide and an overcast sky. Nights like this, when conditions are right along the eastern shore of Mobile Bay, the salt water from the Gulf mixes with the fresh water from the rivers. The fish and blue crabs stop swimming then. Why it happens, I'm not exactly certain—something about the oxygen and the water temperature and the currents no longer running true—but the fish and blue crabs are stunned, traumatized. At the place where the waters meet, they just float on the surface as if they're dead.

  When the tide rises in the early morning hours, the silver sides of the flounder shine as they wash up on the shore. The crabs collect in the soft sand just below the surface of the water. We wait for them here. Some gather them with scoop nets and stakes. Others just pick them up in their bare hands and carry them home in washtubs and baskets. Nights like these are called “Jubilee.”

  I unfold our blankets at the place we like to claim while my son wades ankle-deep in the surf. He shines his flashlight on the wet sand, looking. But it's too early. We have time. My daughter holds my hand and taps my thigh with her plastic shovel.

  “Daddy, may I go to the water with Reggie?”

  “For a little while. Then I want you to come back so you can take a nap before the Jubilee.”

  “First graders don't take naps.”

  “You're not a first grader until September. You know what that means? You're still a Daddy grader. Daddy graders take naps so they're awake when the tide comes in. Is that a deal?”

  “Deal,” she says, shaking off her flip-flops. She points to the glowing hands on her watch. “When the big hand and the little hand are on the twelve, it's your birthday. I'm gonna sing ‘Happy Birthday.' Happy Birthday to you—”

  “Make sure you stay with your brother.”

  “Okay. Happy birthday to you—” She beats time with the shovel against my leg before she runs down to the water to where her brother stands.

  It's 11:45 P.M. In fifteen minutes I'll be forty. Forty is supposed to be a milestone, a “big one” as they say. A party has been planned in my honor. My wife, my kids, and my parents have been up to something. They have that obvious silence about them of people trying too hard to keep a secret. So I'm sure they've gone to a lot of trouble to get everyone together. I'll act surprised.

  I'll have a good time as I always do. July means family reunions, the Fourth, fireworks and picnics. July for me means celebrating one more year, and sharing some time with my brother, Paul. I don't see him like I used to.

  He was born 362 days before me. We were, as my father would sometime call us, “the damn-near twins.” For three days every July, I catch up with him.

  Jubilee nights only happen in the summer months, twice, maybe three times a season. Every few years one would fall somewhere between our birthdays and we would celebrate here. There was a Jubilee the night after I turned eighteen, in July 1981. Eighteen was a milestone for me, not so much because of the age, but because of all that happened. That spring I finished high school. That summer I started working full-time with my father at our funeral home before I started college that fall. That July was four months after my brother found Michael Donald's body hanging from a tree on Carlisle Street. Michael Donald was a friend of ours.

  My mother saves the newspapers from our birthdays. Tomorrow's early edition will come off the press soon. In the morning she'll add it to the stacks of the Mobile Press Register, neatly arranged in blue wooden RC Cola crates that she keeps in the closet under the staircase, stored away from the sunlight. Next to
the crates she has a small filing cabinet where she stores her important papers. There she kept the news clippings about Michael Donald, neatly trimmed and filed in order. On the manila folder, in her impeccable schoolteacher handwriting, a simple label: “Michael.”

  The first clip in the stack was from the evening edition of the March 8, 1981:

  Local man found slain on Carlisle

  * * *

  Police follow leads as investigation moves forward

  MOBILE—Michael Donald, 19, of Mobile was found dead shortly after 6:00 a.m. on the 1400 block of West Carlisle Street. The body of the deceased had been hanged from a tree. Police officials report that the victim had been severely beaten prior to the hanging.

  Paul Deacon, 19, of Mobile, a pulp processor at International Paper, discovered the body and notified police.

  The lights are on tonight at the paper mill. At the north end of the bay, the smoke stacks made their own white clouds. The mill operates three shifts a day, every day of the year, Christmas and Easter included.

  Some nights the smell of the mill carries across the bay. The stench is awful. It's the sulfur. The sulfur breaks down the fibers in the wood, so the pulp is soft enough to make paper. We learned this from Mr. Lewis, our Cub Scout leader, who was a supervisor there.

  In our younger days the members of the Cub Scouts Pack 211 from First A.M.E. Church, Paul and I included, followed Mr. Lewis on a tour of the mill. With goggles and hard hats, we toed a broad yellow line painted on the concrete floor. We felt through our feet the rhythm of the vibrating concrete as the large steel combines ripped the timber to shreds.

  Paul was historian for Pack 211. His job was to collect pictures for our scrapbook. In the picture Paul took that day, Michael stood in the back row with the taller boys, next to Mr. Lewis. My mother held on to that photo. She keeps it with the others.