Southern Girl

by Lukas,Renee J.

  “Yes!” her mother exclaimed in a tone that made the other cashiers stop what they were doing. Carolyn leaned over the counter, her eyes fierce and her hair on fire: “I’m going to take them home, throw them head first into boiling watah, and I’m going to eat them!” She chomped her teeth together, making a snapping sound that sent a cold chill throughout the store, one that didn’t come from the frozen section. They stormed out of the store so fast Jesse didn’t even remember how they got to the car.

  It was a long, quiet ride home. Every now and then Jesse snuck a glance at her mother to see if she was okay. All she saw was an expressionless face, a mouth that was a tight, thin line. Dropping her gaze, she studied the big dents in the thighs that poked out of her mother’s skirt. Jesse had never seen her mother in a wheelchair, of course, and then on crutches, but she’d seen photographs of how she looked after the accident. She walked fine now, had for as long as Jesse could remember. But she’d never known her without those big gashes in her thighs. On one of her legs there was even a line of stitches. Her mother was always pulling her hemline down as far as she could to try and conceal it, but people stared anyway.

  Jesse wondered why her mother always wore skirts and dresses, especially when she didn’t want people staring at her legs. It made no sense. A lot of grown-up things didn’t make sense. Like when the members of the congregation kept staring at Jesse before they knew about the food allergy, waiting to see if she was going to toss her cookies in church. Why were her intestines more important to them than God’s message? Why did anyone care about her mom’s scars or what they ate for dinner?

  Jesse glanced out the window, took a deep breath and reached over to pat her mother’s leg.

  * * *

  Carolyn stared at the horizon, willing the tears to stay inside her eyes as she drove. If she cried now, it would be the second time this week, and she didn’t want to alarm the kids.

  What had begun as a sabbatical, at least in Carolyn’s mind, had, she realized, turned into a permanent living situation. When her mother was alive, hearing her voice on the phone gave Carolyn hope that she might someday return to her hometown. Not that she could picture Dan as a reverend in Boston. But that was a minor detail. Now that her mother was gone, her ties to Boston had grown more distant—friends were always too busy picking up kids from school to talk much to her on the phone—and her hopes of someday leaving this town were tied to wisps of conversations about other places. She’d mention something interesting about a place she’d read about and Dan would seem keen on the idea of visiting it. Then he’d add, “Next time we go on vacation.”

  It was a survival skill, maintaining this perception of impermanence. Not allowing herself to memorize the brands of gum they carried at the Stop ’n’ Slurp mini-mart, for instance, because she was sure she wouldn’t need to know in the long run. Which meant even now, after one pack of gum had turned into hundreds, as she waited in line she always had to check what brands were available.

  She turned toward the road to home. Dan was no longer the most handsome man she’d ever seen, but what she’d felt in the beginning had been replaced by what she hoped was something deeper. She told herself she loved him in spite of his imperfections. She wouldn’t—couldn’t—dig any deeper than that, wary of uncovering something she couldn’t handle. If the foundation of their marriage wasn’t as solid as she assured herself it was, what was all of this for?

  * * *

  That night Jesse cracked into her lobster with reckless abandon. She savored the taste of the sweet meat dipped in melted butter. She didn’t want to see how it got on her plate, though.

  Her sister Ivy, who was two years older than she, was a dainty eater. She always struggled to crack the claws. The nutcracker would slip out of her hand, and she’d huff in frustration. Her big sister had so little strength, it seemed the heaviest thing she could hold was a hairbrush. Jesse teased her all the time because when they would wrestle around on the floor, Jesse could always pin her down. For this reason, Ivy said that sometimes she felt like she had two brothers.

  Danny was as messy as Jesse, but more obnoxious. He liked to scoop out the green stuff and plop it on everyone’s plates to see their reaction. A meal never went by when their mother didn’t have to say, “Danny, cut it out.” Or “Do that again and you’ll go to your room.” Danny was the reason why parents said things like that.

  Their father didn’t eat lobsters because they had eyes. He had a strict policy not to eat anything if he saw its eyes. So on lobster nights he’d stick to his pork and beans out of a can. He never minded that cows and pigs had eyes, only when the eyes were still on the food they were eating. Interestingly, he had to have a side of canned pork and beans with every dinner, no matter what it was.

  “You should see how they look at me, Dan!” Carolyn exploded, taking her anger out on the lobster in front of her.

  “You sure you’re not overreacting?” he replied. He always said she was overreacting. He dangled the word like a match over gasoline. Tonight was an especially bad night to say it.

  Jesse cringed, waiting for part two of the Grocery Store Meltdown.

  Carolyn twisted in frustration, though she didn’t leave her chair. Her husband was a Southern Soil through and through, content with his pork and beans, the sun rising and setting the way it was supposed to and the idea that it was best not to ripple the waters. Getting along with everyone was the name of the game. He’d never really understand what a struggle it had been for her to live here.

  “Now I’m the evil lobster lady of Greens Fork!” Her face was red. “They look at me like I’m an alien!”

  He patted her shoulder. “Well, you’re the prettiest alien I’ve ever seen.” He gave her the patronizing smile that said, “I just want your problem to go away.”

  She kept on eating, chewing louder as if that would make him understand.

  “Heavens! We forgot to say grace.” Dan was more concerned about everyone’s souls and the prospect of hell. That was far worse than the possibility of his wife being on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

  The Aimes’ family joined hands and bowed heads. Jesse took Ivy’s hand, which was covered in sticky lobster juice.

  “Eeww!” Jesse exclaimed, pulling her hand away.

  “Enough,” Carolyn commanded, her eyes burning through Jesse.

  After the display in the grocery store, Jesse thought it wise to listen to her and immediately took Ivy’s sticky hand again.

  “Dear Lord,” Dan began as he did from the pulpit, “let us be truly thankful for what we’re about to…for what we’re eating at your table. Amen.”

  The family ate in a dining area inside the kitchen, cramped together at a square table, surrounded by flowery kitchen wallpaper that evoked a feeling of forced cheerfulness. Though the table in the dining room was much longer, it was reserved for guests, so none of the kids ever got to sit there. Carolyn and Dan hardly used it, either. Another strange thing about grown-ups…keeping rooms in the house that they didn’t use.

  Jesse almost made it through dinner without revealing the big sin she’d committed earlier in the day, but her skin betrayed her. It started with her hands, then spread up to her neck. Before she knew it, she was itching like crazy all over, her fair skin covered in big pink blotches.

  “What’s the matter?” Carolyn asked when she noticed Jesse scratching.

  “Nothin’. It’s nothin’.” She’d hidden all known evidence, but something was happening that she had no control over. It scared her.

  Carolyn took Jesse to the upstairs bathroom where the light shone a spotlight on the pink patches. “You’ve got poison ivy!” she hollered. Her voice was hoarse from all the yelling she’d already done that day.

  The green bouquet Jesse had tried to give Stephanie—that must have been poison ivy.

  “Am I gonna die?” Jesse’s blue eyes filled with worry. Considering the intensity of her mother’s reaction, it seemed as though she wasn’t long for this world.<
br />
  “No.” Carolyn took calamine lotion out of the cabinet and began rubbing it all over the young girl. “Where were you today?” she demanded.

  Jesse couldn’t lie to her. All she could think of was fire and brimstone and going straight to hell if she told a lie. “The river,” she mumbled. She hung her head like a prisoner awaiting execution.

  “The river?” Carolyn screeched. “I told you not to go there! Was Arlene with you?”

  Jesse cocked her head, not understanding the question.

  “Stephanie’s mother?” Carolyn said. “Was she with you?”

  Jesse shook her head “no” and sealed her fate.

  “I don’t believe it! You used to obey me.” Then her mother began muttering incoherently, as she stormed into Jesse’s room and yanked pajamas out of the drawer. She seemed to be talking to herself and to Jesse at the same time. “Everyone in this town…sees me as some kind of aberration…Now my first grader is already defying me! God knows what’ll happen when you’re a teenager!”

  Jesse was sent to bed early that night. As her mother closed Jesse’s bedroom door, her words pierced through the walls: “I don’t want you seeing that Stephanie Greer again. She’s a bad influence.”

  With that, the darkness of Jesse’s room spread across her face, hiding the hot tears that leaked down her cheeks all night long.

  Chapter Five

  It was a lonely summer for Jesse, because without her mother’s permission she couldn’t go to Stephanie’s house. Luckily, her sister Ivy played with her, although she had very specific ideas of what playtime meant. She’d water the weeds their father had asked them to pull. Then she’d plop wet mud on them and say, “With this super fertilizer, your yard will be the talk of the neighborhood.”

  “Who are you talkin’ to?” Jesse asked.

  “The studio audience,” Ivy replied, rolling her eyes. “Duh.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “You don’t have an imagination.” Ivy patted the caked mud to get it to look just right. She’d tell Jesse to grab the plastic pitcher and help her, though Jesse didn’t see what the point was.

  “They’re nothin’ but weeds,” Jesse said.

  “What if they’re small trees that will grow up to be majestic…”

  “They’re weeds!”

  “Ugh! You’re not fun!” Ivy argued.

  “Well, guess what? Your fertilizer show ain’t fun, either.” Jesse got up and dusted herself off.

  She wouldn’t stay mad for long, because she could always find something to do. Summer days in Tennessee were something out of a movie—hazy days, green, sweet-smelling grass, and at sunset, the sun looked like a giant plum lowering in the sky, so close you’d think you could take a bite. How Jesse wished she could share these days with Stephanie.

  Jesse liked to climb trees on their property. Her favorite was one with a trunk that split and went in many directions. She’d pretend it was a monster she had to battle and crawl up one of his arms to get to the source of his power. Somewhere at the top of the tree was his head. Sometimes she’d climb to a certain branch and look out at the valley and pretend there were other houses there. “There’s the Kelmans’ place,” she explained to Ivy. “They have one boy, and he doesn’t like to go outside because he has this disease that keeps him indoors.”

  “What’s the matter with you?” Ivy’s brow was crinkled.

  “I’m having an imagination,” Jesse explained.

  “You’re making up people who don’t exist,” she said. “That’s insanity.”

  “And playin’ ‘Fertilizer’ is normal?”

  They always argued but usually found something they could agree on—like trapping frogs in jars, staring at them a while, then setting them free. Ivy was fascinated with wildlife. She could tell the difference between a robin and a warbler. She wanted to share her knowledge with her sister, but Jesse had the attention span of a fruit fly.

  “Some birds carry diseases,” Ivy told her.

  “I don’t wanna know,” Jesse said. “It’s bad enough I gotta worry about bugs and poisonous plants. Now birds’ll kill me too?”

  “Why does this upset you?” Ivy seemed truly concerned.

  “’Cause of the tick thing,” Jesse said.

  That was their brother Danny’s fault. Jesse was the kind of child who was better kept in the dark about blood-sucking insects. But Danny couldn’t resist not only telling her about them, but also pretending that there was one stuck on her head.

  Jesse didn’t like playing with her brother very much because he liked to do a lot of mean things like that. He’d climb trees too, but only so he could see how far down he could spit. There wasn’t much fun in that.

  Living so far away from town, each of the Aimes kids would make up things to do to keep themselves occupied. Especially Jesse. Her mind became her playground. She learned to use it more than her bike. Or board games. But on rainy days, Monopoly and Sorry! would be dusted off and rediscovered.

  Their closest neighbor was still the Wallace farm. They were the most tired-looking family Jesse had ever seen. They got up at three in the morning. They were always tending their crops and working the fields. No one ever saw any of them without a bucket in their hand. Dan said he thought the Wallaces had kids only to have extra help on the farm. But even they were a good distance from the Aimes house, so Jesse and her siblings didn’t play with them very much.

  Jesse began to count down the days until summer was over. She couldn’t wait to go back to school to see her friend Stephanie again. Her mother couldn’t separate them at school.

  Chapter Six

  Second grade…

  Jesse was in the same class as Stephanie, but she could only talk to her at recess and lunch, since she was still forbidden to socialize with her outside of school. Their teacher, Ms. Wilkins, had a problem with anyone talking in class. She got so angry whenever someone talked Jesse assumed it must have been really quiet in her house.

  “We’re going to the cafeteria,” Ms. Wilkins said. “Stay in a straight line and no talking!”

  That was another big deal in second grade—straight lines. If you didn’t learn anything else, you had to remember to walk in a straight line. Jesse didn’t understand the importance of this either. It reminded her of church. Everywhere she went there were rules and penalties if you broke those rules. Even the Ten Commandments—most of them began with “Thou shalt not…”

  It was now late September when the land surrounding the school was awash in reds and golds, and the breezes grew cooler. For Jesse, this was always a slightly scary time, that feeling of the unknown. Autumn usually meant doing things she’d never done before, especially with each new school year. This grade was no different. In second grade she would have to give her first oral report. She wanted to throw up.

  Ms. Wilkins was known for calling on the kid who looked the most scared. Jesse wasn’t helping herself by shaking and sweating at her desk. She might as well have put a bull’s-eye on her forehead. Of course she’d be the first one called on to give her report.

  She took very heavy steps to the chalkboard at the front of the class. She turned and found everyone staring at her, monsters with teeth bared and eyes stabbing her with quiet judgment. She stuttered and her already moist paper shook in her drenched hands.

  “Rosa…Parks…” Jesse stammered, “is a major…hist…hist…” She wished so badly Ms. Wilkins would shoot her to end her suffering. Right now, she was no different than a horse with a bad leg. But the teacher let it go on. Jesse skipped ahead. “She ref…refused to sit at the bbback…of the bus.” She decided not to look up again and gulped through her next word.

  First there was snickering. Then there was laughter that grew to a roar. The paper in her hands was now shaking so much she couldn’t read it.

  “Ros…Rosa…”

  Finally, someone stopped the disaster. But it wasn’t Ms. Wilkins. Stephanie, seeing that the teacher wasn’t doing anything to stop the laughing, y
elled, “Shut up!”

  That apparently woke up the teacher, who immediately said, “Yes, class, stop that.” Ms. Wilkins held up her hands until she had total quiet. “Now Jesse, can you tell me why Rosa Parks didn’t want to sit at the back of the bus?”

  “It wasn’t fair,” Jesse said, her voice immediately stronger. “She was a person like everybody else.” Though she stared at her feet, she could tell that Ms. Wilkins liked her answer.

  Maybe the teacher felt sorry for her because she let her sit down then and turn in a written paper. Jesse was grateful for that and for Stephanie, the only one who had stood up for her.

  When the bell rang for recess, the two girls rushed outside to grab a couple of swings and catch up on all of those things they’d missed from the day before—intense, seven-year-old conversations that carried great importance. With hours of phone calls stolen from them, they had to make up the time as best they could.

  The sky was getting dark, so they knew they didn’t have much time outside. Soon the teachers would be rounding everyone up to go sit in the gym and play these dumb games where you tried not to let a giant rubber ball hit you. The boys seemed to really love those kinds of games. But then again, the boys, like her brother Danny, dared each other to eat crayons and glue, so she didn’t think they were a good judge of what was fun anyway.

  Stephanie’s swing got as high as it would go before she broke the news.

  “I’m moving away,” she said.

  “Where?”

  “Nashville.”

  Jesse’s face went ashen. “That’s a million miles away!”

  “No, it ain’t.”

  “Might as well be,” Jesse said.

  “We’ll still see each other.”

  “How? I can’t take a road trip without Mama knowin’ about it. She don’t want me seein’ you as it is.”

  Stephanie shrugged like she didn’t care. “It’s not that far.” She kept repeating it as if to convince herself. When their swings slowed a bit, she gave Jesse a piece of paper from her pocket. “It’s my new address,” she said.