Slow Way Home

by Michael Morris

  Beau slapped across the water and pulled his arms to help break free from the marshy mud. “Quit your whining. That’s how come we left Josh back at the house. I don’t need another baby.”

  With the cuffs of our jeans flapping against the air, we rode our bikes back down the bridge and towards the marina. From the highest point, the marina’s white awning and blue sides reminded me of a birthday cake.

  Arriving in the parking lot, I could see blue and yellow sparks flying off of a boat engine as the welder held the torch down below.

  Poppy was standing by the Coke machine when we rode up. His gray overalls were patterned with engine grease. At the gate men with matching blue caps stuck cards into a time clock.

  “How come all those men get to go home and you’re still working?”

  Poppy brushed the sweat from the bottle and never looked up. “They got no choice. We lost a contract today. They’re laid off.”

  Waiting in line, the faces never raised to show any eyes. White and black, there were only eyelids that drifted past the green box as the men fed time cards into the machine.

  At Nap’s Corner I felt almost ashamed to take Harvey’s money for the five crabs that scaled the walls in our bucket. The empty faces of the men at the marina seemed suspended in my mind. Beau stuck out his hand while Harvey dropped a stream of fifty-cent pieces. A fiddle’s whine from the jukebox and the rotating fan that hung from a corner beam struggled to be heard over the noontime chatter.

  “Lord, I hope L.C. didn’t lose his job,” Karen said. She wiped her hands on the apron. “Did you see L.C. standing down there?”

  Beau wrapped the money in a paper napkin. “I didn’t see nobody. Except Mr. Hewitt. Now I did see him.”

  Karen reached over and grabbed Bonita’s arm just as she was walking by with a tray of fried mullet platters. “Lord. Nate Hewitt got laid off. His wife’s got lung cancer on top of all this.”

  Nana moved past the jukebox with its neon lights pulsating to the beat of the music. “You girls stop worrying now. We got jobs and just need to keep our minds set on keeping them.” Before Karen could open her mouth, Nana had given her three menus and was greeting tourists at the door.

  When Sister Delores found out about the layoff, she never worried either. She just got to work assembling a small army to help take action. The following Saturday morning we lined up inside Nap’s Corner and waited for our drill sergeant. Sister Delores kept a whittled-down pencil tucked in a curl on the side of her head. The paper listing laid-off families popped to attention when she snapped it open.

  “Baby, you cover the Larson place out on 98, but be sure to stay close to the car. They got a dog that’s bad to bite.”

  Bonita grabbed a grocery bag full of canned goods from the jukebox. Nana and Harvey stayed busy in the kitchen wrapping up fillets of mullet in yesterday’s newspaper.

  The smell of fish guts spread out into the dining room, and the stench caused me to think about all the morning cartoons I was missing because of Sister Delores’s call for help.

  Nana used the yellow rubber gloves to wipe away sweat while at the same time ensuring that the bloody fingertips didn’t touch her hair. She placed the folded comics into a Styrofoam cooler and patted the side of the box. “And this one is ready to go.”

  “Look out, now,” Sister Delores said. “I never thought I’d meet another woman who could outwork me.”

  Part of my job was arranging the Piggly Wiggly bags in the seats of Sister Delores’s Impala. Tall bags took the place of the typical Sunday morning passengers. I helped mark off the list of deliveries and stapled cards to the bags. The plain white cards were all written in her third-grader block writing: “If you don’t have a friend in the world you have one here: God’s Hospital.”

  “Now you go on and run this up to the doorstep and knock as loud as you can. Don’t lollygag and get caught. Don’t nobody want people feeling sorry for ’em.”

  Cans of peaches sloshed as the bag crinkled in my arms. The house sat on cinder blocks and a green piece of material with tiny orange flowers covered the front door. As I stepped on the chipped porch step I heard the door hinges squeak, and turned back towards the car. The pink cross that dangled from the rearview mirror was my finishing line. Running so fast my lungs couldn’t take in enough air, I jumped into the car feet first.

  As we drove away, I turned to look across the tops of the bags in the backseat and saw a blanket of white dust sweep over the front porch. A woman with orange curlers put a hand on her forehead trying to catch a glimpse of our getaway car.

  Sister Delores laughed in that deep-gutted way. “People running around chasing after dope ain’t got a clue. Now right back there is the only kinda dope I’m studying. Getting high on giving to the needy. Thank you, Jesus.”

  “Boy I wish my mama could…”

  “What, baby? What’s that you say about your mama?”

  The paper bag made a crumpling sound when I snatched it closer to me. “I just was fixing to say I wish my mama could’ve lived so she could help people like you do.”

  Her hand was soft when she reached over and patted my knee. As we pulled away, I stared out the window at the kudzu that snaked around a fence post. Even though my tongue would not let me confess it, I wondered how things might have been different if my mama would’ve gotten a hold of some of Sister Delores’s dope.

  As we clutched our fishing rods with one hand and steered our bicycles with the other, all we could do was nod to the policeman who sat in the parked car next to the phone booth. A woman with a floppy white hat didn’t seem to notice. She pointed to the words “U.S.A.’s Smallest Police Station” as a man dressed in blue-checked shorts, dress socks, and white tennis shoes took her picture.

  Rounding the corner to the dime store allowed a soft breeze from the river to break through the sting from the late May sun. Beau snaked his bike through the parked cars that lined the street, all the while keeping his eyes on the boardwalk across the way. “Good. Nobody’s out fishing today. We’ll get first dibs.”

  It was his idea to check out the fish at the dime store. He was sure that minnows from the fish tank in the back of the store would be cheaper than buying them from the bait-and-tackle shop.

  “Dog. This place ain’t got the first minnow. You think these yellow-and-white stripes might work? Kinda looks like a shiner.”

  As I watched assorted colors of fish swim around tanks with blue rocks and plastic reefs, the smell of bagged fertilizer stacked on the cracked wooden floor kept me from making any big decisions.

  The old man with a gut that draped over his belt sat in a lawn chair at the front register. The crinkle from his newspaper occasionally competed with the humming from the fish tanks.

  “Only ten cents each. Let’s try one of these yellow ones. If I catch something we’ll come back.” Just when Beau grabbed the plastic bag and fish net, we heard that piercing voice.

  “Let me see the goods first and then I’ll tell you if we have a deal.”

  Beau slowly turned around. Even if I’d not known the voice myself, I could have told by the arch of Beau’s eyebrows that the one thing that managed to scare him was in the building.

  The man laughed until he went into a coughing fit. “All right, Miss Rose. See for yourself.”

  We hunched behind the shelf that was lined with matchbox-sized containers of fish food. Over the dusty containers we saw the black wig that curled around the top edge of her leopard-print coat. An electric fan behind the cash register kept the edges of Mama Rose’s hair in a state of flutter. She held up a multicolored stick painted like a bird with a straw hat.

  The man tried to pull his pants up higher. “Not a thing in the world wrong with them except the bottom broke off. I still got the cups. All you have to do is glue the bottom part and then she’s good as new.”

  She ran her finger down the length of the bird and massaged the broken part. “What makes you so sure they’ll dip for water?”

  �
�Got this magnet thing in the bird so that it draws him to the water. All the big tourist places down the state are selling ’em like wildfire.”

  Beau inched down lower when Mama Rose turned her head. He stayed down as they bargained back and forth until the deal was sealed.

  The man wiped his pasty forehead with a folded handkerchief and studied Mama Rose’s coat from shoulders to ankle. “Rose, you been feeling okay? Haven’t seen you in a while.”

  The black wig moved back and forth with her head. “My nerves are just tore all to pieces. I guess you know that ex-daughter-in-law of mine is now a certified nigger lover. Oh yeah, even going to one of their churches.”

  “Didn’t know. You still taking the pills that doctor…”

  “She always was nothing but common trash. Next thing you know she’ll have a nigger man shacked up in Johnny’s house.”

  Before I could stop him, Beau hit the shelf with his fist. Specks of fish food scattered as the sound of vibrating metal made its way to the front of the store.

  “Hey, what’s going on back there?”

  We scooped up boxes of fish food as if it was a game of hot potato. The man’s crinkled black loafers were planted inches from our fingers.

  “Y’all broke anything, you’re paying for it.”

  Rising to face further judgment, I breathed deeper when I noticed the front of the store was empty. Outside the tall window Mama Rose pulled a red wagon with her latest find. In the noon sun her black wig glistened like crow feathers. A crow with a call so loud and shrill that others followed.

  In the backseat of Sister Delores’s car, sweat from the girl with underarm hair pressed against my shoulder. She was one of the new people picked up, thanks to us giving away bags of food.

  “We sure gonna have church today, babies.” Sister Delores’s car was packed extra tight. The fruits of her labor spread across the ripped seat and onto laps.

  I pictured the car rolling down the highway with the back end slumped down from all the weight, sparks flying behind us. It was a good thing that Beau and Josh had begun going to church in Bonita’s car.

  “That truck is about to run over us,” said the girl next to me.

  With her shoulder pinning part of me against the slick car seat, I could only turn my head part of the way. But the steel bars that imprisoned the truck hood gave Alvin away. Sliding down the seat, I could hear the roar of Alvin’s sawed-off muffler.

  Sister Delores kept both hands on the steering wheel and one eye in the rearview mirror. “Don’t pay no mind to that truck.” But the sweat that ran like a tear down the side of her neck convinced me otherwise.

  When Alvin started honking the horn, the smaller children in the front seat craned towards the back window. Lined up against the headrest, their skinny necks stretched out like cowbirds ready to take flight.

  Alvin’s truck roared forward until we could see a stain of red clay on one of the front tires, tires fit more for a bulldozer than a vehicle. One of the little kids up front went to crying when he laid down on the horn again.

  Sister Delores held the steering wheel and wiped away tears all at the same time. “No need crying over this silliness.”

  But when he jerked the truck into the passing lane and was lined up directly next to us, even I dug my fingers into the ripped place in the backseat.

  Two men sat in the front seat as the CB antenna slapped wildly in the air. The one closest to the window stuck his head out. The back of his hair fanned out across his head, but the front remained slicked down. He held out a bat and waved it as if he might twirl it in the air. His words vibrated as if spoken into a rotating fan. “Nigger, you best watch out.” He pumped the bat higher, and his scowl spoke louder than the words the wind tossed about.

  “Roll up the windows,” Sister Delores said. She jerked the knob on the door harder until the glass had cut out the breeze. The truck roared a final time and lurched forward until the antenna was nothing but a speck of silver far ahead of us.

  “Bye, now.” Sister Delores waved when the truck was a distance away. “If anybody ever needed Jesus, it was that poor thing. Oh now, babies, don’t y’all go to studying about them men. You just seen something ugly is all. Just ugly and devil-filled right down to the core.”

  When we arrived at God’s Hospital, Sister Delores parked right in front of the church with the gold cross painted above the front door. She led us in a prayer that asked for peace and for God’s help to reach the man who held up the bat. Then she ran her fingernail down the pink cross that dangled from the rearview mirror. Smiling, she closed her eyes and seemed to draw strength from the touch, the same way my mama did whenever she held one of her nerve pills.

  Soft drumbeats escaped from the doors, and Sister Delores led the little children by the hand. They formed a brightly colored chain of pastel dresses and sailor shirts. Inside, most of the new people had already found seats. I saw one man with a shirt just like the one Poppy wore, a blue pullover with a pocket painted the color of the Marina logo. Beau was too busy matting down the back of his hair to notice me slide into the pew.

  “Boy, you’re sweating like a hog. Get off me.” He moved closer to Bonita, and she moved along the pew until Josh was pinned up against an old man with white socks and black dress shoes.

  The organ started to whine, and I told Beau about the baseball bat. While the rest of God’s Hospital sang “’Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus,” I whispered the details to Beau.

  Harvey stood at the podium in front of the church and nodded to the keyboard player, and voices in various keys soon filled the building once again. Beau looked down at the hymnal and ran his blistered finger across the stanzas. “Did you see Alvin?”

  “No, but it sure was his truck. Those big bars on the front.”

  “How do you know it was him driving? Could’ve been somebody else. Maybe somebody borrowed it.”

  Bonita leaned down, and the gold cross she wore twirled playfully. For a second her hair spray wiped away the lingering smell of crab. “Hush. Now I mean it.”

  So I did hush. I never told Beau he was a fool. I just sat there and watched his finger guide across the hymnal. He wouldn’t have known the truth if it had been written in the pages for him to sing. He couldn’t hear it on account of the brain infection I diagnosed him with that day. Infection of fear and loneliness.

  By the time Sister Delores got up from the tall wooden chair with a cross carved in the back, the amens had died down to a few coughs. She glided across the green carpet and took her rightful place at the podium. Her head shook until the curls rang back and forth like bells that had been silenced. “I’m just standing up here thinking about Jesus and how good He’s been to us. The Lord told me back there five years ago that He wanted me to take His loving words to all His people. I said all His people. Black, white, yellow, half-breed, it don’t make no difference to the King now.”

  “Amen, amen,” a man with patches of gray hair said from the pew in front of us.

  “Now God’s Hospital is growing faster than most hospitals. And ain’t that wonderful. A hospital should be pulling in the hurting. We got no use for people who don’t think they need nothing. Bring me the hurting ones. That’s what my Mother Hightower used to tell me when I was a little girl. She’d tuck me in at night and say, ‘Baby, you gonna be used one day to help this hurting world, but even still this world is not your home.’”

  “No, it’s not. Sure not,” a woman down in front said. A baby started crying, but it didn’t break Sister Delores’s stare on the Bible pages that fluttered in time with the corner fan.

  “I was gonna preach on Abraham and his trip to Egypt, but coming here this morning something happened that tore at my heart. Tore it right down to the quick. Come on, somebody.”

  A woman with hair the color of sand waved a purple handkerchief at Sister Delores. “Preach it, Sister.”

  Right then I wanted to punch Beau in the ribs and stand up and shout that Alvin was the one who tore up her he
art. But Beau was too caught up in drawing a picture of a spaceship on the church bulletin.

  “Love is a precious gift, and some people don’t want nothing to do with it. They act devil-filled to the heart, and it just breaks mine in two.” Sister Delores grabbed the microphone from the lectern, and it squealed louder than the crying baby.

  “Jesus told his disciples to bring the little children to Him, and that’s what I was trying to do. Just like Mother Hightower brought me to Him. Now y’all know we got no secrets in God’s Hospital. They tell me I wasn’t no more than three days old when I was put up in a place for orphans. Nobody knowing any of my people until one day Mother Hightower walked in and picked me out. Said she seen sweetness in my eyes. Mother Hightower’s hand was rough as day-old cowhide, but let me tell y’all something: it belonged to a heart softer than fine silk. We’d say our prayers, and then she’d pull that big ol’ heavy Bible down from the kitchen cabinet and read the words from Psalms. Over and over until I had them stitched on my heart. ‘The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear? When my father and mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.’”

  The buzz from the lights filled the room and not even the baby cried out. Beau looked up and hit my knee with his. “She’s fixing to cry.”

  I just sat there staring deeper into the soft brown lips that curled into a half smile. Sister Delores had found her daddy and her mama in one person, and by the way her nerves stayed so settled, I knew it was for keeps.

  She moved down the stage steps and stood face-to-face with the congregation. “Do you know Jesus? Is He your daddy and your mama or just a crutch you pull out when the pain tears you a part? He wants you to lay it on down, and come home now. Come on home to Daddy Jesus.”

  Harvey had not taken his place at the podium before the words and music flew around us. Words as soft as the place I imagined Sister Delores’s heart to be. “Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling. Calling for you and for me…”