A Place Called Wiregrass

by Michael Morris

  “I expect that man out there has a little bit to do with that good feeling,” Kasi said, lighting a cigarette and then pointing the red tip towards Gerald.

  I stood on the back porch and watched Gerald walk with Cher and Laurel to the corner fence. He opened the fence gate and put a halter on Donnie’s horse. Cher put her tennis shoe in Gerald’s palm, and he lifted her onto the chestnut-colored animal. He fastened two ropes on either side of the halter and then handed them up to Cher. Seated on the horse, she held her back straight and surveyed the crowd. When her eyes fell upon me, I gave her a thumbs-up and opened my mouth real wide, trying to imitate a surprised cartoon character.

  Gerald lifted his right arm high and showed her how to pull the horse towards the left. The slowness in his arm movements told me he was gentle with his teaching. He pushed the brim of his ball cap and squatted on the ground as if he was sitting in an invisible chair. The way he chewed at the end of a blade of grass reminded me how earthy and attractive he was. I couldn’t help but wonder how different my life might’ve turned out if I’d met him thirty years earlier.

  After supper, Gerald put on the porch floodlights, and Brownie slowly walked down the back-porch steps carrying the chocolate birthday cake she made. “Okay, everybody. Looks like it’s time for the birthday girl,” Lee yelled and began leading the group in singing “Happy Birthday.” Brownie bit the edge of her extended tongue. Her ringlet curls bounced each time she took a cautious step down the porch. I watched Cher’s expression and grinned as wide as Patricia.

  Cher looked down at the ground and then back up towards the crowd. Her full lips formed an angelic smile, and the way her brown eyes twinkled from the lighted candles made my eyes swim with emotion. My baby deserved all this and more.

  My body slightly twitched when I felt Gerald wrap his arms around my shoulders. He stood behind me and propped his chin on the top of my head. At first I stiffened, wondering how this display of public affection would go over. But when no one gave us a second look, I exhaled the concern and let my shoulders fall under the weight of his tan arms. The heat from his body and the steady breath against my hair felt reassuring. My hand reached up and rested against his wide hand. I squeezed his skin hard and massaged a rough place where a blister once had been.

  The crowd looked ghostly against the backdrop of the porch floodlights and flickering birthday candles. But their glowing faces only gave me peace. Absent only of Miss Claudia, the group assembled before me was my life now. They put a blanket of comfort on me and made me feel like I was as good as anybody. In their presence ugliness vanished as easy as the sun, which slowly sank behind Gerald’s pasture. Happy birthday to you. And many more.

  Cher and her five birthday guests crowded into the small camera booth and pulled the black curtain. I looked at the brown skates underneath the curtain and imagined the shrill giggles that were erupting within. The same giggles that were drowned out by the base-thumping speakers in each corner of the skating rink. I tried not to worry about how much money Cher was wasting on silliness and reminded myself this was a special day.

  “If you want them to do any games, it’s gonna cost extra,” the little woman yelled to me. She looked like a fifteen-year-old boy with purple glasses and short black hair cut over her ears. A haircut Mama would consider stylish.

  The music vibrated against the beige-carpeted walls. Blue lights made the skating rink floor look like a flat piece of ice. “All they want is one game,” I yelled back. “How much is it to do the…”

  “I’ll pay for the game,” Gerald yelled from behind me. He presented a twenty-dollar bill over my left shoulder. I snatched the money before the little woman could reach up and claim it.

  “No, you’re not neither,” I said, cutting a glance over my shoulder. “Just go on with the game and put it on credit for me.” The little woman wasted no time skating away and blowing her whistle. Credit was something I had learned to despise. Far too many women had worked next to me at the Haggar factory because of its bondage.

  To top the night off, I was almost forced into a nervous breakdown by having kids as small as six years old skate around me like trained circus monkeys. Every time I almost tripped over one, I hated that I couldn’t afford to rent the entire rink.

  “I wish you’d let me help,” Gerald said with his hands tucked inside his jeans pockets.

  “You’ve done enough already.” He had given Cher a birthday gift of ten skating passes, not to mention the cookout.

  Over his shoulder I saw Miss Claudia and Patricia enter. “Miss Claudia’s here. Go get Cher.”

  Gerald waved towards the corner of the skating rink where Cher and the girls had gathered for their credited game. Cher and Laurel were skating backwards and forming the letters to YMCA while the song vibrated the building. I smiled, thinking of how Cher’s own mother used to dance to the song and form the same letters with her arms. Suzette was just about the same age at the time. I turned to focus on Miss Claudia before the image of Suzette’s letter could appear in my mind.

  “For goodness sake. And I thought the cafeteria was loud,” Patricia said with fingers plugged in each ear. “Mama, if we stay long, you’ll be running out of here in a fit.”

  “I’m not the one with my ears plugged up,” Miss Claudia screamed.

  Cher skated over to the bench we sat on. “Come over here and give me some birthday sugar. Or are you too old for such as that now that you’re fourteen?” Miss Claudia asked and hugged Cher.

  The five birthday guests skated over to where Cher stood and watched as she opened Miss Claudia’s gift. Some of the girls cut their eyes cautiously towards Patricia.

  “Oh, I see lots of my former students. What pretty young ladies y’all turned out to be,” Patricia said, looking each of the five up and down like she might purchase them.

  “Oh, my gosh,” Cher said, dropping the brown box and pulling out a short red sundress and navy short set.

  “That’s nice,” one of the girls said. Another rattled off a name brand that sounded like Greek to me.

  “Thank you, Miss Claudia.” Cher leaned down to hug Miss Claudia’s neck. One of her skates slipped on the carpet, and she stretched lower into her arms.

  “I love you, you know that. And I want you to come see me in these new clothes now,” Miss Claudia said.

  Watching Cher tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear and pat Miss Claudia’s shoulder, I silently thanked God for not letting Cher turn out like her mother. Her mother, who was locked up in a Louisiana cell and was so fried out of her mind from drugs that she wouldn’t have the sense to accept a free gift.

  After two weeks of working for Miss Claudia on a full-time summer basis, I was worn out. Not by the workload, but from trying to negotiate a medical breakthrough.

  “Cher found out about a new trial they’re doing up in Birmingham. They say one man was cured by this new stuff.”

  “Patricia was going to help me fill out these papers the city needs after her tennis lessons. And I declare, here it is a quarter after three.” Miss Claudia stretched her arm and studied the gold wristwatch.

  I gritted my teeth and polished the silver teapot as hard as I could. Miss Claudia had been ignoring my every mention of treatment. Her lack of interest was worse than being hardheaded—it was downright stupid. That was the part that made me the maddest. All she wanted to do was play developer for that foolish rescue home.

  When I would find the medical papers Cher had pulled from the Internet still lying on the cherry dining-room table without so much as a finger smear, I hated that rescue home even more. I even tried leaving clinical trial papers in Richard’s garage apartment right on top of his trusty police scanner. But the battle of wills was too intense for a nerve patient.

  Within days, her dining room was converted into a makeshift office. Church elders, city councilmen, and people from United Way called on her at all hours. Anybody who would listen to her talk about that home was offered a seat under the crystal chande
lier.

  “Missoura, we need this place something awful. I just thank the good Lord you and Aaron opened up your home to me.” Miss Claudia placed the fat black ink pen down on the dining-room table. “If it wasn’t for you, I’m sure I’d be dead or in jail, either one.”

  Missoura sipped her iced tea and cautiously glanced at me. The type of glance somebody might give a little child who had walked in during adult conversation. She cleared her throat and knocked twice on the cherry table. “You ’spect I need to talk to the pastor and bishops about this?”

  “I certainly think it’ll help.” Miss Claudia leaned forward and held her hand up. “Oh, and be sure to get them to attend the city council meeting next month. They’re going to discuss setting aside some money to help with all this. It’s real expensive, don’t you know.”

  Missoura slightly turned her head and wrinkled her weathered brow. “How you feeling? You looking mighty pale.”

  I refilled Missoura’s tea glass.

  “Oh Lord, I’m fine. Haven’t had any more problems since that mishap.”

  “Mishap,” I mumbled. Ice and liquid clanked into Missoura’s glass. “She was in bad shape. And won’t even talk about getting treatment.”

  Miss Claudia’s hazel eyes were locked on me. It seemed like an hour before she blinked. “Missoura, if you get your church involved, just be sure to tell them the rescue home will be a place where privacy is respected and people mind their own business.”

  “I’ll have this bed ready for your nap in just a minute,” I said in clipped tones. The starched white sheets popped off the mattress with a quick yank.

  The tap of her cane against the hardwood floor was as faithful as a compass telling her location. Would she lift the cane and hit me across the back for disrespecting her in front of her trusted friend? Part of me wished she would and put me back in my role as simple housekeeper. I always thought the title companion sounded too personal anyway.

  “I think we need to clear the air,” she said.

  “Ain’t nothing to say.” I pulled the pillowcase off with my back still to her. “I got out of line and apologize is all.”

  Her hand rested on my shoulder, and I closed my eyes, pushing down the tide of turmoil that swelled inside me.

  “I want to at least look at you,” she said.

  Biting my lip, I turned around to face her.

  “I understand why you said that to Missoura. You think I’m making a mistake by not taking treatments, don’t you?”

  “No, it’s your business. Whatever.” I suddenly realized I sounded like Cher and felt ashamed for skirting around my anger.

  “I know better than that. But I can’t make you talk. If that’s how you want to do me,” she said with a shrug and turned to walk away.

  “Yes,” I yelled before she had taken the third step from me.

  “I think it’s a mistake. There, I do.”

  She stopped, and her cane caught the edge of her Oriental rug. The end of the rug curled up to reveal a dark pad. She turned her head and studied my reflection in the mirror on the chest of drawers.

  “It just doesn’t make sense. You got money to buy medicine. You could go to some of those trials I gave you papers on.” I dropped the pillow on the bed and slapped both hands on the hips of my jeans. “You can get better. You just don’t want to.” I sat on the naked mattress and put my hands over my ears. I took the offensive towards stopping Mama’s voice. The voice I expected to hear any minute telling me that I would be at the unemployment office by day’s end.

  “I want to live my life the way I want to live it,” Miss Claudia whispered. She was sitting in front of me in the high-back burgundy chair. “Do you remember how constrained you used to feel when that man in Louisiana would knock you around?”

  I lifted my head and looked into her eyes.

  “Well, I sure do. Luther Ranker would tell me what I could wear. When to go to town. When to have supper fixed. When to go to bed. He’d control when I went to the bathroom if he could. And the day I learned he was lost at sea, I stood on the porch of that broken-down shack and promised myself I’d never be controlled like that again.” She balled up a fist so tight, I thought she’d punch me out if I tried to change her. “And let me tell you one thing, Erma Lee. I won’t spend what time I have being controlled by some snake oil that may or may not make me throw up, that may or may not put me flat on my back in that bed.”

  I looked down and slowly shook my head. “But those papers show…”

  “They show lots of things. And for somebody younger, that’s probably just the trick. But it’s not for me. I got my purpose now.”

  “But see there, you could get cured and be around to enjoy the rescue home and everything.”

  She closed her eyes and smiled. “Sugar, I appreciate your concern. Really I do. But I got enough battles to fight with this mess without having to fight you too.”

  At that point I wished she would have fired me. The grandfather clock outside her door struck three, and I wanted to run before the fairy tale ended.

  “You’re mad at me, aren’t you?”

  “No, don’t be silly,” I said.

  “I know you. It’s all over your face. But it’s my life, don’t you know.”

  The turmoil in my stomach tracked up my chest and throat with the rage of a tornado. Don’t cry, I ordered and looked out of her bay window. The bright green oak leaves glistened in the afternoon sun.

  “Come on over here.” She patted the arm of her chair.

  I knelt by her chair and let her rub my cheek with the back of her cold hand.

  “I’m going to need your support and your prayers,” she said. “But I’ll be honest. Most of all, I need you. We’ll make it through this. We’re survivors, you and me.”

  But I was tired of fighting for survival. I placed the side of my face on her lap and turned my head away towards the bedroom window. Spanish moss swung carelessly on an ancient oak limb just outside the window. Had it not been for the stains left on her navy skirt, she would’ve thought I was napping instead of crying.

  A fine mist of rain fell when I pulled up to the building with faded letters, Westgate Trailer Park. I ran into the white cinderblock office and almost slipped when opening the door.

  “Careful. All I need’s a lawsuit,” Miss Trellis moaned behind the wood-paneled counter.

  While making out the rent check, I listened to her describe the bad case of sinus she was collecting with the change in weather.

  “How’s that wayward home coming together?”

  “You mean the home for abused women,” I said, wondering if she had Miss Claudia’s home wiretapped.

  “Yeah, whatever Claudia’s a calling it.” Her nubby hand rested on the roll of her chin.

  “They’re pulling the money together. Still looking for a location.” I zipped my wallet up and turned to go.

  “They tell me Claudia’s gone plumb Negra crazy. Wants to get all them into it. She always was the beatenest thing to make over a Negra. Next thing you know they’ll be taking over the place.”

  Waves of her nasal voice sent a chill through me.

  “That’s just like her to want to stir up trouble. Always something for that bunch.”

  The bitterness was contagious. Before I could help myself my hand had already slammed the counter. Miss Trellis jumped backwards, and the black vinyl chair that held her tilted to the side.

  “All that woman’s trying to do is help people. I’ve heard you run Miss Claudia into the ground until I’m sick and tired of it. Your problem is you’re so eat up with jealousy you might split wide open. At least she ain’t some broken-down hag like you. All the time watching that TV and talking trash about everybody in town.”

  The plastic blinds flew sideways when I swung the office door open. I didn’t turn around when I heard her say, “And they say you got baptized. Huh, some Christian you turned out to be. I’m a mind to evict hypocrites.”

  The worst thing about being poo
r was having to compromise. I didn’t sleep a bit that night wondering what I would do if there was an eviction notice on my door the next morning. I could never ask Miss Claudia to let me live with her. I prayed for options and direction. Upon hearing the recording that my cousin Lucille’s phone number had been disconnected, I realized options were miracles meant for others.

  The next morning I went behind my trailer, my home with Miss Trellis’s name on the title, and picked a handful of wild daisies. The bottoms of my jeans legs were still wet from the dew when I walked into her office.

  She was sitting at the counter sipping coffee while Katie Couric and Matt Lauer talked about their upcoming vacations. When I entered, her beady eyes drifted towards the door.

  “Good morning,” I said and held the flowers up in both hands. “I picked these for you.”

  She slurped the coffee loudly. “Ummm.” She patted her flat gray hair and continued to look at the television.

  “I hope you’ll accept my apology.” I wondered if this was what Lee meant last Sunday when he said Christians have to die to self. Every inch of my self wanted to throw the flowers at her greasy hair.

  Matt Lauer said, “But first this is Today on NBC,” and then the volume blared when a man named Crazy Ed screamed about low car prices.

  Miss Trellis took her time in turning towards me. “Now what you want?”

  I forced a smile and repeated the apology.

  She moaned and closed her eyes. “I don’t know. It sure does hurt a woman to get cussed the way you done me.”

  “Cuss?” Don’t fall for her trap and create another argument. “Yes, ma’am. Like I said, I worked myself silly yesterday. And just…”