by Jade Alyse
Her head was in Mama’s lap, and they swayed on the porch swing together, and they watched the sun set over the Bradford pears, the sky a fusion of pink and amber, the drone of an airplane passing by. Mama rubbed her head with her hand, slowly, soothingly, gently.
This is the way that it had been for years right? Natalie and her mama, together on the porch, watching the sunset, reflecting on life, the daughter, wanting to be so much like her, whose voice, deep and rooted and smooth, was just breathy enough to soothe her, with just a touch of southern soul.
She was never a disappointment, was she? No ma’am. When Sidney and Maya left the house without telling her, where was Nattie? In the house, under her mama, where she belonged, avoiding trouble, waiting for the moment that she and Mama could go to the porch and watch the sky fall, hear the crickets, witness the lightning bugs flourish in the summertime, laugh at Sid and Maya while they chased them around the magnolia-laden front yard. And when Mama lay crying on the kitchen floor, mentally and physically defeated, after Papa had slammed his fist into the side of her mother’s face, seven-year-old Nattie was at her mother’s feet, while Sidney and Maya locked themselves in the back bedroom. She had not quite understood the despair her mother felt at the time. She now blamed her youth and her forced ignorance. Though it made her angry, she chose not to think about why her daddy beat on her mama that way. She only wanted to believe the best of her father. She’d go to sleep praying to God that they’d be fine in the morning, that Mama wouldn’t have a black eye, that Daddy would lift her into his arms, while mama fixed breakfast, kiss the side of her face and declare her his querido.
She had her mother’s eyes. Everyone said so. They were narrow and they twinkled when the sun hit them just right. And everyday Granny Marie reminded her that she had her mama’s laugh, shared the same sweet drawl, had her round butt, her narrow hips, her slim waist.
“I swear, Nattie,” Granny would say. “You’re startin’ to scare me, you look so much like your mama!”
She couldn’t tell her yet.
But, she had to, didn’t she? Brandon David Greene had to exist in her Mama’s heart.
It had taken her several days for her to actually comprehend it herself. Were she and Brandon Greene really serious about getting married? Did she really drop Anthony without a second thought to the consequences?
Brandon hadn’t given that Reina girl a second thought.
He’d swiftly convinced her that he’d met Reina Crutchfield through one of Scotty’s coworkers at the radio station. She was bold like Sophia, had her same sneaky charm, which probably explained why she’d managed to get him into bed the same night as their first dinner date at Finnegan’s. Reina was simple-minded, shallow, and when she wasn’t sweeping fertilizer off of the floor at a plant store on Crest, she was calling him, begging him for another nightcap. Somehow, in the three weeks that they were seeing each other, Reina had managed to start calling him her “boyfriend” to her silly girlfriends. He didn’t correct her as much as he wanted to. Unlike Natalie, she gave him the attention he craved. But, he had no trouble leaving her the night that Natalie appeared at the pond, looking scared and flustered.
There was no other way – Helen Chandler had to understand.
Mama needed to know that Brandon Greene was now her life, that she loved him. She loved every piece of him!
She’d invited Brandon to the fish fry that Sunday.
“Tal, what the hell is a ‘fish fry’?”
“It’s just what it sounds like…there is fish being fried, Brandon.”
“I don’t really eat fish, let alone, of the fried persuasion…”
“I’m sure they will put on a hot dog for you.”
“Ah hell, I’ll be there then…Sunday?”
“Sunday…”
“You’re quiet, Nattie,” Mama said in her low voice.
Was that anything out of the ordinary? Was she not naturally quiet? Shouldn’t Mama have known that?
Natalie sighed and raised her head from her mama’s lap. The breeze picked up, hit her cheeks, made a soft whistling noise.
She didn’t look at her mama.
“Why are you so quiet, girl?” her Mama asked, reaching out to her face.
Natalie shrugged her shoulders childishly. Ordinarily, this was the moment that Natalie could tell her mother anything that ached her heart, anything that threatened her solace; however, she was blessed with very few grievances, aside from troubles with her schoolwork, her job, her sisters.
But, she was thinking. She was thinking about how to explain a person like Brandon to her mother. Was it not simple? He’s tall, Mama…really tall…he’s got really dark hair and really light eyes…and he’s white, Mama…but oh, he’s beautiful, Mama…he’s really, really beautiful…
Simply telling Helen Marie Chandler that she loved Brandon Greene wouldn’t be enough.
Her mother was no sucker for a good love story.
Mama began to stroke her head a little harder. “Natalie…”
Natalie sighed again. “Mama…”
“Yes, girl?”
She then turned to her Mama. This is it! She needed to do it! Her Mama looked so peaceful. What a rarity these days it seemed. How could she ruin that?
The breeze carried her hair a little bit…she heard Brandon’s voice saying that he loved her…she rolled her eyes closed.
In her mind, they are together at the beach, he is holding her hand, their foreheads are touching, she doesn’t want to be anywhere else, she knows then that she wants to be with him.
“Mama…”
“Yes, child? What on earth’s got your mind so fixed?” Mama chuckled a little.
“Mama…I…”
“Natalie Savannah! Say it, girl!”
The phone rang.
Natalie opened her eyes, exhaled deeply; Mama raised and went into the house to answer it.
She can’t do it. She won’t say a word when Mama returns. She’ll suggest dinner…yes! Dinner! They’ll go to Martin’s for seafood…then maybe a movie. Maya’s coming home tonight…what a perfect distraction! She will tell Mama tomorrow.
The mood isn’t right.
Mama returned, holding the phone to her chest. She is giving Natalie a cross look.
“Natalie Chandler…it’s for you…it’s Brandon…your fiancé…”
#
Mama didn’t lose it until they got into the Buick to pick up Maya from the airport. Her sister had flown cross-country to visit a friend at another art school in San Francisco. She gripped the steering wheel with such force, Natalie was sure that her mama would break it. Natalie only sat quietly, refused to look at her mama. She winced every time her mama huffed.
“I don’t understand where I went wrong! It was that school. I told your grandmother that you weren’t ready to be around all those white people…you might catch something…and you did! You caught you a big ol’ honky didn’t you, child?”
Natalie didn’t answer. She knew better.
“How long have you known this boy? Probably no more than two minutes and you want to marry him? Do you think that this boy will take care of you, girl? Do you think that he’ll stay around once you punch out a couple of dark babies? This is a game to these boys, girl. Don’t you understand that? I don’t understand, Natalie…you had direction, you had fire…you want to give all of that up for a white boy? Mama taught you better than that. And you give him our home number? Where’s your sense, girl? You have to call it off! Call it off before you get hurt! You can’t trust them. Did you sleep with this boy? Is that what this is all about?”
“No, of course not, Mama…”
“You aren’t pregnant?”
“No, Mama…”
“You two don’t make sense…no kind of sense! Who else knows of this…do his parents know?”
Natalie nodded. “I will meet them in a couple of weeks…”
“And? What do you think they’ll think?”
“Well, it might be shocking to them
initially but they’ll come around…”
“Exactly! Do you think they want a little black girl in their family? Tainting their image? No…they want a little pasty white girl to go along with their little pasty white boy!”
Natalie shook her head. Mama saw her defiance. “Oh, it’s not true? It’s not true, Natalie? You think the two of you will be different, huh? I bet you think you and this Brandon will change the world, don’t you? This is a cold world, Natalie Chandler…face the reality! You two will never last…he will abandon you!”
Natalie continued to shake her head. She didn’t want to cry…Lord, have mercy…she didn’t want to cry.
There was silence between them. It was the first time that Natalie begin to realize that her mother was wrong; and she begin to question all of the others times…was she wrong then?
The silence wasn’t broken again until Maya was in the car. This time, Mama was enraged. The first person she’d told about her engagement to Brandon was Maya, who’d met Brandon a couple of years back, on a weekend visit to UGA.
“How old is he?” Her Mama asked.
“Twenty-six, Ma,” Natalie told her mother, looking at her sister. “He’s twenty-six…”
“Mama, times have changed! Nat loves this boy! Why can’t you see that?” Maya said.
“I refuse to see it, Maya,” their mama said. “I refuse to believe that my daughter, the one with the most sense in my house, would do such a thing.”
“She didn’t commit murder, Mama,” Maya defended in her soft voice. “She just fell in love.”
Oh yes, falling in love…what a travesty! Such a bad child!
“She’s being foolish,” their mama said.
“You haven’t even met the boy yet, Mama.”
“And have you? Has that white boy got you fixed too? The both of you…so different from Sidney.”
Maya nodded. “I have…he’s great. You really should meet him before you pass judgment.”
“Can’t I? Isn’t he the one who’s trying to snatch my baby away?” “You shouldn’t look at it like that, Mama,” Maya said. “You should look at it like, Nat’s found a great guy, Nat’s happy, and you should be happy for her…”
Mama rolled her lips in tightly, Natalie saw her grip the wheel tightly again, and the two daughters said nothing more.
She called Brandon that night and she cried to him.
“I’ll be there soon,” he said in a low comforting voice. She wished he were there then, as she sat on the floor, leaned against her bed, the window above her headboard cracked, letting the night air in.
She knew that if he were there, he’d be holding her, he’d be kissing the side of her face over and over, the smell of his proximity would overwhelm her. That is what she wanted for the rest of her life.
#
The next morning, she had Granny’s straw hat atop her head, her straight hair, coiling at the scalp from the heat, her brown skin moistened, glistening, glowing, darkening under the sun. She knelt beside her grandmother in the rose garden behind her yellow house at the dead-end of Hargrove at midday, her hands engrossed in hybrid teas of reds and pinks and yellows, pruning, while her grandmother, taking a break, sat in an old rocking chair, sipping lemonade.
She hadn’t said much to her grandmother since she got there, only to acknowledge the kids on their bicycles, bickering at each other as they raced toward the sound of the ice cream truck, perhaps no more than a couple of streets over. After all, that is what she and her two sisters did as children whenever they visited their grandmother in their younger years. Yes, the three Chandler sisters, fighting with the little Harold boys who lived next door, arguing over who could get to the truck the fastest, with their Granny Marie, standing on her front wraparound porch, yelling at her grandchildren to stop messing with the boys and come in for lunch.
Sid was always the fastest, and young Nattie, three years behind her, stayed behind to make sure that Maya, only a few years shy of being a toddler, was okay. Her legs were always considerably short.
A breeze picked up, her grandmother knelt beside her, handed her a glass, the ice cream truck neared, and Natalie collapsed on her bottom.
“Tell me about him,” her grandmother began.
Natalie pursed her lips, took a deep sip from the glass, and looked toward the backyard, the trees scarce, the birdhouses that hung from the branches, bouncing with the wind…
“He’s Brandon…and I want to marry him…”
“I got that much, young lady,” her soft-spoken grandmother chuckled. “I want to know more about him…”
Natalie sighed and turned in her grandmother’s direction. Granny, rosy-cheeked, smooth-skinned and narrow-eyed, smiled sweetly.
“He’s from upstate New York…he has three brothers…he’s Catholic…he’s really good at soccer…he makes me laugh…he gives good hugs…and I want to marry him…”
“Do you love him?”
She took another sip, slowly, replaced her drink on the length of her leg, and whispered, “So much…”
“Well…that’s all you need…and that’s all I care about…oh…wait…is he good-looking?”
Natalie giggled. She didn’t understand why, at the sound of her grandmother’s laugh and the thought of Brandon’s smile, she allowed a tear to roll down her face.
“He must be…shoot…the boy brings tears to your eyes…I want to see pictures.”
She had just one in her purse…
Jekyll Island, Spring Break, 2002…
She was in her yellow bathing suit. Her skin baked that day. He was in those pretty blue shorts with the white hibiscus flowers. He tanned very well. She didn’t do water…she remembered the moment that he walked into the waves with her slowly, coaching her each step, as if she were a child.
They’d emerged from the waves, she, gathered in his big arms, smelling the salt from his body, and Scotty was there to capture the moment.
She handed the picture to Granny, and she examined it for minutes. Then she smiled. “Oh, he’s somethin’ fine to look at, isn’t he? Of course you love him, you’d be stupid not to, wouldn’t you? And Granny taught you better than that, didn’t she?”
She nodded. Granny took her hand. “She’ll come around,” she said. “If you love him, if you’re happy, your mother will come around.”
She only nodded again. This time, her throat hardened.
“My girl’s a stubborn little thing, isn’t she? She’s always been that way…mean as a rattlesnake, my Helen. And all she’s got is you three girls…Sidney’s in Columbia, Maya’s in Savannah becoming an artist…and with you getting married, it’s devastating for a mother, as much as it’s satisfying knowing that you did something right…you did something good with your children…”
“But he’s white…”
“Oh, hosh-posh,” Granny said, slapping the top of her boney hand. “All of a sudden you care? If you cared, Nattie Chandler, you would’ve taken that ring off a long time ago. The only person that should give a damn about that is you…and if you look him in the eye and all you see is the man you love, then why should you care what other people say? Why should you care what your mama thinks? This is your life, girl…this is your life with him…you’re in this life together…”
#
The green Explorer had no trouble finding the humble brick home on Green Hill Street in the early evening, and in her jeans and white shirt she raced outside at sunset, just as he emerged from the driver’s seat, clad humbly in a blue polo shirt and jeans, hair free of product, eyes gleaming in the dazed sunlight. She felt she hadn’t seen him in ages, and she leaped into his arms like a silly child, took in his amazing smell, the strength of his arms around her, the feel of his lips on her cheek, kissing over and over and over…
Maya and Mama stayed put on the porch.
She took him by the hand and guided him toward them…her heart pounded, of course…
Mama did not smile. Brandon gave Maya a small hug.
Natalie prese
nted Brandon to her Mama shortly after.
“Ma,” Natalie Chandler said, clearing her throat. “This is Brandon Greene, my fiancé…”
Brandon Greene extended his hand with a smile. “It’s a pleasure, Ms. Chandler…”
Helen Chandler looked down at his hand, and walked back into the house.
#
He had gotten a small room at the Sheraton in Atlanta, just in case he wasn’t welcomed in the home, and she went with him that evening. They ordered room service, and she nestled herself between his legs as they watched a rerun on television.
He had his hand on her head, stroking softly, and he said, “She hates me…”
“Almost as much as your parents will hate me…”
“How the hell am I supposed to go to a ‘fish fry’ tomorrow if I’m not even welcomed at your home?”
“How the heck am I going to Saratoga Springs, New York?” Natalie asked, placing a hand on his leg. “Because I love you…”
“Yea, I guess that has something to do with it…”
“Exactly.” She kissed the side of his face.
“How am I going to get her to like me, if all she can see is the fact that I’m white?”
“It’s just where we come from, Brandon,” she told him. “It’ll take time…”
This time, she turned her body over and looked up at him. He gave her a quick kiss. “And time is what I got…”
He was such a good dancer it scared her. He took her by the hand, pulled her off of the bed, put in one of his old acoustic CDs, pulled her close to him. She had just began to cry on the bed as they talked…of their future, of them together, of them even making it at all…and he didn’t want to hear it. He only wanted to show her how they’d dance their first dance as husband and wife, reminding her of the nights that he’d whisk her to downtown Atlanta, where’d they’d dance in ambient light until their toes turned blue.
“I want a small wedding,” she whispered into his face. “Just a couple of friends…”
“I want that too,” he whispered back.
“I want my Mama to walk me down the aisle and give me away…”
