No matter who you are or how decent your life, if you live in South Carolina and die in the summer, it’s going to thunder and lightning and rain at your service unless you are buried before noon. Most people would have to schedule death months in advance to get the a.m. appointments. That’s why you see so many tents popped up at say, 2 or 3 p.m., everyone huddled like long lost friends, never mind they’re trying to spare themselves an electrocution.
Aunt Weepie unleashed her Jones of New York umbrella, which I knew came from Stein Mart, the store closest to my near murder. Though all my relatives promised they would never in a zillion years go there again or BI-LO, I knew Aunt Weepie couldn’t resist the store’s 12-hour sales.
The rain soaked us as we made our way through soggy grass toward the big green tent. Every few steps, Aunt Weepie had to stop and pull her heel from the mud as if she were being partially swallowed by burial dirt. I had worn flats, have done so since the mowing down, and will continue doing so unless I think sex is in the offing, which has not been the case in 24 ½ months and counting.
We managed to slog our way to the tent, and it would have been my assumption and to my great relief had Aunt Weepie chosen, as she had at the funeral, a seat near the back.
Under the blue tent, six rows of fold-out, velvet-draped chairs sat unsteadily on the wet ground, and the wind blew the rain in at angles, soaking anyone who sat on the side. The chairs up front, as is typical, were reserved for family and the closest of friends, or perhaps a devoted Hospice nurse. There were three empty rows in the back and a few seats up front, where most decent people who aren’t relatives of the dead refrain from claiming.
I wondered if I had died that day in the BI-LO parking lot, would more than this dwindled crowd come to my service. I certainly hoped so. I wondered, too, if and when Bryce was going to send someone to kill me, or would he do it himself once released from prison. Please God, I prayed quickly, don’t let that letter be about him getting out of prison.
Rain sure will send mourners home, especially if the individual in the coffin was due his or her appointment with death. It seems kind of unfair how the older you are, the fewer are in attendance for the grand day, but I guess by this age, most of one’s friends have passed as well.
While I didn’t want to be seen with her, all heads and eyes were feasting on Aunt Weepie as she wriggled her way one row back from the coffin. I couldn’t believe it. She had planted her bold self right up there with kith and kin. She settled into her seat and shook the water from her umbrella onto the lady’s legs to her left, oblivious to all but herself. She pivoted her head about like an owl’s and flashed a movie star smile and full shot of her glorious Raquel Welch figure. Her dress was tighter than a girdle, and she wore it as well as any woman a fraction of her age.
The preacher was unfamiliar, a third for this Pearlie Mae Corn, and he had a mighty hard time yelling over the thunder and lightning, thus he gave up and mumbled, giving Aunt Weepie his full attention, forgetting blood kin altogether. He hurried so fast Aunt Weepie was unable to produce but one decent long-winded lamentation and a mere mouse squeak of sorrow.
To make up for it, when we all stood to say the Lord’s Prayer at the end, she staggered after the “Amen” and fell partway into the burial pit, hollering “Pearlie Mae!” for great effect. Four big men in black had to haul her out, and the old ladies in hats and clutching wadded tissues gathered around and offered her rides to the family’s home where the food was on its way out of ovens, bubbling in Pyrex containers and CorningWare, which held the heat for hours.
Aunt Weepie managed to nail six invites to the covered dish dinner where we stayed for an entire two hours, Weepie gushing and pretending she was happy as a clam to see “so many familiar faces after all these years.”
People appeared confused as she greeted them, her plate sagging with deviled eggs and fried chicken, meat loaf and green bean and squash casseroles, pecan pies and congealed salads.
“Good to see you, sugar,” she’d say and the old folks would offer a wobbly, watery-eyed smile, then their faces fell and eyes went blank, probably wondering if they’d been struck with Alzheimer’s. I swear two of them were baffled enough by her line of bull that after they’d eaten I saw them in the living room frantically working crossword puzzles, which my daddy does because he read it would prevent dementia.
As we were leaving, the hostess, owner of the home, approached my aunt, and I knew that was it. We were history, caught like thieves with chicken grease on our hands.
“Winifred?” she said, trying out Aunt Weepie’s God-given name. I guess someone finally told the woman who my aunt was. “It was nice of you to come. I had no idea you and Aunt Pearlie Mae were that close.”
“Couldn’t have been a better woman,” my aunt said and sniffed. “Salt of the earth. I got four of her little potty dolls.”
“How nice. Well, you know we’re burying her sister, Icy, tomorrow. It’s been so hard on her. They were twins as you know, and Icy just gave up. Here, let me give you directions to the service. I’m sure Pearlie Mae would have wanted you to be there.” The smile on Aunt Weepie’s face, like that of a cat getting ready to swallow its prey, was as cunning as any I’d ever seen. She opened her little daybook and wrote out all the particulars, giving me a clandestine wink. I sure as snow in Maine would not be joining her again. On the other hand, as far as entertainment value and good eating, she really was onto something. That squash casserole was to die for. I also spotted a really cute man in the dining room. Not that I was looking. I mean who goes to funerals to meet men? Though Weepie says funerals aren’t really about the dead.
“It’s about emotion, sex, food, hedonism, friendships and love. It’s everything in life all boiled down in one event with musical accompaniment. Can’t beat it, Prudy. Come on, be my partner. Your mother turned into a dud after the second round.”
We made plans to send Icy Corn off to the eternal yonder, but I wasn’t certain I’d actually have the nerve to go for Round Two. Weepie said if I brought a big enough purse, I could easily slip in enough food to feed the kids later that night.
“Eliminates one of life’s more miserable chores,” she said. “All it costs is a bit of emotional effort, but don’t worry. You’re a natural. All you gotta do is conjure up some of that shit Bryce did to you and the tears will pour. We’ll get all kinds of invites back to the kin’s homes and hearths. It’s called the Put your Pain to Good Use Plan, Ms. Prudy Dee Millings.”
Chapter Five
Wake up, Prudy. I know you plan to sleep all day: Teach a child to choose the right path and when he is older he will remain upon it. Proverbs 22:6
Mama’s Moral: Ha! I believe I tried to show y’all the right path but only the dear Lord knows why you decided to veer off and wander. Get back on it, sugar. It isn’t too late! The bed will bring you nothing but poverty and misery. Get up!
Before turning in for the night, after tucking in the children, having given them baths, funeral chicken, and forcing them to brush their teeth, I picked up the letter again, this time deciding to read it.
I carefully unfolded the plain white paper and felt myself get sick after reading the first couple of words. Oh, God. I rushed into the pink-tile bathroom and leaned over the toilet, hacking and dry heaving, but nothing came up but acids. Sweat beaded like tiny ants along the back of my neck and forehead.
The words on the page weren’t from the prison officials.
They were from Bryce.
The room swayed and this time, as I flung my head over the commode, I wretched all of the ill-begotten funeral food.
Dear Prudy.
You’re marked for life, like a brand. All mine. No one will ever touch you but me. Don’t think you can move somewhere and not be found. Don’t think I don’t have people watching you. It’s pretty amazing what a prison preacher can accomplish. We are the iron god
s, and there’s nothing the good old boys here wouldn’t do to help a man of the Lord out, if you get my drift? There’s lots of free time in prison and lots of the guys spend it working out, lifting weights. They must think their brawn’s going to get them somewhere. Not me, Prudy doll. I’m every minute of every day possible studying the law and searching the Internet and have found more loopholes to jump through than I could ever need. I plan to take a big leap, sweetheart. You be ready. When I get out—and believe me, I will get out—you’ll be the first I come visit. Have the coffee ready. I take it black these days. No sugar.
Yours in Christ, Bryce.”
I sat by the toilet for an hour, hot tears pouring from my eyes, but no sounds, no sobbing or wracking shoulders like Aunt Weepie produced. How did he find us? That’s what I needed to know. That’s what I had to find out in order to survive.
***
Jay woke up in the middle of the night, delivering a high-pitched howl, a sound that most human beings don’t have the capacity to make unless strangled with fear. I hurried from my bed, having lain awake for hours, and crossed the hallway, the webs of crusted tears instantly wiped away by a mother’s ability to bolt upright in any given set of circumstances when her children are involved.
Once in the hospital, after a C-section and Percodan, I awakened as if a caffeine IV bag had been dumped into my veins. Right then and there I hopped out of bed, stomach stapled and oozing and rushed to the nursery to find my newborn Jay crying and unattended, a blanket bunched and blocking his mouth and nose, all the nurses in the hallway gossiping, unaware my baby was about to smother. A mother’s instinct is as real and strong as any feeling I’ve ever had, and I’ve never once doubted it.
As I now reached for Jay and held him in my arms, he thrashed and squalled. He was soaked with fear, partly from the nightmare, partly the humidity a ceiling fan only manages to stir and spread. It took a few minutes to rouse him, but soon his large brown eyes searched mine. I’d never seen such terror. Not even when I was dying in the hospital and they had brought him in to meet the chaplain did Jay act like this.
“Daddy’s coming back,” he said. “He’s going to get us, Mama.”
Not again. Not the nightmares, which for the most part had stopped by the time we moved to Spartanburg last year.
“Sweetheart, your daddy’s not getting out. He’s a very sick man and did a very bad thing. He loves you but he’s got to get some help. You don’t need to worry, sweetheart.” Lies poured from my mouth the way new milk fills a mother’s breast without effort.
Holding Jay was like sitting on the hood of a cranked car. He was hot and vibrating with a fear that wouldn’t relent.
“He’s coming.”
“No, sweetie, he’s not.”
Jay reached under his mattress and handed me two envelopes, white business letters with no return address but that same Charlotte postmark that sent an electric shock shuddering through me, a hot sting along my spine and neck.
“How did you get these?” I asked, taking the letters, thinking of the one I’d received this morning.
“I got the mail before you did a few days ago. They brought it up to the side porch. The man handed it to me and I was scared to show them to you. I only opened one. It was real mean.”
“No, I mean how did he know where we were, sweetheart, our address? Did you write to him? Remember, I told you he couldn’t write for a while?”
Jay began crying. He buried his chubby boyish face into my chest and choked on his grief and fear. “I didn’t, Mama. I swear I didn’t write him.”
“It’s okay. Shhhh. It’s going to be all right, sweet child.” I ran my fingers through his thick hair, color of Atlantic Ocean sand. Just like his father’s.
“I miss him, Mama,” he said, sputtering. “I love you, but I miss him, too.”
“It’s all right to miss him, sweetie,” I said, knowing my little boy was so hungry for that lost love, even the letters were better than nothing.
I tucked the mail underneath my arm and rocked him back and forth while his body and breathing slowed and returned to normal. “You want me to make up one of my stories? How about the Pink Crow in the Crowconut Tree?”
He laughed through salty tears and a running nose. “I love you. I’m sorry, Mommy,” he said, coughing. “Can I have some water?” As soon as he had a few sips, he fell back asleep. As easy as that.
For the rest of the night, I was up pacing, heart pounding, trying to figure out how this could really be happening. More abuse, more mental torture, only this time from behind a steel fence capped with razor wire.
I walked with a forced calm into the kitchen and climbed onto the washing machine to reach a shelf where I hid the matches from the kids. I struck one and held it to the corner of the envelopes, the single flame stretching as if trying to ignite the words through its own will. I stared as the fire slowly consumed the typed threats. Afterward, I flushed the ashes down the toilet.
I washed off all my makeup, put on the threadbare pink nylon gown I’d lived in for a year and climbed back into bed, knowing this was the worst thing possible. I reached for the phone.
“Mama, you’ll have to get the kids in the morning. I have the flu or some kind of bug.”
“Prudy, it’s 4 in the morning. You aren’t telling me the truth and I’m not going to sit here, roused from my sweet dreams of Jesus and—”
“Mama. Please. Just this one time.” I hung up the phone and writhed in the sheets until the world darkened in my mind.
***
This is the last time, I told myself, I’d allow a day in bed in the pink gown, and the next morning, after Mama reluctantly picked up the kids, I took the same book of matches, ripped off the gown, and let it burn to a putrid smelling ash.
After the letters, I felt myself shut down, like a button going click and then by mid-afternoon of my day in bed, I turned it back onto auto-mommy pilot. Nothing complicated. Just one flipped switch. Baby steps. Just do the next right thing, the therapist had said. “You can only eat an elephant one bite at a time.”
I’d also called Aunt Weepie and canceled Icy Corn’s funeral and big spread of luscious foods.
***
In the months after the incident, before the first anniversary of the “event” and prior to living at Mama’s, the world had seemed to stop unless the kids and I were traveling and running from the memories. The phone would ring and it would be the PTA needing a volunteer to work the dunking booth, and I jumped right in with my plastic cane and plastered-on grin. The doorbell chimed and I received visitors, writing them all thank-you notes and returning each and every casserole dish. I worked and mothered and tried to be the absentee father until I finally collapsed and couldn’t get out of bed. This was about two weeks after we’d had our whirlwind tour of oceans, amusement parks and the string of trips and motel pools.
I taught Jake how to work a microwave and warm Miranda’s bottles, even though technically, pediatricians all said a cup was in order at this age. At two-and-a-half, at least she was potty-trained.
“Warm them on 15 seconds only,” I told Jay one morning as I stumbled out of bed to pour him some Apple Jacks mixed with Grape Nuts, a nutritional compromise we’d made. “Don’t let her out of your sight. Don’t let her put a thing in her mouth. Do you know how to call 911?”
I spent hours cooking meals and putting them in Rubbermaid containers and plastic baggies, scrawling phone numbers, everyone’s but Mama’s, lining up edibles, movies, activities all in arrangement for Jay with written instructions. He was a genius, bona-fide, and had been reading since he was 3. He could handle this for a day or two, I told myself. Just till I can sleep this off, just till I can stand up again. Twenty-four hours. Forty-eight, tops.
I gave him the phone list and the responsibilities of someone more than twice his age.
“All right, Jay, sweetheart. Mommy’s going to bed for a little while, but you get me if you need me.” I felt so guilty that I didn’t shut the door, left it wide open so my children could slide into my bed, the physical form of a mom giving them a hint of comfort when my hands couldn’t put food on the table or pour warm water over their bodies, work shampoo into their hair. I would sling an arm across them and mumble, pulling them close. I wanted to love them, but an oppressive mental fatigue pushed any maternal instincts clear to the bottom of the waiting list.
Every morning I crawled into bed after pouring their cereal and cutting on the TV, snuggling deep where the sheets were cool and meanness was just a memory. It was June, 13 months post incident, and luckily, school was out.
Two weeks later, down to skin and bones, hair like a haint’s, children having been passed to and fro like a football—from one church lady to the next—my mother got suspicious and appeared.
She wasn’t alone. She had Weepie and Iris, her two sisters, by her side, as the entire Aunt Brigade packed up the house of what I allowed to be removed or what the Jeters hadn’t filched—my clothes, kids’ things, and other essentials that would not elicit nightmares. Most of the furniture, what the Jeters hadn’t robbed me of, I left behind, and by nightfall on the day of their arrival, the aunts packed us in Mama’s car, pulling a U-haul of our life behind them.
I had lost almost 20 pounds and was a mess. I don’t remember getting out of bed but a few times during those weeks, zombied trips to the grocery store, buying milk and cereal, a new can opener so Jay could feed himself and Miranda, too.
Chimes from a Cracked Southern Belle Page 8
