by Kia Corthron
3
Sundays at two everybody walkin the south side. Me an Marietta an Henry Lee walk the north.
Ah! early spring’s my favorite. March has such a nice crispness to it, like the last bit of sparkling dew before the dawn.
Ooolg, says Henry Lee in his wheelchair.
Had to run some errands yesterday, happened to drive by the school at recess. All those white children running around, screaming and laughing. Well, they staved it off another season. Integration. It won’t last forever.
Ooolg.
Five years now. Do you realize that? Five years since integration went nationwide with all deliberate speed, said the Supreme Court, well. The South certainly has its way of interpreting that.
A little girl on the south side starin at Henry Lee till her ma smack her, drag her by fast. We hit a bump in the sidewalk.
Sorry, Henry Lee.
September come, I bet the federals crack down. The Negro children brought in, English together with the white kids, phys ed together with the white kids.
A good thing?
Yes. Yes, Randall, I believe it is a good thing. Remember Sally’s son Roger? What a bright boy! Why couldn’t he sit next to Henry Lee and you in class, take advantage of all the white school had to offer? Once I asked Sally what she thought about things. Separate but equal. Her answer surprised me. She said she’d be just fine with it if separate was equal, but it never is. I never forgot that!
Ooolg.
We reach the corner an turn aroun. Our walks with Henry Lee never cross the street. From the east corner to the west corner, from the west corner to the east.
So what do you think? Desegregation.
I shrug. I don’t see this town changin.
But it will. Nineteen sixty now, Randall, late in the day! Eventually we’ll be asked to adhere to the law.
Then I’ll adhere to the law. Sorry, Henry Lee.
Randall, all these years on this walk, you hit that bump every time! But she smilin, glad wunst a week have someone else push his wheelchair, somebody else to talk to.
Hey Frankenstein! Some teenage boys on the south side, laughin.
All the choices in the world, what makes a fifteen-year-old boy drop out and join the army? One little growth spurt enough for him to claim eighteen and for those bastards at the draft board to pretend they believe it. A fifteen-year-old does not imagine that he’ll come home with no legs, half a face, half a brain, the induction officers did not mention that when he signed the dotted line. A boy enlisting, the farthest his foresight may go is to think he’ll either die there or come home fine, never considering what’s worse is in between.
Woman walkin toward us with a baby carriage. She don’t see us, stooped over, coverin up the baby. Or cooin to the baby.
He should be married now. He should be married and me a grandmother. Oh I’m sorry, Randall!
It’s okay.
This last one didn’t take either?
It’s okay. Not everybody meant to be parents.
That’s true, but if you want to be. I mean there are so many abandoned children in the orphanages—
The young mother look up see us, cuttin off Marietta’s thought. Then the young mother cross the street.
You go ahead! Damn you all, stay on the other side! He’s a war hero! You were fine when he was there fighting for your freedom, a war hero!
Mother with the baby walkin head up like she ain’t even heard Marietta yellin, like we on that TV show, what’s it called? Some fourth dimension, us unheard unseen by other humans. Cep teenage boys.
Marietta stoop in fronta Henry Lee. Well, my son. Have you had your exercise for the day?
He say somethin to her, move his hans everywhere.
You sure? she ask. It hit me: Twilight Zone. Name a that show. Then I speak: He need somethin?
She gazin at him, stands, shakes her head. Alright, let’s go home. Which is two houses away. At the bottom a the porch steps I help her lift him up. How she do this when I ain’t aroun?
Thank you, Randall.
I nod.
Visiting every Sunday. You’re a good friend to Henry Lee. You always were.
He was a friend to me.
She nods.
He was just telling me, reiterating. She pause fore she go on. He would like you to have his train set. Could you come in and get his train set?
I look at her. I look at him.
I know, I don’t understand myself. He enjoys it, looking at it. I turn it on and. Yesterday he told me. He said you’ll take care of it, he said. He’s been giving things away! One by one, like he knows, he—
Wisht I had a clean hanky to offer her but I already blown my nose on mine.
Henry Lee gonna be aroun a long time, Marietta.
It’s hard. Hard for a mother. My only child.
Henry Lee gonna be aroun a long time.
In the basement me an him like the ole days, he tole his mother leave us alone. I don’t like deprivin him of his train, but packin it up I ain’t seen him so lively, not since he’s a kid, puttin every piece in its special box, he already wrote on the boxes. FREIGHT CARS. PASSENGER CARS. TRACK. AUTOMOBILES. PEOPLE. SIGNS/LIGHTS. HOUSES. BUILDINGS. His writin squiggly but readable. He fill a box an put it in my arms, then push the box into me liketa emphasize I’m to keep it. Henry Lee an I separate ways that lass year, him in high school ninth an me at the sawmill after the sawmill taken Pa. But summer before tenth Henry Lee signs with Uncle Sam, he ain’t gone but ten weeks fore that grenade come flyin, itty thing he coulda held in his han lay out resta his life. I see how ginger Henry Lee be with them boxcars now an it spur on a memory a him always sayin he gonna hop the trains an my knee take to shakin.
Carryin it all require three trips back an forth his house to mine. Lass roun there Sally swayin thoughtful on the porch swing, on the floor beside her a big burlap bag fulla the lass boxes a train waitin for me. I ain’t seen Sally in I don’t know when. She only part-time now, an I don’t usually go inside a Henry Lee’s an she don’t usually come out. Gray. Glasses. Few pounds thicker.
How you, Sally?
Fine. How you, Randall?
Fine.
I pick up the boxes, ready to go.
He turn out to be a nice man, didn’t he?
Henry Lee?
Uh-huh.
Yes he did.
The swing creak soft.
Make me wonder if it all a bad side a the brain. Like there’s a section reserved for meanness, prejudice. All us got it, but some of us use it more n others, Henry Lee made good use a his once. She sigh. He was a child. But maybe that parta his brain’s the part that explosive shot off. Lotta other people roun here could use that kinda surgery.
I don’t believe Sally really takes stock in the theory she’s puttin forth. Still, the picture she holdin of it in her mind give her some faraway sweet sad smile.
4
When the lass time you come to a meetin?
Buppie with a cigar, some new fool thing he started recently. Sittin near the grill, Lily’s yard. Few years back she started her own tradition: all the family at her house, Confederate Memorial Day.
I dunno, I tell him. Long days. Sip my beer.
We all got long days, we all tired. That on’t stop rest of us.
I pay my dues.
Yeah you pay your dues.
Dusk. Over by the big oak I glimpse Benja’s Aaron sittin alone, in the doghouse like regular. Lily at the picnic table with Deb Ellen, them two sisters havin an after-dinner smoke an the latter say somethin funny an they’s both laughin. Even though she matronly rounder in Lily’s smile I get a flash from when I was a kid, crush on my older cousin. Their mama come sit with em, Aunt Pearlie with that sad smile she pretty much been wearin since the war. Her oldest Jack they was all worried about, he come
back unscathed but here Artie Ray, younger son signed up seventeen, killed in the Pacific three days before Hiroshima.
You know what’s been goin on in this country. Integratin the schools everywhere else, how long till you think it come here?
I shake my head. Ain’t no one gonna let that happen but no sense me tryin to tell that to Buppie once his mine’s made up. Hard head.
Remember Little Rock? How they tried to stop it? An now the little niggers sittin right nex to white.
Confederate Memorial Day work out nice, April 26th fall on a Tuesday. By lucky coincidence this week I’m given Monday off an the whole mill closed today, two free in a row feel like some island vacation. Erma come out the house now, join the women at the picnic table.
You listenin, Randall?
When is the damn meetin?
Toldja. Sunday.
Yaw wanna slice a lemon meringue? My mother suddenly there, smilin. Hopeful.
That your homemade, ain’t it, Aunt Bobbie?
Sure is.
That soun like a winner, I think I will.
Randall?
No thanks.
Lemon meringue! Your favorite.
No thanks.
She stan there a few seconds. Know she lookin at me but I ain’t lookin at her.
Then she say, Yaw went to the cemetery today, Buppie?
Sure. You know Ursula’s daddy past away November.
Yes, I sure was sorry to hear boutcher father-in-law. Randall an Erma come over this mornin. We cut roses off our bush, then us an B.J. gone up, lain em on Ben’s grave. An your granmother. Didn’t we, Randall?
Yep.
Can’t believe how long since Uncle Ben gone.
You know, I got into an argument with Annabelle Maizy from church, sayin Decoration Day’s only about them that served an died, like I’m some kinda blasphemer honorin my poor mother.
Way I was brung up not jus the soldiers. Ya honor all your dead loved ones.
That’s what I told her! Oh Buppie the roses jus bloomed today! Didn’t they, Randall? Prayin, prayin they be ripe for Decoration Day. An I looked out this mornin an there they was! Miracle!
I know she lookin at me, waitin for me to look back, smile at her miracle. I don’t. She walks away.
Thurgood Marshall, he’s the bastard. Remember him?
I shake my head.
You oughta remember him, he’s that nigger lawyer from New York, one done it in the Supreme Court. Schools.
Somebody colored on the Supreme Court?
No! Well not yet, who knows the way things’re goin. He made the case to the Supreme Court.
Whatchu think the buyout mean.
The who?
I give him my eyes.
Oh. Buppie sigh. Guess I don’t like to think about it. When some other company take over a mill, it don’t usually mean cuz they wanna expand the employee roster.
I sip my beer, stare at my beer.
You been there a long time, Randall. Since you’s a kid, me almost as long. Gonna be lass hired, firs fired, I think our positions is secure.
I ponder on that. I nod. I ponder on that.
But tell ya what. Come a day you need a job, plenty a businessmen in the Klan. An hirin time come, guess who they look to firs?
You wanna beer, Aaron?
No thanks, Randall.
Why you wanna call him over? Buppie tryin to whisper an bite my head off same time.
Lookin awful lonely over there all by his lonesome.
Like you care. Only reason you reach out to him is change the subject.
He a member too, ain’t he.
Yeah, he could learn you a thing or two about commitment.
I take a swig.
Him an Benja on the outs again? Buppie still keepin his voice low.
When ain’t they?
Here ya go, Buppie! Oh I didn’t even ask if you wanted some ice cream with your slice.
You see this belly I’m growin, Aunt Bobbie? I think pie alone’ll do me fine. Don’t it look creamy.
You want some ice cream, Randall?
No thanks.
She jus standin there again. I look out in the direction a the park, swig a beer. Be able to see the fireworks from here, though they be tiny little pop stead of a big boom. Don’t know why for but the honorable town council decided fireworks Memorial Day an Fourth this year. I take another swig. She walk back to the house.
Cut her a break.
I beg your pardon?
What happened? You an your mother use to be lovin.
I gently advise you to mine your own goddamn business.
It only happened once.
I look up an now here’s Aaron.
It only happened once, he repeat, eyes on me.
Once what?
The skirt chasin. But your sister won’t forget it. I was a dickaroun in the army, them nurses, WACs, but since comin out, jus that one girl that Julia. Benja don’t belee me.
Lotta late nights.
Runnin from the screamin! Kids screamin, her screamin, I keep my pants up. Jus head for the bars, you seen me in the bars, ever notice I pick up some woman? No. Jus gettin out the house, away.
How bout that black eye she had?
Only happened once.
Aaron.
We all turn aroun hearin that voice. Benja an her stressed face. Come ere. Walkin off, soff talkin, I drain the lass bit a my Bud an my han already grabbin the bottle opener for the next.
I wanna suggest somethin. Buppie, not knowin when to let go of a subject. I’m gonna suggest somethin an might be you won’t like it. Maybe logical why you ain’t so worried bout the innegration a schools, seein as you an Erma don’t seem to be contributin to the population a the school system any.
Buppie on his back so fass I don’t even remember flippin him over outa that chair. Sorry! he say, palms up, surrender, Sorry!
Benja an Aaron run over. What happened! You okay? Aaron stoopin, in Buppie’s face.
Whadju do, Randall? Benja say, an I storm off, away from em all. Jus fore I open the screen door to Lily’s kitchen I turn aroun. Benja an Aaron’s back to me, talkin to Buppie, him still on the groun, like me knockin him eight inches to the grass paralyzed him or somethin, an then there go Aaron’s han gentle on her waist, an just a nudge she lean into him.
I slam the goddamn screen door. How long till that han aroun her waist ball into a fist smackin her jaw again? Yeah, black eye happen only once. An her broke tooth only once. Her broke ankle, arm. What make me go soff an offer the bastard a beer anyway? Him sittin all alone? Alone’s where he oughta be!
Randall honey, you alright?
I storm past her, carryin aroun her goddamn lemon meringue. Maybe you oughta ask your nephew, he’s the one flat on his back, I say without turnin to her an down the basement steps.
Big commotion sudden come to a stop, hearin my feet on them stairs. Must be twenty little boys, all some kinda who knows what kin to me, all wrasslin an laughin till my presence make em freeze.
Go ahead, I say, I ain’t here. Swig a beer. They approach with caution, but forty-five seconds later all of em back in full swing. Distant pop. It’s startin, they say, It’s startin, stampedin me to fly upstairs out to the yard. Whoever planned it space em out maybe three a minute, hopin to stretch the light show to a good half-hour.
