The Funeral Dress

by Susan Gregg Gilmore

  She grew beefsteaks for Curtis and Arkansas travelers and Cherokee purples for herself. She preferred the mild taste and tender flesh of the heirlooms. Leona spied another large cluster of green fruit with a hint of pink to their skins, and she daydreamed of the full jars she would put up for winter. Leona would start picking before long, and she would offer Curtis the first one, sliced and salted and served up on a paper plate. She would eat hers whole, sinking her teeth into its soft skin, its juice dripping down her chin.

  This was the only day of the week when neither the factory nor the church forced Leona to keep an eye on her watch, and she paused to count the ears of corn with sprouted silks and the yellow squash with faded blossoms on their tips. Leona pulled stray weeds and sprinkled fertilizer on the ground. She cleared a spot for a late-summer planting, maybe another crop of beans.

  Curtis had left a few minutes earlier to cut wood on the backside of Brown Chapel Mountain. Runt Bullard had come looking for help, seeing how his brother never showed. Curtis never went back to the poultry business after they lost the baby. He never ventured far from home anymore and acted nervous when he did. He worked plenty of odd jobs around town while he claimed to look for steady work and was always eager to lend a hand at the church. But Curtis preferred spending most of his days on Old Lick, chopping wood for sale or tinkering with his truck.

  “Things will get better soon,” Curtis promised every morning when he dropped Leona off at Tennewa. “Yes, they will. They’ll get better real soon.” Then he’d lean across the seat and kiss Leona on the cheek. These days Leona was grateful whenever Runt called to offer Curtis a day’s pay and she found herself alone on the mountain.

  The rough sound of tires rolling across loose gravel suddenly drew her attention beyond the woods shielding their property from the main road. A large green wagon, with a cloud of grayish dust trailing behind it, headed toward the trailer. Leona had seen this car at Tennewa, parked outside the factory’s office door. Most of the seamstresses carpooled to work, but this oversized wagon, with its wood-paneled sides, did not belong to any of them.

  Leona ran into her garden and stood behind the wiry cages, planting her feet firmly in the fertile soil. She recognized Mr. Clayton sitting tall behind the steering wheel, his long sleeves rolled to his elbows and dark sunglasses hiding his eyes. The manager from Tennewa looked out of place up on the mountain in his crisp white shirt. Leona slipped her hands inside her apron pockets.

  Her heart beat fast, and she feared Mr. Clayton had come to the mountain to reprimand her. Maybe he had noticed her staring every time he walked from the front office to the cutting room in the back of the factory building. She was ashamed of it, of the looking, that is, but Leona couldn’t stop these feelings or her wandering eyes. She thought everything about Mr. Clayton was handsome, his crooked nose and his square jaw, his large hands and thick chest. Leona had looked at Curtis that way once. But she had done nothing wrong, she told herself. She had only looked.

  “Leona,” Mr. Clayton said, shouting out the open window. His broad smile revealed the gap between his teeth. “I guess by that look on your face my visit is not what you expected on this beautiful Saturday morning.” The wagon rolled to a stop in front of the trailer.

  Always dressed in suits and wing-tipped shoes during the week, Mr. Clayton looked more relaxed today in his blue jeans and faded sneakers. Although the sunglasses shaded his eyes, his face appeared more at ease.

  Leona picked at another vine, snapping its brown tip between her fingers and tossing it onto the ground. “Good morning, sir,” she said, reaching for another stem spilling beyond the metal cage.

  “Good to see you, Leona. Don’t worry. This is not an official visit of any kind. I’ve come about my wife.” He pulled his dark glasses from his face.

  Leona’s heart beat faster, afraid Mrs. Clayton had heard of her wandering eyes.

  “Your wife?”

  “Yes. You see my wife wants to have a slipcover made for a bedroom chair, and I heard you do that kind of work on the side. If I’m going to be completely honest with you, I’ve heard you’re the best around.”

  Ever since Curtis lost his job in the mines, Leona took in sewing from women she barely knew—women who drove their fancy cars from Lookout and Signal Mountains and dumped their fine French fabrics in her tired hands so she could turn them into beautiful slipcovers for their ratty old club chairs and camelback sofas, pieces these women called antiques. They told Leona her sewing was beautiful, the best they’d ever seen. They praised her as if she were a child of their own, not a grown woman, although they pursed their lips and asked for discounts when they paid.

  Leona was well aware of her excellent reputation as a seamstress, a reputation that had spread south to Chattanooga and north to Manchester. Yet when she met these women at her trailer’s door, she avoided their eyes and instead focused on their fabrics and detailed instructions. Now with Mr. Clayton standing in front of her, Leona found she couldn’t look at him, either.

  “Anyway, I can’t really show favorites, you know. Wouldn’t be good for morale. I’m sure you can understand my predicament,” he said and grinned.

  Leona turned her eyes to the fresh dirt beneath her feet.

  “That’s why I came to your place. On a Saturday. Off the record. You know what I mean?” he asked, his pace slowing. “I hope that was all right?”

  “Yes, sir.” Leona tried to keep her gaze fixed on the ground.

  “Good.” Mr. Clayton grinned a little wider. “Would you mind taking a peek at this chair I’ve got here, and this bolt of fabric my wife’s bought? I’d love to know what you think. And tell me what you charge for this kind of work.”

  Leona stepped from behind the metal cages. She glanced back at the trailer door, half expecting to see Curtis standing there, watching his wife with the factory manager. She pulled off her gloves, their tips stained with mud, and stuffed them in her apron’s pocket.

  “Looks like you’re going to have a generous crop of tomatoes this year,” Mr. Clayton said.

  “Yes, sir,” Leona answered as she followed him to the back of the wagon. “Kind of late getting some of them in the ground.”

  A small wingback chair and a bolt of pink-and-white gingham fabric sat next to a child’s bicycle and a gray tackle box. Leona wondered about the little boy who must ride this bike with the blue seat and shiny blue frame. Maybe he was nine or ten years old and carried his daddy’s same strong face and deep brown eyes. She wondered if they fished together down in Sequatchie River, if Mr. Clayton had taught him how to bait a hook with a fresh worm and how to scale a blue gill. Leona felt like she was spying, discovering a part of Mr. Clayton’s private life not meant for a collar maker to know.

  “So what do you think?” he asked, pulling the fabric into the sunshine.

  “Yes, sir, a slipcover. When you need it by?”

  “We’re in no real hurry. My wife’s expecting our third child, and she wants to use this in the nursery.”

  “Congratulations,” Leona said. She cocked her head to the side and narrowed her eyes. “How she know it’s a girl?”

  “She doesn’t.” Mr. Clayton laughed. “She’s hoping and praying and wishing on every star in the sky for a girl this time. I told her it was silly to spend the money covering this chair if the baby turns out to be another boy. But she doesn’t care. She thinks if she plans on a girl, then she’ll have one.” Mr. Clayton sat on the wagon’s open gate and held the bolt between his legs. “To tell the truth, I’m in no mood to argue with that woman right now.”

  Leona looked away.

  “Oh, I’m so sorry, Leona, this is terribly insensitive of me. I wasn’t thinking. I forgot you lost—. Please forgive me.”

  Leona fell quiet, and a crow called out in the distance. “It was a long time ago.” She tried to speak but wasn’t sure Mr. Clayton could see the effort. And with the toe of her canvas loafer, Leona pushed a chunk of gray gravel into the soft dirt.

  “L
et me ask someone else to do this. I should never have come up here with all this.”

  Leona fingered the fabric. “That’s okay. I can do it for you,” she said, her tone soft but resolute.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Mr. Clayton reached for Leona’s hand. “I don’t imagine a woman ever quits grieving the loss of a baby.” He squeezed her hand in his.

  Leona did not pull away. She knew she shouldn’t linger like that. Nothing good would come of it, but she liked the warmth of his hand on hers. “I wouldn’t feel right about taking your money,” she finally said and withdrew from his grasp.

  “Well, I wouldn’t hear of not paying you. Not for this kind of work. I insist. How does forty dollars sound?”

  Leona laughed. The sound surprised her, and she clapped her hand across her mouth. “That’s too much.”

  “Not for quality work.”

  “Seems like an awful lot to me. Almost what I make in a week sewing collars.”

  “I tell you what, you feel like gambling a little?”

  “I don’t know about that.” Leona lifted her hand to her brow, shading her eyes from the brightening sun. “Don’t think it’s a sin or nothing, just never done it. Doubt Curtis would care for it much.”

  “Hear me out. I’ll give you fifty dollars right up front.” Mr. Clayton reached for his wallet in his back pocket. “I’ll hand it to you right now. But if it’s a boy, you’ll agree to make me another slipcover, a blue one, free of charge. If it’s a girl, you owe me nothing. How’s that sound? All legal, I promise. Don’t even think the good Lord would have a problem with this one.” He handed Leona a crisp fifty-dollar bill.

  Leona giggled, excited about the prospect of placing a wager, even if it was a legal one. She would keep this to herself though, certain that Curtis would not approve of such an arrangement. Truth be told, she was relieved he was not there, catching her smiling back at Mr. Clayton.

  “Remember, Leona, this is between you and me. Don’t want to be making the other Tennewa women jealous, or we might not ever meet production.” Mr. Clayton winked, revealing fine lines feathering from his eyes. “Can you keep a secret?”

  “Yes, sir. I can keep a secret.”

  EMMALEE

  OLD LICK

  Emmalee woke to find Wilma and Easter standing in front of the refrigerator, cleaning out jars of food that were sure to spoil. They were talking real soft, but as soon as they spied Emmalee walking down the hall, they rushed to her side and guided her to the sofa. One examined her binding. The other kissed her forehead, checking for fever.

  Wilma sat beside Emmalee and stroked her hair.

  “Is this the dress you been working on, hon? The one for Leona?” Wilma asked and pointed to a piece of damask folded across the back of the metal folding chair.

  “Yes’m,” Emmalee answered. She pulled her feet up on the sofa, and Wilma adjusted the yellow afghan around Emmalee’s legs.

  Easter stood on the other side of the living room holding the front of the crimson dress in her hands. It looked small against her wide hips and broad shoulders, and Emmalee worried about its fit. Leona was a more trim woman, she reassured herself. Besides, Mr. Fulton said he could make most anything work.

  “I thought the color would look real pretty with Leona’s hair,” Emmalee said.

  “It sure will. I never seen a piece of cloth quite like this. It’s beautiful. Where’d you get it? I know you didn’t find it here in Cullen.” Wilma motioned for Easter to bring the fabric pieces closer.

  Emmalee confessed she had found the damask among Leona’s sewing. Most of it had already been cut for another purpose. “A woman wearing fancy clothes come by the other day looking for slipcovers. I ain’t sure what those are, but I got a strong feeling Leona’s dress was part of it. I know it was wrong taking some of it, but it was so pretty.” Emmalee explained the young woman in her high-heeled shoes had talked ugly about Leona. “She made me so mad, I guess I didn’t care about cutting up her material. You think she’ll come hunting for it?”

  Easter and Wilma looked at each other and laughed. “I imagine so, but she’s sure going to have to dig deep to find it,” Easter said and laughed a little louder. The lump on her neck weighed heavy on her vocal cords and left her voice sounding raw and hoarse sometimes, particularly when she laughed real strong.

  “I always envied Leona’s hair,” Wilma said as she pushed her own from her face. “It was such a pretty white, not like my mousy gray. It started turning that way when she was no more than forty. This crimson is absolutely perfect for her. It’s a deep red, not too flashy or bright. Perfect for the occasion in my opinion. And it’ll look a whole lot better on her than on a sofa, that’s for sure.”

  “On a sofa?” Emmalee asked.

  “That’s what a slipcover is, hon, kind of like a dress for a sofa or chair. And nobody was better at making them than Leona.”

  “Cora makes them too,” Easter said.

  “You know, Emmalee, in all seriousness,” Wilma added, “you ought to get Cora to teach you how to make them sometime. You can make good money with a skill like that.”

  Emmalee stared at the damask. “Well, I got to have the dress done by tomorrow. Visitation starts Sunday afternoon. I think Mr. Fulton really wanted to get things going today, but he didn’t think he’d get the bodies ready in time.”

  “I bet the whole town turns out for Leona and Curtis. Last I talked to the preacher,” Easter said, “he was even considering holding the service at the school gymnasium. I told him Curtis wouldn’t like that. He was baptized at the church, and he’d want his funeral there too. I told him we’d need to make it work.” Easter paused and cleared her throat. “I got to be honest with you, hon, the preacher told me you were making the dress. I can’t lie to you. That’s why we come up here. Thought you might need some help with it, what with the baby in tow and all.”

  Emmalee twisted her lips. “You didn’t trust me either?”

  “That’s not what Easter meant, Emmalee.” Wilma patted Emmalee’s hand. “But I’m not going to lie to you either. The preacher was a little worried about the dress. You know, what with Leona being older and it being a funeral service.”

  “I bet he was.” Emmalee’s voice turned sharp and defensive. “What would a girl like me know about making anything fine?”

  “He means well, hon,” Easter said. She sat on the sofa next to Emmalee. As Easter’s body sunk deep into the cushioned seat, Emmalee tipped toward her. “I don’t think it was ’cause you come from Red Chert. Look at me. I come from Cloverdale Loop. It ain’t no better.”

  Emmalee liked Easter being next to her.

  “I think the preacher was really shaken up by the Lanes dying the way they did,” Easter said. “I think if you get down to it, he feels responsible, seeing how they were coming to church supper. He’s convinced if Curtis hadn’t wore himself out chopping wood all day, wood for the church, he would have handled the road better. He only wants to do right by them. That’s all. He’s young, too, hon, not much older than you. He’s never been through anything like this, and he really looked to Curtis as a father. You understand?”

  “I understand he come by the house. Tried to talk me out of making it.”

  “I heard that, too,” Easter admitted.

  “Nolan told him I had every right to make this dress.”

  “And you do,” Wilma said. “As long as Mr. Fulton agrees.”

  “But the preacher said something about the baby and sinning, and I don’t know what all.” Emmalee chewed on the tip of her nail.… “He got Nolan real worked up.”

  Easter wrapped her arm around Emmalee. “When you’re young, sometimes you see everything black and white, tough to find the gray in life. Preacher hadn’t found the gray yet. Give him time. He’ll see it ’fore long.” Emmalee dropped her head on Easter’s thick, soft shoulder.

  Emmalee did understand how much it hurt when you felt responsible for someone’s passing.
Nolan had reminded her too often that mothering was what wore out his Cynthia Faye. She grew frail, he said, from tending to Emmalee and had nothing left to fight the cancer.

  “You know, I ain’t going to lie to you while we’re talking about this,” Wilma said. “Some of the older women in the church were putting pressure on the preacher. They don’t know you like we do. All they know is your daddy and that you got this baby on your own. Don’t pay them no mind though. I just don’t want you to be surprised if you hear talk.”

  Emmalee nodded, the top of her head rubbing against Easter’s goiter. “Heard it all before.”

  “I know,” Easter whispered. “I know it, too. And I know it hurts.”

  Emmalee stretched her arm around Easter’s full tummy. Easter pulled her closer.

  “I got the front and back of the dress cut and pinned late yesterday.” Emmalee spoke real soft. “I spent most of the evening working on the sleeves and collar. Took more time than I expected, but they’re pretty much done. Need to set them in place is all.”

  “Need any help with that?” Wilma asked, stepping across the room to the sewing table. “Or placing the hem? What about a zipper?”

  “Mr. Fulton said I don’t need to worry with a zipper or nothing like that. I ain’t ever worked one.”

  Easter laughed again, and Emmalee grew tickled as her head bounced up and down against Easter’s stomach.

  Wilma held one of the finished sleeves in her hand. “What’s this here, hon?” she asked and pointed to a narrow blue band sewn to the end of the cuff, every stitch small and perfect. A cream-colored lace was set underneath the blue, its scalloped edge peeking behind the band of color.