Whistling Past the Graveyard

by kindle@netgalley. com

  “What about Eula?”

  “She’s already there. Said she’d have sandwiches ready when we got back.”

  I couldn’t really believe we was moving out of Mamie’s house. I’d been wishin’ for it for so long—not for exactly how it was happening for sure, but it was still a dream come true. It was gonna be me and Daddy and Eula from now on. I might miss my fort some. But I reckon I could ride my bike here and sneak in it without Mamie knowing.

  “What about my bike?”

  “In the truck.”

  “Mamie still mad?” I asked.

  “She’ll get over it.”

  Well, that just told me Daddy didn’t know Mamie very good at all.

  “Come on!” He sounded excited. He was smiling his real smile, too.

  I started to leave my fort, but stopped and looked back at the Howdy Doody lunch box. Living with Daddy, I could take it and he’d never snoop inside. I stared at it for a minute, then I crawled on out and left it right where it was.

  After we’d pulled away from Mamie’s house, I asked Daddy, “You sorry you didn’t get me adopted?”

  He looked real surprised. “Why would you even ask that?”

  I told him about my figuring out things while I’d been in my fort.

  He pulled over to the curb. “Look at me, Starla.”

  I didn’t much want to do it; what if he started talking ’bout that again? What if he started talking about Lulu? But I wasn’t a baby. I had to have grown-up conversationing whether I liked it or not. I gritted my teeth and looked him right in the eye.

  “Some of the best things in life come when you’re not planning on them. It’s important to see them for the gift they are.”

  That made me think of Eula and warmed up the cold spot in my stomach some.

  Daddy went on, “I nearly died when I thought we might not find you. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.” He swallowed kinda rough. “I’m sorry if I ever made you feel otherwise. I just . . . I thought you’d be better living with Mamie because you’re a girl and I wasn’t sure I knew how to raise you right.” He stopped and looked out the windshield for a second. “And maybe I wasn’t as grown-up as I should have been. But I am now. It’s you and me, kid, from here on.” He reached out and touched my black hair. “You’re my girl. I’d be lost without you.”

  I turned in my seat and looked out the windshield. My ears were hot, but not from being mad. “That’s what I thought.”

  (Thank you, baby Jesus.)

  That night me and Eula and Daddy sat on the living-room floor and ate bologna—and-cheese sandwiches on Wonder bread. They was the most delicious I’d ever had. I liked mine with mustard; Daddy had remembered and not just bought mayonnaise like Mamie always did.

  Since our apartment was upstairs, it was real hot. But Mrs. White gave Daddy a big fan and it was blowing real good, so I wasn’t sweatin’ at all. I wouldn’t have minded if I’d been sweatin’ like a hog, as long as me and Daddy and Eula was in one place. As we sat there and I looked at Daddy talking to Eula, something peculiar come over me. I got the same feeling as when I’d been eating dinner with Patti Lynn’s family, where everybody was having a nice time; a feeling of things being shiny and bright and just like they was supposed to be.

  I bet it wasn’t that way at Patti Lynn’s tonight. I wished I could call her, but we didn’t have a phone. Mrs. White had said we could use hers anytime, but truth be told, I didn’t want to leave this apartment. Even if it was just to go downstairs. Even if it was to call Patti Lynn.

  Daddy started his new job the next day . . . doing what he called being a grease monkey. I thought that was the funniest job I’d ever heard of until he explained it just meant he worked on cars down at the Esso station. Me and Eula spent the morning getting my room set up. We’d just finished when there was a thump-thump-thump on the floor.

  We looked at each other.

  Three thumps came again.

  “We’d best go check on Mrs. White,” Eula said, hurrying for the

  door that opened to a stairway built on the outside of the house.

  I followed along. Mrs. White was real old, older’n Mamie. Her hair was gray with just a few black hairs left in it. She wore old-lady, tie-up shoes and a bib apron over her dress all the time. Daddy said one of the reasons she made the upstairs into an apartment was because she had bad knees and the stairs were troublesome to her.

  Mrs. White was waiting for us at her back door. She had a broom in her hand and invited us into the kitchen. “Sorry to use this”—she lifted the broom—“but I just can’t do those stairs, and it was more dignified than standing out in the yard yelling up at your window.”

  “We just happy you all right, ma’am,” Eula said, smiling.

  I felt real proud of her. A few weeks ago, she wouldn’t’a said boo to a white woman unless she was forced.

  Mrs. White set the broom down. “Well, I know Porter doesn’t have much for setting up housekeeping. And I certainly have more than I need down here.” She pointed to two boxes on the kitchen table. “I thought y’all might be able to use these.”

  I got closer and looked inside the boxes. One had some pans, some silverware, and some towels. The other had the neatest dishes I’d ever seen; the plates and bowls was all different colors, orangey red, yellow, green, what Mamie would call “cream,” and dark blue. Mrs. White called them Fiesta dishes. Funny name.There was some glasses in there, too—but they was regular clear glasses like everybody had.

  All the sudden I wished Daddy had brought my cowboy bowl from Mamie’s.

  “I’m sure Mr. Porter be happy to have ’em,” Eula said, as she picked up the box with the dishes. “Thank you, ma’am.”

  “Please tell your daddy if there’s anything else he needs, just ask,” Mrs. White said.

  I picked up the other box. “Thank you, Mrs. White.”

  She went and held the back-door screen open for us. “And, Starla, you’re welcome down here anytime you want to watch television or use the telephone.”

  I’d been so excited about me and Daddy getting our place that I’d forgot we didn’t have a TV. “Thank you, ma’am.” I was some relieved not to have to miss my shows.

  “It’s just so nice to have other people in the house again. Since I stopped teaching piano, it’s been too quiet.”

  I remembered the sound of her students and their music that skittered from fast to slow and back again, the up and down notes that sometimes sounded wrong. I reckoned I wouldn’t miss hearing them, but the magic that come up when Mrs. White played was different. “Do you still play, Mrs. White?”

  She laughed a little. “Not as well as I used to, but I’ll keep at it as long as I can drag myself to the piano bench.”

  “Good,” I said, following Eula around the corner of the house to our stairway.

  After me and Eula got things put away, we went out to sit on the stairway. It was in the shade and the breeze was nice. I’d been thinking about Patti Lynn all morning. I got to worryin’ maybe she needed to talk to me, with baby James and Cathy and whatnot going on. I wasn’t sure she knew which house was Mrs. White’s.

  “I think I’ll ride over to Patti Lynn’s,” I said, getting on my feet. “I won’t leave you here by yourself long, I promise.”

  “You think that a good idea? Things bound to be difficult over there right now.”

  “But what if she needs me? She doesn’t know where to find me . . . and I bet Mamie wouldn’t tell her if she called to find out.”

  “I see.” Eula sat there for a minute. “Maybe I oughta come too. I wait outside, course.”

  “It’ll take too long to walk. And don’t worry, I ain’t breakin’ any rules, I ride to Patti Lynn’s all the time.” I went down and got my bike from where Daddy had parked it underneath the stairs.

  It felt good to ride again, my legs pumping and the wind in my hair. I took the long way to Patti Lynn’s.

  Turned out, I was gone even less time than I’d p
lanned. Eula was still sitting outside when I got back. I put my bike back under the stairs, went up, and sat beside her. Then I parked my elbows on my knees and sat my chin on my fists.

  “That bad, was it?” she asked, real soft.

  “How come nobody is like they’re supposed to be anymore?”

  “Your friend havin’ trouble?”

  “She’s okay, I guess. But her momma was grouchy and had the house all closed up and the curtains closed. She wouldn’t even let me inside. Patti Lynn had to talk to me in the backyard. Then Mrs. Todd called her back inside after just a minute—and she sounded almost as mean as Mamie.” I sighed. “They sent Cathy away. Not to the same place as baby James, though. She ain’t gettin’ adopted. She’s livin’ with some relation in Ohio.” I looked at Eula and told her the worst part. “They said she can’t never come home again. Patti Lynn cried when she told me—and she don’t even like Cathy. It was terrible sad.”

  We sat there for a minute, Eula rubbing my back.

  “Why’d they send her away?” I asked. “Everybody already knows what happened.”

  “They hurtin’. I’m sure they’s doin’ what they think best for Cathy.”

  I looked up at her. “Like when Charles give your baby away? You think he was doin’ what he thought best for you?”

  Eula looked at me for a long time. “Charles always mean to the core, so it hard to tell. But your friend’s family ain’t like that. So I’d say they got good intentions.”

  While I was sitting there thinking about the storm that was tossin’ me and Patti Lynn’s lives in different directions, I got a big knot in my throat. Somehow Eula musta known, ’cause she pulled me closer and leaned down to look in my face.

  “What’s goin’ on in there?” She tapped my heart, not my head. And I reckoned that was the true source of my misery, not what I was thinking but what I was feeling.

  “If I hadn’t run off that day, nobody’d even know about baby James. Patti Lynn’s family wouldn’t be ruined. Cathy could have stayed home. You wouldn’t’a had to kill Wallace—I know you said that ain’t true, but it is.”

  “Child, the good Lord got plans for all of us that we don’t know— and he always got his reasons. He want us to learn and rejoice in the good that come from his design.”

  “You said a person’s gotta be accountable for what she’s done. If it’s God’s plan, why should anybody ever get punished for what they do?”

  “God’s plan ain’t a free pass. Uh-uh. He give us moments to make choices, and we make them. We accountable for those choices. God’s job ain’t to make our lives easier, it’s to make us better souls by the lessons he give us. I tell you now, I wouldn’t change one choice I made since I met you. No matter what.”

  “You’re just sayin’ that to make me feel better. No good come from what I done.”

  “That ain’t true at all.” She wiped a tear off the end of my nose. “They’s plenty of good.”

  I shook my head.

  “Well, you think on it for a spell. It’ll come clear.” She got up and left me on the step.

  Piano music started to come out of Mrs. White’s windows. It didn’t just touch my ears, it seeped inside and wrapped itself around my heart. But things just wouldn’t come clear.

  I was still sitting there when Daddy come home from work.

  33

  F

  our more days went by without hearing from the sheriff. I started to believe maybe he’d forgot about Eula; started to believe she would just keep on sleeping in our living room on the cot Mrs. White had sent Daddy to fetch from her garage after his first day at work.

  Sunday morning we dropped Eula and her Sunday hat off at the colored church in town. She didn’t want him to drive her all the way out to the country church she used to attend. I hoped people at this church was as nice as the folks at Mt. Zion Baptist. If she liked the town church, maybe that’d be another good reason for her to stay.

  Instead of my usual Sunday dress, I wore the dress Miss Cyrena got me from the charity box. Wearin’ it made me feel less far away from Eula. As me and Daddy climbed the wide steps up to the big, heavy double doors at our chruch, I held his hand, even though it was babyish. The choir was already singing when we went in. I was glad we was late. I figured Daddy would sit in the last pew so we wasn’t “such a spectacle,” as Mamie called it when we was late, by walking halfway down the aisle to our regular pew.

  But he kept right on going toward Mamie and her pink hat. She looked some surprised when Daddy tapped her on the shoulder to slide over. Since I was in church and supposed to be figuring out the lessons God was teachin’ me, I reckoned it’d be bad to make a stink, so I just made sure I was sitting on the other side of Daddy.

  I heard Mamie whisper, “What on earth is Starla wearing?” “She looks fine—”

  The preacher got up and started talking, so that was the end of that. I decided I was gonna wear this dress every Sunday.

  I looked across the aisle and down toward the front. Patti Lynn’s family pew was empty. Disappointment got on me pretty heavy. I hadn’t seen her since the day I rode my bike to her house. Whenever I called from Mrs. White’s telephone, nobody answered. Whenever I knocked on the door, nobody come to open it. I thought sure they’d be at church; they never missed. Mrs. Todd said her boys was always in so much mischief, they couldn’t afford to miss a Sunday—but she’d been smiling when she’d said it.

  I wondered if Mrs. Todd had smiled all week, or if she was ruined forever.

  My mind kept flitterin’ around, thinking about Patti Lynn and not concentrating on figuring out what God was teachin’ me.

  Finally church was over. While the organ was still playing, I heard Mamie say to Daddy, “I’m surprised to see you here.”

  Daddy said, just like nothing had happened, “It’s Sunday.”

  I got up then. I wanted to get away as fast as I could, but folks was yakking in the aisle, blocking my way. I squeezed past Mrs. Frieberger, but I was still close enough to hear Mamie say, “Well”—she sounded like her regular snippy self; she didn’t usually when talking to anybody but me—“I don’t suppose you want to come home for dinner?”

  I wanted to turn around and holler, Home is Mrs.White’s house now. But I didn’t dare sass across the church crowd.

  I heard Daddy say, “Thanks, Mother, but Eula already put a chicken . . .” The crowd got inching too far away for me to hear.

  I stood outside the church, nervousness kickin’in my belly. At home, we was still sitting on the floor to eat, so I hoped that’d keep Daddy from inviting Mamie to eat at our house. I picked holly berries—they wouldn’t be red for a while yet—off the bushes, threw them on the ground, and rolled them under my shoe until the skin rubbed off and left little, wedge-shaped seeds behind. Mamie hated it when I did that.

  Daddy had been telling me things was gonna be different with Mamie now that she didn’t have the responsibility of making me a good person. But I wasn’t feeling in the mood to find out. My tongue was just now healin’ up.

  When Daddy come out, he was alone. (Thank you, baby Jesus.)

  At first I thought Daddy couldn’t find me. Then I saw he was looking at Sheriff Reese. He wasn’t wearing his uniform, but his brown Sunday suit.

  You don’t go pokin’a hornets’nest. Daddy had said it plenty of times when he saw me headed for trouble. But it looked like that’s just what he meant to do hisself.

  I tried to get to him before he got to the sheriff, but Mrs. Jacobi stopped me, telling me how happy she was that I’d got back home safe and reminding me that trouble can’t be outrun. Didn’t I know that now! By the time I got to Daddy, he was shaking hands with Sheriff Reese.

  Daddy asked him where things stood with Eula and the law.

  I almost kicked him in the shin.

  The sheriff rubbed his jaw, like he was thinking. “Didn’t I get back to you on that?”

  “No, sir. I hope that means things are going in Eula Littleton’s favor.
”

  Me, too. I forgot to breathe until I started to get dizzy.

  “Well, we been pretty busy. But I can’t see pressin’ charges.” He said it like Eula wasn’t really worth even thinking much about, one way or the other. I took a step backward to keep myself from kickin’ my own hornets’ nest. I had to keep thinking, Eula’s free! Then my heart got icy. Maybe not. What about baby James? I shook my head to get the clutter out of it. The sheriff was still talking. “Coroner said the man’s skull was cracked all right, so her story stands. I did some checkin’ around; seems that woman did the county a favor.That husband of hers couldn’t keep a job ’cause he kept pickin’ a fight with his betters. As far as I’m concerned, one less Negro to worry about. As for that baby . . . I won’t drag a good family through the courts just to make a point to some colored woman.”

  I took another step backward. Don’t say nothin’. Eula’s free. That’s all that matters.

  “That’s good news, sir.” Daddy shook the sheriff ’s hand again. We walked away together.

  Finally I couldn’t hold it no more. “He acted like Eula wasn’t worth nothin’. Why didn’t you say something!”

  Daddy stopped and looked down at me. “What would you have me do, Starla, argue with the man to get him to arrest her?”

  “Well, no . . . but . . .”

  “You and I are going to thank our lucky stars that in the state of Mississippi the life of a black man weighs less than that of a white one, that’s what we’ll do. Because that means Eula is safe. That’s what counts right now.”

  I got another thought and it made my stomach turn over. “What if she packs up her grip and leaves now?”

  Daddy put his hands on my shoulders. “You were just mad at me because I didn’t make the sheriff see she was a person who meant something. And you’re right, Eula deserves more respect. I’m glad you’re learning something it took me years of working with men from all over the country to begin to understand. If Eula decides to leave, it’s something we have to accept.” He kissed the top of my head, then started walking again.