The Matter Is Life

by J. California Cooper

  Round bout that time, my first daughter, who had been on the street for that man, was married and settlin down. But I had another daughter who was school-smart and wanted to go to college. We needed some money! That man of mine still wasn’t always bringin his money home. I had done stopped chasin him for his love and finally for his money too. Got so I just couldn’t find him, so I stopped lookin!

  What made me so mad was, even when me and my kids work at things to make money for us to live and put some aside, he would find it and take it out the house too! We coulda helped my daughter get to college cause she had worked hard enough for a scholarship! But he didn’t give a damn. So, I pulled my .45 out on him and told him to “Get your ass out of my life cause your ass is all that’s in it. You take everything else somewhere else, so just take that empty-pocket ass of yours there too! We ain’t needed you in a longggg time!” You know, that man cried?! Didn’t want to go! Then I knew, Dora was right, I had married a fool. And he had to go!

  After he left, all my kids and me worked hard, day and night, til my daughter was able to get on way from here to that college for to be a dentist. We all had a paper route, me too. Up at 4:30 A.M. rollin papers, then gettin out deliverin em. We sold everything we could get our hands on, door to door. We mowed lawns, we cut trees, we cleaned houses and garages. EVERYTHING! She is a dentist now. Smile, smile, smile. And she done sent her younger brother to college for to be a veterary what works with animals! All us at home got beautiful teeth. When she first graduated, I didn’t have but eight or nine teeth left in my mouth! Now, I got a mouth full. When I look in the mirror and smile at myself, which I do all day, I love my teeth. Cause my daughter made em, chile!

  When I put my husband out, tho, Dora said, “Oh no! Not you! You told me havin a hot-flesh man was better’n nothin, even a poor one who didn’t have nothin but that thing crouched tween his legs!” I laughed, but when I got home, I cried.

  Anyway, Windora took to sendin money home to help her mama for her dreams. She sent clothes home too, cause she knew they didn’t have much to do nothin with. The one bad thing for her was she was losin her eyesight. Been sewin by bad light for so many years. She could see her child tho, she watched her close. She started havin big plans for Goldora too, but we’ll get to that.

  Now, I know it sound like she didn’t have much struggle. But she did. She was scared sometime in that big city. Well, you got to be. It’s natchel, if you got sense, cause everything in the world is there. People who got everything and people who starvin to death. Just happen it turned out mostly like she planned. Bein a virgin helped, it set her apart from bein a gold digger, the man thought. It made her pure in his sight. He really would have done more, but she was careful not to ask too much. When she didn’t want to have sex anymore, he thought it was just the goodness in Windora comin out. It was really just that she didn’t feel like it with him nor nobody else she knew. She was tired. And it hadn’t got good to her. So she just used sex when she needed to. That’s sad, ain’t it?

  You just know she finally got her own shop. Wasn’t no hi-falutin place in no spensive place. Just a nice, nice shop with some beautiful clothes in it. She had good customers and they came regular. She made it. She was raisin Goldora very well, gettin her ready to go to college. Had already been sendin her to private schools! Just wasn’t no love in her life. And she was goin blind. Her glasses was awful, awful thick now. She was lonely too, like she never thought she would be.

  The men she let take her out, all of em had somethin goin for them in a business way. Or they was professional mens, doctors, lawyers, stuff like that. But, no matter what Windora thought she wanted, she had been raised by down-to-earth humans, and most of the men she knew was what you call phony. Wantin things so other people could know they had em, not just cause they enjoyed em theyselves. Windora was more real than they were! So she didn’t fall in love with em. She just got tired and unhappy.

  I blive she’s comin home soon now, too. I know Splendora is, and she done told everybody she want to see em, be there! Chile, that Splendora is splendid.

  Me? You know, I use to think Dora pushed them kids to do too much. After my dentist daughter, I understood bout school pushin. But she wanted them to be too clean, too nice, too mannered, to dream. Dream. Try most anything to get SOMEWHERE. I thought she was too hard on em. But now, I don’t know. I just lost a son from a overdose of them drugs. I couldn’t help him and I couldn’t stop him. He gone. Just gone.

  And I got a daughter who drinks every minute she awake. Mens just take advantage of her, she don’t get no money and no respect. Sure ain’t gonna get no husband again. Why was they so unhappy they turn to death … away from me? Away from life? Was it cause they didn’t have no dreams?

  I don’t know, I just don’t know.

  At least Dora’s children is still livin. No matter if they sick and blind, they livin! I want you to know I was in pain, I am in pain, from my kids’ pain. And I’m tired. If it wasn’t for my dentist and my veterary, I’d just want to die, cause I wouldn’t be able to see nothin I had done with my life. Is that what Dora meant?

  But … anyway.

  ENDORA

  Now … Endora was lazy, but she wasn’t no fool. She knew if she kept livin at home, she was goin to have to work. She didn’t want that, and didn’t care too much bout goin “somewhere” either. She had her own plans.

  Most of her young life had mostly been turned into herself. She didn’t pay no mind to what other people thought of her or her clothes or her bare feet. She had liked the piano when the lessons was goin round. For some reason she liked to play at funerals instead of weddins. She didn’t like death, just that everybody was busy so didn’t have reason to hold her up in no conversations.

  She liked nice clothes, just didn’t take no bother to keep hers up, so she was always sneakin Windora’s or even Splendora’s things, dressin outside and goin on from there. One thing, she did like to cook! But not for no big ole group of people, just a few, like her family. She wanted to invent new dishes, play around with the recipe. Her things came out good, too! Sometimes.

  Anything she didn’t want to do, she got sick. She didn’t mind stayin in bed for days if she had to. Sometimes she had to, cause that’s the way Dora punish her if she say she was sick.

  She was a thin, willowy, rose-stem kind of girl. Serious, less she be talkin to Lovedora when she was still home. People tell her bout fellows what liked her, she just say, “Phuwee!” or somethin like that. She like sports, long as she runnin the game. She read some, not much, just enough to be too busy to work, less she found a real special sexy book. I know, cause she traded them with my daughter that drinks a lot.

  Endora stumbled upon what she was gonna do with her life, you might say. She loved them cherry cokes they had down there at the little black drugstore. She be goin down there all the time, just a’sittin, lookin at all goin on round her, for hours. Never woulda come home if she hadn’t been sent for. Everybody knew where she was! But didn’t nobody know why she was always there. But me. I found out. Just a way I got, I guess.

  There was a cute little ole womanish girl worked there, at that soda fountain, named Belle. Now, Belle was cute as a bug’s ear! She just be makin them ice cream things and all kinda cokes, justa twistin and turnin, lookin cute. Had a real plump, nice shape. That’s who Endora liked to talk to. Who she liked to stare at, be around. I don’t think she knew why, at first. But she always got mad at the boys and men who hung around there tryin to get close to Belle. Talk smart to em, didn’t like em, even if they try talkin to her own self!

  She was always tellin Belle, “What you let all them men talk to you for? They don’t want nothin worth nothin.”

  Belle laugh and say, “Oh, I don’t know that what they want ain’t worth nothin! I think it is!” Then Belle turn to somebody she waitin on, say, “You want whip cream or ice cream on it?”

  Endora snap her head up in the air, “Humph! I wouldn’t let em say nothin to me! You to
o good for them! You can do better than them!”

  Belle fizz up some coke syrup and stir, say, “With who? Who you know that I don’t know about?” Then she turn and ask somebody, “Want a straw in it?”

  But then Endora don’t say nothin else, cause she don’t know for sure who she talkin bout. All she know is she like to touch Belle’s hand, hold her arm if they happen to walk down the street together. Watch her hips when she be turnin in that little small space behind that counter. She knew she wanted to touch Belle’s breasts. She loved breasts. Everybody’s! She didn’t have much at that time herself. So that was her favorite thing to do … watch Belle. Belle had big busts, big hips, big legs and a big mouth. She love to see Belle turnin and sayin, “You want whip cream and a cherry on top?”

  As she grew older, she came to herself. When she be layin in bed at night pattin on herself like some people do, she think of Belle, then she be shamed and not know why she think of Belle. She just didn’t like no boys. She just told herself one day, “I want Belle.” Then she commence to really sittin on that stool at Belle’s counter every spare minute she could find and all day Saturday. Belle thought they was good friends. I blive Belle would have accepted Endora if she had really known what Endora was feelin, but her brain was lightweight. She didn’t know for a long time.

  Now just to splain a little so you will understand what happened, let me tell you bout the druggist man. He had been married bout fifteen years to a very uppity woman who didn’t want him in the first place. She spent all his money, drank a lot of his liquor, givin a lot to her friends too. She was a alcoholic person. Drunk or sleep most the time. Or just not there where he was. Gone! He never got no lovin or treatment like he thought he deserved. As time went by, he quit beggin his wife so much and went to starin at Endora. She was fresh and good-lookin and always in his store. He thought she might be in there to watch him, cause sometimes she did watch him a long time as he waited on his customers. Anything to keep from starin at Belle all the time, once she knew why she was starin. She didn’t want the fellows comin in there to get the right idea either.

  So, it came to be that a romance blew up where there really was none at all. Then Endora began to take pleasure in teasin him with her eyes. She smile and look away, like she shamed to get caught lookin at him. He liked that, cause hadn’t nobody paid him no mind in a long time.

  They flirted, I mean they flirted hard. He commence to givin her things, playin like he was goin to throw them away anyhow. She took em. That way, Dora got to have a lotta soaps, bubble baths, cheap perfumes, aspirins, mouthwash, cheap earrings, bracelets, makeup for Splendora, all them kinda things they got in a drugstore.

  Then, fore Windora left town, Endora began to steal her clothes, pretty clothes, to wear for a afternoon sittin down on a stool lookin at Belle, while the druggist was lookin at her and she awardin him a look and a smile every once in a while. When she leave to go home, she always back out the store lookin at him, but talkin to Belle. He got her last look every time with what he thought was a little tiny smile, but what was really a smirk. I blive that’s what they call em, smirk, when somebody’s laughin at you!

  I hope I ain’t got to tell you how many fools there is in this here world! That man started plannin on how to get rid of his wife. He finally offered her whatever she wanted if she would just go! She really wanted to go, but she wanted enough money to keep her in Jack Daniels for the rest of her life and it look like she might get it! But that man put a detective on his wife. Whatever he found, and I knew it was plenty, it worked. He was soon free.

  Bout that time, Belle was gettin awful close to one of them fellows was always hangin round and Endora got mad. She quit goin in the store so much. She keep usin Windora’s clothes tho. Windora was screamin bout how come her clothes always be dirty and she just be done cleaned em up! Nobody say nothin cause nobody really knew cause Endora dress away from home.

  Endora put them clothes on and walk and walk all over that town. She began to like them soft, flowin, drapin clothes. Nothin too tight. White or soft pretty prints. Look pretty on that rose-stem body of Endora’s. Stolen white pearls in her ears and round her neck. Some people born knowin what’s right for what they want to do. So now, besides wantin Belle, she want some money too!

  Mr. Nile, the drugstore man, missed her when she stop comin in so much. Thought his presents wasn’t big enough for her after all. When she was in the store, he took to slippin her some money. He musta been overchargin all these poor people to be able to pay off his wife and give Endora some money too, and still keep up his own bills, store and all! That man was spendin money!!

  Then, too, Endora was thinkin she was kinda sickly and she might need somebody with some medicine as a friend for a long time. She start goin back into that store for them cokes she didn’t have to pay for no more, wearin all her borrowed finery, every chance she got, and stare at Mr. Niles.

  Never take her eyes off him, now, for at least a hour or such. She had to get home quick sometime, case Windora get there first. Windora was takin more time off now, gettin ready to leave for Chicago. Still, everytime Endora leave, she back up real slow to the door, lookin at him all the time. No smile, just a deep, deep look.

  If you wonder why I know so much, Hell! I had to watch! I was raisin girl children. I was learnin somethin too!

  Anyway … Mr. Niles and Endora had not never talked with nothin but their eyes, but, chile, twenty minutes after that man got his final papers, Endora was sayin, “I sure do.” Well, she sure did! That chile knew what she was doin … but he didn’t.

  He was so excited! I’m glad he didn’t have to mix no medicine, cause somebody sure woulda died that night! He carried her over the doorsteps, holdin her close in his arms. She justa smilin up at him, holdin him round the neck. He went on through the livin room, straight to the bedroom. He laid her gently on the bed. She smiled up at him. He kissed her cheeks, her lips when he could find em, her ears. She smiled up at him. He turned off the lights and undressed. He couldn’t see her smile no more.

  He reached under her dress. She frowned, said, “What you think you doin?”

  He smiled down at her through the darkness he could see in now. “You my wife now.”

  She kept frownin. “So? What that mean? That you can haul my body round ever which way you want to?”

  He smiled, only a little now. “You my wife. We sposed to do this … darlin.”

  She shook her head slowly, “No,” said, “Ah annh! We did not ever court. We got to court now. You got to win me.… Like a prince or somethin in books. Bein your wife just makes it more convenient, that’s all. I want to be courted … and won … by my husband.” That child sure was lazy. Or smart!

  That man got up. He wasn’t smilin. It was dark, but he saw the light. Said, “What have I got here? You been makin up to me with all those smiles, all this time. Now you …”

  She innerupted him. “I’m smilin at you now, darlin.” She smiled in the dark. “But you have to show me how much you love me. Make me want to … give all my love to you … my virgin body. Court me. Then …” Her voice trailed away. Mr. Niles huffed and puffed, but he didn’t blow Endora out.

  Mr. Niles began to court his wife, Mrs. Niles. Many trips, diamonds and fur coats, much champagne (she read about that at the magazine rack in the drugstore) and many, many dresses, suits and coats she bought from her sister … later, she let him make love to her. She was a virgin, he was pleased. Endora was still lazy. She didn’t let him make a lot of love, but her timin was good. It was just enough lovin to keep him huffin and puffin after his own wife. He lost weight and frowned a lot, but he kept her.

  While all that was goin on, Endora talked quite a bit to Belle. See, now she could hire and fire people who worked there. When she sittin there sippin on somethin, Belle quit spendin too much time talkin to them fellows sittin round there. The light had done turned on in her brain. When, one day at closin time, Endora looked her in the eyes and smoothed her hands cross
Belle’s breast? Belle looked her straight back in the eyes, said, “You want whip cream or ice cream on it?” And they went on from there. It ain’t none of my business, so I can’t tell you nothin bout it. I do know Belle had the most prettiest uniforms I ever done seen, but I ain’t been nowhere! And she could almost tell Mr. Niles what to do, now!

  I don’t blive, in fact I know, Dora don’t know nothin bout all that. Why should she? She don’t need to know. And Endora must didn’t make herself like that, cause for a long time even she didn’t know bout herself. Dora was wantin her daughters to go off from this town and get SOMEWHERE in life, but she thought Endora had done pretty good for herself, so she was satisfied.

  Life just move in on you if you ain’t watchin it. Cause you all know a triangle such as that wasn’t gonna bring nothin but trouble some day.

  Anyway, Endora was now able to help her mama with the last dream at home. At least, she gave her money now and then, and kept her supplied with everything they carried in that drugstore! She bought lots of her clothes from her sister Windora, helpin her. She bought from other big stores too, out them fashion books. She traveled a lot, takin Belle with her sometimes, she might be gone a month. Takin Mr. Niles with her, she might be gone a weekend or a week. Said the store couldn’t do without him. I don’t think he ever missed his first wife, but I blive he knew he was missin somethin!

  As the years passed, Belle began to almost run that store, cause she was kinda runnin Endora. She did the hirin. She hired the wrong girl one day, cause Betina was a pretty little ole young girl and Endora began to sit on them counter stools again. Belle went too far, cause she cussed Endora out bout that new girl. Endora had Mr. Niles fire Belle. I guess that was the wrong thing to do, cause the new girl didn’t want no part of Endora. Didn’t care was she the boss or not. Said, “I was lookin for a job when I found this one. I can look again, it don’t bother me none!”