Gone South

by Meg Moseley

  “You mean you don’t have to plug it in?”

  “No ma’am.”

  “Does it run on batteries?”

  “No. When you push it back and forth, the little brushes pick up almost everything.”

  “Awesome. It’s like those weird lawn mowers that don’t have motors.”

  He fought to keep a straight face. “It’s a similar concept. Sweep the floor mat by the front door and the carpet in front of the register, please. When you’ve finished, you can clean fingerprints from the front door and display cases and so on. But never use any of the cleaning supplies on the merchandise without checking with me first. One squirt of Windex can ruin a valuable antique. Got it?”

  “Got it.” She hurried away with the Bissell, her ponytail swinging.

  George shook his head. If she could learn some new habits, even if it started out as playacting, maybe the habits would do her good. Or maybe she’d only be whitewashing a sepulcher. If she ran into trouble with the law at some point, his new status as her employer put him in danger of being dragged along for the ride. He tried to dismiss the unsettling thought, but it lingered.

  It was a quiet day, as Tuesdays often were, but the slow pace was perfect for training her. Early in the afternoon, he decided she’d observed enough transactions. It was time for her to work the register alone.

  The customer currently browsing the store was a retired teacher who stopped in perhaps twice a year and never spent more than ten dollars. If Mel somehow offended Miss Meyers and she never came back, it wouldn’t be a great loss.

  “Here she comes,” he said softly as the woman approached the counter. “This one is all yours.”

  “No,” she whispered, in a panic.

  “What’s wrong? You did fine on your practice run.”

  “But I know her. She’ll hate me.”

  “Get over it, Mel. Do your job.”

  It was too late for her to argue. Miss Meyers was nearly upon them, her bad hip making her list to the left like a car with a flat.

  Mel looked terrified but attempted a smile. “Hello, Miss Meyers.”

  “Hello, dear,” the woman said. “Do I know you?”

  “You were my teacher,” Mel said faintly. “Second grade. I’m … I’m Melanie.”

  Miss Meyers lowered her glasses and smiled at her. “I’m sorry, dear, but I’ve taught so many children. I can’t possibly remember them all.” The woman placed three doilies on the counter. “These were in the three-for-four-dollars pile.” She reached into a cracked leather handbag and pulled out an equally decrepit change purse.

  Mel tucked the doilies into a bag. Then she ran her forefinger down the sales-tax chart. “That’ll be, um … um … four twenty-four, please.”

  From the tiny coin purse, Miss Meyers extracted a ten-dollar bill, folded in fourths. Mel unfolded it and placed it on the ledge above the drawer.

  She hesitated, moving her lips, apparently going over the process in her mind. Then she pulled out four ones, two dimes, and four pennies, and placed them in the woman’s hand. “That’s four twenty-four,” she said breathlessly.

  Too stunned to speak, George raised his eyes to Miss Meyers’ face. She appeared to be oblivious to this highly irregular method of making change.

  Mel reached into the cash drawer and pulled out a penny and three quarters. “Four twenty-four,” she repeated under her breath. “Twenty-five,” she said, her voice gaining strength as she dropped a penny into the woman’s outstretched palm. “Fifty, seventy-five, five,” she chanted, counting out the quarters. Then she placed a five-dollar bill on the woman’s palm. “And five makes ten.”

  “Thank you, dear.” Miss Meyers stuffed the money into her coin purse.

  “Thank you.” Mel beamed and handed her the bag. “Have a wonderful day.”

  “You too.” Miss Meyers beamed back and leaned closer to George. “Keep a sweet girl like her at the register and you’ll do twice as much business.”

  “Er, yes,” he said. “Thank you, ma’am. Come see us again sometime.”

  Miss Meyers hobbled away, humming.

  “Cool,” Mel whispered. “She doesn’t remember me.”

  Glowing with pride, she watched her former teacher walk out with the three doilies and not a penny less than she’d arrived with.

  George massaged his scalp, hard, with both hands. The good news was that Mel might not have stolen from her previous employers. Not intentionally, anyway.

  The bad news? He needed to confront her immediately. If she overreacted and stormed off, then he didn’t want her working there anyway.

  He cleared his throat. “Mel, we need to have another little talk.”

  Upstairs at her desk, Tish checked the time. Past five. Mel wasn’t back, so George hadn’t found cause to fire her yet.

  He was a good man. A kind man. Tish had already admitted to herself that she liked him, so she didn’t understand why he sometimes spooked her so. When he spoke to her so gently … or teasingly … she froze inside. The night before, on her porch steps, she’d half expected him to lean in for a kiss, but then she’d panicked. He would want to know why, and she wouldn’t know what to tell him.

  Part of it was that he’d apologized for the “little nuisance,” quoting the first words she’d said to the dog at her door. Knowing he’d heard the whole thing, she felt as if she’d opened a window to her heart just when he happened to be passing by.

  She didn’t want to think about it anymore. She’d had enough of the online job hunt too, so she decided to take another look at the McComb letters. If nothing else, they would remind her to be grateful. Compared to Letitia, she lived a cream-puff life. Being unemployed for a while was nothing. Absolutely nothing.

  Tish zoomed in on one of the most poignant letters.

  I’ll be home soon, dearest Mother. I have lost everything but Nathaniel, who was once the delight of his father and his sister who now repose in the vile earth of Alabama …

  When Tish had visited Noble with her dad, he’d driven to the town’s oldest cemetery, thinking Nathan might have been buried there. She’d stayed in the car, trying not to cry. She hadn’t been ready to visit a cemetery—any cemetery—but she hadn’t wanted her dad to know how hard it was. He hadn’t found Nathan’s grave, but when he’d climbed into the car again, he’d been more angry than disappointed. Pressed for an explanation, he’d said he’d found a separate area where slaves were buried, but their graves weren’t marked.

  “As if they weren’t God’s children too,” he’d said. “It’s evil.”

  She’d agreed with him, but she’d been more focused on her private grief. Even now, she couldn’t comprehend the wickedness of slavery or the way it had bled into succeeding generations, long after the Civil War.

  She lifted her gaze from the letter, recognizing that the “darkies” mentioned in that old book were former slaves, as were the people Nathan and Letitia must have hired as household help—for a pittance, probably. Carpetbaggers hadn’t been known for their generosity.

  The front door slammed. “Tish! Tish! Are you up there?”

  “I’m up here, Mel,” she hollered back. “I’ll be right d—”

  Mel’s feet pounded up the stairs. “I gotta tell you,” she yelled, halfway there already.

  Tish shook her head. There went her plan to keep the second floor as her private sanctuary.

  Mel burst into the room, her socks sliding on the smooth wooden floor. “George cleared my name! I mean, he practically called me stupid, but I already know I’m stupid. It was, like, really embarrassing, but he taught me the right way to make change. Sheesh, I’m an adult, I’m nearly twenty-one, and I can’t do something that simple?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “He watched me counting change for a customer, and I did it all wrong. See? It proves I didn’t steal from anybody’s cash drawer. It was all an accident. A dumb mistake—every time!”

  Tish’s natural skepticism kicked in, but she decided
to ignore it. If George believed this new theory, she would too. “That’s great, Mel.”

  “Isn’t it?” Smiling, she looked around the room. Her eyes lingered on the sewing table in the corner. “This reminds me of my mom’s sewing room. You really like to sew? That’s weird.”

  “What’s weird about it?”

  “It’s kind of a mom thing to do. Or a grandma thing. Anyway, my mom’s sewing room is half filled up with Scarlett O’Hara stuff. She spends a ton of money at George’s shop ’cause she’s a Windy.”

  “A what?”

  “A Windy. That’s what we call people who collect Gone with the Wind junk. Except we don’t call it junk. We call it memorabilia. Collectibles.”

  Tish smiled at Mel’s wholehearted adoption of George’s terminology. “I see. Well, do you think you’re a good fit for the job?”

  “Yeah. It’s fun except for the chores. I get to wait on customers and everything, but he’ll only need me part time so it won’t be much money.”

  “Maybe you can find another part-time job too.”

  “Maybe. Hey, I’m starving.” Mel headed toward the doorway. “I’m gonna grab something to eat. You want anything?”

  “No, thanks. Save some room for supper. I’m making stir-fry.”

  “Okay.”

  Mel was back in two minutes with a yogurt and a spoon in one hand and an apple in the other. She set the apple on the sewing table and started the yogurt. Leaning in, she studied the computer screen. “What’s that?”

  “A letter that the original Letitia McComb wrote to her mother after her husband died.”

  “The mother’s husband?”

  “No. Letitia’s husband. She lost her daughter too.”

  “That’s sad.”

  “Yeah. Maybe the whole town had good reason to hate them, but I feel sorry for them anyway. According to Letitia’s letters home, they went through some real tragedies.”

  “What happened?” Mel pulled the chair away from the sewing table and straddled it while she ate.

  “From clues in the letters, I think Letitia couldn’t get pregnant for a long time, and then one baby was stillborn and another one died when he was only six months old.”

  “That’s sad,” Mel said again, scooping a spoonful of yogurt from its container.

  “She finally had two healthy children, a boy and a girl, when she was in her early forties.”

  “Huh. My mom was almost that old when she had me.”

  “And Nathan was a lot older than his wife, so he was probably in his mid-seventies when the two children were teenagers.”

  Mel laughed. “Geez, and I thought my dad was old.”

  “Nathan made a bundle of money when he and Letitia first came to town, but apparently he lost most of it in the last few years of his life. He died when their son was sixteen.”

  “What did Nathan die of? Old age?”

  “The letters don’t say, but a few weeks after he died, their daughter died of malaria. She was only fifteen.”

  Mel stopped with a spoonful of yogurt halfway to her mouth. “That’s awful. That’s like … tenth grade. Before she’d had a chance to go to prom or anything.”

  “Yes, and Letitia was afraid she’d lose her son too. She wanted to move home to Ohio, but she hadn’t been aware of Nathan’s money problems. He was so far in debt that she wasn’t even sure she could afford to leave town.”

  “What did she do?”

  “From what I’ve read, my best guess is that someone pressured her to sell this house, dirt cheap. Then she and her son headed for Ohio with almost nothing.”

  “You mean somebody cheated her out of her house? Right after her husband and daughter died?”

  “It was probably legal, even if it wasn’t kind or honorable.”

  Mel shrugged. “What goes around, comes around. He wasn’t exactly honest himself, was he?”

  “Apparently not.”

  Mel set down the empty yogurt cup, crunched into her apple, and leaned toward the computer again. “So that’s Letitia’s writing? It’s pretty.”

  “It’s called Spencerian penmanship. A whole generation of schoolchildren grew up learning that style.” Tish scrolled down the page to show Mel the closing lines. “Can you make it out? The writing is so small in the actual letters that they’re easier to read on the screen, zoomed in.”

  Mel squinted at it and shook her head. “Read it to me.”

  “Monday next,” Tish read, “abandoning our loved ones to their graves in this hostile land, young Nathaniel and I shall leave for Ohio and your faithful affection. My dear Mother, you have never ceased to keep the door open for us. Lord willing, we will see your face soon, and you shall embrace your grandson for the first time amid the gentle landscapes of home.”

  “It sounds like she was really homesick. I know how that feels.” Mel made a face. “At least her mother wanted her back.”

  “Maybe yours does too.”

  “Ha!” Mel glared at the sewing machine, picked up her empty yogurt cup, and walked out.

  Tish stared out at the trees and wondered about Suzette Hamilton and Mel. Ann Lattimore and Letitia McComb. Barb Miller and Tish McComb. Mothers and daughters, of all people, should try to stay connected.

  Tish made awesome stir-fry. She left out the yucky vegetables like broccoli but added plenty of pineapple chunks and crunchy water chestnuts. It was so good, Mel didn’t mind getting stuck with the supper dishes, even without a dishwasher. Not that she should’ve minded anyway. She had a roof over her head and a comfy bed and hot showers and even somebody fun to talk to. Sure, sometimes Tish acted like an old-maid Sunday school teacher, but she was nice. Mel wanted to make her proud, and George too.

  She hung up the dishtowel and did a happy dance around the kitchen. She had a job, a real job, and her boss was cool even if he was old. He wasn’t like Rocky, who’d groped her, or old Mrs. Howard, who’d called her a moron and a liar. George wasn’t exactly a friend, but he wasn’t an enemy either.

  With everything drying on the rack, Mel walked into the living room and looked up the stairs. She wished she could sneak up there sometime and use the computer, but a computer was a personal kind of thing. Besides, she hadn’t been online in so long she couldn’t remember her user names or passwords for anything. She’d have to start fresh. That wasn’t a bad idea anyway.

  Tish came up behind her, carrying a laundry basket full of neatly folded towels that smelled like fabric softener trying to smell like flowers. “I went into your room and opened the window this morning,” she said. “Just to air things out. And I noticed your sleeping bag smells like smoke.”

  Mel’s chest froze, squeezing her lungs. She couldn’t breathe. “You didn’t wash it, did you?”

  Tish studied her for a long, scary moment. “No. I’m not your mom. You do your own laundry.”

  “Yeah. Sure. I’m sorry, that’s not what I—yes, I’ll wash it.”

  “You can start it right now. This was my last load.” Tish headed up the stairs. “After I put the towels away, I’m going to run out to the garage and say hello to George.”

  “Say ‘hey’ for me.” Mel hurried into her room, shutting the door behind her. Her heart raced as she grabbed her sleeping bag from the floor and unfolded it on the bed.

  Of course her treasures were right where she’d left them. She slid them under her socks and underwear in the top drawer of the dresser. They’d be safe there, temporarily, but she’d have to think of a better hiding place, especially because she’d be at work three or four days a week. Tish probably wouldn’t snoop, but there was no way to know for sure.

  She sniffed the sleeping bag. It did smell like smoke—and made her crave a cigarette, but she didn’t want to make Tish mad. Wadding it up into a big, slippery armful, she took it into the laundry room and set the washer for an extra-large load. She poured detergent in. While the water ran, she spread the sleeping bag across the floor and squirted stain remover on the mud stains.

  “Po
or old sleeping bag,” she said, her voice drowned out by the noise of the water flooding into the machine. They’d been through a lot together.

  Most of the mud came from that ditch in Florida. She’d been caught in the rain plenty of times too, with vehicles speeding past and splashing her with dirty water. The yellow fabric had been bright and pretty when her folks gave it to her for her sixteenth birthday, but that was almost five years ago. She would buy another one someday.

  She crammed the puffy, bulky bedding into the washer and tried to figure out how much money she’d earned so far. Shoot, a day’s wages wouldn’t buy one little corner of a good sleeping bag. Clothes were more important right now, though—and groceries. She’d promised to help with groceries.

  Maybe she could find a baby-sitting job. Nah. Nobody would trust her with their kids.

  She heard Tish’s feet coming down the stairs. A minute later, the back door slammed. It wasn’t an angry slam, just the kind that happened when a door didn’t want to latch and needed some encouragement.

  Mel wandered back to the kitchen, craving a dessert. A bowl of ice cream would work, with fun stuff sprinkled on top. Banana slices. Chopped peanuts. Chocolate syrup. It could be an upside-down banana split, with the bananas on top. She pulled out a bowl, found the ice-cream scoop, and created her masterpiece.

  She’d just sat down to eat when a horrible racket burst from the laundry room, as if the washer wanted to fly through the wall. Mel ran into the dinky room and yanked the lid up. The tub kept spinning, off center, but it slowed and finally stopped.

  She didn’t know what to do. If she’d broken the washer, she’d have to pay for it. She couldn’t afford to, though. Tish would kick her out.

  About to panic, she remembered her mom sometimes stopped a load to move things around. She reached in and shifted the heavy, sopping-wet sleeping bag so it filled the tub evenly. With a silent prayer, she banged the lid shut. Then she restarted the washer and held her breath while the spin cycle worked up to speed. This time, it sounded right.

  Back in the kitchen, she sat down at the table. The ice cream had started to melt around the edges, and it didn’t look yummy anymore.