“Gonna be soon, doctor says.” Cora eyed her carefully. She seemed so happy at the moment Cora felt it was a shame she was going to have to talk to her the way she had planned.
“I know. Any day now.” The room was silent. Outside she could hear the chickens cackling, and a pig oinking probably fighting to get more food. Inside a baby was coming soon. Outside was a thousand miles away.
“When you have your baby, are you gonna stay here?” June stared at Cora and Cora stared back. “Well, are ya?”
“I don’t know yet, Cora. I mean my sister was supposed to take the baby. But now she’s in New York and I’m not sure.” The girl’s eyes dropped. “I never really knew what I was going to do.”
“Then,” Cora said standing over her with the empty basket, one hand on her hip in a strictly business pose, “if you don’t know what you’re gonna do, why you spending so much time with my son?”
June looked up a bit embarrassed. “I like Michael. We’re friends”
“Friends?” Cora dropped the basket to the floor. It made June jump in the bed. Cora looked as if she might hit her. “What you doing getting his hopes up? You going to stay around for him?”
“He told you that?” June half whispered.
“He told me nothing. I got eyes. I can see. I saw this afternoon. Him kissing you like you belong to him. He washes that same shirt every night and brings you flowers every day. He’s sweet on you.”
June blushed. “I do like him, Cora.”
“But he’s just a boy, June.”
“There are lots of men around here that had wives and babies when they was 16.” June tugged on the covers trying not to look at the older woman.
“You thinking my son is going to marry you?” Cora put both hands on her hips to steady herself. She felt a fine bead of hot sweat rolling slowly down her back.
“No, but,” June cleared her throat, “would it be so bad if something happened between us?”
“He’s a boy!” Cora shouted.
“He’s a man, Cora. Most of the men his age are with their women and out of their mother’s houses.” She paused than added: “I know you love him.”
“He’s my baby. Like that baby that’s growing inside of you. I want what’s best for him.” The bead of sweat cleared her waist and she touched her back to make it disappear: “Do you love him?”
In the silence that filled the room June remembered the day she had told Willie that the only man she could ever love was the Piano Man. Willie said there would be others. “But he’s the first,” she had told her brother.
“Cora, people don’t always marry for love.”
“You want my son to give your baby a name, ain’t that it?”
“No, that’s not it either. Michael is important to me.”
Cora paced about the room in anger. Her coal black eyes gleamed. Sweat had covered her back and now started to form on her upper lip. She stayed away from the girl’s bed, stayed away for fear it might provoke her own anger.
“Look, Miss Rich Atlanta Lady, my son don’t need your daddy’s money. He don’t need your type. You rich spoiled girls get yourselves knocked up by the first fool that touches you and you come down here and want someone to marry you and give you a name. You come in here with your long hair and your fancy clothes and your city ways and try to take any man you please. But you act like ain’t no other women around for my boy to look at. Well I have you know it’s plenty that want him. Would let him get inside of them and give them a baby in a minute. Why would he need you and some other man’s bastard child when he can make and have his own?”
Cora breathed hard. So did June. Every colored mother in Atlanta wanted her son to marry one of the Blacksmith’s daughters. Not here, not with a belly growing in front of her. “Cora, I know you know all about me. I did something wrong and now. . .”
Cora didn’t hear, her arms crossed her ample chest that heaved up and down with despair. “Cora, try to believe me, Michael is very special to me. He’s so kind and sweet and I know I could be good for him. I know he’s good for me.”
“Humph,” Cora said picking up her basket and starting to leave. “Your father wouldn’t approve. That’s why you ain’t married to the one that done this to you.”
“I didn’t want to make two mistakes. The man who did this to me didn’t love me. He wasn’t caring like Michael.”
Cora shook her head. “My boy is nice and sweet. Not two faced and two timey like them city Negroes that you been lying around with.”
“There was just one, Cora,” June said defensively.
“That’s all it takes, missy. Or didn’t you know that before you laid down and opened yourself up to some man?”
June said nothing. But the nothing that came from her spread like wild fire on Cora’s face.
“You think ‘cause your daddy got money he can buy you the world? Well, he couldn’t buy you from getting pregnant and he sho’ can’t buy my son. You tell my boy the truth. Tell him why you’re really here. Tell him you ain’t the widow of some saw mill worker and that you laid down with a dog and got up with fleas and you want him to pick them off of you. Tell my sweet, loving Michael that and let him decide whether he wants to be with the likes of you.”
“I was going to do that, Cora. I was going to let him know before you said. . .”
“If you don’t tell him soon, I will.” Cora spat the words out at her and opened the door to leave. She held her head up high as she looked at the tiny woman child sitting in the bed. “You’re not good enough for my son, June.”
“No parent ever thinks anyone else is good enough for their children. I learned that from an expert,” June shouted back.
Cora was sorry for what she had said but she refused to back down to a girl who had been given everything in the world.
June tenderly touched her belly and looked directly into the eyes of the woman staring at her. “You know, Cora, you’re right. I’m not good enough for your son. Not right now. But I could be. I will be.” Cora cut her a glance then turned and walked away stopping only when June said: “I could be the best thing for Michael and you know it.”
“I know you a cheap. . .”
“No you don’t.” A sly grin spread across her face. “Besides, if he’s already in love with me, how are you going to stop him from wanting to be with me?”
Cora turned back to speak but June added: “I’m not going to hurt Michael. Maybe I’m just going to love him in a way you can’t, maybe in a way you can’t remember. Now doesn’t he deserve that?”
June half smiled as Cora stormed away. She was going to find her son right now and she was going to put an end to this.
The girl sank back into her bed nervously laughing now that Cora was gone. “Michael would make a fine husband,” she said to her belly. Already from his touch she had learned what he would want, require and desire. He would be easy to please when he had his own land and a woman in bed with him every night. That’s all he wanted and needed. That’s all any man wanted and needed when you got right down to it.
Of course her father wouldn’t approve but she didn’t care. He might look at things differently with a daughter who had already done things she shouldn’t. He might see himself in the strong young man. Once she was married she would make him give them the land he had left in Alabama. The Blacksmith would have to do it for appearance sake. If she worked things out right they could stay in Alabama and she would never have to see her father again. It would be perfect. Michael with a farm and her teaching school.
She closed her eyes to daydream about such a future when the pains started. Things happened fast and changed the world around June immediately. She thought there was no way to describe the pain that pulled at her insides and made her wish she had never seen the Piano Man. She wished she had never wanted any man.
At first she thought she could handle suffering alone. They were small pulls and she smiled because she knew that meant it was almost time. They were not close together at all
. She could look out the window and see Cora running off to her house, off to tell Michael about the whore he was in love with. She could hear the women on the porch laughing and talking. She could hear a bird singing in the trees. Small pains, like small pleasures, that sometime annoy you.
She closed her eyes thinking she could sleep with these small pains and maybe the big ones she had been told about would come in the morning. She leaned back on her pillows, the sounds around her lulling her to sleep.
But the next pain took her breath away. It woke her and took her down a river filled with the torturous pecking of a woodpecker outside your window when you need to get your sleep and the wagging tongues of gossiping women when you need quiet and the lover that keeps waking you when you want to be alone. It grew and grew within her until she thought she couldn’t take any more, until she thought it would kill her. June knew she would die.
Then the pain subsided. She was scared and lonely. Nothing could describe the horror that she felt when ten minutes later it came again. She opened her mouth and screamed, hoping that would chase it away. But it remained within her, pulling and tearing at her until after what she thought was an eternity it floated away.
The women were in the doorway and on the stairs. They knew what had happened.
Words flew out of their mouths so quickly she heard them but didn’t know which tongue spoke first.
“Get Toby to call Atlanta for Bira.”
“Fetch Michael, he can get the doctor.”
“She don’t need the doctor. She needs the midwife.”
“Then tell him to get both. And to hurry”
“I’ll get the water.”
“I’ll stay with her.”
The pain came again and her eyes filled with tears. She grabbed at her belly trying to tear it apart, to rip it off of her body. Ella took hold of her. “Take hold of my hands for now.”
“God, help me,” June screamed.
“Do as I say, girl. Grab hold of my hands and hold onto to me.” Ella’s usually tiny voice was powerful above her screams and June grabbed hold of her for dear life. She thrashed and turned hoping there was some way to stop this but it did what it had done before and when it stopped June was in tears.
“I can’t bear this, I can’t Aunt Ella.”
The older woman moved about the bed quickly, removing the blankets and leaving on a single sheet. From a chest on the floor she pulled out some heavy rope, just like the kind Willie had used to pull June into the house. The women talked quickly as Ella tied it to the heavy iron headboard.
“You need to save your energy, save your strength. It ain’t gonna get better. It’s gonna get worse and if you keep rolling about like that and screaming like that with every little pain. . .”
“These pains aren’t little.”
“Hush, girl. I say they are little because you have a lot of work left that will hurt and make you think hell is alive inside of you before this baby is born. Now the pains are going to start getting closer and stronger and you’re gonna want to grab something. Hold onto this rope, one in each hand. Let your pain go into the rope and breathe with the pain. Not hard not like you running and out of breath but breathe slow and deliberate. Ride out the pain. You be in charge of it.”
Before Ella could say another word the pain overtook her. At first she tried to hold onto the ropes, but she couldn’t get used to the pain. She wanted to ball up into a knot and rip her insides out all at once. Near the end of that pain she let go of one rope and grabbed her belly, whimpering. When the pain subsided she noticed Mattie moving the mattress rather quickly.
“What are you doing?” June was breathing hard and tears covered her face.
“I puts a knife under you to cuts the pain.” Mattie took a rag and wiped June’s head. “Listen to Ella child and do as she says. You don’t want to die up in here like some . . .”
“Mattie!” Ella screamed.
“Well, how many white women we seen die cause they couldn’t take the pain of childbirth? I just don’t want that to happen to her. I just don’t want. . .”
“Oh, hush, Mattie and go wait for the doctor.”
As Mattie left the room mumbling to herself, June noticed Miss Fannie standing there. The woman’s face looked full of concern.
“You listen to Ella, June,” she ordered.
“It hurts so bad. I didn’t know it was going to hurt so bad.”
“Another one should be coming any second,” Ella told her.
June started to cry. “Isn’t there any way to make it stop?” Terror was sweeping through her.
“Honey,” Fannie said taking her hand, “this is the way every man and woman is born on this earth. Even Jesus was born of woman like this. Now I know some people believes women suffer this way for Eve eating that Apple in Paradise, but I seen cows and horses go through the same thing. Ain’t nothing to be done but to do what Ella says until the doctor gets here.”
The pain tore at her again. This time it was just as great but it didn’t hurt as before. Maybe they didn’t know what they were talking about and the pains were getting better. Or maybe it was the knife kind old Mattie had put under the mattress. She decided it was because she knew it was coming and it didn’t scare her as bad anymore.
She couldn’t believe that her mother had gone through labor six times.
Six times. By the time she had been laying there sweating and trying to live with the pain for three hours, she had already sworn never to touch a man again and never to have another baby as long as she lived.
The doctor arrived at quarter past midnight. He examined her between pains and told her she was doing fine. He also told her that first babies take longer and to be prepared to wrestle with the suffering for a long while.
They wiped her face and they held her hands. She wouldn’t stop kicking and the doctor advised them to go ahead and tie down her legs with the rope gently, not too tight, at the ankles. This way she couldn’t injure herself.
But after a while she just wanted to die. She lay outside of herself and witnessed the things going on around her. People sleeping on and off, clothes and rags being folded and put in a basket and voices talking about things that she had once had some interest in.
She could easily say this had been the longest night of her life.
Toby came back with news that her mother was taking the first morning train and wanted to know why she hadn’t been informed earlier that June was in labor. Once Michael came to the door when she was in the throws of a pain and screaming in anger that it hadn’t stopped. He ran away frightened beyond belief.
“Probably thinks this is the most horrible thing he’s ever seen,” June tried to make light of the situation.
“Some men just can’t handle seeing babies being born.” Fannie smiled at her. “You doing fine, Little Mama.”
“I may be doing fine, but I know I look terrible. Michael. . .”
“It’s all a part of a woman’s work.” Fannie said again. But June couldn’t wait until she could wash her hair and her body again. Couldn’t wait until the stench of feces and sweat was no longer second nature to her nostrils. Maybe she would be able to wear a fresh washed dress.
The baby in her turned and June let out a wail. “Ah,” the doctor said as the women smiled, “seems we’re getting close.”
The night grew longer. June hadn’t been up this late since she had come to Ella and Fannie. To take her mind off the whole ordeal she thought of the times she had danced in the night and had gotten home two hours to dawn. She remembered her red dress and her dancing shoes. She remembered seducing the piano man under the tree, the first time he entered her and the tiny pain she felt as she realized she had given herself to him. A tiny, happy pain compared to now. He could have done things, used things to prevent this moment. She knew this but she hadn’t cared. June had wanted him and this was all she had left of him.
With each pain she wanted to kill him.
The pushing was the hardest. The night was w
arm and she was covered with sweat as she tried to push the baby out of her. She was too tired to live. No wonder some women died, this was about to kill her. She wished she had lived a harder life, maybe the pains wouldn’t have been so great. But she pushed the child out of her without tears. Just do it and finish and you can sleep played over and over in her head. Both her body and spirit were exhausted and she wanted to sleep so badly.
“One more push,” the doctor said and the women helped sit her up as she took in air and forced her body to respond to the command. She felt the baby ease out of her. She collapsed back on the pillows as she heard a slap to fresh wet skin and the hollering of lungs being opened for the first time.
There was no time to rest. She had to pull herself up and look.
“You have a baby girl,” the doctor said and she watched as the women wiped the blood from the infant, wrapped her tightly in a blanket then brought her to June.
“You have a baby girl,” the words came again.
June cried as she touched the howling bundle. Her eyes weren’t open yet but she could tell the newborn was the spitting image of her brother. She had Willie’s thin nose and thick lips. The only difference was a dark colored skin. Dark like your father, June thought, the father no one knows about. A tired and weak June laughed and hugged her baby to her.
“At least nobody will ever call my baby a white lady. She’s as pretty as a chocolate drop.”
The women all admired the baby, for she was beautiful. The doctor cleaned up and went on his way. Before June knew it she and her new baby, tired from just being born, were fast asleep.
* * *
Crying woke her. But it really wasn’t crying, it was tiny whimpering of a small animal. June turned and saw the cradle next to her. The room was empty save her and the pretty brown baby girl stirring in her sleep.
June sat up. The soreness of what she had just been through hit her. Her usual reaction for the past months had been to grab her stomach. But she reached down and nothing was there. It was almost as flat as it had been the day she had met. . .
The Wilful Daughter Page 26
