Catfish

by Madelyn Bennett Edwards

  I sat down to write to Rodney, not sure whether he would receive it before Friday night. I didn’t want him to wait for me and feel rejected when I didn’t show up.

  October 17, 1968

  Dear Rod,

  I can’t meet you. I’m sorry. I don’t know how to get a cab, how to tell the driver where Sammy’s is located, what to pay him or how to walk into a colored bar alone. You probably think I’m a big baby. Maybe you’re right. I’m only 16.

  By the way, I’m sure they’ll notice I’m white! Maybe some other time, some other way.

  Sorry,

  Susie

  *

  Saturday morning the dorm rector, Renée, came to my dorm room to tell me I had a phone call. The pay phone in the lobby was the only place where we could make or receive calls, and it was usually occupied. I hadn’t used the phone in the two months I’d been in Connor Dorm. I almost ran to the lobby. So many thoughts went through my head—one of my brothers or sister was sick, Daddy had an accident or a heart attack, my grandmother fell. Oh, God! Please don’t make me go home.

  The receiver was dangling from the coiled silver wire. I picked it up and answered before I plopped onto the shallow bench and pulled the door shut. It was stuffy and hot inside the phone booth and smelled like sweat and ink, but it was private.

  “Go to the library tonight,” Rodney said. I tried to listen but I was frightened. “Just stand outside the Highland entrance at the bottom of the steps. Be there about eight, okay?” I didn’t answer him. I didn’t know what to say. I felt perspiration drip down my back to the top of my panties.

  “Are you there?” he asked. “Susie, did you hear me?” I hadn’t heard his voice since August. I’d forgotten how it felt in my ear and how it gave me goose bumps all the way down my body into my crouch. I shuttered.

  “Uh... I’m here. I need a second.”

  “Okay, beautiful. I’ll give you all the time you need, but tell me you’ll be there tonight.”

  “I don’t know. What do you want me to do outside the library?”

  “Wait for me. I’ll be in a yellow cab. We’ll pull up right in front of you. All you have to do is open the back door and slide in. Can you do that?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Okay. I’ll see you at eight, only ten hours.”

  “Rod?”

  “What, Baby?” He’d never called me, Baby, before. I loved the sound of it, the way those two syllables popped softly through the telephone and made me feel like Rodney was in the booth with me. He sounded excited, but gentle and kind.

  “Rod.” I didn’t know how to say it. “I’m afraid.”

  “Don’t be afraid, Sweetheart. I’ll take care of you. You’re safe with me. I have everything worked out.” Sweetheart?

  “I’m not afraid for me, Rod.” I let the words turn in my brain before I said them. “I’m afraid for you.”

  “I’ll be fine, so will you. I love you. See you tonight.”

  I heard the click before I could protest again. Then a dial tone. Maybe I was so accustomed to being afraid that I carried fear inside. I stepped out of the phone booth and walked to one of the overstuffed sofas against the wall, plopped down hard and put my head in my hands. I had to think.

  We weren’t in Jean Ville anymore. Did I need to worry about the Klan, that they would lynch Rodney or his dad, burn their house, hurt one of the other kids in the family? Did I need to worry my dad would find out and kill me, or Rodney? Was I so accustomed to worry, that I didn’t know how not to worry any more.

  I had to face it. I knew why I was afraid, terrified, in fact, and it was not about the Klan or my dad. I was afraid to be alone with him. I had learned to live without him, to move on with my life. I didn’t want to find out that I still loved him. If I did, I wasn’t sure I could pretend I didn’t. Not anymore.

  *

  Rodney told me later that he was afraid I wouldn’t show up, that his cab would pull up to the LSU library and I wouldn’t be there. But just as he began to consider what he would do if that happened, he saw me standing there, “Your light blue dress flapping softly in the breeze.” He said he noticed everything—white socks and white Keds, the dusty blue sweater draped over my shoulders.

  I stood there nervously fingering a small clutch purse in one hand while I adjusted my sunglasses with the other. The sun was sinking behind the classroom buildings in the distance so that light filtered through the trees in fingers of gold and yellow. I tapped my foot on the concrete and hugged myself.

  The cab pulled up to the curb. It took a moment for me to realize he was there. Then I snapped out of the trance I’d been in and grabbed the door handle, pulled it open only a foot or so and slid onto the back seat. As soon as I slammed the door, the cab took off down Highland Road.

  Rodney sat on the other side, near the window with his body turned fully towards me, his left leg bent across the middle of the seat and his arm across the back. His long arm almost reached me and I waited for his outstretched his fingers to touch my shoulder, but they didn’t

  I sat on the edge of the seat behind the cab driver, my knees almost touching the back. I turned my head to look at Rodney. He didn’t speak. He just stared at me. I was aware of every fiber of him, his amber-green eyes, the smell of Irish Spring and English Leather, his knee so close to my thigh it emitted energy that felt like a magnetic pull, his breathing, soft and rapid. It had been three years since we’d talked in the Quarters, a year since we’d kissed in the hospital—but it was as if time erased itself and we’d never been apart.

  There was no barrier between us, no car door, no Daddy, no KKK—nothing but air, and he filled it so that the space was not space but a capsule with only the two of us in it. I didn’t notice the cab move or see the traffic or watch the cityscape and I don’t think he did, either. He just looked at me and I felt as if something magical had happened to put Rodney and me in the back seat of that cab, away from everyone and everything that had stood between us for three years.

  We were miserable at that game of playing it cool, so we just sat and stared. I knew he wanted to pull me to him and I wanted that, too, to feel his body press against me. I remembered everything about being in his arms in the hospital—his touch, his scent, the feel of his breath on my face, his voice in my ear—safety and peace.

  I wondered whether he noticed that I was older, taller, had more curves. When I thought those thoughts, I blushed.

  He told me later that he was afraid to say anything or to touch me and scare me away. He said he’d waited and planned for that moment, but when it happened, he froze.

  “Hi, ”I said, finally. It was a whisper and I wasn’t sure he heard me.

  “Hi, yourself.”

  “You look good, Rod.” I wasn’t sure why we were both whispering, but it seemed right.

  “You are beautiful, stunning, gorgeous.”

  “Thank you.” I was embarrassed.

  “Are you okay?” he asked. A slight grin spread across his face and the corners of his eyes lifted, just a tad.

  “I’m fine. How about you?” I wanted to grab him, to hug him.

  “I’m great. How’s school?”

  “It’s hard and LSU is so big, but I’m figuring it out.”

  “I’m not worried about you figuring things out.” Rodney always thought more of me than I thought of myself—that I was smart, competent and strong. But he didn’t say any of those things, he just stared at me with a satisfied grin that drew me into him.

  “You are too kind.”

  “Never. No one could ever be too kind to you. Not ever.” I looked at him and felt wonder and hope.

  Without thinking my hand touched his knee, which was inches away, and I patted it, as if to acknowledge I heard him but didn’t have words to respond. Before I could pull it away, he covered my hand with his. Electricity shot through me. I turned my body towards him, slightly, but enough that I could see this face fully. I squeezed hi
s knee and he, in turn, squeezed the top of my hand. I felt senseless.

  That familiar feeling of pins and needles from my neck down my spine through my stomach and into my panties took me by surprise and I felt moisture gather between my legs. It embarrassed me that I could have such visceral reaction to his hand on mine. It was as if I’d lost control of my own reflexes and my body leaned towards him without my permission. He picked up my hand and placed it on his lips where he kissed each fingertip. Then he wrapped it around the back of his neck, his hand still covering mine for a second, as if to guide it and make sure it stayed where he put it. Then his other arm fell softly from the seat back to my shoulders and gently folded around me. The feel of the back of his neck had me reeling. My sweater fell off my shoulders and his hand gripped the top of my left arm, skin to skin. His palm burned my shoulder, in a good way.

  Suddenly we both realized we weren’t alone and we pulled our hands away from each other as if they were on fire. But our eyes continued the embrace. There was no hunger or fierceness in his stare, although I felt like he wanted me and I could see in his eyes that he still loved me. I wondered whether I was able to hide how I felt.

  “It feels better than I remembered,” he whispered.

  “What?”

  “Just being with you.” He whispered and I felt his breath touch my cheek.

  “Rod?”

  “Yes, Baby.”

  “Is there some place we can go to be alone to talk? I don’t want to go to a smoke filled bar and socialize with people I don’t know. I’ve waited a long time.” The words just spilled out on their own, as if someone inside of me had taken control of my voice.

  “You’ve waited? You’ve waited?” Rodney started to laugh. His joy was contagious and I giggled. “Yeah, Baby. We can go somewhere to be alone. Make sure that’s what you want because, if I get you alone, I can’t promise I’ll let you go.”

  “Oh, held captive, huh?” I laughed softly.

  “Wait right here.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I whispered. He sat up and leaned over the front seat to talk to the Cabbie.

  “Would you drop us at 116 State Street, please?”

  “Sure. Let me turn around.” Rodney sat back and put his left arm over my shoulder and pulled me closer to him. I felt him gasp, softly, then he chuckled. It was endearing, everything he did was endearing and wonderful and sexy and ... I knew I was in trouble, but I couldn’t help myself.

  I leaned into him, lay my ear on his shoulder and sighed. I could feel his heart beating hard and fast and I giggled. I put my hand on his chest and pressed it flat against the place where his heart tried to jump out of his body, as if I could hold it in. He wrapped his arm around me like he couldn’t get me close enough. I snuggled into him.

  We got out of the cab and walked up a sidewalk into the courtyard of a square apartment complex. It was two story with iron stairs on the outside and doors that faced the large grassy opening like motel rooms at the Howard Johnson where my parents would take us for long weekends in the summer—our family vacation. We didn’t climb the stairs. Instead we walked under the second story walkway to the far right corner of the complex. Rodney pulled a key out of his pocket and unlocked a brown door, number 21 on the center. He pushed the door open and guided me into the apartment with his hand in the small of my back. I heard the door shut and the light switch flip. It was a small but clean space with a sofa and matching chair, a small round table with four wooded chairs in front of a counter with cabinets hanging from the ceiling, an opening between the bottom of the cabinets and the counter about two feet high that gave a glimpse into a kitchen.

  Rodney turned on a lamp near the sofa and flipped off the overhead switch. He told me it was his friend’s place. I didn’t ask whether he had brought other girls here, I didn’t care. I just followed him inside. We stood a few feet apart, looking at each other.

  He later told me that he was petrified, afraid to touch me, afraid, well, he said he was ... afraid of me. Me? Sixteen-year-old Susie Burton. When he told me that, I almost laughed. He said he was afraid that if his hand touched my skin, he wouldn’t be able to stop there, that he’d want more. More? More what, I wondered. He said he’d thought about this moment so often, the moment when we’d finally be alone that now that that moment had arrived, he didn’t know what to do.

  I looked at his hands, big, brown, strong. He rubbed his thumb along the tips of his fingers, back and forth, as if counting them, from the pinky to the index. All the time I watched him and breathed that musky scent I’d never forgotten. His thick eyelashes were at half-mast, his hands folded in front of him as he was waiting; waiting for what? I wondered. When I looked up from his hands he shrugged his shoulders ever so slightly as if to say, “What now?”

  What now, indeed, I thought as he reached up and scratched his forehead near his hairline. It was a gesture I’d noticed him make often when he stood next to my car window at the Esso station, a thinking gesture.

  He reached out with both hands, across the gulf of air that separated us. I unfolded my hands in a way that told him it was okay to take them, but I was afraid. Afraid I’d want him to hold me forever.

  Somehow our hands met in that abyss that seemed to separate us by a mile; but when they touched, the space between us disappeared and we were one.

  All of our fears were realized. Touching was so powerful that we both knew we wouldn’t be able to stop with our hands, we had to touch each other elsewhere. As innocent as I was, I knew he felt it too, because, without thinking, when my thumb began to rub the side of his hand and I lifted my eyelashes to finally let him see the tears gathering, he pulled me to him, put his hand on the back of my head and let me wipe my eyes on his chest.

  *

  Daddy’s trips to Baton Rouge became less regular after Governor Earl Long was out of office but he’d recently been hired to lobby for the insurance industry—and he had a number of clients whose corporate offices were in and around the state capitol. He came to Baton Rouge several times a month.

  He called James and me to see if we could meet him for lunch one Thursday about mid-way through the fall semester. James was a junior in pre-law and I never saw him since the campus was massive and we had no classes that were even in the same buildings.

  I had a class at noon that Thursday so I had to bow out of the lunch date. Daddy and James went alone. After lunch Daddy came to my dorm to wait for me to get back from class. I was unaware of this, but one of my friends told me later what happened.

  The telephone in the booth in the lobby of Connor Hall rang and one of the girls ran to answer it. Daddy was on the sofa in the lobby and listened to the conversation as the girls called out.

  “It’s for Susie,” she screamed. “Go get Susie Burton.”

  “Susie’s still in class,” someone called. “She should be back in a few.”

  Daddy told me I couldn’t date, that I was still too young. He grabbed the phone and stepped into the booth.

  “Hello. Who’s this?” He yelled into the mouthpiece.

  “Uh, uh. I’m calling for Susie Burton,” a male voice said.

  “This is her father. What do you want with her?” Click. “You chicken-shit coward,” he yelled into the phone. Just then I walked through the front door and turned right towards the hallway to my room. He called out.

  “Susie! Susanna!”

  I turned and saw Daddy standing in the lobby one foot in the phone booth, the receiver in his hand. I was surprised, then afraid, but I tried to act if I was happy to see him.

  “Daddy,” I said and walked quickly towards him. “What a great surprise.” I held my books against my chest, as if for protection, stood on tiptoes and pecked him on the cheek.

  “I’m the one who’s surprised,” he said.

  “Why are you surprised?”

  “I just hung up the phone with your boyfriend.” He still held the receiver and pointed it at me.

&nb
sp; “I don’t have a boyfriend, Daddy.” He hit me across the face with the phone receiver. Blood spurt from my cheekbone and my books flew in the air and scattered throughout the room. I grabbed my face as a shriek shot out my mouth. Before I understood what happened, he backhanded my other cheek and I stumbled against a sofa and slid down to the floor, my back against the base of the couch. He kicked me and screamed.

  “Get up! Get off that floor.” I sat there and stared at him in disbelief and horror, clutching my bleeding cheek and folding into a ball to protect myself from his pointed boots that stabbed the side of my chest. There was blood everywhere. “I said, ‘GET UP!” He grabbed me under my arm and lifted me to me feet. But I was still bent forward, my face in my hands. He slapped me across my head and I lifted it in reaction, which exposed my face. He backhanded me across my other cheek and, this time blood spurted from my lip. I cupped my mouth with my hand and fought to get away from him, but his grip on my arm was strong and tight. I could hear screams and someone yelled, “Get Miss Druid. Get help.”

  He reared back and punched me in the face with his fist. I turned my head just in time and he connected with my already bleeding cheekbone rather than my nose. I went limp and he let me fall to the floor in a ball. Blood shot out onto the tile floor from places I didn’t know existed.

  He yelled. “Get up you impudent slut. I told you, ‘No boys.’”

  Mrs. Druid, our house mother, came running into the lobby dressed in a navy suit and black heels. She walked right up to Daddy from the side and caught him unaware. Mrs. Druid was about forty-years-old, plain-looking, with kind, intelligent eyes. We all loved her. She positioned herself between me and Daddy as his leg was in motion,. Before he realized she was there, his foot connected with her ankle. She stumbled and yelled.

  “Get out of here. Now.”

  “Butt out, bitch.” he said. “This is my daughter and we are having a father-daughter conversation. This is not about you.” She didn’t move.