A Redbird Christmas (9 page)

Winter

O
N THE MORNING
of February 21, everybody up and down the street declared, “Well, winter is here,” and noted with horror that last night the temperature had dipped all the way down into the 50s. That afternoon, Oswald looked across the river and for the first time saw blue smoke curling out of the chimneys of the houses on the other side. The air was suddenly fragrant with the smell of wood smoke from the burning of local pine, hickory, and cedar logs.

Oswald welcomed the cooler weather because in the following days he discovered it brought winter sunsets, and the river sunsets were different from anything else he had ever seen. They mesmerized him. He loved sitting there on the dock in the cool crisp air, the river so quiet you could hear a dog bark a mile away. Every afternoon he watched the sky turn from burnt orange to salmon, pink and lime green to purple. Navy blue and pink clouds were reflected in the water, and as the sun slowly disappeared he watched the river change from teal blue to an iridescent green and gold that reminded him of the color of the tinfoil that came wrapped around expensive candy and then from rich tan to a deep chocolate brown. As the evening became darker, the birds and ducks that flew by became black silhouettes against the sky. He sat each night watching the evening change colors and the currents of the water make circles, until the moon came up behind him and rose over the river.

With the last of the sun fading, he could see the reflection of the green lights on the docks across the way and the stars twinkling in the river like small diamonds. What a show. This was better than any movie he had ever seen, and it was different every night. It was so wonderful at times he felt he wanted to do something about it, to try and stop time, make it last longer, but he didn’t know what to do. How can anyone stop time? He knew with each passing day his own time was running out, and there was nothing anybody could do to stop it. If he could, he would have stopped it right then and there on the river, while he was still well enough to enjoy it.

A few weeks later, Oswald was still feeling well, and Jack was still making everyone laugh except Mildred, and everything was going along as usual until Saturday morning, when Patsy showed up at the store to see Jack. One side of her face was red, and it was obvious that someone had hit her. Roy asked her how it had happened, but she said nothing. Butch, who had been in the store first thing that morning, was in a rage over it. Afterward all six-feet-four-inches and 128 pounds of him stormed down the street to Frances’s house in a fit and threw open the door.

“That just aggravates the fire out of me!”

“What?” asked Frances.

“Somebody hit Patsy!”

“Who?”

“I don’t know!”

“Are you sure?”

“Sure, I’m sure. There’s a big old handprint on the side of her face.”

That afternoon an emergency meeting of the Mystic Order of the Royal Polka Dots secret society was called to discuss what could be done. After much talk back and forth, Betty Kitchen allowed that Roy might be right. She said, “There may be nothing we can do without getting those people back there all riled up. You all know what they are like.”

Mildred said, “Trailer trash.”

Frances said, “Oh, now, Mildred, that’s not a very Christian thing to say.”

“No,” said Mildred, “but it’s the truth.”

Butch admired her ability to hit the nail on the head. Frances got back to the point. “Now, I think we all agree that this is definitely a Polka Dot matter, and I think the least we can do is offer to buy her some decent clothes. Here it is, the dead of winter, and the little thing is still running around with no coat or shoes.”

“How much money do we have in our Sunshine fund?” asked Betty.

Frances went over to her gravy boat display, and lifted the top off the third one from the left, and pulled out $82. They took a vote to spend it all on Patsy, and the motion passed unanimously.

Betty said, “The next question is who and how are we going to ask the family if we can do it.”

Mildred said, “Why don’t we just take her to Mobile and do it ourselves? Why ask?”

Frances looked at her. “We can’t just take her, Mildred. They might have us all arrested for kidnapping. That’s all we need is to go to jail.”

“Yes, but if you go back there where they live they’re liable to turn the dogs on you,” warned Dottie. “Or shoot you.”

“Well, two can play that game,” said Butch, patting the sidearm he wore under his shirt. “They’re not the only ones around here with guns, you know.”

“Oh, Lord,” said Frances. “That’s all we need is gunplay.”

“Why don’t we go as a group?” asked Mildred.

Frances shook her head. “No, that might be too threatening. I think one of us should just casually pay a visit like a friendly neighbor. Who wants to go?”

Butch raised his hand.

“No, not you, Butch, it has to be a woman,” said Mildred.

Betty Kitchen said, “Well, I’ll go. I’m not afraid of any man. They fool with me and I’ll sling them into tomorrow and back.”

Dottie, who knew that Betty was not exactly capable of being subtle, said quickly, “I think you should go, Frances. You’re the nicest and least likely to get thrown out.”

The following Sunday, Frances parked her car at the store and walked down the white sandy path in her high heels, carrying a purse on one arm and a large welcome basket on the other, hoping she would live through the day. Throughout the years a variety of people had moved back up in the woods, and her husband had told her it was best to let them alone. Some were hiding from the law and were not very friendly to strangers. They usually stayed awhile, threw trash everywhere, and then moved on. A few years ago, the sheriff’s department had arrested some of them, so there was no telling what she was walking into today. A few moments later she suddenly heard a loud crack, which almost scared her to death. She thought she had been shot. She turned to see Butch, who had been darting back and forth in the woods trailing behind her and had stepped on a branch. “Oh, my God, Butch, what are you doing? You nearly gave me a heart attack!”

Still darting, he jumped behind a tree and said in a whisper, “Don’t worry about me, you just go on. I’m here just in case you need me.”

Oh, Lord, she thought. Butch had clearly seen too many movies. She continued on until she reached a clearing and saw a broken-down trailer sitting up on concrete blocks. An old rusted ice box lay on its side in the yard, along with an assortment of worn tires and motorcycle and car parts. As she got closer, some kind of pit-bull-mix dog came rushing toward her, barking furiously, baring his teeth, and straining at his chain. Frances stopped dead in her tracks. In a moment a five-foot-tall fat woman in a tank top and short shorts opened the door, yelled at the dog to shut up, and then saw Frances standing there.

“Hello,” said Frances, trying to sound casual, “I hope I’m not bothering you. I’m Mrs. Frances Cleverdon, and I was wondering if I might speak to you for a moment.”

The woman stared at her. “If you’re a bill collector, it won’t do you no good. My husband ain’t here.”

Frances, trying to reassure her, said, “Oh, no, I’m just a neighbor lady come to chat and bring you a little gift.”

The woman shifted her small pig eyes to the basket. “You wanna come in?”

“Yes, thank you.” Frances climbed the concrete steps while the dog leaped up and down and literally foamed at the mouth. The place was a mess. She took note of the empty beer cans on the counter and a box of stale doughnuts. The woman sat down and crossed her enormous white leg with the tattoo of a snake around her equally enormous ankle. After Frances had moved a few things and made a place to sit, she said, “I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.”

“Tammie Suggs.”

“Well, Mrs. Suggs, I really came here today to discuss your little girl.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed. “What about her, what did she do? Patsy!” she yelled. “Get out here!”

“No, that’s all right, she didn’t do anything—”

“If she stole something, I ain’t paying for it.”

Patsy appeared from the back of the trailer, looking frightened.

“No. It’s nothing like that, Mrs. Suggs. Hello, Patsy,” she said, and smiled.

Frances leaned forward. “I was hoping we could speak in private.”

The woman turned and said to Patsy, “Get out of here.”

Frances waited until she was gone. “Mrs. Suggs, it’s just that I . . . well, a group of us, actually—have grown very fond of Patsy and wondered if you had had a doctor look at her lately?”

“What for?”

“Well, her condition—her leg?”

“Oh, yeah, she drags that thing bad, don’t she. But she was already like that when her daddy left her here. She ain’t even my kid. She was just dumped on me. I don’t have no money for doctors for my own kids, much less her. Then after her daddy took off, I got stuck with her and the next thing I know my old man up and runs off, and me and them kids is about to starve to death.”

Tammie Suggs looked far from starving, but Frances refrained from comment and continued. “Do you know what causes her to walk like that? Was it an accident of some kind?”

Tammie Suggs shook her head. “Naw, he told me it happened when she was born. Her mother was real delicate-like and was having a hard time delivering, so the doctor jerked her out with forceps, and it left her all twisted like that.”

“Oh, no!”

“Yeah. And the mother died anyway.”

“I see. Did he say if anything could be done about it, maybe special shoes of some kind?” Frances said, as a subtle hint.

Tammie shook her head and scratched her large arm. “Naw, her daddy said she’s always gonna be like that. That there weren’t no use to put shoes on her, she just ruins every pair, dragging that foot like she does.”

“And where is the father now?” asked Frances, trying her best to remain pleasant.

“I don’t know, but he better get his butt back here soon. I’m tired of putting up with her.” Frances could not help herself and winced slightly at the last statement. Tammie saw it and snapped at her. “Look, lady, I’m doing the best I can. You try raising three kids with no man.”

“Oh, I’m sure it’s very difficult, but maybe we could help you buy Patsy a few things, maybe some toys or clothes?”

Tammie thought it over for a moment. “Well, me and the boys needs things, too.”

After she could see that there was really no use to try and reason with her, Frances put the envelope with the money on the table and left. When she got outside she was so disgusted with the woman she didn’t know what to do. She walked by the dog, who was having another jumping-up-and-down fit, straining to break free from its chain and eat her alive. Frances, a lady to the core, uncharacteristically turned on him and said, “Oh, shut up, you!” Butch caught up with her halfway to the car and Frances, who had never been able to have children of her own, said, “What kind of a man would leave his child with that horrible woman? You just wonder what the Good Lord is thinking about when he gives people like that children.”

For the next week, everybody watched Patsy to see if she showed up in shoes or anything other than that old dress, but she never did.

Although Patsy had no new clothes, Frances was determined to make sure the little girl had at least one good meal a day. At twelve o’clock each day, she walked down to the store with a hot lunch and sat with her in the office while she ate it. At first, Patsy was shy and afraid to eat, but Frances, who had once been a schoolteacher, was finally able to convince her that it was all right, and pretty soon she had her talking a lot more. As she left one day, Frances told Roy, “You know, that is the sweetest little girl. It’s all I can do not to just pick her up and squeeze her to death. Can you imagine a father leaving a child like that?”

Roy shook his head. “No, I can’t.” Then he said sadly, “You know, Frances, there are a lot of people that should be shot.”

Roy would have shot Julian LaPonde a long time ago, if he had not been Marie’s father and if her mother had not begged him not to. He was not over Marie yet and still remembered how she looked that night, the last time he ever saw her.

He still wondered how she was doing. He could have found out from her mother, who liked him, or gone through the Catholic priest on the sly, but it would have been painful to know she had forgotten him and equally painful to know she had not. In her last letter to him, she had said that if he loved her he would forget her and find someone else and have a happy life. He loved her, all right, but have a happy life without her? That was something he had not been able to do.

Roy and Mildred had a lot in common. Mildred, although not as young as she used to be, still had a good figure, small hips, and large full breasts and years ago could have had any boy in Chattanooga but instead she had thrown her life away over Billy Jenkins. Why she had picked him over all the other boys that were lining up at her door was beyond Frances. He was certainly not up to her. A no-good lazy bum from the wrong side of the tracks, as their father had put it, but nothing would do at the time than for Mildred to settle on the one boy nobody in the family liked. Frances suspected that if they had liked him, Mildred would not have wanted to marry him. It was as if Mildred went out of her way to find the one unsuitable boy in town and go after him. It had been a small scandal and had cost their father a small fortune. The bridesmaids’ dresses had been bought and fitted, the country club rented, food ordered, and invitations sent, and one week before the wedding the groom skipped town on a motorcycle, leaving a note saying
Sorry, I guess I wasn’t ready. Love, Billy.
Mildred had been inconsolable and heartbroken for years. But Frances wondered if it was not so much over love as it was that Mildred always wanted what she couldn’t have. Mildred had had a few men friends after that, but she never really loved any of them. None could ever compete with the one that got away.