Belle Teal (9 page)

“How are you going to be a fox?” I ask her.

Clarice shrugs. Our fourth-grade teacher wrote on Clarice's report card that Clarice needs to work on carrying out her ideas.

Darryl, he looks uncomfortable. “I'm not sure I'm going to come to the party.”

“But Darryl, you have to come. It's the best school party of the year,” I tell him. “Except for the Christmas program.”

Darryl is fiddling with his straw paper. “It's at night, isn't it?”

“Of course,” Clarice replies. “You can't have a Halloween party in the daylight.”

“No . . .”

We finish our lunches and go out to the playground. Instead of working on
City Lights,
Clarice and me spend all of recess telling Darryl how wonderful the Halloween party is. The three of us just huddle up and talk. By the time the bell rings and we are standing on line, I think we have pretty much convinced Darryl to go. “I could be a fireman,” he says. “I even have a red fireman's hat.”

So that is the good thing. The bad thing is that as Clarice and me are about to get on our bus that afternoon, Vernon calls us that name again.

The way he hisses the words makes them sound even dirtier than they already are.

A funny look travels across Clarice's face. Then she marches up the steps of the bus and says to Bernette as we walk by, “Belle Teal is coming home with me this afternoon, so you can skip driving up the hill.”

Bernette looks awful relieved, not to mention HRH, who has overheard Clarice. But I grab the back of Clarice's jacket and say, “What are you doing?”

When Clarice doesn't answer me right away, I can tell this is one of those things that she is not sure how she's going to carry it out.

“You'll see,” she says as she flumps down in a seat. Bernette drives straight into Coker Creek, and at the second stop, Clarice, me, Chas, Vernon, and two other kids get off. The door of the bus has barely closed when Clarice plants herself in front of Vernon and just stands there.

“What,” says Vernon.

“Say it again,” says Clarice. “Call me and Belle Teal what you've been calling us.”

I am shocked. I have never seen Clarice do something like this.

Vernon allows a small smile to twitch his mouth up. “Why? Are you going to fight me?” he asks. He raises his fists to Clarice's face.

Clarice looks uncertain. So I step in. “Only if you want to fight a girl,” I tell him.

Now Vernon looks uncertain. He drops his fists, but he says, “Okay. Niggerloversniggerloversniggerlovers.”

“My father —” Clarice starts to say, but her face just crumples.

I am feeling all cool and calm. “Vernon,” I say. And then I add, “Chas,” since Chas is hovering behind him. “Clarice and me are friends with Darryl and you better get used to it.”

“Your
friend
,” replies Vernon, “doesn't belong in
our
school.”

Chas steps around Vernon, feeling braver. “And we shouldn't have to associate with his kind,” he says.

“But it's okay for them to serve you meals?” I ask, knowing that Chas sometimes eats at the counter in Sherman's. The heat is rising to my face and I have to take in deep breaths and remember again about Gran and her Lord, and Mama and what she believes in.

“That's all they're good for,” says Chas. “That and cleaning up.”

My head begins to pound and I am about to forget everything I just tried to remember. I pull back my arm and I really think I am going to sock one of the boys, but then I drop my hand to my side and turn my back on all of them. I just march down the road toward Route 518, even though I can hear Clarice calling after me. When she calls louder, I start to run, and I keep running until I don't hear anything. Then I slow down.

Tears have come to my eyes and I blink, blink, blink all furious-like as I stomp along. I don't bother to wave in at Miss Wanda as I stomp by her beauty salon. I am breathing hard and my chest hurts. I swipe at my tears with my hand, which is none too clean. Chas and Vernon are pigs, I think. And Clarice, I could just wring her neck. How is it that Darryl doesn't go home from school in this state every single day? I wonder. Or maybe he does, and I just don't know about it.

I reach 518, blast across the highway, and hit our dirt road, which is muddy from a rainfall we had yesterday. I look up and see the trees against the sky. The leaves are starting to blow off. And that sky, it is a deep dark blue. The days are so much shorter now. By Halloween, we will have turned our clocks backward and it will be full-on dark by the time we get to school for the party.

I clomp along in my old boots, which Gran has said I will have to make do with this year if my toes can possibly take it. I hate trudging up our hill in the dark. I'm not even making good use of my thinking time. I have to concentrate so as not to trip over rocks or roots. Even so, I fall twice. The second time I go down on my knee and muddy up the flannel dress Gran just made.

By the time I fling open our front door I am a mess. I'm all muddy, my knee is bleeding, and I know I look like I've been crying.

“My stars,” murmurs Gran when she sees me. “What on earth?”

I can't help myself. I start to sob.

Gran, she folds me into her arms, hums a tuneless tune.

Finally I pull away from her, look into her eyes, and say, “I think I put a hole in my dress.”

“Well, never you mind. Tell me what happened, Lyman. Not fighting again, I hope.” Gran has turned away and is sorting through a kitchen cupboard for Band-Aids and the Mercurochrome.

I can't answer her. The color glides out of my face, and I begin to shake.

Gran returns, takes my hand, feels the trembling, and sits me on a kitchen chair to take care of my knee.

I lean into Gran's soft, creased face and whisper, “Vernon called me a nigger-lover.”

But Gran is singing softly about bluebirds and the White Cliffs of Dover and Jimmy sleeping in his own little room again, and I don't know as she has heard me. When she is satisfied with the state of my knee, she holds my hand for a moment, brushes the hair from my face, then turns to the pots on the stove.

 

Mama comes home late that night, long after I have turned out my light. Sometimes she goes to a study room at the secretarial school to do her homework so's to be sure she is ready for her next class. I call to her when I hear her pass by my bedroom door.

“Precious?” Mama replies. “You all right? Not sick, are you?” Mama sits on the edge of my bed and feels my forehead.

“I'm okay.” The entire time I was trudging up our hill this afternoon, crying and bleeding and mad as a hornet, all I wanted to do was talk to Mama about Little Boss spitting, and those dirty words spewing out of Vernon's lips. But now, with Mama at my side, stroking my hair, what I say is, “Tell me what is really wrong with Gran. I know it's something more than just getting old. It's like she's gotten lost.”

“Did something happen today?” Mama wants to know.

I tell her what Vernon said, and how Gran thought I was Lyman coming home after a fight. “Mama, Gran calls me Lyman half the time and Adele the rest of the time. Yesterday she was wearing a sweater
underneath
her dress. And she forgot Halloween is coming. I showed her the black cat and the pumpkin I made in art and she said something like it was a funny time of year for that.”

The light from the kitchen creeps through the open door to my room and falls on Mama's tired face. The corners of her mouth twitch, but not like Vernon's did in the afternoon. Mama purses her lips. She blinks her eyes. At last she says, “Precious, sometimes when people are old their minds go funny. I think maybe Gran is getting senile.”

“But she's still cooking and all,” I point out. “And she talked about the fruitcakes this morning. Even though she forgot Halloween.”

Mama nods. “We'll just have to be patient with her. She can't help it when she forgets things. Doesn't even know she's doing it.”

I lie back on my pillow. When Mama leaves the room I make my mind run away from thoughts of Gran and Vernon and Chas. I focus in on Halloween. My costume. Maybe this year I will be something beautiful. A genie, the sort who would wisp out of a bottle. I could wear some of Mama's makeup and wind my hair up on top of my head. I could look magical and mysterious and very, very wise.

A
fter our fight with Chas and Vernon I am mad at Clarice almost until recess the next day. On the bus in the morning, the boys make crying noises at me and pretend to wipe away tears, even though I know I did not actually cry in front of them. I don't sit near them, and I don't sit near Clarice either. I sit across the aisle from HRH and ignore all of them by reading another Nancy Drew mystery.

At lunch I sit with Clarice and Darryl as usual, but I do not speak to Clarice or trade anything with her. When she tries to talk to me, I answer like, “Darryl, please tell Clarice I do not care for her pear.”

After I have done this three or four times, Darryl, he says, “Belle Teal, tell me, how long is this going to go on? I am not going to carry your messages forever.”

I think for a moment. Finally I say, “It is going to stop now. But Clarice, please do not do things like that without telling me first. I have to be prepared.”

“What did Clarice do?” asks Darryl.

Clarice and me look at each other. Since I am still a little mad at her I say, “Do you want to tell Darryl?”

“No,”
she says, annoyed-like. But then she turns to Darryl and her eyes look kind. “We had a misunderstanding, is all.” She turns back to me. “Belle Teal, I am sorry for what I did.”

“Well, I am sorry too.”

Even so, we don't say anything for a while. Finally Darryl, he can't take the silence any longer. “I decided to come to the Halloween party,” he announces.

“You did?!” Clarice and I cry.

“Are Winnie and Terrence coming?” I ask.

“Are you still going to be a fireman?” asks Clarice.

“I don't know about Winnie and Terrence,” says Darryl. “And my costume —”

Darryl is interrupted when Little Boss, who has been sitting at a table directly behind him, tips his chair backward and bumps into Darryl, squeezing his chest against the edge of our table.

“What was that you just said?” asks Little Boss.

“Little Boss, you say you're sorry!” I exclaim.

Little Boss crashes his chair back into position, then stands by Darryl's side. He is joined by Chas and Vernon.

“You,” he says quiet-like to Darryl, but it's mean quiet, not kind quiet, “better not come to the party.”

“This is not a party for your people,” adds Vernon.

“You have already poisoned our school, you are not going to poison —” Little Boss is saying when suddenly someone else is at Darryl's side.

It's Miss Casey.

“Ray Stomper,” she says, “let me remind you of something. You too, Chas and Vernon. Darryl is a student at Coker Creek and he has as much right to attend a school party as you do. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, ma'am,” the boys mutter.

Miss Casey, she stands at the end of our table until the boys have settled back in their seats.

Meanwhile, I am getting an idea. But I wait until me and Clarice and Darryl are off by ourselves on the playground before I say anything about it. Then the idea about bursts out of my mouth.

“Guess what,” I say. And then I go on and tell them. “I just got an idea.” I am so excited that my voice is a little trembly. “Darryl, what if everyone knew what costumes you and me were going to wear to the party, and then on Halloween night, we
switched
them. Little Boss and them, they would spend the evening with me, I mean they would think it was me but it would really be you, and then at the end of the party we would throw off our costumes and Little Boss and Vernon and Chas would see that they had played games and all with
you.
They would be so surprised! And
then
they would know that you are not poison or anything — just another kid at the party.”

While I have been talking, Darryl's eyes have been growing bigger and bigger. But he doesn't say anything, so I ask him what does he think.

“Oh, Belle Teal. I — I can't do that.”

“Why not?”

“Well, Little Boss would just about kill me.”

“No, he wouldn't. You all will be at the party. He couldn't do anything to you in front of everyone. You haven't been to the party before, Darryl, but some parents come too. It isn't only for kids. There'll be plenty of grown-ups there.” I look at Clarice. “Don't you think it would be fun?” I ask her.

Clarice makes a face like she isn't sure. Finally she says, “Darryl, I don't think anything would happen to you. Plus, it will be our chance to make a point with the boys after everything they've been saying. But Belle Teal, how are you going to make this work? One thing, you won't be able to say a word all night long. People can tell your voices apart, you know.”