Celeste's Harlem Renaissance (23 page)

“I know,” I whispered back, settling into Momma’s rocking chair and sighing. “She’s mean as ever.”

“She’d knock her food to the floor just to watch the church ladies and me clean it up,” Mrs. Smithfield whispered.

Memories of my water-blistered fingers and scratched-up knees flashed through my head. I sat up straighter. “If she does that to me, I’ll clean it up the first time,” I said loudly. “But after that she’ll go hungry. Aunti Val made me scrub floors in New York City most every night, but I ain’t about to scrub my own every day just because of
her
hysterics.”

“Look out now!” Miss D whooped.

“Celeste!” Mrs. Smithfield slapped her hand over her mouth. “You’ve come back full of fire and sass, hair growing, filling out, speaking up. New York was good for you.”

“Cece being in charge’s gonna be hard for Society to swallow,” Miss D said softly again. “Be stern, honey, or she’ll run you over. You
could
remind her that this is better than her being put in the poor farm.”

I thought that over. Poppa wouldn’t ever go for that. “Aunti Val said she was coming down the last of August,” I told Mrs. Smithfield. “That’ll help me a lot. Didn’t she, Miss D?”

“That’s what she said,” Miss D replied.

“It’ll be so good to see her again,” Mrs. Smithfield said politely.

I pursed my lips at both of them. “You don’t think she’ll keep her promise, do you?”

Mrs. Smithfield stayed quiet, but Miss D said, “Don’t get me to lyin’.”

“Well, we’ll see.” I stood up. “Can I go over to the Stackhouse and call Poppa? I know how to use the telephone and can pay for the call. And I can read up on apoplexy in Mr. Hodges’s books.”

“Read up on common sense, too,” Miss D said, “and how to knock some into both your aunts’ heads.”

Mrs. Smithfield burst out laughing. “Miss D, if you lived down here, you’d have me howling all the time. Go ahead, Cece.”

“Ada — can I call you Miss Ada?” Miss D said, sipping on her tea. “I hear you bake a mean Lady Baltimore cake. I do one myself that I’m not too ,shamed of.”

While they talked, I slipped off to my room and transferred things from my schoolbag and valises to my secret places. Even though Aunt Society was partly paralyzed, I bet she could still get around in that wheelchair if she wanted to, and poke about. Just before I left, I stuck my head into her room. She sat in her chair, eyes closed. I knocked on the wall to get her attention. When I told her where I was going, she opened her eyes and shook her finger “no.” I reminded her that Mrs. Smithfield and Miss D were here, but she kept frowning and finger shaking. I left anyway.

Out in the hot sun, I danced, twirled, waved at folks in passing motorcars, and sang “I’m Just Wild About Raleigh” up Hargett Street. Back home! I paused when I reached City Cemetery, debating whether to visit Momma’s grave. I decided I needed a longer time for that. When I entered the hotel, Mr. Toodlums welcomed me back. In a few seconds, I was hearing, “Celeste! How’s my girlio?”

“Poppa, I’m home! Can I come see you? You feeling better?” His voice warmed me from the inside out. “What’s a apoplexy?”

“Girlio, just hearing your voice makes me better already. You’ve seen Aunt Society, right? She’s kind of bad off. Apoplexy is when a vein breaks in your brain. They call it a stroke, too. One could have killed her. She had three. But she’s still with us, praise the Lord. I’m counting on you to help pull her through and get her back on her feet, if you can. Try to be patient with her. She’s glad you’re back.”

“No, she’s not. She made me get off your bed, she grunts left and right, rings that —”

“You be the head of the family for me. Honey, you happened to call in the middle of dinner. They only let me come to the phone because they knew you were arriving today. I was hopin’ you’d call, but I got to cut out ’cause they’re real strict about making sure I eat. I’m still gaining a little. By the way, me and the cows are on good terms now. Honey, they’re calling me for dinner. Best time to call is midmorning or early afternoon.”

We said a few other things, then we got off. His voice sounded so good! I wanted to see him
now
! I thanked Mr. Toodlums for making the call. “I wonder could Mr. Shepperson take me out to Poppa this week?” I asked. “I wanna see him!”

“I’ll check. Oh, tell your guest that he or Mr. Smithfield’ll pick her up at eight
A.M.
And I won’t charge you for the call. Welcome back.”

Over at the apothecary, Mr. Hodges welcomed me back, too, and inquired about Poppa. His medical book said people who had light strokes often thought they’d had a bad headache. People who had severe strokes sometimes forgot who they were, or ended up with twisted muscles like Aunt Society’s mouth and arm. Sometimes one eye got bigger than the other. If they didn’t die right away, some people got depressed or were as helpless as babies. Though she was close to it, Aunt Society wasn’t completely helpless. She was too mean for that.

“How’s she making out today?” Mr. Hodges asked when I returned the book to the shelf near him.

“Well, she was sitting in her wheelchair when I left. It’s hard to understand what she wants, since she can’t talk. Poppa and Mrs. Smithfield said she’s glad I’m back, but she doesn’t act like it. What if she won’t take her medicine or let me help her? What if I make mistakes?”

“She knows what she needs to do if she wants to get better,” Mr. Hodges told me. “Just do your best, Celeste. Won’t nobody fault you for your mistakes.”

Next I swung by Evalina’s house behind me, but nobody was there. Angel Mae lived over on South Street, which was a ways away. I’d have stopped at Swan’s, since she lived behind me, too, but I was afraid of her uncle’s slobbery dog and those evil cats. I knocked my own dogs on home.

The aroma of oxtails and navy beans, Miss D’s sweet potato pie, greens, small red potatoes, and Mrs. Smithfield’s buttery cornbread drifted through the screen door when I reached our porch. I could have ate the air! In the kitchen Miss D and Mrs. Smithfield were chattering like old friends. “I wanted to cook a little something for you to remember me by,” said Miss D. “I love this stove. It heats up so quick that —”

Clang! Clang! Clang!

“It hasn’t rung since you left,” said Mrs. Smithfield, “so it must be for you.”

“All right.” I replaced my frown with a smile and, taking a deep breath, went to my aunt, heart pounding like one of those Garvey parade band drums. Aunt Society laid the cowbell on the bed and pointed to her stomach. “You ready to eat? Food smells good, doesn’t it? I’ll tell Mrs. Smithfield.” She frowned and pointed again. “What? I don’t understand you!” I rushed back to the kitchen and told Mrs. Smithfield.

“She needs to go do her business. I’ll show you how we handle that.” Oh, joy. I dragged after Mrs. Smithfield. She pushed Aunt Society in her wheelchair to our lavatory. She half lifted her up out of the chair and inside. After a few grunts and whispers, they maneuvered back out.

“You’re doing much better, aren’t you, Society?” Mrs. Smithfield panted. She removed Aunt Society’s glasses and patted her face dry. “Want some supper now?”

Aunt Society grunted and lifted her hand. Mrs. Smithfield wheeled her into the kitchen. Miss D had set the table and stood by, waiting. I trailed in, feeling helpless. How would I ever learn to do all this? I couldn’t even please her when she was well! Aunt Society wouldn’t look at us at supper. She’d point to what she wanted, and we’d put it on her plate. She used a fork and spoon well enough with her left hand, and did she ever eat. That hadn’t changed. She didn’t throw any food on the floor, either.

She didn’t want to sit in the parlor with us after supper, so I wheeled her to her room. I noticed a little bald spot at the back of her head. Maybe I could wash her hair with Walker shampoo and get it to grow back. If she’d let me. “You want anything?” Silence. I took that to mean no and escaped to the parlor, where Miss D and Mrs. Smithfield were eating sweet potato pie. They’d set my plate on my chair.

Mrs. Smithfield was saying, “I’d happened to go by her house to ask about Taylor and found her sitting on the front porch, just staring. She couldn’t move, couldn’t talk. She’d been feeling poorly the last few months, you know. Oh, you didn’t? The Bivenses carried her to Saint Agnes Hospital.”

Since Aunt Society hated the Bivenses, their wagon, and Lissa, that could practically have given her another stroke,
I thought. Mrs. Smithfield asked ladies from my aunt’s church to sit with her after she left the hospital. “They were wonderful. A couple were even practical nurses. But even as sick as she was, Society kept getting meaner until she ran them off. And she knew those ladies, too!” She pointed her fork at me. “That’s when I talked with Taylor, and he said to call for you. He thought that maybe she’d pay attention to you.”

Thanks, Poppa. I liked that he trusted me to nurse his sister, and it did get me back home. But what a way to have to get here.

At nightfall the cowbell rang. “She’s probably ready for bed. C’mon, Cece.” After another lavatory visit, Mrs. Smithfield helped Aunt Society slip on her gown while I stayed by the wall and tried not to watch. She had always been thin, but now she was a bony bag of wrinkles drooping everywhere. I didn’t want my bosom and behind to hang like that when I got old.

“Make sure she swallows these pills at bedtime.” Mrs. Smithfield picked up a yellow glass bottle from the nightstand. “Sometimes she hides them, then spits them out. Open your mouth, Society, so I can see. All right, dear.”

Aunt Society looked at me. We both knew she’d never let me look in her mouth.

In the kitchen Mrs. Smithfield said she’d return in the morning to see Miss D off and to check on my aunt. She added that Aunt Society wouldn’t want anything tonight unless she had to do her business or was thirsty. I prayed she wouldn’t need either.

Back in my room I watched Miss D smear white face cream on her neck. “You think Aunt Society’ll get better?”

“I expect she will if she wants to. Ole sister’s still got fire left in her.”

“I don’t mean to be nosy, but you said something about Aunti Val not taking care of her family. What’d you mean?” That had been bothering me ever since she’d said it back in New York.

She stopped smearing. “She got into my business about my jobs and Gertie and so forth, so I had to jump salty and get into hers. She has talked off and on in the past about coming back here to do one thing or another, but she hasn’t. Still, she expects folks to help her.”

“You really don’t think she’ll come in August, do you?” I had to ask again, now that we were alone. I wrapped my scarf around my head and waited for her answer.

Miss D returned to smearing. “She said she would. Won’t know till she gets here. Maybe with you down here in this situation she might hold to her word. That gal’s a butterfly flitting from one rock to another.”

“What’s butterflies and rocks got to do with it?”

“She’s flying around with her head in the sky while scrubbers and scrapers like me and you stay here on the ground, like rocks. Us rocks wish we were like them up there with no problems or responsibilities, not have to deal with the real, you know? When the butterflies get in trouble, they head for the rocks, something solid. When it’s safe, they’re off again. Having you come to New York is the most responsible thing I’ve ever known Val to do. But she leaned on you like you were grown and she was the child, didn’t she?”

“No, no, she didn’t,” I said, wondering if that was really the case. “Entertainers are kind of, uh, flighty, anyway.”

“Val’s pinning everything on
Shuffle Along,
and she only got that part because you and I pushed her. She’s actually too old to still be a hoofer in a chorus line, competing with young gals like Caterina Jarboro. Val’s good, but that gal’s
great.
”

“But Aunti Val still hasn’t had her big breakthrough —”

“And I’m saying at this age she may not get it —”

“— so maybe she figures she can’t come home until she
is
a star.” I stopped, finally understanding what Miss D was saying. “It must be awful to work so hard so long and still not have what you want. Miss D, I’m glad you know about these things. Nobody else said anything about, well, just things, except Poppa sometimes. Aunt Society was so negative about everything, I didn’t like to listen to her. Aunti Val told me about a lot, but she’s not here. And now you’re gonna be gone.” I felt dread start to weigh down on me again.

“I know what it’s like to be a motherless child,” Miss D said. She looked at me so tenderly tears came to my eyes. “I felt your loneliness strong the minute you knocked on my door that first day, when you and that egg tangled with that quilt. I was a motherless child. Wasn’t for my grammaw raising me, who knows where I’d be? That’s why people got to keep connections with family whether you’re a star or a floor scrubber. Val was married, you know. You look surprised. She was married to Nathaniel Chavis, your uncle.”

My mouth flew open. “What? Aunti mentioned his name, but she didn’t say they were married. Just that this Mr. Chavis had died. How come their being married had to be a mystery?”

“It wasn’t to folks who knew.” Miss D chuckled. “They weren’t married very long. It was sad and kind of funny, too, how he died. Val told me that they were sitting on top of a piano having their picture taken. Afterward, when she gave him a big kiss, he fell off the piano, broke his neck, and died, just like that. I warned her not to ever kiss me ’cause she had the kiss of death. Girl, she got mad at me! Anyway, Nathaniel was a rock. Valentina was close to your momma, too, then
she
died. I expect that your momma was probably everybody’s rock. Society’s tried to be a rock, but now she’s sick. Me, I love my family and I want to go home to South Carolina for good. I’m their rock, see.”

My mind was reeling with all this information. “So why did you leave South Carolina?”

“I went up north to get away from the hardships that the White folks were giving us Colored. A bunch of us headed for Harlem in 1901, because we heard good jobs, nice homes, and such were supposed to be so much better for Colored up there. Harlem’s the Colored capital of the world! I’ve enjoyed it, but I’m getting old,” she said. “Things are a little better now down in South Cacky Lacky. But mostly I want to be round my kinfolks. So that when I get sick I’ll have my people near to care for me.”