Ellen Foster (2 page)

We will rest some more. The day is early and we need some more rest.

I always love to eat a good supper, brush my teeth and go to bed early. If I am not sleepy I can always find something to do.

Lately I lay up in the bed and read old books. I told the library teacher I wanted to read everything of some count so she made me a list. That was two years ago and I’m up to the
Brontë sisters now. I do not read comic books or the newspaper. I find out what news I need off the television.

I can hardly tolerate the stories we read for school. Cindy or Lou with the dog or cat. Always setting out on some adventure. They might meet a bandit or they might hop a freight but the policeman or the engineer always brings them home and they are still good children.

I myself prefer the old stories. When I started my project I enjoyed the laughing Middle Ages lady that wore red boots. She was on a trip with a group of people swapping stories, carrying on, slapping each other on the back.

What I am reading now is a little fancy for me but it is on the list. Just men and women sneaking around in a big dark house with one all into the other’s business. The library teacher said the author and her sisters wrote books because in their day they could not go out and get jobs. I bet they were just well off and did not need to work.

I could lay here and read all night. I am not able to fall asleep without reading. You have that time when your brain has nothing constructive to do so it rambles. I fool my brain out of that by making it read until it shuts off. I just think it is best to do something right up until you fall asleep.

I always want to lay here. And she moves her arm up and I push my head down by her side. And I will crawl in and make room for myself. My heart can be the one that beats.

And hers has stopped.

Damn him to the bottom of hell damn him.

What to do now when the spinning starts people will come and they will want to know why and I cannot tell them why.
They will not come yet no not for a while. I have her now while she sleeps but just is not breathing. I do not have to tell him so let him sit and wonder at the quiet in here. Why this house is so still and people all over everywhere are glad for the day.

Guilty and held down in his chair by God and fear of a sweet dead woman.

You can rest with me until somebody comes to get you. We will not say anything. We can rest.

I despise that dress and get your hands off me is what she needs to be told. But I push the bathroom door and leave my aunt on the other side and me to myself.

Is this my lipstick now? I do not think I should put a dab on to wear to the church. She would let me. But somebody would say something.

Put it back put it back just like it was. When I am old I can come back and wear it. When it is not for play. They didn’t need this to dress her up with? Somebody must have got her another stick. She left this one at home. To be sure they don’t paint everybody they do business with with the same stick.

I will just wash my mouth and sit on the toilet to look. I can see them all through the crack in the door. Everybody I have not seen since last Christmas sitting around patting their hands together.

My daddy is thinking about how good a tall glass of anything would be. Before they all got here he rounded up all his beer cans and pitched them under the back porch.

Somebody must have given him that suit. All he ever wears is gray work outfits. I want to sew a little patch over the pockets
that says his name BILL. He could be like the Esso man. Can I help you, ma’am? Check your tires? Change your oil? Throw a knife at you?

All he has done since Sunday morning is open the door for folks and shake his head yes or no. His brother Rudolph put him in the car and took him to town to pick out the coffin. I know when he got there my mama’s sisters chased him off. They are the ones with the taste.

He sits there with both feet on the floor and his eyes are red but not from crying. When somebody goes by and leans forward to his ear he touches them on the shoulder. Still king. Now quiet.

She finally shut him up.

3

Oh I wake up and have the day and what do I want to do with it? I will go catch a pony and ride it. I can take something for me and the pony to eat in a bag so I can stay gone all day. I might get Jo Jo to ride with me. But I think she has ballerina lessons today.

I myself can dance.

I need to get up and eat what I smell. The oven door squeaks and she’s holding soft round biscuits.

I got the clothes that I wore yesterday at the foot of the bed so I can change under the covers. It is not necessary to be cold so early. Just so my underwear is clean is all I care about today. By supper I will smell like pony all over.

Maybe nobody else has thought about riding that pony Dolphin today. One thing about here is that you have to wait your go. Today is my turn if I am the first one to get to the breakfast table.

My hair will smooth down without a comb. I look good as long as you don’t see me from the back.

I feel good at the table with the biscuits. All that is cold is my hands. I hold them over the biscuit tin until my new mama tells me in a nice way that I am rude. So I sit on my hands until the biscuits are cool enough to hold. The others come in one by one or two but they see I was here first and will get the first biscuit and the pony.

I do not want to watch them anymore. What one can hardly wait to say to the other is making them squirm.

What did you expect? Marry trash and see what comes of you. I could have told anybody.

Here I am wearing this red checked suit like a little fool. When the day’s over I’ll burn it. I know my aunt Nadine wants to come back in here and fix me up. She gave me this outfit like she bought it just for me but I saw her girl Dora get her school picture taken in it last week. I do not have much choice but to wear it. In a while I’ll be grown out of my underwear.

But that is OK by me. Just do not let that woman knock on the door and ask me how am I getting along in here. I ought to stuff my front and walk out with a sudden big chest. Give them something to see and discuss. Not just speculation.

Dora’s mama thinks it is time to get this show on the road. She could not organize a two-car colored funeral so she has herself all worked up over this affair.

Stick the fruit delight and the food that’ll go to the bad in the fridge. Fridge she says.

She’s moving my way. I tell her I was just on my way out
when she gets here. She will need a little privacy to adjust her slip and face. She wants to look especially good because she has elected herself to ride in the big car.

Oh yes and now we are all ready. My daddy wonders if I plan to tell somebody the whole story. I do not know if there is a written down rule against what he did but if it is not a crime it must be a sin. It is one way or the other. And he wants to know if I’m telling.

My aunt sashays her large self out of the toilet and I suppose now we line up to go. She must have gone to school to learn how to get grown folks into little bunches and decide who rides behind who.

Won’t she be disappointed when we get there and they put her away and we come home and that is all? She will go back to her house tired but not too tired to think about how smoothly everything went.

You are definitely in the first car, she tells me. Just so I got a ride there is all.

The undertaker opens the car door for me. He has been to the house twice since Sunday just to say he cares. I am glad he cares but I think I would like him better if he said it is my job to care. I make more money than you will ever see just to care. That would not offend me.

I do hate to sit in between folks in a car. Put me by the window so I can get some air and get out quick if I need to. I demand to ride by the window in this car that is big enough to hold the smiling undertaker, Dora’s mama, Dora, my daddy, and me.

The other children know the pony is not specifically mine but they let me play like he is mine.

After I eat all I can hold I ask for some maybe just two more biscuits to take with me please. The pony and me would both enjoy a biscuit with some fried meat and jelly. That is what we will eat for lunch. I have my thermos and my sack ready to fill up.

I keep calling things mine but nothing actually belongs to me except a few things that I moved out here with. But while you use or play with the things here it is OK to call it yours. When you get through with something, clean it up and put it back so the next one can call it his. That is the rule.

I have my lunch and I am dressed warm and ready to go.

And away I leave the house and my new mama standing at the kitchen window watching me run across the yard to the pasture.

I need to roll down the car window and stick out my face. Dora is used to her mama’s scent and my daddy is past smelling. The smiling man is too kind to remark.

He just drives slow down the path dodging the holes and the wide washed-out places. He will need to wash this big car before he picks up the next load of strangers.

When I get out I want to count the tires.

Having sidled herself up beside the smiling man, Dora’s mama searches for just the right thing to say. The man will think how wonderful she is and maybe find a job for her.

What a lovely day! She decides on this.

And I look at the back of her neck and think to myself my mama is dead in the church, my daddy is a monster, your girl
is probably going to pee on me before this ride is over and that is all you can find to say.

I just see out the window all the folks’ houses and barns and dogs running in the yards. You cannot help but notice everything because he drives so slow.

The leaves are starting to change good. Every year I want all the leaves to be fall-colored at the same time but there are always some that don’t match.

I know this is the best time of the year. The leaves and people too changing and doing things to get ready. I like to read about men and their boys who tap maple trees in New England. They wear plaid jackets and hats with ear flaps when they go to the woods to get the syrup. It does not get cold enough to do that here even in January.

That tree in Junior’s yard is redder than it was yesterday. When it looks so red it could explode on fire and burn down Junior’s house and barns and everything in them the leaves fall off the tree. Junior’s girl Trixie sweeps the leaves into a pile and they rot. That is all until the next year.

My aunt is entertaining the smiling man. That is her part-time job. When she is not redecorating or shopping with Dora she demonstrates food slicers in your home.

She will bring her plastic machine into your living room and set the whole business up on a card table. After everybody plays two or three made-up games she lets you in on the Convenience Secret of the Century. She will tell you how much it would run you in the store. If the smiling man has a wife he can expect my aunt and her machine in his living room sometime soon.

Then on she will go about sorrow and sin and how is Ellen
ever going to make out? Pretty soon she catches onto the sound of what she is saying and she pulls one word out to meet the next and once every sentence or so she will clap.

I hope the wise woman thought to bring her child an extra set of clothes.

Dora has soaked the seat of this car. My daddy is not aware of this but I am so I slide closer to the window to put some space between this red suit and Dora. Old as me and wets herself once or twice a day. I know they expect this dress back dry. Dora’s mama would stand beside Dora dripping and deny her big girl wet herself.

You are right, Aunt Nadine. I promise never to pee in your girl’s pants again.

She talks still but at least I can breathe with my nose outside. I could not ride like this for very long.

Dora wants to know if the smiling man will stop and get her a snack. Her mama tells her to hush little one but I could shut her up for good.

4

We have to drive through colored town to get to the church. They do not do anything but fix dead people and preach their funerals in this church. My aunt is so glad to be out of colored town. She unlocks her car door because now she feels safe.

Oh and wouldn’t she like to be inside one of these white houses peeling cucumbers in a snap! And she will tell you about how everybody got his money and especially about the doctors. All they do is cheat, gamble, and run around. All anybody expects of you is a good honest living and to love the Lord with all thy heart. The smiling man probably lives in one of these houses and needs to hear this.

I do see myself something in one of the yards I want. And if he’d stop I’d hop out, take it and toss it into the trunk. I ride by here every Saturday but I have never seen that fountain until now. I would love to have it. It would look good in my yard. I could stick the garden hose up that baby angel and watch the water fill up and spill over the edge.

But I did not come to town to steal out of somebody’s yard.

When we get to the church there are more people there than I know.

There is no reason I have to look at her. It would just give me something else to think about.

But I see Starletta and she looks clean. I wish I could sit with her and her mama and daddy.

Starletta and her mama both eat dirt. My daddy slapped my face for eating dirt. Oh yes but I have seen Starletta sucking in her face drawing what she can from red clay. My daddy slapped my face and jerked my elbow round to my nose and he ran his finger across my gums feeling for grit. She eats that mess like it is good to her. She sits at the end of the row while her mama chops. She loosens a piece and pops it in her jaw and squeezes. She sits and eats clay dirt and picks at her bug bites. Starletta has orange teeth and she will plait my hair if I ask her right.

I am in the family section looking out on the rest of the people. I do not know this preacher. He says that even though he did not know my mama he feels like he knew her well because he has met us and we are all so nice. It does not bother him that what he said does not make good sense.