Perfect Peace (9 page)

“Okay, Gracie. Just leave it alone.” Emma Jean sniffled. “It’s all in the past now, so just let it go.”

“That’s the thing! It
is
in the past, but
you
can’t let it go! That’s why you haven’t been to see Momma. ’Cause you can’t let it go!”

“I don’t even think about that stuff anymore.”

“You’re lying, Emma Jean.”

“Don’t call me a liar, girl!”

“I’ll call you a liar until you start telling the truth!”

“Fine!” Emma Jean shouted. “Fine! I remember it! But that don’t mean I gotta think about it every day!”

“Who could forget it? Of course you think about it every day. So do I. We just can’t change it.”

“No, we can’t, so let’s stop talkin’ about it.”

“Emma Jean, we gon’ talk about this now, if we don’t ever talk about it again! You might not have another chance.”

“Another chance to do what?”

Gracie cleared her throat. “To forgive Momma. To stop hating her.”

“I don’t hate her.”

“You think you do. Maybe you do. Who wouldn’t? But that’s not wrong. What I’m trying to say, though, is if something happens to Momma, you’ll never get the chance to confront her and free your heart. That’s why I’m begging you to go see her. Say whatever you want, but please go. Please.”

Emma Jean wiped her cheeks.

“And, anyway, Momma’s not the woman she used to be. She’s really not.”

“Oh really,” Emma Jean sneered.

“Really. You’d be surprised. The last few years, especially once she got sick, she’s turned into a woman I’ve never known.”

“Probably thinks she’s gon’ die. Everybody gets righteous before they think they goin’ to meet the King.”

“Maybe,” Gracie pondered, “but even before she got sick, she said something that made me believe she was sorry for how she had treated you.”

Emma Jean refused to ask, so Gracie volunteered, “She said, ‘Everything I ever wanted Emma Jean got.’ ”

“Ha! What I got?”

Gracie shrugged. “I don’t know. Whatever it is, Momma wanted it. I mean, think about it. You got a husband who loves you, six boys and a beautiful little girl now, and you got your health.”

“This ain’t what
I
wanted!”

“Maybe not. But Momma would’ve been happy with it. That’s what she said.”

“Well, I can’t do nothin’ ’bout that. She’ll have to take that up with the Good Lawd.”

“Will you go see her, Emma Jean?”

Emma Jean sighed. “I doubt it. But I’ll think about it if it’ll make you happy.”

“It’s not for me, Emma Jean. It’s for you.”

“Well, if it’s for me, then I ain’t goin’. I’m through with her, Gracie. You can tell her you saw me and I was doin’ fine.”

“I’m not telling her anything. You go and tell her yourself.” Gracie rose, retrieved her pocketbook from the floor, and said, “Please, Emma Jean. Go. Even if you don’t say anything, let Momma clear her heart. Hearing her out might clear yours, too.”

“Clear my heart? Clear my heart?” Emma Jean wept again. “Did you say clear my heart?”

“Yes. And Momma can clear hers, too.”

“So I been keepin’ Momma from clearin’ her heart? All dese years, I been de one wit’ de key to her heart and didn’t even know it?”

Emma Jean’s tone left a putrid taste in Gracie’s mouth. She wished she’d simply glanced at Perfect and left.

“You can’t change the past, sister. All you can do is forgive people for it.”

“You gotta be kidding! Girl, listen. If I hadn’t forgave Momma years ago, I probably woulda killed her by now, so please don’t talk to me about no forgiveness.”

“You didn’t forgive Momma, Emma Jean. You jes’ tried to forget.”

“How you know what’s in my heart?”

“Because the heart always tells on itself. Even when we think we hidin’ it.”

“Well, mine feels fine to me. If Momma got somethin’ she need to say, she can come over here and say it. Otherwise, I’m through wit’ de whole thing.”

“Very well.” Gracie gave up and clutched her purse beneath her arm. “I just wanted you to know that Momma’s time is limited just in case you wanted to make things right between you two. Before it’s too late.”

“That ain’t fu me to do. She de momma.”

“All right. Just don’t let the sun go down on your wrath. That’s what the Bible says.”

Emma Jean chuckled. “You reap what you sow. It says that, too.”

Gracie left, convinced that Mae Helen would die before Emma Jean saw her again. Still, she was glad she had tried. A child’s hurt obviously evolves into an adult’s resentment, she told herself, so after years of abuse, the possibility that Emma Jean might forgive and forget was a virtual impossibility. Maybe she should have fought more directly for Emma Jean when they were children, Gracie considered, but what could she do about that now? Even if she apologized, which she felt she’d done, Emma Jean’s pain wouldn’t decrease. All Gracie knew to do was promise to love any child she birthed—even if, like Emma Jean, it was ugly.

Yet children never came for Gracie. Pearlie neither. They were too uppity and saddity, Gus said, to be somebody’s momma. Gracie wanted a college-educated man like herself, and Pearlie refused to look at anybody if he wasn’t lighter than she was. Mae Helen told both of them, once they turned thirty, “Y’all ain’t
that
damn gorgeous! You better get you somebody before it ain’t nobody to have!” But the girls refused to settle. In their forties, Gracie and Pearlie married Stanley and Buster Wilson, the ugliest, most unrefined brothers in Swamp Creek. They did that only because Mae Helen told them she was tired of feeding their stuck-up asses.

Once Gracie left that day, Emma Jean tried frantically not to think about Mae Helen, but the more she tried, the more impossible it became. It was always Gracie who kept mess going, she thought. Always sticking her nose in somebody else’s business. So what that she hadn’t seen Mae Helen in months. Who says a daughter
must
visit her mother?

After their last encounter, Emma Jean swore she’d never set eyes on the woman again, even in a casket.

“What’s that smell, girl?” Mae Helen had declared, walking into Emma Jean’s kitchen years ago without knocking.

“Hey, Momma.”

“That meat musta been spoiled, girl. I wouldn’t eat it if I was you.” She pinched her nose and frowned.

Emma Jean offered her a seat and continued washing dishes.

“Where de boys?”

“Out fishin’ with Gus. They gon’ be disappointed they missed you.”

“I’ll see them nappy-headed niggas soon enough.”

Emma Jean sat a glass of iced tea before Mae Helen, who drank it in one gulp. “Needs more sugar.”

“Momma, that tea’s fine. It’s almost syrupy as it is!”

“You drink it the way you want to. I’ll make my own at home.”

Emma Jean huffed. “It’s never enough, is it?”

“Huh? What’d you say?”

“Never mind.” She rinsed the empty glass and returned it to the cabinet. “I have some cake if you want some.”

“Oh no. I don’t care for sweets.”

Emma Jean recalled Mae Helen’s sweet tooth and chuckled lightly. “The boys is really growin,’ you know.”

“I guess they is, sittin’ ’round here eatin’ like hogs.”

Emma Jean struggled to ignore her. “You’re welcome to stay for dinner. I cooked more than enough.”

“No, no. I jes’ come by to see what that new baby o’ yours look like.” She grunted, “Ump. I shoulda guessed.”

“He’s pretty, Momma, but he ain’t no baby no more. He’s almost a year old!”

“Better late than never.” She studied the kitchen in apparent disapproval. “What’d you name him?”

Emma Jean smiled. “Mister.”

“Mister? Mister what?”

“Mister Peace.”

“Hell, I know his last name. I’m askin’ ’bout his first name.”

“Mister
is
his first name,” Emma Jean slurred, never having considered how ridiculous the name might sound to her mother.

“What? Are you serious? That’s kinda stupid, ain’t it? I bet Gus named him, didn’t he?”

“He’s a sweet boy, Momma. Grin all de time. Happy as he can be.”

“Yep, Gus named him,” Mae Helen murmured. “Ain’t no way in the world I woulda let that fool name my baby no Mister. That’s ’bout de dumbest thing I ever heard of, but if you like it . . .”

“His name’s fine, Momma. Like I said, he’s a good baby. Don’t do nothin’ but laugh all the time. The boys love him.”

“I guess they do! They don’t know no better.”

Emma Jean grimaced. “What’s that suppose to mean?”

“Oh, don’t worry about it. I was jes’ talking to myself.”

That’s when Emma Jean broke. “Get out, Momma!”

Mae Helen trembled. “What did you say, girl?”

“I said, get the hell out of my house!” Emma Jean went to the screen and held it open. “You ain’t never said a kind word to me my whole life. Pearlie and Gracie were
your
precious daughters, and I was the garbage my daddy left behind. I thought that maybe you’d start bein’ nice to me when I got grown, but obviously I thought wrong. You talk about Gus like a dog and treat my boys like they ain’t nothin’!”

“What?” Mae Helen stood. “I speak to dem ugly children all the time!”

“Can you say something nice for once! Huh? Can you? Would it kill you to be kind just for a day?”

“It’s nice enough of me just to come over here!” Mae Helen declared, sashaying past Emma Jean and into the yard.

Emma Jean followed. “Don’t chu know what it do to a child to call ’em mean names? Don’t chu know you cain’t treat children that way and get away with it forever? Don’t you know I dreamed about stabbing you every night I slept in that house?”

Mae Helen smacked her lips.

“You ain’t got to care ’cause I ain’t got to have you no more. And God have mercy on yo’ soul if you ever need me!” Emma Jean panted.

“Why, you ungrateful heffa! How dare you talk to me like that after all I did for you.”

“Oh, Momma, please! All you did for me was make me hate you.”

Mae Helen shuddered. “Pearlie and Gracie would never talk to me like this.”

“I’m sure they wouldn’t! Perfect Pearlie and Gracie.”

“You always was jealous of them.”

Emma Jean hollered, “Oh kiss my ass, Momma!” and marched back into the kitchen.

Mae Helen pranced away, leaving Emma Jean overwhelmed. She loved her mother and that’s what she hated most. Her childhood had been spent praying for a change of Mae Helen’s heart, although it never happened. She thought she’d gotten over things by now, but Mae Helen’s demeaning of her boys conjured memories of Emma Jean’s dream of killing her. Now that she was a mother, she could live without her own, she determined, but what she couldn’t tolerate was the possibility that her boys might grow up like she had, feeling ugly and rejected. She’d stab Mae Helen directly in the heart before she’d let her do that to another child.

The cussing felt good and relieved Emma Jean of years of repressed emotions. Fear had always made her contain her tongue, lest she disrespect her mother beyond repair, but now it didn’t matter. Emma Jean wished she had beaten her. That’s what she had felt like doing, and that would have cleansed her heart completely. Or so she thought. The truth was that the episode left her shaken for three days. The least noise caused her to glance over her shoulder, thinking Mae Helen had returned to whip her good. She hated how much she feared her mother, and she hated even more that she couldn’t stop loving her.

Emma Jean laid Perfect in the bassinet and dreamed of all the things they’d do together. Like pick blackberries along the banks of the Jordan and talk about boys the way she and her sisters once did.

“Ain’t Virgil Ponds ’bout the cutest thing you ever seen?” Pearlie said dreamily one hot July morning. She’d just turned twelve.

Gracie and Emma Jean giggled.

“He’s tall, and lean, and got some soft curly hair. Oh my God! He’s so gorgeous!”

“He’s all right,” Gracie said, “but he ain’t cuter’n Phillip Hampton.”

“Phillip Hampton?” Pearlie cried. “That boy ain’t cute. His head is round as a plate!”

“Yeah, I know, but he’s still cute to me. Momma said he got some Indian in him.”

“He does have some good hair,” Pearlie conceded, “but he ain’t cuter’n Virgil.”

Gracie noticed Emma Jean’s silence. “Who you like?” she asked.

Emma Jean shrugged. “Nobody.” She ate a handful of overripe blackberries.

“Don’t you think Virgil’s cute?” Pearlie asked.

“He’s okay I guess. Look kinda mean most of the time. Don’t never smile.”

“You mean he don’t smile
at you
?”

“He don’t smile at nobody!” Gracie said.

“He smile at me. And anyway you can’t ask a man to like
everybody
.”

“Well, I’m just sayin’ I wouldn’t choose him,” Emma Jean said, and continued berry picking.