Playing by the Rules: A Novel (31 page)

“Yeah. That was ages ago. Ain’t you forgot about that?”

“No. I committed a crime when I rescued you and now those cops I was concerned about are starting to move in on us.”

“So what does that mean?” Ruby Rose bit her bottom lip.

“That means it’s time to leave Lemon City.”

“No. I don’t want to go.” She stood up with such force that her chair fell back on the floor. “I’m going on a hunger strike just like Dick Gregory,” she announced, her lip starting to quiver. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get it to stop. “I’m not eating ever again,” she said, digging in her heels. “You don’t want me to be happy. You never did. You never came to see me when I was with Mama. Then you take me away from mean Miss Molly Esther and you drop me like a hot potato for that woman. You just don’t want me to have any fun. I hate you. I hate you!” Ruby Rose cried and stomped her feet before running back into her room.

Jeremiah could hear her sobs through the door. He felt bad about how his sister was feeling, and for the whole situation. Regardless of his efforts to do what was best, it seemed nothing turned out right. He had no choice but to ride out this storm. It wasn’t easy raising an anchor that had just been lowered and positioned. Just as Ruby Rose was getting comfortable in Lemon City, he had to uproot her, and it was only fair to give her time to get used to the idea of being without a home.

Not knowing how to handle this kind of situation, Jeremiah called Nana for advice. Since Nana had been in a partying mood ever since the Annual County Fair, it came as no surprise to Jeremiah that she offered a celebration as a solution.

“There’s a big fight coming up soon,” said Nana, kicking off
her Sunday shoes, just getting back from church. “Willie says it’s between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman. But we’ll make it a going-away party for you and Ruby Rose too. That’s a few weeks away. That’ll give the chile some more time in Lemon City, so you won’t have to shock her into leaving right away. Meantime, she can help Elvira in her delicate state with errands and chores, and keep up her home schooling and piano lessons. I’ll talk to Billy— see if he can keep Beauregard off your trail for a while longer. Billy will do what I tell him. Don’t you worry. Tell the chile we’re planning a party for her and Muhammad Ali. That’ll cheer her up.”

Jeremiah didn’t know if delaying the inevitable would help or make things worse, but when he knocked on his sister’s door to tell her the news, she was thrilled to have more time in town. Then she boldly announced that her hunger strike was over and immediately poured a bowl of cereal and sat down to eat again. Being happy always gave her an appetite.

Time came and went as the trees shed their leaves from summer to prepare for fall. The big match was in October. Just as everyone was glued to their TV sets to watch
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman
, there wasn’t a Lemonite in town who would have missed “The Rumble in the Jungle”—Muhammad Ali taking the ring to see if he could reclaim his title as heavyweight champ. The closer it got to the going-away fight party, the sadder Ruby Rose became. By the evening of the main event, Nana saw that the girl’s head was drooping so low that it seemed her lips were dragging the floor. Jeremiah was right behind his sister not knowing how to handle her grief when they entered the Dunlap home, so he let Nana take over.

Quickly putting her arm around Ruby Rose, Nana guided her to the dining-room table to help herself to the chicken wings, potato salad, deviled eggs, and lemon pound cake she’d made for the
occasion. When those enticements to put Ruby Rose in a better mood didn’t work, she shuttled the girl off to the kitchen, mentioning that her favorite ice cream, Sealtest vanilla bean, was in the freezer, even though she knew that ice cream was the last thing on Ruby Rose’s mind. She was trying to think of something to say to comfort the girl, some wise insights about growing up and meeting people in her life that would come and go. But Nana couldn’t be of much help. She didn’t have a point of reference about people’s comings and goings, because all she had ever known was Lemon City.

Carrying a bowl of ice cream she wasn’t interested in, Ruby Rose sat down at the dining-room table. The way she was playing in it with her spoon, Nana could tell she wanted to be left alone.

Then the doorbell rang and the last guest had arrived. Ole Miss Johnson showed up and everyone was happy that Nana had done the right thing by inviting her next-door neighbor into her home. Just the same, it didn’t stop Nana from snorting, and Clement from grunting, when she walked through the door.

Despite Ruby Rose’s need for privacy, Medford sat down next to her and lifted her chin to look squarely into her face. A moment after gazing into his eyes, she burst out crying uncontrollably.

“It’s not fair. It’s not fair,” she said between sobs. She plopped her head down on her arms over the table. Medford rubbed her back and tried to shush away her tears.

“You found your mother, and I have none,” she cried. “You’re gonna settle down now, and I gotta be on the run.”

Medford pulled her close to his chest. “You have your brother.
He’s
your family.”

“It’s not the same,” she said through tears. “I want to go to school. I want to take piano lessons. I don’t want to leave.”

Sadie heard that part about the piano, which made her want to
cry too. She was going to miss the girl terribly, and she put her finger to her nose to hold back the sniffles.

As Medford held his little friend, he got to thinking. “You can always come back to visit,” he said. “It’s not like you have to stay away for good. You’ll always have a welcome, and a round-trip ticket back to Lemon City.”

Happy for the invitation, Ruby Rose wasn’t completely convinced that a visit was going to be a long enough stay to do the trick.

“Come on now. Eat something,” said Medford.

Ruby Rose wiped her nose with the sleeve of her sweater and stared at her bowl of half-melted ice cream, which she turned and twirled around with her spoon. Realizing Medford wasn’t going to leave until he saw her eat something, she lifted the cold white mush to her mouth, and he seemed to be satisfied that he’d got his way.

Everyone gathered around the TV to watch the main event. When Muhammad Ali danced into the ring, there wasn’t any breathing in the room; even the night crawlers outside seemed to stop moving out of respect. Ali was warming up, shuffling his feet, throwing punches into the defenseless air. When heavyweight champion George Foreman stepped into the ring, Ali pretended to be scared, taunting the champ with as much mouth as he had muscle. The fight took center stage in Zaire with sixty thousand spectators worldwide, and the Dunlap family and their friends felt like they had ringside seats.

Once the fight began, there was no keeping the men in the room quiet. With the cooler packed with beer next to the couch so they wouldn’t have to walk to the kitchen, they had all the refreshments they needed to stay seated and root for the former champ. Ali was thirty-two years old and in tip-top shape, and Foreman was twenty-five and solid like a bull. Granddaddy was
hoping that wisdom would teach the young buck a lesson and whip him into shape.

“Nice block,” Billy commented as Ali dodged Foreman’s punch.

“Have y’all noticed? He’s not dancing around like he usually does,” claimed Jeremiah.

“That’s because he’s waiting for George against the ropes,” answered Granddaddy, “daring Foreman to come after him.”

“He knows what he’s doing,” said Louise. “Foreman keeps snorting and swinging punches. Ali’s strategy is to tire him out.”

“It’s the ropeadope,” added Clement, opening a can of beer.

“It doesn’t even seem like Foreman is hurting Ali,” said Medford, keeping his eyes on the TV. “He’s amazing. Look at how Ali takes those punches. It’s like his midsection is steel-plated.”

“Ouch…ooh…,” said Granddaddy after Ali threw a punch that snapped George’s head back, and Granddaddy contracted his body and winced as if he had felt the punch himself.

“Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!” Louise yelled, each time a little bit louder, as Ali blocked several punches from Foreman, then scored a few landings of his own.

“I don’t care if Foreman pulverized Joe Frazier and Ken Norton,” said Bootsie. “He ain’t getting a piece of Ali tonight …Ali is hot like James Brown and ‘Papa Don’t Take No Mess.’ ”

Everyone in the room laughed, and Nana looked at Ruby Rose, who was slumped over in the dining-room chair, looking as limp as Saint, who was curled up in her lap.

By the eighth round, the fight was over. Muhammad Ali knocked out George Foreman and lived up to his title of being The Greatest. Everyone around the TV cheered so loud that the victory startled Ruby Rose and made Saint jump and trot off into the kitchen. Elvira’s head nearly rolled out of her hand, because it was way past her bedtime and she had dozed off in the chair.

Now that the fight was over, Medford went into the kitchen
and came out with two bottles of chilled champagne in his hands. He made eye contact with Granddaddy and placed the bottles on the table. Out of nervousness, he started eating a chicken wing from the platter on the dining-room table. After sucking the meat down to the bone, he began chewing on the gristle. The ligaments got stuck in his throat and he began choking uncontrollably, covering his mouth with both hands, gagging over the cake and the rest of the food on the table. He choked harder when he looked at Louise, and she ran over to him to pat him on his back.

“Don’t do that!” Vernelle shouted, throwing down her white purse, rushing to Medford’s side. “Let me at him.” She had just learned a new choking technique in her midwife class called the Heimlich maneuver and approached Medford from behind. She grabbed him with both hands clasped together underneath his rib cage and gave a sudden hard tug slightly below his waist. It was then that the gristle propelled itself out his mouth and flew into the air, hitting Louise in the middle of her head. For the first time that night, Ruby Rose showed signs of life. She laughed and laughed until it looked like her freckles were dancing on her face and she keeled over because her stomach hurt. Medford was embarrassed and got down on one knee to apologize to Louise like he was begging for forgiveness, while Nana, Clement, and Ole Miss Johnson just shook their heads. Louise stared at him, wondering why he was being overly dramatic and wasn’t getting up from the floor. She tried helping him, but he was so heavy that he couldn’t be moved; it was almost as if he were stuck. The next thing she knew, he removed a tiny gift-wrapped box from his pocket and opened it. Immediately, her jaw dropped and she put both hands to her face. No one in the room had anticipated this event except for Granddaddy, who had given Medford permission to ask Louise for her hand in marriage.

“Beautiful Louise,” he said, his voice wavering and his hands
beginning to shake. “Beautiful Louise,” he repeated to gain back some of his composure. “I’ve known you for most of your life and I know what kind of woman you are. Because you’ve got a lot of years ahead of you, I know I will respect the kind of woman you’ll become. I love you and most of all I accept you for who you are, and I know this to be true, that I want only you to be my wife.”

Nana burst out crying. Louise was so surprised by Medford’s announcement that it looked as if her hands had become attached to her face.

“I don’t want you to feel pressured into doing something you don’t want to do,” said Medford, knowing Louise all too well.

Louise looked at Nana, who had started crying into a napkin, and then at Granddaddy, who was nudging her with his eyes to accept his proposal. She didn’t know if she was ready for marriage, but she did know that when the time came, she’d choose Medford.

“Medford,” she said, and everyone in the room held their breath. “I would
like
to marry you.” She said her words carefully, as if trying to remember how to construct a sentence. “At least I
think
I would.” She wanted to make sure she was ready to confirm her own opinion in public. “But I would prefer to have a very long engagement first,” she said with confidence. “And you have to promise to
call
me Louise; not that I don’t want to
be
your wife, mind you, but that’s not my identity.”

“Is that a yes?” Medford asked.

Nana stopped her tears and looked up from her napkin.

“That’s a yes, let’s give ourselves a little more time to see,” she said.

Nana didn’t know what to make of that answer and wished she were standing close enough to her granddaughter to ask her if she were crazy.

Coming from Louise, that was commitment enough for Medford,
and he rose from his knee and kissed her and everyone in the room who was fighting back tears, except for Nana, who had waited a long time for this moment but was confused. Ruby Rose seemed happy, as the smile had returned to her face.

Medford held Louise in his arms for a while, then whispered something in her ear, and she didn’t hesitate to nod in agreement.

Everyone in the room was wondering what more they had to discuss.

“Excuse us for a minute,” Louise said. “Medford and I have to talk.” They went to the front porch and closed the French doors behind them.

“Ruby Rose wants to stay, Louise,” said Medford. He paused, then added, “We can adopt her.”

“Adoption? I don’t think Ruby Rose wants to live with me. She hates me.”

“She doesn’t hate you. She just hates the fact that she hasn’t had much love in her life. You’re just the woman she needs to set her example—strong, fine, smart, and independent.”

“That sounds all well and good, but you should like kids before you become a mother.”

“Come on, Lou.”

“I don’t know. It’s true. Everything is happening way too fast…marriage, motherhood.” She looked at Medford’s disappointment and didn’t want to do that to him again. “I guess the good news would be, at least I’d know what I’d be getting into. For the most part, her personality has been predetermined; she’s already potty-trained, she can dress herself, and she’s smart. Truth is, she kinda reminds me of myself.”