Songbird (16 page)

After she reads me the rest of our messages and the tandem numbers I hang up the phone and debate on whether or not to call Francie back right away. They are all a sore spot with me by this time. Older, of course, and with families and all. Well, at least James and Francie have families. And I had to hear that through this crazy grapevine that actually included that awful Vicki Miller who is now married to the son of Lynchburg's richest people and doesn't that just beat all?

And yet, would I have felt better if she'd ended up married to a roofer, a janitor, or a bartender?

You bet!

My foster siblings never called me or tried to find me. Until now. So maybe they figured it was time to see if I made good. Although, maybe they knew because our picture appeared in the Lynchburg paper last time the crusade landed there.

I try not to list the realm of possibilities like I did with Mama, because, it seems silly to think that all four of them died.

But the kicker in all of this is something I have not yet divulged. I lied to Harlan. I lied about a lot, because there's a lot of difference between an orphan and someone who's been deserted by her own mother. I don't mind him feeling sorry for me, but the amount of sorry a desertion deserves is more than I can handle. That's the kind of sorry that the wounded person ends up consoling the consolee and that's just beyond my desires or capabilities.

Worse secrets have been kept, that's for sure.

I mean, I was a virgin when he married me. He should be thankful for that!

I dial Francie's number right away, my fingers feeling like melted ice pops. She picks up on the first ring, as though she has been waiting.

“Hello?”

“Francie?”

“Yes.”

“Its Char— I mean it's Myrtle, Francie.”

“Myrtle!”

She still sounds just like Francie.

“Why in the world did you go and change your name, girl! We've been looking all over for you for years!”

“You have?”

“Yes, we have.”

Oh, Francie always could get irritated with me.

“Well, I’m sorry then.”

“You should be!”

“It's nice to hear your voice now, though,” I say.

Her voice warms twenty-five degrees at least when she says, “I sure know it.”

“So you're still in Virginia?”

“Yep, over in Roanoke now. Got married to one of James's UVA friends. He's a pediatrician, which is quite handy with little Gloria, who's two-and-a-half and Travis, he's only five weeks and the cutest thing.”

“Heavens, Francie, you've got your hands full! I’ll bet they're cute!”

“Oh, they are!”

“This is so good talking to you again. How's everybody doing?”

“Well, Myrtle, not so good. You have no idea how glad I was to see that photo of you in the paper. We'd been trying to find you for another reason.”

Her voice drops. Something is very wrong. “What is it, Francie?”

“Stacy died a month ago.”

“Oh, no! What happened?”

“She had ovarian cancer.”

“Oh, Francie. I wish I had known.”

That autopilot of calm kicks in.

“I know. But that isn't the only reason I’m calling, Myrtle. Stacy had a child.”

“So she married, too?”

“No. She went a little bit astray for a while, got pregnant, and you can figure out the rest of the story.”

“How old's the child?”

“Two. A little girl named Hope.”

“Who is she staying with?”

“With us.”

“That must be terribly difficult.”

“It is. And we'd keep her in a heartbeat, but that wasn't Stacy's wish.”

“No?”

“No. She wanted you to take Hope if we could find you. It was a shock to us all, I won't hesitate to say, but there it was right in her will. She didn't have the nerve to tell us face-to-face.”

“Well, being so sick and all.”

“Oh, don't I know it. I’m not saying I blame her, Myrtle, just saying what happened.”

“I’ll have to talk this over with my husband.”

Oh, Stace.

“I figured that. But the longer Hope stays with us, the harder the transition will be for her.”

“I’ll call you tomorrow. I’m sure Harlan will be fine with it.”

“I knew you'd come through, Myrtle. You always did come through. Mama always said if there was anybody in this world that could rise to a challenge, it was you.”

“She did say that? Mrs. Evans said that?”

“She thought the world of you, Myrtle.”

“How's your dad?”

“Still living in that apartment. But he stopped traveling a couple of years ago. Opened his own children's clothing store out in that shopping center in Boonsboro.”

“Really?”

“Yep. And you know Grandma died not soon after you left Lynchburg.”

“I know. I went by the home the first time I came back to town and they told me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Me, too. Her prayers have lived inside of me all these years, Francie.”

“That sure is the truth. There were times I could almost see that ‘hedge of protection’ she was always talking about.”

A great wail erupts in the background. “You'd better go put that fire out,” I said.

“That's Hope. Gloria just bit her arm. Those two! ‘Bye, Myrtle!”

And she hangs up the phone.

I stare out of the filmy glass of the phone booth and I remember Stacy. I assume she's right there next to her own.

“Harlan?”

“Yes, Shug?”

“Did I ever tell you about the Evanses?”

“No, I don't believe you ever have.”

We lay in the section of the camper van we called “the loft.”

Harlan is just a real skinny guy and he's taken to wearing these new thin ties that the Chess King sells and they make him look even skinnier, if you ask me, not to mention straight off the set of
My Three Sons.
So you can believe me when I say it's easy for us both to fit on that bed that juts out over the driving area. Now, that, for your information is what makes this a Class C motor home and not a Class A. Class As look like buses; Cs resemble vans with a house piggybacked on it. Believe it or not, Melvin installed a skylight up here and we watch the stars a lot. All I can say is, “Thank You God we're not in that truck camper anymore.” Talk about cramped.

Now, Harlan and I have never had much of a problem in the love department, if you know what I mean, which could be a little surprising considering that Richard-in-Vermont escapade. However, that was only one bitter mistake in a lifetime that may have had many. Not only that, Harlan is tender and treats me with such care, not rough and rowdy like Richard. And now that the sweat is cooling and we both feel like cats, I figure I’d best bring it up.

“Do you want to hear about the Evanses?”

“If it's important to you.”

“They were my set of foster parents after I lost Mama.”

“Were they good to you?”

“Oh, yes! Mrs. Evans was the best lady in the whole world.”

“Was?”

“She died, too, when I was thirteen.”

“Oh, Shug!”

See? This is why he doesn't know the whole story yet. Harlan feels other people's pain way too acutely.

He shakes his head. “I knew I was doing the wrong thing by staying silent. I knew I should have asked you to talk about your pain! Here you've been carrying this around and I could have helped lighten your load.”

“Don't be silly, Harlan. You did lighten my load.”

And there it all plays out, just like I knew it would, me comforting him. I hold him to myself as he says, “I’m sorry, Shug. I’m so sorry. I should have known. I should have cared more.”

“Oh, Harlan, don't be ridiculous. You do care! Now let's get off this topic before I explode. I have some things I have to tell you. Hold on for a second.”

Naked, I jump down from the bed, use the bathroom and stare at myself in the mirror for a while. How could I ask him to just suddenly bring a child into the ministry?

Aahhh! But the self-punishment he's doing right now for not having the instincts he feels he should have had will work in my favor. Of course he'll let me keep Hope now.

Thank You, Jesus. The timing couldn't be better.

I climb back up into the loft and wrap myself beneath the quilt, next to his lean warmth.

“So why do you want to tell me about the Evanses tonight, Shug?”

He takes my hand and we continue to stare at the Plexiglas-covered sky. A dim reflection of our faces stares back — Harlan's long thin aspect with that Fred Astaire chin, me with my Irish smile and Transylvania hair. My ball-bearing breasts. His sunken chest. If any couple looks less glamorous after making love than we do, they must be one sorry pair! I smile despite the sad story ahead, the part where Mrs. Evans dies.

I cry again, because Harlan is the only person to whom I could ever confess my longing to tell Mrs. Evans of my love.

“I think she knows, Shug.”

“I’m hoping Jesus passed along the information.”

“I’ll bet He did just that.”

I pull the quilt up—the one Luella made us for our wedding present—around my shoulders.

“Anyway, my stepsister Francie called the ministry and I called her back.”

“What did she want?”

“Stacy, she was the youngest sister, the one I shared a room with, died a month ago.”

“Oh, no, Charmaine. Are you okay? I was wondering why you were so quiet today.”

“It gets worse, though. Stacy had a little girl named Hope. Two years old.”

“Poor thing. At least she's got her daddy.”

“There's no daddy in the picture.”

“Well, you can sure relate to all of that, then, can't you, Shug?”

I am silent.

“Talk to me, Shug.”

“Stacy left a will, Harlan, concerning little Hope. She left her in my care.”

Harlan is silent.

I don't know what to say. I want him to ask a question and any question will do because I’m not a choosy type, not after living half a childhood off cold egg sandwiches from the Texas Inn.

The silence of grief and the night impregnates itself with sleep, for me anyway. February night rolls over inside a freshly quilted blanket of dew and shuts off the sounds of all that is human.

A touch awakens me. Harlan's thin hand is gilded with the morning sun. He flips his fingers over my knuckles as glibly as he flips through the soft onionskin pages of his old Bible. I gaze out over the prickly cornfield beside the church.

“When do we go pick up Hope?” he whispers. His fingers travel to my chin and he parallels my face with his own.

“As soon as Forest Hill Church can let us go?”

“The last meeting is tomorrow night. Why don't you call Francie and let her know we'll be down the morning after. We'll get an early start.”

I raise my own flittering fingers through the thinning hair atop his head. “You're really something, Harlan Hopewell.”

“No, Shug. You are.”

“What made you want to take her on?”

“Her name. Can you imagine it? Hope Hopewell? That's a name that will make anyone smile. Especially you, Charmaine.”

“Why do you say that?”

“You need somebody to belong to, Shug.”

“But I belong to you.” I nestle against his shoulder. I love this man so much.

“Not in the same way.”

He is right. And I find it amazing that a man who truly knows so little about me knows me so well.

6

H
onest to goodness, I swear if we owned a house, which we don't, we'd have to take out a second mortgage just for diapers! I make Harlan and the boys stop at rest stops all the time as soon as I change Hope because I refuse to travel all day in the RV with a soiled diaper.

I wouldn't trade my Hope for anything in the world, and most every mother I know says the same thing and rightly so. She took to us right away. Harlan loves her, too. “We've been sent a gift from God, Shug!”

And I agree.

The nicest thing I noticed about Hope right up front is this, she has Mrs. Evans's pansy eyes. I feel like God is giving me the chance to give back to Mrs. Evans all she did for me. Yep, pansy eyes and feathery, light brown hair that her satin ribbons use as a sliding board.

And do the people at the crusades love her? Oh, my! Sometimes if Hope is crying, I’ll sing with her there on my hip. Our piano player, Henry Windsor, will even let Hope sit at the piano with him if both she and Leo, Grace's four-year-old, won't stay content in the nursery. Grace Underhill is our resident, yet precious, as in “all God's children are precious” fly in the ointment. She sings with the crusade as well now. So there we'll be, up on stage singing and playing with the kids all around us and the folks out in the congregation thinking we're just regular folks after all. Just like them.

In all truthfulness, I think Henry likes having someone next to him up there. He's quite short, almost as short as I am. Dresses up in dark suits, shirts stiffer than Mama's gin, and hangs bright yellow ties around his neck—sunshiney bits of silk that light up a face filled with the joy of music. Henry and I love to perform together. And when I’m with him, I’m glad I’m short.

Now, I don't know much about much, but crusade people have much more in common with the circus crowd than they do regular, house-abiding citizens.

Tonight is a night like that. The Songbirds have been complete once again for several years now. I love them like sisters, well, Ruby anyway. Grace is more like that annoying cousin you feel so sorry for you can't turn away. But our voices blend like sisters’ voices. However, I do believe the Songbirds are beginning to crumble and it breaks my heart.

So tonight we start with “Jesus Loves Me,” a wonderful message no doubt. Ruby undergirds us all with her deep, African tones, and Swedish-rooted Grace lifts us up with her sweet high notes. And then there's me, in the middle as usual, doing the melody. I guess Mrs. Evans really knew what she was talking about all those years ago.

Ruby wears red like she almost always does and she stands to my left, tall and gorgeous, and smooth. Her butt protrudes beneath her gown, and so do her breasts and her tummy, but Ruby doesn't care. She always says, “I am woman, hear me roar!” and then she'll curve her thin, sculpted arms up into a bodybuilder's pose. The gown falls slim and straight, yet modest with a high neck and tight, long sleeves made of fine chiffon. After all, we sing to a pretty conservative crowd more times than not.