The Red Rose Box (4 page)

The man behind the wheel stopped the truck and said, “Four little barefoot country niggers.”

Nathan and Micah cowered, hunching their shoulders, the way colored boys had to when this kind of danger came around. Ruth and I looked straight down into the dust and we all kept walking. Fear walked with us. The man behind the wheel spat on the ground, laughed, and drove on. We turned and watched as the red taillights disappeared like red stars into the darkness.

Micah stood up straight and whispered, “I woulda said somethin.... I woulda but I don't wanna wind up hangin from no tree, burned to a crisp.”

I looked up, and a gray owl flew in front of the moon.

Nathan and Micah took the path to their house without saying another word and Ruth and I ran home. Afraid.

We planted the peach pit, hoping this one would grow and bear fruit. We were rich until tomorrow, Sunday, when we would drop our shiny dimes into the offering basket along with the other pennies, nickels, quarters, and a few fifty-cent pieces. Sometimes I looked at that money thinking we needed it more than God, but I never told anyone my thoughts. I was certain that kind of thinking would land me in hell or somewhere close.

So that night, I got out my rosary and put it around my neck before I went to bed.

Of course Ruth said, “Don't no rosary b'long round your neck.”

I kicked her hard under the covers.

The sun knew when to rise, the moon when to glow, lightning where to strike once, maybe twice.

It was Tuesday and Ruth and I sat in the back of Elijah's truck, scarves tied around our hair. The sun had just come up and as he drove we felt every bump in the dirt road. Elijah stopped his truck. We had come to the cotton fields, ready to work for two dimes, maybe two quarters. At least twice a week during the summer, Ruth and I found ourselves here. I looked at the tips of my fingers, knowing a little blood was about to flow. It was like touching the tiny thorns of a new rosebush, except the cotton plant wasn't pretty to look at. We took our burlap sacks and Ruth, Elijah, and I found a row. Elijah started picking and singing, picking and singing, Ruth and I behind him, picking, just picking. I tried to be careful not to stick my fingers but I always did and it always hurt.

“Ouch,” I said, rubbing the tip of my bloody finger on my dress.

Elijah said, “Hurry along, Leah. The skin on your fingers gonna get thick like mine, then you won't have nuthin to whine about.”

I looked at my hands. “I'm gonna be a schoolteacher, not no cottonpicker.

“A schoolteacher. You don't say,” was his reply.

“She's like Daddy ... dreamin,” Ruth added.

I looked at a tired old woman in the next row, reached toward the prickly plant, took hold of a piece of the white fluff, pulled at it without sticking my fingers, and placed it in the burlap sack.

Elijah was ahead of me, singing and picking when he looked back at me. “A schoolteacher? Who gived you that idea, Leah Jean?”

“It just come to me one day when I was watchin Mrs. Redcotton write on the blackboard. Mrs. Redcotton said I'm smart enuf. She went to college, so she oughta know.”

“You don't say.” Elijah bent over, singing and picking.

I thought about the red rose box and the postcard from Paris, a train that was about to take me far away, all the while picking and picking until my sack was nearly full.

I was tired when Ruth and I climbed into the back of Elijah's truck at the end of the day, but there were two quarters in my hand and two in Ruth's. I fell asleep.

The days and nights kept coming and Mama and Gramma stayed up late, cutting dresses, sewing, talking, their low laughter coming in under our door, and by the end of the week we had a closet full of clothes. Mama borrowed a few of what Sister Goodnight called her finer things and by the twenty-ninth day of June, we were in the back of Elijah's truck, on our way to New Orleans. I had the red rose box in my lap, hundred percent silk bed jacket and all.

Elijah let us off in front of the station with our bags, saying he was going to park, but when I saw his hand waving, I knew he was on his way.

I reached down and dusted off my patent leather shoes until I could see myself.

I looked around and around at everything and everybody until it felt like my head was spinning. A porter, high yellow and as polite as could be, came up behind Mama and asked her if she needed a little help. She told him we were going to Los Angeles and he asked to see our tickets. He winked at Mama, smiled at me, piled our trunk on a cart, and tried to take my red rose box. I told him I could carry it myself and I could tell he didn't know that we were poor and country. I followed Mama up four steps into the colored section on that Jim Crow train.

Mama and Gramma took their seats and Gramma put a quarter in the palm of his hand. He seemed thankful as he tipped his hat and walked away, humming a tune. Ruth and I were looking after him when the train started to move. We hurried to the window and stood, looking and watching. We were wearing matching pale blue sundresses with ruffled sleeves. Our hair was fresh and pressed with a warm comb.

I looked at Mama and I thought that she was pretty. I stood in front of her until she reached for me, put her arms around me, and sat me in her lap like a half-grown pig. Mama began to cry and tears rolled down her cheeks.

Gramma shook her head. “Why you cryin, Rita Ann?”

Mama replied through her tears, “Cuz I ain't never wanted nuthin, just a little house, a good husband, and some babies.”

Gramma reached for her hand. “Ain't nuthin wrong with bein content, if that's the way you was put together.” Then she said, “Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy,” and Mama stopped crying. Gramma said to me with two quick winks, “Hand me my shoe box, Leah Jean.”

I handed her the shoe box, Gramma opened it, offered me a piece of fried chicken, Ruth a piece of stick-it-together cake, Mama some roasted peanuts, and we ate. I sat in the window seat, watching the world go by. I pictured my daddy. Thinking about him made me smile.

Three days later, we were in Los Angeles.

I was never going to be the same.

 

 

 

A
unt Olivia walked through the crowd like she was walking on water, and no one had to tell me it was her. She was the prettiest woman in the station, white or colored, at least I thought so. Olivia and Mama looked at each other for what seemed like a long time but no words passed between them. Ruth and I stood together, holding hands. Too many people were weaving in and out, out and in. I kept one hand on Gramma's blue polka-dot dress.

Finally, Olivia, being the oldest and the wisest, reached for Mama and pulled her close. I could see Mama's hurt melt like butter in the sun. I looked at Olivia, and she must have felt my eyes on her soul because she let go of Mama, reached down, touched my shoulder, and kissed my cheek, then the top of Ruth's head. She gave Gramma a hug and a kiss. Then she put her arms around Ruth and me and we walked through the station.

I paused to look at the drinking fountain as we made our way to the door. I was thirsty and there were no signs. I pointed to it and asked Aunt Olivia, “That for white or colored?”

“Anyone who's thirsty, white or colored. No Jim Crow here.”

I turned the handle and the cool water met my lips.

We walked to Aunt Olivia's car. It was shiny blue and gleamed in the sun. A porter, who had a face like the man on the Cream of Wheat box, placed our things in the trunk, and as he took his tip with a smile, we got in.

Olivia drove slowly and it was a long ride, through streets full of people, some colored, most not.

Gramma said, “I cain't wait to get outta this girdle, into a housecoat. Lord have mercy, I hate to be uncomfortable.”

I looked out of the window, the red rose box in my lap, for ten minutes, according to my real watch. Then I turned and looked at my mama's sister, Olivia. She had dark brown hair, pressed and perfect, red lips and nails, no other face paint, the whitest teeth, skin the color of a sweet praline, delicate bones, and brown almond eyes that didn't dance.

We passed a red streetcar and I looked to see if colored were sitting in the back but I saw a lady with skin so black it was almost purple sitting right behind the driver, and I began to see what Mrs. Redcotton had talked about. We drove past a movie theater but there was no colored entrance, and we passed shops and restaurants, where there were no Whites Only signs. I started to think about the word
freedom.

When the car stopped, we were in front of Aunt Olivia's house. It was white with green shutters and two stories, and had a brick path, like a house where Mama had once worked in Lake Charles. Olivia called to me and Ruth, and she held our hands while we walked up the steps with her. There were six steps. I know because I counted them.

A round colored lady, dressed like a housemaid, black dress with a stiff white apron, opened the door. She wore a big smile, a black hair net, no gold teeth, and she called Aunt Olivia “Mrs. Chapel.” She was dark brown and her ears were pierced.

She said, “Evenin, Mrs. Chapel.”

Olivia replied, “Evenin, Mrs. Pittman. These are my nieces, Leah and Ruth Hopper.” Olivia turned to Mama and Gramma and continued her introductions. “And my mother, Mrs. Carter, and my sister, Marguerita ... Rita Hopper.”

“Leah, Ruth, Mrs. Carter, Mrs. Hopper, pleased to meet you. I'm called Mrs. Pittman round here, though I ain't got no mister to speak of.” Mrs. Pittman held the door open and we walked through, into another world.

While the grown-ups' minds and eyes were on one another, Ruth and I wandered off. We looked but didn't touch because everything was too fancy. It seemed like no one touched anything and we weren't about to start.

There was a long violet velvet sofa. Two chairs, the color of cream, had threads of gold that made them glisten in the sunlight. In the corner there was one large violet velvet chair with a footrest that matched. Glass lamps with pale yellow shades sat on tables of dark polished wood. The floors were covered with rugs that my feet sank into. There were paintings on the walls surrounded by frames of gold and a staircase with a white banister that curved its way upward. Beauty was everywhere and I liked the way it felt. Ruth took my hand and we smiled at each other as I led her to the foot of the stairs. We looked up, silent, like two cats waiting.

Mrs. Pittman came up behind us and we almost jumped out of our skins.

She said, “Y'all must be tired. I'll show you upstairs to your room so's you can get freshed up.”

We walked up those fifteen steps and she took us to a room where everything was pink, including the walls. Mrs. Pittman brought in our traveling bag and left it inside the door. She showed us the bathroom that was attached to the room and it was pink too.

Mrs. Pittman told us as she stood in the doorway, “Mrs. Chapel fancies pink. Mr. Chapel be home soon and you oughta be dressed, ready for supper by then.”

She closed the door and we took our shoes off and jumped, like grasshoppers, on the bed that was big enough for two. Ruth went into the bathroom, flushed the indoor toilet, and turned on the water in the tub.

I made her stop. “We don't have time for no bath. Change your drawers and wash up in the sink.”

We washed our faces, necks, arms, legs, and ears with pink washcloths that we were afraid to get dirty, put on clean underpants, white undershirts, never worn, matching lavender dresses, clean white socks, and our patent leather shoes. I combed Ruth's hair, braided it into two braids, then combed and braided mine. We sat on the bed, waiting. We didn't know what else to do.

We sat for ten minutes before Mrs. Pittman knocked on the door.