This Bitter Earth (16 page)

Chapter 19

FAYLINE had been expecting a bit of a crowd. Well, it was Friday and there was some hot band out of Jericho that would be playing at Two Miles In that night. The young girls that had come into her shop for Shirley Temple curls a few years ago were now women that were on the look-out for men.

They wanted their hair relaxed, bumped, flipped and streaked. They all wanted to look like The Supremes.

The first person to step through her door was Handy. Fayline knew that Handy always traveled with Ike, but Ike was a few years older than him and moved ten times slower. They were the oldest things walking and spoke as if they’d been around when the founding fathers installed the first marker that would become Bigelow.

“Boys,” Fayline greeted them even though Ike hadn’t even reached the door yet.

“Fayline.” Handy spoke in a heavy whisper, making the word sound as if it were spoken with his last earthly breath.

Ike shuffled in and lifted his hand in greeting to Fayline before sitting down in one of the old green-and-cream chairs she’d salvaged from her last dinette set.

“Y‘all come in for a wash and set?” Fayline teased and sat down in one of the dryer chairs.

Ike made a noise that sounded like a laugh, while Handy just grinned his toothless grin.

“No, we just coming from the station,” Handy said, and couldn’t help but lick his lips when Fayline crossed her thick legs.

“Uh-huh, y‘all down there playing dominoes?”

Ike grunted and Handy nodded his head.

Fayline waited for Handy to offer something more, but he just stood there, old, crooked and grinning.

“So y‘all stop in to take a rest before heading home?”

“Yeah, and we saw that girl that was here before.”

Fayline raised her eyebrows and sat up a bit straighter.

“What girl?”

“What they call her again, Ike?” Handy said, turning to Ike, who was beginning to nod off. “Ike!”

Ike twitched and opened his eyes.

“What the name of that woman we saw down at the depot tonight?”

Fayline leaned in and strained her ears best she could but could not make out a thing Ike was mumbling.

Handy turned back around to face Fayline. “Susan?”

“Herman Powell’s girl?” Fayline said, losing interest. “She back in town from college?” she said, getting up to get an emery board from a table packed with bottles, jars and nail polish. Handy had to wipe the drool that developed around his mouth from watching Fayline’s behind bounce beneath the material of her peach-colored polyester pants.

“No, not Susan. Uhm, Sally ... Sylvie ... Sara ...”

Fayline threw him a look that was filled with disgust. This man couldn’t even remember who he had seen a few hours ago and now he was in her shop trying to gossip about something he clearly couldn’t remember.

“Sally Epson or Morris? Sylvie Jenkins, the wife of Judd or his first cousin? Sara Cooper, Nathan, James or Brown?” Fayline folded her hands and waited.

Ike scratched his chin, looked up at the fluorescent lights, cringed and then looked down at his shoes.

“Well, Ike?” Fayline’s voice was becoming hostile. Gossip was like gold in Bigelow.

“Sugar.”

The name seemed to float out of nowhere and both Fayline and Handy turned on Ike in awe.

“That’s it, all right! Sugar!” Ike said, snapping his finger in triumph.

“Y‘all sure about that?” Fayline’s eyes were wide. “Sugar? Tall, black ugly thing?” Fayline’s mouth watered.

“Yup. But she didn’t seem too hard to look at to me,” Handy said, trying to straighten his posture.

“Well, you old and half-blind. Shirley probably look good to you.” Fayline’s mind was reeling as she picked up the phone to dial the very same person she had just insulted.

Ike mumbled something else Fayline didn’t catch, but Handy evidently heard loud and clear.

“Yeah, I think I was married to Shirley once upon a time,” Handy replied.

By the time Pearl descended the stairs again, Jewel in hand, and went to sit beside her husband on the couch, just about everyone in Bigelow knew that Sugar was back in town.

The women remembered Sugar quite well and shot their husbands warning looks, while forbidding their sons to go anywhere near Grove Street.

The Taylor family assembled in the living room, waiting for whatever would come next and not one of them had a clue. They had devoured their food in silence, their eyes playing tag with each other. Of course there was the occasional heavy breath and Gloria had tried to speak, but Seth had shook his head vigorously and had put his palm up, stopping any words that might slip from Gloria’s mouth.

Joe didn’t eat, he just sat in the living room clearing his throat, tying and untying his shoes. He did get up and walk toward the television, but changed his mind halfway there and returned to the couch.

When Pearl settled herself onto the couch next to Joe, Sugar moved to the doorway. She felt safer there.

Mercy remained in the kitchen, seated at the table, staring out the window toward the place where #10 once stood.

The kitchen was cozy and warm. It reminded Mercy of her grandmother’s kitchen and the good smells that always seemed to be there. Even the voices of the strangers were comforting. Mary’d always had a house full of people.

But these people were not dancing, laughing or playing cards; these people seemed to be mad and mourning all at the same time. Mercy wondered who had died.

Grandma.

Her mind reminded her and Mercy felt that piercing jab that would always accompany that realization.

She dropped her head and wished she were dead too.

Seth was still in his seat and Gloria had pulled the matching wing chair from across the room so that she could sit next to her husband.

Jewel whined a bit when she saw her mother and stretched her fat arms out to her.

“Well,” Pearl began as she passed Jewel off to Seth and then began fingering the small cross that hung from the thin chain around her neck.

Joe rubbed at the bump on his head and wondered if he was actually still unconscious and all of this was part of that state.

Pearl let out a heavy breath, clasped her hands in her lap, turned to face Joe and began.

“This day been on its way for a long time and I knew the good Lord would let me keep breathing until it got here.” Pearl looked over at Sugar and then back to her husband.

“When... when you came here,” she continued, turning her attention to Sugar again, “I knew you was suppose to be here with me... with us,” Pearl said and laid her hand on Joe’s knee. “You look so much like my baby, so much like her! Ooh, it hurt me just to look at you and it hurt me worse not to.” Pearl threw her hands up to her face. “Lord, you don’t know how I hated you for looking so much like my baby, it ‘bout drove me mad.”

Joe tried to wrap his arm around Pearl, but she shrugged him off.

“What you done to this family?” Gloria hurled at Sugar. “You hush, you hear? You don’t know nothing ‘bout this. Nothing!” Pearl turned on Gloria.

Gloria looked to Seth for support and when he offered none, she shrank back into her chair.

“I wanted to tell you, I tried to—” Joe finally found his voice, but Pearl didn’t allow him to use it.

“You kept it from me, when all the time you knew she was yours. You ain’t tell me even though I was dying inside and going mad in my head.”

Joe dropped his eyes in shame. “I wasn’t sure... I thought... and then the picture...” Joe’s mind was jumping between all of the scenes that had led up to this moment. Him and Bertie Mae beneath the birch tree; the full moon and the sound of footfalls echoing above their groans. Sugar moving in next door, the gossip. Seth in love and then in pain almost all at once. And then his dream the night Seth left. Someone was walking through his dreams and he could feel the low branches of a birch tree brushing against his bare back and then came Pearl’s horrifying scream from #10.

“I saw that white man call you back over. I saw him give you something, Joe, something that knocked the wind out of you. You sat down on that porch and I thought you would sit there forever.”

Pearl looked down at her hands as she spoke. “You came in and I wanted to ask you what was wrong, what that man had found over there, but your face looked so strange I was afraid to ask.” Pearl twisted her wedding ring around her finger. “You hugged me. You ain’t say a word, just held me real close like one of us was about to die.”

Sugar shifted her weight from one foot to the other. She wanted to sit down, but that would mean sitting on the couch with Pearl and Joe and she felt she had no place there.

She turned to look at Mercy, who was standing now and staring out of the kitchen window.

“You had something to drink that night. Plum wine, corn liquor, can’t remember which, and you fell asleep on the couch. I tried to wake you, but you wouldn’t move and that’s when I saw it, slipping out of your pocket.”

Joe’s face went gray.

“She sure was a fine woman,” Pearl said, looking at Sugar. “You favor her around the eyes and mouth.”

Sugar smiled back and for some strange reason she felt herself begin to blush.

“Pearl, I’m sorry.” “Sorry for being a man, Joe?” Those words carried ten long years of bitterness and Joe closed his eyes against them.

“Ain’t nothing you can say to make it better or make it go away. What’s done is done.” Pearl clapped her hands together. “You two.” She pointed to Sugar and then to Seth. “Y‘all family. Now you didn’t know that then, but you know now.” Pearl paused to consider her next set of words. “Y’all more than just family, y‘all are brother and sister.”

Seth twisted in his chair.

“Seems like there some things happening here that I don’t know about,” Gloria hissed at Seth and turned an even eye on Sugar. “So what happened ten years ago?” Her words were sharp.

“Something that concern them two and not you,” Pearl said as she pulled herself up from the couch.

“She my wife.” Seth felt he needed to say something, anything. This had all gone too smoothly for him. He wanted his mother to scream and cry and hate his father the way he was hating him.

“Yes, she is, and that was your choice, not mine.” Pearl spoke as she moved past him. “Man and wife don’t tell each other everything. Ain’t that right, Joe?”

She didn’t need an answer and wasn’t interested in hearing one.

“Sugar, come on in here and introduce me to this pretty child you done brought down here with you.”

Pearl took Sugar by the hand and they walked into the kitchen.

JJ hadn’t said much of anything since the band walked in late.

“We ain’t late, we right on time,” the slick-talking so-called manager of the band called Jericho replied. “My name is Luther Cobbs, my friends call me L.C.,” the man with conked red hair said and extended his hand to JJ.

“JJ,” was all Joe Jr. said.

“Yeah,” Luther said, pulling his hand back and running it across his hair. He gave the place a once-over before he turned his attention back to JJ.

“Nice place you got here. You the sole owner?”

JJ didn’t bother to answer him. “Set your boys up over there,” he said and turned and walked away.

The band played for three hours straight before they took a break. JJ had to admit that Jericho was probably the best band . he’d had at his club. They didn’t start out slow like most bands; they played every song like it was their last. With each tune the tempo rose until JJ thought they would actually blow the roof off of Two Miles In. At one point the entire building was trembling, and the pots that sat cooling on the stove in the back began knocking up against each other.

Mack, the piano player, was a round blind man with lips so tiny they folded away into his fat face when he smiled. He called for a bowl of ice when the trumpet player led him to the bar. His fingers were swollen from the knuckles on down to the tips.

“I ain’t never heard ivories sing like that!” Angel said, pushing her hefty bosom out toward him.

“Thanks,” Mack said.

“Yeah, the whole band is hot. But you, you are the best one—”

“He’s blind,” JJ interrupted her.

“He is?” Angel said, waving her hands in front of Mack’s face.

“Yep.” Mack laughed.

“She fine, though,” the trumpet player injected, enjoying the view that was wasted on Mack.

Angel considered the trumpet player for a moment. He was tall and as thin as a willow. “Oh,” she said, stepping around Mack. “I can’t be leading no man around,” she cooed, dabbing at the moisture that had formed in her cleavage. The trumpet player just grinned.

JJ shook his head and rang the cowbell he kept over the bar, indicating the last call of the night.

“Scotch, straight up.”

JJ heard the request and reached for the scotch bottle and a shot glass. He poured the liquor and looked up into the mirror to check out the man who’d made the request. But his features were distorted beneath the haze of body heat that had settled on the mirror.

“One dollar,” JJ said, turning to meet the man face-to-face.

JJ knew what his eyes looked like to other people because he saw it when he looked at himself in the mirror.

Living inside of him was an abysmal loathing that had begun when he hoisted the coffin of his baby sister up on his shoulder and watched as his mother folded into herself.

Years later the hate rooted itself deeper the night white soldiers stormed the barracks of his infantry with guns, blowing away most of the men in the company.

JJ had escaped with his life, but not his soul, and he had wandered aimlessly for months, living as a vagrant, first in small towns and then later in big cities. He would hold odd jobs, rent a room and buy a woman’s warmth whenever possible.

JJ would realize that it was the women who pushed him over the edge and sent him wandering again. Sometimes he would look down into their painted faces and see his dead sister, his crying mother or the twisted dying face of one of the men from the 364th infantry; or they would be lying beneath him, legs spread ready to receive him and make the sad mistake of looking into his eyes.