Reverend Love surveyed the faces of the remaining boys surrounding me. He picked up my Bible bag and handed it to me. “Are you all right?” he asked.
I indicated I was okay, but I glared at Lerman until he dropped his gaze.
Reverend Love spoke quietly through tight teeth. “Matt, pew duty. Jason, you help. Lerman, clean the bathrooms. Now.” He took a weary breath.
“Faith, come on down off there.”
She stood still for a full minute, considering her options, then came down the way she’d gone up, by way of the rainspout, onto the metal trash container near the back entrance to the kitchen.
Reverend Love waved everyone inside.
“The show’s over, y’all.” He took Faith by the arm.
“What in the name of kingdom come were you thinking? Somebody could have been seriously hurt. The boys were wrong to be bothering Dulcie, but I can’t have you being a vigilante around here.”
Faith shook him off and walked into the church. She didn’t look at me as she passed, ignoring me completely—as if she hadn’t just saved my skin—as if she hadn’t been magnificent, my very own avenging angel.
15
b-u-r-d-e-n
burden (n.)
anything that is carried; heavy load; the refrain or chorus of a song
When I arrived to sew choir robes with Evangeline the next day, Faith was already seated at one of the banquet tables. Evangeline leaned over her, head bent, gentle words floating, “That’s right. Uh-huh. You don’t have to hurry it. Take your time.”
Faith unhooked scissors from her thumb and forefinger, and placed them down hard on the table. “I can’t do it. I keep messing up.”
Evangeline patted her hand, covering Faith’s rough, nail-bitten fingers. “Child, we all mess up. We just got to keep trying.”
Faith didn’t look at me. In fact, she ignored me completely. She picked up her scissors and scowled.
Evangeline threw out her arms and embraced me, like she hadn’t seen me in a month. Maybe she’d had her fill of Faith’s no-can-do attitude. “Dulcie, you are just in time. Faith and I cut out the rest of the robes this morning.” She beamed, as bright as sunshine rays. “Faith was kind enough to come in extra early.”
Faith gave me a miserable glance. “Preacher-man’s idea. Crack-of-dawn punishment for making what he called an embarrassing display.” Then she said, in a perfect Reverend Love imitation, “On a Sunday, no less. I appreciate what you were trying to do, but that wasn’t the way to go about it.”
She pointed at me, scissors in hand. “You owe me, big-time.”
I dug into my Bible bag and took out my notebook. I pointed at the smiley face and showed it to Faith and smiled. I wanted to let her know I appreciated her taking on the Bible study bunch.
She shrugged. “They had it coming.”
The bulletin from Sunday church service fell out of my notebook and floated to the floor. Evangeline picked it up and examined the cover carefully.
“A swan flying above Redeemer. Imagine that.” She gave me a sidelong look, saying under her breath, “You remember what I said. Those creatures are a thing of beauty, but dangerous, you hear.” She handed the bulletin back to me, her face full of meaning.
Somehow she knew I’d been back down to the swan nest and was letting me know she knew. I tucked her warning, along with the bulletin, back into my bag.
Faith put down her scissors with a thump, finished with the robe she had been cutting. Her voice hopeful, she asked, “So, we done?”
Evangeline guffawed loudly. “No, child. Now we have to trace the patterns onto the cloth, and then we have to sew ’em.”
Faith put her head down on the table and moaned. Evangeline’s laugh, Mama, was warm and heavy, like syrup, and she poured it over you until you couldn’t help but gobble it up.
Faith went back to work and shushed her complaining.
Evangeline showed us how to copy the dots and lines of the pattern onto the cut-out fabric shapes with blue tracing paper. We had to unpin the pattern from the fabric every few inches, and insert the tracing paper between the top and bottom cloth, and then run a little tracing wheel along the seam lines printed on the paper pattern. When we took the tracing paper away, the markings were left behind on the fabric, so that we would know where to sew.
While we worked, Evangeline sang songs about freedom, going home, flying up to heaven, and one about somebody named John Brown.
The stars above in heaven now are looking kindly down,
His soul’s marching on!
Faith recognized the tune and sang along.
Glory, Glory, Hallelujah!
Her voice was high and sweet, a perfect accompaniment to Evangeline’s low silky tones.
Glory, Glory, Hallelujah!
His soul’s marching on!
Evangeline cast a glance at me. “Dulcie, you can sing along. Feel it in your body and let it free. Many ways to speak, sugar—not all of them with words. Some creatures don’t need sound at all to communicate. There are ways under heaven to say what you got to say that are more natural than words can ever be.”
I knew Evangeline was right, Mama. I thought about the swans—their secret language—how they spoke to me, and me to them—how we understood each other without words.
Faith and Evangeline continued singing. Using the tracing wheel to keep rhythm with their voices, notes sang out of my soul, and I made melody without a sound. I had only to imagine my voice rising out of me with ease, serenading right along with them.
Evangeline said, “That’s it, girl. Don’t let nobody tell you that you don’t have a voice, when you can communicate just fine.”
We worked until lunchtime. Evangeline brought out egg salad sandwiches and soda bottles from a metal cooler under the sink. We went outside to the farthest picnic tables by the playground, seeking shade.
Faith spread out on her back atop one of the tables. “Man, I am dog-tired.” She ate her sandwich, looking up at the sky, her feet dangling over the edge.
Evangeline pried off the bottle tops with an opener, the kind Ray called a church key, and handed us each a soda. Evangeline laid out a cloth and some napkins, then sat, unwrapping her sandwich. I sat across from her.
Faith asked, “Miss Evangeline, you always been a choir director?”
She laughed. “Lord, no. Only since May. But it is my calling, I do believe.” She took a swig of pop. “No, girl. I used to sew down in Atlanta, back in the day. I took in laundry, repair work, made dresses for people. Had me a husband back then too. We had a child. Things were hard for us, those days. Hard to get jobs. Hard to find a place in a world that didn’t seem to want you, anyhow.”
Faith sat up and crossed her legs. “You have a kid?”
Evangeline wiped some crumbs away with her napkin. With her voice low, and keeping her eyes down, she let the words rush out of her. “My baby’s name was Jeremiah. When he was six years old, he opened up the screen door by himself. The puppy Jeremiah’s daddy got him for his birthday ran out through it. Jeremiah followed that puppy right into the street, got hit by a car. He died in my arms, right in front of our house.”
Evangeline laid her hands on the table, palms down, as if she were trying to keep her balance. She shook her head, as if by doing so she could keep something away from her that was threatening to overtake her.
Faith said what we were both thinking. “I am so sorry, Miss Evangeline. I didn’t mean to pry.”
Evangeline looked out to the tree line and the field beyond. “I left Atlanta. I wandered here and there after that, settled in different towns, looking for a place to bury my hurt.”
She took a stick of licorice root from her dress pocket and broke off a small piece of it. The smell was rich and crisp, lingering in the air around us. “I was so angry with God. I kept asking, ‘Why did you take my baby from me?’ ” Evangeline popped the piece of licorice root into her mouth and chewed it as if it relieved her of calling forth her loss. “One day I f
ound my way into a church.”
She gathered up the wax-paper sandwich wrappers and folded them neatly.
“I started to sing. I went into that empty church every night, and I sang. I sang until I was hoarse. I sang even when I couldn’t sing. One song at a time, I let go of the anger.”
Faith’s eyes were round black buttons. “This church?” she asked.
“Yes, this very church.” Evangeline waved away a fly from the table. “But how I got here is another story for another time.” Evangeline got up slowly. She patted Faith on the shoulder and went inside.
Faith and I lingered outside at the picnic table for a bit, soaking up the sun, letting the breeze tickle our bare feet. A ladybug landed on Faith’s arm. She studied it for a while, then told it, “Fly away home. House is on fire. Your children are alone.” She blew on it, and the insect took to the breeze.
Evangeline’s story hung in the air between us, giving us pause, before we followed her inside. I understood then, the reason Evangeline knew the language of heartbreak so well, Mama. Though you would have never known it, she was near to drowning in it herself.
Back in the vestry, Evangeline said we were finished if we wanted to be. But Faith and I stayed.
We spent the afternoon singing, or as Evangeline said, letting go of our troubles. Faith’s clear high notes, Evangeline’s low smooth ones, and my silent ones—the rhythm of the sorrow inside us rising up in a chorus of glory hallelujahs.
16
a-p-o-s-t-l-e
apostle (n.)
a person sent out on a special mission
Tuesday came—a whole week since I’d hit Loretta Swinson with my Bible. The day gave way to the glory of summer, the corn rising along with the heat. Evangeline had gone to town for sewing machine needles. Aunt Bernie was off to a Ladies’ Auxiliary luncheon at Mrs. Butler’s. Reverend Love had taken Faith to visit a county social worker to settle her paperwork.
I loaded up Maybelle with a couple of slices of Wonder Bread snitched from the bread box in the kitchen. Then I headed out for the pond and the swans. I pedaled down Victory Road, my heart lifted in anticipation, anxious to visit the birds and enjoy the quiet of their world.
When I arrived, the swans greeted me, swimming close, observing me with care, protecting their babies from possible danger. After a bit, even the babies—the little pens and cobs—swam up, curious. I tore off little pieces of bread and tossed them into the water.
Penny Lane and Mr. Cobb held off from eating, letting the cygnets grab their fill. The parents were no doubt hungry too but remained watchful over the little ones as they enjoyed the feast I’d brought them. The cygnets stayed close to their parents and were often reminded to stay put with a tiny shove from Penny or Mr. Cobb. Some of the babies were bolder than the others, some greedier, some staying farther back. They seemed to have already grown a couple of inches since I’d first discovered them. Their bodies were rounder, their stubby pink legs sturdier.
When the bread crumbs were gobbled up, I climbed up onto the tree limb to watch them at their doings. The babies resembled ducklings, short-necked and stubby. Their wings resembled little appendages, without much worth. They didn’t seem to mind that they weren’t as beautiful as their mama and papa, though they imitated the way Mr. Cobb and Penny majestically preened their wings in the sunshine, flapping their downy baby winglets with pride.
Penny Lane waddled up to the shallows and paddled her feet in a back and forth motion—loosening the plants and reeds from under the water. She nibbled here and there, waiting for the babies to do likewise, teaching them to gather the natural food within their reach.
After a bit, Penny and the cygnets toddled up to their nest, the large mound of sticks and leaves in the middle of the pond. Mr. Cobb swam nearby, guarding his brood—on watch—as the babies tucked their heads under Penny’s wings.
Watching them made me ache, Mama.
Though I couldn’t say it to anyone, missing you was like a fever that would come on all of a sudden, making me swoon with longing, my chest aching as if my heart had turned itself inside out. I had no control over it. I missed you so bad, Mama. I missed our life in Lilac Court. I even missed Ray.
Yearning crept up and lingered there with me. The trees sighed, holding me in their sway. The little splashes the swans made soothed me. I closed my eyes and imagined that I was curled up next to you—imagined that I had not left you that morning—imagined I had stayed with you—holding on for dear life.
Ray hadn’t called or visited. He stayed away, as near as I could figure, because I was just a reminder of you and what had happened in the trailer that day. Sending me to Shepherdsville was the only way he could get on with living, I guess, not having to look at me and remember our life together.
When I lost you, Mama, I lost Ray, too. He was the only daddy I’d ever known. Now that you are gone, I’ll never know who my real daddy is. You had promised that you would tell me one day, when I got old enough. Remember?
He could be somebody right there in Shepherdsville. Somebody I sat next to in church, or stood next to in line at Kessler’s Drugstore. I couldn’t help noticing every single man who might fit the bill—comparing him and me. Was his nose the same shape? Or his eyes the same color as mine?
I wondered if my daddy would know me on sight the same way I imagined Mr. Cobb would know his own swan babies, even when they were grown and had flown away.
I climbed down from the tree limb and wandered closer to the pond’s edge. The water was murky, green with algae and little tadpoles. My hands were sticky with tree sap. I only meant to wash up. No sooner had I put my hands into the water than Mr. Cobb came at me like a bolt of white lightning.
He came right up out of the water at me—his wings spread full—hissing like a cat. He thought I meant his family harm, and he aimed to stop me. I took a couple of steps back, and he surged forward, flapping his wings.
I heard Evangeline’s instructions in my head, how she told me to signal I meant no harm. “Now, if a swan were ever to get riled, you stand your ground. Hold perfectly still. You raise your arms out to your sides and hold them like Jesus on the cross. You act like a swan. Spread out your wings.”
I lifted my arms out, stood still like a statue, and looked Mr. Cobb right in the eye. I tried with all my being to communicate with him. I don’t mean you any harm. He remained in front of me, just a few feet away. He pulled his wings in, yet held his position. We stayed like that for a minute, until he got bored and went back into the water, ignoring me.
Shakily I walked to the edge of the clearing and looked back. Mr. Cobb paddled out to the nest, his long neck raised, as if to say, This is my place. I make the rules. He stuck his beak under the water and nibbled at the grasses as if he didn’t care about me at all, but I knew he was still watching me closely.
I made my way to the parking lot and back to Maybelle, breathless, legs quivering. If something had happened to me back there, no one would have known.
As I came around the corner of the church, I almost collided with the clothesline that Evangeline had set up from a hook on the church wall, by the vestry. The other end was fastened to a tree by the picnic tables. The last of the choir robe fabric was clothes-pinned to it—a rainbow flapping in the breeze. Evangeline sat in a webbed lawn chair, reading a Life magazine and sipping from a bottle of Coca-Cola.
“Well, Dulcie Dixon, where did you come from? Like to scare a person half to death.”
I pointed at my bike. Just out for a ride. She wasn’t convinced.
“What have you been up to?” She looked me up and down, taking in my mucky shoes and dirty hands. “You can wash up here.”
She rose out of her chair and unpinned one of the long rectangles of fabric from the clothesline. “These are dry anyhow. You can help me fold, once you clean your hands. I’ll press ’em and put ’em up in the vestry. You never know, our bitty choir might grow, then we’d have to sew us up some more robes.” I knew Evangeline shouldn’t cou
nt on that, Mama. The folks at Redeemer didn’t strike me as a rainbow-wearing type of crowd.
I washed my hands in the vestry sink, then helped Evangeline take down the fabric. We folded it into a laundry basket and took it inside. Evangeline opened up the ironing board and plugged in the iron.
She bent over and got a Coke out of her old metal cooler and handed it to me. “You find something back there, you don’t mention it to nobody, you hear? None of that wild pack down in the basement need to know anything about it. No need to mention it to your auntie, either.”
I made the motion of locking up my mouth and throwing away the key. Evangeline looked sideways at me and guffawed. “Well, I guess we don’t have to worry about that, do we?”
She touched the iron, making sure it was hot enough. “I reckon it’s high time I tell you the story about the swan that brought me to Redeemer. Seems you’ve earned it. Being a swan-keeper yourself.”
A swan-keeper. That sounded exactly right to me, Mama. I sat in the overstuffed chair in the corner, ready to listen.
She pressed the strips of bright cloth as she talked. “Years ago this would have been, before you were born. After I lost Jeremiah, I felt the need to move on. There wasn’t much work to be had for a woman of color, and I didn’t have much savings. I prayed and asked the Lord to send me a sign. I waited and I waited, but the Lord was silent. Nothing.”
She glanced my way. “You listening?”
I nodded.
“So I took matters into my own hands. I went to the bus station and bought a ticket as far north as I could afford—to Chicago. But I only made it to Ohio, because the bus driver wouldn’t let me use the bathroom on the bus. I had to wait until the scheduled stops. I put up a fuss, and he pulled into the station here in Shepherdsville and left me right in the parking lot. Tossed my suitcase out after me.”
Evangeline sprinkled water from her ironing bottle, then smoothed the fabric, then sprinkled some more. After she ironed the cloth until it was smooth and shiny, she handed it to me to fold.
Rising Above Shepherdsville Page 9