Some Love, Some Pain, Sometime

by J. California Cooper

  MLee turned back to her dishes, “Sir … My husband is maybe gonna move here to be with me, so I ain’t gonne be here in the evenin’s no more. I sure would like to keep my job, but … it’s gonna take me a long time to make up my mind bout my recipe. Why can’t you and me just forget bout them ole things anyway? I need my job, I surely do. And I like workin for you and the Mrs. I love the children and all. But I wish I didn’t ever make them cookies! They just done ruined my life.”

  Mr. Korky wrinkled his forehead, thinkin, then he said, “Everyone wants you to stay. Don’t worry … now. We’ll talk again when you get to know we really are your family.” He turned to go, “Oh, and we are giving you a $5.00 raise a week anyway. That ain’t as good as $60 a week you would make at the plant makin them cookies, but, I’ll … delay … drop the matter now. We’ll talk again, Emmy.” He left.

  On Sunday, MLee took Alec home. She did the drivin.

  She was surprised when she drove up to the little yellow house. The yard was clean and she saw the two trees planted on each side of the porch. Her rockin chair was still covered and sittin there, waitin for her. She shook her head in wonder, cause it seemed like that chair and everything else was years and years ago. She got out to see if there was any sign of another woman bein in her house. The house was clean. The kitchen table didn’t wobble anymore. There was no sign of any other woman anywhere. She went out into the backyard. Rosey was tied to a post in the next field, eatin new grass. The fence had been repaired and the chickens was runnin around, but they couldn’t get out. He hadn’t spent a lot of money, but he had spent some time on things. She was shocked and in wonder at it all. Alec had been doin somethin with hisself. Not much, but somethin!

  MLee moved into her own house when she got back to the city. “I got a house note now, better get to work.” She worked at night doin her bakin, and delivered cookies, pies and, now, sandwich orders in the afternoons. She barely had time to cook for the Korkys. She spread out to the work places she passed goin to and from that school, and took orders for the next day. It became a good and regular thing. She was deep in it before she realized it, and she had thought of it all by herself … with Mr. Korky’s help at askin and seekin out her secret recipe.

  Now, it was a little slow at first, very slow, so MLee kept on workin for the Korkys. She was dog-tired, dog-tired. After another year or so of all this workin, MLee counted her money and she had quite a bit. She never had spent a dime less it was on her business. MLee was really doin good on her cookin. She had even hired a little help. She paid her help extra to teach her how to read and write better. That MLee was somethin! And she could drive that car on her route with her eyes closed almost. She saved every dime that didn’t go in her food. She paid the house off. It was hers, for real!

  One day Mr. Korky said to her, “Emmy, where you rush off to every day so much? Mrs. Korky say you always runnin off. Since you got that car you say your husband bought you, you leave outta here quick as lightning. You making them cookies somewhere? Selling em?”

  “No, sir. Just got a family to tend to.”

  “Emmy, if I find out you are selling them cookies you wouldn’t give me the recipe for, I’ll put the city on you. They got laws and all, you know?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Alright now.”

  As soon as Mr. Korky left for the plant, MLee finished the jobs she had to do that mornin, cleaned everything up, then she went to see Mrs. Korky. “Mrs. Korky, mam, I blive I’m gonna have to quit.”

  “Oh, Emmy!” Mrs. Korky was what they say, dis … mayed.

  MLee went on. “My home needs me so much, and … and, well, I just got to go. The new girl, Sarah, can take over. She knows bout all I know now.”

  “Oh, Emmy. Well … I … You wait til Mr. Korky comes home.”

  MLee was takin her apron off. “So, I’m leavin today, now.”

  She was scared about the city license people and she was tired of arguin with Mr. Korky, so she quit. He like to died and so did his wife, cause MLee was clean and the best cook they had ever had. MLee stopped takin cookies and things to the school where the Korky children went. But she went every place else she could, always lookin over her shoulders for Mr. Korky. For the next three years she worked day and night, for herself. Savin, savin that money. She had other dreams now.

  She went home to the country two or three times cause she now had two grandchildren by Northa. Her son was still overseas somewhere I don’t remember. She was bout forty years old now, and she was tired, but she looked better than she had before she left here. And she had done put a spark under Alec, cause he was workin more steady. Tween the mill, which still gave Negroes the lowest, dirtiest work and the lowest pay, and other handyman jobs, he tried to hold in there. He finally gave up the mill, cause to keep his heavy labor job, the leaderman told him he would have to help build him a house and barn on that man’s own property! Wantin him evenin’s after his mill job, for no pay! Or lose his job! He started at it, paintin and carpenterin, but finally quit. “They make you feel like a nigger,” Alec said.

  Some other company had done bought up a lotta land round here, bout five or six miles away, and did a lot of plantin. When time came, they hired people to pick and gather the fruit and vegetables. Alec was one of em. They paid reeeall low wages, but he stuck with it. “I blongs to myself,” he said.

  He didn’t know what else to do to get MLee to come on home. One Sunday, sittin on the porch in the heat of the sun, he looked over the front yard; seein the two trees were doin real good, he decided to plant more of em. He walked two, three miles and dug up every young tree he wanted, brought em home and planted em, front and backyard. Trees everywhere.

  When MLee had been gone for bout five years she went back to the country. Drove up in front of her old house in a real nice car. Her purse full of money (a bank account full, too), her head full of dreams. The trees made the house look better, but MLee knew what was inside. The fence was patched, the yard was clean, but the house was still yellow and dry as she had left it.

  Alec came out and stood on the porch lookin at her, waitin. MLee had not come home very much, just come to see her grandchildren and leave. She finally got out the car and walked slowly through the little crooked gate.

  “You come home to stay this time?” he asked in a low voice.

  “I don’t know.”

  “I want you to come home.”

  “Why?”

  “Cause. Cause I love you, MLee.”

  MLee didn’t say nothin, just walked into the house, noticing it had a new screen door. MLee loved her little house. Had raised her children in it. Had loved Alec in it. Had stopped lovin Alec in it (cause of the pain, you know). Alec followed her around.

  She asked him, “You workin anywhere, Alec?”

  He sighed. “A little. Tried to go back to the turpintine plant. Walked way over there bout a week, but them smells make me sick. I tried, just couldn’t take it.”

  “What about the sawmill?”

  “It done closed, MLee. Put a whole lotta men outta work. It done closed. All the colored men built all the white boss’s houses and barns … for free … then the mill closed. I’m … I’m workin, plantin and pickin in the right seasons for a new company.” His voice brightened. “MLee, sometimes I’m workin right side of white men. Poor white men who ain’t doin no better than me! That company don’t care nothin bout them either. They makes the same money I do, some of em! They hungry sometimes, too!”

  MLee sat down in the kitchen. Said, “I need some of them men over here. We gonna get some work done to this house.”

  Alec sat down, puttin his head in his hands. “MLee, I ain’t got much money. I got some I saved from cuttin logs a little for the white man who sells cords, but he gotta whole lotta men to work for him now, so he don’t want to pay but $4.00 a day for a ten hour day. Sometime, only $2.00 or $3.00 when he got somebody waitin around. I been tryin to sell eggs. They good hens, but they ain’t steady. I sell Rosey’
s milk, don’t keep none for myself. Give some to Northa for them babies. I sell the calf when there is one. But I still ain’t saved no money, hardly.”

  MLee stirred in her chair, “You need to go somewhere and learn a real trade, Alec. Learn how to do somethin with your hands that let you work for your own self.”

  “I’m a old man, MLee.”

  “You may be beat out, but you ain’t old.”

  “Too old to be goin back to school like a boy.”

  “You know how to fix some things, Alec. Put up a sign say, FIX IT SHOP. Folks can’t afford new things. They need to get the old things fixed.”

  “MLee, these folks round here ain’t even got old things to have fixed in the first place.”

  “Then go into town to the Salvation Army or somethin and buy some and fix em and then sell em to somebody so they will have somethin for you to fix when it breaks down again.”

  Alec just looked at her. “With what, MLee?”

  “I found a way.”

  “You a woman.”

  “I’m a people. Plenty women don’t do nothin for their self. Some people do!”

  “A woman have it easier.”

  “I’m so tired of hearin people say things like that. Ain’t nobody got it easier less they born with all the money they gonna need, then they still ain’t got it easier, cause HAPPY don’t run that way. You! You got to work for what you think makes you happy! You got to try, anyway. I done found out.”

  “I’m proud of you. Proud of you, MLee. You somethin more than I figured. I don’t know how you done it, but …”

  “I tried. That’s how I done it. I tried.”

  Alec hung his head down, said, “Well …” His was a sad, sad sound.

  MLee took a deep breath. “I’ll tell you what I want you to do, so I can come home.” Alec raised his head. His little eyes moist, longin to have his wife back. She been gone more’n five years.

  Wellll, MLee fixed that old house up like new and Alec helped her every step of the way. They painted it! They hired a builderman who built houses and added three rooms and made the kitchen larger and it was full of all new things. Put on a new roof, put in new wirin, new plumbin. Her favorite thing was the bathroom INSIDE the house, with a tub AND a shower. Threw that ole tin tub away. Tore the old barn down and built it further away from the house, and Alec helped build a workshop for himself to WORK in. Alec even built a brand-new chicken house and got a sister for Rosey the cow, cause Rosey was old now. Built MLee a garage for her car. Now!

  Alec managed to take some lumber from the lumber MLee got for the house and he built her a good size booth a little to the side, front of the house, facing the road so she could have a cookie store. The lead builder complained bout Alec’ stealin wood and buildin things. He wanted to kinda tear Alec down cause he liked MLee. She was a wide-awake, go-getter woman. But MLee knew what Alec was doin, so she told the lead man, “Don’t worry bout it.”

  MLee drove back and forth from the city a couple times a week. She was buyin new curtains, spreads, tablecloths, drapes, sheets and just anything she wanted. Now … the last thing she got, she had to bring the man from the city to do. She wanted her a swimmin pool! She got it. Small, but it was a swimmin pool with a cover, and MLee used it too!

  Alec liked to died cause he didn’t know how much money MLee had. She told him, “I’m gettin broke. We’ll both be the same. You will have to work and take care of me.” He scratched his head and grinned, cause it wasn’t nothin he could say. She was not sleepin with him yet. They both had their own room. She heard him walkin round in his room on the nights she stayed at home and she wanted to call him in, but she said to herself, “When I do let him in, he ain’t gonna be so easy to cheat on me again.” Cause, you know, she did love the father of her kids.

  One of them rooms was built for her grandchildren. Northa was not happy with her life nor her husband. She was livin MLee’s old life. MLee wanted to take the kids and send Northa to the city to run the business and even start college if she wanted to. “Have a new chance in life. Do somethin for herself,” she said. Northa cried from sheer happiness and she started goin up to that city with her mother to learn how to do things. MLee was plannin to go up twice a week and make cookie batter til Northa learned everything. Then, too, her son would be comin home some day. It was his too, if he wanted it. Her whole life was steady changin! Touchin a lot of people. Even I start lookin up that ole dusty yellow road.

  Well, when all the buildin was done, the pool filled, the dust had settled, MLee went out early one mornin on the new front porch. Alec had set her rockin chair out, still covered, and he had set another one out for himself. She uncovered her rockin chair, looked at Alec and smiled. He just grinned, glad his wife was back. He read a lot into her smile at him. Who knows? But I blive he better be more manly about everything, cause MLee done found out she can DO things by herself, for herself.

  Anyway, then she sat down and started rockin. Rockin and smilin. Lookin at her trees. Lookin at her store booth. Lookin up that long, ole, dusty, yellow road. Just’a smilin. And rockin. And lookin. Thinkin. Smilin, chile.

  Somebody for Everybody

  Being alone, feeling alone, in a small town can be pretty hard on you, cause you don’t hardly have too many people to choose from to fall in love with. Being alone and feeling alone in a big city can be worse cause there be so many people and, still, ain’t none of em yours. You got a lot to choose from, but it’s more to loneliness than just choosin somebody. They say it’s somebody for everybody, but just prove it sometime!

  Now, this story is shaped like a “V” to me. Two different stories startin at the top and meetin together at the bottom. I don’t know zackly how to begin, but … here goes.

  Kissy, born Kissella Mae, was in Chicago on this cold, cold, wind razor-sharp, snowy night. She huddled in her bed trying to keep warm. She had worked her eight hours plus two hours overtime because the girl to relieve her was late. It was drafty in the little place where she worked as a waitress. The door openin all the time. Even though she only lived in a room with kitchenette, it was her “home” and she wanted to get back to its warmth.

  Kissy was alone in this big city. Didn’t have nobody. She didn’t want anyone she knew and, maybe, they didn’t want her either. She had tried, several times, to be together with somebody, but it just didn’t work out. She was still alone.

  She lay there, feeling bottomless depression in that deep, endless, loneliness. No husband, no child, no friend even, that she was close to. Just nobody, but herself. She shivered, thinkin, “No electric blanket either. Not even a small electric footpad.”

  Kissy’s mind roamed back, reluctantly, over the twenty years since she had left her tiny, small hometown. She had gone to California to have an operation she had heard she could get to make her, you know, smaller. California cost too much to live in and she couldn’t save for the operation, which also cost a lot, so she moved on to Chicago to try to see a doctor she read about and stayed twenty years tryin to save the money for the operation. And, too, twenty years of looking for somebody to live her life with. Wasn’t nobody for her in her hometown. She had tried. She thought here, in a big city, she would find “the ONE.” At first, she was excited and hopeful, surely expecting a lover who would turn into a husband. Someone with money, maybe. A business, maybe. No luck. Lady Luck was busy helpin somebody else who probly didn’t even need her.

  Then, she just wanted to meet somebody with potential. Well, that’s a good thing to have. No luck. Then, just a man with a good job. All good dreams, but good fortune didn’t even seem to know Kissy, much less smile on her.

  Though Kissy was not a virgin, she thought of herself that way because she had never felt what it was to be a satisfied woman. Never did feel good up under a man. So to her, she WAS a virgin. And, to Kissy, masterbation was degrading. To have to make love to your own self was a sign of something she did not like for herself.

  Now, the main problem was something Kissy
was born with. She was a small size woman. Petite, they call it. But her personal part, the part she made love with, her whatchamacallit, was very large. Nobody fit. They tried and some of them laughed. A few got up before they were finished, which is unusual for men cause you know they’ll stay no matter what a woman has to offer. Now, that hurt in Kissy’s heart.

  She had never, even the first time when she really was a virgin, known the pleasure of lovemaking. Or love that lasted any time. Who had stayed? Nobody. Later, those same few, who stayed for her little money or tips she made, laughed and called her “Lucy.” “Juicy Lucy” the mean evil ones said. They left to find someone more fitting to them. You know what I mean?

  Wasn’t nothing Kissy could do, it was naturally natural. Not her fault that she was too large for the average man to know what he was into. Cause of her pain … and loneliness, she got desperate. Kissy wanted to be like other women. Wanted. Loved. That pushed her to try men she didn’t really want, never would have tried in any other circumstance. She did not intend to be a loose woman. Once she tapped a new lover on his shoulder and said, “Please, let’s stop. I can’t even tell what you are doing.” One time she waited for someone to make love to her and thought he took a long time with that foreplay stuff. Finally, when he got up “through,” she was still waitin for him to start. Never felt a thing.

  Well, now, life ain’t ugly. Ain’t too far sad. But it does have little twists and turns for each of us. Don’t laugh. Kissy knew what it was, or was not, for her. Do you know what yours is?

  One morning, not long after that winter day in Chicago, Kissy gave up and decided to go home. She was now thirty-eight years old. “Hell with it!” she cried out in her little kitchenette. “I’m tired! I been here all this time and I ain’t doin nothing for myself really. Ain’t findin no lover or husband. I can’t help it if I am built wrong. I’m goin home to rest. And die. I got my nieces and nephews. Plenty of em. I ain’t gonna think of sex and love again!” She was fussing with the air, but she lay down on her bed and cried when she was finished fussin.