Some Love, Some Pain, Sometime

by J. California Cooper

  Now, Kissy had been tryin to save money for that operation she wanted, and she had saved some, but something always came up and she had to use it. Lots of time she sent it home to her mother cause somebody in the family needed it. They thought cause she was up there, in the North in that big city, she must be makin big money. They were wrong, but she always sent what she had and started again.

  That operation she was savin for was one she had heard about that they could cut part of your “private part” away and leave it smaller. Nicer. More normal for life. So she had a little money now somebody hadn’t sent for, yet. She decided she would use it to go home and get herself settled, then look for a job.

  She informed the apartment manager and her job she would be leaving. She began working on things getting ready to go home. She thought, “I’m goin home worst than I was when I came. I’m older. A failure. Still a single woman. No children. Alone.”

  Now, Buddy is on the other side of that “V.” He had moved to a smaller town from a big city, thinking his chances to get a good wife would be better there. More reasons for a wife to be faithful cause there were less men to choose from. He had had his problems growin up because he was not all that good-lookin. He had a strange way about him, but it came from his takin time to listen to others and try to help them in some way. People aren’t used to that.

  Buddy was the kind of man that was just nice. There is, I believe, at least one in every town, nice to the point of bein a fool sometimes, I think. Cause all he wanted was some friends and a woman of his own but all the women did in this town was use him. Used him! Play with him. Teasin and talkin about him. I don’t know the WHOLE story, cause people lie a lot, but I do know them women used him. And because he wanted somebody so bad, he would take what he could get and give all he had.

  It seems it was a fact that Buddy had been too well blessed (?) with that whatchamacallit men, and some women, make such a fuss over. All the ladies in town claimed to be built too small (?) to handle his problem. They mostly talked about him at Curlee Ree’s Beauty Shop, cause that’s who he liked best or did the most for, Curlee Ree. She talked about him like a fool dog! The others would purse up their lips real tight when they said what a shame he couldn’t find nobody to fit his size. They believed Curlee Ree was lyin when she said, “I done seen it, but never, never would I allow him to ruin my body with that … that. He can rub it on me, but don’t shove it on me.” They would just almost roll on the floor laughin at that poor man.

  Bud worked two jobs. One was as a deliveryman at a bakery and one driving a cab evenins and weekends. He needed extra money cause a lady here and there, and specially Curlee Ree, always needed somethin even if they didn’t give him nothin. They was always on the lookout for him to bring the garbage from the rear of their house to the front or bring firewood in, nail a shelf or fix a door or a drain. Things their own men ought to do if they had one. Bud did it all. Sometimes he would get a peep down a dress or a sight of a thigh or even a open robe showin plenty more. Sometimes he just got a piece of chicken … but not a piece of what he really wanted. No sir! But I know he enjoyed that chicken cause he didn’t get no home-cooked food. He always ate out at them little overcooked dinner spots, lookin sad as he chewed his food and stared at the fly-specked walls. They all worked him that could, but they didn’t care nothin bout him cept to laugh at him. But he even helped old women and men, so he just liked to help people anyway.

  Weill … Bud was gettin older … and sadder … and lonelier. His hair was graying. He’d be clean one day, but wear that same shirt bout three or four days. His clothes needed mendin and nobody offered to do it for him. Me neither, I’m guilty, but my husband would never, never have stopped arguing bout it. Once I felt sorry for Bud and mended some torn pants for him and I told my husband he paid me. But I couldn’t do that too much.

  Once I invited him to a church social so he could get a home-cooked meal. He ate bout five of em! Then he played with the kids. Runnin round after the ball and things like that. He didn’t have no children of his own, just always looked out for other people’s children cause he loved them. Just had to love SOMEBODY, I reckon.

  Anyway, I don’t have to tell you he was a very unhappy, lonely man. Even with all the “friends” he did friendly things for.

  Now, I work at a little ole magazine shop near the Greyhound bus station. I was leanin on the counter, lookin out the window the day Kissy got back in town. I had been talkin to her mother so I knew she was expected. I was really glad cause Kissy had been my friend when we was growin up, in school and all. That’s why I knew so much bout her life and all.

  When I saw her, I ran out off my job to hug her, wonderin had she changed much. She looked older and so small and miserable, tired and dirty. She was still open and honest-hearted though. City hadn’t changed her none. Said she was gonna be lookin for a job. She didn’t even wait for me to ask her why she came back home, just said slinging hash in a city like Chicago, that big and busy, wasn’t easy and slingin ass gettin to work in the winter was even harder. I saw my boss was lookin out at me so I told Kissy I would see her later and went on back in to work.

  She had a big fluffy wig on and her big lips (that’s why they called her Kissy) were brightly painted and glistenin. I knew she had just slashed it on as the bus turned into town. With age, her legs had seemed to bow out a little more and her knees had got fat the way age hit you sometime. But she was dressed cheap and flashy, youngish like. Not in anything real short and revealin, but bright and fluffy. It was like her clothes was tryin to look happy for her.

  That first day she came in town on the Greyhound bus, Bud’s cab was sittin out front and she turned to it, carrying two cardboard bags, some books and a big purse. Not magazines, but real books. She bent down to ask him how far something was and how much it would be to get there. She said, “I can go on and walk if it’s gonna be too much. I need to save money.” He told her what she wanted to know but offered her a free ride and reached for her bags. She pulled back, cause she from the city now and knows about strangers givin you something for free. She looked at him good, askin, “Do I know you?”

  He said, “No. Don’t think so. If I knew you, I’d remember.”

  Then she said, “Well then I better walk til I find out what I’m doing!” I was tryin to wave to her through my work window that he was alright, but she didn’t see me.

  Bud scratched his head, watched her leaning with them suitcases as she walked on away from him and thought about how he never saw anyone in this town refuse anything free before. He jumped in his cab and followed her. Rollin down the window, he said, “Why don’t you walk if you want to, but give me the bags and I’ll drop them off at your house. You won’t owe me nothin!”

  Kissy asked, “Really?” Cause she really was tired.

  Then Bud asked, “What’s the matter with you? Where you from? Ain’t nobody ever been friendly to you?”

  Kissy started walkin again, sayin, “Some friendly cost too much.”

  Bud stopped the cab, got out, walked around and took the bags and the books. He smiled at her as he handled the books. “You read these?” She nodded yes. He smiled at the books, said, “This friendly won’t cost you nothin. Go on and walk if you want to.”

  Kissy walked home. When she got home there they were, her bags. She looked at them a long minute then she hugged her family, still lookin at them bags.

  By and by, we talked and she got around a little. I told my boss about her and Kissy came by about a job. We was just a small shop and there ain’t no big readers round here, but I told Kissy the next job come up it was gonna be hers or I was gonna be lookin for a job myself. I also told her to go to the hairdresser and forced the money on her as a welcome home present. Well? She was my friend and she was in need!

  Well, when she went to the hairdresser, Curley Ree’s, you know that, they was jealous of her cause she had been off to a big city, Chi … ca … go!, and they only always talked about goin. So they commenc
e to pickin at things to tell her, make her feel like less or somethin. They told her about what she ought not wear and how she ought to wear her hair. Told her she was too old for what she was doin. Ask her didn’t she learn nothin up in Chi … ca … go? Stuff like that, you know?

  Well, when she finally got mad, her hair was half done, standin all over her head and all, but she stood up, knocking them irons out her dresser’s hand and said, “How you gonna tell me how I feel? How I should dress? It ain’t how long your dress is that matters, it’s how quick you pull it up! You may feel old, but I don’t feeeeelll old. I’m young inside. I couldn’t be oooold if I tried cause I don’t feel it! What’s old anyway? You?! (They didn’t like that.) Old is when you’re dead! Old and cold! That’s the only too old I know! So you leave me alone and tend to your business cause you look like you need some advice help with yourself!” She started to sit back down, but turned back to the startled ladies. “Another thing. I’m back. Back to stay. I don’t bother nobody. So don’t cloud up over me or I will make it rain.” So they let her alone and talked about her only when she was a long way from hearin.

  By now, Kissy knew how most grown people felt about Buddy. Women first, then the men, on account of how the women belittled him to make themselves and their men look better and smarter. Kissy’s sister, who Kissy had moved in with, was a little put-on phony herself and she was a little put off by the way Kissy dressed and talked and didn’t care bout lettin people tell her how to run her business, so she was thinkin of puttin Kissy out. But Kissy found a job and told her sister she was movin out before the sister had a chance to pull her grand stand. That made the sister mad too, and she was one of those Kissy had sent money back home to and helped!

  Kissy had got a nice, sweet, little job at the library! She found a nice little housekeeping room with kitchenette and private bath, chile. It was not far from where she was with her sister and she did not have much to move, but I told her “Call Bud. (See? I knew what both their troubles was.) Ask him to move you.” She did and he did. He was glad to do it. He even hung around and did things like hammerin a nail where it was needed, fixin a window that wouldn’t open, you know them things. He wouldn’t take no money (I told him not to, to try to get a home-cooked meal). He told her, “What I would really like, Ms. Kissy, is a home-cooked meal. To eat sittin cross from a real live woman keepin me company while we eat. I ain’t had that since I was a child. And maybe you can tell me what’s in some of these beautiful books of yours. Yes, mam, I sure would like that best.”

  Now … don’t ask me how I know so much. You know they both friends of mine. But after dinner they had talked a lot and she turned her little portable record player on and played some of her little record collection. Charlie Parker, Billie Holliday, Dinah Washington and B.B. King. And then read him some poems and stuff out of Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston. Then some Black history, bout how wonderful we are and our strength and all. About our African-American men who came through and lasted (we still here) and our women who had the strength and backbone to stand up and take and take and still keep comin back, then raisin children to stand up too. (I also borrowed them books from her, cause the library didn’t have em til much later.)

  She told him there were other strong peoples, like pioneers or the poor of any color who went through many hardships. Good people. But the greedy and the murderers always come, giving no one else a chance, but they were not really the strong. That a gun does not make you a man or make you strong. You only become death with a weapon. God makes a man, the devil makes a weapon and pain and death. Oh, all such stuff as that til late up into the night, or early morning.

  And I don’t have to tell you Bud fell in love. Wasn’t no way for him not to. Kissy was kind. That’s all it really took. Kindness and peacefulness. Like a exchange of friendship … not favors.

  Both these hungry people … hungry for touch, affection, love, didn’t want to go too far, too fast. They had no practice at believin in life or love.

  At the door when he was leavin, she let him hold her tight and even kiss her. Now, I’ma tell you, the stars pulled loose from whatever they were hinged on way up there in the sky and all of em, all of em, seemed to circle round Bud’s head and heart. He was full. His stomach, his head and his heart. Kissy felt the world turn and thought it was her own heart foolin her. She was afraid to trust life or luck again and she was too tired to hope. But, you see, hope don’t wait for nobody to call it, it just shows up, sits there somewhere, makin you happy and sad at the same time, sometime.

  He started droppin by her house to see was she alright. Did she need anything? Could he fix somethin? He brought groceries, sayin, “Oh, these are not for you to cook for me, they for you. I know you be tired when you get off work and you walkin too. I just picked em up thinkin you might find some need for em.” Her little icebox was full. She would smile and pull out them groceries, sayin, “I can’t keep them less you stay and eat some with me.” Well, you know he was always polite and stayed.

  One time when he tried to hug her again, she put her arms up to ward him off. He looked confused, so she told him, “Listen. I don’t know nothin bout your business and I don’t know nothin bout where these hugs are takin us … and we better stop til I do know.”

  Bud smiled a big smile that lit up his face. “Kissy, you know I love you. I love to hug you. Love to kiss you. I don’t want to bother you none, but I wish you’d just let me hold you, least let my skin kiss yours.”

  Kissy, thinking bout ole Lady Luck was teasin with her, not really gonna give her nothin this time either, she stepped back. “I like huggin you too, but I still don’t know nothin bout your business. If you have any … you better get it all straight before we start any business of our own. Now, I think you better go, Bud.”

  Bud left there kind’a bent over, shoulders slumped down, scratching his head, thinking, “I ain’t got no business. Ain’t had no business.”

  Next day or two, Bud went back. He had really missed her, so he went straight for the hug and a kiss. Kissy stopped him, again. “Get your business straight, Bud.”

  “What business?” he asked.

  “Any business,” she answered. “Listen, Bud … Say, what is your real name?”

  “Budrow.”

  “Well, listen, Bud,” she looked confused herself, “listen, I am a woman.”

  Bud smiled. “Believe me, I believe I know that.”

  “I am a grown woman.”

  Now Bud looked like he could cry. “What must I do, grown woman?” He looked like he was really tryin to figure it out. “I love you. I don’t have no other woman that blongs to me. No other woman at all.” He sounded like he could cry.

  “Sit down, Bud, please.” He sat.

  Kissy thought this was all a waste of time. She did not believe this man would work out and keep loving her either. She did not want to lose him. She wanted more of him. In fact, she loved him. His kindness, his thoughtfulness, his giving of himself was all new to her. It was like … was like … havin a honest, sincere, normal, real, lovin companion. She had been happy for longer than ever before in her life. But she felt the moment they made love … together … close love, he would get up, laugh and leave. “I don’t want the pain anymore,” she told herself as she sat there lookin into his earnest, sincere and confused eyes. “And … he don’t have a thing to his name but his heart. I’m too old to have too many kinds of pain in my life anymore.”

  She knew it had to be said, so she said it. “I live here in a small, dinky, kitchenette room.” Bud looked around the room like he was in heaven, but he nodded to satisfy her. Kissy pointed at him. “You live in a smaller, dinkier room with NO kitchenette even.” He looked at her then looked away. She went on talkin. “I just got here and I have more than you to come home to in the evenins when I finish work. If you don’t have no ‘business’ then what do you do with your money?”

  Bud, in a split second, was glad to know it was about money, then was sad to know i
t was about money He bent his head, lookin at the floor. He started to speak, but Kissy interrupted him, “No, no! Don’t tell me. Just stop doing it. Save it. You a grown man, too. You need somethin of your own! A home maybe. Some decent clothes. If I ever sleep with you I am not crawlin between no dingy sheets next to no day-old underwear. Not me and my precious skin and perfume and nice gowns. I got two gowns and one jar of expensive cream for my skin and one bottle of one of the best perfumes there is. I saved hard for them so I could feel like a woman again, after I had worked like a dog.” He took hold of her hand. She took a deep breath, angrily wiped a tear from her face and said, “And I already been hurt … enough. I ain’t throwin my heart out there again to have it thrown back in my face. Not me … and my precious skin and perfume and cream. No siree.”

  Well, Bud look like he didn’t know whether to laugh in happiness at the first real, good, personal, intimate, sensible conversation he had ever had with a personal, intimate, sensible woman, or to cry because he didn’t know what to do next. So he did the next best thing; he asked Kissy, “What must I do?”

  Kissy was ready. She took another deep breath and said, “If you don’t have no other … no woman, you get your money together. Look for a better place to live. Just look, don’t pick. I’ll help you pick. Don’t have so much time to waste on people who don’t really care about you. Help the old and the helpless, but help yourself. Do something for yourself … and then, maybe … you can do something for us … and I can do something for us. We can do something for each other. BE something to each other!”

  He, hesitantly, gently, took her in his arms, she didn’t fight it. She said, “I’ll tell you the truth. I’m tired. Tired of movin on and ending up alone. Being wrong bout … things. I … like you … a lot, and I want a home. But I don’t want no fool.”