“Mama, I keep thinkin’ about Maggie. She’s makin’ a difference, and workin’ hard at bein’ involved, and I’m here in this…this…cocoon of a town, pretendin’ things aren’t goin’ on around me.” I turned and watched the men at the barn. “My husband is hurtin’ boys, and men, just because their skin is a different color.”
“Oh, Alison. You’re not Maggie. Maggie is a different woman all together. She could no sooner settle down and have a baby than you could go to New York and change the world. You’re sewn from different fabric.”
Maybe Mama was right. Maybe I was just dreaming, and I didn’t actually have the strength to do anything or evoke any changes in life.
“I guess.” I sighed, resigning myself to the life I’d created. “How do you get past it, Mama? When you are with Daddy, how do you forget how he treats them?”
“Your father isn’t beatin’ up anyone. He treats them fairly, he gives them secure jobs. He just holds them at a different social level than us. That’s very different.”
“Is it?” I asked.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I had looked forward to the train ride to New York, but after several hours of traveling, the movement made me sleepy. I dozed on and off, thankful that there was not a passenger sitting next to me, though we picked up more at each stop along the way. The nearer we came to New York, the more color the leaves boasted. Glorious red and orange leaves waved from their branches. The crisp sky looked less dense than the Arkansas sky, and I wondered if that was because of the heat that seemed to linger in the south, or if it was just the unhappiness in me lifting itself off my shoulders. Jimmy Lee fell silent after our fight. He didn’t argue about me going to see Maggie, and I didn’t press him about going through my personal things. It was like there was a silent agreement between us to leave each other alone for a bit, and for that, I was thankful.
When I first stepped on the train, I was scared of traveling so far by myself. I wasn’t sure what to expect, though Maggie had assured me that no one would bother me. I brought a few books and when I wasn’t gazing out at the pretty landscape, I was nose down, escaping into the private world of John and Abigail Adams. Those Who Love had been recommended by Maggie, and I found myself enthralled with the love in those pages.
Each time the train stopped, I’d look around at the people going off and coming on the train, and I’d wonder where they were heading. I didn’t dare talk to anyone. All in all, I found the train relaxing, like I was in the pages of my own adventure book.
Mama had sewn a small pillow for me to rest my head on, and another for my lower back, and surely I would have been in worse shape without them, but still, I was achy and uncomfortable as we neared my destination. I was surprised to see two colored men board the train and sit in the same car as me. I couldn’t help but keep glancing at them. Were they worried about sittin’ where the white folks sat? I didn’t think so. That must be what Jackson and Maggie had been talking about. Things were different up here.
It was no wonder Maggie didn’t come home more often—by the time we reached New York, the twenty-two hour trip felt as though it would never end. Crowds of people disembarked, walking fast, as if they all knew exactly where they were going. I felt as out of place as a pig in a horse trailer, and as lost as a blind cow.
“Pixie!” Maggie’s voice carried through the station like a familiar embrace. I saw her running toward me, dropped my bags to the floor, and fell into her open arms. “Let me see you!” She ran her eyes up and down my swollen body. “You are so beautiful,” she said.
My feet hurt, my belly was as big as a house, and I knew how awful I must have looked. Though I’d been trying to ignore it, looming on my shoulders was Jimmy Lee’s rage. Even the relief of seeing Maggie and her compliments didn’t take away the hurt of my life.
“Come on,” she said, gathering my bags. “Let’s get you to my place. I wanna hear all about your new married life.”
Cars raced by as we walked block after block toward Maggie’s apartment. Her hair had grown shaggier, and her skin shone bright. The walk didn’t seem to dampen her energy one bit, though it zapped what little I had left quicker than I realized. I had never seen so many people in one place. Several times I stopped and stared, in awe of the mixing of the races, and the sheer number of people on the street. Maggie tugged me forward, anxious to get to her apartment. I felt like a cow being herded toward a barn. Everyone seemed to be going somewhere in a hurry. I didn’t notice the chin-snub that was so common back home, and that, more than anything else, made me wonder about this new place Maggie had made her home.
When we finally flagged down a streetcar with the money Daddy had given me, I fell into the black vinyl with a long-overdue sigh of exhaustion and took it all in. I ran my hands along the smooth, shiny seats. I’d never seen anything like it before. Daddy would be mad that we gave money to someone to drive us around. I could just hear his voice, That’s what God gave you legs for. I smiled to myself, missing him but knowing I’d have to keep yet another secret about what we used his money for. We took the streetcar for several blocks, and I marveled at the height of the buildings. Never before had I seen anyplace with so much concrete. Everything here was new to me, and I tried to make sense of this world that Maggie lived in. There was hardly any grass anywhere. Where did all those people get their eggs and beef? Maggie explained that in New York, everything came from markets, and there was no farmland in the city. I couldn’t wait to tell Mama about everything. I soaked it all in, memorizing the way the buildings looked, and even the insane honking of the horns. Every building seemed to have a stream of people walking in and out. Cars’ engines revved and lights flashed, and I was drawn into the energy of the area. By the time we reached Maggie’s apartment building, my reservation had been replaced with curiosity.
We climbed five flights of narrow stairs up to the top floor of a very old building. Plaster peeled from the walls, from cracks wider than my pinky finger, and snaked around the corners.
“Maggie, are you sure this is safe?” I asked, out of breath as we neared the top of the staircase.
“You’re such a farm girl,” she laughed. Maggie unlocked three locks and let us into an apartment, which was about the size of our bedroom back home. There was a tiny stove and refrigerator to the left of the door, and a window that looked across a span of about ten feet, and directly into the brick wall of the building next to us.
“My view of New York,” Maggie laughed. “Pix, wipe that pity off of your face. This is the most freedom I’ve had in twenty years.”
“It’s just that it’s…”
Maggie twirled around, her arms almost hitting the wall. “Small? Old? Ugly? I know, and I still love it!”
I sat down on the only piece of furniture in the room, a ratty, old couch. I sank all the way down to metal.
“Careful, that’s our bed you’re sittin’ on,” she said.
I stood and Maggie lifted the cushions to show me the convertible sofa. “The guy next door was givin’ it away when I moved in. It suited my purpose just fine.” Maggie poured us each a glass of lemonade and sat down beside me.
“Wow, you really are pregnant.” She rested her hand on my stomach.
“Yeah, I guess I am.”
“I guess I had you pegged wrong, Pix. I got the feelin’ you weren’t even sure about gettin’ married to Jimmy Lee. Are you happy? Does he treat you right?”
I nodded, feeling the burn in my cheeks, trying to feign a smile. My sister saw right through my façade. She squeezed my hand and put an arm around my back.
“Oh, Pixie,” was all she said. I laid my head against her shoulder and breathed in the floral scent of her perfume. Tears bubbled up from within my chest and I tried to bite them back, tensing my muscles and swallowing the sound of my sobs. I must have cried for a full five minutes before I pulled back and wiped my eyes, sniffling, my cheeks growing redder by the second.
“What is it? You can tell me, Pix.”
&n
bsp; “He found your letters. He—” I couldn’t bring myself to tell her about him attacking me. She’d be furious. She’d never have been that weak.
Maggie brushed my hair off my shoulders and held my hand. “Okay. Okay, so he knows…what? You’re involved? I’m involved?”
“I don’t know. That you’re involved, and that I wanna be.”
“Damn.” Maggie drew in a breath and let it out quickly. “Well, then, we gotta figure out what’s next. Do you think he’ll tell anyone? This could be very dangerous if they know what’s comin’.”
“What’s comin’?”
“Pix? Did somethin’ else happen? Did he do anything to you?” Maggie skipped right over my question.
I turned away.
“Pixie, if he touched you, so help me.”
I nodded with my back to Maggie.
“Damn him. Well, you’re not goin’ back there. No way, Pixie.”
I spun around. “I have to go back. He’s my husband. Mama and Daddy are there.”
“What kind of husband hurts his wife?” Maggie paced, her arms crossed. She stopped and put her hand to her chin. When she got that determined look on her face it could only mean one thing. The wheels of her mind were churning, planning.
“He didn’t really hurt me. He just, he…he held me down and called me a Negro lover.”
“Oh, I’ll show him a Negro lover all right,” Maggie fumed. “I can’t let you go back there.”
“I’m goin’ back, Maggie. I have to.” I laid my hand across my stomach. “I’m havin’ his baby. It’s my duty.”
“Damn it, Pixie, now you sound like Daddy. Your place is not to be held down by an ignorant redneck.”
In my heart I knew she was right, but in my mind, I couldn’t take his baby away from him even if he didn’t want it. He’d grow to want it. Mama said all men did, that they were just scared of the responsibility, but once they see the little baby’s face, they melt like butter. I was learning that marriage was hard, and staying in my marriage was what was expected of me by Mama and Daddy, no matter how much it hurt or how hard it was. I found myself stuck between running from a man I no longer loved or respected and confessing my failure as a wife to Daddy, or sticking with my wedding vows, for better or worse, and remaining the sparkle in Daddy’s eyes.
Maggie stomped across the floor and took my face in her hands. I had nowhere to look besides into her angry eyes.
“Pixie, you listen to me. I know you, and you know this isn’t right. It’s not okay for you to be treated this way.”
“He was just angry. It’ll pass. He’s never hurt me before.” At least not physically.
“It’ll pass? Pix, you’re not a little girl anymore. You’re gonna be a mother. You need to think about more than just yourself.” Maggie put her hand to her eyes. “What happened? How did he go from sneakin’ out with you to this?”
If only she knew.
“Promise me that if he touches you again, you will leave immediately. Go stay with Mama and Daddy. Come here. Hell, go anywhere you need to, but do not stay with him. I swear to God I will kill him if he touches you again.”
I gave her my word, then wondered if I were strong enough to keep it.
Maggie pulled a flyer out from beneath a stack of papers. “There’s a meetin’ tonight about the boycott in Forrest Town.”
“Wait, you didn’t tell me about a boycott there. You said they were makin’ headway with civil rights, but you never mentioned Forrest Town. Maggie, I said I wanted to be involved, but a boycott, where I live? I don’t think that’s smart.”
“I didn’t tell you because I thought you’d cancel, Pix. They’ve been workin’ on this for months. They were gonna have the meetin’ last month, but I asked them to wait.”
“You tricked me!”
“No, I opened a door so you could make a decision for yourself. You don’t have to do a damn thing. There are groups comin’ from all over; Mississippi, Chicago, New York. Pix, this is huge. They’ll be boycottin’ the major stores and—”
“Wait,” I said, panic thumping against my chest. “Boycottin’ the major stores? Why? Jimmy Lee’s furniture store? It’s the biggest store in town. Why are you doin’ this to me?”
“Oh, my God, Pix, have you lost your mind? Doin’ this to you? Think about it, they don’t let coloreds work in the showroom, only in the stockroom, and for peanuts!” She paused, letting her words settle on my shoulders like a weight. “Hell, they don’t even let them shop in the front of the stores or eat in the diner. If we don’t take a stance now, when will it happen? Do you see any changes occurrin’? Do you see Jimmy Lee openin’ his shop to Division Street families?” Maggie ran her hand through her hair. “Do you want your baby to grow up like we did? Afraid to talk to the little colored girls in town? Come on, Pixie, do the right thing.”
The tiny room was closing in on me. Jimmy Lee’s store, boycotted? “If the coloreds boycott, how will that help make any changes?”
“Not just coloreds, Pix. This is bigger than you and me and Division Street. There are whites from all around who are takin’ part in enforcin’ integration.” Maggie spit her words out fast, smacking the back of her hand in her palm for emphasis, as if everything she said was the most important. “Think about it. No one will come from other cities to shop there. People will be afraid to cross the picket lines, afraid of fights and trouble.”
“Maggie—”
“I know what you’re thinkin’. Not trouble like violence trouble, but trouble like yellin’ and name callin’.”
That didn’t feel right. I’d heard about the riots, the fights, coloreds getting beaten. “How can you say that? You don’t know,” I said. “You have no idea what might happen, and you know what they do to coloreds there, for nothin’ more than breathin’—this could cause all sorts of trouble for them. And what about you? What will you do in all of this?”
Maggie sat down and crossed her long legs, her short skirt barely covering her thighs. “Alison, listen to me. You can live in your little daddy bubble all you want, but I can’t. I thought you wanted to help.”
I sat next to her. “I did, but—”
Maggie shook her head. “You did when it was removed from where you were, when you could hear about it, but not really be affected by it. I get it, you know? I was that person. But now,” she looked around the apartment. “Things are different. I have friends who are colored. I have met wonderful men and women who are colored. I can no longer turn a blind eye to things. Even if things are better here, and in bigger cities, I can’t pretend they’re that way everywhere.”
I closed my eyes and just breathed. I couldn’t make any decisions, my mind was too full of information, right and wrong, segregation and integration, tangled together like a convoluted web of confusion.
“Why don’t you rest for a few hours before we leave for the meetin’.”
Nothing could have sounded more inviting at that very moment. I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep.
Chapter Twenty-Three
The only thing that separated night and day in New York was the color of the sky. There were just as many people walking around the streets at night, coming in and out of stores and restaurants, as there were during the day. Some were dressed in fancy clothing, others wore everyday jeans. Coming from a family where going into town was a big deal, seeing children milling about at eight o’clock at night with their parents made me wonder what type of parents those people were. Children sat in restaurant windows, their parents smoking at the dinner table. Daddy would have none of that. Daddy was all about family being home, safe, together. Forget the fact that we couldn’t afford fancy restaurants. Even if we could, I think Daddy would want Mama’s down home cooking warming our bellies.
“Don’t these kids have to get to bed? Don’t they go to school?” I asked
Maggie laughed at my ignorance. “Of course. It’s just different here.” She pointed to a brightly lit sign above the restaurant that said, Anyone with ca
sh is welcome. “You don’t see that back home, huh?”
Maggie pulled me down an alley and then down two more quieter streets. I began to worry when I realized we were suddenly alone. The noise of the city fell away behind us, and suddenly everything seemed too big. Two colored men came around the corner, heading in our direction. I grabbed Maggie’s hand.
“Relax,” she said with a smile. “You’re not in Arkansas anymore.”
I watched them descend a stairway and disappear, and then I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.
Two minutes later, we were heading down the same set of stairs. I clung to Maggie’s arm, begging her to turn around. “Trust me,” she answered. The stairway led to a small, dead-end alley. Maggie knocked three times on a dark-green, wooden door. She knocked two more times in rapid succession, and the door swung open.
A colored man with an enormous Afro and crooked, yellow teeth stood before us. Maggie embraced him. I closed my mouth tight, my eyes darting around the inside of the building. The alley behind me was dark, the room before me was not much lighter. I wanted to run, to find a modicum of something familiar, but there I stood, mesmerized by the sweet and pungent aroma that filtered out the door.
“Marlo, this is my sister, Pixie. Pixie, Marlo.”
“H...hi.” My voice shook. It took all of my will to follow Maggie into the dark, low-ceilinged room. Cigarette smoke and something more acerbic filled the air. Music played low in the background, the beat fast and inconsistent. My hand was glued to Maggie’s arm. She pulled me forward, embracing each person, colored or white, introducing me as her little sister. I’m not sure what I expected, but the closeness of the coloreds and whites, sitting on the same couches, white girls with their legs stretched across the colored girls’ laps, passing cigarettes back and forth, took me by surprise.
“Drag?” A stick-skinny, dark-haired girl held out some sort of thin cigarette toward me.
“No,” Maggie said, and pushed her arm away. “Darla, this is Pixie, my little sister. She just ‘bout choked when she tried smokin’ with me.” Maggie winked at me. “She’s not smokin’ and she never drinks, so she won’t be playin’ any of those reindeer games.” They laughed like schoolgirls.
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