“I know you didn’t come to check on Genny,” I said. “Why are you here?”
She thrust her chin out even farther. “I came to see you. I knew you’d come running here for them, like always. This machine will take dollars if you don’t got the change.”
I narrowed my eyes. “I don’t feel like giving you a dollar right now, Ona.”
She started rummaging in her pocketbook. At last she pulled out a crumpled bill and started fussing with the machine, trying to thread the dollar through. The machine spat it back out, and she immediately tried to stick it in again. The rollers inside made a tinny, mechanical buzz as they sucked at the bill.
She said, “I bet Bernese is already at home, isn’t she? Shot my dog on the public street with the same kind of gun that put my boy Tucker on probation.” She shook her head as the dollar bill came whirring back.
“Bernese is home on bail,” I said. “Thig did arrest her.”
“Bernese owns Thig Newell, and you know it,” Ona said. “It was wrong what she done, shooting my dog.” The machine spat the dollar back at her for the fourth time.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake.” I snatched the dollar and stretched it tight between my hands, rubbing it back and forth across my thigh to straighten it. “No one is saying Bernese should have shot that dog. Even Bernese probably knows it was wrong.” I put the dollar in the slot, and it stayed in. I pressed the Coke button, and the can clattered out at the bottom. “She was overwrought. We all are. Genny’s hurt. She really got hurt in all this. I hope you see that.”
When I looked back at her, I could see she wasn’t listening. She was staring at me with a lost and hungry look, avid and familiar.
She’d been watching me that way since I was three. That was the year Hazel Crabtree, my birth mother, ran off with a roustabout she met at a traveling carnival. She hadn’t been heard from since.
But she left a note, and in it she told Ona what an awful mother she had been and detailed the horrors Ona had driven her to. As a parting shot, she’d explained exactly why Stacia Frett’s adopted baby had such wild red hair.
My first memory of Ona may well be my first real memory. I was lying in my toddler bed, and I heard a sound like the shrieking of the damned. It was coming from below me, from the front yard. It was Ona Crabtree, beyond drunk, waving her daughter’s Dear Mama note and howling, “Bring me that baby, you bitches.
That baby is my baby, and you better bring her out to me before I light your fucking house on fire. I’ll burn you Frett bitches out and take her!”
I got out of bed and ran to look out of my window, down into the yard at the screaming creature with wildfire for hair. She was so pale and thin that her flailing arms looked like they were made of bones. I started crying, sure she had come to chew me open and eat my guts while she dragged me away into the black night.
Then the light flipped on and I saw Genny in my doorway.
And I saw my mother, hurrying to pick me up and hold me, tucking me close against her. She carried me away from the window and sat down with me on my bed. She tilted my chin so my face was directly in front of hers, within her narrowing field of vision. I looked up into her eyes, gray and calm and reassuring, and she began signing.
That was the first time she told me the story of my birth, our love story. I don’t remember the specifics of that particular telling, swaddled as it is inside the memories of the thousand other times she told me. I do remember the comfort offered by her hands as they moved for me, telling me that I was safe, that I was Nonny Jane Frett, that I was hers and no one else’s. She may have been trying to tell me who I was, or only who she wanted me to be, but either way, the thing I understood most clearly was that I was so, so loved.
As she signed, I could hear people yelling. It was probably Bernese and Ona trying to outscream each other on the lawn. My mother’s voiceless assurance, silent but so eloquent, drowned them both out, and then her moving words were bathed in flickering lights coming through the window, flashing red and blue, as the police came to restore order and take Ona away.
Now I felt Ona’s gaze on my skin like greedy fingers, and I knew, for her, this conversation we were having was not about Genny, and it wasn’t about Bernese shooting her dog. This conversation was twenty-seven years older than that. I felt the terrible force of her love closing in over me. It was fierce and hopeless, close to unrequited.
Some of my anger was pressed out by the palpable weight of her longing. I knew then, in a deep, real place inside of me, that the dog getting out had been an accident. It was just one of those things, and Ona hadn’t called her brother or his crazy sons, demanding violence. Not yet, anyway. She had come here to see if I was blaming her, if I hated her. She’d lost me on so many levels; I could feel how deeply it still mattered to her.
Deflated, I said, “Genny’s going to be fine, though. They say.”
“I looked in on y’all in that room, and she seemed plenty perky to me. She was sitting up and making that witchy-poo hand talk,” Ona said.
“Genny was sleeping in the other bed. I was talking to Mama.”
Ona eased closer to me. “That’s good, then. I was worried maybe the dog got at her voice box. What’s the blind one doing in the hospital when it was that other one got hurt?”
I tried to hang on to my patience, but it was her genes that had left me with such a short supply. “My mother’s name is Stacia Frett. You know her name is Stacia, not ‘the blind one.’ ”
“But she is blind,” said Ona, defensive.
“Yes,” I said.
“And deaf, too,” said Ona.
“Yes. She was born deaf.”
“How can that be a mother,” said Ona. She wasn’t speaking angrily; in fact, she sounded like she was musing, but I could tell by the way she refused to meet my eyes that she was riled. “She can’t see what you’re up to, or hear you, and it’s a miracle she didn’t drop you on your head and make you pure retarded.”
“Maybe she didn’t drop me because she was sober,” I said.
Ona’s breath came out in a sharp little cough. I flexed my hands once, twice, trying to keep them from fisting.
“Make peace,” I thought to myself. “Give her what she wants so she won’t call her brother, so she’ll get rid of those other dogs.”
What did it matter, as long as Genny felt safe? All I had to do was make peace and I could go home, get divorced, and get the hell away from Athens and Jonno forever. There was plenty of interpreting work in Atlanta, not an hour away from my family in the other direction. Maybe I could even have Fisher for part of the summer, get the two of us away from Between with all its Fretts and dogs and bloody-minded Crabtrees. We could go to Centen-nial Park and sit by the fountain and eat some damn peaches.
I saw how easy it could be, in this moment, as Ona peppered me with starving glances. She was desperate for some sort of connection, and it seemed possible that if I would lean forward, give her a hug, give her something, maybe we could be done with this.
But it was so hard to lean in that direction. I didn’t know how to offer affection when I didn’t have it, especially since she wanted me to prove I cared by talking trash about my own mother.
I tried for some warmth of tone. “All I’m saying is, please keep in mind that you’re talking about my mother.”
“My girl carried you in her body. That’s a mother,” said Ona, her back still up. “I’m your granny by blood.”
“I know what you are,” I said flatly, and we stood together in the alcove with all our history hanging between us.
After Hazel spilled her guts and fled town, Ona had tried to win custody, but Isaac Davids squelched that. He’d finally agreed to let her have limited visitation with me when I was five, probably to keep us out of court. I’m not sure Isaac’s rushed adoption job was 100 percent kosher; Isaac would breeze cheerfully around the closest of legal corners when the client was Bernese.
The visitation did not last long. I remember a few strained out
-ings with Ona, sitting shy and silent in her truck while she drove me to Tastee-Freez and asked me question after question. Was I doing well at school? Did I have friends? Were “those people”feeding me properly?
The open, angry way she talked about my mother and the rest of my family made me squirm. At five, I did not know what to say when she handed me a soft-serve cone and said, “You’re being raised up by thieves.”
She called Bernese by the same name Bernese would later give Ona’s alpha dog. She probably hated Bernese more than she hated Mama and Genny put together. Ona wasn’t stupid. She knew who had done the legwork. In fact, if there was a person on God’s green earth Ona Crabtree hated more than the Fretts, it was their lawyer. The Fretts never would have been able to take me without Isaac. Bernese may have married Lou Baxter, but Isaac was her good right hand. Uncle Lou always seemed dragged to me, as if tumbling along haplessly in Bernese’s considerable wake; it was Isaac who walked beside her, and Ona knew it.
After what would be my last unsupervised visit, I came out of Ona’s front door and down to the sidewalk where my mother and Genny were waiting to walk me home. I kissed Mama, and then I turned to Genny and said, “What’s a faggot Jew?”
I was fluent in ASL, but my spelling skills were not yet up to asking Mama about words I did not know how to sign. Genny blanched and then told Mama what I had asked.
Where did you learn that word? Mama signed.
I had watched Genny’s hands and could now answer her. I signed, Ona calls Mr. Isaac the faggot Jew of Between. Mama turned so I could not see her hands and erupted in a flurry of violent sign to Genny.
Then she turned back to me and signed patiently, Ona doesn’t like it that Mr. Isaac is Jewish. That’s his religion, like we are Baptists. And it also means he was born Jewish, like you were born Irish and we were born German and Seminole. Some people don’t like people who seem different from them. That’s a stupid way to be, and we Fretts are not stupid.
The other word . . . is not a nice word. Don’t say it. In our house, we call men who have never married “bachelors.” Do you understand?
I nodded. She gave me a kiss and then marched us all immediately over to Bernese’s house. Bernese deployed Isaac again, and within a few days he was knocking on Ona’s door with more paperwork. After that, our visits were supervised. That meant my mother and Genny would take me to meet her at a park or the Loganville McDonald’s. Genny and Mama would sit down side by side, hips touching, a few feet away from Ona and me. They sat as still as if they were the two main components in a wall, watching Ona with daggered eyes and hostile posture.
Now they were lying hurt in a room down the hall, and Ona was visiting with me frighteningly unsupervised. “What does that mean, you know what I am? I’m blood kin to you, and you ought not side with Bernese Baxter against me.”
I took a deep breath. “I have tried to make Bernese see your side of things, Ona. You should know that. I had a long talk with her, and I am sure that here, in the light of hindsight, she’s sorry about shooting your dog. Just like I am sure you’re sorry about what the dog did to Genny. She’s not going to ask you to help pay for Genny’s treatment here at all. Genny’s going to be here a couple of days more, and she had to have over forty stitches.”
Ona huffed and then got the Coke out of the bottom of the machine. She stared at the can and said, “This is plain old Coke.
I was gonna get me that vanilla kind.”
“You know, a lot of people would sue over the hospital bills. I think that shows how sorry Bernese is.” I hated the wheedling note in my voice, but I forced myself to smile and step in closer.
Ona rolled her eyes. “Bernese sleeps on a big old pile of money, and it don’t mean shit to her.” She popped the tab on the Coke and took a swig. “I tell you what, if she’s going to let bygones be, then I can, too.”
“Thank you, Ona. I was worried you might call your brother.
You know his oldest boy, Billy, has quite a temper,” I said in what had to be the understatement of the decade. “I hope you won’t get them all riled up and coming over this way.”
Ona shrugged. “Them boys can get into some trouble, though, can’t they? But right now I think me and you, we can work it out between us.”
I swallowed and added, “I was also hoping you might consider finding new homes for the other two dogs. Maybe one of your relatives could take them. I have to tell you, Ona, I’m scared of what might happen if the dogs get out again. Bernese wants to have them put down, but I can convince her to let that drop, too, if you can move them somewhere.”
Ona nodded almost agreeably. “I got me a second cousin, Clint, who might would take them.” She sidled a step closer to me, so close I could smell her breath, the sweetness of the Coke masking an undersmell, something faintly rotten. I held myself still beside her. “He’s been wanting some good dogs, and he’s all the way over to Baton Rouge.”
“I’d really appreciate that.” I reached out and gave her upper arm a quick squeeze. “I need to get back and check on Genny.”
I started to go, but Ona jumped toward me and clasped me in her bony arms. I went rigid, almost recoiling, but immediately forced myself to relax and put one stiff reciprocal arm around her.
She let go of me and stepped back, and I knew that she had felt my involuntary pulling away. Her throat moved, swallowing, and her eyelids ticked, twice. I watched her watery eyes ice up, hard-ening over pain. Then her eyelids dropped, and she said, “So as soon as I get, let’s say, eight hundred dollars, we’ll forget the whole mess.”
“Eight hundred dollars?” I repeated.
“Yeah,” said Ona. “Them dogs is pure-blood Dobie. And that bitch was the pick of the litter. She was worth the four hundred I paid out, easy. And I’ll need two hundred apiece for them other two. Since my cousin will have them, it don’t seem right Bernese should pay full price for me giving them up.”
I wasn’t sure what I had in the bank, but I could get the eight hundred from Mama, no question. Mama was as pragmatic as Bernese but with only half her temper. She’d pay it to be sure Genny was safe, which was all that mattered to her. The war would be halted with no more blood spilled, which was all that mattered to me. “That seems reasonable. I can bring the money over.”
“Bring it Friday night, why don’t you. Ain’t seen you in a age of Sundays. I’ll make us a roast.”
I nodded vigorously. “I’d love to have dinner with you. That would be great. Eight hundred. Fine. I’ll see you later, then.”
I was headed back up the hall, almost giddy with relief, when Ona came out of the vending alcove and called after me, “Don’t bring cash. I can’t have cash like that around the house. You know Tucker moved back home for his probation, and if he gets aholt of it, he’ll drink it up.”
My heart stuttered. I turned back to her and said, “Maybe I can bring it to you Friday morning, while the banks are open.”
“Naw, you just come on to supper. You can bring me a check.”
She smiled at me, her yellowed eyes leveled on me with a gaze as cunning as any fox’s. “Bernese’s check. And if she felt like it, she could write ‘sorry’ down in the space where you write what a check is for, but I don’t absolutely have a demand on that. Her check. Signed by her. That’s sorry enough. Soon’s I get it, I’ll move them dogs.”
I opened my mouth to answer her, but she quickly lifted the Coke can in salute and said, “See you Friday.”
CHAPTER 8
OVER MY DEAD body,” said Bernese. “Over my bloated, rotting, double-dead body and the bodies of my executors.”
“Lord, help me,” I said to the ceiling. I tried again. “Do you mean that? Because Ona’s nephews might take you literally.”
I was helping Bernese restock the display shelf at the front of her store. The counter and the register were against the opposite wall, with the display window and a big play table in between.
Behind us were aisles filled with dollhouses and kits and furn
iture and molds and doll-making supplies. This bank of shelves was nothing but dolls. Reproductions of my mother’s dolls.
They looked blankly down at me. Each doll was centered in its own box, and all the boxes lined up in uniform rows that stretched from floor to ceiling. My mother’s dolls were lovely, but here there were simply too many of them, perfectly aligned like beautiful, stoic soldiers. The whole wall was like a shrine to OCD. A shrine with eyes.
“Hand me up the frogs,” Bernese said. She was balanced on top of a rickety stepladder, restocking the animal dolls on the highest shelf. My mother had made a series of long-faced foxes and portly bears, neckless frogs and sloe-eyed cats, all with furry hands and delicate feet, arched and pawlike. Genny had sewn them into upright bodies, like people, and dressed them in stuffy Victorian finery. I started passing up boxes from the open crate beside the stepladder, wincing. I was sore from spending the night in a chair between Genny’s and Mama’s beds. They hadn’t released Mama until this morning.
Bernese put the frogs up on the highest shelf, her thick body balanced precariously on her tiny feet. All the Fretts had ridiculously short, wide feet. Paddle feet, Genny called them. She said I had ski feet because they were so long and narrow, the tops dotted with pale freckles.
“So the Crabtrees want my money. There’s a shocker,” said Bernese. “Ona should pay me to not sue her and take her stupid gas station. I could put in a BP with a decent toilet. She’s got some long hairy hanging ones to even ask.”
“Good grief,” I said, cutting my eyes at Fisher. Mama and I had picked her up at kindergarten after lunch, and now they were playing together with one of the open dollhouses on the play table. Bernese had assembled two huge houses, back-to-back, mostly for Fisher, but also for customers’ kids. There was a box of battered furniture and about twenty dolls that had seen better days. Mama and Fisher had picked a family from the box, and they were deep in silent conversation about the dolls’ imaginary lives.
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