This I Know

by Eldonna Edwards

  21

  I thought it would never happen. As I sit with my underpants around my ankles staring at the dark splotch it’s obvious that this is blood and it’s coming out of me. The stain is shaped like a jellyfish, dark in the middle and faded on the edges. When I touch the spot and lift my finger to my nose, it smells like rust. I find a box of Kotex pads under the bathroom sink and pull out what looks like a tiny mattress with sheets hanging off both ends. I stick it in my underwear and head toward my bedroom to retrieve the sanity belt from my dresser that Mama gave me a couple of years ago.

  The huge napkin keeps my thighs too far apart and I’m walking like Aunt Pearl. This woman thing is not as cool as I thought it would be. Joy has Tampax and I know where to find them. I tiptoe to her room as gracefully as I can with what feels like a diaper in my underwear. Joy’s asleep with her head at the wrong end of the bed. It’s one of the few times I’ve seen her face recently without a furrow in her brow. I quietly steal two tampons from her closet shelf and waddle back to the bathroom.

  This is even worse than the pad. I’ve tried every position they show on the stupid box. I’m getting blood all over my knuckles, poking around where I know it’s supposed to go, with no luck. The box says “slender,” but the cardboard cylinder feels like it was made for an elephant. I wiggle it around some more until finally the thing moves inside me. I really, really hate this. I can’t possibly suffer this every month.

  Chastity follows me with her eyes as I walk toward the refrigerator to get milk.

  “Why are you walking funny?”

  “I’m not.”

  “You are. You’re walking like a duck.”

  I fill my bowl with Cap’n Crunch and add milk. Daddy must have had a coupon. Usually it’s Cheerios or Corn Flakes or some brand we’ve never heard of. Either that or Chastity threw one of her fits in the store.

  I start to sit, but the cardboard thing pinches inside me and I jump back up.

  “Whatsa matter wif you? You fall down or sumpin’?”

  Even though she’s ten, Chastity has started talking like a baby ever since Mama got back from the rest home.

  “No, I didn’t fall down or sumpin’,” I say, mocking her.

  Joy walks in dressed in neatly-pressed jeans with a blouse tucked into the waistband.

  “Hey, Joy, lookit Grace. She hurt her butt and now she walks funny and can’t sit down.”

  A fire rises in my cheeks. “I didn’t hurt my butt, you infantile. I got my period, okay?”

  Chastity’s blue eyes widen and her mouth drops open, exposing a mouthful of half-chewed cereal. “Really? Wow. I can’t wait to tell everybody!”

  “You better not, Chas. I’ll make your life miserable. I promise.”

  “You alweddy do,” she says, making a face.

  Joy looks at me, then Chastity. “Leave her alone.”

  I can hardly believe my ears. Joy doesn’t say anything else, but I can feel her watching me as I move awkwardly around the kitchen.

  “Hey, Chas, go get my purse, will ya?” Chastity bounds out of the room. Joy’s request means chewing gum for her.

  As soon as Chastity is out of earshot Joy whispers through her teeth, “You stole some of my Tampax.”

  “I’m sorry. Those pads are so awful and that stupid sanity belt for hooking them up is impossible.”

  “Sanitary belt, Grace. It’s called a sanitary belt.” She’s trying to be nice, but I can tell she’s choking back a laugh.

  “Oh,” I say, even though I think mine is a better name for it.

  “Just don’t do it again. You really shouldn’t use tampons the first time anyway.”

  “I know. It hurts like crazy.”

  “That bad?”

  “Yeah, the cardboard keeps digging into my insides.”

  Joy spits out the milk she was just starting to gulp. “You left the cardboard inside?” Joy laughs so hard her face gets even redder than mine. “That is the dumbest thing you have ever done, Grace. In fact, it’s so dumb I’d be too embarrassed to tell anybody.”

  She’s clutching her stomach. I want to punch her. I feel my chin start to quiver and I burst into tears. I hate being a woman and I hate having my period. But what I hate most is that I do such stupid things.

  Joy stops laughing and eyes me with something like sympathy but more like pity. “I should have explained it to you.” She motions me to follow her to the bathroom. She slides a hidden blue box from behind the stack of towels in the linen closet and unwraps a tampon. “Like this, see?” She pushes the cotton out of the tube in one swift motion and it falls on the floor with its string trailing along like a dead mouse. “The cotton stays inside. You pull out the cardboard and throw it away.”

  I just stand there.

  She hands me the box. “Don’t worry. You’ll get it after a couple of tries. Or you can switch back to the pads.”

  I grab my belly. “Why does my stomach hurt?”

  She shakes out a couple of white tablets from a blue bottle in the medicine cabinet. “Take these. The cramps will go away after a few hours. If it gets bad just go to the sick room at school and ask for a heating pad.”

  The only good thing about this period so far is Joy being halfway nice to me. I pop the pills into my mouth and chew them up. I love the way aspirin fizzes my tongue and makes my whole mouth tingle.

  Chastity jiggles the door handle. “What’re you guys doing in there?”

  “Nothing,” Joy says. She unlocks the door. “Let’s go, Chas. I’ll walk you to school.”

  Joy takes her small leather shoulder bag from Chastity and starts fishing for gum. I’m left with a box of tampons in my hand, a knot in my gut, and the knowledge that my life has changed big-time.

  “Isaac, if you can see me, go away.” I say it out loud, but I mean it as a joke.

  Of course I can see you.

  “Isaac? Oh man, I can hear you! It sounds like you’re talking into a tin can. What are you doing here?”

  You spoke to me.

  “Yeah but . . .”

  You didn’t think I’d answer? We don’t have to be in any special place to talk, Grace. Not anymore.

  “Why not? I thought . . .”

  Exactly. You thought you had to be in the closet. You believed it, so it was true. But I distinctly heard you speak to me just now.

  “I know, but I was kidding.”

  Were you?

  I sit on the edge of the bathtub. “No, I guess not. Actually I was wishing you could somehow help me. I don’t mean physically help me but, like . . .”

  I’m stuttering like an idiot.

  No need to be embarrassed, Grace.

  “I’m not.” I quickly shove the tampon into my pocket.

  Grace?

  “Yeah?” I stare at my white tennis shoes. There’s a spot of blood on one of them.

  I don’t see you in the way you think. I’m not watching you. I’m watching over you.

  “You mean like a guardian angel?”

  Something like that. Think of it as soft vison. I’m able to picture you as a red-haired girl in blue jeans if I choose to, but those details aren’t important to me. Right now I sense someone I love going through a range of feelings from joy to anger to sadness to . . . embarrassment and frustration.

  “But I thought . . .”

  Things have changed, Grace. You’ve reached a point in your life where your gift has deepened and will continue to do so. You’ll need me less and you’ll grow to trust yourself more.

  “No! I do need you. I’ll always need you.”

  And I’ll be here when you do.

  “Promise?”

  Promise.

  His voice echoes in my head, then fades, and I know he’s gone. I close the bathroom door and get to practicing this new womanhood thing.

  * * *

  Isaac was right. It’s not just the period or the cramps or even the hormones flooding my body. It’s as though a secret channel has suddenly flung its doors wide open. Everyth
ing feels stronger and deeper than before. Sounds are crisper and the images that come to me are more colorful. Even my teacher’s voice is like a knife the way it slices away on a distant part of me, the part that hears without listening.

  Mrs. Oberman is lecturing us about the natives who lived here before the Europeans moved in. It’s why nearly every Michigan county has an Indian name. I glance down at the history book on my desk. The wrinkly-faced Indian in the photograph looks sternly at the camera, like those guards who aren’t allowed to smile when standing in front of a palace. When I trace the black and white photograph with my finger, his eyes seem to soften. It feels as though he’s looking at me. Not just in the way a portrait sometimes appears to follow you with its eyes but actually seeing me. I slam the book shut. I must have gasped out loud because suddenly the room is quiet and Mrs. Oberman is staring at me along with everyone else in the room.

  “Is there a problem, Miss Carter?”

  “No, ma’am,” I say. But I can feel him, that Indian guy, warm under the covers of my book.

  * * *

  I stop at Ralph’s on my way home from school to buy an Orange Crush. Ralph’s feet are sticking out from under an old blue Chevy. I hear a thunk as his head bumps into metal and then the F-word that I’ve only heard Lola say one time and under similar circumstances when she dropped a manure shovel on her bare foot. Ralph rolls out from under the car, rubbing his forehead. When he sees me he grins.

  “Sorry, Grace. I didn’t know you were standing there.”

  “It’s okay,” I say.

  He stands and wipes his hands with a dirty blue rag that doesn’t seem like it’s doing much good.

  “I haven’t seen you in a while. You doing okay?”

  “I’m all right.”

  He frowns. “How’s your mom doing?”

  I picture Mama drooling on her pillow or shuffling to the back stoop, where she sometimes sits for hours. I’m about to tell Ralph she’s okay, just like I tell everyone when they ask about her. Before I can open my mouth the picture of her scrambles in my brain and instead I see her slumped behind the wheel of our car.

  “Grace? Honey, you look pale.” Ralph leads me to a greasy chair. “Why don’t you sit down for a minute.”

  I try to shake the image of Mama from my mind, but it won’t go away.

  “Can I use your phone?”

  “You need a ride? I’ll take you home.”

  “No.” I run behind the counter and dial our house.

  Hope picks up. “Carter residence.”

  “It’s me, Hope. Where’s Mama?”

  “Grace? I don’t know. Probably in bed. Why?”

  “Go look and come back.”

  “Okay.”

  I hear her footsteps pad toward the bedroom, then farther away. She calls for Mama. Half a minute later she’s back.

  “She’s not in her bed or on the back porch.”

  “Who else is there?”

  “Everyone. Joy and Marilyn are in the kitchen. Chas is watching TV. Daddy’s in the bathroom.”

  “Tell Joy to check in the barn for Mama.”

  “Why would she—”

  “Hope! Do it now!”

  She drops the receiver and I hear it swing back and forth against the wall.

  “Joy! Chastity!” I scream into the phone. “Somebody go help Mama! She’s in the barn and she needs help RIGHT NOW!”

  Ralph looks at me like I’ve lost my last marbles but keeps his distance. I hear muffled voices, the back door slam, then Daddy’s voice. He picks up the receiver.

  “Who is this?”

  “Go to the barn!” I yell.

  “Grace? What’s going on?”

  “It’s Mama! She’s not breathing. Daddy, please go to the barn!”

  The receiver drops again, this time hitting the floor.

  PART TWO

  For the Lord has poured over you a spirit of deep sleep.

  He has closed your eyes and covered your heads,

  you prophets, you seers.

  —Isaiah 29:10

  22

  February 1972

  Over a year has passed since Mama went into the coma. Between the carbon monoxide fumes and the pills she took, the doctors say her prognosis isn’t good. What they mean is, she might never wake up. Daddy hasn’t let any of us come to the hospital because he doesn’t want to upset us kids any more than we already are. But this week they told Daddy he should let us visit. They think we’d feel better if we could see Mama sleeping peacefully. I heard about a man who was in a coma for ten years and then just popped his eyes open one day. Maybe they secretly hope we might be able to bring her out of it since they haven’t been able to.

  I read in a magazine that people in comas can hear you even if they can’t respond. I want to tell her about all the happy things she’s missed, like Marilyn’s first time on the potty, Joy getting her actual driver’s license, that we filled two more Green Stamps books and we’re halfway through a third. I’ll leave out the sad stuff, like missing my thirteenth birthday, and probably my fourteenth since it’s only a couple weeks away. I’ll tell her about the day Daddy let Joy trim his hair with the electric razor and she carved a huge bald spot in the side of his head. He tried covering it up with shoe polish but it rained, turning his collar black and his face red. I think she’d laugh at that. I could probably fill an entire notebook with the things she’s missed.

  Hope and I slide into the back seat of our bus. Daddy has Joy drive to Blue Rapids so he can spend the time last-minute studying for his sermon tomorrow. I brought my math homework. Hope brought her Bible. She’s up to the book of Jude in her quest to read the whole thing, about a year behind schedule but almost there. Chastity refused to come along. Threw the biggest fit I’ve seen since she was seven years old and her favorite dress shrunk in the clothes dryer. I think she doesn’t want her heart broken twice. The tantrum worked. Daddy let her stay home to watch Marilyn.

  When we get to the hospital Daddy takes Hope and Joy into Mama’s room first because they let only three people in at a time. I wait in the visitor’s lobby, where a little boy with the darkest face I’ve ever seen stands directly in front of me, staring. There aren’t any black people in Cherry Hill so it’s hard not to stare back. He has an Afro like on the Jimmy Hendrix album at Lola’s house. I want to touch it so badly I have to hold one hand with the other one to keep myself from feeling that kid’s head. A little girl with a bazillion barrettes in her hair comes up and stands next to him. The two of them look at each other and giggle with their hands over their mouths, but I can still see their dazzling smiles.

  I busy myself with an article in Good Housekeeping about how to look good for your man when he comes home from work. According to the magazine, no man wants to be greeted by a wife in curlers. A kiss is welcome, but she should not talk at him as soon as he gets in the door. Fix him a drink, the article says, and let him unwind before serving him dinner. It doesn’t make sense to me. Seems like the husband should be the one who brings the wife a drink after running behind kids all day, shopping for groceries, doing laundry, and cooking meals. Maybe if Daddy had helped Mama more she wouldn’t have needed those nerve pills. Maybe she wouldn’t have tried to kill herself. And maybe she wouldn’t have ended up in this cold, ugly hospital.

  Daddy taps me on the shoulder, startling me. “You can go in now.”

  When I walk into the hallway he points toward a room where Joy stands sideways in the doorway, one foot in the room and one in the hall. He motions for me to go in. “I’m going to call on some of the other patients. Joy will stay with you.”

  Ever since Mama’s “incident” he’s been watching me with an eagle eye. When he asked how I knew about her being in the barn with the engine running, I said God told me. He can’t get too mad at me because if I hadn’t made that call Mama might not even be alive. But I know he’s rattled. He stares at me when I walk into a room, brows furrowed, like he’s trying to read a road sign from too far away without h
is glasses on.

  I stand in the hallway with my feet frozen in place. My legs are trembling. I want to see Mama, but part of me is afraid. Daddy puts his hand in the center of my back and pushes me across the hall. Joy moves aside and I feel myself stepping over an invisible line between two worlds. I glance toward Joy lingering in the doorway, picking at a hangnail. Hope remains on her knees on the other side of Mama’s bed, praying quietly, her head resting on the sheet near Mama’s feet.

  Mama’s skin is pale as baby powder and her body like a limp doll. She’s not in this world at all. Her breath is here but that’s about it. I force myself to pull a chair up next to her bed and reach for her needle-bruised hand. As soon as I touch her I’m lost in a different place. There’s no hospital room, no sisters, and no more sounds from the bedside machines. Yet here’s Mama, smack-dab in front of me, sitting on a porch swing, a slight breeze blowing the hair back from her face.

  “Mama?”

  “Grace . . .”

  The way she says it is like a prayer.

  “What are you doing here, Mama?”

  “I’m just resting, that’s all. Isn’t it a lovely day?”

  Dandelions and butterflies flood a meadow beside us. Each time the wind blows it ruffles the grass, turning it a new shade of green. The sky above us is the color of a lagoon with cloud bubbles swimming by. I can smell lilacs blooming somewhere close by.

  “It’s beautiful, Mama. But where is this? Where are you?”

  Mama smiles so big her eyes almost close. She grips the chain that supports the hanging swing and nudges with her feet. The swing creaks as she moves, but I can’t see up to where the creaking starts. Even the clapboard wall behind her looks like just the front of a house on a stage set. If I walk up and push on it, will it fall over? Is there anything behind it?