“Are you ready?” I asked.
“Yes, Ma’am,” she replied. “Where are we going?”
“Christmas shopping,” I said with a lightness I did not feel at the moment.
Patrice and I slid into the back seat of the taxi and I asked him to take us to the J.C. Penney store downtown.
“Meter’s been running,” he said as he pulled away from the curb.
I ignored the comment and turned toward Patrice.
“Tell me about this young man - what was his name? Sidney?”
“Cedric,” she sighed. “What do you want to know?”
“How old is he?”
“Twenty-one,” she answered.
“Does your mama know about him?”
“She’s known Cedric since he was a baby!” Patrice sounded a bit defensive.
“I didn’t ask if she knew him; I asked if she knew about him. There’s a difference.”
“What about him?” I was surprised at how well this sixteen year old child could deflect questions.
“Well, for starters, why is he visiting you without your mama being home? Does she know about that?”
“No, ma’am,” Patrice groaned.
“Do you think she would approve?”
“No, ma’am.” She was near tears now. “Are you going to tell her?”
“I don’t like to lie to your mother.” The irony of my phrasing was not lost on me.
“She’ll kill me for lettin’ him in the house when she isn’t there.”
“Patrice,” I sighed, “You’re a bright girl. Exceptionally bright from all I know. Do you realize the chances you’re taking with your life?”
“We were just hanging out together, Miz Beckworth! Honest, we weren’t doing anything wrong!”
“If your mama doesn’t know about it, it’s wrong. What I’m worried about is what you don’t know.”
“I know he likes me,” she said defensively. “He thinks I’m smart and mature…” She paused and then added, “and pretty, too.”
“Lot of people think those things about you,” I agreed. “But not all of them want the same thing from you as he does.”
“How do you know what he wants?” she asked, suddenly sullen, as if she knew very well what I was going to say.
“Because I know, that’s how.”
Patrice sighed and slumped into the corner of the back seat.
“Patrice, you have promise. Do you understand that? You have the talent and intelligence to break free of your situation and make something of yourself.”
She rolled her eyes and turned her head toward the window.
“Something much more than just a young single mother, or a wife if you’re lucky.”
“Bible says being a wife is a good thing,” Patrice countered with the only argument she could find.
“It is a good thing - at the right time and under the right circumstances. Otherwise, it can wind up being a life sentence.”
“You didn’t have it so bad, did you?”
“I wasn’t having sex at sixteen.”
That got her attention. Patrice sat up straight and looked me right in the eye.
“I never did, Miz Beckworth! Never!”
“Good!” I beamed. “And I’m going to help you keep it that way!”
She sat completely still, staring now at the back of the driver’s seat.
“Are you gonna tell Mama?” A single tear escaped the eyes that had long been full and threatening to overflow.
“No, I’m not,” I replied.
“What are you going to do, then?”
“I’m not sure just yet. We’ll have to wait and see.”
Just then, the taxi pulled up in front of the two-story J.C. Penney building three blocks from my house. I could see the twins and Gracie getting off the bus and racing toward my front porch. They never looked in our direction as I paid the cab driver.
“Let’s go, Patrice,” I said jovially as I took her arm and guided her into the square beige building. “We’ve got a lot of shopping to do and only a little time to do it.”
We climbed the marble stairs to the children’s department and found plenty of clothes from which to choose. Patrice knew all the new styles and the sizes the younger girls wore. We chose a dress for each of them, with matching lace socks and patent leather shoes. I thought the socks might be a bit too childish for the twins, but Patrice assured me they would be good for church functions.
We bought smock tops and two pairs of jeans for each of them, and completed our shopping with fancy new underwear from the children’s department.
Then we headed back down the wide staircase to the Misses’ section. I knew Blanche’s size from purchasing uniforms over the years. Patrice and I found a bright blue suit and a matching wide-brimmed hat for Blanche to wear to church. Afterwards, I chose two house dresses and a pair of soft white slippers that I thought Blanche would enjoy.
Once that was done, I ushered Patrice to the Junior Department and told her to start trying on clothes.
“For me?” she asked, her eyes glistening with unshed tears.
“Of course, for you!” I laughed. “What? Did you think you weren’t included in Christmas?”
“I thought maybe you were mad at me,” Patrice said shyly.
“Don’t mistake concern for anger, child. I care about you and I care about your mother and I can’t stand the thought of her bearing anymore heartbreak.”
With that, the tears spilled over in her eyes and she brushed them away with the back of her hands.
“Okay, no crying allowed,” I said, and pushed her toward the clothes. “Let’s see how some of these things look on you.”
I took my initial purchases back to the service department to be gift-wrapped. When I returned, I found a chair near the dressing rooms and let Patrice model every outfit she liked, which turned out to be a considerable few. I paid careful attention to sizes and favorites and, when we were done, sent Patrice to the back to collect our wrapped goods. I chose three pairs of slacks, two shirts and a dress that Patrice had adored, even though I thought it a bit too short for my standards. After paying the clerk for them, I asked her to have them wrapped and told her I would pick them up later.
I didn’t want Patrice to see what I had purchased, so I had the clerk take the other items away from the register, thinking Patrice would return any moment. When she didn’t, I headed for the service department. She wasn’t there, either, and the clerk I had originally seen had been replaced by a middle-aged woman whose thin lips were flanked by the lines of a perpetual scowl.
I identified myself and asked for my packages.
“Oh, Mrs. Beckworth,” the clerk gushed, “I’m so glad you’re here! I just had the most unpleasant experience with a Negro girl over your packages.”
I must have been stunned, because it didn’t register with me what she meant.
“What happened? Did she pick up my gifts?”
“Oh, of course not,” the clerk said confidently. “There is no way in the world I would let one of those people steal your things.”
“Steal my things?” It took hindsight to realize that the sinking feeling in my chest hit before I truly understood what she was saying.
“Why, a girl was just here, trying to take your gifts. I turned her away, of course. She wasn’t going to pull anything over on me!”
“Where is she?” I demanded.
I suppose she thought my anger was directed at the object of her scorn because she nearly crowed in triumph, “Why, the manager has her in his office right now. I imagine he’s searched her and…”
I didn’t stay to hear the rest. I headed right for Red Bascomb’s office, which was just three doors down. I didn’t bother to knock.
“Patrice!” I called her name even as I was turning the knob. I saw Bascomb’s back before I saw the frightened child huddled against the wall. He whirled to face me and she inched from behind him and ran straight into my arms.
I held her against my s
houlder and did my best to comfort her, all the while glaring at the stunned man in front of me.
“What is the meaning of this?” I demanded of him.
“Why I was just… I was told…” Red Bascomb faltered. “Is she with you?” he finally managed.
“Looks like it, doesn’t it,” I said through clenched teeth.
“I think I’ve made a mistake, Ora,” Red Bascomb admitted.
“What gave it away, Red?”
To his credit he had the decency to blush.
“I was told she was attempting to collect items that didn’t belong to her,” Red stammered in his defense.
“She was with me!” I hissed.
“I see that now,” he said, his composure nearly regained, “and I certainly apologize. But, it was an honest mistake. I truly didn’t know, Ora.”
I actually stamped my foot at him. Then I took Patrice by the shoulders and turned her sodden face towards him.
“Tell her that.”
Red let out a sigh. “I am sorry, Miss Lowery. I hope you will forgive me, but I didn’t realize who you were.”
Patrice just nodded and turned away. Then, bless her heart, that child drew herself up to her full height and walked serenely from Red’s office and through the store. I followed as she stopped at the service desk and faced the clerk.
“I’ve come to collect Miz Beckworth’s packages,” she said to the bewildered woman, who simply stood with her scowling mouth hanging wide open.
I slapped my hand down on the counter, my bracelets jingling noisily. “Did you hear her?” I asked.
The clerk fumbled with several large bags behind the counter and eventually handed them to Patrice, who took them in each hand and proceeded through the store. Apparently the grapevine was short there, because every clerk in the store stopped what they were doing and watched that child pass with head held high and tears nearly dried.
I wish I could say that I fully comprehended what took place that day, but it is only in the retelling of the story that I understand my part in it. And, Lord forgive me, I just now realized how much my indignation was misplaced. I was upset that Patrice had been treated badly; there’s no doubt about that. But, it never dawned on me how wrong it was that I tied her innocence to the fact that she was with me, not who she was, and I am humbled by my ignorance.
Fifteen
The girls had a ball retrieving my decorations from the attic that night after supper. In fact, they found a good bit more than just decorations. It had been years since I had climbed the narrow steps to my attic, but the girls would not have it but that I join them there to see the treasures they had found.
A cedar chest full of my grandmother’s old clothes and my mother’s wedding dress lay in one corner. One box held a variety of crocheted doilies and embroidered handkerchiefs and other various tablecloths and linens. There was an entire stack of hatboxes and a hall tree sporting a half dozen more hats on its hooks. Another box held scrapbooks full of pictures dating to the late 1800s. My wedding album was there and I sat down at my mother’s old dressing table to look through the evidence of my innocent hope. In one picture, I sat in an ornate chair, smiling up over my shoulder at Walter with an expression of unabashed adoration on my face. He was returning my gaze with a beguiled grin of his own.
Funny, I hadn’t remembered adoring Walter like that. Nor did I remember him ever being particularly captivated by me. As I sat there in my attic, with three little girls busily rooting through and trying on various costumes of another era, I wondered if time had so altered my memory that I had forgotten such things as love, or if pictures did indeed tell the story.
I finally dragged the girls away from their plunder by promising hot chocolate while we decorated the tree. I also assured them we’d return to the attic to play at some later date.
Patrice, sufficiently recovered from the afternoon trauma, washed the dishes and made the cocoa while Blanche rested in Walter’s recliner and watched our festive doings. Blanche would normally have gone home much earlier, but it was Friday and the girls wouldn’t have to go to school the next day, so we were all carried away with our merriment. Before we knew it, the clock chimed eleven times and we looked at each other in amazement. Blanche was snoring softly from the chair and Grace had fallen asleep on the couch, but the rest of us were still going strong when we put on the last ornament, a brightly lit angel to adorn the treetop.
I sent the twins to the guest bedroom and Patrice to Walter’s old room, which hadn’t been used once since his death. Blanche kept it clean and changed the sheets every couple of weeks, but I had scarcely opened the door in the past year.
I couldn’t remember exactly when or why Walter had moved out of our room and into what used to be the guest room. Something about his snoring disturbing my sleep - or my restlessness disturbing his - I can’t remember which came first. One day he moved to the extra bed in the middle of the night. Then he moved his clothes from our closet so that he wouldn’t wake me up when he got ready for work. Eventually we started calling it his room, which necessitated the decoration of my old sewing room as the new guest room.
Patrice was just happy to have a bed to fall into after her long, long day. I took blankets down to cover Grace and Blanche, turned off the tree lights, locked all the doors and returned to Patrice’s room to check on her before retiring myself. She was buried in the covers with pillows piled high under her head.
“You comfortable?” I asked, knowing the answer already.
“This is the best bed I ever slept in, Miz Beckworth. I slept at my friend’s house a couple of times, but I’ve never slept anywhere all by myself.”
“Never?”
“No’m, not ever once.”
“You don‘t have your own room now?” I asked.
“There’s only two bedrooms in our house. One’s got two twin beds and Mama just has a double.”
“Goodness, that’s not many beds for all you children! How do you manage?” I couldn't seem to help being nosy.
“Well, me and Gracie sleep in one bed and the twins in the other. Marcus used to sleep on the sofa when he was home or, every once in a while, with Mama. I guess I could sleep on the sofa if I wanted to sleep by myself, but it just doesn’t seem right somehow.”
“You miss your brother, don’t you?”
“Yes, Ma’am, I do sometimes. Long as I just pretend he’s away at boot camp I do pretty good. I can’t hardly look at a semi truck now, though. It makes me remember too much.”
“I’m sorry about that, Patrice.”
“Nothin’ for you to be sorry ‘bout, Miz Beckworth. You didn’t do nothin’ wrong.”
“Anything wrong,” I replied. I can’t for the life of me figure out why correcting her grammar seemed like the thing to do at the time.
“Yes, Ma’am,” she smiled sheepishly.
“You sleep tight now, okay?”
“I will,” Patrice murmured sleepily. “Real tight in this comfy ol’ bed.” She turned away from me then, rolling to her right side.
“I sure am sorry about what happened today,” I said gently.
She turned her head back to look at me with calm acceptance. “Oh, it’s all right, Miz Beckworth. I’m kind of used to it by now.”
Her reply stung me worse than the horror we faced in the department store, because she told the pure truth of it.
Sixteen
The next day, after Blanche and the girls had eaten breakfast and gone on home, I walked down to the Woolworth store to buy stockings and little gifts for Blanche’s girls. I had an awful lot of fun choosing perfumes and bath oils and shiny hair clips for each of them. And I bought Blanche a big box of chocolate turtles, which I knew were her favorites.
I had just finished making all my purchases and was about to head for home when I saw a rack of bicycles in the front window of the store. I somehow missed them on my way in and they were marked for clearance, it being so close to Christmas Eve.
They had ten-speeds in ever
y color and size, and smaller bikes with banana seats and tassels hanging from the handlebars. I thought about Blanche and her girls walking everywhere and, although I couldn’t imagine Blanche heaving her ample behind onto a bicycle of any shape or size, I thought it might be good for the girls to be a bit more mobile.
I stood there contemplating the purchase of four bicycles and how much it would cost, sale or no sale. I had almost talked myself out of spending the money when a something occurred to me that stopped me in my tracks. What if Grace had ridden a bicycle to my house the day that Skipper Kornegay had stopped her in the woods?
I bought four bicycles. The largest was for Patrice, a 21 inch yellow ten-speed with curved handlebars like the racers use. Two smaller ten-speeds were perfect for the twins, just alike except that one was bright orange and the other purple. I bought a pink bike for Gracie, with a white basket in front and glittery plastic tassels hanging from the handlebars. It was the perfect size for her, big enough that she could ride without the training wheels that were attached, but small enough that they came with it. I had no idea whether any of the girls could ride the bicycles, but I sure felt better once I bought them. I arranged to have them delivered on Christmas Eve. I would put them in the garage until Christmas morning.
I stopped at the soda counter after I made my purchases. I had intended to go home to have lunch, but I thought of the hot dogs on grilled buns Walter and I used to enjoy there on Saturdays. And cherry cokes. Real cherry coke, not the store-bought canned ones you get today. I sat at the counter, feeling shaky and unladylike on the wobbly stool, but I stayed right there. I ate my hotdog with plenty of mustard and relish and I felt right proud of myself for all I’d accomplished in one morning.
The Pecan Man Page 9