One O'Clock Jump

by Lise McClendon

  When she rounded the corner onto Charlotte and saw the large group in the middle of the street, her heart lurched. An accident, Jenny or Luther, hit by a car, passed out from hunger. But no—people were laughing, cheering. There were the two bachelors from the second floor, legendary grumps now grinning. Mrs. Ferazzi in her flowered apron, even Tony, hollering and throwing up a fist.

  After parking the car, she approached the crowd slowly, wishing she could slip by but knowing it wouldn’t happen. Energy filled the street, a strange and jubilant feeling. As she got closer, she saw Betty Kimble and Harvey Talbot each with one of Luther’s arms, pulling him toward the center of the circle. Luther’s face had darkened and he shook his head violently, digging his heels into the cobblestones.

  In the center of the circle sat Mrs. Ferazzi’s piano. Joe Czmanski struggled to push a wedge under one leg to keep it steady on the cobblestones. Winkie Lambert and a new beau in a streetcar hack’s uniform egged Luther on, calling for him to play. Across the crowd, Poppy and Frankie stood mutely, worry clouding Poppy’s motherly brow.

  Harvey and Betty had pushed Luther up to the piano, but he grabbed onto the back side of it and refused to budge. Betty put her hands on her hips and started a harangue in the vein of “all we’ve done for you.” Harvey smiled at the man, tried a man-to-man approach. Neither attack worked, and Luther’s refusal to play sent up jeers from the bystanders. They had all helped carry the damn piano into the street, it seemed, and were expecting some payment in music.

  A large Plymouth came down the street behind them; the driver laid on his horn. Winkie’s beau stepped back to give the man directions to turn around. Harvey saw Lennox and waved her over. “He said he’d do it if we brought the piano out,” he said. “Talk to him.”

  Luther had broken out in a cold sweat. He held his head in his hands, elbows on the back of the upright, and looked like he might cry. Lennox didn’t know what to say to him. Whose idea was this? She looked back at Talbot and frowned. He urged her on.

  “Luther?” she said softly. “Remember when we planned that picnic by the river?” He moved his hands, eyes fixed on her face now. “I didn’t tell you, but I’m afraid of the river, of the snakes and fishes and water. I didn’t want to go there.”

  “You dint?”

  “Nope. The river scares me.”

  His eyes darted around the street, lighting on faces, on hands, on windows bright with the rosy flares of last light. Then back at his own hands, graceful and brown.

  “So I was happy when we didn’t have that picnic,” Lennox went on, her voice low. “I felt like that man in the book I gave you, that I’d gotten free of something, gotten away. But I was wrong.”

  Luther rubbed his fingers into his eyes, wiped sweat dripping off his eyebrows, stared back at her.

  “The fear stays inside you until you let it out, let it go free. I had to do that with the river.”

  “Whacha do?”

  “Jumped right in. I was scared, but I did it anyway. After the first splash, it was fine.” It was a sham. But for Luther, she would do anything, even tell lies.

  She saw him looking at the ivories. She leaned close. “You have the most beautiful hands, Luther.”

  He dipped his chin, a tiny smile on his lips. He stretched out his fingers on the top of the upright and the talking in the crowd hushed. He lifted his head up and rounded the instrument. Joe Czmanski pushed the apple crate forward, centering it in front of the keyboard. Luther grabbed it, held it close for a second, then straddled it, extending his arms from one end of the ivories to the other.

  In a bar or two, Norma and Nell were bobbing their heads, Betty and Ho jitter bugging. Mrs. Ferazzi rocked on the balls of her feet in time to the music. The piano was woefully out of tune. No one seemed to care. The ragtime music sounded tinny and dated, but he played it so neatly, his fingers tripping over the keys, light as air. For a moment, time stopped and they were back in New Orleans, St. Louis, Charleston, in a speakeasy, nothing but music and moonshine and smiling.

  Frankie’s braids bobbed in time. Poppy’s worry still clung, but she was smiling now. As one song ended and the clapping subsided, Luther started up again, a Jelly Roll Morton song, “Kansas City Stomp.” When he hit the high trills, Lennox could see her father and mother dancing close in the apartment over the drugstore, and she felt a shiver run up her back.

  Harvey appeared at her shoulder, leaned down to whisper in her ear, but gave her a small kiss instead.

  “Hey, Dorie!” Frankie touched her arm. “I wrote my paper about that book, and I think I figured out what it means.”

  Harvey moved around the piano. He looked back at Lennox and winked, then leaned an elbow on top of the upright.

  Lennox turned to Frankie and smiled. “I’m glad.”

  “You wanna hear what I said?”

  With the limp daisy in her fist, Dorie closed her eyes before answering. The vibrations of the piano thumped through her. The bridge—there was Verna walking away into the twilight. And Tillie. Singing. Something sweet and high and pure. The evening light, lavender and misty, began to pale. The river disappeared, and Verna took Tillie’s tiny hand in hers.

  Dorie’s eyelids began to burn. She let the image go and opened her eyes. She looked at the people, her friends, with their happy, rapt faces, and knew she would never be one of them. But maybe this was enough. Joe’s ravaged face, the bachelors who barely spoke, the old woman lost in a dream of salvation, the twin sisters with their caring hearts, the single girls searching for adventure. Harvey Talbot, who .. . was Harvey. Poppy, who finally told the story of a broken man. And then Amos and his lost love. The future looked full of war, suffering, losses. But what choice was there? The past was full of ghosts.

  She took Frankie’s arm in hers. Luther pounded on the keys and grinned up at them.

  “Yeah, Frankie, sure,” she said. “I want to hear it. But can you tell me later? I love this music.”