Granma’am said every inch of me would show in the picture, and we all would look at it for the rest of my life, and my children might have it if it last that long. “Fix y’socks with that on y’mind,” she told me. As I was closing the gate she added, “And don’t wrinkle y’dress.”
The man who took the picture had a lot of equipment—lights, curtains, cameras, tissue to wipe down the Eboline. The Kinsey family went first, I waited. I asked Mrs. Kinsey to check my socks soon as I put them on. She checked them again after their family photograph, while the man who took the picture was telling me where and how to sit. Where my hair was fuzzy and short around the front and sides, she rubbed it back with warm, sure hands. She dabbed some of the pressed powder from her compact and brushed it on the tip of my nose. Her busy smell of mother.
J ASKS ME can he come over to Margarete’s to see me. This is after he quit school and started the job he got. He is already over to Margarete’s visiting when he asks me this, and I am deep in my book covers half listening to him. I ask him from where I am where is he going. He doesn’t answer back right away so I look up at him. I can tell by his silence and his face he is saying something that I should ask him more about. I simply ask him, “What you talkin bout, J?” He and I both know from the false high of my voice that I am stalling, and I am; I don’t want to talk about new things. I want to keep on doing what I’m doing. I don’t want to be interrupted.
His face crumples a little.
Well, dog. What exactly is he asking me? I take a deep breath; there he is looking at my hair, I guess. He says the way I braid it reminds him of home.
“I cain’t answer you, J,” I say. I am the only one calls him that.
“How come?” he asks me.
“Cause you asking me,” I dodge, “about Margarete’s house.”
“Oh,” he accepts.
Huge mistake. J had been educated in the Arkansas school of whatever this was he thought he was doing. He sent his uncle Jump over to ask Margarete.
I didn’t think nothing of seeing Jump at the house them few days later, so I have to say I might of opened the door on this eruption myself. Big Jim and Luke edward and Margarete teased me enough to burn clean through. For a while, I was so heated up by all this off-color attention that I took a clean dive into the cool spring of my lessons. I tried not to think about J and his boyfriend girlfriend silliness. But the teasing made me kind of mad.
J did come by, a couple weeks after his uncle. First thing he said: “Cain’t my uncle Jump make anything happen!” Grinning. I could of slapped him. Instead, I cussed him out. Shocked at my roiling, he asks, “Whassa matter, Neesey?” and that pitiful piece of heather branch he brought me dropped with his arm from behind his back and ruined his surprise.
“Everybody looks at me like my hips are spreading!” I shot at him, my eyes full to snapping with all the disagreement hanging. He looks foolish and uncomprehending.
One after the other, they had each got me privately. They teased me in public, but they all felt like they had something more important to say. First David came, then Margarete, then Big Jim, and then Luke edward. Keep your dress down. Keep your dress down. Keep your dress down. Keep your dress down. They all said exactly the same thing. Except Luke edward who said keep your dress down and your underpants up.
My next birthday, my second in Detroit, when I was turning fourteen, only J and Luke edward remembered, and only J on time. Though he had been as persistent as a farmer, and come by once a month, I was curt with him until my birthday was forgotten. Just like my family helped me get mad at him, they created the vacuum that let me know he really was a good somebody to have around. J sent me a card and came by the house after work. By the time he arrived, my mouth had turned down the way I hate and the way Margarete’s does when the bills ain’t paid. I was not glad to see him, and I was shamed of my feeling, and then he commenced to showing me a box wrapped in birthday paper.
My day changed, late as it was. It wasn’t a real big box, but that didn’t matter not at all. It was wrapped in birthday paper, and he grinning, “Open it, open it.” We had some coffee in the kitchen, and I opened my one box slow. Inside was some long-arm kitchen mitts. I squealed. J explained, “They industrial. For all-the-time cooks, like you.”
I had put them on while he’s talking, and up to my elbows was covered in silver quilt. I got right up and went to the oven and pulled the pan of lamb chops I made for myself for my birthday, see did I feel any burning heat. I didn’t. I basted the chops while I was up, see did I have any trouble working with a spoon with the mitts on. I didn’t. J had got up with me, and said, “I was wonderin how you cooked em. They sure smell good.”
“You hungry? They done.”
“You got enough?”
I felt defiant. There were leftovers in the box, and any of these late Negroes who forgot my birthday for the second time, well, they could just eat what we had yesterday. I put two lamb chops and a mound a spinach and a mound a potatoes on his plate. I fixed a plate for me. “You want some gravy, J?”
“Yeah,” he said.
“What you want it on—the meat?”
“And potatoes,” he said.
I laid my mittens neat in the box and poured us some ice water in my lovely tumblers. We sat down and had a birthday dinner. While we was eating, J asked me did I know the rhyme about Mary had a little lamb.
I nodded my head yes. Miss Pearson had reminded me when we went to Hudson’s cafeteria and had tea and mashed potatoes that I must never never never talk with food in my mouth. Mrs. Valentine Kinsey had said the same thing to me all the time down the country, but Mrs. Kinsey said it mostly so I would teach her children good manners, I thought; Missus Pearson really cared about how it made me look.
“What about it?” I asked him when the murky mixture of tender lamb and soft spinach had slid warm down my throat. I wiped my mouth with the paper towel I had laid our silverware on. I liked talking to Josephus. (Even though the way his schooling was handled made me mad—in the nights I had had to wonder if I was only mad cause their ignoring him in school meant he left me there alone.) When he talked he said real smart, country-wise, foretelling things. “What about it, J?” I repeated, when he took too long to answer me.
“Well,” he started. “Mary had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb. Mary had a little lamb. Its fleece was white as snow. Everywhere that Mary went, Mary went, Mary went, everywhere that Mary went, the lamb was sure to go.”
And then sometimes, he made not a whole lot a sense. He shoveled more food in his mouth after reciting, as if the break to say the rhyme had starved him.
“J, I don’t know what you talkin bout,” I said. Not understanding things puts me in a bad mood, usually. I didn’t want to get in a bad mood when this was my only little birthday celebration. If he didn’t explain hisself, I was gone be mad, and I was gone be mad at him. He had about five minutes. I started to pull together my dishes and things like I was gone get up. And like you might expect, that put fear of God in him.
“You think it has to do with the Bible?” he said.
See what I mean? He may be country, but he is not dumb. And I am very fond of curiosity, I love questions.
“What you mean, J?” I said, happy.
“Well, Mary,” he said, emphasis on Mary.
“Yes,” I said. I have finished with my food.
“And the little lamb could be Jesus,” he said.
“Hmmm.” I said. “I ain’t never heard it bein bout the Bible, J,” I said, “but that don’t mean it ain’t. You could be discoverin somethin,” I said, and then I did get up to start on the dishes. I didn’t want to sit over no food scraps, chatting.
J asked me what was my best time this year and I remarked about all the crates a books I covered for Missus Pearson over the summer. How it took me all those weeks to finish the job, and how Missus Pearson just left it for me to do. How that was a real job that wasn’t cleaning or cooking or something else that need to be
done day in and day out. How when it was finished, I could look at the books stacked up, and know I had lasted through all that was expected of me. I love schoolbooks, anyway, I said.
“We all know that,” J answered, smiling broad.
J asked me, well, what about the baby I’m raising so nice. I had finished all the dishes in the sink. Me and J went and looked over the crib rail at Clara. Clara is eleven months. Clara has a big appetite. J wants to know what I feed her. I tell him she eats a half a soft-boiled egg with a half a piece a bacon mashed in it in the morning. She likes just a spoonful of applesauce for dessert. Dessert of every meal. I give her a little prune juice in her bottle when I come home from school, and Saturdays and Sundays at eleven. For dinner, she just has whatever vegetable I fix—I mash it up for her—because she’s so distracted by Margarete and Big Jim she’ll eat anything at dinnertime, no trouble.
J is seventeen, be eighteen in the summer. I think from his questions he gone say something stupid about babies and make me want to send him home. He whispers, “Ain’t we gone have birthday cake?” I tell him no, I ain’t got no cake. It’s bad luck to bake your own birthday cake, I tell him. J says he sorry he didn’t know that before he came. I tell him that’s OK cause those mittens he brought sure will cut down on my scars.
J left to take the bus across town, home, and I felt better. I turned off the oven and let the food get cold in the kitchen. Nobody was hungry when they come in even though everybody remarked that I didn’t say we was having, what’s that they smell, lamb chops.
In the morning, when the kitchen got light, my mittens with the birthday paper could be seen. Everybody was sheepish, and I got presents the day after.
J called on the telephone and had a conversation with Luke edward. I wasn’t home, didn’t know nothing about it. I had been to Missus Pearson’s, and she gave me a box with cotton gloves for the spring. Off-white gloves with tuck seams down the back of the hand. They were wrist length and in a glove box. I was thrilled near to a faint.
I didn’t have such a good time that visit, though. Margarete had woke up late that Saturday and, rushing to get to the shop, passed all her agitation on to the baby. So Clara was cranky, and Missus Pearson was happy I was fourteen but thought this was the time I needed to start paying more attention to how Negroes act.
She wanted to know if I saw what was going on in this city. If I was noticing how rambunctious Negroes were becoming.
Rambunctious, I think.
She started to talk about the fires on this and that side of town. And in other cities too, she waved a newspaper at me.
I used Clara’s crying as my excuse, and I took my gloves and left. Missus Pearson could outdo herself, talking about Negro weakness or laziness or failure to understand about the world. (Clap, clap.)
But the gloves made me smile all the way home. And at one red light, I took the box out of Clara’s stroller and looked at them again. When I got to the house, I had my hands full so I rang the bell. No answer. It was hardly twelve noon, Saturday morning; I knew Luke edward was in there, probably sleep.
“Luke,” I hollered, and it made me laugh. It was just like when I was in Detroit when I was little, and Margarete would send me out to get them boys, and I would holler and holler till my head ached, seem like. And I would still have to walk all the way up to their faces, and be big and strong and bold. A mama representative. “Git in the house, Luke edward, time to eat. Git in the house, David, Mama wants you NOW.”
“LUKE, LUKE,” I hollered. Finally he came down to the door.
“Hi, Buddy, how you?” I said. “Help me with this stroller.” I lifted the baby, Clara held my glove box, and I headed up the stairs. “How you get that flour on your sweater?” I asked.
“Where you gettin them hips is what I want to know,” he said. He bumped up the steps with Clara’s Cadillac.
I smelled cake. Clara saw J inside and called to him in garble. He came and took the baby from my arms. He had flour in his hair.
I walked straight into the kitchen, which you know was a mess. Nine cookbooks open, flour and eggshells everywhere. The cabinet doors a-gaping.
“It’s a cake in the oven,” J beamed.
It came out a little lopsided, but it came out. When Margarete and Big Jim’s friends came over, everybody got a little sliver—just a little sliver—and we had a birthday party, rowdy, for me. J stayed half the night and walked home happy.
It was clear from the beginning that J would take care of me. Before he started at River Rouge Plant, he kept me from being by myself in all my country ways. He encouraged me to keep my head up when the baby was coming down like a guillotine. And he always asked what I was studying, said I should keep my mind alert. After Margarete had Clara, he came and visited and hauled the big stroller down the front stairs for me while I hauled the baby behind. I had got mad at him before, and for good reason, I think. But after that birthday, I forgave him, and he noticed. He felt better. So when Clara is finally toddling—and can be left with other people from time to time—J says he wants to make out and is it OK. I think it is probably time.
We go to his bedroom on his birthday; mine is long past. The men get they birthdays off at the plant. His uncle Jump has told him to have a good time, and because I don’t want to know, I don’t ask if he told his uncle Jump I am coming over.
We have been to have hamburgers and french fries and milk shakes at suppertime. We walk back; J knows I like to walk. J’s room is neat and orderly. He does not have a closet, but he has hammered up two long boards at different heights all along one wall. On the boards he has put nails, and on each nail is a hanger or two with his clothes he wears. His shoes are lined up, and his feet are big.
J asks me if I want to sit on his bed, and I sit down at the edge. He kisses me behind my ears a number of times. He seems to be taking care to be soft, and I appreciate that. All while this is happening, I am telling myself I am near fifteen, and this is time enough.
J asks me if he can touch my titty, and I stop thinking about my age long enough to tell him, yes, he can but not hard. I am surprised when he reaches inside my sweater to touch it, but he doesn’t pull it hard and it feels nice. I look at him out the side of my eye, and he is being so careful and looking at me so hard that our eyes lock like hangers caught together at the hook. I have to laugh cause I’m nervous; something in the caughtness of this hurts a little bit.
He laughs with me, and we talk for a little while. He promises me that his uncle Jump is not coming anytime soon, and he tells me that his private is big. He asks me do I want to see it, and I tell him no. He asks me do I want to take off my clothes, and I tell him no. He asks me can he take off his clothes, and I tell him no.
Then he asks me if he can kiss me in the mouth. I just lean forward, except I close my eyes shut. He kisses me in the mouth and it’s nice, and he puts his hand inside my sweater again and I am happy.
We do this for a long time, and then J presses me down on the bed. He does not press me down hard. He doesn’t push me either; it’s kind of like the sway you see in the movies, and because I have seen it in the movies, I know what to do. J squirts some lotion into his hand and reaches for his private. I don’t look.
I just lay down there and kiss him back, and J hoists himself up on top of me. I don’t complain because I’m not taking anything off. Anything spills will get on my skirt, and that’s that.
He is strong as the dickens, cause he is moving his legs and everything around, holding himself up with his hands. I don’t want him to fall down on me, thinking he will break my ribs, and then what will I say I was doing? He doesn’t fall down on me, but this holding himself up lasts a while, and I am shocked by the whole thing.
Yes, J is using the lotion and rubbing himself up and down on me. He breathes hard. I open my eyes and his are squeezed shut, and he is calling my name. His ramming his hips has hoisted up my skirt, and he is moving like he’s got a motor. I am alarmed, and I call his name. He answers calling mi
ne, but doesn’t stop moving. Well, I never! The bed was just a-shaking, up and down against the wall, and my legs is spread open to go round the space his machine hips is taking up. I realize I have thrown my arms up, to kind of hold on, and I take my right one and throw it down between my legs, when he’s in a up motion. I just want to make sure my panties is in place. My hand knocks against his big knuckles of one hand where he rubs and rubs.
I don’t think he even felt me move, but he started to shudder about that time. Thank you, Neesey, thank you, he is saying. He opens his eyes, and I am looking at him. He smiles at me, thank you, Neesey.
He moves off me to his knees, and pulls my skirt down as he goes. He lays his head on top my skirt, and rests there, kneeling. I know he does need to rest. I touch his nubby hair, cause I like him, and cause I can reach, and cause I don’t want to be alone after this short but true alarm. We lay there until he gets up, and I notice his private is flat again in his pants.
First thing he says, “Is you all right?” I tell him yes. We sit quiet on the side of his bed. I guess he is probably thinking, like I am, that this is a curious business. After some time when we only breathe, he stretches out, smiling. “Neesey,” he says.
I leave him all the space to go on, and turn my head to him.
“This my best birthday,” he smiles and tells me.
“This is,” I say.
JOSEPHUS TOOK TO coming by for me some Saturdays, to spend part of his weekend off from work at the plant. At first, I was mad at him for involving Margarete like he did, but he stayed out my way for a while, and in time, of course, I missed him. I missed school, I missed activity. I missed everything but diapers and mashed food.
Saturdays was Margarete’s long day at the shop. She got a regular customer at eight o’clock who liked to have her hair done before she did her shopping. Close to the baby’s birth, the eight o’clock wasn’t no problem, cause Margarete was home and resting. But when Margarete and Big Jim started to go out again on Friday nights, then Saturday morning got to be a groggy mess with Margarete rushing around on not enough sleep and me trying to keep the baby’s morning sweet.
Good Negress Page 21