Passing Through Perfect

by Bette Lee Crosby

  One by one they tromped down the basement stairs, across the playroom, and out the door into the backyard. With the chill of winter already in the air the cushioned wicker furniture was gone, stored for the winter. There was one green metal chair, cold to the touch, but better than the ground; Sidney lowered himself into it. Benjamin sat on the low wall of a planting bed, and Paul leaned his back against a support post.

  Sidney was the first to speak. “For God’s sake, have these people gone mad?”

  It was a long time before anyone answered Sidney’s question, and the silence settled in like a heavy fog.

  “They ain’t gone mad,” Benjamin finally said. “They’re just feeling what a whole lot of other folks feel.”

  “And what’s that?” Paul said sharply. “A hatred of anybody who’s different?”

  “That’s exactly what it is!” Sidney snapped. “And this is how it starts.” He went on to tell the story of his cousin, Ezra.

  “This past week I’ve been thinking about Ezra a lot. I think about him and that beautiful family he had. Gone. All of them gone.” Sidney lifted his hands to his face and rubbed his eyes. There were no tears to be brushed away, just a sharp pain poking at the back of his eyelids.

  “How do we fight evils such as this?” he asked sorrowfully.

  “For some leaving is the only way to fight,” Benjamin said. “If Ezra left Germany, he might a’ saved his family.”

  Paul hesitated, torn between wanting Benjamin to stay and wondering what was best.

  “To stay or leave isn’t always an easy decision,” he finally said. “If not for that promise to Daddy, I might not have left West Virginia.” He told of the day he’d carried Jubilee down the mountain on his back.

  “I was more scared than I let on,” he said. “We had no home, nobody to turn to, very little money, and I didn’t even know whether or not I’d find work.”

  Benjamin gave an understanding nod. “There’s times when you see a place bleeding the soul right out of your body, and still you stay. Not ’cause you wanna be there, just ’cause you’re scared of leaving.”

  Sidney turned to Benjamin and asked, “What finally made you decide to leave Alabama?”

  “Isaac,” he answered. “I want him to grow up being proud of hisself. Delia used to say there’s no hope in Grinder’s Corner.”

  As Benjamin sat there talking, her words came back as clearly as if she was whispering them in his ear. “Grinder’s Corner is a place where colored people don’t do nothing but live and die, that’s what she’d say.”

  With a melancholy look tugging at the edge of his mouth, he finished the thought. “I wish I’d seen the truth of them words sooner.”

  As they sat and talked, a gray squirrel jumped from the oak tree and scampered off in a swirl of dry leaves. The evening grew colder, but no one left. Benjamin spoke of things he’d never before given voice to. He told of the night Delia died and how he’d searched for hours before finding her and Isaac lying alongside the road.

  “They was lying in the rain for hours ’fore I found ’em,” he said. He lowered his head into his hands and sobbed. It was a cry that could barely be heard, but Martha Pillard heard it.

  ~ ~ ~

  It was eight-thirty when Martha first discovered Sissy missing.

  “Darlene,” she said, “have you seen Sissy?”

  Busy making a list of lawyers she’d be contacting, Darlene answered, “No, Mama, I ain’t seen the damn cat, and I got other things to be thinking about.”

  “There’s no need to get snippy,” Martha answered.

  Going from room to room, she bent down to check beneath the furniture and in closets. Once she’d looked in every imaginable place downstairs, she climbed the steps and started searching the bedrooms. She lifted the bed skirts and looked in every cubby, but Sissy was nowhere to be found.

  “Darlene,” she hollered down. “Did one of the twins let Sissy out?”

  “Nobody let Sissy out. Check under the bed.”

  With a worried look stretched across her face, Martha hobbled down the stairs calling Sissy’s name. She looked in the kitchen and under the sofa, then turned back to Darlene. “You sure the kids didn’t let her out?”

  Paying no attention to the concern in Martha’s voice, Darlene said, “Mama, I’m trying to get some work done here. The kids don’t give a damn about that cat. If she got out, she got out on her own.” She angrily scratched a line through the name she’d just written and started over again.

  Martha opened the front door just far enough to stick her head out and called for the cat, but there was nothing. It wasn’t like Sissy to disappear that way. She was declawed, a house cat. She didn’t belong outside. Martha turned back, shrugged on a black wool sweater, and stepped onto the porch. Leaning heavily on her cane, she maneuvered her way down the three steps and began poking at the bushes.

  Once when she heard the rustle of dry leaves she stopped to check, but there was nothing.

  “Maybe a chipmunk,” she reasoned and began working her way around to the side yard. It was darker there, more difficult to get a firm footing. Martha, who was edgy to begin with, moved slowly and quietly. From time to time she whispered the cat’s name, but when there was no response she moved on.

  Certain it had been one of the twins who’d let Sissy out, Martha grumbled that Darlene should have been the one to go in search of the cat. She knew it was an unrealistic expectation. Darlene would have given a single call, then come back and said Sissy was gone.

  Martha seldom left the house at night. Her bones ached in the damp chill, and darkness was her enemy. With just one good eye, she couldn’t see well and had to poke at the ground to feel where she was stepping. Last year when Louise Green went out to drop a bag of trash in the garbage can, she’d stepped in a gopher hole and spent three months hobbling around with a cast on her leg. Martha thought of that when she moved into the backyard.

  Edging her way toward the far end where the tool shed stood, she heard voices. They were low and barely distinguishable. She stopped and listened. The first voice was unfamiliar; a man telling of a rainstorm and a woman hit by a car. At first Martha could catch just a few words here and there, but the sorrow of his voice drew her in. She inched her way closer to the tall hedge that separated one yard from another.

  “It’s because of Isaac,” the voice said. “How can a boy grow up happy when he knows his mama’s killer’s walking around free?”

  Free? Martha thought. At least Tommy’s killer went to jail. She continued to listen, inching closer and closer until she was standing in the thicket of the hedge.

  The next speaker was Paul; Martha recognized his voice right away. It was strong and sharp, still carrying that twang of West Virginia.

  “All this hatred,” he said. “It’s so wrong. How can it be fair that some men are born black and some white?”

  Sidney spoke, and his was a voice almost as familiar as Martha’s own. “It’s not just black and white,” he said. “Look what happened to Ezra.”

  Someone mumbled an answer Martha couldn’t hear, so she pushed back the branch blocking her way and edged further into the brush.

  “Folks start to fear somebody or something, then it grows into hate. I know it’s hard to believe now, but Carmella was that way with Paul.” Sidney gave a weary sigh and continued. “She’s one of the kindest women on earth, but when she thought Paul was responsible for the shooting she hated him with a vengeance. She did everything possible to see he was punished and never once stopped to consider whether or not it was fair.”

  “Hard to believe that of Miz Carmella,” the stranger said.

  Martha stood there listening until a squirrel leapt from an overhanging branch and landed on her shoulder. She let out a piercing shriek and fell forward into the thicket of the hedge.

  All three men jumped up and came to investigate. Martha’s cane lay under her chest, and she couldn’t get to it.

  “Martha?” Sid said, then bent to
see if she was okay. “Are you hurt?”

  “I’m okay,” she mumbled. “Just can’t get up.”

  With Paul on one side and Sidney on the other, they lifted her from the brush and set her back on her feet. Benjamin picked up the cane and handed it to her.

  “What were you doing in there?” Sid asked.

  “Sissy got out. I’ve been trying to find her.”

  “She an orange-y looking cat?” Benjamin asked.

  Martha nodded.

  “I seen her going up the tree.” He pointed to the oak in the Klaussners’ backyard.

  Benjamin and Paul started toward the tree and, hanging onto Sid’s arm, Martha hobbled along behind.

  Sure enough, the cat was up there, two limbs down from the top.

  “Sissy baby, come to Mama,” Martha called, but the cat didn’t budge. She repeated it several times, promising treats, holding up her arms and wiggling her fingers. The cat huddled close to the tree trunk and mewed.

  “She’s scared to jump,” Benjamin said. “I can fetch her if you want.”

  “Oh, yes, please,” Martha pleaded.

  There were few things in life Martha valued as much as she did Sissy. In the long and lonely evenings, the cat came and sat next to her on the sofa. Stroking her fur and listening to her low purr as it rumbled through the small body reminded Martha she was still alive. In time she had begun conversing with the cat in much the same way she’d spoken to Big Tom.

  “Let’s watch the Ed Sullivan Show tonight,” she’d say as if she were talking with her dead husband. The truth was Martha found Sissy a lot more loyal than Darlene and definitely easier to like.

  Benjamin was used to climbing trees; he’d trimmed half the oaks in Bakerstown. He was up and down in almost no time, and when he handed Martha the cat she looked up into his face and smiled.

  “Thank you,” she said, and a touch of sincerity floated up through the words.

  Afterward, Sid helped Martha back to her front door. Halfway through the door, she stopped and turned back. For a moment it seemed as though she was about to say something, but the moment passed and she stepped inside with nothing more than a good night nod.

  Darlene was still sitting at the desk. Hearing Martha’s footsteps, she turned and triumphantly leaned back in the chair.

  “Well, Mama,” she said, “it’s done! I got six lawyers willing to work for us. We’re gonna get that nigger out—”

  “Shut up, Darlene,” Martha snapped.

  “Mama! I thought you’d be happy—”

  “I’d be a whole lot happier if you’d go home where you belong.” She set Sissy down on the floor and turned toward the staircase.

  “Well! Of all the ungrateful—”

  Martha glanced back over her shoulder. “Go home. I’ve had enough of you for one night.” She continued up the stairs, and the cat padded along. As Darlene stormed out, Martha heard the front door slam like a hurricane had blown through.

  A Sleepless Night

  Few people on Bloom Street slept that night. Most went to bed at their usual time, then tossed and turned with worrisome thoughts churning through their minds. Archie Dodd slept soundly, knowing he’d been a true friend and done the right thing. Henry Jacobs suffered a severe case of angina and didn’t once close his eyes. He blamed it on Mildred’s potato leek soup and swore he’d never again touch the stuff.

  “We’ve had that same soup every Wednesday for the past twenty years,” Mildred reasoned. “It never bothered you before.”

  Ignoring the thought Henry climbed out of bed, went downstairs, and fixed himself a Bromo-Seltzer. When it seemed the acid indigestion had eased up a bit he returned to bed but still could not sleep. At first he fumed, remembering how Sidney had singled him out in front of everyone. It was like a big fat finger pointing to him as the culprit. He wasn’t the one who started this. He’d simply gone along with what the others wanted. Why should the burden of guilt be dropped on his shoulders?

  When Henry began to run low on things to be angry about, he started remembering the pain in Sidney’s eyes. By dawn he’d come to the conclusion that it would have been better if he’d not signed Darlene’s petition. The girl had always been a troublemaker, and he was a jerk for letting himself get suckered in.

  Bob Paley didn’t fare much better. After the confrontation at the Klaussner house, he came home and plopped down in the chair in front of the television. He sat there for nearly an hour before he snapped the television on, and then it was only because Barbara demanded to see the news.

  At five-thirty the next morning she came downstairs and found Bob still sitting in that same chair, his eyes wide open and a test pattern buzzing across the television screen. She took one sniff and caught the stink of vomit on him.

  “Haven’t you gone to bed?” she asked, but when she spotted the half-empty bottle of Irish whiskey sitting on the side table it was answer enough.

  Adding a thoroughly disgusted tone to her words, Barbara said he’d better get his ass out of the chair and start getting ready for work.

  “Maybe I would be getting ready for work,” he said, “if you hadn’t stuck your nose in other people’s business.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” she said indignantly.

  Bob, mad at himself and mad at Barbara for convincing him to sign the petition, said, “You know exactly what I mean. You cost me a good friend ’cause of some colored guy I’ve never even seen!” He looked up with the meanest imaginable look tugging at his face. “I got a feeling you ain’t never seen him either, have you?”

  “Well, I haven’t actually,” Barbara stammered. “But Prudence did.”

  “Prudence Wentworth!” Bob screamed. “You had me go up against a friend ’cause of what some girl who don’t even live here and Prudence Wentworth said?”

  “It’s not just what they said—” Barbara began to argue, but by then their words had grown so loud they could be heard two streets over.

  Maybe it was because in the morning the people on Bloom Street rose and had to face themselves in the mirror, or maybe it was simply the lack of sleep, but the same argument was repeated in six different homes that morning.

  Martha Pillard was the lone exception. Now that she’d sent Darlene and the twins home, she had no one to argue with. She had only herself and the memory of the voices she’d listened to last night. Before she’d come face to face with Benjamin, based on the sound of his voice she’d pictured him as a man with pale skin and light hair, perhaps graying at the temples. She’d also felt the brokenness of his soul when he spoke of his dead wife, and she knew he was someone who suffered a loss as great as hers.

  She could still see Benjamin lifting the cane from the ground and passing it to her. His skin was dark as the night, but the expression on his face had been one of concern and reverence, not anger. Turning to the cat, she said, “Sissy baby, you could have been stuck in that tree for God knows how long if it wasn’t for that Negro man.”

  The cat gave a long luxurious stretch then snuggled its head into the curve of her neck.

  “You know, Sissy,” Martha said, “I think we might have misjudged that colored fella.”

  The cat purred, which for Martha was proof enough.

  ~ ~ ~

  Sidney rose early that morning. He’d planned to wait another week or two before calling Marty again, but he had to do something now or Benjamin was going to leave. He hadn’t said so, but Sidney saw it in his eyes.

  Last night after going to bed he’d lain awake for endless hours, his thoughts jumping back and forth from Ezra to Benjamin. When the first rays of daylight broke through, Sidney went to the window and checked. The blue truck was still parked in the driveway. Benjamin was still there, but Sidney knew the truck would be gone tomorrow. He woke Carmella, explained what he was going to do, then said, “Go downstairs and make sure Benjamin doesn’t leave before I get there.”

  Carmella always dressed before she came down to start breakfast, but on this particular
morning she stood at the stove wearing a faded blue chenille bathrobe. When Benjamin walked into the kitchen, she was layering strips of bacon across the griddle.

  “Miz Carmella,” he said, “I got something to—”

  “Can it wait until after breakfast?” she asked. “I’m a bit busy right now.”

  “Well, I reckon.”

  “Good.” She answered in an easy way, one that gave no indication something else was in the wind. Without turning away from the stove she said if Benjamin was looking for something to do in the meantime, he could carry the dishes and silverware to the table.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. As he lifted the stack of dishes from the side counter Benjamin sniffed the bacon. He suspected the Klaussners already knew what he was going to say and this was their way of doing a special goodbye. Bacon didn’t happen on a Thursday for no reason; Thursday was an oatmeal day.

  Like many of the residents of Bloom Street, Benjamin had spent a sleepless night. Not because of the decision he’d had to make; that was inevitable and he’d known it from the start. It was the sadness in his heart that held sleep at bay, the sadness of leaving people who felt like family.

  It was an odd sort of family—Sidney, Jewish; Carmella, Catholic; Paul and Jubilee, orphaned children of a West Virginia coal miner; Benjamin with skin dark as night and Isaac a light coffee color that was somewhere between him and Delia. No two of them the same, yet they fit together like different pieces of fabric in a quilt. A quilt that, despite the mix of colors, felt cozy and warm.

  When the pink of morning began to show along the edge of the horizon, Benjamin was still awake. Alabama, even with all its anger and prejudices, had been home and it had not been easy leaving. Now, less than a month later, he was leaving another place that in a strange way felt like home.

  You and Isaac have a place here for as long as you want to stay, Sidney had said. And he’d meant it; but Benjamin couldn’t forget the angry words that came from outside. Bakerstown was more than a thousand miles away and yet here it was, pushing its way onto the Klaussners’ doorstep. How far north, Benjamin wondered, did a man have to travel to reach a place where people were colorblind?