Tumbling

by Diane McKinney-Whetstone

  “We’re down here on business, Miss—I mean, Ethel,” Willie Mann stammered.

  “Then why the front of your pants soaking wet?” She laughed again.

  Fannie laughed too. How absolutely amusing to see Willie Mann stammering, caught, and he cares that he’s caught, and he’s nervous, and his spell was broken over Fannie at least for now, and she hoped forever.

  “See, even the young lady thinks you’re funny. What’s your name, sweetie? Come from behind this no-screwing man so I can see you.”

  Fannie moved way to the side of Willie Mann, away from the desk that had held her trapped. She stepped out in full view of Ethel.

  Ethel’s whole face smiled all at once when she looked at Fannie. “Well, you sure look like sunshine all in yellow down here in this murky cellar. You too bright-looking for these surroundings, and if you ask me, you too pretty for this cheap ass that ain’t even got enough style to surround you with a little satin and lace.” Ethel contained herself. Fannie still looked to Ethel very much like the little girl that Noon would troop through the streets of South Philly back when Ethel was searching out a good home for Liz. She was only taller. Same dark, woolly hair that would never stay contained in those thick, tight plaits, same corn-bread-colored skin, same thin nose, same dancing to the eyes, just taller. She wanted to run to Fannie and hug her, thank her for being such a good sister to Liz. She’d heard over the years how tight they were. And then she stopped her memory because she didn’t want to go any farther than that. Not now.

  “Actually I’m not at all one of his young ladies,” Fannie said as she moved even farther away from Willie Mann. “Ma’am, uh, can I call you Ethel, because I know you quite, quite well, and well, uh, you don’t know me, but you probably, well, you might know about me.”

  “Sure, sweetie, please call me Ethel. It makes me feel young when young folks call me by my first name.” Ethel moved in closer as she talked. “Tell me your name, sweetie. And where might I know you from? I hope from being surrounded by people better than Mr. Willie Mann here, and I sure am glad to hear you not really with him, guess he just got himself all worked up over the thought of being with you. Now tell me your name, sweetie.”

  “Fannie,” she said. “My name is Fannie.”

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  Tom Moore’s stomach turned inside out and his hands shook as he read the chapter of the City Code, mimeographed onto the Highway South Project’s official letterhead. He had no business even working on a Saturday. Cut back, his doctor had ordered. Take a vacation, longer weekends, relax. But here it was a Saturday and he’d gone to work anyhow, and now his hands shook and the turning in his stomach was slowly rising up to his chest as he read the page. It was an excerpt from the chapter of the City Code citing the requirements for demolishing structures. Tom Moore knew what they were asking him to do. Even as he turned the page over in his hands that shook and read his boss’s scribble: “Moore, write up something like this: ‘In the interest and ultimate safety of the Negro community still residing in the area targeted for relocation, the Highway South Project, which was about to acquire the church, and in so doing had petitioned an independent appraisal, has detected fractures significant enough to warrant further investigation of the church structure.’”

  Before he even got to the scribble in red that demanded, “Moore, level the church,” he knew they were asking him to justify its demolition. Making it easy for him too, no need to walk from his desk to do the research, no need to ponder how to force this situation with the church to apply to the City Code.

  The dark hair along his white arms almost stood straight up as he pushed his half-eaten liverwurst and cheese sandwich to the side of the desk and reached for the phone. The phone was heavy to lift, and he had to catch his breath as he set it down in front of him and pushed his fingers into the black holes and watched the dial spin back around at dizzying speed. His breath caught right at the top of his chest when he heard his wife’s voice on the other end. “You know how you been wanting to go away, California? Isn’t that where you been wanting to go?”

  “Tom? Is that you?”

  “California, right? Get us some tickets. Let’s leave tonight.”

  “What? What are you saying?”

  “It’s gotten very bad here. Very bad.”

  “Tom, please tell me what’s going on. You’re making me nervous.”

  “The church, I mean. The houses, okay, we’ve made a lot of progress with the houses, but the church wasn’t part of the equation. Even the pastor was still resisting. Now they’re telling me to write the church up. You do know what that means? It means they’ll just level it. All I have to do is write it up and say that the structure has fractures, or a fucking gas leak, or is sitting in a sinkhole.”

  He could hear his wife breathing heavily on the other end. He wondered if she was wearing the twenty-fifth anniversary diamond ring he’d just given her. He wondered how amenable she’d be to selling it. “They shouldn’t have sent me down there to do business with those colored people down there. Haven’t I been telling you that all along?”

  “Tom, I want you to come home right now. You need some rest. You got no business even being there on a Saturday. Come home. Tell me you’ll come home right now.”

  “I got to do something first.” His voice suddenly took on new energy. “I’ll be there soon. First I’ve got one more thing to do.”

  He mashed the receiver quickly, then picked it back up and dialed another number. He sat up straighter when he heard his boss’s voice crackle, “Hello,” through the phone line.

  “I can’t justify leveling the church.” He was surprised to hear the words coming from his mouth. He could taste the remnants of the liverwurst and cheese sandwich sifting along his tongue.

  “What? Who the hell is this?”

  “We can get all the properties, it may take some time, another year or two, but we can get them all out without tearing down the church. Those Negroes down there have become quite aware of processes anyhow. They’ll challenge it. It’ll be too damned tough to write it up so it won’t be challenged.”

  “Moore? Is this you?” the voice on the other end demanded. “We don’t want to wait another year or two. As long as they got that church down there to go to, the holders-on won’t budge. So write it up and get that fucking church off of that corner.”

  “We’ll offer the reverend a higher price for the church. That way they can vote on it or do whatever they need to do amongst themselves to sell it outright. We can just relocate the church, we won’t have to tear it down and, you know, just shock everybody like that.”

  “Hasn’t that goddamn reverend been in your pocket all along?”

  “But that was just so he would be noncommittal, you know, so he wouldn’t resist outright in front of his congregation. We promised him we wouldn’t touch the church. It’s been easier that way.”

  “Moore, you’re not getting paid for fucking easy.”

  No shit, he thought, as he let the phone go limp in his sweaty hand. He wasn’t getting paid for the most of it. He rubbed his chest, trying to rub away the heartburn from the liverwurst. He wasn’t getting paid for the church services or for sitting at the dining room tables down there where he had to look in their eyes. After he’d looked at the pictures of Jesus on the walls, the baby pictures on the mantels, the figurines in the china closets, the fruit bowls on the buffets, the tops of their heads, the plates they set in front of him, the palms of their hands. After he had nowhere else to look and he had to look in their eyes, and he started to know them by name: Mrs. Saunders, Mrs. Jones, Mr. Hicks, Sister Maybell—he even called her Sister Maybell.

  “Why bulldoze the church now?” he yelled into the phone. “What’s the fucking rush, why the sudden ostentatious show of power? I can’t justify leveling the church.” He said it again. “You level it your damn self. You go down there and look in their faces when they pray. Then let’s see you tear down the fucking church.”

  He
banged the shiny black phone on the receiver. He pressed the mimeographed chapter of the City Code into a long white envelope and addressed it to Reverend Schell. He stared at it for a while. Then he covered it over with a clean white label. This time he addressed it to Noon. He gathered his personal effects and quickly shoved them into his briefcase. He was thinking about the night-owl flight he and his wife would take to California. He couldn’t stay here anymore. He had only two options if he stayed here: Be a villain or a hero. He couldn’t stomach either. He’d just leave.

  Herbie ran through the house to get to the door. “All right,” he yelled. “What is it, a damn fire?” He was just in the bathroom relaxing with his newspaper before the urgent knocking pulled him up. “Better be important,” he mumbled, and then looked through the window and saw Fannie all in yellow.

  “Where’s Noon?” Fannie asked as she stumbled into the doorway, out of breath. “I got something to tell you.” She smoothed at her hair and tried to bring the excitement in her voice to a controlled whisper. “But I don’t want to tell Noon just yet. Where is she? Is she here?”

  “At the church,” Herbie said. “Jeanie came running over here not long ago, all excited, talking so fast I couldn’t even understand what she was saying. All I could make out is that Tom Moore was fired earlier today or quit. Then something about the church, and Noon was shouting, ‘Lord have mercy,’ as she ran out behind Jeanie. Don’t seem good, whatever it is.”

  “Uh-oh,” Fannie said, concern covering her face. “I got to get over there and see what’s going on. And then I got to get back to work before Pop thinks I quit on him. But first I got to tell you something, Herbie.” Fannie was still fighting to catch her breath. And then stopping herself and swallowing hard, she said, “I see your folded newspaper, sorry I interrupted you, but you’ll never believe who I just saw. She’s actually here; she’s actually in Philly. I just talked to her.”

  “Just tell me who, Fannie, without the dramatics,” Herbie said as he tossed his paper on the coffee table and walked to the deep armchair.

  “Okay, but I don’t know how Noon’s gonna handle this; she hates her so. But Noon got to understand she been wrong about her all these years. I mean, Herbie, she’s so honest, and warm, she’s real warm, but then I always knew she would be. I been trying, to tell Liz all these years that she has a powerful love for her, that’s why she left her. You should see her face when she talks about Liz; you just feel it inside how deep her feelings run.”

  Herbie was no longer looking at Fannie. He was staring blankly, seeing the letter in his head. He was scanning the loopy inked figures, trying to see the date. Four weeks. She had said. It had only been three. But then he hadn’t taken into account how long it took for the letter to reach him. How long it could have sat at the club before Big Carl handed it to him. Damn, this was happening too fast. He had wanted to prepare Noon first. He had wanted to be the first one to see Ethel, to warn her what she was up against. He had even intended on coming clean with Fannie, just so she would know. Now that Ethel was back Liz might be spurred to tell anyone who’d listen. He at least wanted to tell Fannie. But Ethel’s feet had already hit Philly’s dirt. She was already strutting up and down the tight blocks, in and out the bebop clubs, probably shopping on South Street, and Ninth Street, sipping coffee at Horn and Hardart, hailing yellow cabs when she didn’t feel like walking, paying some young head to carry her bags filled up with lemons for her singing voice, going to Clara’s to get her hair washed and pressed, her nails done, her eyebrows tweezed. She was back. He could barely hear Fannie rambling on and on excitedly, sounding very far away.

  “Herbie, Herbie, you not even listening,” Fannie said, walking right up to his face, almost shouting. “I’m trying to tell you something important, and you not even paying attention.”

  “I know what you trying to tell me, Fannie, okay,” he said as he just let himself collapse stiffly into the deep armchair. “She’s back, right? Ethel, she’s the hell back here.”

  “That’s right,” Fannie said, her voice suddenly calm, serious. She stared at Herbie as he sat in the deep armchair. It was almost as if he wore a leaded belt filled with guilt that pulled him down, made everything on him sag, from his hairline to his eyebrows to the corners of his mouth, his shoulders, even his arms as they hung over the sides of the chair. He put his elbows on his knees and slumped forward with his face buried in his hands. Fannie sat along the arm of the chair. She didn’t say anything at first; she just sat there.

  Herbie was breathing loud breaths into his hands. He shook his head slowly back and forth. He couldn’t find the right combination of words. Did the combination of words even exist? How could he explain it to Fannie? Coming home to Noon, night after night, hoping that maybe tonight she wouldn’t be like a corpse, still and cold. Making him feel like putting a strap to her just to hear her cry out, just to make her move, to stir her nature, just to get some life-affirming sign, some passion, even if it was just to wrestle him away, to fight him off, just some motion. And not just for his release, not just for his pleasures. He could go to any club on any night and find a body just for his pleasures. He just needed to know that Noon was alive. How could he explain it to Fannie, that he wasn’t some sex-crazed thing that ran to Ethel whenever she would have him just to push it to her over and over? That it wasn’t just that Ethel moved like fire, and danced, and squeezed and arched. It was more that she was alive, bubbling over with life, unrestrained. He was free when he was with Ethel. No lugging and shouldering, no shit to carry. No cotton to bale, no frightened younger brothers, or sobbing fathers, no whipping up a response from mothers already dead.

  “Something I need to tell you, Fannie,” Herbie said, startling the air that had become so still around them. “It’s shit from the past, Fannie, but since the past and today done gone and met and shook hands with each other, I got to tell you about it.”

  Fannie ran her hand along Herbie’s shoulder. “I’m listening, Herbie,” she said softly as she moved her hand from his back and smoothed at the lacy doilies that rested along the top of the chair.

  Herbie rocked slightly to and fro and tapped his feet gently. He moved his hand from his face somewhat. “It ain’t been peaches and cream with me and Noon,” he said, and then stopped and cleared his throat. “I mean I love her, as God is my witness, I always loved her, but she had some problems, and sometimes it sent me to places where I had no business being. You following me, Fannie?”

  “I’m with you, Herbie,” she said, stroking his back again.

  “I spent a lot of time with Ethel, Fannie, when she was here in Philly. Every chance I got. Sometimes I thought that if she would have given me the word, I’d have left. That’s what makes me feel worst of all. I would have left Noon and you girls. It’s just that Ethel was always so free like. I didn’t feel no pressures when I was with her. You know, Fannie, it’s hard on a man, it’s damn hard on a colored man. Ethel just made it feel a little easier.”

  Fannie listened to Herbie’s words spill out and fill the room. She knew she just needed to let Herbie talk. It was best not to interrupt him and remind him that it was damned hard on Noon too, nor would she counter him with how life was filled with pressures and that’s not a ticket to go running around. Because actually Fannie did understand. Sometimes she could see through the action clear to the motivation. Sometimes she could sniff the vinegar behind the syrup in somebody’s sweet exterior and mannered niceties. And other times, like now, in the face of a person’s indictable wrongdoings, Fannie could see straight through it all, all the way to his true nature.

  “I always knew it was something about you and Ethel and Liz,” Fannie said as she moved her hand from Herbie’s back and smoothed at the doilies that rested along the back of the chair. “I guess I always figured it for what it was too. I just never let it see the light of day. Until just now, watching you, reading your face.”

  She patted his back. “Herbie, you a good person. You care. And I know Noon
would never, ever understand it in a million years, but I do.”

  “I don’t deserve a daughter good as you.”

  “I ain’t so good. I just never saw things in right and wrong in the conventional sort of way. Sometimes what seems right to everybody else seems downright evil to me.”

  “I ain’t been a great help to Liz growing up in this house either,” Herbie said as he sat straight up. “In fact I tried to make her life miserable every chance I got. I’m sure that’s part why it was so easy for her to turn on Noon the way she did. I never really made her feel like she was the daughter to me you were.”

  Fannie stood and walked to the window. She couldn’t remember the last time she had seen Liz. Three days ago, maybe. She had passed her in the hallway as she rushed to get her bus so she could make it to her first class. She had asked Liz if she was going to school. Liz had looked down, muttered something about having an upset stomach, and quickly retreated to her bedroom. And then the knocking on the wall started again. Fannie knew that part of it wasn’t Herbie’s fault.

  “Liz is going through something that I don’t even understand, Herbie. And most of it don’t have nothing to do with you. And the parts that do, well, I’m sure God’ll forgive you. In fact,” she said as she walked back to Herbie and stooped in front of him and took his hands in her own, “I’ll bet if God were to condemn you to hell right now for running around on Noon, I’ll bet it would be to the luxury part of hell. In fact, when it got too hot, I’ll bet he’d even let you have a fan, and not one of the paper ones that they give you in church; I’ll bet he’d give you an honest-to-goodness electric fan. And everybody would say, ‘See that Herbie wasn’t such a bad guy, heard he even got a fan in hell.’”