by Robin Talley
Ruth rolls her eyes. Then she tugs at a piece of purple fabric. “What’s this?”
“Oh.” I forgot about that dress. After it first happened I asked Mama to let me send away for a dress I saw in Seventeen. It cost fourteen ninety-five. Mama’s mouth dropped open when she saw the price, but when I told her I needed it, that it was important, she looked at me for a long time, then nodded.
When it arrived two weeks later, I stuffed the dress in the back of the closet and forgot about it. By then I’d lost my appetite for fancy jewelry and colorful dresses. I didn’t want to wear something that would make people look at me. All I wanted was to disappear.
“Here,” Ruth says. “You can wear this with Mama’s green church shoes.”
“I don’t know,” I say.
Ruth is already unbuttoning the back of my white dress. “If you’re going to stand up on a stage in front of a crowd full of angry white people you might as well look pretty while you do it. Here, put on another slip, the neckline on this dress is too low for that one.”
It turns out I don’t have a slip with a neckline low enough for the Seventeen dress. I have to wear an old half-slip under my crinoline petticoat, with my garter belt and hose underneath and only my bra on top. I feel almost naked as Ruth helps me pull the dress over my head.
It’s worth it.
The dress is short-sleeved with a flowery spring print—purple, white and green. Much brighter colors than I normally wear. It has a high waist, which Ruth assures me is the latest trend, and a row of tiny buttons running from the collar to the waist. The V-neck shows a full two inches of skin below my collarbone.
With the crinoline the skirt flounced out so far I’m worried my choir robe will look bunchy, but Ruth says the robe is so heavy it’ll hang straight down. I’ll probably be hot from wearing all that fabric under the stage lights, but at least I won’t be shivering from the cold as well as my nerves.
Not that I’ve had much time to think about my nerves in the flurry of getting dressed. I wonder if Ruth did that on purpose.
“Oh, Sarah,” Mama says when I come down the stairs. Daddy’s standing off to the side, his eyes on Mama, who’s got one hand clenched on the knob of the banister. They must’ve been in the middle of a conversation. “You look so pretty. Doesn’t she, honey?”
Daddy drags his eyes away from Mama, turns to me and smiles. “You do look very pretty, Sarah. Very grown-up indeed.”
I smile back at him. Maybe tonight won’t be so bad.
Then Daddy squints. “Wait. Are you wearing lipstick?”
I cover my mouth with my hand. It isn’t the dark red color Ruth gave me before. Just a light, pretty shade, like the kind Mama wears. I didn’t think they’d notice.
“Go wash it off,” Daddy says. “You know the rules. No makeup until you’ve graduated.”
I turn to go. I should’ve known better than to try this. Mama and Daddy are still upset with me for joining choir in the first place, and for all the detentions, and—
“Oh, Robert,” Mama says. “It’s a special occasion.”
I turn back, cautious, in case Daddy contradicts her.
But neither of them is looking at me anymore. They’ve got their heads bent together.
I back up the stairs and duck behind a corner so they’ll think I’ve gone back to my room.
“It’ll be all right,” Mama whispers. “We can make it a few more months.”
“But a few more months after that, the savings run out,” Daddy says. “If Hairston keeps cutting my hours at this rate.”
Mama sighs. “If you’d left your name off some of those articles maybe he’d leave your hours alone. It’s bad enough that we’re on those state NAACP lists. You really think he’s going to stop punishing you?”
“I can’t let him think I’m afraid of him, Irene.”
“Well, Sarah can work this summer. That’ll help. And we’ll figure something out for the fall.”
Work? This summer? Me?
I go to the bathroom and shut the door.
I’ve heard Mama and Daddy talk this way before. They never stop worrying about money. We paid too much for the house, Mama always says. We live beyond our means. The Free Press is one advertiser boycott away from going out of business. The Gazette doesn’t pay Daddy enough for the work he does.
Now his hours are being cut. By her father.
I hunt around for a cloth to take off the lipstick.
I’ve never had a job before. I’ll get one, of course, if Mama and Daddy need me to. Maybe Judy could get me work at Bailey’s. I could be a stock girl.
I don’t want to work for a man who threw a glass in his trash can because he thought my lips had touched it, but I’m sure Daddy doesn’t want to work for a man who writes editorials about how Negroes are scientifically inferior, either. You don’t always have a choice.
I pause with the cloth halfway to my lips.
I like how I look right now.
I look serious. I look like I matter.
And Daddy was right. I look grown-up.
I put the cloth away and go downstairs.
I’m ready.
* * *
The concert is going well so far.
Too well. It’s making me anxious.
The topmost rows of the auditorium are packed with brown faces. From the stage I can see Mama, Daddy, Ruth and Bobby sitting with Chuck and Ennis and their parents. Reverend Tillman, Mr. and Mrs. Mullins and Miss Freeman, our neighbors Mr. and Mrs. Jackson, Mr. and Mrs. Muse, and what looks like half my church choir, plus Frances and her sisters and their parents, plus some other Negroes I don’t even know, are all gathered with them. Every last one of them beams down at me as I finish singing with the Girls’ Ensemble.
When we’re done singing, the Negroes clap harder than anyone else.
I smile at them as we step down from the risers and let the Glee Club climb up for their big song. After this the Balladeers will perform. The solos will be next. First hers, then mine.
I take deep breaths as I step into the wings and pull off my choir robe. I’d like to watch the Glee Club, but I’m too nervous to stand still. Soon, the concert will be over, and we’ll all go to a party Frances’s parents are throwing at her house to celebrate. I try to think about how much fun it will be, but I can’t think about anything but the next five minutes.
Backstage everyone’s in clusters, whispering. She’s in the center of a group of girls wearing deep green Balladeers robes. The Balladeers get the nicest costumes on top of everything else.
I wish I’d waited to see what she was going to tell me at rehearsal yesterday.
But I can’t talk to her. I can’t be in a room with her. It’s too risky.
I have to work to remind myself of that sometimes.
In my dream last night we were in the back room at Bailey’s. She smiled at me. It was the same smile I saw her give Coach Pollard one day as he dropped her off.
In the dream I smiled back at her and we touched hands. That was all—just our fingertips stroking each other. I couldn’t believe how electric that simple touch felt.
When I woke up this morning my face was burning. I had to pray harder than I’ve ever prayed before I could get out of bed. Even then my legs were shaking.
Because the dream didn’t feel wrong. It felt the opposite of wrong.
The song ends and the Balladeers take the stage. Six members of the band climb up to play along as the eight singers harmonize.
I imagine what it would be like to be out there with them. To have the best music, the best costumes. To be part of the best school singing group in the state.
But I wouldn’t be soloing tonight if I’d been put in the Balladeers. That’s something.
“What?” Mr. Lewis says behind me. His v
oice is sharp with anger. “Where is he? What happened?”
I turn around, but Mr. Lewis is talking to a boy I don’t know. The boy shrugs.
“Fine,” Mr. Lewis says, lowering his voice. “I’ll play it myself. Where’s the sheet music?”
The boy shrugs again. Mr. Lewis throws up his hands and storms out the side door.
The Balladeers are almost finished with their song. We’ll have to go out onstage in less than a minute.
Patricia, the Glee Club soloist, comes to stand beside me. She looks even more nervous than I feel.
“Don’t worry.” I smile, trying to forget what I just heard. I can’t afford to think about anything but the performance now. “You’ll be terrific. You were wonderful in rehearsal yesterday.”
She smiles back. “Thank you. So were you.”
That’s the first time any of the white students have said anything good about my singing. Well, except Judy. And her. But they don’t count.
The Balladeers are on their last line. They’re good, but I don’t think they’re that much better than my church choir.
She is in the front row, smiling a fake smile. Her voice shines out of the group. She’s the best of them all. Mr. Lewis was right to pick her as the soloist.
I recognize her father in the second row of the audience. He isn’t smiling. I’m not even sure he’s awake.
The group finishes. It’s time for Patricia and me to join her onstage, but there’s no one at the piano.
Suddenly I know what Mr. Lewis and the boy were arguing about.
“Gary’s not here,” I whisper.
“What?” Patricia’s head jerks up. She hasn’t figured out what I have. That Gary didn’t want to play the piano onstage with a “nigger” singer. “Who’s going to play with us?”
“Mr. Lewis said he’d do it. He went to go get the sheet music.”
“Go where?” Patricia is shaking. We’re both thinking the same thing. If Mr. Lewis went back to the Music room, that’s all the way on the other end of the school.
The Balladeers and band members onstage are looking for us in the wings. She has taken off her choir robe and stepped back out in her black dress and pearls. They don’t need the piano for her performance—not when there are so many other instruments onstage—but they aren’t supposed to start her solo until Patricia and I are out there.
The audience is rustling, looking at their watches. Until now the show has flowed seamlessly from one song to the next. If we don’t start soon they’ll think the concert is over.
“Girls, get out there!” hisses Miss Jones, who’s backstage helping with the robes.
“There’s no one to play the piano,” I whisper.
“Get out there anyway. Linda’s up first, and you’ve got the band.”
But the band doesn’t know my song or Patricia’s. They’re only here to play with her.
Patricia is breathing fast. “I can’t sing a cappella,” she says. “I can’t.”
“You won’t have to,” I say. “Mr. Lewis will be back before you need to—”
“Go!” Miss Jones shoves us forward, none too gently. “Or they’ll all leave and the PTA will raise a firestorm!”
There’s no time to argue. There’s no time to even take a breath.
We’re out on the stage.
The rustling stops. The room is completely silent now. Everyone is looking at me. No one’s smiling.
My family is staring, too, their mouths in fixed straight lines.
I step to my mark and glance toward Patricia, willing her forward. She meets my eyes and steps up next to me.
That’s the band’s cue. The opening notes of “Ave Maria” rise up.
Her voice is even better than it was in rehearsal. I try to relax and lose myself in the music, since that’s the best way to prepare for my own performance, but I can’t. Instead I watch her face as she sings.
She looks beautiful, but she doesn’t look happy.
She doesn’t look nearly as confident as she did in rehearsals. She keeps shooting anxious looks down into the audience. At her father.
Mr. Hairston is definitely awake now. Awake, and frowning.
Next to him is a pretty dark-haired woman who must be her mother. On his other side is a bald man who looks familiar. Mr. Hairston leans over to whisper something to the bald man, who whispers something back. Mr. Hairston looks at his watch.
Onstage, she keeps singing, but her hands are clasped too tight in front of her.
They finish the song, and the Balladeers and band members file off the stage while the audience applauds. I want to clap, too—she sounded wonderful—but it wouldn’t be professional, so I glance back toward Patricia with a smile.
Patricia isn’t looking at me. Her eyes are fixed on the floor. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other. She’s so pale I’m afraid she’s going to be sick.
We still don’t have an accompanist. The band members are all gone. It’s just her, Patricia and me on the stage.
And it’s my turn to sing.
Well, there’s nothing to be done about it. I’m not going to give up before I’ve begun.
I’ve sung a cappella before, but never in front of a crowd like this. Never on a stage with a spotlight shining on me and a girl I’ve kissed three feet away. Never in front of two hundred people who want nothing more than to see me fail.
I’m not going to let these people see my fear.
I move to the center of the stage. She takes my place next to Patricia. She’s looking toward the piano stool, her brow creased in confusion.
I inhale. If I wait any longer, the “Nigger!” shouts will start. The only reason they haven’t already is that everyone’s still wondering why I’m standing here.
So I clasp my hands behind my back and sing “Amazing Grace.”
I sing it the way I used to sing at picnics in Chicago, when all the families on our block would gather for old-fashioned Alabama-style cornbread and fried chicken and collard greens.
I gaze out into this audience of shocked, stony-faced white people and imagine they’re the friendly black faces of my childhood, calling for me to sing a pretty Gospel song on a lazy afternoon.
After the first few lines the crowd is rustling again. The shouts will come any second, but I’ll keep singing no matter what. I’ll finish the song even if they shout me off the stage.
’Twas Grace that taught my heart to fear
And Grace my fears relieved.
How precious did that Grace appear
The hour I first believed.
It’s a beautiful song. It’s about God’s love. God’s love isn’t going to be stopped just because some angry white people want it to be.
I keep singing.
The shouts don’t come.
I raise my voice, singing to the very back of the room.
To her, too.
I want her to hear me. I want her to hear how without backup, without instruments, without even a single piano to accompany me, I can sing just as well as she can.
I want her to know I don’t care what she thinks of me. What rumors she tries to spread. I have more important things on my mind than any trick she could ever pull.
Through many dangers, toils and snares
I have already come.
’Twas Grace that brought me safe thus far
And Grace will lead me home.
On the last verse, when the catcalls still haven’t begun, I bring my hands out from behind me and I stop holding back. I sing the way I sing this song in church every Easter, my hands in front of me in praise to the Lord, my voice echoing across the room.
I’m not thinking anymore about what I look like in my new low-necked dress. Or who’s watching, or what they think of me. All
I’m thinking about are the words I’m singing and the Lord I’m singing them to.
The Lord has promised good to me.
His word my hope secures.
He will my shield and portion be
As long as life endures.
When I finish, the room is as silent as when I first walked out.
I wait for the shouts. They’ll come any second now.
Instead, someone’s clapping.
It starts in the back of the room, with Mr. Muse. Then Mrs. Jackson joins in. Half a second later there’s Daddy, on his feet in the very back row, clapping harder than anyone. Ruth leaps up beside him.
Then all the Negroes have joined in. Ennis stands up with Daddy. The other Negro students and their families, sitting in the back rows, are clapping, too.
There are even some white people clapping. And smiling.
There are white people in this room, total strangers, smiling and clapping for me.
But most of the white people aren’t doing either. A lot of them look angrier than ever.
Her father is one of them. His hands are folded in front of him, his eyes fixed on my face. He’s looking more closely at me than he ever did at her.
Mr. Lewis steps out onto the side of the stage, setting sheet music on the piano and clapping along with the others. He smiles at me. I smile back.
I glance at her, expecting her to be just as angry as her father. I stole her spotlight. They’d all be talking about her performance now if I hadn’t come along and distracted everyone. If she hasn’t already told everyone the truth about me she’s bound to do it now.
But Linda’s smiling at me.
And clapping. People are looking right at her, but she’s clapping for me anyway.
Something swells in my chest. It’s both completely unfamiliar and completely right.
I must be imagining things. She couldn’t possibly—
Does this mean she’s forgiven me?
No. No one in their right mind would forgive me, not for—
Then, from Linda’s side, comes a wail.
It’s Patricia. Her face is buried in her hands. She’s heaving with sobs.
I should have said something to reassure Patricia before I went out. I shouldn’t have shown off so much.