Lies We Tell Ourselves

by Robin Talley

  Her room is the same size as mine, but since she doesn’t have to share it she’s covered all the walls with photos torn from magazines. Girls in pretty dresses from Seventeen. Handsome actors in ads for movies I watched from the balcony.

  On her dresser there’s a framed photo of Coach Pollard. It’s from the Jefferson yearbook from a few years ago, when he was a student. I go over for a closer look.

  “Are you really going to marry Mr. Pollard?” I blurt out before I can think better of it.

  Linda closes the door behind her. We stand facing each other with her dresser, and the photo, between us.

  “Of course I am.” She sits on the desk chair, crossing her ankles and folding her hands on her knee. “We can’t announce the engagement while I’m still in school, that’s all. Jack is a gentleman. He always thinks about propriety.”

  My throat feels dry. I wish I’d taken the drink her maid offered.

  “Are you going to marry that boy?” she says. “Ennis?”

  I try to laugh, as though such a thought has never crossed my mind.

  “You’re going steady, aren’t you?” she says.

  I shake my head. “He hasn’t asked me. Anyway, we’re far too young to think about marriage.”

  Linda nods. “It’s much easier with an older man.”

  This isn’t what I’d hoped we’d talk about this afternoon.

  I’m curious about Linda and her fiancé, of course. I have been ever since Judy first told me. At the beginning I thought it couldn’t possibly be true. Linda wore a pin on her collar every day, but she and Mr. Pollard didn’t act the way going-steady couples do. When Kenneth Cox and Brenda Green walk down the hall together he keeps his finger threaded through the cloth loop at the back of the neck of her Villager blouse, as though she’s about to make a break for it.

  Then I saw Linda and Mr. Pollard talking next to his car in the Bailey’s parking lot one day. The looks they were giving each other were serious. Very serious.

  “How did you start up with him?” I sit on the edge of her bed. There’s nowhere else in the room to sit.

  “It was last summer, out at Kiskiack,” she says. “He works there, and I went up every day in July. We got to talking. It was simply one of those things.”

  I nod. You always hear about scandalous things that happen at Kiskiack Lake in the summer. I’ve never been there—colored people aren’t allowed to go anywhere white people swim, not in the South—but everyone hears the stories.

  “When’s the wedding?” I ask.

  “After graduation.”

  “But when?” Graduation is only three weeks away.

  “Oh.” Linda shrugs. “Jack’s difficult to pin down. You know how men are. He says he’d just as soon whisk me away somewhere. Elope, you know.”

  I don’t like the way Linda’s talking, as though she’s reciting dialogue from some romance novel. I like the way she usually talks better. Especially now that she’s stopped trying to convince me Negroes are inferior.

  Come to think of it, I still don’t know why she stopped doing that.

  “What happened to you?” I say. “Why did you print that article? You must’ve known what people would say.”

  She shrugs. “I’ve never worried too much about anything Bo Nash might think.”

  “This isn’t about Bo. You know that.”

  She shrugs again and leans over the back of her desk chair. Her pleated skirt bunches as she tucks one leg under the other. A few inches of bare skin peek out above her knee sock. I stare at it for a moment before I catch myself and look away.

  “I don’t know.” She tucks her head into her arm. I can’t see her face. Can’t see what she’s thinking. “I—I don’t know. Once I started thinking about it, I got to a place where I couldn’t think myself back out again.”

  I knew it. I knew Linda was too smart to believe all those things she said.

  “What place was that?” I say.

  “Ah.” For a long time, she doesn’t say anything. Finally, she looks back up. “It was after what happened in the office that day. With Miss Jones. When she wouldn’t let you go get your brother when he was sick.”

  “Oh.” I’d forgotten all about that. “Bobby was fine. He was only faking.”

  “Well I didn’t know that then. I thought he was really sick, the same way I used to get sick when I was little, and he was only going to wind up sicker because Miss Jones was treating you that way. And she was only doing that because you were colored. Your little brother never did anything to anyone. And what the boys did outside Bailey’s on Saturday—well, it was kind of the same thing, wasn’t it?”

  Miss Jones.

  Seriously? Miss Jones?

  Everything I’ve ever said to Linda about the movement didn’t make an impact at all. She just needed to see Miss Jones being a pain.

  “I just knew it wasn’t right, what they did to that boy.” Linda’s eyes are fixed on the wall. “And it was my fault. Because of what I said.”

  I don’t argue with her. It was her fault what happened to Chuck. Partly. But if she hadn’t said what she did, someone else would have sooner or later. It was bound to happen once Chuck took up with Kathy Shepard.

  But if what Ennis said is true—if Chuck and the Shepard girl love each other—why shouldn’t they be together? Why do they have to care about what Bo Nash thinks?

  “It’s like what Bo did to that other boy in Study Hall,” Linda says. “Everybody knew that was wrong, but nobody wanted to say it.”

  “So did you write that editorial to say beating people up was wrong?” I say. “Or to say segregation was wrong?”

  Linda shakes her head. “You know I’d never speak out against segregation.”

  Of course.

  I should’ve known she didn’t really understand.

  But I want her to. More than anything.

  “When they canceled the prom, and that boy’s parents held a private dance just for the white students, you knew that was wrong, didn’t you?” I ask her. “I could tell you did. I saw it in your face.”

  Linda meets my eyes. Hers are steely. “You make it sound so simple. It’s not.”

  “You don’t think I should be allowed to go to the same dance as you?”

  “Of course I think you should, but you’re different. You’re Sarah.”

  That should bother me, her saying something like that. It does bother me, but part of me wants to smile, too.

  She thinks I’m different.

  She really feels something for me. Like I do for her.

  And even if she still supports segregation, she won’t go on that way forever. She’s still hanging on to that last thread of who she used to be. It’s got to be hard to let go, but before long, she’ll come to understand the truth. I’ll help her.

  “It seemed to make sense, at first,” she says. “I always thought the school was right to cancel the prom. Colored people and white people dancing together? Everyone knows that isn’t right.”

  She looks up as if she expects me to argue. I don’t.

  Everyone does know that. Even I know it.

  But I’m sitting in Linda’s room anyway.

  “But then,” she goes on, “when I kept thinking about it, it made me wonder. Why does everything have to be about color?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “But it is.”

  “Yes,” she agrees. “It is.”

  She looks at me with those steely eyes again. For a long time we just gaze at each other, neither of us speaking.

  Linda’s changed. She’s changed more than I ever could’ve imagined when we first met.

  I try to imagine what that would be like. To think about something so hard you realize you’ve been wrong your whole life. To go out in front of everyone you kn
ow and tell them you’ve changed your mind. It’s no wonder she’s still holding on to some of her old beliefs, but it’s still incredible what she’s done.

  I try to imagine being that strong. Then I realize I am that strong.

  Why have I always been so afraid to believe that?

  “At the beginning,” I tell her, “I wanted to die. When we first came to Jefferson, all I wanted to do was take Ruth and get us both out of that place. I wanted to go someplace far away where I could go to sleep and never wake up.”

  I’ve never told anyone that. I’ve never had anyone I could tell.

  I never admitted it to myself, either.

  “I don’t feel like that anymore, though,” I add. “Everything’s different now. I mean, in a lot of ways it’s just as bad as before, but I guess I’m different now.”

  “You wanted to—what?” Linda’s smile is gone. “I mean, I guess I knew it was bad, but I didn’t know it was that bad. And it was us that did that to you.”

  I start to say that it wasn’t her, it was the others—but that would be a lie, too.

  “I’m sorry,” Linda says. She’s staring at her hands. “You must hate me.”

  “I don’t hate you. I never really did. Well, maybe those first few days.” I smile at her again. She smiles back, but her chin wobbles. “After that I tried to keep on hating you, but it never worked. I kept seeing these little things you did or said. I could tell there was something different about you. Even though you were William Hairston’s daughter.”

  Linda lowers her eyes again.

  “You know my father works for your father, right?”

  She nods. “Daddy didn’t even know he had an NAACP worker on his staff.”

  I chuckle. “Your father needs to open his eyes.”

  Linda doesn’t answer. Did I say something wrong?

  “Sorry,” I say quickly. “I shouldn’t talk about your father that way.”

  “You can talk about my father however you want.” She’s still looking at the ground. “Believe me, I’ve heard enough people singing his praises for a lifetime.”

  I think again about how Linda looked at her father at the concert. How he looked back at her. How he frowned.

  I wonder what it’s like living in a house with William Hairston. I wouldn’t want to spend another day here either if I were her.

  “Is that why you want to get married so soon?” I ask, softening my voice so she won’t get angry. “Because you want to get away from him?”

  “Of course.” Then she sits up straight and adds, “But really it’s because I want to be with Jack. Jack is wonderful. He’ll make a perfect husband.”

  “You don’t have to get married to leave,” I say. “What about college?”

  She laughs.

  “I’m serious,” I say. “I’m going to college this fall. You could, too.”

  “College isn’t for people like me,” she says. “College is for girls who haven’t already met the right man. And haven’t learned how to type and take shorthand.”

  I know she’s only parroting something she’s heard people say, so I try not to let that hurt my feelings. It still does, though.

  “If you get married right away, you won’t ever get to be on your own,” I say. “You’ll go straight from your father to your husband. Don’t you want to have any time to yourself?”

  “What for?” She blinks at me.

  “To think about if marriage is what you really want.” I pronounce the words slowly. I never thought I’d say something like this out loud. I’ve barely said it in my own head. “Or if you want something else.”

  “What else is there?” Her eyes are clear and steady.

  “I don’t know,” I say, because I don’t. “But maybe there’s something.”

  “There isn’t.” Her voice is flat. “Trust me. I checked.”

  “What do you mean, you checked?”

  “I went to the library.” She reaches into the gap between her desk and the wall and pulls out a paperback, an ancient tattered thing with pages falling out. “This was stuck behind a shelf.”

  The book’s torn cover shows two white girls, one with blond hair, one with brown. They’re both wearing slips that are cut down low. They’re sitting on a bed together. One girl is looking off to the side, ashamed.

  “Where was this in the library?” I flip the inside cover open, trying to keep it from falling off. The cover makes it look like—but no. Surely there aren’t books about—

  “I was looking for a book I found in the card catalog. It was by a doctor, Kingsley something. Only his book wasn’t on the shelf. Someone must have stuck this one there instead. It doesn’t have library tags.”

  I read the first few sentences of the book. It seems normal enough, but that cover—

  “The book talks about it,” Linda says. “It’s about two girls at college who—well. Anyway, it ends horribly.”

  So it is a book about that.

  Now that I know, the cover seems different. It makes me feel—something. Something I shouldn’t feel.

  I squeeze my eyes shut.

  “There’s no other way the book could’ve ended,” Linda says. “When something’s unnatural it can’t go on too long before somebody gets punished for it.”

  My thoughts are racing. I can’t stop looking at the book cover.

  “I’m not sure that’s true,” I tell Linda. “I think maybe it’s us who do that to ourselves. The punishment.”

  Linda takes the book out of my hand and waves it over her head. “The girl in this book almost gets expelled from college.”

  Expelled? Really? I suppose that’s why it’s so important to keep it a secret.

  But that’s only a story. It’s not real. I don’t know how this works in the real world.

  “Why were you looking for this in the library?” I ask.

  She looks down. “I wanted to understand why it happened. What it meant. There was no one I could ask.”

  It. She’s talking about it.

  “What do you think it meant?” My fear grows with each word. We’re crossing a line now. Talking about it.

  Linda shakes her head. “I guess it means there’s something wrong with me. That’s all it could mean, right?”

  I shrug. When I answer her, I speak slowly, figuring out each word as I go. “Well. I don’t know what it means. I’ve thought and thought and thought about it, but I can’t figure it out. I don’t think it’s so simple as a book like that would say, though. I don’t think anything’s as simple as it looks from the outside.”

  Linda stares at me for a long time.

  “You’ve thought and thought and thought about it?” she says softly.

  I’m trembling, but I nod.

  “Me, too,” she says.

  I flush. I’m still trying to think of what to say next when a door slams in the front hall.

  “Is that your maid?” I say.

  Linda doesn’t answer. She’s gone stiff.

  A man’s voice rumbles toward us from the front hall.

  “Is she here?” he bellows.

  Linda bolts out of her chair, her eyes fixed on the door, her face stark white.

  I’ve been afraid of my father before. When I’d broken a rule and was about to be punished for it. I’ve never been that afraid, though.

  Something here isn’t right.

  Then Linda’s running to the window. If her father finds me here—

  I scramble toward her and together we push up the seam. I gather my skirt in one hand and hoist myself over the frame without even checking to see how high the drop is.

  Fortunately, it’s only three feet. I land in a crouch, one of my loafers coming off. As I pull it back on I wonder how I’ll explain the grass stain on m
y sock to Mama.

  Then Linda tumbles out the window after me, landing on her backside.

  Is she crazy? Her father must know she’s home.

  But I help her pull the window back down. And when Linda starts off running around the side of the house, I follow her.

  “What are you doing?” I whisper, looking from one side to the other. Surely her father will come out to look for her when he finds her missing.

  “We have to get away from here,” she says. “He’s seen the article. He has to have. There’s no other reason he’d be looking for me.”

  She takes my hand and tugs me after her.

  We dart between houses and through yards. A few of Linda’s neighbors are outside. A woman weeding her garden. Two old men smoking pipes in rocking chairs on a porch. A few others we pass in a blur. We’re moving too fast to get a good look at any of them, but I’m sure they notice us. A colored girl and a white girl—and William Hairston’s daughter at that—running through the fanciest white neighborhood in Davisburg? Who wouldn’t notice?

  Linda stops to catch her breath when we’re half a block away. We’re safe from the neighbors now, in an alley between an old empty house and a corner store, hidden from the street by a row of Dumpsters. Even Linda’s father won’t think to look for us here.

  “He didn’t know you wrote that article?” I ask.

  “No. He didn’t see it yesterday, but now—” She rubs her eye. “I shouldn’t have done it. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  “Yes you do. You told me. It’s about right and wrong, remember? That’s all any of this is about.”

  “No it’s not,” she says. “It can’t be. Because this is wrong, remember?”

  She lifts our hands. They’re still clasped tightly. Even though we aren’t running anymore.

  “I don’t think right and wrong is always that simple,” I say.

  She stares at me for a long minute. Then she kisses me.

  Her lips on mine are warm and sweet and wonderful.

  It’s so different from that day at Bailey’s I can’t believe it.

  There’s none of the fear. None of the anger.

  It just feels...good.

  But how can it? Isn’t this supposed to feel the opposite of good?