“Henry!” I yelled so loud that Mother sat up with a yelp.
I jumped up and threw myself at him. He caught me and swung me around, letting me go in time to catch Mother. We made such a ruckus that James came out of the bedroom grumbling about the sun not even being awake yet. He saw Henry and rubbed his eyes a couple of times. Then he turned around and went back into his room without a word.
Mother straightened herself out and pushed her hair back from her face. “Well, you must be starving. You’re as skinny as a fence post.”
Henry’s eyes lit up. “Oh yes, ma’am!”
I helped Mother get breakfast started, frying up some ham from the night before while she made biscuits. Henry sat at the table while we worked, filling us in on all his adventures between here and Chicago. Mother just about fainted when he told her about that man taking a shot at him as he dove out of the window. I’d left that part of his letter out seeing as how I didn’t think she could take it.
While Mother finished up the gravy, I joined Henry at the table. He told us about the semi-professional baseball teams he was planning on trying out for in the spring, saying he’d go clear to California if he had to. I asked him all about the places he’d seen, and he did his best to describe the mountains of Tennessee, the bluegrass in Kentucky, and the busy city life of Chicago. I was mesmerized, and wished out loud I was traveling with him.
“Don’t you go putting any ideas in her head,” Mother said as she put plates of food on the table.
Henry grinned at me. “I reckon she’s done got her own ideas in there. I doubt there’s any room for mine.”
James came out and ate with us, though he didn’t speak more than two words to anybody. We tried to go on about our conversation with Henry, but James’s silence and stony expression was building a mountain of tension in the room. Mother and I cleared the dishes away, and then we crowded around the fireplace to open our stockings. James handed one to me and one to Henry before taking a seat with his.
I dumped the contents into my lap, a huge orange, a bag of nuts, and five different pieces of candy from the drug store. It wasn’t even half of what usually fell out of my stocking, but I was more thankful for these few items than I’d ever been for all those others. I hugged Mother’s neck and thanked her, wondering how she’d saved enough money for all that.
Henry was already peeling his orange. “How did you know I was coming?”
“I didn’t,” Mother said.
“But my stocking—it’s full.”
She put her arm over his shoulder. “Honey, no matter where you go, or how long you’re gone, or whether you’re here with us or not, you will always have a stocking.”
I was hoping the joy we felt would last, that it would be enough to heal James’s anger. But it wasn’t long before he stood and told us he had to go into work.
“Aw, come on,” Henry said. “It’s Christmas Day. You work yourself to death all the time. Stay and enjoy the day.”
“That’s rich coming from you,” James said. “Obviously it was the easiest thing you ever did, running off and abandoning your family. I guess we should be a little more like you. Just throw off our responsibilities and enjoy life!”
“Hey now,” Henry started, but James kept on going.
“Who do you think picked all that cotton and took it down to the gin? Who worked their hands to the bone fixing this place up so it would at least be livable? That was me! How do you think we even have the money for flour and salt, so Mother can make those biscuits you gobbled up this morning? That’s me, working as many shifts at the train station as I can get!”
Henry didn’t say anything, but he started looking like a pot getting ready to boil. Every word from James was a tiny bubble forming on the bottom, getting ready to burst forth.
“I been doing nearly everything around here!” James yelled. “While you been doing what? Running around gambling, drinking, hopping trains? Did you even know Ruby nearly got herself killed?”
“What?” Henry looked at me wide-eyed. “When? What happened?”
“Naw!” James yelled. “You’re too busy living it up to worry about that!”
“Look, I get it,” Henry said pushing himself out of his chair. “You’re the hero! I’m the villain! You saved everybody, while I just left them to die! So take a swing at me brother! Will that make you feel better?”
Mother stood and pushed her way between them. “Now you two stop all this nonsense. There’s no point in doing this. It won’t change a thing.”
James shook his head and stepped back. I kept hoping he’d run out of steam and say he was sorry, or that Henry would apologize for running off. But they just stood there feeding their anger. Finally James walked away, grabbing his coat as he stormed out the front door.
Henry dropped his head. “I’m sorry, Mother. I should’ve never come home.” Then he turned to me and pulled me into a hug. “I had no idea, Rubes. I swear.”
“I know,” I said, hugging him with all my strength. “But you’re here now. James will be okay. You just have to talk to him and make him understand. Everything will be okay.”
Henry was gone by the time I woke up the next morning. Couldn’t say I was surprised, but I was mad at him for hurting Mother again. James muttered something about us all being better off, and then nothing more was said about it. I got a letter from him about a week later explaining how he didn’t want there to be any more trouble than necessary, and that he’d let us know how he was doing. He tried to make it sound like leaving was noble somehow, but I was sure he knew as well as I did that he just didn’t know any other way to handle things than to run from them.
In January, I started back to school. Since there wasn’t anything to do around the farm until spring, I spent my afternoons catching up on all the work I’d missed. Most of my teachers were understanding, except for Mrs. Sharp, of course. You’d have thought I’d missed a whole year of school with all the work she wanted me to do. I didn’t see how Home Economics could be so important. Seemed to me I needed to focus my attention on things like math and history, but Mrs. Sharp got on me and stayed on me for weeks. Mother had to help me with some of the sewing, especially since I was never any good at that.
I didn’t mind the reading or the history, but catching up on all the math I’d missed gave me fits. On Sunday afternoons, Matthew would come by and help me with it. Then we’d head down to Hannah’s for a couple of hours before he had to leave for Tuscaloosa again. I looked forward all week to Sundays, and not just cause I was spending time with Matthew, though if I was being honest, that was a major reason for it.
But I also loved our afternoons with Hannah and Samuel. We finished reading The Jungle Book, so I started reading Huckleberry Finn out loud. Hannah and I would sit at the table while the boys sat on the bed with their backs against the wall. Samuel seemed to warm up to Matthew a little each week, and they started going down to the creek after I’d finished reading, while Hannah and I visited.
One day after I’d put my book down, Matthew asked Hannah how much longer she had before the baby would come.
“I don’t know for certain, but I’m thinking it’s about another month,” she said.
“Is it really that soon?” I asked. “You better start teaching me what I’m supposed to do.”
Matthew gave me a funny look. “What do you mean?”
“I’m helping deliver the baby.”
“You mean you’re helping the doctor deliver the baby, right?” He looked back and forth between me and Hannah. “Right?”
“No,” I answered. “It’s just going to be me and Samuel.”
“Don’t look at me,” Samuel said, jumping up from the bed. “I ain’t catching that thing when it comes out.”
Matthew looked stunned. “Ruby, you can’t deliver a baby.”
“Why not?”
“What if something goes wrong? What if you need a doctor?”
I looked over at Hannah and narrowed my eyes at her. “See? You n
eed a doctor.”
Hannah stood and pushed her chair under the table. She grabbed a rag and started wiping everything down. “I done told you about them doctors. Now, I already done this once before. I know how it goes. I can tell Ruby everything to do.”
“How will she know to come?” Matthew asked.
“Samuel’s going to come get me.”
“What if you’re in school?”
I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought of that. “Uh, well. I don’t know. Hannah?”
“It ain’t like the baby just going to hop on out. That kind a thing takes a while to get going. I’ll know when the time is right.”
Hannah kept on wiping things, the chairs, the windows, the shelves. I could see she was nervous, and that made me nervous. “What if I talk to Dr. Fisher and see if—”
“I said no,” Hannah answered. She quit cleaning and pointed her finger at me. “If you don’t want to do it, then don’t. That’s your business. You’re the one all fired up on helping me.”
“What about a doctor from Colony?” Matthew asked. But Hannah turned her finger on him.
“Now listen here. Ain’t no colored doctor gone deliver a white baby. Ain’t no white doctor gone deliver a baby from a colored woman. So I got to just do it myself.”
Matthew and I shared a look of resignation. He didn’t bring it up again with Hannah, but on our walk back that day, he started in on me about getting a doctor for Hannah.
“Have you even tried asking Dr. Fisher about it?”
“No,” I said. “I wasn’t sure what to say.”
“I think we should talk to him.”
I didn’t want to argue with him. I knew Hannah would never agree to having him there, so I stayed quiet and kept walking. But Matthew seemed determined to argue with me.
“Who’s the father?” he asked. When I didn’t answer, he sighed. “I hate it when you do that.”
“Do what?”
“Say nothing. I ask you a question, and you just go completely silent.”
“I can’t answer you.”
“You mean you won’t.”
I sped up my pace. We still had a whole field to cross. Plenty of time to get him riled up at me.
“Ruby, just tell me one thing. Is the father of that baby the same person who attacked you?”
“Yes.”
His fists closed. “And he’s a white man?”
“Yes.”
We walked a little ways in silence. I’d hoped answering a couple of questions would satisfy him. But it only made him more frustrated.
“So you lied to me,” he said. “When I asked you who hurt you, and you said you couldn’t remember, you lied to me.”
He stopped walking, so I stopped too. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t want to make things worse for Hannah and Samuel.”
“It’s someone from Calhoun’s farm isn’t it? Another sharecropper? A farmhand? Does Calhoun know? You can’t just do nothing! What if he does this again?”
“Look, no one’s even working around Calhoun’s place right now. I’ll figure it out come spring. But I have to protect Hannah.”
“You can’t protect Hannah! You’re a fourteen-year-old little girl!”
Anger swelled up inside me and nearly came flying out of my mouth. But I closed my eyes and swallowed the hateful words. Instead, I prayed for wisdom, and the patience to not slap him upside the head.
“It’s not my place to seek vengeance. God’s wrath is on that man’s head, and God will finish him. Not me, and certainly not you.”
He shook his head and went back to walking. I hated to send him off still mad at me, so when we got back to the house and he was getting into his car, I tried to offer an olive branch.
“I’ll talk to Dr. Fisher this week.”
He closed the door and hung his arm out of the window. “Is this me winning an argument with you?”
“Something like that.”
The corner of his mouth tipped up, and my stomach fluttered. “I’ll take it,” he said.
I got James to drive me into Hanceville the following Saturday and drop me off by Dr. Fisher’s house. I knocked on the door and was greeted by Mrs. Fisher with a huge smile.
“Lord a mercy, child! When did you get so tall? And so thin?” She was about the largest woman I’d ever seen in my life, so I was pretty certain everyone looked thin to her. I only saw her in town every once in a while, but she was always so nice. And it seemed to me like she always smelled of cookies, which was why I didn’t mind her great big old hugs too much.
“Hi, Mrs. Fisher. Is Dr. Fisher here? I need to talk to him about something.”
“Sure, sure. Come on in.” She led me through the foyer and into the kitchen. “Just grab you a few of them cookies on the table. He’s back here in his office.”
I took two cookies cause Mother always said that was the most polite number when offered food. Any less or any more was just plain rude. Then I followed Mrs. Fisher into the office they’d built onto the back of the house. Dr. Fisher was sitting at his desk, leaning close over some papers. He jumped up with a big smile when he saw us coming in.
“Well, what a pleasant surprise! How’re you doing Miss Ruby?”
“Oh, just fine. Mother sends her best.”
“What can I help with you with?”
I glanced over at Mrs. Fisher, afraid I wasn’t going to be able to speak freely with her in the room, but that must’ve shown her my thoughts, cause she said she’d leave us to our talking and go finish up some cooking. After she’d closed the door, I knew it was my time to get him to understand the situation, but I wasn’t too sure how to get started. I fiddled with my hands until I remembered what Mother said about that. Then I shoved them behind my back.
“Well, you know how a while back you had to come out and fix me up after that incident down in the woods?”
He nodded, and his face grew serious. “I do. Everything all right? Any lasting effects we need to deal with?”
“Not really. I still get headaches some days, but mostly I’m fine.”
“It might be a good idea to get someone to take a look at that head of yours. Make sure there ain’t no permanent damage. I can call down to Birmingham and set something up.”
“No, I’m fine. That wasn’t why I came to see you. I actually wanted to talk to you about the family down in the woods I’ve been helping out. I’m sure Mother told you everything.”
He frowned. “I don’t know about everything, but I’m sure it was plenty.”
“Well, my friend Hannah, see…she’s pregnant. And she doesn’t have anybody to help her really, well, except me. And I can do my best, but I think she should have a doctor there. Or at the very least a midwife.” I was hoping he’d jump in and offer to help, but he just dropped his head and stared at the floor between his legs, so I kept on talking. “I don’t know anyone that’s a midwife, except for old Mrs. Kellerman down the road a piece from our old house. But I don’t think she likes me too much, and besides, I’d rather you be the one to help.”
I stopped right there cause I couldn’t think of anything else to add. He didn’t say anything for what seemed like several minutes; then, finally he straightened up. But he didn’t really talk to me; he went to moving things around on his desk. I thought I heard him mumbling a few things.
“Dr. Fisher, is there something wrong?” I asked.
“No, no. I’m just trying to get my schedule organized here. I got several appointments to keep today, and I seem to have misplaced some of my papers.”
“But what about Hannah?”
He stopped fussing with his desk and sighed real loud. “I’d like to help you, Ruby. Really I would. I just can’t. And you shouldn’t be messing around with Negroes anyhow. There’s a reason they got their own doctors and businesses and such. It’s better that way. Besides, that’s how you got yourself into that mess in the woods in the first place. You’re going to go and get the wrong people all riled up.”
“The wrong people?”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It dawned on me right then that I’d never really thought about how the people I knew talked about colored folks, or what they thought of them. I mean, I knew in general terms I guess, but up until the past few months, I’d never been faced with a choice about how I was going to feel and act on it. I wondered how many other people would let me down when I put a choice in front of them.
“Dr. Fisher,” I said. “Just who would be the right people?”
I honestly wasn’t trying to fluster him, but he did get out of sorts at that point. There was a lot of pacing and muttering about little girls getting themselves in the way of men, and what was he supposed to do about it exactly. I didn’t interrupt during this argument he had with himself cause I’d had plenty of those too. Sometimes you have to wrestle with other folks, but most times, it’s you wrestling against yourself that’s the hardest.
He finally took a deep breath and sat back down in his chair. “Ruby, I don’t know what you’re trying to do here. I do know about the way things are in this world, and I’ve seen first hand what happens when you come up against the world. I fear for you, honey. I really do. Please think about what you’re risking.”
“I think about it a lot. Seems to me we all ought to be thinking about what we’re willing to risk. God doesn’t call us to be like the rest of the world. He wants us to love others more than ourselves, to be servants. That’s what I understand, and that’s what I aim to do. I don’t see anything in the scriptures about loving only white people, or only people who are just like me.”
He shook his head and slumped forward, leaning his hands on his knees. “I’m sorry, Ruby. I can’t do it. I don’t want to let you down, but I can’t do it.”
I had to admit I was mad. I was hurt too. Here was a man who I’d respected my whole life, who’d done his best to save my little brother from dying, then my daddy. I’d seen him fret over both Matthew and me while we were in pain. How could a man with the capacity for love and kindness like that let it have boundaries?
Healing Ruby: A Novel Page 30