by Amy Sorrells
“I know, girl. I know.” I put my arm around Molly and turned to face the window and moon and stars beyond. I kept the window cracked open, even on chilly nights, so I could hear the crickets and smell the weight of the hills and closeness of the ocean. Night music floated in and soaked my heart, swirling from the nightmares I faced each night even before I slept … the ones I kept to myself, too afraid to share with anyone, even Ernestine.
The hole in the center of Daddy’s chest fills my mind, blood flowing all around despite his great hands clasped there, pressing against the life flooding out of him. And me, pressed against the closet door, wondering still why my good and kind daddy lay stuck in a cold, black hole in the ground on account of standing up for his sister.
Princella’s raised voice in the rooms below blamed Daddy for everything. Vaughn argued back at her. Vaughn and Ernestine always said Princella has her reasons for all her hate, and I was sure she did. Like a pecan farmer knows in his bones when his crops are destined for a storm, I always knew something was off-kilter about my family, even before the shootings. Life around here was like a hiccupping movie reel at school, one of those the teacher tries every which way to fiddle with, turning the projector knob back and forth to try to bring focus, glimpses of clarity skipping by, crooked frames never quite settling in.
I folded the pillow under my head and pulled the frayed quilt up higher as fear overwhelmed my heart, moaning like the wind slipping through my window. Making sense of my life felt like a ferry crossing Mobile Bay, bleating its whistle as it moves farther and farther away from the distant shore. I listened for the sound of those ferries, I pulled my knees up close to my heart, and played my nightly game with the now-visible moon, daring it to stare back at me and see who could go the longest without blinking.
Each night I played that game, and the moon always won.
Pale kare kare. Pa eseye twonpe.
“Speak plainly. Do not try to deceive.”
CHAPTER 23
Anniston
“Hey there, Anni.” Solly came to help Vaughn prune the trees. Splotches of light leaned through the breakfast room windows, and Molly chased the reflections as they bounced along the walls in random places.
I tried to pull my too-short hair over my swollen eye. “Hi, Solly.”
“Mornin’, Solly.” Mama’s greeting vibrated in my ear and throbbing head.
Solly leaned down to my level as he made his way toward the coffeepot. “Whoa there, darlin’. What happened to you? You didn’t pick a fight with one of those squirrels in your traps, did ya?”
I tried to smile, but my cheek smarted tight as a balloon about to pop. “I’ll be okay.”
Solly’s dimples faded into a worried frown.
“You might want to keep your voice down.” Mama handed a mug of steaming coffee to Solly. “Princella’s still asleep. Vaughn will be down in a minute.”
He rubbed his stubbled chin for a moment, eyes questioning Mama as she packed a cooler full of drinks and snacks. “Y’all have big plans today?”
“Yeah, where’re we goin’, Mama?”
“We’re takin’ a little road trip,” said Mama.
“New Orleans,” said Ernestine.
“What’s the occasion?” Solly asked.
I was as eager as him to know the answer to that.
“Truth,” said Mama. “It’s time for a little truth around here.”
The highway running north and south along Mobile Bay teased drivers with views of the ocean and homes with gardens straight out of the Southern Living magazines stacked on Princella’s coffee tables. Wisteria spilled over the tops of stone walls and picket fences, begging passersby to stop and visit. Peach and pecan stands and run-down gas stations peppered the land along our drive, along with homes and shacks and chicken coops. I couldn’t tell which buildings were for people and which ones were for animals. Made me wonder what it would be like to live behind such weathered walls. Once in a while, a shaggy, panting dog and a human watched from their sagging front porch as we passed.
“If I Can’t Have You” by the Bee Gees played, and I sipped on a Yoo-hoo.
“Are we going to the Garden District, Mama?” I wasn’t sure what she meant by truth, but I hoped it included beignets. I could almost taste the powdered sugar melting on the tops of them already.
“Right near there. We’re going to have lunch with some old friends.” She and Ernestine grinned at each other like some big secret set between them. Most times, trips to New Orleans were full of good food and shopping. I’d brought a book to read to pass the driving time, but I didn’t feel like reading today. From my spot in the backseat, I stared out the window and listened to the “American Top 40” show on the radio. Ernestine worked on quilting squares.
Mama drove. She didn’t say much until we got to somewhere between the Biloxi and Gulfport, Mississippi, exits. “I’m so sorry, Anni. Sorry about last night. Sorry about how Princella treats you. Sorry for your worries over Comfort.” She let out a long sigh. “Mostly I’m sorry about Daddy. This … this wasn’t how our life was supposed to be.”
“Mama …”
“No, wait, you need to hear this. I didn’t know things would get this bad. The family’s always been a mess, but killing? And now, Princella raising her hand against even you? She comes from a long line of hurt—one she swore you and nobody else would ever find out about. One that’s trickling down to you, and we’ve got to stop it from coming down any farther, no matter how determined she is to forget about her own past. Some things shouldn’t be forgotten, no matter how much someone thinks they ought to be.” Mama turned the AC up a notch. “I’m so sorry you have to hear such things at your age. But you’re a strong, brave girl, so I know you’re big enough to hear it. I wish a heart as good as yours didn’t have to learn humans are capable of doing such evil to each other. Especially people in your own family … Especially people in your own family.”
Mama concentrated on the road in front of us, white lines falling under the car in an awkward rhythm, each pulling me closer to learning about the things she spoke of. I couldn’t tell if she spoke for my benefit or for her own. I think she tried to work truth out of the mess for herself, too.
One thing for sure, she was right. Some things you shouldn’t forget.
As the car passed over the road, I remembered better times. Happy times. Times I’d spent with Daddy.
“Ready for this, Anni?” Daddy held my head against his chest in the exact place his heart beat. “Lemme get a good look at ya.” He put his hands on my shoulders and tilted me away from his body. “My sweet baby girl, getting to be such a young lady.” He smelled like soap and laundry detergent. And his smile—oh, Daddy’s smile melted me.
A junior is as far as I ever made it in Girl Scouts, tiring of all the rules, requirements, and obligations. But square dance night was one we all looked forward to, even me.
Daddy tucked a daisy from one the table centerpieces behind my ear and offered me his arm, floating me to the center of the Thomases’s barn.
“Partners to your places, like the horses to their traces!” said the square dance caller into the microphone. The band, made up of a banjo, a couple of guitars, and a drum set, warmed up their instruments. “Let’s all boil some cabbages down now, ’hear?”
It was one of my favorite square dances, and the caller gave us instructions, especially for the first-timers. But me and Daddy, it was our third year in a row, and we remembered the steps easy.
“Bow to your partner. Bow to your corner. Allemande left!”
We swirled and swooshed by my fellow troop members and their daddies, grinning till it hurt.
“Pass on through and do a pull-by, then promenade all the way home!”
Boil them cabbage down, down.
Turn them hoecakes ’round, ’round.
The only song that I can sing is
boil them cabbage down.
Possum in a ’simmon tree,
raccoon on the ground.
Raccoon says, ‘You son-of-a-gun,
‘shake some ’simmons down.’
“Allenmande left, then allemande right. Four ladies chain, and we’ll do it all again!”
Daddy barely took his eyes off me, no matter where we were in the circle. Times like those, I was glad I had no brothers or sisters. No one to share the way he made me feel like such a treasure.
Butterfly, he has wings of gold.
Firefly, wings of flame.
Bedbug, he got no wings at all,
but he gets there just the same.
Boil them cabbage down, down.
Turn them hoecakes ’round, ’round.
The only song that I can sing is
boil them cabbage down.
“Turn your corner, like swingin’ on a gate. Right through. Left through. Don’t be late!” The caller loved trying to mess us up, in which case, we’d about fall on the ground, we laughed so hard. Worked up a sweat, too, all the turning and swinging, switching and swirling.
Ladies do, and the gents, you know,
and it’s right by right by wrong you go.
And you can’t go to heaven while you carry on so.
And it’s home, little gal, and do-si-do,
And it may be the last time, I don’t know,
And oh, by gosh, and oh, by Joe.
“Weave the ring!” the caller hollered, the last call of the dance. And somehow, when we finished all the round and round and back and forth, we ended up standing before each other, face-to-face, laughing until we couldn’t laugh no more.
The whine and crackle of the radio as Ernestine fiddled between Peaches & Herb, the Bee Gees, Styx, and Billy Joel brought me back to the conversation she and Mama were having. Ernestine gave up and shut off the radio altogether.
“That’s the nature of secrets,” Mama said. “The more they’re stuffed away, the angrier they get, scratching and clawing to get out in the open, tearing us up inside as we fight to keep ’em tucked away. But the heart knows—the heart that’s not holding the secret in knows, especially when it’s a good heart like yours, Anni. The secrets of others get their slime all over the innocent. I can’t sit back and let secrets keep clawing at you. It’s time we broke the cycle of sins and lies in this family wide open.”
And you can’t go to heaven while you carry on so.
The line from the old square dance echoed in my head as Ernestine handed me a baggie filled with crumbled pralines.
“Sometimes evil is acquired. Sometimes it’s inherited. Sometimes it rubs off like the scent of perfume left on unwashed clothes, sweet at first, but then the stench seeps through. I’ve been around the Harlans long enough now, I saw the evil growing like a cancer. Now it’s spread to places it should’ve never been allowed to spread.”
Sadness like a wave turned my stomach. Now that Mama and Ernestine talked about it, I knew the evil about which they spoke. I felt it in my dreams, the ones where I was chased. I knew I never had a direct reason to be scared of anything, so maybe, like Mama said, I felt sin all around me, even though I couldn’t see it.
And you can’t go to heaven while you carry on so.
Mama continued. “Vaughn came from a long line of pecan farmers. More important, he came from a long line of gentlemen. He had the best of everything—education, a future as heir to the plantation. When he was young, he could have married any young lady in town, and everyone respected him. So when he brought Princella home from college, why, everyone knew she was completely wrong for him—not because she was poor, but because she had a dark and bitter heart.”
“What was so wrong with her? Did something happen to her to make her that way?”
Only movie characters were as bad as her. Cinderella’s stepmother. The queen in Sleeping Beauty. Images of those cartoons flashed through my mind.
Mama continued. “Yes and no. One of the biggest things was how Cole was born. See, Princella was the girlfriend of one of Vaughn’s teammates, who dumped her after he got her pregnant. Vaughn admired her all along from a distance, but she still loved the baby’s father. Regardless, Vaughn felt sorry for her and took it upon himself to care for her, marry her, give her a good name, and help her raise that child—Cole. Of course, back then, and with nowhere else to turn, Princella took him up on it. The whole Harlan family grieved Vaughn’s decision. Still, he held fast to his gentleman ways, caring for Princella and treating her like a queen.
“As Cole grew, Princella near worshipped him, to the point of neglecting your daddy and Comfort after they were born.”
“That’s how you came to live here, right, Ernestine?” I interrupted.
“That’s right, child.” She winked.
“She lavished Cole with gifts, hoping that might ease his tantrums and disrespect. While his personality on the outside made him the most popular young man in Bay Spring, he was a liar and downright mean at home. With Vaughn’s help, Princella groomed him from grade school to be a starting quarterback, a role he fell into naturally. Cole knew that. He took to dating as many girls as he could without worrying about how many hearts he broke, as well as having long nights out and coming home late and drunk.
“In the meantime, Comfort and Rey grew closer and closer and fell farther and farther away from Cole. Rey took to studying and music mostly, and Comfort took to friends and her books. She preferred to stay out of the limelight, but her beauty and Princella’s constant social pressures pushed her into the cheerleading and all those pageants.
“Cole went on to college, where he kept womanizing and drinking. Vaughn clung to his gentlemanly ways and tried to keep Princella happy. He pulled Cole out of jail for underage drinking many times and used his buddy Miles Gadsden to smooth over complaints of harassment from different girls.
“When Cole came home from college, he often acted inappropriate with Comfort, making crude comments and patting her on the behind and other things. Vaughn and Princella pretended not to notice, even when Rey and I tried to talk to them plain about it. The more Cole’s behavior carried on, the more upset Comfort became. She tried to steer clear of him, but when Cole got an idea in his head … The engagement made him snap.”
I shook my head, still struggling to believe that a person could be so awful. “He had everything. Why didn’t he just leave her alone?”
“I don’t know. We’ll probably never know. But sometimes, when a person has everything, they still want things they can’t or shouldn’t have for the pure power and greed of it. That’s what starts wars. And that’s what makes a man rape.”
I watched the second hand of my Hello Kitty watch make tiny jumps around the numbers.
And I felt the sore spot on my cheek throb.
Rad sal lave nan fanmi.
“Dirty clothes are [to be] washed in the family.”
CHAPTER 24
Anniston
Crossing Lake Pontchartrain into the concrete bustle of New Orleans gave me excited butterflies every time. We weaved our way through the city until we got to St. Charles Avenue, where Mama pulled off the interstate. Elaborate, colorful homes stood alongside bland, neglected buildings. Those with scrolling, ornate metalwork seemed to scold the sad, older structures for being so worn-out and tired. We parked on an unfamiliar side street nowhere near any of the places Mama usually took me in New Orleans. I couldn’t see the lake or the river or any buildings like the ones near Daddy’s college, Tulane.
“We’re here.” We headed toward the entrance of an old church with a four-story brick building attached to the back of it. Between the sidewalk and the back building, a chain-link fence surrounded a playground full of boys and girls of all shapes and colors. Some raced Big Wheels on the blacktop. Others squealed, their color-tipped braids flying
as a merry-go-round spun them like a blender. In a grassy section, younger kids—some wearing only diapers—splashed on a water table full of balls and boats.
When we got to the front of the church, I read the sign out loud: “St. Augustine’s Freedom Home for Women and Children. Established 1932. Why we stopping here?”
“When I went to nursing school in town, my apartment was near here,” Mama said. “My roommates and I came and volunteered here as often as we could, a couple times a month, at least. I met your daddy here too. Thought you might like to see it.”
The wood doors were full of carvings and stained glass, like they belonged on a castle. A blast of cold air-conditioning greeted us as we stepped into the musty-smelling foyer with worn, crimson carpet. A black sign with white letters stuck on it read, “Welcome, all who are weary and need rest.” On one side of the foyer, a makeshift office was set up with tables, file cabinets, a phone, and a couple of typewriters. The black lady behind the desk nearly climbed across the top of it to get to Mama.
“Oralee! Look at you, not a day older than when you was here in college!” Jeans and an orange, polyester shirt with a long, pointed collar stretched across her thick body, and her graying hair was braided in cornrows with orange beads.
Mama hugged her tight, her eyes wet wih tears. “Aamina, it’s been way too long.”
“Oralee, I’m so very sorry about Rey. So very sorry.”
The two of them stood rocking and holding each other for a while, until Mama stepped back and wiped her eyes. “Aamina, meet Anniston.”
“Well, it’s about time. And so grown up. I’m sure you don’t remember we met when you were learning to crawl. Your mama brought you here to show you off. She’s sent me a few pictures over the years, but you a young lady now.”