by Daniel Black
MAE HELEN HURT
1880–1948
“OUR DEAR MOTHER”
Emma Jean couldn’t restrain her weeping. “Momma!” She collapsed to the earth. “Why didn’t you love me?” Her sobbing seemed louder here. “That’s all I ever wanted. Somebody to tuck me in at night and read me bedtime stories. Like white folks do with their kids.” Emma Jean sighed. “But you never did. I tried to clean up so good that you’d have to love me, but I guess I never did it good enough. And you know what’s funny? I woulda done anything, I mean anything, to get your attention. The day my daddy came, I wanted to go with him ’cause I could tell he wanted me, but I wanted you to want me, so I stayed.” She shook her head pitifully. “Now, I done ruined my child’s life, just like you ruined mine. You wouldn’t believe what I’ve done. I meant well, Momma. I just wanted a daughter so I could show you how horrible you had been to me. But it didn’t happen like I planned. I guess it never does.”
A setting sun cast purple and blue streaks across the skies. In her head, Emma Jean heard Mae Helen repeat, “I shoulda named you Nobody.”
“I ain’t mad at you the way I used to be. I didn’t know bein’ a mother was so hard. Maybe you didn’t mean to treat me the way you did. I didn’t mean to do my Perfect the way I did her, either. I really loved her. Still do. But ain’t no way I can fix what I did. And ain’t no way you can fix what you did. I guess we in the same boat, huh?” She smirked. “I don’t know what’s gon’ happen, but I pray my child don’t never hate me—as much as I hated you.”
For the next several days, the Peaces conducted their lives in abject silence. Moving about the house like actors in a silent film, they struggled to make sense of a reality none of them had anticipated. Emma Jean cleared Perfect’s bedroom of dresses, combs, hair ribbons, purses, and other miscellaneous girly things and burned them in the barrel behind the house. She wanted to keep a few mementos, like the floral bedspread, just to remind her that she had once had a daughter, but then she decided to let everything go. All except a strip of the yellow decorative ribbon from the party. She shoved it into her bra quickly, glancing around to make sure no one saw her. Even the patent leather shoes, which had cost more than she had ever divulged to Gus, went up in flames as Emma Jean shook her head. She would’ve burned Olivia if she could’ve found her. This was going to work, she told herself. It had to.
The most strenuous job was repainting the room. Authorly had painted it yellow the day after Perfect’s birth, but Emma Jean couldn’t ask him to paint it again—not after what she’d done. She couldn’t ask anybody for anything, she knew, so she assumed the task herself. The paint was a shade of blue she liked, so she hoped the boys would like it, too.
She stepped back and examined her botched work. Spots of blue paint lay scattered across the floor and windows, and, try as she might, she couldn’t paint over Olivia’s name heavy enough to obliterate it from the wall. Oh well. The room was blue and that was the point.
Authorly broke the silence on the third day. He told Paul to sit in the chair while he shaped his hair into a neatly cropped Afro.
“Ain’t no need in us tryin’ to avoid this. You a boy now, so you gotta look like one.” He waited for Paul to say something, but he never did. “And you gotta stop soundin’ like a girl and start soundin’ like a boy, too.”
“How?” Paul whispered.
“Just talk deeper”—Authorly lowered his voice—“like this.”
Paul tried, but lowered his chin more than his voice.
“No! That’s not it!”
Woody, Sol, and Mister watched, praying that Paul met Authorly’s expectation before his patience waned.
“You still sound like a girl.”
“Of course he does,” Woody said. “What else could he sound like? That’s all he knows.”
“That ain’t no excuse. He’s a boy now and he gotta sound like one. Right now. Today. What’s gon’ happen if other folks hear him and he sound like that?”
Woody didn’t argue.
“So, from now on, you gotta sound like this.”
Paul tried to mimic Authorly’s rich baritone, but succeeded only in offering a raspy soprano.
“Stop that! You gotta do it right! You can’t go ’round this community soundin’ like no sissy!”
Woody shouted, “He’ll get it, man! Give him time!”
“Why don’t you shut up! I don’t see you tryin’ to teach him nothin’!”
“He’ll learn everything he’s supposed to know soon enough.”
“What? Is you crazy? He’s gotta know this now. Other folks gon’ see him and know he’s a boy, so he’s gotta act like one.”
“I know, Authorly, but just take it easy. He ain’t gon’ learn everything overnight.”
“I know that! But he’s gotta start.” Authorly returned his attention to Paul. “Wipe your eyes and stop cryin’.”
Paul obeyed. Under normal circumstances, he would’ve expected Gus to save him from Authorly, but, now, he knew he was on his own.
“Now try it again. Say your name.”
“Paul,” he whimpered.
Before thinking, Authorly shoved him to the floor. “Say it like a boy!”
“Stop it!” Woody said.
“I’ll stop it as soon as he sounds like a boy!”
Paul trembled.
“You’ll stop it right now! I might not can beat you up, but I swear ’fo God I’ll try!”
Mister helped Paul from the floor.
“He ain’t never gon’ be no man,” Authorly shouted, “long as y’all keep babyin’ him! I don’t want no sissy for a brother!”
“We don’t, either,” Woody said, “but you cain’t change him in a day. It takes time. Just give him time!”
“Forget about it!” Authorly said, dropping the scissors and storming out. “I don’t even care!” The screen slammed behind him.
Paul wanted to disappear. He hadn’t meant to defy Authorly; in fact, he wanted nothing more desperately than to please him, but he simply couldn’t. What was a sissy anyway? He had never heard the term, but he was sure he didn’t want to be one. He certainly didn’t want to embarrass his brothers, so he decided to practice his deep voice at night until it came. Maybe then Authorly would be proud of him.
“Let’s go, boys,” Gus called the next morning. “We got work to do.” He put on his hat and walked through the door without looking back.
Paul’s pleading eyes met Emma Jean’s.
“I’m sorry,” she mouthed.
Mister pulled Paul along before Emma Jean could cry out on Paul’s behalf.
Unfamiliar with physical labor, Paul feared that, once again, he’d be proven inadequate. Outside, Gus told Mister, “Y’all pull dem weeds from ’round the sprouts, then take the cows some hay. I’ll meet y’all back at the barn when you get through.” By “y’all,” Paul assumed Gus meant him and Mister, so he followed his youngest brother to the field and awaited instruction.
They bent to their knees and Mister said, “You take that row and I’ll take this one. All you gotta do is pull these little grass sprouts up and throw ’em away. Just don’t pull up the plants. Daddy’ll be madder’n a wet hen if you do.”
Paul followed directions. He hated dirt and grime beneath his fingernails, but somehow he knew not to mention this. The work was slow and uninteresting, and Paul’s lower back ached before they reached the middle of the first row.
“How did it feel bein’ a girl?” Mister asked, breaking two hours of uninterrupted silence.
Paul shrugged.
“You and Momma seemed real close. Like y’all was friends.”
He whispered, “I guess we was.”
“What did y’all talk about? You know, when y’all used to sit at the table and giggle?”
He shrugged again.
“Did y’all talk about boys?”
“Sometimes.”
Mister wiped his brow with the back of his right hand. “I used to watch y’all. I’d be jea
lous, too. It seemed like y’all was havin’ so much fun.”
“It was okay.”
“I knew you wanted to play with us though. I heard you ask Momma, but she said girls ain’t s’pose to be runnin’ ’round wit’ no boys. I wanted to play with you, but I couldn’t. Even when you was a baby, I remember askin’ if I could play with you and everybody said no.”
“It don’t matter now.”
“Guess not,” Mister said, and continued pulling weeds. When they reached the end of the row, he said, “Authorly don’t hate you. He just want you to act like a boy. So other folks won’t make fun o’ you.”
Paul nodded.
“You ain’t gotta be scared o’ him. I mean, he’s tough and all, but he’s our brother and he’ll take care o’ us.”
“I can’t sound like him.”
“It’s okay. You’ll start soundin’ like a boy pretty soon, and then he’ll leave you alone.”
They squatted and began pulling weeds from the next two rows. Paul couldn’t imagine how he’d make it another hour without fainting from exhaustion.
“Don’t worry about it. Authorly’ll be okay. I know it’s hard, but you gotta do it. People’ll laugh at you if you don’t. They’ll call you a sissy and stuff.”
“What’s that?”
“A boy who acts like a girl. People hate ’em, especially other boys. They beat ’em up sometimes.”
“Oh.”
“Men treat ’em real bad, too. Women just shake their heads. Nobody likes ’em.”
“I don’t wanna be no sissy.”
“I know. Nobody does. That’s why Authorly’s so hard on you. He don’t want you to be one, neither.”
Paul nodded.
“So, like he said, just do what we do. Like you doin’ now.”
The two pressed on until they completed the field. It was lunchtime.
“Come on,” Mister said, standing slowly. “Let’s get somethin’ to eat.”
They met Gus and the other boys behind the barn.
“Y’all finish the field?” Gus asked, looking only at Mister.
“Yessir.”
“Good. Get you some o’ these biscuits and molasses and salt meat. It’ll hold you over ’til suppertime.”
Everyone ate in silence. Mister and Paul sat in the grass while the big boys stood.
Suddenly Paul screamed, “Ahhhhhh! A snake!” He jumped and began to run. Woody chuckled.
“Get back here, boy!” Authorly demanded. “And stop screamin’ like that! You ain’t no girl no more!”
Mister grabbed a hoe and chopped the snake’s head off. “It’s okay. I killed it.” He resumed eating.
Authorly lifted the headless creature and presented it to Paul. “Hold this.”
Paul froze.
“I said hold this! Ain’t no country boy scared o’ no snake. Here! Take it!”
Even Gus thought Authorly was a bit too much, but he didn’t stop him.
Paul stared at the snake dangling from Authorly’s monstrous hand.
“I’ma slap you if you don’t take this snake, boy!”
Woody and Sol expected Gus to say something. When he didn’t, they stepped toward Authorly simultaneously.
Paul wanted to obey, but fear paralyzed him.
Authorly’s left hand came so fast that Paul never saw it, but he felt the sting. “I said hold this, boy!”
Before Woody and Sol could grab him, Gus said, “Y’all let Authorly be. That boy gotta learn somehow.”
“But Daddy,” Woody protested, “he’s only eight! Authorly ain’t gotta treat him like—”
“You wunnit scared o’ no snake when you was eight, was you?” Gus asked.
“No, I wunnit, but I been a boy my whole life.”
“Well, he been one, too! He just didn’t know it. Now he gotta start actin’ like one.”
“He’s doin’ de best he can, Daddy!”
“You mind yo’ own damn business, boy! I’m de daddy ’round here and I say how things go.”
Authorly’s eyes never left Paul’s. “Here,” he said, hoisting the snake in the air. “Take it.”
“It won’t hurt you,” Mister said. “It’s already dead.”
Paul’s arm felt heavy, like a solid steel rod, but he didn’t intend to get slapped again. He reached forward, prepared to receive the snake with his thumb and index finger, like one might pinch his nose.
“Not like that!” Authorly pushed his hand away. “Like this.” He clutched the snake with his entire palm.
If Paul dropped it, he knew he’d really be in trouble, so he closed his eyes and seized the snake as though angry with it.
“Good. Now. That’s how you do it.”
Woody winked at him. “See? It won’t hurt you. You’ll learn.”
Paul looked at Gus, who looked away. Yes, Paul had held the snake, but, in Gus’s heart, he still didn’t seem like a boy.
“Finish yo’ lunch,” Gus said to everyone. “We still got work to do.”
Sol extracted a book from beneath the bib of his overalls. Knowledge fed his soul and his body, he told Gus, although this made no sense to a father who had never read anything. Authorly taught Sol his ABCs at three and by five Sol read better than everyone in the house except Emma Jean. Sometimes he made up words for fun, asking his brothers if they knew what the words meant. Their puzzled expressions evoked his laughter and served as the origin of countless fights between him and Authorly. He would go to college one day, he told the family, although he didn’t know where or how. Only Emma Jean believed him, and if she hadn’t spent the family’s meager savings on Perfect’s birthday party, she would have contributed it to Sol’s college fund. Now that Perfect was Paul, she wished she had.
Paul’s noonday appetite dissipated the moment he touched the snake, and even Mister couldn’t convince him that he’d soon regret an empty stomach. He felt proud of himself, having faced a fear that once seemed insurmountable. He almost thanked Authorly, but decided against it. Encouraging his traumatic—though liberating—approach was definitely not something he wanted to do.
Paul rose and disappeared behind the barn. He unbuckled the straps of his overalls, lowered his underwear, and squatted.
“You don’t pee like that no more,” Authorly said.
Paul hadn’t noticed him following. He jumped, scattering urine across his clothes, unable to cover himself before Authorly beheld his nakedness.
“A man pees standin’ up.”
Paul tried to rebuckle the overall straps, but his trembling hands wouldn’t allow it. “Like this.” Authorly unzipped the fly of his overalls, motioning for Paul to do likewise. Then he extracted his penis.
Paul tried not to gawk at Authorly’s gigantic extension. Would his grow into that, he wondered.
“You hold it like this. With one hand.”
Paul looked, from the corners of his eyes, trying not to look at all. Authorly peed and Paul followed suit. “Then you shake it like this. So you don’t leak into yo’ drawers.”
Paul shook his shaft, wondering if Authorly was laughing internally at his miniature penis.
“Then you tuck it back in like this”—Authorly demonstrated the move—“and you go on ’bout yo’ business. Don’t no boys pee sittin’ down.”
Paul zipped his fly and followed Authorly back to the others. For years to come, he would wait for his penis to evolve into what Authorly had, but it never did. He wondered if something might be wrong with his, if maybe its growth had been stunted during his girlhood days. Every day he looked to see if, finally, his penis size matched his brother’s and every day he was disappointed that it didn’t. Maybe if he could act more like a man it would grow, he thought. Yet after age sixteen, and very little success with masculinity, he stopped trying—although he never stopped hoping.
Chapter 17
Come Sunday morning, Sol’s singing awakened the household as the sun peeked over the distant horizon. The boys rose, wondering if the family would attend church. Would
Paul go, Mister asked himself. What would people say when they saw him?
“I don’t think we better take the boy to church, Gus,” Emma Jean said, leaning up and rolling her stiff neck. “It’s just too soon. He ain’t ready for that.”
“We goin’,” Gus said. “And he’s goin’, too. Ain’t no need o’ hidin’ him, and it ain’t gon’ get no easier. The sooner the better.”
“I know. You’re right. But maybe if we waited just one more week, he’d be a little . . . um . . . you know . . . stronger so if people laughed at him he could take it a little better.”
“We goin’ today. All of us.” He slid into his good overalls and entered the living room. “What y’all waitin’ for? Y’all know we goes to church on Sunday mornins. Get y’all’s behinds up and get ready for service.”
They obeyed, each wondering how they’d survive the day. Authorly might fight, Mister considered, if someone said the wrong thing. Then Woody would have no choice but to assist. Sol hated violence, but Mister felt certain that Sol would fight if he had to. Of course James Earl couldn’t be counted on for anything. The guarantee was that he’d watch and cry, squeezing his head until the commotion subsided.
Other boys would definitely have something smart to say. That was to be expected. Mister just hoped they wouldn’t say it during church.
Eva Mae saw Paul first and wondered why she was dressed in boy’s clothes. And why had someone cut her hair like that?
“Hey, Perfect,” she called.
When Paul turned, he was relieved that Eva Mae wasn’t horrified.
“What happened to your hair? And why you got on them boys’ clothes?”
Before he could answer, Gus said, “Mind yo’ business, li’l girl. This ain’t got nothin’ to do with you.”
Eva Mae bit her bottom lip and stared at her best friend. “We ain’t gon’ sit together like we always do?”
Authorly pushed Paul away from Eva Mae as though she were the problem. What had she done, she wondered. Paul wanted to tell her that they were still best friends, if she wanted to be, but everyone made it clear that he was not to speak for himself. Not that day.