My Old True Love

by Sheila Kay Adams

  THE WAR COME RIDING in for us on the hot breath of an early summer and the men went pouring out of Sodom like water through a sieve.

  Mary’s daddy Andrew and her brother Andy rode off for Asheville the day after we caught wind that North Carolina was leaving the Union. Fools went with big grins and shooting off their guns. They went to join up with the South and Zeke never said a word as we stood on the porch and watched them go.

  He did say something when his brother Shadrack went with the same intent a week later. He said, “Well, there goes my brother, Arty,” and his voice broke at the end. I would not say nothing. I did not care which way Shadrack Wallin went. For somebody who had not spent much time worrying in the past I was making up for it now. The worry that laid in my breast was much bigger than the baby I was five months gone with.

  My own brother Robert left and never even told Mommie he was going. Oh, how that broke her heart.

  Mary’s other brother Jonah that was Hackley’s friend went one evening and nobody never heard from him again. Poor Lucindy. She lost all of her boys in that damn war and was not worth killing from then on. She died when she were fifty-four, an old wore-out woman.

  You could hear Big John Stanton’s ax thwacking for a solid week. He split more wood than I have ever seen in my life before he rode off. Daisy noted it down in her Bible: this 6th day of July 1861 is one on which my pur hart has brok. John has gone to the war.

  I KNEW IT WOULD come home to roost with me as well, and I vowed to myself that I would not throw a big fit when it come. I spent a lot of time hiding around from Zeke so he would not know how much I was crying. I swear I was just like a young’un apt to go to crying at the least little thing anyway. But this was like I was standing under a big hammer just waiting for it to fall right on my head. And even though I had tried to ready myself for the blow, when it finally fell on me it almost drove me to my knees.

  I was out on the porch trying to catch a breeze when he come up behind me. The young’uns were asleep and it was so peaceful and quiet except for the sound of the night bugs out in the trees. My name come from him on a sigh and all the hair stood up on the back of my neck at the word. “Arty,” he said and that was all. But I knew what it meant. The child within me gave a great knock and was still. I laid my hand over my belly and it seemed like we stayed like we was for a long time. Finally I said, “Well, tell me what to fix for you to take with you,” and he told me later that night as we was laying next to each other in our bed that he had never loved me more than he did right then.

  But I did not cry.

  The next day he plowed the upper field and all of us went to planting late corn. I kept looking at him wanting to fill my sight with him standing there stripped to the waist and his lean body glowing with sweat. John Wesley, Carolina, and Abigail was out with me covering the last hills. Sylvaney, Ingabo, and Zeke Jr. was playing out under the big poplar at the edge of the field.

  “Sylvaney, honey, go get us a bucket of water,” he called out and her little head popped up and she was off toward the house at a run. I watched her go and thought again how much she favored me. That is one thing I will have to admit about me and Zeke. We had the prettiest young’uns. And of the whole bunch Carolina was the only one dark like the Wallins.

  I looked back at Zeke and found his eyes on me. They was as purple as the lilacs that bloomed down by the house. I felt the tears starting and got really busy covering up that corn.

  When I looked back at him he had turned and the plow point was parting the dirt digging a straight dark furrow that looked like water streaming out behind him.

  IT WAS IN THE cool dark of the next morning that I grabbed onto him as like to never let him go. I kissed his face all over and his breath smelled like biscuits and gravy. I put my face into the hollow of his throat, but I did not cry. “Don’t worry about John Wesley running off. He done that so you would not see him cry,” I said, and the face I offered to him was as dry as dust. “How’ll you manage?” And his eyes seemed like they was digging around inside of me trying to see my very heart. “Hush,” I said and put my palm flat against his mouth. “Don’t say no more. If you’re going, go on. Larkin said he’ll help me and he will. Now go on.” I nodded out toward the road where Hugh set his horse. His fingers dug into my arm and he said, “I love you, Arty.” I thought then I was going to break down, but I did not. “I know that,” I said. “And I never have knowed love with nobody but you.” And I tried one more time to memorize his face by the light of the stars. “Don’t be no hero, Zeke,” I said. And he said “I ain’t no hero, Arty,” and then he pulled away from me and a space ain’t never been as empty as the one he stepped out of. He got up on his horse and I started to turn back toward the house. I could not stand to look at him anymore, and I balled my hands into fists and went almost running. And then I thought, “Arty, you cannot let him go like this,” and I made myself stop and watched him go until I couldn’t make out his shape anymore.

  Then I cried and them tears I had been so stingy with come in such a flood that I thought I would surely drown.

  ON THE DAY PEARL was born I was as restless and cagey as an old sow bear. I had gone up on the ridge above the house and was allowing my eyes to feast on the colors of that fall to see if that would calm me down. I loved watching the change come on and my eyes picked out the red maples that were always the first to change. On down the slope was the deep gold of the striped maples and the bright orange of the sugars. Mixed all in was the bloodred of the dogwoods. And way up on the very top of the ridges was the soft yellow of the chestnuts. It was almost as though the mountains knowed somehow of what hardships was waiting for us and was trying to put on a big show now. I leaned down to pick up a chestnut burr and the pain grabbed me low in my back. You can just imagine what I thought when I went to straighten up and could not do it. I knew right then that this baby was going to come and come quick. I hollered for John Wesley and he come running with his eyes big as saucers. It is a good thing he come fast as he did, for if he had not I would have had her right out on the mountain. I just barely got back to the house and she was born. Let me tell you, this is surely the way to have a young’un. Abigail was all that was there to help me and all she really did was catch her when she come out. And as I looked at her little round head covered up with all that black hair, I thought, “Well, they will be no doubt as to who daddied this one, Lige Blackett, thank you very much,” because it was just like looking at a little bitty Zeke Wallin.

  But Lige Blackett never got to see my precious Pearl. He fell dead as a doorknob two weeks later.

  Larkin and Hackley had been all day stripping cane when Julie run to get them. Hackley wanted to have a molasses making which as usual was just him an excuse for a big drinking and a frolic. But I must say since he’d mentioned it my mouth had been pouring water at the thought of a big mess of ’lasses. They was nothing better in the winter time than a chunk of cornbread smothered in butter and warm ’lasses.

  They was hot and quarreling like two old women when they stopped by the house on their way down to the Blacketts’. Larkin had been stung by a hornet and Hackley was giving him down the road about it. “You still favoring that sweat bee sting, Larkin?” he said. And Larkin said, “Sweat bee, hell, it was big as a damn crow.” I fed them and sent them on their way and was glad to see the back of them.

  Pearl started to fret and I picked her up and held her while she nursed. She was a good baby and had kept that big thick mat of hair. I smiled at the little bows Abigail had tied all through it and kissed the top of her head. They is nothing in this world that makes your heart go all peaceful like kissing the downy top of your young’un’s head. I was not even sore these two weeks after her birth. I reckon what your body has done six times before it has no trouble remembering on the seventh time around. And I was glad of it.

  I fixed a big pot of stewed taters to take to the setting up and by the time I got over there the house was standing full. My young’uns scattered a
nd Mary met me on the porch but her eyes were all on Pearl. She took her and I could see the want on her face like somebody had painted I want me one, too on it. I went on in the house to speak to the family, and who should I see but Andrew Chandler big as you please standing right by the cooling board where they had Lige already laid out.

  “Why, howdy, Arty,” he said. And I howdied him right back. It was no secret that my man and Hugh was fighting for the Union. And they was no secret that the Chandlers had casted their lot with the South. But we was still neighbors, and through Mary we was family. I could be as polite as the next one. I had nothing to say when Shadrack come slinking around like the yeller dog that he was, though. As far as I was concerned, he was not family for all that he was Zeke’s brother.

  Late up in the night Andrew cornered Hackley and set in on him about when he was going to join up. “Ride back with me tomorrow morning. I’ll get you in without a bit of trouble.”

  “I ain’t about to go off and leave Mary till I have to,” Hackley said.

  “They’s some of us around here starting to wonder who’s going to look about our own.”

  I could tell by how red Andrew’s face was that he was getting mad.

  “That’s what I mean. I can get you in with them that’s staying around here.”

  And I could tell Hackley was getting hot, too. “I ain’t leaving Mary till I have to.”

  “You sure it’s not that now everybody’s leaving you’d hate to give up being the only rooster in the henhouse?”

  It went quiet as a tomb in that house, and Hackley sounded sort of strangled-like when he said “You accusing me of something?”

  And I thought, Andrew Chandler, you better hush right now or you will have my brother to kill.

  Thank God for cooler heads, because Sol Bullman stepped right in between them and said, “Why, Hack, Andrew, what is the matter with younse? Acting like two little boys, I say. And us here trying to bury poor old Lige. It always proves an amazement to me how you never know when the angel of death is going to come swooping out of the sky and cut you down.” He looked from one to the other.

  And you know me. I piped right in with, “Why, what are you talking about, Sol? Lige was ninety year old.”

  Andrew popped a shaking finger right under Hackley’s nose and said big and loud, “You mark my words, Hackley Norton. Time’s coming when you won’t be able to set on your fence. You’ll have to jump one way or the other. So you ought to decide whether you are with us or against us.”

  “Why, I reckon I’ll ride that fence for now. I’m for me and mine, and if you need reminding, mine just happens to be yours, too!” Hackley said, and his voice was just as big and loud.

  Andrew flipped the back of his hand at Hack and went on out the door. And I was even gladder to see the back of him.

  Sometimes, especially if the person is old, a setting up can be right jolly, but this one was not. It seemed like them harsh words that had been flung back and forth cast a pall over everybody and it was a quiet night spent round poor old Lige. As we was walking home the next morning a big wind come up and it turned off cold. I told Abigail that it was blowing straight out of the north and she said, “Ain’t that where Daddy is?” I could not even answer her.

  When I went to bed that night the wind had laid down and I knew they would be a big frost come morning. I laid there listening to my young’uns sleep and my eyes just poured water that I could not let leak when they were awake. I missed Zeke so bad that I finally scooched up next to Pearl and held on to what felt like all I had in this world left of him.

  It looked like it had snowed the next morning and I had to break a rim of ice to get water from the spring.

  We buried Lige that day and I had never seen a bluer sky in all my life.

  WE LET OURSELVES BE lulled along that fall. I must say that there is a certain peace in knowing that nature will move things in the direction they’ve been going for generation after generation. For me they was comfort in knowing that I went along doing the very same things that Mommie had done and that Granny had done before her and so on. The war was still roaring all around us but there in Sodom it was still out of our sight, and as they say, out of sight, out of mind. You couldn’t help but notice it when we all got together for a frolic since they was no men to dance with and us women would dance together with one of us taking the man part. I will have to say it was not near as much fun, but Hackley made sure the music was good even though Lum was gone off to the fight.

  When we killed our hog it was up to me and Larkin to do the biggest of the work. Bless his heart, he stayed all night with me and we ground sausage till almost daylight. I told him I’d come help cut cane when it was ready, and he said that would be good and if the frosts held true they would be cutting it in a week.

  That was some of the biggest cane I’ve ever seen. It was just full of juice and I was sticky all over with it on the day we cut. That was a good day. Mary looked after all the young’uns, and me, Larkin, Julie, Hackley, Abigail, John Wesley, and Carolina had a big time. I got to telling tales about Granny and we laughed. Daddy showed up about quitting time and we deviled him about coming right when the work was all done. He helped us carry it to the barn and as we was stacking it, he asked Hackley if he knowed how to witch the boilers like Granny used to. She used to have the biggest ’lassie boilings ever was and to my knowledge never lost a single run to scorching, which is an amazement. Daddy used to tell it was because she cast some sort of spell. Everybody in Sodom would come toting every pot and jug they had. One year the color of every run looked like spun gold and it was just as thick. Now them was some of the best I ever put in my mouth.

  They was a big crowd that showed up that year too.

  That first morning I’d gotten there before the sun was up and Larkin was just hooking old Dock up to the grinder pole. I patted him on the nose and remembered how I used to ride his back turned around so I could talk to Pap while he plowed. Lord, them was the good old days. I wondered if mules had memories and if old Dock missed Granny as much as I did.

  “You’ll walk twenty miles today, Dock,” I said, “even if it is just round and round in a big circle.”

  “It’ll be good for him,” Larkin grinned as he give one last tug on the cinch under his belly. “He don’t do nothing all the day long but pick.”

  Daddy was setting out on the chopping block with all my young’uns gathered around him. He had his pocketknife out and was cutting them off some sopping sticks and they was all standing around big-eyed, waiting. He was laughing and cutting up with them, saying how these was the best sticks in the world. Years later I took that same knife out of his pocket on the day he fell dead at the milk gap, and it was sharp as a razor. I carried it myself until Zeke Jr. got up big enough to give to because Daddy always said a pocketknife was a thing to use.

  Up in the day as we were taking off the first run Carolina got stung by a yellow jacket and carried on like you would not believe. Somebody was always getting stung, because once the bees found the fermented leavings they would get drunk as hoot owls and would sting you as quick as look at you. I reckon they would fall into that mean drunk category.

  It was such a pretty day and by three o’clock it was hot. Larkin stripped off his shirt and he was sure a pretty creature standing there feeding the grinder. I was nursing Pearl, and Mary went over to get a bucket of juice and stood talking to him.

  “Ain’t you afraid your back will blister?” she asked him.

  And I said, “Why, he ain’t blistered in his life.”

  “If I was to stand here five minutes without a shirt, I’d have water blisters as big as your hand.”

  Now some women would have said that sort of sly-like, trying to get attention, but Mary said it as easy as she would have said, “I believe it might rain this evening.” One look at Larkin’s face told me that his mind was painting all kinds of pictures.

  Julie hollered out wanting to know what she ought to do with the seed heads
and Mary said, “Just a minute, I’ve got a sack I’m putting them in.” As she turned the neck of her dress slipped down and for just a thought her round white shoulder popped into view. She went pulling it back up.

  Larkin was watching her so hard he forgot to duck as that pole came back around and it give him a pretty good knock on the head. Good enough for him. If I’d been close enough I’d have give him a knock myself. I could not help noticing that Julie made a point of being at the ready each time that bucket needed emptying the rest of that evening.

  By the time the night fell, the smell was almost too much for me. It felt like the inside of my mouth had a thick, sweet coat on it, although I had not helped sop a single boiler. I had sent Abigail on to the house with Ingabo and Sylvaney, both of which had eat so much sweetening they had took to throwing up. Another run had just come to a boil and the women was skimming off the scum when I had finally had enough and eased off with the excuse of feeding Pearl again. She was not really hungry and fell asleep pretty quick. I was dozing a little myself and was not really paying no attention when I heard Julie say to Larkin, “I just get so tired of being Andrew and Lucindy’s other girl. Not the pretty one, the other one.”

  I studied about her saying that the rest of the night. I would have hated to have had to go through life that way, longing to be something I could never be. I don’t reckon I was never anything other than just Arty. I vowed right then and there to make it a point to try real hard to never show a preference with my own young’uns. And as you know, that can be hard, for some young’uns is easier to love than others for one reason or another. But I figure life is tough enough to live through as it is.