talk about is where she is and when she coming back.
“Come on, Baby Girl,” I say after while. “Let’s take a walk, find out what’s going on.”
We walk up Devine, turn left, then left again, and up Miss Hil y’s street, which is Myrtle. Even though it’s August, it’s a nice walk, ain’t too hot
yet. Birds is zipping around, singing. Mae Mobley holding my hand and we swinging our arms having a good ole time. Lots a cars passing us
today, which is strange, cause Myrtle a dead end.
We turn the bend to Miss Hil y’s great big white house. And there they is.
Mae Mobley point and laugh. “Look. Look, Aibee!”
I have never in my life seen a thing like this. Three dozen of em. Pots. Right smack on Miss Hil y’s lawn. Al different colors and shapes and
sizes. Some is blue, some is pink, some is white. Some ain’t got no ring, some ain’t got no tank. They’s old ones, young ones, chain on top, and
flush with the handle. Almost look like a crowd a people the way some got they lids open talking, some with they lids closed listening.
We move over into the drain ditch, cause the traffic on this little street’s starting to build up. People is driving down, circling round the little
island a grass at the end with they windows down. Laughing out loud saying, “Look at Hil y’s house,” “Look at those things.” Staring at them toilets
like they never seen one before.
“One, two, three,” Mae Mobley start counting em. She get to twelve and I got to take over. “Twenty-nine, thirty, thirty-one. Thirty-two
commodes, Baby Girl.”
We get a little closer and now I see they ain’t just al over the yard. They’s two in the driveway side-by-side, like they a couple. They’s one up
on the front step, like it’s waiting for Miss Hil y to answer the door.
“Ain’t that one funny with the—”
But Baby Girl done broke off from my hand. She running in the yard and get to the pink pot in the middle and pul up the lid. Before I know it,
she done pul ed down her panties and tinkled in it and I’m chasing after her with half a dozen horns honking and a man in a hat taking pictures.
Miss Leefolt’s car’s in the drive behind Miss Hil y’s, but they ain’t in sight. They must be inside yel ing about what they gone do with this
mess. Curtains is drawn and I don’t see no stirring. I cross my fingers, hope they didn’t catch Baby Girl making potty for half a Jackson to see. It’s
time to go on back.
The whole way home, Baby Girl is asking questions bout them pots. Why they there? Where they come from? Can she go see Heather and
play with them toilets some more?
When I get back to Miss Leefolt’s, the phone rings off the hook the rest a the morning. I don’t answer it. I’m waiting for it to stop long enough
so I can cal Minny. But when Miss Leefolt slam into the kitchen, she get to yapping on the phone a mil ion miles a hour. Don’t take me long to get
the story pieced together listening to her.
Miss Skeeter done printed Hil y’s toilet announcement in the newsletter alright. The list a them reasons why white folk and colored folk can’t
be sharing a seat. And then, below that, she fol ow with the alert about the coat drive too, or at least that’s what she was supposed to do. Stead a
coats though, it say something like “Drop off your old toilets at 228 Myrtle Street. We’l be out of town, but leave them in front by the door.” She just get one word mixed up, that’s al . I spec that’s what she gone say, anyway.
TOO BAD FOR MISS HILLY there wasn’t no other news going on. Nothing on Vietnam or the draft. Ain’t nothing new on the big march coming up on
Washington with the Reverend King. Next day, Miss Hil y’s house with al them pots makes the front page a the Jackson Journal. I got to say, it is a funny-looking sight. I just wish it was in color so you could compare al them shades a pink and blue and white. Desegregation of the toilet bowls is
what they should a cal it.
The headline say, COME ON BY, HAVE A SEAT! They ain’t no article to go with it. Just the picture and a little caption saying, “The home of Hil y and
Wil iam Holbrook, of Jackson, Mississippi, was a sight to see this morning.”
And I don’t mean nothing going on just in Jackson, I mean nothing in the entire United States. Lottie Freeman, who work at the governor’s
mansion where they get al the big papers, told me she saw it in the Living section a The New York Times. And in every one of em it read, “Home of Hil y and Wil iam Holbrook, Jackson, Mississippi.”
AT MISS LEEFOLT’S, they’s lots a extra talking on the telephone that week, lot a head-nodding like Miss Leefolt getting a earful from Miss Hil y. Part a me want a laugh about them pots, other part want a cry. It was a awful big risk for Miss Skeeter to take, turning Miss Hil y against her. She coming
home tonight from Natchez, and I hope she cal . I reckon now I know why she went.
On Thursday morning, I stil ain’t heard from Miss Skeeter. I set up my ironing in the living room. Miss Leefolt come home with Miss Hil y and
they set at the dining room table. I ain’t seen Miss Hil y over here since before the pots. I reckon she ain’t leaving the house so much. I turn the tee vee set down low, keep my ear turned up.
“Here it is. Here’s what I told you about.” Miss Hil y got a little booklet opened up. She running her finger along the lines. Miss Leefolt shaking
her head.
“You know what this means, don’t you? She wants to change these laws. Why else would she be carrying them around?”
“I can’t believe this,” say Miss Leefolt.
“I can’t prove she put those pots in my yard. But this”—she holds up the book and taps it—“this is solid proof she’s up to something. And I
intend to tel Stuart Whitworth, too.”
“But they’re not steady anymore.”
“Wel , he stil needs to know. In case he has any inclination of patching things up with her. For the sake of Senator Whitworth’s career.”
“But maybe it real y was a mistake, the newsletter. Maybe she—”
“Elizabeth.” Hil y cross her arms up. “I’m not talking about pots. I am talking about the laws of this great state. Now, I want you to ask yourself,
do you want Mae Mobley sitting next to a colored boy in English class?” Miss Hil y glance back at me doing my ironing. She lower her voice but
Miss Hil y never knew how to whisper good. “Do you want Nigra people living right here in this neighborhood? Touching your bottom when you pass
on the street?”
I look up and see it’s starting to sink in on Miss Leefolt. She straighten up al prim and proper.
“Wil iam had a fit when he saw what she did to our house and I can’t soil my name hanging around her anymore, not with the election coming
up. I’ve already asked Jeanie Caldwel to take Skeeter’s place in bridge club.”
“You kicked her out of bridge club?”
“I sure did. And I thought about kicking her out of the League, too.”
“Can you even do that?”
“Of course I can. But I’ve decided I want her to sit in that room and see what a fool she’s made of herself.” Miss Hil y nods. “She needs to
learn that she can’t carry on this way. I mean, around us it’s one thing, but around some other people, she’s going to get in big trouble.”
“It’s true. There are some racists in this town,” Miss Leefolt say.
Miss Hil y nod her head, “Oh, they’re out there.”
After while, they get up and drive off together. I am glad I don’t have to see they faces for a while.
AT NOONTIME, Mister Leefolt come home for lunch, which is rare. He set down at the little breakfast table. “Aibileen, make me up some lunch, would you
please.” He lift the news
paper, pop the spine to get it straight. “I’l have some roast beef.”
“Yessir.” I set down a placemat and a napkin and some silverware for him. He tal and real thin. Won’t be too long fore he al bald. Got a
black ring round his head and nothing on top.
“You staying on to help Elizabeth with the new baby?” he asks, reading his paper. General y, he don’t ever pay me no mind.
“Yessir.” I say.
“Because I hear you like to move around a lot.”
“Yessir,” I say. It’s true. Most maids stay with the same family al they lives, but not me. I got my own reasons for moving on when they about
eight, nine years old. Took me a few jobs to learn that. “I work best with the babies.”
“So you don’t real y consider yourself a maid. You’re more of a nurse-type for the children.” He puts his paper down, looks at me. “You’re a
specialist, like me.”
I don’t say nothing, just nod a little.
“See, I only do taxes for businesses, not every individual that’s filing a tax return.”
I’m getting nervous. This the most he ever talk to me and I been here three years.
“Must be hard finding a new job every time the kids get old enough for school.”
“Something always come along.”
He don’t say nothing to that, so I go head and get the roast out.
“Got to keep up good references, moving around to different clientele like you do.”
“Yessir.”
“I hear you know Skeeter Phelan. Old friend of Elizabeth’s.”
I keep my head down. Real slow, I get to slicing, slicing, slicing the meat off that loin. My heart’s pumping triple speed now.
“She ask me for cleaning tips sometimes. For the article.”
“That right?” Mister Leefolt say.
“Yessir. She just ask me for tips.”
“I don’t want you talking to that woman anymore, not for cleaning tips, not to say hel o, you hear?”
“Yessir.”
“I hear about you two talking and you’l be in a heap of trouble. You understand?”
“Yessir,” I whisper, wondering what this man know.
Mister Leefolt pick up his newspaper again. “I’l have that meat in a sandwich. Put a little mayonnaise on it. And not too toasted, I don’t want
it dry now.”
THAT NIGHT, me and Minny’s setting at my kitchen table. My hands started shaking this afternoon and ain’t quit since.
“That ugly white fool,” Minny say.
“I just wish I knew what he thinking.”
They’s a knock on the back door and Minny and me both look at each other. Only one person knock on my door like that, everbody else just
come on in. I open it and there Miss Skeeter. “Minny here,” I whisper, cause it’s always safer to know when you gone walk in a room with Minny.
I’m glad she here. I got so much to tel her I don’t even know where to start. But I’m surprised to see Miss Skeeter got something close to a
smile on her face. I guess she ain’t talk to Miss Hil y yet.
“Hel o, Minny,” she say when she step inside.
Minny look over at the window. “Hel o, Miss Skeeter.”
Fore I can get a word in, Miss Skeeter set down and start right in.
“I had some ideas while I was away. Aibileen, I think we should lead with your chapter first.” She pul some papers out a that tacky red
satchel. “And then Louvenia’s we’l switch with Faye Bel e’s story, since we don’t want three dramatic stories in a row. The middle we’l sort out
later, but Minny, I think your section should definitely come last.”
“Miss Skeeter…I got some things to tel you,” I say.
Minny and me look at each other. “I’m on go,” Minny say, frowning like her chair gotten too hard to sit in. She head for the door, but on her
way out, she give Miss Skeeter a touch on the shoulder, real quick, keep her eyes straight like she ain’t done it. Then she gone.
“You been out a town awhile, Miss Skeeter.” I rub the back a my neck.
Then I tel her that Miss Hil y pul ed that booklet out and showed it to Miss Leefolt. And Law knows who else she passing it around town to
now.
Miss Skeeter nod, say, “I can handle Hil y. This doesn’t implicate you, or the other maids, or the book at al .”
And then I tel her what Mister Leefolt say, how he real clear that I ain’t to talk to her no more about the cleaning article. I don’t want a tel her
these things, but she gone hear em and I want her to hear em from me first.
She listen careful, ask a few questions. When I’m done, she say, “He’s ful of hot air, Raleigh. I’l have to be extra careful, though, when I go
over to Elizabeth’s. I won’t come in the kitchen anymore,” and I can tel , this ain’t real y hitting her, what’s happening. The trouble she in with her friends. How scared we need to be. I tel her what Miss Hil y say about letting her suffer through the League. I tel her she been kicked out a bridge
club. I tel her that Miss Hil y gone tel Mister Stuart al about it, just in case he get any “inclination” to mend things with her.
Skeeter look away from me, try to smile. “I don’t care about any of that ole stuff, anyway.” She kind a laugh and it hurts my heart. Cause
everbody care. Black, white, deep down we al do.
“I just…I rather you hear it from me than in town,” I say. “So you know what’s coming. So you can be real careful.”
She bite her lip, nod. “Thank you, Aibileen.”
CHAPTER 23
THE SUMMER rol s behind us like a hot tar spreader. Ever colored person in Jackson gets in front a whatever tee-vee set they can find, watches Martin Luther King stand in our nation’s capital and tel us he’s got a dream. I’m in the church basement watching. Our own Reverend Johnson went up
there to march and I find myself scanning the crowd for his face. I can’t believe so many peoples is there—two-hundred-fifty thousand. And the ringer is, sixty thousand a them is white.
“Mississippi and the world is two very different places,” the Deacon say and we al nod cause ain’t it the truth.
September come and a church in Birmingham blows up into a mil ion pieces, with four little colored girls inside. That wipe the smile off our
faces pretty quick. Law, do we weep and it seems like life can’t go on. Oh, but it do.
Ever time I see Miss Skeeter, she look thinner, a little more skittish in the eyes. She try to smile like it ain’t that hard on her that she ain’t got
no friends left.
In October, Miss Hil y sets at Miss Leefolt’s dining room table. Miss Leefolt so pregnant she can’t barely focus her eyes. Meanwhile, Miss
Hil y got a big fur around her neck even though it’s sixty degrees outside. She stick her pinky out from her tea glass and say, “Skeeter thought she
was so clever, dumping al those toilets in my front yard. Wel , they’re working out just fine. We’ve already instal ed three of them in people’s
garages and sheds. Even Wil iam said it was a blessing in disguise.”
I ain’t gone tel Miss Skeeter this. That she ended up supporting the cause she fighting against. But then I see it don’t matter cause Miss Hil y
say, “I decided I’d write Skeeter a thank-you note last night. Told her how she’s helped move the project along faster than it ever would’ve gone.”
WITH MISS LEEFOLT SO BUSY making clothes for the new baby, Mae Mobley and me spend pretty much ever minute a the day together. She getting too
big for me to carry her al the time, or maybe I’m too big. I try and give her a lot a good squeezes instead.
“Come tel me my secret story,” she whisper, smiling so big. She always want her secret story now, first thing when I get in. The secret
stories are the ones I be making up.
But then Miss Leefolt come in with her purse on her arm, ready to leave. “Mae Mobley, I’m leaving now. Come give Mama a big hug.”
But Mae Mobley don’t move.
Miss Leefolt, she got a hand on her hip, waiting for her sugar. “Go on, Mae Mobley,” I whisper. I nudge her and she go hug her mama real
hard, kinda desperate-like, but Miss Leefolt, she already looking in her purse for her keys, kind a wiggle off. It don’t seem to bother Mae Mobley so
much, though, like it used to, and that’s what I can’t hardly look at.
“Come on, Aibee,” Mae Mobley say to me after her mama gone. “Time for my secret story.”
We go on in her room, where we like to set. I get up in the big chair and she get up on me and smile, bounce a little. “Tel me, tel me bout the
brown wrapping. And the present.” She so excited, she squirming. She has to jump off my lap, squirm a little to get it out. Then she crawl back up.
That’s her favorite story cause when I tel it, she get two presents. I take the brown wrapping from my Piggly Wiggly grocery bag and wrap up
a little something, like piece a candy, inside. Then I use the white paper from my Cole’s Drug Store bag and wrap another one just like it. She take
it real serious, the unwrapping, letting me tel the story bout how it ain’t the color a the wrapping that count, it’s what we is inside.
“We doing a different story today,” I say, but first I go stil and listen, just to make sure Miss Leefolt ain’t coming back cause she forgot
something. Coast is clear.
“Today I’m on tel you bout a man from outer space.” She just loves hearing about peoples from outer space. Her favorite show on the tee-
vee is My Favorite Martian. I pul out my antennae hats I shaped last night out a tinfoil, fasten em on our heads. One for her and one for me. We look like we a couple a crazy people in them things.
“One day, a wise Martian come down to Earth to teach us people a thing or two,” I say.
“Martian? How big?”
“Oh, he about six-two.”
“What’s his name?”
“Martian Luther King.”
She take a deep breath and lean her head down on my shoulder. I feel her three-year-old heart racing against mine, flapping like butterflies
on my white uniform.
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