The Red Rose Box

by Woods, Brenda

  It was August. The New York City air was hot and our clothes stuck to us as we drove past broken fire hydrants. Water poured into the sky and fell back down like buckets of rain. Children ran in and about, smiling and cool. I wished I was with them.

  Dinner was served. Uncle Bill pulled his wrinkled white handkerchief from his shirt pocket, wiped his brow, and took a sip of ice water.

  “What a lucky man I am to be in the presence of three lovely Negro women,” he said.

  “I’m not a woman. I’m a girl,” Ruth replied. “Why do some people call us Negroes and others call us colored?” I asked.

  “Colored and Negro, same thing,” he replied.

  Olivia added, “Same as colored. Colored is colored, nearly white to black as midnight, colored is colored.”

  Uncle Bill folded his damp handkerchief. “I don’t care what they call me, so long as they don’t call me a nigger.”

  I said, “White folks call us niggers, drive by in their trucks and tell us to get out the way, little barefoot niggers.”

  The waiter served the strawberry ice cream I’d ordered.

  Aunt Olivia dabbed the corners of her mouth with her napkin. “God doesn’t seem to mind what color skin you wear.”

  Someone began to play the piano in the hotel lounge. The music floated into the dining room and found us.

  “Good night! Good night!” Ruth said as she bounced around the room like a big brown cricket. She settled on the bed and asked, “What you readin?”

  I showed her the cover of the book that Uncle Bill had given to me. “The Time Machine. It’s about this man who makes this machine and goes to other places without a boat or train.”

  “Flyin in a airplane?” Ruth questioned.

  “No.” I explained, “He gets in a machine and turns on the electricity and the machine takes him to other places.”

  “That can’t happen, he musta been dreamin.”

  “Some things come from imagination,” I told her.

  Ruth put her head on the pillow and said, “I’m not gonna be a teacher. I’m gonna be a lady lawyer.”

  “No such thing as a colored lady lawyer,” I told her.

  “Yessirree. Uncle Bill told me he knowed a colored lady lawyer once.”

  “Knew, not knowed.”

  Ruth closed her eyes and fell asleep fast. I covered her, turned off the light, and fell faster.

  I fell into a dream, a dream about birds sitting in a weeping willow tree. They were sleeping until a flock of crows came, shiny and black. They circled the tree like Indians circling a wagon train. It began to rain and a wicked wind began to blow.

  I woke up. It was dark outside. There was no moon, not even a slice. Birds were sleeping, I guessed, except owls. I sat in a chair until I saw the sun.

  Aunt Olivia came in quietly, softly, tears in her red eyes. She put her hand on my shoulder. “Hurricane hit Sulphur.”

  And that was how God chose to take Mama, Daddy, Sister Goodnight, Miss Lutherine, Nathan and Micah Shine, Miss Lilly, Penny Adams, and nearly twenty-five more, in the middle of the night, without warning. Ruth and I, Gramma and Elijah and a few others were spared.

  I told Aunt Olivia that she was a liar. “They’re not dead! You’re just mad becuz you can’t have no babies! You want us for yourself! We’re goin home next week! Daddy gonna be at the train station and Mama gonna be with him.”

  Olivia reached for me. Tears kissed my lips while Ruth slept.

  Eleven

  Sulphur was torn, ripped up with few places for anyone to lay their heads. Fallen trees rested on their sides. Roofs rested on the ground. Roads were flooded. The sky was gray.

  It was eight days before Mama and Daddy were laid to rest, in plain pine caskets, side by side.

  We walked over pieces of the house where we’d been born, Ruth and I, looking for something, anything, bits of this and that. Ruth ran to me, a broken picture frame in her hand. Mama and Daddy stood arm in arm on their wedding day. I tried to take it from her but Ruth held tight.

  She looked at me. “They ain’t gone. They just hidin. I’ma find em. They just ain’t looked hard enuf.” Tears.

  I sat down in the rubble. “No such word as ain’t.... They gone, Ruth.”

  Ruth turned to Elijah, standing nearby, and asked, “Where’s my mama’n daddy?”

  Elijah answered, “With the angels.”

  Ruth handed me the picture. I pulled out the pieces of broken glass, put the picture and the broken frame in a brown paper bag, pulled my legs up close, and wrapped myself up. Tears.

  “Why people gotta die?” I asked Elijah.

  “They ain’t really dead, Leah, just changed.” Elijah took the bag from my hand and pulled me to my feet.

  “I can’t touch em, can’t see em, can’t hear em. So they’re dead.” More tears.

  Elijah took Ruth by the hand. “Come along now, Leah, your gramma’s waitin outside, Aunt and Uncle at the church. Y’all gotta train to catch. Nuthin else worth savin.”

  I walked over memories and bits of broken glass and saw the postcard we’d taped inside our closet. I picked it up, tore it into pieces, and let them fall to the ground like falling leaves. I didn’t want it. Hadn’t been for Olivia and the red rose box, none of this would have happened. Ruth and I would be with Mama and Daddy, walking through the streets of heaven.

  I pictured the four of us, a family of angels with silver wings, white gowns, halos of honeysuckle around our heads, sitting near the throne of God. I looked down and saw the peach pit we’d planted. It had taken root and pushed its way up into the light. Tiny green leaves sprouted. Its newness had saved it. I thought of Miss Lilly and climbed into Elijah’s truck.

  “Why can’t we stay here with you?” I asked Gramma. Ruth sat on her lap. There wasn’t an inch of space between us. My right shoulder touched the truck door.

  “Got nowhere for y‘all to sleep. I got no other choice, Leah. It’s best this way.” Heartache hung on her words. “Olivia gonna do right by you and her husband is a righteous man. Y’all gonna have everything, everything.”

  “I don’t want everything. I want Mama and Daddy.” I took off my patent leather shoes and tried to throw them out the window. “I don’t want nuthin money can buy.” Gramma caught my arm. My tears would not stop.

  Elijah handed me a handkerchief. “Dry your eyes, Leah Jean, b’fore you cry yourself blind.”

  “Let her be,” was all Gramma said. Then she said again softly, “Let her be.”

  On the train I began thinking about my prayers and not wanting to spend my life in Sulphur. I wondered if that was what had made the hurricane come or if Mama and Daddy were just ready to go, knowing we would be in good hands. I didn’t want to pray anymore and I was thinking that I was going to throw my rosary out the window, off the train, when no one was looking. Ruth and I sat there, shoulders touching, across from Uncle and Aunt. I twirled a lock of hair between my fingers, the same way Mama used to, and more tears came.

  Uncle Bill said, “Hush now, Leah. Come over here. Sit beside your aunt Olivia, close your eyes.”

  I stood. Ruth grabbed my skirt and pulled. I turned, looked in her eyes, and sat back down. Ruth fell asleep with her head on my shoulder. I could see the trail left by one tear on her cheek.

  I wanted to see my daddy, tall and brown, to feel my mama’s lips on my right cheek, to smell apple cobbler cooking in her oven.

  I wanted to watch Sister Goodnight rub up against Elijah, begging for a shot of gin. I wanted to ask Miss Lutherine for another slice of sweet potato pie. I wanted Penny to whistle while she bounced her red ball and picked up five copper-colored jacks with one hand. I wanted to hang Miss Lilly’s clothes on the line and watch them blow in the wind.

  I wanted to hear Mama and Daddy laughing low, wrapped in each other’s arms.

  I closed my eyes and dreamed about the pink room in Los Angeles. The next thing I remembered, I was half asleep in it. Ruth, who had been put to bed in the yellow room, tiptoed in
through the moonlight, her shadow beside her, and climbed in at the foot of the bed.

  Part 2

  Twelve

  The sun rose and filled the room with light.

  Mrs. Pittman knocked softly and came in. “Wake up, sleepy-heads,” she said.

  I thought it was Mama until I saw her thick hand on my arm. I felt empty. I was hungry for love and kisses, hungry for Daddy’s little pats on the head, hungry for the smells that came from Mama’s kitchen, hungry for the feel of southern soil beneath my feet.

  “Mornin, Mrs. Pittman,” I said. “Ruth’s still sleepin or playin possum.”

  Ruth opened one eye and closed it quickly.

  Mrs. Pittman walked toward the door and walked through, into the hall. She peered back in. “Breakfast’ll be waitin on you.”

  “Not hungry,” was all I could say.

  “Gotta eat,” was her reply.

  Want to die, was all I could think.

  She read my thoughts and said, “Gotta go on livin, Leah.”

  I said, “Yes ma’am,” and she closed the door.

  Ruth opened both eyes and sat up. “Gonna be hot today. What you think?” She got out of the bed and walked over to the window. I joined her and we pulled the curtains aside and looked down to the street. A green-and-white car crept by. Three girls we hadn’t seen before, two brown and one high yellow, were jumping rope, double Dutch, two ropes whirling, dusting the sidewalk, not a cloud in sight. Ruth reached for my hand. “What you wanna do?”

  “Nuthin,” I lied. I wanted to find my way to the train station, wait for the conductor to yell, “All aboard,” take Ruth by the hand, pull her up the steps, find our seats, and get back to Sulphur where we belonged.

  “Breakfast waitin,” I told her.

  “I ain’t hungry,” Ruth replied.

  “No such word as ain’t,” I reminded her with a half smile.

  “I’m not hungry, smarty-pants.”

  Aunt Olivia knocked and opened the door. Our eyes met hers and she joined us at the window. “Library opens at nine, thought you two might like to join me.”

  “Not me,” Ruth said, turning away from her.

  I thought about my daddy, the books that had found their way from his back pocket into my hands and mind. I missed the smile he always gave me as he handed me another work of art. A small treasure. It seemed as if he were calling me.

  I walked over to the bed, put on my bed jacket and slippers, made my way to the door, and walked downstairs to the kitchen. It was eight-thirty and I wanted to hurry.

  Three minutes later Ruth found her way to the table and sat down beside me. “You’re goin, huh?”

  “Not like it’s a party or nuthin.” I put a spoonful of Cream of Wheat in my mouth and swallowed.

  “We’re supposed to be sad, too sad.”

  “I am too sad.”

  “If you were too sad, you wouldn’t be goin to the library. You wouldn’t be goin anywhere except church on Sunday.”

  “I’m goin to get books, sad books to make me sadder.” I wondered if she understood.

  “How you gonna know if they’re sad books?”

  “I’m just gonna.”

  “Sad books gonna make you cry, Leah.”

  “Cryin don’t kill you.”

  Ruth ate her breakfast in a hurry. “I’m gonna get sad books too, two of em.”

  Uncle Bill breezed in through the back door. He was whistling.

  “You’re sposed to be sad,” I reminded him. “Too sad to whistle.”

  “Sorry, little ma’am.” Uncle Bill hung his head. “One thing I have is respect for the dead.”

  Aunt Olivia, Ruth, and I climbed the library steps together, a silent trio. We approached the librarian. She was as white as Miss Lilly. She wore the same sturdy black lace-up shoes and her glasses hung around her neck on a silver chain. Her dress was blue-and-yellow plaid, her sweater white with buttons that looked like pearls, her wavy hair pinned back.

  I spoke in a whisper. “We are looking for books, very sad books.”

  She looked up from her desk with kind eyes and asked, “Sad books... fiction or nonfiction?” I thought I saw a smile coming to her lips. “Fiction means made-up stories. Nonfiction means true stories.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” I said, looking at Ruth.

  “We need to be sad, too sad,” Ruth added.

  The librarian got up from her chair. “And why would that be?”

  “Because our mama and daddy got killed in a hurricane and we didn’t and we gotta stay sad for a long time,” I answered.

  “I see.... Most books mix up the happy with the sad, the same way life does. I’m Mrs. Baker. Follow me and we’ll see what we can find.”

  As she stood up we looked down at our feet and said, “Thank you, Mrs. Baker.”

  “Our aunt is over there,” I added and pointed toward the aisle where Aunt Olivia stood.

  “I see,” Mrs. Baker whispered. She put her finger to her lips and added, “Shhh.”

  It was quiet. Quiet like Sulphur at midnight and daybreak, the silence of the room broken only by the sounds of doors and books opening and closing, the cling of the small cash register as it collected fines. I had never seen so many books. We walked behind Mrs. Baker to the children’s section and Ruth started to hum. I turned my head slowly and the joy left her as our eyes met.

  Ruth and I filled out our applications for library cards and we checked out The Secret Garden, Charlotte’s Web, and The Borrowers, hoping they would keep our sadness flowing, hovering around us. I saw Mrs. Baker and Aunt Olivia exchange smiles as we left and we walked home on each side of our aunt, holding her hands.

  That night we sat in silence, swallowing sorrow with supper. I looked down at my plate. Smothered chicken, green beans, rice and gravy. I put in a mouthful. Elijah would have said that Mrs. Pittman put some magic in her food. All I knew was that it tasted good.

  Aunt Olivia put down her fork. “Leah, Ruth? Your uncle has a surprise for you after dinner. Clean your plates. Drink all your milk.”

  Uncle Bill looked up and smiled.

  “A present?” Ruth asked.

  “A present,” Uncle replied.

  “Is it a doll? Because my doll got killed in the hurricane too.” Ruth picked up her glass and took one last gulp of milk.

  “Dolls can’t die. They don’t have flesh and blood,” I said, taking one more bite of chicken.

  “I know that, Leah. I mean, I couldn’t find my doll.” She cut her eyes at me.

  “You didn’t even look for it,” I said.

  “Did so.”

  “It’s not a doll,” Uncle Bill interrupted. “But if you want a doll, Ruth, you too, Leah, we’ll have to get you one tomorrow.” He looked at his watch. “Store’s closed now.”

  “I’m too old for dolls. I’m eleven now,” I told him.

  “I’m not ... not too old,” Ruth added. “I’m nine ... so I would like one tomorrow, with hair made from yarn and two matchin black eyes made from buttons ... like the one Mama made ... like the one got lost in the hurricane.”

  I heard the sound of a train in the distance.

  Mrs. Pittman removed my plate and put peach pie in its place. We finished supper and followed Uncle Bill into the kitchen. He walked to the corner near the oven and stood over an open cardboard box. We walked toward him slowly and looked inside.

  “A weenie dog ... you got us a weenie dog!” Ruth reached in the box and picked it up. It licked her face twice. I touched the top of its tiny head. I held. one of its soft-as-velvet ears between my fingers.

  Uncle Bill smiled. “He’s a dachshund. What you gonna call him?”

  “Him?” I asked.

  “Him,” he replied.

  “Weenie ... let’s call him Weenie.” Ruth looked at me.

  “That doesn’t sound nice,” I said.

  “We could call him Dog, Hot Dog.” Ruth let him lick her nose.

  “Hot ... we should call him Hot becuz he looks like a hot dog a
nd we got him on a hot day.” I took him from Ruth’s arms.

  “Then Hot it is,” Uncle Bill said with a smile.

  I put Hot on the floor and he walked over to where Aunt Olivia was standing beside Mrs. Pittman.

  “I hope he knows how to go outside and do his bisness,” Mrs. Pittman said, frowning. “Becuz I’m not bout to clean up no dog doo.”

  “Trained to scratch the door ... what I was told,” Uncle replied.

  “Hope you was told the truth,” Mrs. Pittman mumbled, leaving the kitchen. “Don’t like no dog in the house. Only place for a dog is outside on a leash. Dogs in a house is nasty.”

  Aunt Olivia didn’t say a word. Uncle Bill took a cigar out of his white shirt pocket, picked up his gold-plated lighter, lit the cigar, and took two puffs. Mrs. Pittman returned to the kitchen, plates stacked in her arms. Ruth sat on the floor and Hot licked her face again.

  “That’s nasty, lettin a dog lick you in the face after he dun licked hisself and everything else.” Mrs. Pittman placed the dishes in the sink and turned on the water.

  Ruth replied, “He loves me ... so it’s not nasty.”

  Mrs. Pittman kept talking. “Don’t like no dogs ... only thing worse is a cat ... never know where a cat is hiding ... don’t know how to come when you call ... do whatever they please.”

  Aunt Olivia smiled at me, Uncle Bill joined her at the door, and they went into the other room.

  “Who’s bout to feed him?” Mrs. Pittman asked.

  “Been fed,” Uncle Bill said from the dining room.

  “Lord have mercy.” Mrs. Pittman rinsed the soap from a plate, turned it over, rinsed the other side, and placed it in the dish rack.

  Hot pranced over, sat on his hind legs, and looked up. Mrs. Pittman looked down and his eyes met hers. “What you lookin at? ... Ain’t even half a dog.”