Songbird

by Lisa Samson

  She slams the drawer shut and bites on her bare thumbnail, and I wonder if she’ll call what she ingests “lunch.”

  MaryAnna blows out an exasperated sigh. “Okay, well, I guess I’ll have to get through this without one.”

  Wonderful. My first shot at an agent and all she can think about is a cigarette. One thing good about growing up the way I did is that it breeds resourcefulness. “I’ve got an idea. Let’s walk down to that Eckerd store there on the corner and we can talk on the way.”

  MaryAnna jumps to her feet, breasts jiggling like two molded aspic salads. She is very thin otherwise, which makes the breasts suspect. No butt. Celery stalk legs and a neck with napa cabbage veins and tendons. “Good thinking! Let’s go.” She grabs a handbag from underneath her desk. Not a purse. A handbag. Any woman will tell you there’s a clear difference between the two.

  “Do you sleep well at nights, Ms. Trench?”

  “Hardly a wink. Why?”

  “Just wondering.”

  She checks her face in the mirror by the door, a face grounded by a black V-neck shirt she probably bought in the toddler section to ensure that kind of fit. “Let me tell you this, Ms. Hopewell … hey, can I call you Charmaine?”

  “Of course you can.”

  “Just thought I’d ask. Some of these singer types can be so uppity.”

  She shuts the door to her office, waves to the nice receptionist in one of those Michael Jackson red leather jackets, who showed me in and made me a cup of tea while I waited an hour past my appointment time.

  “Well, I’m sure not uppity. I come from nothing, and I’m still nothing, Ms. Trench.”

  “Well let me just tell you, Charmaine, if you hire on MaryAnna Trench, you got an agent that works almost twenty-four hours a day for you.”

  Well, I’ll be. Suddenly I wonder if Mr. Haney on Green Acres has taken over the emaciated, augmented body of MaryAnna Trench.

  While walking to the drugstore, we talk about all the dead country music stars because, believe it or not, Ms. Trench keeps pictures of their graves in an album. If that isn’t the weirdest thing I’ve ever heard I don’t know what is!

  The bell clanks against the glass door of the drugstore as we enter. MaryAnna is still talking. “The latest ones in my collection are Judy Canova and Junior Samples.

  “Junior Samples died?”

  “Yes. And not long ago.”

  “Always wondered how he came across that name. Must be a story there.”

  “Oh, the country stars have their stories.”

  “Don’t we all?” I say.

  MaryAnna, eyes bright with excitement, lays a hand on my arm. “Hard luck story?”

  “You wouldn’t believe it if I told you.”

  And MaryAnna grins. “Honey-pie, the buying public loves nothing more than a hard-luck story.”

  At that moment, I realize that the niggling little tickle inside of me, the one that said “You will be famous one day, Myrtle Whitehead,” is whispering again.

  I picture my Mama. I remember her prophecy of fame for me, her ill-conceived daughter. I remember a lot in this moment, reminded by MaryAnna Trench of my hard-luck story.

  Hard-Luck Story.

  Myrtle Charmaine Whitehead Hopewell’s Hard-Luck Story.

  Oh, my lands!

  Maybe I should skip the singing profession and go straight to the biography.

  “Would you mind if I made a quick call from that pay phone outside while you buy your smokes?”

  “Not one bit.”

  I push my way back outside, my spiked heels clicking against the concrete. Hairdos mill above me, fringes and studs vie for attention and a few rhinestones sparkle at eye level. And cowboy boots and hats bob everywhere. As if any of these people wear these items of clothing for their intended purposes! However, the big hair makes me feel right at home, and smugness envelops me because mine is natural.

  A man with boots pointier than Vicki Miller’s head hangs up the phone, gives me a little salute off the brim of his seventy-five gallon hat, and I smile.

  Harlan, who’s waiting for me at his sister Bee’s house, picks up on the first ring. “Shug?”

  “It’s me. Listen I don’t have but a minute.” I tell him the entire hard-luck story angle. “Do you think it can hurt to approach it like that?”

  “Well, I don’t know, Char. I’ve never thought about stuff like that before. I can tell you it would be a great way to share the way God has turned your life around with His blessings.”

  “The best among them being you, Harlan.”

  Sometimes I even make myself sick.

  “Well, I don’t know about that, Shug. I think I’m the lucky one in the whole deal.”

  My goodness, I just love this fellow.

  “I’m not going to sign anything today, Harlan. Just so you know.”

  “Whatever you do is fine with me, Charmaine.”

  MaryAnna Trench emerges, stepping onto Music Row and lighting up a Pall Mall right away. She French inhales, something I think I would learn to do if I ever became a smoker. But that would be death to my vocal chords, unless I want to sing like Kim Carnes or Rod Stewart.

  She exhales. “Now what I need to know is if you want to take your career mainstream or Southern gospel?”

  I try to keep up with her long legs. It is not easy. “I don’t know. I never really thought about it.”

  “Think about it. It’s important.”

  “Will I get on with the Gaithers if I go strictly Southern gospel?”

  MaryAnna laughs and laughs and it reminds me of somebody starting an engine after it’s already running.

  The truth is, I love gospel music. It’s in my blood, although I never once really heard Mama do more than hum. The thing about gospel, I guess, is if they find out the real truth about my life, that I’ve been lying all these years about Mama being dead and all, they’ll forgive me. Right? I mean, isn’t that what Christians do?

  I guess it’s just the changes that have occurred in my life lately, getting Hope, taking my singing career a step further, dealing with Grace who missed two nights at last week’s crusade and came home smelling like a still, but I’m feeling extra weary, and a little blue.

  It takes even more effort than usual to do even the most simple of things these days.

  Better stick with Jesus.

  “I’ll go Southern gospel.”

  I need all the help I can get.

  8

  Some women remember the year events happen by their hairstyle, where they lived, or what job they held. I remember by my clothing. Even now I still sit at the machine for a couple of hours a day as we drive in the motor home or park somewhere in a church lot or a campground. I still make all the costumes for the Songbirds. I can remember what year we sang at which church because I remember our dresses.

  I’m still the same. Right now, I’m looking at MaryAnna Trench and thinking, “I am signing with my first agent and I am wearing a pair of purple designer jeans—50 percent off at Hecht’s—and a white, frilly cotton blouse I made a few months ago.

  Of course, MaryAnna’s outfit tops mine completely. Her skeletal form is swathed in a caftan this afternoon. A caftan! I’m thinking I may just travel around the world via Ms. Trench’s choice of outfit. Paris and all black the first visit. A caftan now. I won’t be at all surprised if next time I greet her she’s wrapped up like a caterpillar in a sari or wearing khaki and a pith helmet.

  I can’t quite imagine someone in a sari smoking Pall Malls, however.

  “Just sign by all the ‘X’s, Charmaine. I assure you it’s a standard contract.”

  And so I do as she says and the funniest feeling comes over me, like I am a candy bar at the movie theater, but I’m paying the customer to buy me and eat me, throw away my wrapper and forget about me by the time the last flicker of light has faded from the giant screen of silver.

  I really wish I could afford a lawyer. But isn’t that what agents are supposed to do anyway? Protect thei
r clients from the record companies and whatnot?

  “You do have a lawyer in-house?” I ask.

  “Not in-house. But one who we use all the time.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “William Williams.”

  “William Williams?”

  “Well, he goes by Billy.”

  I call Harlan who’s over at Bee’s as soon as I leave the building. “I’m by that Eckerd store.”

  “How did it go?”

  I sigh, feeling silly all of a sudden. “I signed. Their lawyer is named William Williams. He goes by Billy.”

  And Harlan and I laugh and laugh.

  “Don’t worry, Shug. You’ll do all right. You know that.”

  I wish I had his optimism. Lately, though, it’s all I can do to even summon up the smallest bit of real enthusiasm. And I outright snapped at Grace the other day. I feel so testy!

  Harlan says, “How about if we celebrate tonight? We’re pulling out tomorrow morning for Greensboro.”

  “You want to go out to eat?”

  Harlan and I hardly ever go out to eat. Evangelists rely on “love offerings” and let me tell you, born-again types are the most tight-fisted group of people you’ve ever seen. One time we had a church take out a portion of the love offering for the extra gas and electric it took to turn on the lights of the church for those few services not normally scheduled during the week.

  “You know I love to eat out. Where do you want to go?”

  “How about the Western Sizzlin’?”

  “Really? Steak?”

  “You know it, Shug. It’s not every day a beautiful lady signs on with a real Nashville agent.”

  “That sure is the truth. Okay, I’m on my way home.”

  So I climb into Bee’s little Mazda and make my way back to Lebanon. But I stop in at the Kroger for some Sominex. I don’t know why, but I’ve been having trouble sleeping lately. I wish I could blame it on Hope, but to be honest, that child sleeps like a teenager!

  Poor Harlan, too. My libido is down to nothing these days but I’m able to muster up some semblance of enthusiasm for his sake. And once we really get started, I do enjoy myself.

  Nevertheless, when I step up into the RV and see Harlan standing there holding our baby, I smile. “Mama!” she cries and lunges for me. I drop the bag and catch her before she crashes to the ground.

  Harlan picks up the bag and looks inside. “What’s this for? You having trouble sleeping, Charmaine?”

  “Just falling asleep, Harlan. I feel so keyed up nowadays.”

  “Must just be the excitement of your singing career.”

  “Must be.”

  A big homemade sign is taped to a cabinet in the kitchenette. KNOCK ‘EM DEAD, SHUG!

  I hug my husband, kiss my baby, and can’t wait until morning when we pull out of here. I’ll still be all curled up with Hope in the bed at the back of the van, feeling warm and sleepy.

  I can’t say I understand Harlan’s drive to go around preaching like he does. But I can understand why he doesn’t want to settle down. Still, he takes good care of us. I guess maybe I should be more like him.

  I’d like to say I am one of those people in search of their father. But I’m not. Because I doubt Mama had any idea who my father was.

  I suppose I could get all sentimental and imagine some fairytale scenario.

  1. They were childhood sweethearts and he came to visit her at Randolph Macon, they succumbed to a night of pleasure due to the passion in their hearts. He promised his heart forever, slipping a ring on her finger, and on the way back to Suffolk he died in a tragic car accident.

  2. He was an older man, a rich widower with an aching heart. He saw my Mama walking home from class one day, her books bumping slightly against her slender, youthful hips, and he asked her out. She never really loved him, but she pitied him, allowing herself into his arms for only a short time. After that she told him it could go no further. She wanted to fall in love, you see, to feel that heady blush of a fully beating heart, but it never happened. She never told him about the pregnancy to avoid complications and the accusations from Lynchburg society at large that she only slept with him to ensnare him.

  3. He was a dying young man with only six months to live. She sat at his bedside until the end, hiding her belly as it expanded to keep the failing invalid from experiencing yet more pain as his sweet young life faded away. But he knew. Yes, somehow he knew and as he died he said, “Take care of the child. Take good care.”

  Most likely, my father was none of those. Most likely he could have been one of ten subordinary people, and what child wants to deal with that?

  9

  It’s the autumn of 1983, and Harlan, Hope, and I are headed to Suffolk for a crusade. Mama’s hometown. So it’s easy to imagine the butterflies I feel. No need to diet this week. I couldn’t put more than dry toast in my mouth even if I wanted to. Only one time was I more nervous than this that I can remember and that was when Bowl-O-Rama began to shoot my scene. But when I compare meeting that eccentric director to possibly meeting my grandma Min, well, it’s like comparing a deli-counter turkey sandwich on white hold the mayo, to a gooey cheesesteak sub, extra cheese, and fried onions, if you please.

  I tell you what, I thought those Sominex pills would work. I am so tired of being tired. Lying there awake at night I do too much thinking. It’s that simple. And when I do too much thinking, I hate to admit it, but I do miss Mama a little. Or I miss what Mama and I might have been, I guess. I definitely miss Mrs. Evans in the true sense of the word. Francie and I talk every couple of weeks now and that makes things hard. Daddy this and Daddy that, and James this and James that, and I feel like such an outsider, despite the fact that I’m raising Hope as my own. They all agreed she should call us “Mama” and “Daddy” because everyone has a right to have parents.

  We’ll adopt her soon.

  Well, we are almost to Suffolk. This Route 58 is so boring that I’ve decided to lie down with Hope for a nap, not that I’ll sleep, but I’m going through a list of ingredients in my head for the crème brûlée I’m going to make. After that cherries jubilee nightmare, I figure I need to give the whole gourmet dessert affair another chance. I’ll get one of the boys to run to Food Lion later on.

  Melvin’s driving today because Harlan is sitting at the dinette going over his new series of messages entitled, “What’s Really Eating at You?”

  Lord, help us, but he’s on this antipsychology kick right now. As if people don’t think Christians are strange enough.

  I draw Hope’s little body close to mine, slipping my arm beneath her tender neck and cuddling her childish form into my own. She smells so good. Harlan got us a Rubbermaid tub to put in the shower stall for her baths. When we give her a bath he sits in the narrow hallway outside the bathroom door and I sit on the toilet with the lid closed and she splashes and plays. And you know, she doesn’t even mind getting her hair washed? I thought all children hated getting their hair washed. One time, Luella told me about Esteban and how he screamed so much during his baths she dubbed them “The Bath of a Thousand Screams.”

  “How much longer, Melvin?” I hear Harlan ask.

  “About twenty more miles, reverend.”

  Rain pings the tin roof of the motor home. I grieve inside because I know I will try to find my grandma and I know I will do it behind my sweet Harlan’s back. This is something I must do without him because I couldn’t bear telling him if Grandma’s dead or doesn’t want anything to do with me.

  Harlan unknowingly heaps guilt upon my already loaded conscience when he makes his way to the back and curls up with “his girls,” as he calls us with his particular brand of corny sentimentality. He whispers softly in prayer, so softly I cannot understand the words.

  I pretend I am asleep.

  I often wonder nowadays what ever attracted Harlan to me in the first place.

  Route 58 unravels before us.

  I look over at Harlan, asleep now beside me on the be
d. His mouth gently sags to the side and a soft, whistly sort of snore blows from the gap. Hope’s profile, sculpted with the smoothness of Ivory soap and about as lacking in porousness, steals my gaze, but not my thoughts. We’ve pulled into the church parking lot. Over the phone, the church was quick to apologize for being so new. Harlan told me about it after he first talked to them. “They said, ‘We’re not one of the old historic churches, Reverend Hopewell, but we do know how to praise the Lord here at Grace and Truth Assembly.’”

  We laughed ourselves a good one.

  “Not one of the historic churches?” I asked.

  “That’s what they said.”

  “Must be a stuffy old town, Suffolk.” No wonder Mama wouldn’t go back. Unless she did go back. Oh, dear Lord! What if I find her right there with my grandma Min?

  I hear Melvin hooking up the electrical to the church and I peer out the small window at the back, relieved to see our motor home is parked behind the church. It’s embarrassing enough to live in a motor home without being parked in plain view to all passersby.

  “Harlan?” I rouse him. “We’re here.”

  He opens his eyes but does not sit up. “What’s the place like?”

  I peer out again. “Not much. Little red-brick, country-style church. Looks like it was built in the fifties.”

  “That’s new to these people?”

  “I guess so.”

  He sighs. “How much money do we have left in the account for salaries this month?”

  “About fifteen hundred dollars.” I keep the books.

  We have seven people on the crusade payroll now. Harlan and I, Henry Windsor, Ruby and Grace, Mel and his nephew Randall, who we never see because once he sets up our sound system and all, he heads off to the bars. Mel was hoping this stint with the crusade would go far in saving his soul.

  Harlan sighs again. “I was hoping to get you a nice surprise, honey. But I think it’s going to have to wait. Thought I could stow a little more away.”

  “It’s a surprise you’re saving for?”