Jump into the Sky

by Shelley Pearsall

  So that was the reason why I didn’t have any choice really. Sitting there in the Delaneys’ little kitchen with the rain hammering down like the Pacific Ocean outside, I had to act like a tough pillow, like nothing could bother me, and tell him yes—

  “All right,” I said, trying to keep my voice from falling to pieces. “I’ll go along with you.”

  35. Sitting Still

  Turns out, the decision to go along with my father would be the easy part, but the harder parts were still waiting ahead. We made plans to leave Pendleton at the beginning of October, and it was my daddy’s idea to stop in Chicago before we went to his assignment in North Carolina. “I’ve got some furlough time,” he said, “so we’ll spend a few days there.” Think he was trying his best to make me happy, but I was afraid seeing the place would only make me miss it more.

  When she heard we were leaving, Willajean acted like her world was gonna end, even though her brothers were expected back home any day. I was packing up the last of my things one night when she came into my room with a folded-up piece of paper.

  “Wrote you something,” she said, holding it toward me, her eyes blinking nervously behind her glasses. “You can go ahead and look at it.”

  Well, I opened up the paper, and it turned out the girl had written the world’s longest poem for me—a poem all about stars and peace and everlasting love. Good grief, I had no ding-donged idea what to say.

  “What do you think?” she asked after I read it.

  I had no idea what I thought. Fortunately, I noticed MawMaw Sands’s sweetgrass basket, which was sitting empty on the bed, waiting to be packed up, and I got a flash of divine inspiration. “I think you should have this basket for your poems.” I pushed the basket toward Willajean. “It was made by an old African lady named MawMaw Sands, whose ancestors jumped off slave ships and lived in the Georgia swamps years ago, and everybody buys their baskets from her because they have things in them you can’t always see. She gave me this basket before I came to Pendleton and now I want you to have it.”

  “What in the world are you talking about?” Willajean glared, hands on her hips.

  “I’m just saying, sometimes you gotta believe in things you can’t see, that’s all,” I replied, trying to sound mysterious. Swear I was almost as good as MawMaw Sands herself. “Since you want to be a poet someday, I thought maybe you should have something nice for keeping your poetry inside.”

  Willajean studied the basket, opening it up and looking inside. “It’s pretty, but I wanted you to have the poem. I wrote the poem for you.”

  Heck, girls were impossible. I had to think fast. “Well, how about if you keep the basket and I keep the poem?”

  Willajean gave me a melty-looking smile and she took off with that basket like it was a block of gold, telling me, “Thank you, Levi. Outside of my family, nobody has ever given me a real gift before.”

  I hoped MawMaw Sands wouldn’t mind me giving away her gift, but I figured she probably already knew I would. Wouldn’t be surprised if she was sitting down there in North Carolina on her viny green porch, making me a new one at that very moment.

  I’ll admit I hung on to the poem from Willajean for a long time after leaving Pendleton because it was the first poem a girl ever gave to me, and maybe someday Willajean would be as famous as Emily Dickinson, who knows.

  The morning we left Oregon, the weather was clear and chilly, not a cloud in the sky. “Perfect jump day,” my daddy said, glancing upward and shaking his head like it was hard to leave. Willajean was back in school, so it was only Mrs. Delaney seeing us off at the station. She was waiting on pins and needles for her boys to come back. I think she spent more time looking around the train station for the two of them than saying goodbye to us, but that was okay with me.

  Now, if you’ve ever come back to a place that you haven’t seen in a while, you know how things change. After all the wide-open spaces of Oregon, the city of Chicago seemed to have shrunk while I was gone. Everything felt smaller. Aunt Odella’s apartment was a shoebox compared to where we’d been. When we arrived and she flung open the door to welcome us, I looked around the tiny space and thought, Good grief, how could the two of us have lived here?

  Aunt Odella was the real story, though. She looked as if she’d gone back in time and found her younger self. “Levi, look at you,” she said in this soft-edged voice when she opened the door. Swear even the voice sounded new.

  When my father stepped through the doorway in his dress uniform, she started carrying on and crying all over his shoulders, which took me by surprise considering the way she used to be. I guess some people must get their waterworks later in life, because Aunt Odella couldn’t stop boo-hooing and telling my father how proud she was of everything he’d done in the war.

  After introducing us to her new husband, Paul, she heaped on about a hundred more praises, saying how my daddy was one of the few colored paratroopers in the army and I was one of the nicest boys in Chicago. “I raised him right,” she said proudly.

  Paul reached out to shake our hands. He had a weakly grip and sweaty palms, but he seemed like a nice enough fellow. Found out he’d met Aunt Odella in June at a church funeral, where else? And it was love at first sight. You could tell they were crazy about one another from the way they kept giving each other little smiles and looks when they didn’t think we were paying attention.

  It made me wonder if the cactus was right after all. Without all the heavy burdens on her two shoulders, Aunt Odella had changed into a bright cactus flower overnight. Like I said, she didn’t even seem like the same person she was before. Which just goes to show you maybe there are times in life when change is what you have to do to survive. Despite what other people might’ve thought about my aunt sending me away so suddenly, I couldn’t hold that choice against her—or anybody else, you know what I mean?

  Archie stopped by for a visit while we were there, and I’ll be honest with you, he had changed for the worse. We’d written a few words back and forth during the summer, so I’d heard the bad news about his brother being declared killed in action. Don’t know if it was the pain of losing his brother, or me not being around to keep him on the straight and narrow—or both—but he’d taken up cussing and girls and just about every other bad thing you could name.

  When he showed up to see us wearing one of those baggy zoot suits with a fedora slouching over his eyes, Aunt Odella turned right back into her old self. “Can’t believe you are strolling around town looking like that,” she said, hands on her hips. “Putting your family to shame. You can expect next time I see your momma or your granny in church, I’m gonna have a word with them.” After he left, Aunt Odella shook her head and said it was too bad the way he’d turned out. I’ll admit part of me was torn up to see him so different.

  Fortunately, Uncle Otis hadn’t changed much at all. Well, except for his wife—she had left and took the green battleship with her too. Uncle Otis had bought his first Buick because he thought maybe the problem was with his automobile, not his wife. Me and my daddy heard all the sorry details of his wife troubles while he was giving us our sharp-looking razor cuts. Then he started pestering us for the reasons why we were going back to the South.

  “War’s over. Can’t understand why you’re sticking with the army and moving south, Charlie. Why not stay right here where all your family is?” he said, talking to my daddy like he was my age. “How about if I give you that spot right over there.” He pointed at the empty barber chair next to us. “Teach you everything I know about cutting heads. Let Levi go back to his old school and all his friends. This young man’s got a good head on his shoulders, you know.” As he patted my shoulder, the razor drifted dangerously close to my ear. “How about you? How’d you like to be a barber someday?” he said, looking at me.

  I shrugged and told him no, I’d thought about maybe working for a newspaper.

  Uncle Otis shook his head. “Naw, you don’t want to do that. All they tell is made-up lies. Be a barbe
r instead. We give people the real scoop about the world right here.”

  My daddy grinned. “Nobody tells stories or cuts heads like you, Otis.”

  “That’s true.” Uncle Otis nodded solemnly. “Can’t keep a wife to save my life, but I sure can keep Chicago looking good.”

  You can see how everybody in the family was doing their best to get us to change our minds. It wasn’t easy to leave, especially when Aunt Odella handed us a bag of her good fried chicken and a framed picture of her and her fellow and started boo-hooing about never seeing us again. It was real hard.

  But even with all the begging and bribery, me and my daddy stuck with what we’d planned to do. After spending almost a week in Chicago—which was both too long and too short at the same time—we bought tickets at Union Station and boarded the train again. Felt like I was repeating my own life. Same station I’d left from in May. Same destination. Only thing different was having my father sitting next to me, instead of a white lady with a cake box.

  One whole day passed by our windows without much to worry about. We were on our second day of traveling—I think we were somewhere in Maryland—when we noticed a few of the folks around us getting up. Two colored servicemen carrying their army duffels on their heads left the seats behind us. A colored family near the front corner of the car stood up suddenly and left their seats as a whole group. “Must be something good cooking in the dining car up ahead this morning,” my daddy joked. We were reading some penny comics and magazines we’d bought, not paying much attention to where we were, just having a good time. We’d already eaten breakfast at one of the train stations, so we weren’t hungry.

  I remember the shadow that was cast across our seats by the conductor who came to stand next to us. Think me and my daddy looked up at the exact same time. The conductor wasn’t smiling. He had a thin face that coulda used a good shave and there were stains under the armpits of his wrinkled uniform, as if he was somebody who didn’t care much about how he looked. “Time to get up and move forward,” he said, pointing at the front door of our passenger car.

  “Pardon?” My father set his magazine down slowly.

  The man’s voice got louder and slower, as if we were ignorant fools. “I said, it is time to get up and move forward to the colored car.” Heads turned to look at us. All the faces around us were white. I suddenly realized there wasn’t a colored person left in the whole car. And let me tell you, if the eyes of the passengers sitting near us had been machine guns, me and my daddy woulda been full of holes.

  “I’m Lieutenant Charles Battle of the U.S. Army, sir, and I’m staying right here in the coach seat I bought and paid for,” my father replied calmly. Very slowly he unrolled his magazine and began to read it again. My heart was pounding so hard, I thought my ribs might explode. Stared at my comics, not seeing a thing, just a dizzying blur of colors and words. The back of my shirt melted into the blue seat cushions.

  “If you don’t get up and go where you are supposed to go, soldier, I’ll have you removed from this train.”

  Now, you gotta picture my daddy’s square army shoulders and strong parachute-holding arms. His sharp dress uniform with its perfectly creased blouse and tie. The paratrooper wings and polished brass. Think you woulda needed a tank to get him off the train.

  “I’m an officer in the U.S. Army,” my father said, sliding out of his seat. As the train rolled down the tracks, he stood in front of the conductor in the swaying aisle. His head almost skimmed the ceiling. “I risked my life jumping out of airplanes and protecting this country from the enemy for the last three years. I saw one of my men lose his life for the war, and I have a right to this seat”—his hand smacked the cushions, making me jump—“as much as anybody in this country. And I’m not leaving it.”

  He sat back down, not looking at me. You could see a shine of sweat across his forehead and the veins on his temple standing out, thick as roots. With a slow, deliberate move, he reached toward the floor and picked up his magazine again.

  I think all the air had gotten sucked out of the car by then, because I sure couldn’t find any to breathe. I was convinced the conductor was gonna take us out of this world. Instead, he turned toward me. Even though me and my daddy looked alike, I don’t think the conductor realized we were father and son. Most army officers didn’t travel around the country with their half-grown children.

  The conductor pointed his finger at where I was sitting, next to the window. “You, boy, get up and follow me to the front right now. You know better than to be here in this car. Let’s go.” His face was hard.

  This was the point when I realized that deciding not to leave somebody—and deciding to stay with them—are two entirely different things. Deciding not to leave my daddy was the easy part because all I had to do was follow him. Choosing to stay with him meant accepting the consequences of whatever happened to us—good or bad—together.

  “I think I’m gonna stay where I am,” I replied, my voice not sounding too certain.

  The conductor acted like he hadn’t heard me. Or didn’t believe me. Hard to tell.

  “What did you say, boy?”

  This time I found another voice. “I’m staying here with my father.”

  The conductor’s expression was a flat plate of fury. The rest of the passengers still had their eyes aimed in our direction. You could feel the looks ricocheting around the car.

  “You’ll regret not leaving when you had the chance. You get farther south, they’ll show you what’s what.” A mist of spit from the conductor’s mouth splattered our faces. Then he turned and stalked out of the coach, keys clattering on his belt.

  I know it probably sounds strange to say, but I believe that was the moment when the two of us—my daddy and me—felt like we were father and son for the first time. As we sat there in that southern train car splattered with spit, sweat pouring down our faces, I think both of us realized we were stuck together by what we had decided to do, no matter what happened next. We’d done a blackout jump together, as Cal would say, and there was no leaning back to close the door.

  As the train rolled through town after town, getting deeper into the South, the two of us stayed side by side, waiting for whatever fate would come on board for us. Didn’t dare say a word to each other, just stayed face forward, our eyes staring at the seats in front of us. At one point my daddy’s hand reached over and squeezed my arm, like he was telling me to not give up hope yet.

  We were on that train for what seemed like hours and we never moved one inch from our seats. Our spit dried up and our stomachs rumbled and pee backed up to our eyeballs, but we sat there like we were glued in place. Figured we’d never be able to unbend our legs again, after all that time. To this day, I don’t know why nobody came on board to get us. Or why we weren’t arrested at one of the stations and dragged off to jail.

  We rode in a coach car meant for whites only all the way to Fayetteville, North Carolina. When we peeled ourselves outta the seats finally, it was early evening. We stumbled off the train at the end of a long line of white people who were in a speedy hurry to make it down the aisle before us, as if we had some dread disease that might be catching.

  Nobody was waiting to arrest us once we set foot on the ground, though—which was a big surprise to us because we sure thought they would be. Same dumb signs still hung everywhere, of course. COLORED. WHITE. Black fingers pointed out the direction we were supposed to go. But we stood there on the platform, ignoring all of them. Turning quick, my daddy wrapped his arms around me in an army hug that just about squeezed the pee into my brain. His hands thumped my back. “You are one darned brave person. I am so proud of you. So darned proud of having you as my son.”

  “Well, I am too,” I replied, which didn’t make much sense, but that’s what I said.

  As we headed to the army bus stop with the sun setting behind us, I knew our old lives had come to an end. Things were changing.

  The world was changing.

  Me and my daddy—we�
�d been away from each other for a long time, rolling through our lives like lonely rocks. Leaving had been a curse hanging over both our heads, but we’d stood up to it on the train—looked it right in the face—and stuck together, no matter what harm coulda happened to us. And now that curse felt like it had finally been broken.

  Maybe our new life together wouldn’t always be easy—I was sure it wouldn’t since me and my daddy were different people, you know, and we had a lot of catching up to do. Living in the South would be tough on both of us.

  But as Aunt Odella always said, “The end of one thing is the beginning of something else.” As I walked next to my father under the cactus-orange sky, you could tell the new beginning was already starting for us. Even if I did have to practically run to keep up.

  Author’s Note

  Within the big stories in history, there are always many smaller ones—stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary things. I first heard about the black paratroopers of the 555th Parachute Infantry Battalion from a veteran who had been one of the famed Tuskegee Airmen, a group of black pilots in World War II. The few details he knew about the paratroopers and their mission intrigued me. He said the men of the 555th were sometimes known as the “Triple Nickles,” and they had once been part of a secret operation to protect the United States from Japanese balloon bombs and forest fires during World War II.

  My search to find out more about this little-known part of World War II led me to an eighty-seven-year-old veteran named Walter Morris, who was the first African American in U.S. history selected to become a paratrooper. In early 1944, Mr. Morris was part of a small “test platoon” of seventeen soldiers who became the nation’s first black paratroopers at a time when few African Americans had ever flown inside a plane, let alone jumped from one. This small group eventually became the 555th Parachute Infantry Battalion, or Triple Nickles.