Bound South

by Susan Rebecca White

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Swallowing the Raspberry

  (Louise, Spring 2008)

  After we learned of Nanny Rose’s death and began making plans for her funeral, I called Caroline in Oakland to make sure that she could come home for it. Caroline said that it is actually great timing, that the public school where she is student teaching is going to be on spring break and that it won’t be a huge deal for her to miss a couple of her classes at Mills, where she is earning her credential. She said that maybe she will ask Sam, her boyfriend of six months, if he would like to come too, as the school where he teaches is also on break.

  The only problem with Sam coming is that I was planning to fix a big sausage, egg, and cheese casserole to serve at breakfast the morning of the funeral. And Sam is Jewish. Though I assume he can’t be too, too religious considering he is dating a woman who wears a cross around her neck—or at least, Caroline was wearing one the last time I saw her.

  So I went ahead and asked Caroline, “Does the boy eat pork?”

  “The boy?” she said. “He’s three years older than I was when I got married.”

  “Yes, and you were a baby. Much too young. It’s okay if he doesn’t, I just need to know so I can plan meals.”

  “The boy eats pork,” she said. “The boy loves pork. The boy thinks there is nothing on God’s green earth that can’t be improved with a slice of bacon.”

  “Really?” I replied, thinking that if they are still dating by next Christmas I might enroll him in the Bacon of the Month club, just for fun.

  “His logic goes: he’s a bad Jew for eating it, but he feels guilty about it, so that makes him a good Jew.”

  I smiled. Sounds like something Ben Ascher would have said.

  WHEN I CALLED Charles in New York to tell him about Nanny Rose, he groaned. “Well, shit. She just had to go and die on the weekend of the prom, didn’t she?”

  “I’m surprised NYU has one,” I said, ignoring his lack of sentiment toward his grandmother. “I thought prom was for high school.”

  “It’s called the Prom You Never Had. It’s an LGBT thing.”

  Oh. LGBT stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, something. I can never remember the last part. Transsexual. Or maybe transgender. Whatever Sandy was—I think—though don’t quote me on that. Charles gets so irritated when I get my gay terms wrong.

  I told Charles I was sorry that the funeral conflicts with his party and he sighed and said it’s no big deal, that this way he’ll get to see the dogwoods in bloom, which is one of the few things he misses about Atlanta.

  NANNY ROSE LEFT instructions in her will stating her desire to be cremated, which shocks me. How could she not want to be buried next to her husband and her son? One hint might be that in her will she specifies that her ashes be mixed with the ashes of Gunther, who was cremated last fall after a long decline and an assisted death. I am convinced that that dog’s death brought about Nanny Rose’s. After all, he was her constant companion in that big old house of hers on Peachtree Battle Avenue. Not that she was completely isolated there. I visited once a week and she had a housekeeper come almost every day—it was her housekeeper who found her slumped over on her kitchen table, her cup of coffee still hot beside her—but come evening Nanny Rose was always alone.

  For years John Henry and I tried to get her to move into a home for active seniors, but Nanny Rose refused, and there was really no medical reason that would mandate her doing so. In fact, whenever I accompanied her to her annual physical, the doctor always gushed over what good shape she was in.

  “She’s healthier than most fifty-year-olds!” he would exclaim, and I would think to myself, Good Lord, she’s going to outlive us all.

  THE FUNERAL IS held at Trinity Presbyterian, Nanny Rose’s church. Trinity is a very solid place, made of red brick and situated on a big, grassy hill. You can be sure that no matter how hard a wolf might huff and puff, he would not blow Trinity Presbyterian down. Nanny Rose was so upset when I did not join Trinity after John Henry and I got married. I made John Henry join All Saints instead. To me the decision was perfectly reasonable. All Saints was the church where I was baptized, it was near Ansley Park—where I knew we would end up living once we moved out of our starter house—it was where we were married, and its chapel, which includes seven stained glass windows designed by Tiffany Studios, is stunning.

  Don’t get me wrong. Trinity is a fine church and I’m sure we would have been happy there, especially considering how seldom we attend services. But not becoming a Presbyterian was one of my few open rebellions against Nanny Rose, one of the few barriers I managed to erect that she didn’t bulldoze right through.

  In retrospect, I imagine she admired my firm resolve.

  AT THE MEMORIAL service the minister says that Nanny Rose was “both gracious and a force to be reckoned with,” which is pretty much true, though occasionally she dropped her gracious side. Still, I am relieved that he seems to have actually known her. Too often you go to funerals and it is just so obvious that the minister has no understanding of the person behind his or her eulogy. (I wonder how much Sandy’s minister knew about him/her?)

  Because Nanny Rose is to be cremated, there is no body—or even coffin—to view, but dozens of people come to the service to show their respect, including the well-powdered ladies from her circle and the remaining members of her bridge game. Also attending are several members of John Henry’s firm, other business associates of his, tons of our old friends, and most of my new ones. Stephen and Chevre attend, of course. Bob, Stephen’s partner, would be here but he’s taking care of his own sick mother, who lives in Highlands, North Carolina.

  Tiny is here. She drove up from Sea Island last night. She’s still single. A few months after she and Ray started dating, she found out that Ray and his friends were part of a pool, placing bets on how many “beach widows” they could sleep with. When Tiny called to tell me this revelation, I jokingly told her that she should never, ever have trusted a man who uses self-tanner.

  “Easy for you to say,” she said, and I could hear the bitterness in her voice.

  My comment about self-tanner had only been an attempt at levity. But then I realized something: Tiny is jealous of my lasting relationship with John Henry. Which is so strange considering that before they got divorced I always viewed her relationship with Anders as ideal, while my relationship with my husband was so tenuous. Or rather, my feelings toward him were tenuous. There was sexual passion, yes, but otherwise I felt such anger toward him so much of the time.

  I’m not as angry anymore.

  AFTER THE MEMORIAL we go to the Houston’s on Peachtree, just south of Peachtree Battle shopping center, where Nanny Rose used to run all her errands. Our group at Houston’s—John Henry and his high school friend Jack, Caroline and Sam, Charles, Stephen, Tiny, and me—is certainly an eclectic bunch.

  We arrive at the restaurant at 6:00 p.m., expecting to be early enough to avoid the crowds. The very elegant hostess, a black woman with her hair pulled back into a chignon, tells us that we will have to wait until two tables open up.

  “May we please have one big table?” I ask.

  “I’m sorry, ma’am,” she says. “Our tables can only accommodate up to six guests.”

  “Honey, two of our guests are so skinny they only count as one, and if you’ll just pull up an itty, bitty chair for me at the end of the table I’m sure we will all be able to squeeze in,” says Tiny.

  I swear you would think she was flirting with a man.

  “I really am sorry to inconvenience you,” says the woman, “but we can’t pull chairs up to the booths. It creates a hazard for the servers.”

  I consider slipping her a twenty but decide to use sympathy instead. “Listen, if you could possibly find a way to seat us all at one table—and we really don’t mind squeezing—we would so appreciate it. You see, we just came from the funeral of my husband’s mother, and he really needs all of his family gathered around him at this time.” />
  “I’m so sorry for your loss,” says the hostess. She pauses and looks around the restaurant, which is built to resemble a hip fifties ranch with low wood-beamed ceilings and big plate-glass windows looking out onto Peachtree. “Let me see what I can do.”

  She hands me a beeper, informing me that it will vibrate when the table is ready.

  Tiny grabs the beeper from me and slips it into my front pocket. “No sense not taking full advantage of the buzz,” she whispers.

  I try not to laugh, but I can’t help myself, and then Tiny starts laughing too. I turn away from the hostess, whom I just told I was in mourning. My shoulders are shaking. Hopefully she will think I am overcome with grief.

  “Let’s wait outside,” says Tiny, once she collects herself. “I need a cigarette.”

  “When did you start smoking again?” I ask, surprised. Tiny smoked in high school and college, but she quit right before Helen was born.

  She sighs. “Oh, I don’t know, Louise. I guess I picked it back up in Sea Island. I’m not a chain-smoker or anything; it’s just an occasional pleasure.”

  I look around to make sure everyone else is doing okay before I disappear outside. Charles, Caroline, and Sam sit on one of the benches in the inside waiting area, talking. John Henry, Jack, and Stephen make their way to the bar. Good. Let them all drink and have a good time. John Henry especially, as he is the one who has lost his mother. Though considering the fact that we all must die someday, Nanny Rose certainly made a splendid exit.

  After a lifetime of health, she died of a massive (and most likely instantaneous, according to the doctor at Piedmont) heart attack. She couldn’t have had a better ending if she had planned it herself, and knowing Nanny Rose, she probably did. She probably left instructions to God in writing.

  TINY AND I stand outside, leaning against the stacked stone exterior of the restaurant, watching the other groups of people who are waiting for tables. Many of the patrons are African American, and many of them are dressed better, and far more expensively, than either Tiny or I. One woman in particular stands out. Over knee-high black leather boots she wears a short-sleeved, scoop-neck, cream-colored sweater dress that is made entirely of cashmere. (I know because I saw it at Neiman’s. I thought about getting it for Caroline, for her to teach in, but it cost $695.) Around this woman’s neck hangs a long gold necklace, a diamond-encrusted circle dangling from its end. Usually I don’t care for logo bags, but her Louis Vuitton works. Her hair falls just to her shoulders. Her diamond studs are simple but big. Her posture is impeccable, her body slim and fit, though not at all bony. She is with a group of all black women, and they are all dressed to the nines, from their salon-styled hair to their expensive boots and heels. And surely every toenail in that group has been recently clipped, filed, and painted.

  “I had no idea this Houston’s was so diverse,” whispers Tiny.

  “Stephen says that this Houston’s and Justin’s—the restaurant P. Diddy owns, which is just across the street—tie for being the epicenter of black power in Atlanta,” I whisper, pleased to have such knowledge.

  “Well aren’t you a fount of information,” says Tiny, blowing out smoke rings like she used to do in high school.

  WHEN THE VIBRATOR buzzes I jump it startles me so.

  “Not used to that?” asks Tiny, leering.

  We walk into the restaurant and gather up our crew, motioning to everyone to come on. Charles has joined the other men at the bar. He, John Henry, and Jack all drink beers out of the bottle, while Stephen holds a martini glass. I bet John Henry ordered Charles’s drink for him, without even asking what he wanted, because even if Charles did want a beer, I doubt he would have ordered a Budweiser. Caroline and Sam are still sitting on their bench, squeezed as close as can be. Ever since they’ve arrived home I’ve been noticing the private looks they give each other, while pretending to listen to others talk. Their glances are so sweet, so intimate, that I almost want to say, “Hey, let me in on your secrets!”

  THE HOSTESS HONORS my request and seats us at one booth instead of two, which means we are all squeezed rather tightly against each other. Immediately we order more drinks—another round of beer for John Henry and Jack, martinis for Charles and Stephen, a margarita on the rocks for Tiny, and wine for Sam, Caroline, and me. Then Caroline suggests we tell stories about Nanny Rose.

  “I’m sure everyone has a good one,” she says.

  Everyone says yes, yes, though in truth neither Sam nor Stephen knew Nanny Rose at all, and probably the last time Jack saw her was at John Henry’s and my wedding. They are just here for support.

  “Darling, you start,” I say to John Henry, but then the waitress returns because she can’t remember whether we ordered two or three spinach and artichoke dips for appetizers.

  Once that is settled I prompt John Henry again, and all eyes turn to him, except Jack’s; he is looking around with a quizzical expression on his face, probably wondering how he wound up packed so tightly into a booth with two gay men.

  “Mother was a real firecracker,” says John Henry.

  “That’s for sure,” says Jack. “She was one tough lady.”

  “Here’s to firecrackers!” says Stephen.

  We raise our glasses and clink them against each other.

  “She was always on time,” I say.

  “Pathologically so,” mumbles Charles.

  “When I was a kid she believed there was nothing that couldn’t be cured by an enema,” says John Henry.

  “Christ,” says Jack, shaking his head.

  “You poor thing,” says Stephen.

  “If I had a cold, she gave me an enema. If I had a stomachache, she gave me an enema. If I had a sprained wrist…”

  “She gave you an enema!” say Stephen, Tiny, and I.

  “Nice timing,” says Sam.

  OUR WAITRESS RETURNS with the drinks and the dip, and then it is time for everyone to give their dinner orders, which always takes a long time because no one ever remembers what kind of salad dressings and soups are offered, so the poor waitress has to keep repeating the options again and again.

  She starts with me—I have the dubious honor of being the oldest woman at the table—and I order the hickory burger with fries. Thank God I managed to go to Bodypump this morning.

  While people are busy studying the menu and ordering, I study Sam. Compared to Davis, he seems very, very young. Which he is, though he’s not a boy. He’s youthful but not immature. Caroline says he graduated from Berkeley when he was twenty-one, spent two years in the Peace Corps in Peru, and is now in his second year at the teaching program at Mills College, working on his masters at night while teaching math to middle school kids during the day. Caroline is in her first year at Mills, becoming credentialed to teach elementary students.

  I would never say this to Caroline’s face, but it saddens me that she gave up acting or at least pursuing some kind of art. And I regret that at each critical stage in her life it was a man who got in her way: Frederick by diverting her from Juilliard, Davis by making her so damn comfortable she forgot how hungry she was to be on the stage. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not blaming either Frederick or Davis, I just think she’s had—well—shitty timing with men.

  And I know that teaching is a noble career, but I also know how passionate she was about theater, and sometimes I wish that she would just get her old selfish gene back, that she would say “to hell with duty!” and try to find her way to the spotlight again.

  But maybe I’m just nostalgic for my thin, young daughter who seemed to have the world before her, who seemed ready to fight any person or thing that got in her way. She’s become so calm, so assured, so settled in her own (substantial) body. Which is a good thing, I suppose. It just makes me feel old.

  John Henry and I are footing the bill for her Mills tuition, same as we did for her divorce lawyer. It was a noncontested divorce—very clean as far as those things go. She did get a little money out of it, which she offered to use to help pay
her tuition, but John Henry told her to either invest it in mutual funds or put it into a high-interest savings account, ING or Emigrant Direct.

  “A woman needs money of her own,” he said, which promptly caused me to open my own checking account, where I keep all the money I make on art sales. (I had been keeping it in our joint account, but doing so made me feel as if I had to ask for John Henry’s permission every time I wanted to spend it.)

  Caroline and Sam both say that they are dedicated to working in the Oakland public schools, despite all the known difficulties of overcrowding and underfunding. I say good luck and keep me posted. What I don’t say is that I have my doubts as to the sustainability of their career plans—not to mention the sustainability of Caroline’s dedication. Still, I wish them well.

  BEFORE SAM AND Caroline arrived home I asked John Henry how he felt about Sam being Jewish. We were sitting on our front porch swing, enjoying the warm spring evening while eating strawberries I bought at the Morningside market.

  John Henry finished chewing his berry, swallowed, and said, “It’s probably not a bad idea to mix up the gene pool.”

  Funny he should say that. Funny because it epitomizes what I have come to think of as the “kinder, gentler John Henry,” and funny because it brought up, indirectly, something I have been worrying about for over a year now, whether or not our gene pool has already—if not mixed—at least taken a detour.

  I made the discovery last fall, after Charles left for NYU. I had decided to turn his bedroom into a den so that I could use the entire downstairs for my shows. While I was boxing up all Charles’s remaining things, I came across a photo slipped into the pages of his senior yearbook from Coventry. It was a photo of the cast of Salt of the Earth, the show that starred Missy’s father. And there, in the center of the picture, was a man who looked startlingly like a young version of my father. A curly-haired man just like Daddy, he had the same intense eyes framed by the same long lashes, the same elegant nose, a broader smile but the same large teeth behind it.