Daughters of Jubilation

by Kara Lee Corthron

  “You know what you can do, though?” Grammie Atti offers.

  “What?”

  “Trust her and stay out of her way,” she says.

  Clay sighs and nods.

  “It’s a vulnerable process. Imagine you tryna learn to play a new instrument. It’s gonna sound like nothin’ but noise for a while. What if she was hidin’ in a closet, secretly watchin’ you fumble around? That’s an invasion of privacy.”

  “I think he understands, Grammie,” I say. Does she know Clay’s a musician? Does she know everything?

  “Are we sure he understands?” she asks, her eyes on Clay.

  “Yes,” he responds.

  “Good. Anything else you wanna know?”

  “Does it—does it hurt her?”

  “Well that depends—”

  “I can answer myself,” I say. “It depends on what I’m doing, what I’m going through, and what the triggers are. Some things hurt and others don’t. Like anything else,” I tell him. I take ahold of his hand and speak to him without words.

  Try not to worry.

  I don’t know if he heard me or not, but his face brightens a little.

  “I’ll walk you out,” I say.

  Clay rises, and I head for the door.

  “Again, I’m sorry for causing any trouble, Miss Athena.”

  “I can’t stand apologies, but I suppose I can accept yours. Come back on a Saturday. I’ll give ya a special reading. Family friend discount,” she says with a wink.

  “Good night, ma’am,” he says. I grab my flashlight, hold the door open for him and walk him down the steps.

  “You mad?” he asks.

  I shake my head. “No. But I don’t like bein’ spied on.”

  “I won’t do it again.”

  We walk in silence for a moment. When we get to the gate, he stops and turns to me.

  “Can you honestly blame me, though? Some maniac chases you all over town, and then you go out at night alone? That’s insane!”

  “No, it’s not,” I say, but he does have a point, and truth be told, I didn’t want to go out by myself; that was Grammie Atti’s idea.

  “Promise me you won’t do that again,” he says.

  “I don’t know if I can promise that.”

  “Evvie, come on! Don’t be stupid.”

  “Don’t call me stupid!”

  “I’m not calling you stupid! I’m just—I’m sayin’ don’t make a stupid choice.”

  We stare at each other. Neither of us willing to concede.

  “I’m always careful, Clay. And you should know by now that I can take care of myself,” I explain.

  “You know? It doesn’t make you weak to lean on somebody every now and then,” he informs me.

  I look out at the dark street. I flick the flashlight on and off. I turn around to look at Grammie Atti’s. Her kitchen light’s still on. Wasn’t sure if she woulda just gone on to bed—she does that sometimes. But it looks like she’s waitin’ for me.

  “I know that.”

  “I thought—I don’t know. You said your grandmother’s like your teacher. I was worried. I just wanted to make sure you were… safe.”

  So Clay still thinks Grammie Atti is a fruitcake. Great.

  “There is nothing wrong with my grandmother,” I tell him. “She has no intention of hurting me. I don’t wanna discuss this again.”

  “What about—” He stops himself.

  “What?”

  “Your grandfather. Didn’t she hurt him?”

  I freeze. I have no idea what he’s talking about.

  “Clay, are you an old church lady now? This is nothin’ but gossip! She never hurt nobody. She loved my grandfather, and he was taken too soon.” That is literally all I know about my grandfather. The exact same thing I know about my great-grandmother. Nobody in my family talks to me about our history. Once someone’s dead, they disappear.

  He lets out a big bear of a sigh.

  “All right. If you are sure that she ain’t touched in the head and you feel safe with her… then I’ll have to trust you.”

  “Didn’t you tell me once that in every rumor there’s a ounce of truth? Not a pound?”

  He stares at me, eyes full of worry and maybe some anger, but the longer we look at each other, the calmer he seems.

  “Yeah. I did,” he finally says.

  “Go home, Clay. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  I turn and head back up Grammie Atti’s walk. When I get to the door, he stops me again.

  “I’ll wait. I’ll take you home.”

  Somehow accepting this offer feels like I’m losing something (what it is, I don’t know), but I’d rather not walk home in the dark.

  I nod, and he goes back to his car, parked across the street.

  “He’s somethin’ else, ain’t he?” Grammie Atti appears again at the open door, makin’ me jump.

  “He’s a good one. I can tell. Not like the drunks and troublemakers your mother used to mess around with,” she says. I say nothing and make no movement to agree or disagree. One of those “troublemakers” she’s referring to is my father, and I don’t appreciate her insulting him.

  “Sexy, too. That never hurts. He reminds me a little bit of…” She waves her hand away, as if what she has to say isn’t worth it.

  “Who?” I push. Now I’m curious.

  “Your grandfather. Roy. I was pretty smitten with him when I was your age. He was smart and handsome, and he could make me laugh like nobody else.” She laughs for a second, but then her smile fades.

  “How did he die?”

  She raises both eyebrows at me, taken aback by the question; then she sucks her teeth.

  “Ah hell. Is that rumor goin’ around again? People are so damn stupid. He got hit by a train. It was a tragedy. And I had nothin’ to do with it. End of story.”

  So Clay didn’t hear a rumor that she “hurt” him. He heard she killed him.

  “Why am I just now hearin’ all this? Why didn’t I know what happened to your mama or my grandfather before this summer? Why do we keep so many goddamn secrets? Is he the one buried out here?” I blurt. I think I went too far. I didn’t mean to be disrespectful. I just feel so frustrated. I hate that if I don’t come out and ask about a thing, I may never have the whole story or any part of the story at all.

  Her mouth tightens, and I think she’s about to read me the riot act. Or worse. She side-eyes me, but that’s it. Her scowl relaxes, and now she seems more sad than mad.

  “Death ain’t somethin’ we like to talk about, Evalene. We’ve seen a lot of it. A lotta horrors. We do what our foremothers did: we keep goin’ forward, and we only look back when push comes to shove.”

  “But why do we keep all these secrets?”

  “We don’t. We have our own ways of sharin’. You’re just startin’ to learn. It’s not so mysterious.”

  “Who… who is buried out here?”

  “Lotsa folks. Some by choice, some not. Ain’t nothin’ to cry about. We will all be feedin’ worms at some point,” she chuckles. “Once somebody’s dead, there ain’t nothin’ to fear no more.”

  That’s a helluva way to think about death, but I guess it’s true.

  “I’m sorry for gettin’ snippy. Just tired, I guess.”

  “You look after that boy as best you can,” she says. “We can’t prevent destiny once it’s been writ, but we can do our damndest to influence it. A little goes a long way.”

  That statement is too complex for my mind to unravel right now.

  “Time for you to get home,” she says, and then she goes inside and closes the door. Done for the night.

  As I walk down the path, I think about the word “destiny.” I’ve never cared for it. I hate the idea that our lives have been etched in stone someplace we can’t touch or see, and we’re all just players in a drama that already has an ending unbeknownst to us.

  When I open the gate, Clay turns on his engine. I will look after him—even when he annoys me like toni
ght. I will look after Anne Marie, Mama, and the twins. And me. Though my malcreant has been absent lately, until I get rid of him myself, I won’t feel safe.

  I believe I have the strength to take care of myself and the people I love. I will keep my eyes and my heart directed at them, so that if destiny tries to harm any of ’em, it will have to go through me.

  21 Acquainted

  “EVALENE! TELL HER WHAT I did after lunch! Tell her about my art!” Abigail demands. It’s the end of the day, and all I want to do is go, but Miss Ethel won’t stop talkin’. Sometimes she gets chatty with me when she gets home just before I leave. Whenever this happens, it’s cuz she feels the need to remind me that she’s the boss.

  “Wait a minute, sugar,” Miss Ethel tells Abigail, sweet as honey cake. She turns back to me with considerably less sweetness. It’s already five minutes past six, but she enjoys wasting my time. “Now, Evalene, you didn’t let her eat any Mary Janes, did you?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “Because I told you, she cannot have any more candy before her dentist appointment on Monday, and I mean that.”

  “I understand, ma’am. She had no Mary Janes.”

  She looks at me doubtfully. Maybe she hopes she can catch me lyin’. Maybe she gets her jollies that way.

  “Evalene! Evalene! Evalene! Show her my art! Show it to her!”

  I indicate the paper stuck to the fridge with an old “Peace and Prosperity” vote-for-Ike magnet. It is the most pitiful rendering of a baby and her dog I have ever seen, but Abigail is proud of her “art,” so I dutifully point it out.

  “My, how pretty,” Miss Ethel lies. She then pays me with a tight smile and advises me to get enough sleep so I won’t be late in the morning. Bitch.

  I pedal home quickly. Keeping an eye out in case somebody’s followin’ me. Again.

  When I get home, I’m granted the honor of bathing the twins, cuz I’m doomed to take care of little girls endlessly, it seems. I can’t figure out how they get so dirty. Tonight they looked like they’d been workin’ all day on a damn farm.

  I get in bed later, and I’m antsy. I wonder what Clay’s doing right at the very same moment. What he’s thinking. I check the clock. Ten till eleven ain’t so late.

  I tiptoe down to the kitchen and quietly dial the phone. I decide if he doesn’t pick up by the third ring, I’ll hang up.

  It rings once. Twice.

  “Hello?” It’s his mother, and she does not sound happy.

  I panic and hang up. I go back up to my room and look for something to read. I pull out my old standby, The Golden Book of Astronomy, and leaf through the worn pages.

  I feel more relaxed and sleepy as I read. I don’t know if anything is as calming for me as the stars and the night sky. What would it be like to travel out into space? If it ever becomes possible for regular people, I wanna go.

  Something jolts me awake. I don’t know what time it is, but it feels late, and my book has fallen to the floor. I fluff my pillow, and I am about to lie back down when I see Coralene standing stone still in my doorway.

  “What are you doin’? You scared me,” I whisper.

  She just stands there, staring.

  “What’s wrong? It’s late.”

  “I can’t sleep,” she says.

  I sigh and beckon her over to me. “Bad dreams?” She shakes her head no, but something has frightened her. I check to see if she’s wet herself, but she doesn’t smell or feel damp. I try to blink myself more awake when Doralene’s little face appears in the doorway.

  “What is going on?” I whisper-shout.

  “Evvie? Can you make that man go away?”

  I am wide awake now. “What man? Are you dreaming?”

  “The man in our room,” they both say in unison.

  Before I can think, I’m up and runnin’ down the hall, and there he is, illuminated by their strawberry nightlight, without a drop of shame. The blood drains from my face to see him here. In my home. This close to me and my sisters.

  He has a thick bandage on the side of his head, and his face is bruised. The accident. I did that to him. Too bad he wasn’t hurt worse.

  “Hello, Evalene,” he says to me as if I invited him.

  I can’t speak.

  He smiles. Then he picks up a doll and, for no reason I can imagine, pops its head off and pockets it.

  His dirty white fingers around the doll’s neck. Somethin’ familiar about that. I’m seeing red. And black. That coal-black hair. Those ocean-blue eyes.

  I’m remembering now. I’m remembering fragments of Virgil Hampton. Oh god, I remember him, the smell of him, the feel of him, the pain of him. I want to disappear, to go unconscious, but none of that can happen. I can’t let him see the terror I feel, and I have to protect my sisters.

  “You get the hell outta here now.” I try to make my voice steady. Cold and steady.

  “You caused serious damage to my truck with that little game of yours.” I’m noticing now that his voice has an odd dulcet quality. Like a Svengali. Everything about him is vulgar.

  “If youda left me alone, none of it woulda happened,” I say through my dry throat. I know I’m angry. The very thought of this fucker fills me with fury. But I cannot activate my anger band. I try to remember what Grammie Atti said. Take back what he took from me. It’s inconceivable.

  “A spiteful man would make you pay dearly for what you’ve done, but I’m not a spiteful man. I didn’t come here to fight. I came for a truce.”

  I almost wish one a the bad headaches would come to me now and I could at least make myself puke on him. But I think I mighta grew out of ’em. Lucky me.

  “I’m going to give you one more chance. Let me escort you home from your job. That’s all. During that time, we can get reacquainted and put an end to this frivolous power struggle before somebody gets killed.”

  “You do realize if you stopped bothering me, it would be over, don’t you?” I’m starting to feel stronger.

  “Why do you need to make this so hard?”

  “Why do you want what you can’t have?” It slipped out before I could think about it. If I had, I probably wouldn’t have said it.

  He doesn’t seem angry, though. He leans against the pink-and-green mini dresser. It’s not meant to support the weight of a grown man. He better not break it.

  “If you got to know me, you wouldn’t be so defensive all the time,” he says.

  The twins have crept down the hallway in total silence. I didn’t know they could be that quiet. I glance at them and, with a gesture, warn them to freeze where they are. I wanna pick ’em both up and run to Mama’s room, but I remember how she crumbled just upon hearing Virgil Hampton’s name. I remember feeling like I had to take care of her in that moment.

  Then a more ominous thought crosses my mind: she couldn’t protect me back then. Why would she be able to now?

  “I’m really not that hard to get along with, you know? I have no intention of disruptin’ your life,” he continues. “That said, you are going to drop your Negro auto mechanic. It has to happen. It’s non-negotiable.”

  The little dresser creaks, and Virgil springs away from it. I think this is the first time I’ve seen him genuinely startled by somethin’, and it was nothin’ at all.

  “Seems like he has a high opinion of himself,” he says. “Good for him, I guess. He’ll get over the hurt. But you gotta do it, Evvie.”

  I’m seething. He has the gall to call me Evvie? Like we’re friends? Who the fuck does he think he is?

  “I get that it’s hard, but I want him outta the picture. It’ll happen one way or another.”

  I cannot have him threatenin’ Clay. No, ma’am! He scares me, but I don’t care. I stretch myself up to my full height, spreadin’ out like a cobra. Time for him to see that he is not the only predator in this room.

  “Virgil Hampton. I will be blunt so there is no confusion. I do not like you. I have no interest in getting acquainted with you. Leave my house and do not com
e back.”

  His eyes sparkle. I hate him, and he likes it.

  “I’m not asking for much,” he says, “and I’m tryin’ to make it a fair arrangement. Course you can make it hard if you want to. Hard can be fun. In the meantime… Coralene and Doralene, right? That’s cute. They sure are pretty, aren’t they? Just like big sister. They can call me Uncle Virggie. I can teach ’em some games.”

  My heart throbs in my throat, in my head, my guts. And I still can’t make the power I been relyin’ on work. He’s too strong, and he knows where I’m weak. I gotta do somethin’ now. So I just use my brain.

  “Non-negotiable you say? This is not how a negotiation works. What do I get?”

  He looks surprised; then he laughs. “You’re right. What do you want?”

  Shit. I want him to shrivel up and die, but I don’t think that applies in this situation.

  “I want you to stop following me. I want you to stay out of my home—”

  “That’s two things.”

  “Quiet,” I say. He listens.

  “I want you to keep my sisters’ names out of your mouth and out of your mind. That is non-negotiable. Do you understand me?”

  “I do. Funny. I thought you were gonna ask for money,” he quips.

  I take the deepest of deep breaths. He’s complying. I am making a risky decision, and I can only pray it’s the right one. The time has come for an everyday hex.

  “Fine,” I say.

  “Fine?”

  I try to sound as civil as I possibly can. “What you are asking for is fine. As long as you bring me straight home.”

  He perks up. “At first. That’ll give you time to get used to me. Yeah. I can agree to that.”

  I swallow bile and nod. “Good.” I know it’s now or never. I have to sell the lie. I move toward him. I don’t take in his nauseating scent. I close my eyes and tilt my head up to him. His face collides into mine, violent and clumsy and wet. I hold back the vomit in my stomach with all my strength, and then I reach up to that coal-black hair of his and caress the oily tresses before ripping out a fistful.

  “Jesus!” he cries, stumbling backward. The twins run in the room, and I think I can hear Mama stirring now.

  “I’m sorry,” I say quietly. “Got carried away.”