by Fauna Hodel
“This baby ain’t gonna darken. What’s wrong with you? You either colored like us or white, you can’t change somebody’s skin.”
“Don’t you tell me what I can and can’t do; I’ll change this baby from white to colored, even if I don’t change the color of her skin. This baby is gonna grow up to be just like me!”
“Lord help us. The last thing we need is another Jimmie Lee running around.”
“What do you mean? There ain’t nothing wrong with me.”
“Huh! Nothing that a healthy dose of the Bible won’t cure, and I’m not talking about reading it. I’m talking about you eating it, page by page.” Jimmie laughed out loud as a car passed by with a couple of young white boys inside. They mimicked her laugh, and Jimmie flashed a rude gesture after they turned away.
“White trash. They all alike.”
“Yeah, that’s what you always say.”
“Well, it’s true. They use the coloreds as if they were their own property, to mess around with until they get tired. It never changes.”
“What do you mean, it never changes?”
“Just what I said. We colored and they white, and to them we ain’t nothing but dog shit!” Rosie peered at her with a quizzical look, waiting for Jimmie to continue.
“Jimmie Lee, you ain’t never gonna change.”
“I changed since me and Chris been together,” Jimmie replied, “and I really changed since this baby come along. That’s for sure!”
“You and Chris changed since this baby come along.”
“Yeah, I’m doing all the raising, cleaning diapers, feedin’, and making formulas. That’s how I changed. Him—huh! All he gets to do is walk around like a big shot, tellin’ everybody about his ‘Little Angel that was sent by God’. Well, if his ‘Little Angel’ was sent by God, why didn’t He send a damn babysitter instead of letting me do all the shit!”
Rosie looked over at Jimmie and said, “This don’t have anything to do with God, but your niece is looking to go to college and I bet she’d jump at the chance to make a little money.”
“What niece you talking about?” Jimmie asked.
“Sally.” Rosie responded.
“She’s in LA. She old enough to go to college?”
“Not yet, but I know she’d love to get out of that full house,” Rosie said. “I talked to her mother the other night, and she kept on complaining about all the kids in the house and couldn’t wait till they all grow up and get jobs.”
“Yeah, she’s always moaning about something. I’ll tell Chris. See what he says,” Jimmie said.
Since Chris’ work schedule and church responsibilities forced him to spend time away from Jimmie Lee, she became more bogged down with the details of motherhood. She became frustrated at not knowing precisely where Chris was all the time, jealous at believing the worst, and angry at her ineptness in dealing with the situation. Within a short time after the baby arrived, she plotted ways to combat her confinement and Chris’ freedom. Her idea of battle, however, was to drink more heavily. Her responsibilities were dramatized even more when she received the first of several letters from Dorarro, Dr. Hodel’s current wife.
Dear Mrs. Greenwade,
Congratulations to you and your husband from all of us on the new addition to your family.
I know it took a lot of courage for you to accept a stranger into your home. However, I am confident that you will raise her with the warmth and love you’ve shown. As you know, Fauna’s biological family needs to be treated with secrecy. I want you to know that you will have complete responsibility for the welfare of the baby and we will not interfere in any way. If you need help in the future, we’ll do what we can.
There are certain conditions you should be aware of and that we will insist upon. First and foremost, the child’s legal name cannot be changed. It must stay Fauna Hodel. This is the one request of Fauna’s mother. She didn’t ask for much when she gave up the baby, but that’s all she wanted. Of course, you can call her anything you want, but there are some future financial circumstances that you should be aware of. Fauna’s grandfather, George, is a respectable physician living in California. Some of his assets were inherited from his father. There is no doubt that he would have attained this money and power on his own. Dr. Hodel is a certified genius with an IQ that’s off the scale. He is notoriously charming and persuasive, and as shrewd as he is brilliant, with some rather unusual behaviors that I don’t want to write about at this time. Let’s just say that he is not one to fool with—under any circumstance.
You may be aware of the adverse national publicity generated by the trial involving George and his daughter, Tamar. He was acquitted of the charges and is very sensitive toward any further scandals relating to his family. This brings me to the second request.
You must never contact my husband directly. If for some reason there is need to get in touch with us please do so by writing to me first. I will then pass on the information to George and I can assure you he will take whatever action is necessary. He cannot afford to be connected to you directly for fear of the press and their insinuations.
Finally, Fauna must never know about any of this until she is older. She needs to be raised normally, like other kids. Do not let her contact her biological mother. She is immature and cannot be trusted.
Thanks again for the courage and generosity you’ve shown for taking on the responsibility of raising a mulatto child. If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact me at my P.O. Box.
Sincerely,
Dorarro
Jimmie Lee read the letter slowly. She then fixed herself another drink, and read it again to make certain she understood everything. At first she was agreeable to the request. There was nothing demanding about it, nor did she, at the time, have any plans to contact these white folk in San Francisco anyway. This adoption deal was much too easy for her to make any waves. It would be difficult enough trying to keep a white-looking baby without complicating matters by bringing in outsiders who could very easily persuade the authorities to force the Greenwades to turn the child over to a another couple. Besides, Jimmie Lee was getting used to having Pat around. She was feeling good about the attention she was receiving and knew it would be her last hope in keeping Chris for herself. She had no intention of contacting Dorothy, no matter what problems arose. The more she thought about the letter, the more annoyed she became at the gall of this white woman.
She walked into the bedroom where the baby slept and cradled her in her arms. In the dimly lit room the contrast between her own black arms and the pinkish white flesh of this infant was remarkable, and bore a striking similarity to what Jimmie was feeling inside. She stroked the infant’s thin blond hair and said to herself, “I don’t know where you come from, little girl, whether you half-colored or not. It don’t matter much to you now; but I’ll tell you something that you can keep for the rest of your life. The half of you that’s white sure ain’t gonna act like these white folks who sent me this letter. No, my Lordy, you sure ain’t.
“These whiteys don’t look out for nobody but themselves. You may look white to a lot a folks, little girl, but you sure ain’t gonna grow up like one,” she said pitifully.
Jimmie folded the letter slowly, returned it to the envelope, and placed it in a lower dresser drawer. All she ever wanted was for Chris to love her as he did when they were younger. Instead, she strapped herself with someone else’s baby. A baby whose skin was whiter than any mulatto she’d ever seen. The pressure threatened to sink her. She sauntered from the bedroom to the liquor cabinet and plopped down with a full bottle of gin and proceeded to wash away reality.
It was early evening when Chris returned home. While still on the doorstep, he heard the screams that could only be made from an infant in serious trouble. He shook with fright as he rushed into the bedroom and saw Patty struggling to grab her breath between howls. His little angel was bright red, alone, and afraid. He plucked her up and held her gently in his powerful arms. “
Shhhh, shhhh, my baby, Daddy’s here. It’s OK. Everything’s all right.” She continued to scream as if she was in deep pain.
“Blessie, Blessie, where are you?” He shouted while walking from room to room. As he stepped into the parlor, he noticed Jimmie’s limp body slumped between the couch and the floor with an empty liquor bottle by her side. He rushed over to her with his screaming daughter in his right arm and shook her warm, clammy shoulder. Kneeling down he shook her again, yelling in her ear. “Blessie, Blessie, are you all right? Wake up! Wake up! Are you all right? What happened? This baby is a mess; can’t you hear her screaming? Blessie!”
Jimmie struggled to lift her head. She slowly opened one eye, glassy and bloodshot and zeroed in on the crying baby. “What’s a matter, baby? You hungry?”
“Hungry?” answered Chris, “What do you mean hungry? How long you been like this?”
“I must of fell asleep.”
“Asleep! You’re dead drunk. What’s the matter with you? Something could have happened to the baby and you wouldn’t have known a damn thing!”
“Don’t you give me none a your shit.” Jimmie sat upright. Her body stiffened. The attitude quickly changed from that of a sleepy lamb to an angry wolf.
“You’re never here to take care of this baby.” She said indignantly. “I’m the one who does all the pickin’ up, cleaning, feeding, washing clothes, all the walking outside. You never take care of this child. Then you come home and decide that I’m not doing a good enough job. Well, if you don’t think I’m doing enough,” she slurred. “Then damn you, do it yourself! Cause there’s no way this girl’s sitting by taking care a this child while your ass is out fooling with those sisters at the church, which I know you’re doing, so don’t try to tell me different.”
“What, Sister?” Chris snapped back still holding the screaming infant. Jimmie’s argumentative nature was coming out quick and furious.
“You been spending more time between going to work, high stepping about town, and going to the church, and less time with me. We was to be a family. But instead, you saddled me with a baby that does nothing but cry and mess up herself. You go out and tell everyone how proud you is to be a real father—which you ain’t—and I get stuck doing the work. Now you give me that damn kid, she needs to be changed.”
Chris was visibly upset by his wife’s remarks. Disappointment etched his face as he watched this strange woman take the baby into the bedroom. Not quite herself yet, she staggered most of the way. He followed her to make sure that she would not fall with his precious angel.
“Little Patta, my white little Patta. You sure are white,” she whispered as she placed the infant on the bed and began the routine of washing, changing, and feeding. “You belong to me, too. Yeah, you do. He doesn’t really want anything to do with you. Just wants to show you off like a new suit. You such a helpless little thing, but that’s cause you’re so tiny. But you’ll get bigger and grow up, and you’ll still be white. That ain’t never gonna change. Don’t matter what that piece of paper says. You’re my baby, and I’m never gonna let anything bad happen to you.”
Chris stomped out the back door into the yard and took a few deep breaths of fresh air to calm down. He overwhelmed his wife with the time-consuming duties of being a mother and homemaker, leaving time for himself to work with his congregation. He now knew that Jimmie wanted to use the child to bind them together. It was difficult to conceive of either fulfilling their goals: neither wholesome nor compassionate as Chris had hoped, nor romantic as Jimmie wished. From that moment on, only Chris knew the outcome of this perilous arrangement.
Jimmie Lee went back to work part-time at the hotel, forcing Chris to spend more time with the baby, a diversion he found rewarding but frustrating. Patty Ann learned to walk early, and she was talking up a storm at fourteen months. But the baby cried frequently, leaving Chris to comfort her.
“Aaah, calm down little angel, try to be a little patient. What do you want? Your Momma’s not here and I can’t understand you at all.” Chris left the baby to cry while he gathered up the gear that always accompanied little Patta for the short journey to Rosie’s.
When Rosie came to the front door and saw Chris with the baby, she braced for another imposition from him. “What’s the problem this time?” she said stiffly.
“I can’t get her to stop crying and I got to get over to town to get some things done before it’s too late.”
She gently held the baby in her arms and looked down with a smile. “What kind of things?”
“You know, church things.”
“Church things! Church things! Well, I told you before and I’ll say it again, I just can’t stop everything I’m doing just because you can’t take care of this baby.”
“No, it’s not that. I really need to get this stuff done.”
Rosie looked with suspicion at Chris, then down at the baby. A puzzled look came over her face. “What’s ever gonna happen to you, child?” She turned and walked with the baby into the house. “What’s ever gonna happen to you?”
Chris finally got the message, and hired a babysitter, rather than listen to Rosie’s scolding.
As the months went by, each week brought a new problem and a new babysitter. The common-law marriage began to unravel. Jimmie Lee was suspicious of her suave preacher. Chris responded by appeasement and agreed to provide room and board to her teenage niece, Sally.
“Hey, Lil’ Patta.” Jimmie Lee had the twenty-month-old baby on her knee. “We gonna even out the sides a little. You gonna get a good babysitter.”
“Baaaaaaaabysitter,” said Patty. “A babysitter. I a babysitter.”
Jimmie Lee laughed, “No, no, no, you the baby. Sally’s the babysitter.”
“Sally a babysitter?”
“Yeah, that’s it! She is Sally, and she is beautiful! You’re gonna love her. She’s just graduated from high school. And she’ll be going to college too. How ’bout that?”
“How ’bout that!” The baby mimicked Jimmie.
“You talking just like me. You sound like one of my own—that’s if I had any, which I ain’t. If I closed my eyes and just listened to you, I’d know you anywhere. You sound like me. You smell like me. But you sure don’t look like me.” Jimmie put herself nose to nose with Patta and gave her a big kiss. “You ain’t mine, and you are white, but I surely do love you. I surely do.”
CHAPTER 5
In keeping with the latest style, Sally wore her blouse with the collar upturned, letting her wavy, black hair dangle just below. Her slacks were always skin tight and pegged at the ankle. She was energetic, charismatic, and colorfully dressed, accentuating her well-proportioned features—soft, slender arms, full breasts, and shapely hips. Each crack of her contagious smile coerced the only mar in an otherwise flawless, brown complexion—elusive dimples that surfaced on each side of her soft lips. When anyone retreated after a glance, her glistening brown eyes invited another look. Her disarming innocence and bubbly personality brought her to the center of attention at almost any gathering. She made everyone feel at ease.
Jimmie, however, noticed that Sally treaded lightly the first few days at her the house, cautiously staying out of Jimmie’s way and performing each assigned chore with the minimum of instruction. The addition of a family member living under her roof boosted Jimmie Lee’s confidence while relieving the routine of raising a baby. Jimmie now had a live-in housekeeper, babysitter, and a built-in audience of one.
Within a few weeks, Jimmie’s enthusiasm for the ingénue began to wane as she noticed Chris’ charm soar to a new high. One evening, after Sally fell asleep early in the baby’s room, Jimmie sat with her head in her hand at the kitchen table, drinking 7-Up, while waiting for Chris to come home. He arrived with a small bag that he laid on the countertop and said, “Where’s Sally?”
“She went to bed early, said she was tired.” Jimmie responded while keeping an eye on his movements.
“Patty too?”
“Yeah, they both a
sleep,” she said, looking up at Chris as he pulled a colorful plaything from the sack.
“What’s you got there?” Jimmie asked.
“I picked this up for the baby, at that new department store. Sally said Patty needs some more stimulation,” Chris responded.
“Sally said, Sally said, who the fuck is Sally? So now you taken orders from a teenager?”
“She didn’t give me an order,” Chris said with a chuckle.
“Seems like the only thing that stimulatin’ you is my niece,” Jimmie snapped back.
“Sounds to me like you’re a little jealous,” Chris said.
“I ain’t jealous. What do I got to be jealous of? Cause she’s so young and sweet? Or cause you two are always off talking together. What do you yak about anyway?”
“We yak about your family mostly. There’s a lot of stories she never knew about,” Chris said.
“Yeah, and don’t think you know them all either,” Jimmie responded.
“It’s good to find out what they’re teachin’ in school today. Like what they say about this McCarthy business or politics, you know—current events. Or sometimes we talk about books, like The Invisible Man. I wanted to know if they were discussing that in her class, and other stuff too. She’s curious and interested in learning new things.”
“I know what you up to. You ain’t the one who’s gonna be teachin’ her anything either. And don’t even think about trying nothing with my niece,” Jimmie shot back.
“What’s the matter with you woman? What do you think I am? Your jealousy is like a dog with a bone . . . never lets go.” Chris said while shaking his head on the way to the bedroom.
The tension between Jimmie Lee and Chris increased with each passing week. Allowing Sally to take care of Patty provided Jimmie with some well-earned freedom, but it also created as much of a temptation for Chris as did the sisters from the church. Sally was caught in the middle of Jimmie’s crosshairs.
Each Thursday Chris plied his trade polishing out boots made of soft calfskin, alligator, or engraved leather, or buffing out exotic snakeskin, a few custom designed with etched silver toe-tips, for high rollers at the Riverside. While he worked, Jimmie now had the luxury to slip off in her most conspicuous outfit spending the afternoon in the New China Club, a casino owned by Asians and the only one that permitted Negroes to play. The other casinos barred the few free-spending Negroes that had money because the white owners didn’t want to alienate the white clientele. The New China Club needed money and catered to everyone, and Jimmie knew many of the regular customers. She rarely gambled, mostly drank. For Jimmie it was a place to be seen in her efforts to become part of the local color. It was her way of becoming famous.