A Place Called Wiregrass (20 page)

When Lee spoke of Jesus’ resurrection and how I was making a public commitment, I looked straight ahead at the beige walls on the other side of the pool. I did shift my gaze slightly to the right to get a better idea of how the church looked from the higher viewpoint. My view reached over the choir members’ bald spots and big hair and settled on the congregation. I saw my supporters in the third pew.

Gerald had his arms folded and was looking real serious. Miss Claudia draped her arm over Cher’s shoulder, and whenever she turned her wrist, her diamond ring shimmered with a radiant light—much like the light I knew I would see if I got killed like Leslie by a drunken driver or, worse yet, a drunken ex-husband. I didn’t want everybody to know I was looking at them, but I wanted more than anything to brand the details on my brain. Deep within my spirit, I knew the day would be a hallmark in my life, like the birth of my children and the birth of Cher. I stood very still, trying not to splash water as Lee spoke.

Lee held up his fingers and put them side by side. He told the congregation how baptism is only a symbol. He said the real difference was when I asked Jesus to forgive me of my sins and to come into my life. Seeing how I really didn’t mean it the first go-round, I decided not to tell Lee about getting baptized during Vacation Bible School. I didn’t want him to think I was putting on to try to get Gerald to marry me or something.

“Baptism is just a public declaration. The heart is where it really counts.” Lee turned and smiled at me. Then, with those two long skinny fingers, he illustrated what I was about to do. He tilted his left finger down and still had the right finger upright. His bony fingers now looked like a cross. With Lee standing behind me, I went under the water. I visualized that cross, the one the Son of God died on to pay my debts to the Creator. The smell of Clorox on the white handkerchief Lee held over my nose and mouth was so strong, I feared I might gag and claw his hand for mercy. But the fear gave way to peace, and I felt Lee’s hand lift the back of my head, pulling me out of the water.

There at Wiregrass Community Church I rose that Mother’s Day with wet hair and the smell of bleach burning my nose. A thunder of “Amens” bounced off the cinderblock walls. I wiped my eyes and felt refreshed, like Jesus must’ve felt when He rose out of the grave after hanging in torment.

The stark white Sunday school room was my dressing room that morning. With a towel wrapped around me, I sat on a beige metal chair. The chill of the icy surface caused a shiver to creep down my spine. Staring into the blackness of the chalkboard, I felt a drop of water run down my bare leg. The faint voices and muffled organ notes of “To God Be the Glory” drifted like background music in a dentist’s office. On the third verse, I knew I’d soon have to walk down the aisle and take my place in Gerald’s pew. But every time I tried to lean forward, I could not move. My brain wanted my butt to sit tight in the metal chair. To memorize the clean feeling that the most expensive bar of soap could not match.

Miss Claudia seemed just as comfortable at the Golden Corral as she had been Easter Sunday when Cher and me lunched with her at the country club. Since Doctor Tom and Patricia went to see his mother in the nursing home, Miss
Claudia had no one left to celebrate Mother’s Day with but Richard. And his usual case of Sunday morning sinus prevented him from leaving the house. So instead of the fancy crystal and soft piano music of the country club, Miss Claudia sipped her iced tea from a gold plastic cup and listened to Marcie carry on about a trip to Charleston.

“I’m going to a convention for the Sheriffs’ Association,” she said with a flip of hair. Ends of blonde hair barely missed the brim of Miss Claudia’s hat. “I’m Houston County’s senior dispatcher, that’s how come I’m going. And I just don’t have a thing to wear.” Marcie leaned closely towards Miss Claudia as if they might share a secret language.

After ten minutes of jabber, Marcie looked down to cut her sirloin, and Miss Claudia winked at me. The knots inside my stomach prevented me from eating more than two bites of chicken. I was grateful for Marcie’s trip. Her bragging kept conversation away from Mother’s Day and the absence of the woman who brought her into the world.

When I directed the Lincoln back to its proper spot in her garage, Miss Claudia sat still long after Cher had gotten out of the car. “Erma Lee, just remember when everything is right with you spiritually, like right now, that’s when the devil will come after you with a vengeance.” I halfway nodded and pulled the key out of the ignition, never realizing the real devil was only six miles away.

Saturday was so hectic helping Miss Claudia and washing my own clothes that I didn’t have a chance to sort through the mail stacked on the kitchen counter. Now I quickly opened a manila envelope with Bozo’s first-grade scratchy penmanship. Inside was a sticky note advertising John Deere tractors. On the note he had scribbled brief remarks:
My lawyer’s looking at
papers. I’ll sign them when he says to. Tell Cher to behave.
It wasn’t a love letter, but for Bozo any words minus vulgarity were a major breakthrough.

“Yes,” I yelled out loud and wondered if Cher could hear me over the radio playing in her bedroom. Digging deeper into the envelope, I pulled out two cards.

One was a birthday card with clowns. Opening it, I found a twenty-dollar bill and the words
Love, Pop
written on the bottom. So it would seem like Cher had more gifts, I put it aside and decided to give it to her at her skating-rink party.

The other card in the envelope didn’t have a return address. The sunflower on the cover with the words
Happy Mother’s Day
made me first think my son might have sent the card. But when I looked inside, the bright blue words jumped out at me with the force of a rattler in a 3-D movie.

I just stared at her name and pictured her dressed in prison clothes and writing this from inside an iron cell. I took Suzette’s card outside and stood behind the trailer, reading the words as though the bright flowers on the front were something pornographic.

I read her words three times and tried to analyze the handwriting to make sure the same girl who ran away from home
to marry trash had actually written the kind sentences. Her former penmanship had evaporated as a late morning haze in my memory. Almost thirteen years had passed since we had spoken. The day she entered the Louisiana prison system was the day I buried her. The rehabilitated ghost had found me.

Inside the trailer I took the card and placed it under my mattress. With Cher talking to LaRue on the phone, now was not the time to get her more confused by telling her that her mother had awoken from the dead. I poked the card until the words were permanently hidden under the mattress. Only then did I feel assured that the happy sunflowers would not shine out and be discovered by anyone lifting the edge of the frayed mattress.

I hung up the phone three times before I finally dialed her number. Then I closed my eyes and prayed for strength. “Hello,” her thick-accented voice said. Her voice was heavy on the hell part of the word, and I wondered if I sounded as backwoods on the phone.

“Hey, Mama. It’s me.” With my eyes still closed, I tapped my nails on the kitchen counter.

“You done decided to come back?”

“Well, no, I just…”

“Then you must be calling for money. Now I told you back yonder when you got your nail mashed up, I ain’t got it. And with you up and quitting your job…”

“Mama, I didn’t call for money.” I sighed and rolled my eyes.
Why was I making myself miserable like this?
“So did you get my card?”

“What?”

“Your Mother’s Day card? I sent it last week.”

“Ain’t come yet. You talked to Bozo?”

“No, but I got a note from him. He was pleasant enough. He even sent Cher a birthday card. You know her birthday is next Saturday.” Mama never could remember Cher’s birthday.
Why bother
?
Since she never gave Cher a birthday gift while we were in Cross City, she sure won’t give her one now.

“Well, you done messed around and waited too long. Bozo’s got him another woman. They tell me she’s a big shot down at Wal-Marts. Makes good money. Drives a nice car. And he told me he’s gonna sign them divorce papers. Before the ink is dried, he’ll marry that gal. You mark my word.”

“Really,” I said with an excitement she never caught.

“Well sir, it’s just too late for you. He’s done put you down the road. I just never did understand, Erma Lee. The man makes a good living. Oh well, it’s done too late is all.”

“Yeah, I guess so. Well, I got a good job here working at a school. And…”

“Working at a school? You ain’t qualified for that.”

The old bitter feelings began clawing their way up my chest. I tried counting to ten like I did when Cher was nasty to me.

“Hello. Anybody there?”

“Yeah. Uh, well, I work in the cafeteria. Oh, and I help with a real nice older lady in the afternoons. She’s been real good to me.”

“Mmm-huh,” she mumbled. “You best be careful. They act nice, and next thing you know you’re out of a job for getting all in their business. You and the girl like it down there? Your cousin Lucille’s telling everybody you ain’t called her or nothing.”

“Now, I went by to see Lucille when we first got here.” I sighed and smiled, knowing there was no winning at this game. “We’re doing good. Really. And I, umm…got baptized today.”

“What? You done been ducked once. Down yonder at Stella’s church.” Another long sigh. “For crying out loud.”

“I didn’t understand then. I was just joining a church. But now I feel good about…”

“Well, I know this call’s running up a big bill. Tell the girl I said hey. After Bozo signs them divorce papers, no telling when I’ll see y’all.”

“No telling,” I said and hung up the phone. Looking out my kitchen window at Kasi scrubbing the wheels of her truck, I wondered if Patricia and Richard knew how blessed they were.

I leaned against the pantry door and tried to mentally shovel the hateful thoughts out of my mind. The image of me signing the divorce papers separating me from Cross City was my strongest shovel. And alongside Bozo’s name on the divorce papers I added the name of the woman who was forced by nature to let me come into this world.

T
he first meeting of the First Methodist Rescue Home committee was held at Benson’s, the chain department store that was once Miss Claudia’s late husband’s Emporium. Miss Claudia had planned a late lunch to give me time to finish up at the cafeteria. Opening the heavy glass door to the store, I might as well have been escorting the First Lady.

“Well, looka here,” a woman with tight curly red hair sang out behind the Elizabeth Arden counter. As soon as the woman pulled off half-glasses decorated with little sparkles and hugged Miss Claudia, all sorts of people gathered. Miss Claudia glowed in front of her audience.

“How’s your mama and them getting along?” she asked the black man who kissed her cheek.

“Gracious alive, you’ve lost so much weight I liked to not have recognized you,” was another comment offered to a woman who tucked her chin and giggled.

Fearing being crushed against the glass makeup counter, I moved towards the rows of clothes hanging on metal racks. Casually I looked at the tag on a denim skirt. I quickly released the tag when I saw it marked as seventy-eight dollars. Another sign I was out of place in Miss Claudia’s world. A world where even a meal was a big to-do.

The Confectionery was located on the top floor of the store, and by the time we arrived at the little restaurant, the group was already assembled. I stopped dead in my tracks
when I saw Prune Face seated at the table, frowning and talking at the same time. The two other ladies were recognizable from the list of people who called on Miss Claudia. Funny, they all sort of looked alike to me with their bluish tint hair, cut and teased above their ears. Only Prune Face and Miss Claudia had unique hairstyles. Prune Face’s ashen blonde color that dried her face out even more, and Miss Claudia’s pretty soft black hair with light gray streaks.

“I beg apology for my tardiness,” Miss Claudia said and adjusted her lilac scarf.

I stood behind her waiting for instructions like some little lap dog. I took a step backwards and almost knocked down a woman carrying a tray with glasses of iced tea.

“Easy,” said the black woman, balancing the tray.

“Oh, I’m so sorry.” I reached out to help her bring the tray to the table. I could feel the eyes of the First Methodist ladies on me like hawks seeking a fresh kill.

The black woman’s silver glasses hung low on the end of her nose, and she rolled her eyes up at Miss Claudia. “Lord a mercy, you better get over here and give me a hug.”

“I planned lunch here especially so I could see you, Mavis,” Miss Claudia said with her arm around the thick-shouldered woman. “How you getting along?”

“Ornery as ever. How you?”

“About the same,” Miss Claudia said.

The ladies at our table slightly grinned and reached over to remove glasses of iced tea from the tray.

“Mavis, I want you to meet Erma Lee. She’s my new companion.”

“Lord, you got a full-time job trying to keep her in line,” Mavis said and playfully hit Miss Claudia’s shoulder.

My eyes followed Mavis’s broad white skirt into the kitchen. I fought the urge to follow her. Washing dishes and cooking were what I knew, not carrying on a conversation
with women with too much time on their hands. After an endless supply of chitchat about grandchildren and sick people in the hospital, Miss Claudia outlined her plans for the home.

“This home ought to be a sanctuary, don’t you know. A place where we can build women up,” Miss Claudia said, raising her hands upward.

“Claudia, this sounds just precious,” Prune Face said, pouring a packet of artificial sweetener into her iced tea. “But where on earth do you imagine this little place being?”

“Franklin Martin has a pile of land he can donate,” said Mrs. Larson, the heaviest of the group. She nodded, and a lump of fat bunched under her chin.

“Oh, he’ll do no such thing,” Prune Face said. “That man won’t even come to church regularly.”

“Well, we might keep him in mind,” Miss Claudia said and winked at Mrs. Larson.

“Y’all ready to order?” Mavis asked, clutching a small green pad. She used a pen to push the sliding eyeglasses back onto the bridge of her nose.

While the others ordered, I studied the menu, carefully looking for the least expensive item. Nothing was under seven dollars.

“Doll baby, what you want?” Mavis finally asked.

“Umm, just a tossed salad with Thousand Island dressing.”

Mavis put her hand on her hip and looked down at me. “A tossed salad? You know you want more than that.”

I glanced around the table and saw the high-class eyes staring back. Their saggy sockets seared my neck. “No, really. I just…”

“That’s how she keeps that schoolgirl figure, Mavis,” Miss Claudia said.

Mavis departed, shaking her head and mumbling something I could not detect. I wanted to jump up and tell her that I was an impostor.
“Give me an apron and put me to work,”
I wanted to yell.

“Erma Lee can help us to know what younger women need from this home,” Miss Claudia said, smiling at me.

“She’s experienced some of this, I suppose,” Prune Face said with a quick shake of her blonde hair. Prune Face was thumping another pink bag of fake sugar. I stared at the mechanical way her wrinkled index finger launched from behind her pink thumbnail.

“No, Elizabeth. She’s just younger than you and has more sense,” Miss Claudia said. Her chin pointed upward, and the hazel eyes cut sharply towards Prune Face. The laughter from the other ladies caused me to raise my head. Prune Face rolled her eyes and tore the empty sweetener bag in half.

The cookout was all Gerald’s idea. An early birthday present for Cher, he told her. For me it was a double celebration. School had let out for summer the day before the get-together.

The smell of burning charcoal and chicken fat drifted over Gerald’s backyard. Various members from Wiregrass Community Church congregated around makeshift tables designed by Gerald. Marcie and Chase were away at her convention in Charleston, and Donnie was watching his girlfriend ride in a horse show up in Eufala. It was Cher’s night. My only disappointment was that Miss Claudia was too tired to come.

“Man, you went all out,” Lee said and pointed to the white table spreads.

“It ain’t much,” Gerald said, tucking his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “Just a sawhorse on either side and a piece of plywood. Erma Lee got the tablecloths from K-Marts and arranged them flowers.”

“Well, you shouldn’t have said nothing. It looks like Martha Stewart was here,” said Lee’s wife, Sonya. She laughed
and folded her arms over her chest. Sonya covered her arms over her chest a lot. I decided she must be embarrassed about the pounds she carried. Whenever I was around her I always tried to tell her how pretty her skin was. And every time she would lean forward and say, “You think?” Every time I complimented Sonya, I felt taller, a little more like Miss Claudia.

A.J. and Brownie helped Gerald flip chicken breasts on the grill while me and Kasi ran in and out of the kitchen carrying necessary dinner items to the table.

“I won’t know how to act in front of no preacher,” Kasi said when I pointed Lee out in the crowd.

“He’s the same as you and me. Please, he’s even been in jail.” I didn’t want her to think my preacher was some holier-than-thou.

Kasi closed the refrigerator door with her foot. “Get out. What for?”

I repeated the story Lee told during his sermon. “Anytime, you know, you want to come to church, I’ll be happy to have you ride with us.” I shocked myself by sounding too much like a know-it-all. The last thing I wanted to do was to sound like one of the people who used to knock on my door in Cross City forcing religion on me. “I sure ain’t no expert. But I tell you, I feel the best I have in…well, forever, I guess.”

“I expect that man out there has a little bit to do with that good feeling,” Kasi said, lighting a cigarette and then pointing the red tip towards Gerald.

I stood on the back porch and watched Gerald walk with Cher and Laurel to the corner fence. He opened the fence gate and put a halter on Donnie’s horse. Cher put her tennis shoe in Gerald’s palm, and he lifted her onto the chestnut-colored animal. He fastened two ropes on either side of the halter and then handed them up to Cher. Seated on the horse, she held her back straight and surveyed the crowd. When her
eyes fell upon me, I gave her a thumbs-up and opened my mouth real wide, trying to imitate a surprised cartoon character.

Gerald lifted his right arm high and showed her how to pull the horse towards the left. The slowness in his arm movements told me he was gentle with his teaching. He pushed the brim of his ball cap and squatted on the ground as if he was sitting in an invisible chair. The way he chewed at the end of a blade of grass reminded me how earthy and attractive he was. I couldn’t help but wonder how different my life might’ve turned out if I’d met him thirty years earlier.

After supper, Gerald put on the porch floodlights, and Brownie slowly walked down the back-porch steps carrying the chocolate birthday cake she made. “Okay, everybody. Looks like it’s time for the birthday girl,” Lee yelled and began leading the group in singing “Happy Birthday.” Brownie bit the edge of her extended tongue. Her ringlet curls bounced each time she took a cautious step down the porch. I watched Cher’s expression and grinned as wide as Patricia.

Cher looked down at the ground and then back up towards the crowd. Her full lips formed an angelic smile, and the way her brown eyes twinkled from the lighted candles made my eyes swim with emotion. My baby deserved all this and more.

My body slightly twitched when I felt Gerald wrap his arms around my shoulders. He stood behind me and propped his chin on the top of my head. At first I stiffened, wondering how this display of public affection would go over. But when no one gave us a second look, I exhaled the concern and let my shoulders fall under the weight of his tan arms. The heat from his body and the steady breath against my hair felt reassuring. My hand reached up and rested against his wide hand. I squeezed his skin hard and massaged a rough place where a blister once had been.

The crowd looked ghostly against the backdrop of the
porch floodlights and flickering birthday candles. But their glowing faces only gave me peace. Absent only of Miss Claudia, the group assembled before me was my life now. They put a blanket of comfort on me and made me feel like I was as good as anybody. In their presence ugliness vanished as easy as the sun, which slowly sank behind Gerald’s pasture.
Happy birthday to you. And many more.

Cher and her five birthday guests crowded into the small camera booth and pulled the black curtain. I looked at the brown skates underneath the curtain and imagined the shrill giggles that were erupting within. The same giggles that were drowned out by the base-thumping speakers in each corner of the skating rink. I tried not to worry about how much money Cher was wasting on silliness and reminded myself this was a special day.

“If you want them to do any games, it’s gonna cost extra,” the little woman yelled to me. She looked like a fifteen-year-old boy with purple glasses and short black hair cut over her ears. A haircut Mama would consider stylish.

The music vibrated against the beige-carpeted walls. Blue lights made the skating rink floor look like a flat piece of ice. “All they want is one game,” I yelled back. “How much is it to do the…”

“I’ll pay for the game,” Gerald yelled from behind me. He presented a twenty-dollar bill over my left shoulder. I snatched the money before the little woman could reach up and claim it.

“No, you’re not neither,” I said, cutting a glance over my shoulder. “Just go on with the game and put it on credit for me.” The little woman wasted no time skating away and blowing her whistle. Credit was something I had learned to despise. Far too many women had worked next to me at the Haggar factory because of its bondage.

To top the night off, I was almost forced into a nervous breakdown by having kids as small as six years old skate around me like trained circus monkeys. Every time I almost tripped over one, I hated that I couldn’t afford to rent the entire rink.

“I wish you’d let me help,” Gerald said with his hands tucked inside his jeans pockets.

“You’ve done enough already.” He had given Cher a birthday gift of ten skating passes, not to mention the cookout.

Over his shoulder I saw Miss Claudia and Patricia enter. “Miss Claudia’s here. Go get Cher.”

Gerald waved towards the corner of the skating rink where Cher and the girls had gathered for their credited game. Cher and Laurel were skating backwards and forming the letters to YMCA while the song vibrated the building. I smiled, thinking of how Cher’s own mother used to dance to the song and form the same letters with her arms. Suzette was just about the same age at the time. I turned to focus on Miss Claudia before the image of Suzette’s letter could appear in my mind.

“For goodness sake. And I thought the cafeteria was loud,” Patricia said with fingers plugged in each ear. “Mama, if we stay long, you’ll be running out of here in a fit.”

“I’m not the one with my ears plugged up,” Miss Claudia screamed.

Cher skated over to the bench we sat on. “Come over here and give me some birthday sugar. Or are you too old for such as that now that you’re fourteen?” Miss Claudia asked and hugged Cher.

The five birthday guests skated over to where Cher stood and watched as she opened Miss Claudia’s gift. Some of the girls cut their eyes cautiously towards Patricia.

“Oh, I see lots of my former students. What pretty young ladies y’all turned out to be,” Patricia said, looking each of the five up and down like she might purchase them.

“Oh, my gosh,” Cher said, dropping the brown box and pulling out a short red sundress and navy short set.

“That’s nice,” one of the girls said. Another rattled off a name brand that sounded like Greek to me.

“Thank you, Miss Claudia.” Cher leaned down to hug Miss Claudia’s neck. One of her skates slipped on the carpet, and she stretched lower into her arms.

“I love you, you know that. And I want you to come see me in these new clothes now,” Miss Claudia said.