Ferris Beach (33 page)

My mother was actually relieved when we got a postcard from Memphis, Elvis on the front, that announced she was married and on her honeymoon. “Why on earth did she go to Memphis for a honeymoon?” Mrs. Poole asked, and my mother, who had posed the same question the night before, repeated what my father had said. “I read just the other day that Memphis is the place to go for honeymoons this year.” Sally Jean said that she had heard there was a foray of things to do, Graceland to name just one. “I guess
not
hearing from Angela means that all is well,” my
mother said one night, when there had been no letter or call to follow the postcard. “Our fair-weather friend. Though she could at least come get her car.”

“I heard from her a week ago,” my father said, pencil in hand as he doodled an elaborate building. “All is well.” He looked up just as my mother was opening her mouth. “Really. All is well. She wanted to start paying us back some money, but I told her to take her time, get settled in good.”

“You know, I used to spy on you and Misty some,” Merle said one afternoon, a clear crisp day. It was after Valentine’s Day because I was twirling the thin gold bracelet he had given me round and round my wrist while we sat on the rough gray stone facing my house. “I’d hide and watch you two twirling batons or singing songs up on your porch.”

“Oh God.” I felt my face go hot with the thought of the two of us out on my porch, arms locked as we mimicked Diana Ross and Marvin Gaye. “You couldn’t
hear
us, could you?” He waited a long time before saying no, he couldn’t hear us.

“Once I was out here. It was a couple of years ago.” He stared down at my wrist, at the thin gold chain. “And you all of a sudden came running in through the gates. It was night, too.” He sat waiting for me to explain. “It was like you were wild or something. You ran in and then right back out.”

“I don’t know why I did that.” I shrugged, my heart beating faster with the thought of that night—the Rhodeses waiting to go to Hardees, my father’s Al Jolson album playing. “Why did you spy?”

“I don’t know either.” He pointed up at our house, where the sheers in my window were pulled off to one side. “That’s your room?” I nodded, and then we just sat there until my mother came to the far end of the porch to call me inside.

“Why can’t you two sit in the house?” she asked one afternoon. “Or at least on the front porch.” She was making baklava
and held a thin piece of pastry in one hand. “Theresa keeps asking me what you all
do
out there.”

“We just
talk”
I said.

“But why can’t you just
talk
in the house?”

“Cleva,” my father said and came into the room, “haven’t you ever heard that old proverb about talking in the cemetery?”

“No.”

“Well”—he turned and stared out at her greenhouse, which just that week had been completed—“it’s good luck.” He kept his back to us, and I imagined his expression, that same phony deadpan he used whenever he tried to lie. “Yes, it goes back to a legend associated with Mesopotamia. Seems the people believed that if you talked in a cemetery you would gain strength from the spirits.”

“And how much is the tea in China
today?”

“Ten cents a bag if it’s Lipton, twenty for something better,” he mumbled. “Get enough of that spirit strength and you become immortal. Yes, and still better than that, if you talk in a cemetery every single day after school, then your mother will be known as the most wonderful woman alive.”

“Really,” she said, and shook her head, looked with pride at her pan of baklava. “Well then, I’d be a fool to complain, wouldn’t I?”

“Depends on the price of tea,” he said, and came over, grabbed her around the hips; it was Jack Sprat and the Mrs. at their best. “Our whole life depends on the price of tea in China.”

“I hope not,” she said, and gently pushed him away. “That price is constantly changing.”

The night the Huckses’ house burned down, everyone gathered in our backyard to watch. The small blue house was no longer visible, only the huge orange flames and dark black smoke that hung over the neighborhood like a fierce thundercloud. Merle had been at my house when it started, the two of us sitting on the front steps and shining a big flashlight onto the sidewalk, where Misty practiced her baton routine for the upcoming majorette tryouts. By the time the fire engines arrived, the flames had spread to the back of the house; Merle was there, screaming for his mother and Maybelline, but several men held him back, kept him from going closer. The pickup truck wasn’t in the driveway, and he didn’t know if his mother and sister were with his father or not. Dexter’s motorcycle wasn’t there either.

“I never thought I’d be thankful for that field of kudzu and
all those old junky car parts,” my mother said, and held onto my father’s arm, her face yellow in the reflection that lit up the night sky. “But I sure am. It’s at least slowed it down a little bit.” Well, Lord forgive me when I whine, I wanted to say. But I just stood and watched Merle still standing at the edge of his yard, Perry Loomis suddenly beside him with her thick blond hair waving down her back, sparkling in the light of the fire. Mrs. Poole was standing beside Mama; she was fully dressed as if going to a social, and I noticed that Mama kept fidgeting with the collar of her green robe, wishing that she, too, had taken the time to dress for the fire.

“Is anybody in the house?” Mrs. Poole asked.

“Well, we know Merle is okay,” my father said. “He was over here when it started.”

“He’s always over here lately, isn’t he?” Mrs. Poole asked. “He seems like a nice boy but you might should watch it. You know they say the apple doesn’t fall far.” She turned and smiled a wry smile at me as if to say I didn’t know anything. “Poor Gladys Hucks. You know, she is a simple, simple soul. Might’ve done it cooking.”

“I’m surprised it didn’t happen back at Christmas with all those lights and wires,” Mama said. “I’ve always said it was going to happen.”

“Well, thank goodness it didn’t happen at Christmas,” Mrs. Poole said. “Wouldn’t that be sad to have your house burn down at Christmas?”

“Oh, yes,” my father said and stepped over, hugged me up close as I watched Merle frozen there, the firemen still holding him back. “It’s so much better that the house is burning now instead of at Christmas.”

“Now, Fred,” she began, but he turned to me before she could finish.

“Go on over there if you want,” he said and nodded towards Merle. “I’m going to be right here.”

“Okay,” I said, but then hesitated again after taking several steps.

The ambulance came, and people stepped closer to the edge of the yard, hoping to be able to tell what was going on. “Old man Hucks probably passed out with a cigarette,” one of the men said, and several others nodded.

“The boy smokes,” Mrs. Poole said. “I’ve seen him. Marlboros, I believe.” I knew that if she had a little umbrella over her and could sit those long crooked bones down that she’d have one herself. “There’s just the three children living there now,” she continued. “I took them a few canned goods back at Christmas, and Gladys told me how the boys had near about run her crazy. You know that oldest one is off somewhere and that one next in line is headed the same route. Then there’s that one that has taken up here at your house and the little girl.”

“Thanks for the live report,” my father said, and stepped closer, pulling me with him.

“Fred,” my mother said in a reprimanding tone. “Merle seems like a nice boy.” She turned to Mrs. Poole. “He’s polite.”

“Yes, well, let’s hope he doesn’t take a turn.” Mrs. Poole turned one way and then another to see who all had gathered.

“Could be it was an electrical fire,” my father said. “Faulty wiring. All those houses down there are in bad need of repair.”

“Not anymore,” Mr. Rhodes said. “I just heard it’s spread to that house next door, front of that house is gone. If they don’t get it out soon, the whole stretch will go like a stack of paper.”

“We do need rain in the worst way,” Sally Jean said. Just that week, mid-March, they had come and sodded her yard and she had faithfully watered it every day for fear that it might die. In the distance, beyond the flames, I could see the baby Jesus family, father and mother and two children, as they watched all of their belongings disappear in the thick black cloud, years of collecting lights and ornaments and carols, gone in a flash of flame.

“Well, there’s going to be plenty of work for me over the
next week or two,” Mrs. Poole said. “We better start right now gathering up some clothes and food. I wonder if we might be able to rent out Brown’s Econo Lodge again.”

Merle was still talking to Perry, her hand clutching his arm; I kept waiting for him to turn around, but he never looked away from that house. A lot of the neighbors started getting restless and headed back home, asking others to call and let them know what happened. Finally I walked over and stood a couple of feet behind Merle. Perry was crying, a hand up to her face as she leaned into Merle, his arm draped around her back. A fireman was axing down the back door, beside which the kitchen window was a bright, blinding orange. I glanced up in our yard to where my parents stood and then back to the cemetery, where it was so odd to see the dogwoods in full bloom against the ugly black smoke and strange yellow sky. Something was going on in the front yard, where two more police cars had come down the road and screeched to a stop. I stepped right up beside Merle, reached and took hold of his hand. He squeezed back, fingers gripping mine, and took a step away from Perry, his arm dropping away from her. “Have you seen ...” Before I could finish my thought, the pickup truck was rounding the corner, stopping when it was unable to pass the police cars gathered there, and we saw them, Merle’s parents, the little girl in Mr. Hucks’s arms, as they ran towards the house. “I gotta go.” He turned to me. “They’ve got to let me go over there now.” I heard his mother calling for him, and then he was gone, running along the edge of the yard, waving his arms and yelling back to her. I saw him get to her and then together the four of them stepped closer to the house. Perry and I were standing silently together, so close I could hear each labored breath and sniffle. “I hope Dexter’s okay,” I said, and she nodded, turned to me with a blank stare. “We’re engaged,” she said, and then walked in the same direction Merle had gone. I wanted to follow her, but I also felt that I didn’t belong there right then. I heard a shrill scream like a siren, but then I realized
it was Mrs. Hucks; I could see her in the strange light, kneeling forward, head in her hands, Mr. Hucks squatting beside her while Merle stood with his arms around his sister. Perry was right behind him, hands up to her face.

“Do you want me to walk over there with you?” Misty was there, still holding her baton, still wearing those old white go-go boots of Mo’s that she used for practice. “I will if you want me to.”

“No,” I said. “Let’s wait.” Again I felt torn, wanting to go, but also feeling that I might see more than Merle would want me to see or want me to know. Now he had disappeared behind one of the fire engines with his parents, and Perry was left standing alone in the yard. The firemen were asking people to step back as they sprayed the whole field on the chance that there were any stray sparks.

“It’s getting cold.” Misty tugged on my arm. “Come on. We can watch from your house.” I followed her back up through the yard, past my mother’s gazebo, the greenhouse. Within the hour there were just sparse flames remaining, and the black cloud had lowered, leaving a fine mist of soot to cover our yard. It was hard to see, but as far as I could tell there was nothing left. My father and Mr. Rhodes walked over there with some other men, crossing the field and then disappearing around the fire engine and into the blackness. Misty and I had wanted to walk with them, but my father suggested we wait until they got back.

Mrs. Poole used our phone in the kitchen to call Brown’s Econo Lodge out on 301 and reserve several rooms. Then she called the emergency number, asked for the police department and then asked for the officer’s name, and then gave him his orders to go and pick up the homeless and carry them to Brown’s, to tell them that somebody would be bringing around some clothes and food the next day.

“That’s very nice of you, Theresa,” Mama said, Sally Jean nodding, a mug of hot chocolate cupped in her hands.

“It’s all a part of being who I am.” Mrs. Poole sat down, propped a black patent pump on another chair, a position I’d certainly never seen from her, and lit a cigarette. “I sure hope the boy didn’t start it,” she said, blowing a stream of smoke upward.

“He didn’t,” I said. “He was right out there on the front porch.” I felt my voice crack as it got louder, as I stood and pointed toward our front door.

“Might’ve left a cigarette, honey, that’s all I meant.” She smiled that wry smile again. “I mean everyone is not as careful as I am. Why, Mr. Bo was so careless about his cigars, and do you know what I did?” None of us responded. “I said, do you know what I did?”

“No.” Mama shook her head, pulled the collar of her robe up around her chin as she stared at the empty stretch where homes had been, maybe saying a prayer of thankfulness that it was not us, maybe regretting her many wishes that those houses did not exist. Misty nudged me with the toe of her boot and crossed her eyes, stuck her tongue out the corner of her mouth as a gesture of Mrs. Poole’s craziness.

“Well, every night I’d collect the ashtrays and I’d put them inside of my washing machine for the duration of the night.”

“Hmmm.” Mama was watching Daddy cross the yard now, her hand lifting to him, though he made no response. “Hmmm,” I echoed her voice, wishing that I’d see Merle. Was he beyond that empty lot waiting to go to Brown’s Econo Lodge, standing there with the other family, children shivering in the night air? I imagined him crouched and curled in the cemetery shed.

“Yessir, I put them in the washer because I knew they’d never start a fire there.” She paused, lit another cigarette off the old one, another thing I’d never seen her do. “A refrigerator might work, too, dishwasher. I suspect any major appliance would work.”