Authors: Melissa Foster
“Oh, thank God.” Mama’s tight face came into view. She gently touched my arm. “I was so worried,” she said. “It’s okay, you’re in the hospital. Jimmy Lee brought you.”
“Joshua,” I whispered.
Mama dropped her eyes. “I know, baby. I know. He’s gone, remember?”
I shook my head, my eyes instantly filling with tears. Memories trickled back to me. Patricia lying on the ground. Joshua in my arms. Jimmy Lee.
Oh, God, Jimmy Lee.
“Where’s Jimmy Lee?”
“I’m here,” he said from the doorway. “I was just talkin’ to the doctor.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“I saw you walkin’ down the road and I was yellin’ to you, but it was like you didn’t even hear me. Then I saw the blood drippin’ down your leg, and you must have been delirious because you headed down Division Street and you grabbed some woman’s baby.”
“Joshua,” I whispered.
Jimmy Lee looked at Mama. “She must still be out of it.”
I shook my head. Mama rubbed my arm. “She lost so much blood,” she said. “Alison,” she said softly. “You hemorrhaged, from the delivery. They were able to stop the bleedin’, but you have to take it easy.” She closed her eyes against the tears pooling in her eyes. When she opened them, she touched my cheek. “I’m so sorry, baby. Thank goodness you’re alive. We almost lost you.”
“Joshua,” I said again.
“He died, remember?” Jimmy Lee spoke sharply, then turned and paced. “Can’t they do somethin’? Make her go to sleep or somethin’ so she doesn’t torture herself like this?”
I grasped the edges of the mattress, the IV line in my arm pinched my skin. “I’m not torturin’ myself.”
“He’s dead, Alison,” Jimmy Lee insisted. “Dead, okay? He’s not comin’ back.”
I shook my head against the pillow.
“Alison, we buried him in the family plot, remember? You rest, honey.” Mama turned to Jimmy Lee. “Why don’t you go home and rest, too, Jimmy Lee. You’ve been through a lot lately. ”
“I’m not leavin’,” he said.
I could still feel the soft weight of Joshua in my arms. My baby didn’t know me. He might not ever know me. My breasts ached, engorged with milk my baby would never drink. I looked at Jimmy Lee and felt the same disgust I’d felt since the day he forced himself upon me at the river. I turned away, my mind burning with the memory of Jackson’s tender touch. I tried to muster Daddy’s voice to center me.
Know your place
. Every inch of my body revolted against those words. My stomach tightened, my hands and jaw clenched. I closed my eyes and tried again.
Be a good wife. Know your place
.
“No!” The yell escaped my lungs before I could stop it.
Mama gasped. “What is it? Do you hurt?”
“No!” I said again. “No, no, no! I won’t
know my place
,” I cried.
“I’m gettin’ the doctor. She’s out of it.” Jimmy Lee headed for the door.
“I don’t need my doctor. I need my baby. I already lost the man I love. I’m not gonna lose the child I love, too.”
Jimmy Lee’s face contorted into a mess of confusion.
Mama put her hand to my forehead and I shook it off. “I’m sorry, Mama, but it’s true. The baby wasn’t Jimmy Lee’s.”
Jimmy Lee took a step closer to the bed.
“I’m sorry. I married you without knowin’ I was already pregnant.”
“What are you sayin’?” Mama asked.
“I was with someone else,” I cried.
“You whore. Who was it?” Jimmy Lee fumed.
“Watch your mouth, that’s my daughter,” Mama spat.
“Who? Who was it?” he demanded.
“It doesn’t matter who,” I said.
“Like hell it doesn’t matter.” Jimmy Lee grabbed my arm and squeezed. “
You
cheated on
me
? You’re nothin’ but a stupid farm girl. You were charity to me! You’re nothin’!”
“Get out of here!” Mama said, flat and firm. “Don’t you ever talk to my daughter that way.”
“Your daughter’s a whore and a liar,” he seethed at Mama, and then turned his anger on me. “Don’t you ever speak to me again.” Jimmy Lee spun on his heels and stormed out the door, leaving a trail of vicious words in his wake.
My hands shook from relaying details of the night of Joshua’s birth to Mama. The feeling of having my heart ripped from my body returned, fresh and unbearable, when I told her of our plan to pretend that Joshua had died. All I’d wanted was to protect him. Disappointment rode strong in her eyes, not from my being with a colored man, strange as that might seem, but for not trusting enough to confide in her. Mama stood at my bedside now, holding my hand, tears streaming down her cheeks.
Maggie flew through the doorway, out of breath and spouting questions. “What happened? Is she okay? Patricia said Jimmy Lee hit her. I just passed him in the hall and he looked pissed. Oh, my God, Pixie, are you okay?”
Mama let out a quick breath before answering Maggie. “She hemorrhaged.”
“I know, I got that much,” Maggie said. “But she’s okay? She’s gonna be okay, right?”
Maggie spoke so quickly that I could feel something pushing inside of her. The way her eyes jumped from me to Mama and back again told me she was holding something back.
“Maggie, Mama knows,” I said.
“She knows? You know?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “We didn’t want to lie to you. We just didn’t want you to have to lie to Daddy about this, too.”
Mama nodded. “You did the right thing.”
“Cheatin’ on Jimmy Lee? Leavin’ my baby? I did the right thing?” I didn’t understand how that could possibly be true.
“What you did before marryin’ Jimmy Lee, that was wrong. But you know that. You don’t need me to harp on you. What’s done is done. And yes, you did the right thing leavin’ your baby behind. Your father would have killed us both if you’d come home with a colored baby.”
“But, Mama, I can’t leave him. I mean, I did, I tried, but I can’t leave him there. I need him. I love him.”
Mama backed herself into a chair, where she leaned on her elbows and let her face fall into her hands.
Maggie took my hand and with a glint in her eye said, “Pixie, Jackson came home. He isn’t dead. He’s with Patricia and Joshua now.”
“Jackson? Albert’s brother, he’s alive?” Mama looked from Maggie to me.
“Are you sure? How do you know?”
Jackson
. My world was righting itself. This had to be a sign. It was time I knew
my place
, only my place wasn’t where Daddy thought it should be.
“Albert got word to Mr. Kane, who called me. Jackson’s home. He’s safe!” Maggie exclaimed.
Tears of joy sprung from my eyes. My heart beat strong within my chest, renewed energy streamed through me. I took a deep breath and did what I should have done long ago. “Mama, Jackson Johns is the father of my baby, and I love him. I love him—I love them—with all my heart.” It felt so good to say those words, I had to repeat them. “I love Jackson Johns.”
I felt physically stronger the next afternoon. The nurse explained that they’d pumped me full of blood, fluid, and antibiotics, and the doctor said I could go home, as long as I took it easy.
“Mama is on her way to pick you up.”
I pressed the telephone receiver tight against my ear, listening to Maggie’s concerned voice, and thinking about how I’d almost lost her.
“I’m gonna ask Mama to take me to see Jackson on the way home,” I said.
“Pix, you can’t do that. The police are patrollin’ the streets. Several men are still missin’. And Jimmy Lee is on a warpath, askin’ everyone in town if they knew you were runnin’ ‘round behind his back.”
Everyone knows?
I was determined to take responsibility for what I’d done and to be with the man I loved.
“You can’t go near Division Street,” Maggie warned.
“I gotta, Maggie. I gotta see Jackson.”
“Alison, it’s bad,” she said. “Think about Jackson. If Jimmy Lee finds out that Jackson is the father, he’ll kill him on the spot.”
I assured her that we’d be extra careful.
“How do you plan to tell Daddy about the baby?” she asked.
“I’m not sure.”
“Maybe I can help,” she offered. “I’ll feel out his mood before you get here. Daddy’s feelin’ the long tail of the boycott—none of the farmhands have shown up since, so he’s exhausted and worried.”
“Maybe it’s better if we don’t tell him,” I said, wondering when it might ever be a good time to break Daddy’s heart.
“We’ll see. Pix, be careful if you go see Jackson. Promise me.”
I promised her and waited for Mama to arrive and drive me home.
“Let’s not tell your father about the baby ‘til we have time to figure it all out,” she said.
That made sense to me, since I couldn’t go to my own apartment, and I couldn’t bring the baby to Daddy’s house, I didn’t have many choices to consider.
“Can we stop and see Jackson and Joshua on the way?” I asked.
Mama looked at me and turned her head slightly up, in that way that said,
Oh, honey. I wish it were that easy
.
“How am I gonna do this, Mama? I love him. I want to see him and, to be honest, I don’t really care who knows it. Once I tell Daddy, no one else really matters.”
“You’re not that naïve, Alison. You know all too well what could happen to Jackson—and to your baby.”
Mr. Bingham
.
Mr. Green
. “So, what do I do now? You tell me.”
“I’m thinkin’.” She drove with her eyebrows drawn together, both hands on the steering wheel, staring intently at the road.
“What about if we parked behind their church and walked over?” I pleaded.
“Alison,” Mama sighed.
“Please, Mama? Could you have left me, or Maggie, or Jake? Could you have forgotten a man you’d loved?”
Mama’s clenched face softened, the lines on her forehead diminished.
“Please, Mama? It’s all I can think about. I’m scared every minute of the day now anyway. Don’t you think I worry that Jimmy Lee will figure this all out and do somethin’? Look at what he’s done. He beat up kids just for bein’ colored. He killed a man. He saw to the death of another. Once he knows the truth, then Jackson and Joshua—and even I—don’t have a chance.”
“Maggie,” Mama said, as if she were thinking of her and the word just came out accidentally.
“What about Maggie?”
“You can stay with Maggie, you and Joshua, until you figure it out.”
“Mama, have you seen Maggie’s apartment? It’s tiny.”
“It’s safe,” she said, nodding to herself. “Do you even know if Jackson wants to be with you? You’re makin’ a lot of assumptions about a man who just came back from the dead.”
“Oh, he wants to be with me alright.” For once, I knew exactly what I wanted and where I belonged. “There’s no doubt in my mind. It’s not an assumption. He told me.”
“Even now, after all that’s happened?” she asked.
I watched Mama drive past our road. “Mama? Where are you goin’?”
She turned to face me. “The church.”
I’ll never know what possessed Mama to give in and take me to the church, because no matter how many times I asked her why she did, she just smiled and said, “It was the right thing to do.”
We walked across the parking lot, Mama walking too close to me and asking every three seconds, “Are you sure you’re okay? You’re supposed to take it easy. Let me know if you want to stop.”
“I’m fine,” I answered, and though pain pressed in on my abdomen, I honestly felt better than I had in weeks. The thought of my baby pulled me forward, the thought of Jackson pushed me faster. We reached the back lawn of their property, and I was thankful not to have to see the dark stain of my blood in the street.
Mama grabbed my arm. “Alison, listen to me. You don’t have to make any decisions today. You can just visit your baby and then let that sit with you for a while.”
I knew what she was doing. What I was planning was scarier than anything either of us had ever gone through. My life there in Forrest Town was quickly coming to an end, and her life, as she knew it, was too. I reached for both of Mama’s hands. “Mama, you’ve spent your whole life worryin’ about my happiness, Maggie’s happiness, and Jake’s. Now I’ve found mine. It might not be easy, and it might not be right based on this town’s perspective,” I dropped her hand and put my right hand over my heart, “but in here, where it really matters, it’s not only right, it’s perfectly clear. I’ve found my place.”
She nodded, and we walked up the back steps of the house. Standing on the back porch, I thought of the woman I’d become, and the sides of Mama I’d only recently discovered. She’d given up so much of her life for the good of her family—her beliefs, her interests. In a way, I was followin’ in her shoes. I would have to give up everything I knew to be with my child.
My heart drummed in my chest. My nerves tingled, making me jumpy all over. The pain I had experienced as I walked over was masked by happiness the moment Jackson opened the door, Joshua in his arms.
The cuts and bruises on Jackson’s face and the bandages around his neck silenced my joy. Jackson didn’t say a word. He didn’t have to. The smile that formed on his lips and the light in his eyes told me everything I needed to know. He opened the door wide and invited us inside, handing Joshua to Mama, who took him without so much as a pause in her breath.
Cringing with each painful step, Jackson took a step toward me and opened his arms. I melted into them. The feel of the bandages beneath his shirt saddened me. The familiarity of his chest, the way we fit together, the warm scent of his skin, lessened my sadness. Jackson was there, he was alive, and that was all that mattered.
Tires screeched out front. Jackson tensed.
Tinsel flew through the front door. “It’s that white guy, the one who beat Thomas!”
Jimmy Lee
. Mama handed Joshua to Patricia.
The three of us went to the front of the house. Jackson told us to stay inside as he limped out the front door and down the steps. We watched him from the open window. Jimmy Lee stood beside his truck, parked caddycorner across the middle of the street. He swayed, and I wondered if he’d been drinking.
Jackson stood strong—legs planted firmly apart, arms crossed, biceps twitching. I grabbed Mama’s hand and listened, hoping Jimmy Lee didn’t know we were there.