"I ain't gonna be thankful for
that, Wanda!" Lexie said. "That'
s like bein' glad your house burned down and only took out half your kids."
"Well ain't you the dramatic one now," Wanda said. "And ungrateful, too. You best bite your tongue, Lexie, 'fore the good Lord puts it in mind to befall sorrow on the rest a' this here mess." Wanda run her styling comb through Lexie's hair and sure enough, plenty more strands fell out.
"See?" she said.
Lexie started crying again and dabbed at her eyes. I hugged her lap and told her she looked better'n anyone I ever seen with their hair half gone, even though Homer Bailey, the goat man, was the only one I knowed like that. From then on, Lexie always let Wanda do her hair real regular. And she'd take me with her, too. I remember one time we was just talking and laughing, having us a fine old time doing nothing.
"Lori Jean, honey," she said, "I do believe it's time we head to the beauty shop. What'cha think, baby girl?" she asked and waited for my answer just like I was a grownup and counted.
She was putting on lipstick and fussing in the mirror at the dressing table Melvin fixed for her. It was the mirror her mama give her 'fore she died, so it was real special, for sure. It was the kind of mirror you don't even have to hang on to. It stood up in place all by itself. It sat on a long, pretty scarf Lexie draped over a board resting on two peach crates Melvin hauled in for her. MeeMaw sewed a right pretty skirt for it even. Real nice, just like the kind the ladies in the movies have. Lexie was a whole lot like the ladies in the movies. She even walked like that Marilyn one the men all whistle at, only Lexie did it better. She didn't act stupid or nothing when she did it. She just talked normal like and smiled and walked along with her sides moving that way all on their own. I tried it myself and it didn't work, so I knowed it just come natural to her. Me and Marilyn had to work at ours and it showed.
I practiced walking like Lexie every night 'fore prayers, before MeeMaw come to tuck me down. I figured I had a lot of time to get it right, which was good 'cause mine resembled Myrtle Soseby's, the church lady. She had one leg shorter than the other and walked with a wiggle, too—only no men whistled.
"Melvin, honey," Lexie said that day, "give me some money, sugar. We girls need to git ourselves all gussied up for the weekend." She walked that wiggly walk on over to Melvin and sat right down in his lap. He sniffed her hair real good and smacked his lips and said he was gonna gobble her up. He's so funny. He was always saying things like that. Lexie loved Melvin and I did, too. He was a big old teddy bear, he was, with a Santa belly. It hung over his belt buckle whenever he stood up and jiggled when he walked.
It was hard for me to understand my stepdaddy Ray being his brother, same ma and pa even. Didn't make no sense a'tall. They was nothing alike. Didn't even look alike. Carolee told me where babies come from and how they was made after Connie Dee, her older sister, told her. So I figured Melvin and Ray's ma had a different daddy helping her make one of them and their pa just never knew, 'cause how'd he know 'less she told him and that didn't sound like something a ma'd tell a pa, 'less she weren't right in the head or wanted a good whupping.
One time Ray punched my mama's eyes and her nose real good for just looking back at a fella that looked at her first. They swelled all up and turned black and she stayed in the house 'til they turned yellow and purple. Then she come out again. Lexie helped her put makeup on 'em and we all went to church that Sunday, even Ray. Her eyes stayed funny for a while, then they got better, but her nose never did look like mine again.
Ray said she had a big mouth and he'd redesign her lips, too, if she didn't learn to shut it. But she didn't and her mouth got cut up bad a couple of times. It wan't 'til she got it all stitched up that she stopped talking back to him. By then she didn't much look like the same mama no more. Her nose had a hump in it and when she smiled, which weren't often, her front tooth was missing. Ray said we didn't have no money to git her a new one, but I saved any money I got, mostly pennies, just in case I could get enough put up for Christmas. How much could one little old tooth cost anyway?
But I reckon she should of shut up while she still had her pretty face or kicked him out 'fore he wrecked it. For sure she'd have her front tooth, and she probably wouldn't have to be in that jail, going to that courthouse with those chains on her ankles that they roped up to her waist. I probably might still be there, too—with Carolee, down at the creek, swinging on that rope, just running and playing, making up a batch of them mud cookies. But knowing Ray, I guess he wouldn't of stayed kicked out anyway. He was as big as he was mean. He did what he wanted. Somebody bigger and stronger than my mama would of had to stop him.
I prayed Melvin would, but he didn't. Guess he couldn't, Ray being the older brother and all, out a' respect or something.
Then they got their own place, Melvin and Lexie. By the time Ray started in on me, they weren't around to see it. I wondered if Melvin would of stopped him then. Mostly I wondered if Lexie would of
made
Melvin stop him. I thought about it every time Ray got hold of me. I cried about it when he busted my eardrum and it hurt so bad and Mama poured warm oil in it and pushed a plug of cotton in to keep it there. I hated the feeling of that stuff as it trickled into my head. Mama said to stay out of his way and to run and hide when he got the liquor out, which didn't make no sense. I'da been hiding all the time I wasn't in school 'cause he got hisself fired and weren't working no more.
Most of that bad stuff didn't start 'til after MeeMaw died. She got the flu, the kind that come all the way from China. I was eight. She died in her sleep out on the porch. 'Neumonia. I hated that porch from then on. It weren't nothing but a mud room leading to the back step, anyway, but it was her spot and she wouldn't hear of giving it up. I knew it was too cold out there. Mama knew, too, and fussed at her all the time about it. That was one thing about my ma. She loved MeeMaw as much as I did. She loved MeeMaw the way I wanted her to love me.
Melvin and Lexie coming was about the best thing that ever happened to me and the worst thing, too. Carolee said that was a paradox. She's real smart. Read it to me right out of a book,
It was
the best of times; it was the worst of times.
Melvin, he was looking for work at the Scottsdale Cotton Mill clear over in Decatur. Heard they was hiring and drove over from Birmingham after Lexie's mama died. He found work straightaway and they found a temporary place to stay with us, MeeMaw saying it was our Christian duty to look out for those that needed a helping hand.
Things was about perfect, too, 'til Ray got word the mill was hiring and he showed up. Mama fell for him right off. The first thing I noticed 'bout Ray was he picked his nose and had bad breath. Mama must not of cared, her being so lonely. Ray didn't cotton to church none, talked hisself a filthy mouth MeeMaw said, and she run him off. Told Melvin right out how it was.
"You and Lexie is welcome to stay a piece, 'til you git settled," she said, "but that no-count brother a' yours is not welcome to put another foot on my doorstep."
"Yes, ma'am," Melvin said. He was real respectful to my meemaw, he was.
"He's a lost soul, that one, ma'am," Melvin said, and he shook his head from side to side real sad like.
"Amen," MeeMaw whispered back, and she nodded her head real sad like, too.
"Reckon we should pray for him right now, ma'am?"
"Glory be," MeeMaw answered.
And Melvin, he led us in prayer. MeeMaw bowed her head and closed her eyes. Melvin winked at me and Lexie and then he said a prayer as good as any preacher.
MeeMaw liked Melvin. She liked Lexie all right, too, I guess, but prayed real funny when Lexie was around.
"Sweet, merciful Jesus," she said once when Lexie was all fixed up nice for church. And another time, Lexie wore the prettiest yellow sundress that scooped down in the front and jiggled when she moved and MeeMaw said, "Mercy! Lord a' mercy!" She shook her head and looked up at the ceiling like it was heaven itself.
"God help us all," she said. Stuff like that. We was only going to a picnic and I thought Lexie looked real nice. All the men did, too. She was the center of attention that day. Just beautiful. They musta couldn't believe how good that yellow dress went with her red hair 'cause their eyes followed her wherever she went that day, 'til they drunk too much whiskey and couldn't follow their own feet and some of them fell down even. MeeMaw prayed for them, too.
Lexie had a special way with people, 'specially men and most 'specially Melvin.
"Melvin, honey, reach on down in yore pocket, sugar, and give your sweetie all you got," she said, and he did. He give her all the money he dug out of his jeans.
"Gosh, is he always this nice?" I asked.
"Pretty much."
"And you always get what you want?" I said, not understanding. Mama never got nothing from Ray but trouble.
"Uh-huh," she said and smiled this itsy-bitsy smile where just the corners of her mouth turned up and her eyes twinkled like Christmas.
"How come?"
"It's a secret, sugar."
"Oh, tell me, please, please!" I begged, thinking I could pass it on to my mama so's Ray'd be nice to her, too.
"Well, sweetie, I get what I want," she said and turned and whispered in my good ear, "'cause I got what he wants."
"Oh…" I said nice like, but I was plumb disappointed. Mama didn't much have what Ray wanted, I guess. He just wanted that bottle and he wanted those young girls he met down at the tavern. I heard her yell that at him one morning when they was fighting over where he'd been all night.
"Go on now," Lexie said. "Fix yourself up real pretty, baby girl. We're going shoppin', too." Lexie was getting herself a set and style most every week now. One time she even got herself one a' them permanent waves, which stunk real bad at first. Before shopping we headed to the Cut 'n' Style. Lexie picked out a different color for Wanda to use on her hair. Wanda had these little ponytails for Lexie to pick from, looked like they come off the back end of itty-bitty horses. She pointed to one with some gold in it.
"See, honey, in't it pretty?" she asked me.
"Uh-huh."
"Now, don't be tellin' peoples I dye my hair, Lori Jean, hear?" she said. "There's a few things a proper girl keeps to herself. Her hair color and her bust size is two of 'em."
That sounded reasonable to me and I decided I'd keep those things to myself for sure. It weren't hard since I wasn't planning on changing the color of my hair. It was near black and Carolee said it was hair sent by the angels. Hers was blonde. And keeping my bust size secret weren't no problem, neither, being I didn't have none yet. But I decided when I got me some, I wouldn't tell anyone what size they was 'cause I wanted to be just like Lexie, excepting for my hair. I couldn't see changing it, mine being sent from the angels themselves and all.
Lexie tried on dress after dress that day. She settled on a pink sundress with little baby straps and she bought me one, too. She did! She honest to golly did. I liked to 'bout died of excitement right on the spot. It was white with a crocheted collar. It had these tiny flowers peppered all over it with lace all around the hem. Said I looked like a princess. I don't know about that, but I sure felt like one. I never wanted to take it off. I woulda slept in that dress, but I was afraid I'd get it all wrinkled and ruin it 'fore Sunday. After church the next day we went to the fair. MeeMaw made Lexie put a sweater on over her shoulders 'cause of the straps on her dress being thin as spaghetti.
"Missy," she said, "I got enough faith to move mountains, so I don't have enough left to count on those straps holdin' up melons the size a' Georgia!"
"Oh my, my," Lexie said. She acted real surprised to hear words like that come out of MeeMaw. I weren't too surprised. MeeMaw had more'n one side to her. I heard her curse once even, when Maybelle Hawkins's grandson stole Rosie, her roosting hen.
"Lewis Hawkins, you run off with my hen!"
"Did not."
"You did!"
"No ma'am."
"You little shit! I seen you with my own two eyes," she said and chased him clear down the road, dust flying in all directions. Caught him, too. About wrung his neck the way he must of wrung Rosie's. He and Chester Britt roasted that chicken over a fire down by the creek and ate it. I saw 'em. I never did tell, though, it being her favorite hen and all.
MeeMaw was plumb full of wisdom. She had a lot of 'pinions, too, and she passed them on whenever they come to her.
"Missy, the Lord didn't put those bosoms there to test the strong and tempt the weak," she said to Lexie one morning 'fore we left for church.
"'Course he didn't," Lexie said.
"Then tuck 'em back in 'fore some fool grabs 'em!" MeeMaw said. Lexie did like she was told, no questions asked.
After church, at the fair, we run into Maybelle Hawkins.
"Lexie Ann!" Maybelle run over to hug her. "Why it's been ten years if it's been a day!"
Lexie hugged her back, but she didn't look none too happy to see her. I could tell.
"You sweet thang. Don't you look good, now," Maybelle said.