The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat (38 page)

Mama wept as she watched Barbara Jean go. “All that pain. That part of livin’ I surely don’t miss.”

I closed my eyes, though I can’t really say for certain that they’d actually been open, and fell asleep. I journeyed again to Leaning Tree, the glistening creek, and my sycamore.

When I woke up, it was dark outside and James was snoring in the visitor’s chair. Mrs. Carmel Handy, the retired schoolteacher who’d once set her husband on the path to righteousness with the aid of a cast-iron skillet, stood at the foot of my bed. I was surprised to see her. I’d never had anything against Miss Carmel, but she hadn’t had much use for me when I was a student in her classroom, and that hadn’t changed in the decades that passed afterwards. But there she was, all dressed up, visiting me in the hospital. Then I saw her talking to Mama and knew that Miss Carmel had taken the boat across to the other side.

I said, “Hello, Miss Carmel. I didn’t know you’d passed. I would’ve sent a ham to your family, if I’d known.”

“Just happened today. And, let me tell you, it came as quite a surprise. I was in the middle of cleaning up after supper and I came down with what I thought was a touch of indigestion. Next thing I knew I was getting up from the kitchen floor and my arthritis was gone and my real teeth were back. Then, something drew me right here. And now I know why. Listen, I have a small assignment for you.”

The Skillet Lady came closer and whispered a message that she wanted delivered to James. Just like I’d explained to Lester, I told her that I probably wouldn’t be talking to any living people again. But she got me to promise I’d try.

I slept and dreamed through the fifth morning—I was doing more of that every day. But I was aware of my kids’ presence in my room that afternoon. Denise, Jimmy, and Eric walked in, all full of hope and good cheer. They updated James on the grandkids, their spouses, their lives. They did all the things I’d have wanted them to do to make their father feel better. I was so happy and proud that I used every bit of strength I had to swim up through the water and fog in my mind so I could thank them. It worked for a little while. I got out a few words—my only words to live people that whole day. But after I spoke each of their names aloud, I faded away again. Then my children’s composure wilted like the straggly flowers of my garden. Eric’s lip began to tremble. Jimmy started to sniffle. Denise’s eyes leaked tears. My big boys each laid their heads on one of their sister’s shoulders
and sobbed. The spectacle was made even more heartbreaking by the fact that Jimmy and Eric had, respectively, seven and eight inches of height on Denise, so they had to crouch down to be comforted. This was the sight I had feared seeing. I was relieved when they dissolved into gray as I fell asleep again.

When I woke up, my room was filled with the warm light of the afternoon sun. It was also packed with people. James held my hand. He had such thick stubble on his face I wondered if maybe more than one day had passed while I slept. My three kids stood next to their father with their hands linked like they used to do when they crossed a street together as youngsters. Barbara Jean and Clarice were perched at the foot of my bed, both of them massaging my legs. Richmond and my brother, Rudy, stood behind Barbara Jean and Clarice with bowed heads. My pastor stood on the opposite side of the bed from James, reading from the Bible in a voice that sounded way too loud in the small space of my crowded hospital room. It was clear from the miserable expressions on everyone’s faces and the fact that the nurses had suspended the two-visitor rule that all of these folks were there to say goodbye.

Beyond the ring of sniffling, praying people, my dead acquaintances gabbed without bothering to lower their voices. Among the chatting ghosts stood my father, fit and hardy in his sawdust-sprinkled coveralls. When Daddy realized that I was aware of my surroundings again, he made his way through the crowd to my bedside. He said, “Hey, sweetheart, I see you’re back. You had a rough night, baby.”

Lester, looking dashing in a rust-colored three-piece suit and leaning on a gold walking stick, took his place next to Daddy then and said, “I hate to bother you, Odette, but I think maybe this might be a good time to talk to Barbara Jean like you said you would.”

Daddy snapped, “This is hardly the time for her to be thinkin’ about that, Lester.”

Carmel Handy disagreed. “She made promises and she needs to keep them. That was one of the most important lessons I taught my students.
Honor your word
.”

Mama said, “If she’s going to talk to anybody, I think she should
start with that cheater.” She pointed at Richmond. “I got my request in first.”

They all started to argue. All those dead folks putting in their two cents about what I should or shouldn’t do with the end of my life. Mrs. Roosevelt was the only one who kept out of it. She just sat cross-legged atop a steadily beeping machine to the side of my bed and hummed to herself.

I tried to ignore them and concentrate on my own plans. During that last long nap, I’d been thinking about the way this endgame should play out. If I could work it right, these needy ghosts might get some satisfaction, too.

I had to wake up, completely, just for a little while. But that was a tall order. My body didn’t want me anymore. The more I tried to wake up, the more my flesh tried to push me out. I wrestled and wrestled, latching on to every reviving thought I could muster. I reached way back and pictured Mama, young and brassy, shouting for me to get my ass out of bed for school. I smelled the bad coffee James distilled on cold mornings. I splashed my face with the frigid water from the creek behind Mama’s garden. I thought about the one thing I wanted to do more than anything else and I tried to draw strength from it.

In front of me, a tiny pinpoint of clear air appeared in the haze. In my mind, I ran for that open spot and pulled at it with my fingers until I could stick my head through. Then I kicked and pushed back toward my old life while Lester, Miss Carmel, and Mama shouted out encouragement.

The first thing I said was “Everybody, shut up.”

My pastor looked surprised and offended and stopped reading. I was actually talking to the dead people in the room, still fussing and yakking, but I didn’t know how many words I had left in me, so I didn’t waste them on the reverend’s hurt feelings.

At the sound of my voice, creaky and hoarse, James shouted my name and started kissing my face.

Denise ran out and fetched Dr. Soo. A few seconds later, Alex squeezed into the room with a nurse at his side and probed me with a cold stethoscope.

James said to the doctor, “See, I told you my girl wasn’t done yet.” But the frown on Alex’s face as he reviewed my vital signs said that he didn’t believe there was any need to celebrate.

The bucktoothed, tipsy Angel of Death agreed with the doctor. When we made eye contact, Mrs. Roosevelt shook her head solemnly. Then she whispered, “It will happen today.”

But she didn’t need to warn me. I could see that milky water, thicker and darker than before, forming again at the edges of my vision. So I got down to business.

With a voice weak from not being used, I croaked out, “James, you look terrible and you smell bad. Alive or dead, I won’t have you going to seed. And listen, Carmel Handy is here and she wants you to know that she died yesterday.”

“Day before,” she corrected.

“Sorry, day before yesterday. She’s on her kitchen floor. She wants you to talk to your cop friends and see to it that none of them start the rumor that she died with a skillet in her hand. She refuses to leave this world with people making jokes about her.”

Of course, I knew full well that the time for Carmel Handy to worry about people joking was in the seconds before her skillet met the side of Mr. Handy’s head. But she seemed satisfied with what I’d said to James. She said, “Thank you, dear.”

Now that I’d completed her assignment, I waited for her to leave. I figured once you did a ghost a favor they would fade away or maybe pop like a soap bubble that had been pricked with a pin. That was how it worked in the movies, at least. But Miss Carmel was no Hollywood ghost. She stayed put, looking relieved but excited about what might happen next.

Worried expressions spread around the room like a virus. James was frightened. His concerned gaze went back and forth from me to Alex Soo. “Sweetheart, did you say Carmel Handy is dead,
and
she’s here?”

“Yes,” I said. “I didn’t want to worry you with it, but I’ve been seeing dead folks for a year now. I know it’s probably not what you want to hear, but I think we both knew it might happen sooner or later.”

From the back of the room, Mama hollered, “Hey, Odette. Tell Richmond what I said about taking care of those urges!”

“Richmond, Mama says …” I stopped to think about what to tell him. I was not about to utter the words “carry a Victoria’s Secret catalog into the bathroom” to Richmond Baker. I said, “Mama says you need a new hobby. She suggests you take up reading.

“And, Clarice, Mama also says you should count your blessings for having Richmond around to do the thing he’s best at and not having to deal with the bullshit that comes along with living with him. Right now she wants to slap you, but I think she’ll get past it if you promise to forget about what your mother says and just use Richmond till you use him up.”

Clarice looked mortified, and it pleased me to see that I could still embarrass her after so many years. When she recovered enough to speak, she said, under her breath, “Barbara Jean, I think she’s got brain damage.”

“Call it brain damage if you need to, Clarice. Just do what Mama says, or we’ll both haunt you.”

I spoke more carefully to Barbara Jean. “Lester’s here and he wants me to tell you something. He feels bad that he got you to marry him when he knew you didn’t love him. He says it wasn’t right and he should’ve done better by you since he was so much older. He’s asking you to forgive him.”

Barbara Jean didn’t look the least bit surprised or upset by what I’d said. I knew that she was worried about me, but I could also see that she still wore the remnants of the despair I’d seen on her face two days earlier when she’d talked to me about Chick and his brother Desmond. And I supposed that, after the haunting she’d gone through over the years, a message from her dead husband was nothing.

Barbara Jean said, “Tell Lester he was good to me … to us. He’s got nothing to feel bad about. I’m glad I married him.”

Lester let out a sigh. He tipped his hat to me and then, like Miss Carmel, sat watching.

James said, “So, you say you’ve been seeing dead folks for a year?”

“Just about,” I answered.

Big Earl, Miss Thelma, and Daddy yelled out in unison, “Tell James we said hey.”

I relayed the message. “Daddy, Big Earl, and Miss Thelma all say hey.”

James twisted his mouth and rubbed at the scar on his face, the way he often did when he was deep in thought. No doubt he was remembering Mama and her endless public conversations with dead folks. But my James is as adaptable as any of those bowing trees along Wall Road. The frown melted from his face and he nodded his head. “Okay then.” Addressing the room, he called out, “Hey, Pop Jackson. Hey, Big Earl and Miss Thelma.”

James never ceases to amaze me.

I felt like I was drifting away again and I forced myself to breathe deep and concentrate on staying in this world a little while longer. When I got a second wind, I spoke again, my voice even fainter and hoarser than before. “Now I’d like to have a little family time. Reverend, Alex, nurse, would you mind giving us some privacy?”

They didn’t look pleased about it, but they cleared out like I asked. After they left the room, I said, “The rest of y’all can go, too,” talking to the ghosts. But only Lester and Miss Carmel complied. Lester performed a low, courtly bow and then offered Miss Carmel his arm. She wrapped her hand around his elbow and walked toward the door with him. As they left the room, I heard her say, “Lester, did I ever tell you that your wife was born on my davenport?”

I talked to Rudy and my children. “I need y’all to do something.” When they stepped forward, I said, “I need you to take my husband home and make sure he’s fed and bathed.”

James shook his head no. “I’m not leaving you.”

I said, “James, I promise you won’t come back here and find me dead.” I could see that he was mulling it over, wanting to believe me. For insurance, I issued commands to Rudy and my giant sons. “Carry him out if you have to, but take him home.”

Eric, Jimmy, and Rudy glanced at each other and then at James, wondering what to do. James let them off the hook, like I thought he would. He said, “Okay, I’ll go home and get cleaned up. But I’m
coming right back.” He said to the Supremes, “Call me if anything happens.” Then he kissed my forehead and left with Denise, Jimmy, Eric, and Rudy.

“Clarice, I want you to pick up a couple things for me. I want you to get that violet housecoat you gave me last Christmas from my bedroom chest of drawers. I’d have asked James, but Lord knows what he’d bring back. And I also would kill for a piece of Little Earl’s peach cobbler. Would you run by the All-You-Can-Eat and get me a piece?”

Thrilled to think that my appetite had returned, she said, “Sure, I’ll go.” Then, to Barbara Jean, “I won’t be long.”

When Clarice was gone, I said to Barbara Jean, “I’ve got one thing to say to you, Barbara Jean, and it’s not coming from any dead person. It’s coming straight from me. You need to go see Chick. And not just for the ‘making amends’ stuff.” Her mouth dropped open then as she realized that I had heard and remembered the things she’d said to me a couple days earlier while I was swimming around in that world between worlds.

She wrung her hands for a moment and then, recovering, said, “I’ll talk to him soon. I promise. I’ve just been waiting till I’m strong enough.”

“Go now. And after you’ve settled the past, deal with the here and now. It’s time to see how this thing between you and Chick is supposed to play out, once and for all.”

Barbara Jean said, “It’s too late for any of that, Odette. Years and years too late.”