Finding My Thunder (33 page)

Finding My Thunder 54

Now
that Seth and me had our six week check-ups I went ahead and got on birth control.
Then Naomi insisted I see about where I stood in terms of getting back to school.
But I was no longer 'amenable' to the regular high school situation. At least that's
what Principal Brown was telling us as we sat in his office, me holding my darkish
baby.

They
would allow me to take final exams to finish out my junior year, since I had been
so close to finishing anyway. But students with special circumstances like mine
were, they felt, better served in a special school.

"It's
a tricky thing when one of our students falls in the family way. It's just not conducive
to good morale for the students. Especially one such as yourself, Miss Grunier,
a…good student. We have to be careful of the tone we set."

I
suspected he was talking more about my morals than the schools morale, but he'd
always given me a headache pretty much. I put Seth on my shoulder and patted his
back and he did a loud burp. I kind of thought that said it all. Then he loudly
passed gas. Well that was for Hannah. My son was brilliant.

"I
have wondered in my time," Naomi said adjusting the collar on her red
coat, "if there were a way to detect some of the fathers of these babies.
I have wondered if they also would not be found less amenable to the regular high
school situation but I suppose that's a foolish idea as this situation seems
tailor made for them."

Mr.
Brown tried to scoot higher in his chair and his face flushed red. Well, she didn't
know her place and the climate was such, any hint of discrimination by anybody
for anything could be construed as potential lawsuit material.

"But
of course…that is the way, the womenfolk carrying the burden of 'tone,'" Naomi
laughed, "for the 'tone deaf,' who set the pace of this world." Well,
she was pretty pissed off I could tell but he might think he imagined it and
she was smiling.

"Mrs.
Blue there is a very fine technical school in Corning and girls like Hilly are welcomed
there. Negroes as well, of course," he said, his face flushing a deep red.

"Of
course," she said, "according to the Desegregation Act." Naomi
looked at me, her brows raised and a smile on her lips. I was an official
member of the Negro club now and he was letting us know. "But I've got to
tell you, there are no other girls just like Hilly. This girl has been through
a lifetime of difficult circumstances many adults have not known, and now she
is a mother and she has talent, and ambition, and so many plans. So what can
this technical school do to assist her in her journey to take care of her son and
be a productive member of society?"

Here's
what he said, I couldn't start technical school until the following school year,
but it was a one year program and I'd have my diploma. I would receive secretarial
training. That was what was available for me. That or Keypunch. The rest of the
school was dedicated to training young men, auto body, auto mechanics, carpentry,
and welding.

"What
about welding?" I said.

He
stared at me, then came to and coughed some. "Welding and sheet metal. Hardly
the thing a young woman would ever take in the history of that school," he
said. "We need to have a serious conversation here. Your future is
serious."

I
didn't plan to be a welder, but it would be nice to understand the business and
what better way to learn it since I happened to need my high school diploma.
Well, Naomi thought I did. So might as well learn something I was actually
interested in and could use in my life. I'd already had typing and shorthand at
Ludicrous, and an intro class for accounting. I had the office part pretty well
figured, but welding…did I really want to be in the dark about that? I knew Allie
wasn't.

"They
got a rule against girls taking those classes?" I asked, cause it was
always thought cute when one of the guys signed up for home
ec
and sewing. But I knew this was nobody's idea of cute. If I showed up in an all
boys' class, it could be seen as a joke and a challenge.

"Miss
Grunier," he said, fingers folding over his stomach. "They have a
no-pants rule for young ladies in that school. Just that alone…how are you
going to weld in a dress?" Yes, spreading my legs had always been a
problem apparently, but I did not say this, of course. And making me an
exception since I'd be doing something that obviously would require pants, that
took too much imagination.

"It
isn't natural, not any of it," he went on. "Oh I know you all want to
be men these days…well that's ruining our country. Burn the bra and all."
He shook his head with disgust.

Then
that died down and we sat quiet just staring. Welding was it. It's what I needed.

Where
else was I going to get that kind of education and my diploma all paid for by
the state of Tennessee?

Naomi
said, "Principal Brown, who would we speak to about the technical education
you've mentioned?"

That
threw him a bit. "You mean the secretarial?"

"I
mean who is in charge of that school," she said back and I had to look
down so he wouldn't see my smile.

Then
the strangest thing, before that month was out, a knock on Naomi's door, and it
was a man in a suit. Seems Lonnie had an uncle and there was money. Eight thousand
five hundred dollars and fifty-two cents. With Lonnie gone, I was in line to inherit
that money.

And
next I got some social security money for my dead father, one seventy five. And
fifty-five a month until I was eighteen and back pay to catch it up. I was damn
near rich.

I
walked the property that day, my old yard, and all around the house. There it was,
too old and sick to breathe fire. Silent. Sad. I was tired of seeing it like
this, truth be told. Where else would I be? You couldn't budge me out of
Ludicrous with Danny out there wandering. I would stay here, my love a candle
in these windows. I would wait for him here. I knew there were better ways to
spend this money, and this house would suck it down like it was a kid with a
soda on a boiling hot day.

Practically
speaking, it took a dumb kid like me to believe it could rise, this empty tomb
without a savior…but I could save it. It knew love because of me…because of Danny.
It could know that love again.

Back
at the bank they told me they wanted nine thousand, but seeing as I had lived
there all my life and I had cash and it wasn't likely to sell very quick, they
took eight and Naomi signed.

I
could have talked her into anything at this point. If I showed life or interest
over a rock or a stick she said yes to the rock and the stick.

I
was a home owner. I had no virtue to protect so she didn't have to worry if Danny
came back he'd sneak in my room. We were adjusting to the new way of things. We
were both a little crazy but it's like a new spark got in us and we were laughing
again…sometimes. Yes, I'd had a home with Naomi and I did not need more. But
her home was a place of rescue, refuge, and others needed it too. When Danny
came home…he couldn't stay there…we couldn't stay there, and I was making a
way. But in truth I had cast this place on the waters…cast it off…first time in
sorrow, second time in relief, but it had come back to me of its own.

I
had so much to do but it was pretty exciting to open that old place again. Dickens
and Annie snuck down so much, and their mother looked the other way, and the
father wasn't paying close enough attention. He was a drinking man being taken over
since Sukey took off and no one heard. He had two sons out there, one in dishonor,
one in honor, but both gone.

So
we cleaned and shined and painted. I had to make Annie change her clothes cause
she had ruined a dress and her mother wasn't happy. And soon as school was over
there they were, those two, then another. The older sister Rita who didn't want
anything to do with me before, but she was just harder to win. At first she
didn't want to help, but she did like to work in the kitchen. She liked to make
things neat and tidy more than paint, so she did that a lot, and she'd arrange
again and again. And then she'd read a book or do her homework and she was
pretty negative most the time, but not so bad. Sometimes she was downright
encouraging. She told me she didn't believe that Sukey hurt me and that Seth
wasn't his, probably Danny's and I didn't want to say and that's why Danny
wasn't coming home and that's why Sukey had to leave. It was all my fault.
Everything. I had ruined their family.

Dickens
about lost it. "Shut up Rita, you're not supposed to say," he
shouted.

"You
all believe that?" I asked him.

"No.
Dad does. That's where she heard it. Mom said not to repeat it. She knows that.
She knows how he is when he drinks."

"Rita…I
want you to know something, Seth is mine. When you're older maybe your mom will
want to tell you more, maybe she won't. But right now, you need to promise me
you'll never speak about this again. It would hurt Seth if he heard such a
thing, and it hurts me."

She
broke down crying then. She grabbed her things and said she was going home and
not coming back.

But
the next day she was back, and she had some cookies for me her mom had baked.
She hugged me then, and I hugged her. After that things got better between us.

It
was not so long after that I was living in the old house again. I took to Lonnie's
room of all things, well I'd torn everything out of there was ever his. I even
changed out some of the furniture with my old stuff, I don't know why. It was
chilly, but not bad, and once I had Seth down for a few hours I hoped, I kept
the living room dark and I stepped out on the porch. No sooner I did that and
he took to crying cause he'd woken up again. I went in and got him. "You
little bugger," I said. I got the bottle and wrapped him good and took him
out on the porch and I sat out there on the stairs and had him on my lap, his
little kicking feet against me. He wasn't really hungry so I sat the bottle
beside me. Seemed like he liked it out there in the dark, just looking around
with his
googly
eyes. He had that look like he'd come
from that other world, that water world, especially now his dark eyes picking
up the moon's light.

I
heard it first, and I knew it even though I didn't. But my head snapped up and
I listened and I guess I was being protective with Seth and all, but it was
more, someone walking, but a halting in it, and I gathered Seth up and put him
on my shoulder, but I was leaning forward looking far as I could down the
sidewalk, and I saw him. Walking toward me, in his army shirt, his hair long,
but everything in his thinness, everything what I knew. And he was at the gate
and he looked at me for just a beat, and that halting gait now, him walking to
me, and using his hands on the steps, sitting next to me, like we'd barely
missed a night together.

His
eyes were not on me, but on that baby, and I lowered Seth and slowly shifted him
in my arms and set him on Danny's lap, that broken altar, I laid the baby
there.

And
Danny was bent over him, and his hands went to the boy, his hands so large and
strong on that boy, even as they were thin and brown and they had done so many
things I did not know. And I moved closer, as close as I could, and my arms around.
And such a feeling came in to me, as if I could finally breathe, finally settle
inside.

And
for quite a time we were there, like the day, in the water, and he held me, and
I felt his legs kicking under me, holding me afloat, the way I held him now, my
arms around him, around the outside of his, holding him together. And I
realized he cried, and Seth's blanket, it caught so much of the wet sorrow and
repentance. "I…," he finally said, "I found him in Canada."

"Did
you kill him?"

"I
planned to. I went there…to. But…I tried…I had my hands…on his…on his…," Seth
set to wailing then and I reached for him, but Danny scooped him up and put him
on his shoulder and shushed him, and he rocked him a little, and I realized how
good he was with babies, and how much practice he must have had. He held Seth.

He
loved Seth.

"You
couldn't do it," I said.

"I
tried," he said, but he kept rocking Seth and Seth was soft against him.

"Who
told you?"

"Robert.
He got it all from Bixby. He even found out where Sukey was headed." He
was here, holding Seth, talking to me.

I
touched his hair. Oh God, his hair on my fingers.

He
was crying again, sobbing so hard, I took Seth.

"He's
beautiful," he choked out. Then he just collapsed, fell over on the stairs
crying.

"Come
in the house," I told him. I took Seth in and settled him in his bassinet.
Then I hurried to Danny but he was just entering the door, and I saw his face better,
though the lights were out. It's like he just made it over the threshold before
he half fell on me and we lowered to the floor together. "My Hilly,"
he kept saying, gripping me, crying, crying. "My Hilly."

Now
I was shushing him as he had Seth. I wanted him to cry. I knew he'd held it…all
these months, this year. So I held him and he held me, like I knew we needed to
do.

"I
love you," I said, and he dug in his back pocket and opened his wallet and
pulled it out, the thinnest tatters of all the I love
you's
I'd written, when I was a girl, just a kid.

I
laughed, and he laid it carefully on the stairs there and he held me again, and
I held him, tried to let my hands adjust and believe.

"I
don't ever want to be apart again," I said.

He
held me and cried in to my neck.