Unto These Hills (10 page)

Chapter Six

When we crossed the river bridge, my heart sang merrily at familiar landmarks. The village hummed with life as folks bustled about, jackets and sweaters trussing and warming, headed for the Company Store or to work, or simply hanging out, legs dangling from rock walls that lined Main Street. The occupied hotel rockers moved rhythmically and lazily under a warming afternoon sun. Some of the faces were new, some not. Many waved cheerfully at us as our old Ford ambled toward Maple Street

Sheila was antsy to see Polly, and Timmy, though sad to leave his cousin in Chicago, was just as eager to see Vince Kale, his pal.

Me — I nearly swooned just to be back. Butterflies flapped as I anticipated seeing Daniel. And Emaline. Only a brief, sorrowful instant jolted me when my brain processed Renie among those I’d come back to. Having been away had spared me the day to day readjustment to that loss. Now, it hit me head on.

We’d just arrived and were climbing stiffly from the car when Emaline came bounding across the yard and tackled me. We boo-hooed and hugged and carried on forever before helping tote all the baggage in. Then, we escaped to the back door stoop. We laughed at the tear-sodden mess we were.

“Lordy, Emaline, I never thought this red-dirt, hilly land could look so beautiful. And even with Lyman Plant’s stinky dye let loose in the water at times, it smells better’n Chicago.” We laughed uproariously

“Is Darrel Ploughman still calling you up saying, ‘I gotta go flush the commode. Tucapau needs the water’?” I asked. Darrel lived in Lyman Mill village, which was upriver — as the crow flies — about three miles from Tucapau Mill. Lyman released their dye refuse into the river, sending it downstream. The stench, at its worst, was akin to rotten eggs.

“No, thank the good Lord. Not since I’ve been dating John.” She balefully rolled her eyes. “I never could understand that joke’s logic since it’s
their
garbage that stinks up our water.” Actually, the pong came sporadically, only after a dumping.

Fact was, Fairmont Mill village, downriver from Tucapau, got the worst of the stench since the chemicals, by the time it reached them, were
really
rotten.

“S’all in fun,” I said, feeling magnanimous, even affectionate toward our neighboring classmates, experiencing an overwhelming appreciation of my own turf.

“Sorry I’ve not written as often lately.” Emaline cut her watery eyes at me and cringed comically, as though expecting me to hit her.

“Well,” I hiked my red nose up in the air, “you
ought
to be, you hussy.”

We giggled outrageously until we ran out of steam, then just sat there in our sweaters — South Carolina’s March climate being much milder than Chicago’s — and simply basked in the old familiar solidarity. “So,” I crossed my arms and ankles and plastered my back to the doorjamb, “tell me all about him.”

Emaline, cheeks magenta with emotions, gushed, “we’ve been dating for six months now. Oh, and Daddy’s got a girlfriend.” She sighed and watched my reaction. It didn’t seem right, somehow, replacing Renie but Emaline seemed not upset at the idea.

“Do you like her? Who is she?” My insides flailed about in protest.

“Mmm. Yeh. She’s nice. Name’s Doris. She and Daddy met in the mill. Lordy!” She wrinkled her nose cutely. “Every female on the hill’s been matchmaking.”

My insides began to settle down, seeing as how Emaline wasn’t opposed to the idea of her daddy with another woman. I’d just have to adjust, in time.

Footsteps crunched around the corner of the house. My heart leaped as he approached us, hands shoved in jacket pockets, tall and splendid in a new maturity. The face seemed more chiseled somehow, more angular. And had he always been that tall and
masculine?
A thrill shot through me.

“Hey, Sunny,” he said as softly as a butterfly lighting.

“Lord have mercy,
Daniel,”
I whispered, feeling my eyes go wide. Then misty. I couldn’t help but show my astonishment at how he’d changed. Didn’t care that he saw.

“Oh.” Emaline jumped to her feet, blushing furiously. “Ahhh — I’ll be running along now and give you two time to….” She shrugged and disappeared in an eye’s blink.

He stood there for long moments, those turquoise eyes probing deep, deep inside me, drawing feelings I’d never before felt. I realized I was holding my breath and let it out on a rush. I patted the step beside me, not trusting my limbs to hold me up and take me to him.

Wordlessly, he spanned the space and lowered himself beside me, his long legs easily stretching across three steps, with room to spare. His solidness, settled against me, felt so good and his fragrance, spicy and mannish, made my head spin. “You’ve grown a little,” I teased breathlessly, scrooching up my shoulders, something wonderful flailing about inside me.

He grinned then, that slow lingering smile that engulfed and warmed me. And I felt Heaven burst over me. “Yeh. I guess I have.” His gaze held mine, the blue-green shimmering like a thousand sun rays tossed over Silver Lake. “And you’re even prettier.”

I felt my cheeks warm but still couldn’t tear my gaze from his. “So are you.” The words slipped out and we both laughed then. “Good grief,” I groaned. “You are anything but
pretty.”
Then I grabbed my hot cheeks. “That’s not what I mean, Daniel. You are —”

Suddenly, his hands covered mine and tilted my face up. His lips touched mine with such reverence I heard my breath suck in on a hiss. Then his arms slipped around me and pulled me gently to him. His face fit into the hollow of my shoulder, where I felt his warm breath against my neck.

“Ahh, Sunny,” the words rode out on a groan, “I’ve missed you so.”

I ran my fingers along his shoulder and up to cup his head to me. “I missed you, too, Daniel. So, so much.” The sweetness of that moment lingers till this very day, triggered unfailingly by a mere whiff of Aqua Velva
.

~~~~~

Nana invited Daniel to eat dinner with us, a fancy feast by her standards: fried chicken, mashed potatoes, yams, string beans cooked in ham drippings, and my grandmother’s buttermilk biscuits.

Aunt Tina had undoubtedly helped Nana out with buying the food, it being a homecoming and all, because Uncle Charlie had died suddenly in the past year of a stroke, leaving Nana without the paltry amount she earned for doing his cooking and cleaning.

That I’d not grieved his passing reaped me no guilt. Rather, I felt relief. I wouldn’t have to worry about Sheila being around him. Nana had mixed her meager furniture with ours in our vacated residence and Aunt Tina made special arrangements with Mr. Montgomery to pay Nana’s rent.

In the past year, Aunt Tina’s husband, short squat, ugly Talley Seay, left her for another woman. Devastated, Aunt Tina had resumed Nana’s rent after she and her spoiled son, Alvin, moved into our house with Nana.

Just one big happy family
, I thought, acknowledging I felt a tad sarcastic. Still — it was good to be home, inside familiar walls with family and kin.

And to feel the mill hill wrap me in safety.

I was disappointed to see that pieces of Mama’s furniture had been doled out to relatives. “It’s all we could do,” insisted Aunt Tina, non-apologetically. “After all, ya’ll wud’n here. Didn’t even know if you was ever comin’ back, to tell the truth.”

Dad blame it! Daniel and I coulda used that furniture after we marry. I held my tongue, determined not to allow her to steal my joy.

She shrugged, then continued filing her long red nails. “Ya’ll can have your same upstairs room back. Alvin’ll take the room next to it and Mama’ll share my room with me. Francine will have the other room to herself while she’s still ailin’.”

Great. Timmy will be crammed in with two near grown sisters while Alvin lounges in a big ol’ room all by himself.

But, like the rest of us, Timmy didn’t complain. He was just happy to be home.

Even Francine seemed contented to heal in familiar surroundings.

Me? I felt only a brush of guilt at counting my lucky stars — at the expense of Francine’s illness.

Didn’t matter that Aunt Tina invaded our space and we had to put up with Alvin. What mattered was that we were back on the mill hill. A sweetness hummed inside me that sang of family and friends and roots.

I was home.

~~~~~

In those first days back home, Daniel was there nearly every waking moment, his unreadable gaze following me, his ear inclined to my every word. He touched me little but I knew when he wanted to. Oh yes, I could feel his need.

To everyone else, Daniel was invincible, a strong rock upon which to lean, I could tell by the way Nana now deferred to him. He’d won her respect. Not a small accomplishment. I alone knew the innermost Daniel, the young boy who’d been beaten and downtrodden, who’d stood strong and tall still. Who’d hidden his pain from everyone but me.

I saw past his patina of toughness. Daniel needed me.

Just as I needed him.

~~~~~

Doretha, Walter, and Daniel threw a homecoming party for us the second night back. It was a simple, thrown-together, last-minute thing. When domestically-challenged Doretha chickened out, Berthie baked a four-layer chocolate cake. Sandwiches, chips, dips, and cookies completed the refreshments.

Still exhausted from the long ride, bedridden Francine’s morale did its lowest plunge ever. “Don’t see why I can’t go,” she pouted but fatigue thinned her voice to a near whisper.

She was still on bed rest, though no longer considered contagious. Sheila and Timmy were excited to be co-guests of honor with me. Sheila, now thirteen, wore an outfit of mine, filling out the blue clingy sweater much better than I ever could. She had the lushness Francine boasted of, with steadily lengthening legs that rivaled Francine’s. I laughed at times to hear Francine’s disparagement of our little sis.

Sheila was, after all, the family beauty with her breathtaking, ethereal combination of perfect features, olive complexion, green, long-lashed, bedroom eyes so like Mama’s they caused mouths to drop open. Jealousy ate Francine alive.

“Why’s
she going
tonight?” she snarled from her bed. “She’s still a kid.”

“So is Timmy. Doesn’t matter, Francine,” I shushed her. “Doretha made it clear we all are guests of honor.”

“’Cept me.” Francine’s anger slid right through the fatigue. “I
hate
this pissy ol’ TB. This stupid bed. No fun. No cigarettes. No
nothin’!
I’d be better off dead.”

I struggled to keep from smiling. I’d heard it all before. It no longer drew sympathy. I finally talked her into loaning us her record player and all-the-latest-hits record collection. All gifts from Tack.

“I’ll bring you a big plate of refreshments and tell you all about it,” I bartered.

She still sulked, cutting her eyes accusingly at me. “Everything? You won’t leave nothin’ out, will you?”

“Promise. Anyway, Tack’s coming to keep you company.” I ignored her eyes’ dramatic roll, as in ‘so what?’ I didn’t like Tack but I had to hand it to him in his devotion to Francine. Her earlier gratefulness to him now lay in tarnished ruins.

The party was wonderful. Emaline and John, Daniel and I danced every dance together, except one, when Walter cut in and we monkey shined to
Mister Sandman.

“Hey,” he stage-whispered over the music, “when you get tired of ol’ ugly over there, I’ll be next in line. Okay?”

Humor glimmered in his blue, blue eyes, now half-mooned over a silly grin. “Yeh, Walter. Sure.” I joked back, “I’ll remember that.” The Chordettes loosed Mister Sandman and the dance ended.

“Thanks, Sunshine,” Walter winked and flashed me that quick smile of his before handing me back over to Daniel, who’d pulled a passable dance out of inexperienced Sheila. Afterward, she beamed, whispering to me, “Did you see me dance, Sunny? Huh?”

“Yeh,” I grinned back. “A regular ol’ Betty Grable.”

Doretha flirted a little with Aunt Tina’s son, Alvin. His response was so
flat
she soon moved on to tease Timmy, who blushed and let her coax him into dancing to
Sh-Boom,
an awkward but fun venture for both. Alvin’s bland gaze followed Doretha, who was not usually the flirty, partying, dancing type. Tonight, she stretched herself. All to honor us, the Acklins.

The McGuire Sisters’
Sincerely,
Daniel’s and my song, had everybody on their feet in the crowded room. I giggled as Walter tried to pull Doretha in his arms and she swatted him soundly, then succinctly put the distance of the room between them. He winked at me and seized Sheila for a spin, delighting her to no end.

We’d pushed back all the chairs and sofa to make dance space and Daniel’s arms felt wonderful and snug and
right.
Our cheeks melded and his breath rustled my temple hair. Anticipation threaded its way through me like a warm fizzly spring. Soon we’d be married and experience the fullness of love.

“Mama!”
Doretha shrieked, that in itself phenomenal, since she normally barely spoke above a whisper. Daniel and I sprang apart, startled as our gazes followed hers to the kitchen doorway, where Berthie stood, blinking in confusion. It took a moment to register.

She wore only a loose-fitting brassiere from which she spilled like mounds of soft rounded, kneaded dough, and a half-slip that revealed her nakedness underneath. Even her feet were bare. The sight, so at odds with the strong, dignified Berthie I’d come to know, smote me profoundly.

Doretha rushed and herded her away. “Now, Mama, you know…” Her voice faded as they climbed the stairs to Berthie’s bedroom.

My heart grieved. The Berthie I knew was not behind those eyes.

Walter looked a mite flushed as he hurried to cover the awkward moment. “Berthie, she — ahhh, she’s growing a bit forgetful at times.” His brow furrowed. “I wonder where Dad is?” He seemed irritated that his father hadn’t prevented the scene. Then suddenly, his quick, James Dean-crooked grin appeared. “Hey, let’s get back to partying.”

We did. But the evening had lost its magic.

~~~~~