Four of a Kind: A women's historical fiction (73 page)

Late in the night we at last stop in front of the Lighthouse – for the first time I notice it looks a bit rickety, like it’s in competition with me to see who falls first. Looks like every light is on, Mama’s way of saying Welcome Home. I want to run back in to its safe womb and never leave again. I didn’t do so good out there on my own.

Jerry stares at the house, his hands motionless on the steering wheel, his body so still, his eyes distant, to the point that I’m thinking he’s listening for crunching leaves or a breaking stick, like he’s stalking deer. I don’t like the idea of him doing that to my home-place.

“Thank you for a safe trip home!” I say as gaily as possible. That should scare the deer away.

“Win-na-de-ya-ho,” he says softly but he’s not looking at me.

Another old coot talking gibberish. I roll my eyes, gather up Jesi, and leave him in the truck without invitation. I decide to tell Mama he didn’t want to come in. “Leave my suitcases on the sidewalk,” I say above Jesi’s whimpers.

I
’m writing this from the hospital. Long story. I’ll get to it. First, here’s what I wrote on the bus trip down to Nashville.

February 26, 1964: Isaac and I are on a Greyhound and will be traveling all night. Here we sit, heading to a sit-in.

“Sit-in will be easy with your leg and all,” Isaac said, as we took our seat at the front of the Greyhound. “Now we both will be even.”

“Even?”

“Yeah, we’ll both have a handicap.” He pointed to his skin. “Where we’re going, my skin keeps me from doing a lot.” I wonder again how old he is. There’s something older about him, like his mannerisms and white shirt and tie, but it’s hard to tell; his brown skin is clear and his forehead is as smooth as fudge.

“Did I ever tell you how old I am?” he asked. Yeah, he does that all the time – reading my mind, I mean. “I’m forty-four.”

“Groovy,” I answered. Forty-four? Holy Shit!

“Did I ever tell you that I’ve slept in your house?”

“Did we sleep together? Slip me some acid and now I don’t remember?”

“You weren’t born yet. I was only two years old. Your grandpa brought me and my family up here. After my dad was lynched. We stayed at the Lighthouse for a few days until my uncle and my mother got themselves jobs. Your grandpa helped there too. They still talk about it and drive me by your house and tell me never to forget about the good white people, no matter how bad it gets. I can remember wetting the bed there and getting whipped for it and I can remember that winding staircase and me sliding down those wooden stairs bumpity-bump in my pajamas. We moved to the colored section of town where I quit school and went back to Savannah looking for my roots.
I found out they’re actually in the small town right outside Savannah called Pickerville. Ever heard of it?”

“Only on my birth certificate,” I said, thinking how cool that he knows my birth place, but not surprised; he flips me out in knowing more about me than I do. Mama and GB would look all upset when I brought up anything about my birth, like it was JFK’s assassination or something. So then out of nowhere GB said she’d work something out to where I’d know all about where I came from. Thanks to GG telling me where the key is to their chapters, now I know more than I want to know. I sure as hell ain’t telling Isaac about that.

“You mean you and me were born at the same place?” Isaac asked, giving me his first grin of the day. “I knew you lived at the Lighthouse; that’s why I sat behind you in Civics class. Did I tell you that I came back up north to finally get my high school diploma? We got more in common than we thought, white sugar!”

More in common than he knew; I still don’t have my diploma. A Goof maybe, but I’m a hip Goof.

So we’re heading south and the further down we go, the further back in the bus we sit. When we change buses in Kentucky, we go to the last row. “I got dibs on this here seat,” he says with a weak chuckle.

“Why?” I asked stupidly.

“Cause I want no trouble,” he answered as he flops down, hard, like someone pushed him.

“We could pretend we’re back in the Passion Pit,” I teased, referring to his name for parking in the back row of the drive-in movie.

He looked out the window, saying nothing. Out there was getting hotter and hotter, and darker and darker. Okay, it’s getting night time but you get my drift.

“Are we driving into hell or something?” I asked, trying to lighten him up.

No smile. He looked out the window some more. He’s not frosted but he’s not happy either. “Very, very close,” he finally answered, so softly I lean in to hear him. “So close, you can smell the smoke. And at night, if you’re real quiet, you can hear the cries.” And then he begins reciting a cool poem that he tells me later is called “Silhouette” by Langston Hughes:

Southern gentle lady

Do not swoon

They’ve just hung a black man

In the light of the moon

They’ve hung a black man

To the roadside tree

In that dark of the moon

For the world to see

How Dixie protects

Its white womanhood

Southern gentle lady

Be good!

Be good!

I look out the bus window into the black night and the whole thing gives me goose bumps. What’s odder than what he’s saying is how he’s saying it. He’s mumbling now and speaking faster, like he doesn’t want anyone to overhear, and he doesn’t want anyone to stop him. This tall straight proud man loses his posture, too, and stops looking me in the eye. But the thing most far out is, he’s replacing “Yeah, man” with “Yes, sir”. He’s freaking me out to where yesterday I would’ve kidded around with something like,
You wanna be my slave? Like maybe my sex slave?
But today I’m afraid he’d go ape. He’s probably going to go ape-shit over me even saying “ape”.

It’s morning when we get off the bus in Nashville and the day just gets freakier from there. Two colored men met us at the bus station and called me a “righteous babe” and Isaac got some of his confidence back and introduced them as “old room mates” and they all laughed like that’s a good joke. Not So Funny when I pieced together that their living arrangement was at the Parchman State Prison. They called themselves Freedom Riders in those days. “Doesn’t sound so free to me,” I said uneasily and they laughed easily. They mentioned some sort of clan and how this clan set fire to a bus the Freedom Riders were riding in, like they were talking about a Sunday drive. “Weren’t you scared, man?” One of them, Joseph, placed his large brown hand on my shoulder and answered, “I used to go to Martin Luther King’s church and he preached that there is some evil in the best of us and some good in the worst of us. When you look at everybody that way, you don’t get so scared.”

We walked to the bus terminal lunch counter, where a sign was posted stating,
We Serve Only White Trade Here
. I turned to walk away and Isaac asked where I was going? “Somewhere where we all can eat,” I said. The three of them laughed again, jolly laughter and I wondered why colored people have such nice white teeth. “Get with it, righteous babe!” Henry said.

They sat casually at the counter and I said, “That’s cool,” like we do this all the time. The waitress behind the counter didn’t look so cool. “Everything’s copasetic,” I said to her. “I’m Goldilocks and this is the three bears and we would like some porridge please.” She pretended like we weren’t even there. Isaac put his finger to his lips to me and I clammed.

We sat there for an hour until I got so hungry watching her bring burgers and fries to other customers. “You need to eat,” Isaac whispered to me. “I want you to stay here and me and the other two will go out on the street. Order some sandwiches and bring them out, okay?” He laid two dollars on the counter.

As soon as they left, the waitress brought me a menu. “My mother has polio and that’s the only reason I’m serving you. You better find you a new batch of friends, people of your own kind, if you’re staying here in this town.” She shook her head, kind of like a mother who sees her child misbehaving.

I brought the food wrapped in wax paper out to the boys and they’re all laughing again. “What gives?” I asked. “Goldilocks, I thought I’d lose it back there,” answered Henry. “
The three bears?
You are a trip!” and they cracked up again.

We scarfed our tuna sandwiches down on the way to Kress 5&10. “We gotta keep moving if we want to start a movement,” Henry said. They tell me they’re all members of the NAACP and they’re opposing segregation at restaurants through nonviolent direct action. They tell me they hope I’m not here for kicks. They tell me I’m not “hep” but I will be when this day is over. They ask Isaac if we’re jacketed and he says I’m his white sugar to sweeten his bitter coffee and he gives me a wink. “That sounds easier on the ear than
zebra
,” says Henry and they all chuckle and shake their heads.

At the Kress lunch counter, it looks like the sit-in is in gear ‘cause there sat other colored folks at the counter. Isaac whispered to me that I could sit on the end of the counter if I wanted to, to stay out of line of any danger, so naturally I chose to sit between him and Henry. All of us sat calmly, all the men decked out in white shirts and ties, and me in my shirtdress from Christmas, looking like we were going to church next. People started coming up behind us and saying shitty comments about niggers and nigger lovers but I followed Isaac’s lead and we never turned around to acknowledge them. In the mirror across from us, I could see a few of the taller flakes standing behind us, some greasers who had combed their hair into duck tails or wore flat-tops, and acting Elvis-cocky.

Isaac ordered coffee and we got the same eyeball that the waitress at the terminal counter threw us – and nothing else. We sat for four hours like that while the mob behind us thickened and I could feel the anger creeping down my back like molasses. Come to find out, it wasn’t molasses but cream. I’m about to freak out, so I put my hand over my mouth and turned to Isaac only to watch in horror as salt, mustard and ketchup were dumped on my three bears’ afro hair. They continued looking ahead, chins jutted out, mouths firmly shut, Joseph looking so sad. Isaac whispered, “These are probably local clan members. Don’t sweat it. Remember: Nonviolent resistance.” Sitting like that, our backs were to the wall – if you get my drift – and with nowhere to go, man, it was a bummer.

Isaac didn’t set me up for this sort of bullshit hostility but hey, it’s probably my fault since I was bragging about how I came from three women who fought in revolutions. I claimed I came ready as Superman but I sure as hell wasn’t geared up for the cigarette someone put out on Joseph’s arm. Joseph flinched, Joseph broke out in a sweat but Joseph was one badass in being able to take that and not lose it. It was all I could do not to turn around and give the asshole back there the bird.

“Maybe we should book it,” said Isaac to Joseph. He was chewing on his lip.

“Tomorrow it’s McCrory’s lunch counter,” Joseph said with a feeble smile.

No sooner than he said that, I saw caps and uniforms in the mirror and heard whistles blowing and someone yelled out, “The Fuzz!” and it all turned to mayhem.

I swear to Buddha, I’ve never seen anything like it – police pigs grabbing colored men off their stools and beating them with clubs. White racists spitting and yelling, like this is a legal dog fight. Someone grabbed my bandana I had wrapped around my hair and my cool choker I had beaded myself and dragged me off my stool. When I tripped over my bum leg and fell to the floor, the group around me noticed my brace and I heard, “She’s a cripple, man, leave her alone.” I crawled between pants, peggers, all straight legs, to the front of the place and huddled in the corner, shaking. I looked out the plate glass window and saw them handcuffing Isaac and I jumped to attention and pushed my way outside.

“Why are you arresting him,” I shouted above the roar. “He’s done nothing wrong! We were just sitting in there!”

“Disturbing the peace, breaking segregation laws, disorderly conduct, you name it, miss, we can pin it on him.” The pig looked me up and down, like he was drawing designs on me, and finally said, “You don’t belong here. Now get outta here before I change my mind.” He jerked hard at Isaac’s cuffed hands and I saw Isaac grimace. His lip was bleeding and he had a large bump on his forehead. So damn unfair!

“Why won’t you arrest me, huh? I’m a cripple, right? I’m no good to you, is that it?” I slowly raised my hand and my middle finger popped out like it’s been dying to all day. “Climb on this, Tarzan!”

Isaac turned around as far as he could to try to face me with his hands behind his back. I could see his eyes bugging out at my finger. “Cool it, white sugar,” he said. “He’s right, you don’t belong here. You go on! Call David Lewis and he’ll come get you.”

“You can’t tell me what to do!” I shouted. “No man can tell me what to do. Arrest me, too! Is it because I’m white then, is that it?” The policeman turned his back to me and walked away with Isaac.
That’s when I noticed a riot had broke out around me and someone had set fire to the rag top of a hot-rodder and people were yelling “It’s gonna blow!” and I have this unexplained terror of fire and I couldn’t stay in this madhouse alone, to die, to burn in hell. I was going with Isaac All The Way. With all my limping might, I ran at the uniform and shoved him hard in his back. He tripped and almost fell to the ground, bringing Isaac with him. Isaac looked at me like I was a mad woman; I suppose I looked that way, maybe I was. “Arrest me, you racist pig,” I yelled. “I’m a nigger lover and I love this one!”