Swan Place (6 page)

When it was time
for us to go home, Aunt Bett said, “You all just leave your Sunday clothes here. I’ll freshen them up for you. You’ll be needing them for
 . . .
” She stopped and our eyes met.

“I know what it is we’ll need them for, Aunt Bett. And there’s no need for you to drive us home. We can walk.”

Darlene motioned me into the bedroom. “I’m glad my shirt looks nice on you, Dove, but let me get you another one for going home in.” She disappeared into “The Closet” and came out with another shirt. After I had taken off her favorite shirt and put on the new one, I saw that on the front was printed MAMA’S BIG GIRL and under that in smaller letters: FT. LAUDERDALE, FLORIDA. Darlene or Aunt Bett didn’t seem to notice that, and I decided I wouldn’t let it bother me. Besides, it was true. I most certainly was my mama’s big girl. And I always would be. Aunt Bett sent us off down the road with a basket loaded with ham wrapped in wax paper and a big jar of potato salad and some of her good biscuits—in case Roy-Ellis was hungry. He was home, but he was sitting in his chair, drinking a beer and watching the wrestling matches on television. His eyes were tired-looking, and I knew he wouldn’t be able to pretend that everything was okay.

“Aunt Bett sent over some ham and potato salad for you,” I told him. “I’ll put it in the refrigerator.”

“Thanks, honey,” Roy-Ellis mumbled. But I don’t think he even heard me. So I took care of Molly and Little Ellis until it was time for them to go to bed. As soon as they were asleep, I went to bed myself, because there didn’t seem to be anything else I could do. And when I crawled into my cot that night, it felt like a hundred years ago that the telephone had started ringing in the early morning darkness.

I knew exactly what she meant, because Aunt Mee always showed up to help in a house that was full of sad people. Anytime somebody died, Aunt Mee just came in through the back door, wearing a clean, carefully ironed, white apron, and she took over all the dish washing and refilling the trays on the dining room table, and just moved in and out like a dark shadow, doing for folks. When she went to help folks in the big houses, they had to call her to come, and they had to pay her, as well. But when black folks or even poor white folks had their sorrow, she came without anybody calling her or giving her a thing for it. I don’t know why.

By afternoon, all the ladies
from Aunt Bett’s church started arriving, and one went into the kitchen with me and helped me sort out what all had to go in the refrigerator and what could be stored on the counter. There was so much food, we had to rearrange everything in the refrigerator, and the whole time we worked, she kept making some kind of clucking noises. Sounded just like a hen. But she was a nice lady, and before she left, she said for me to call on her if I needed anything. I thanked her and said I would, but of course, I didn’t even know her name.

On Tuesday, Aunt Bett came over and brought our Easter clothes, all freshened up and looking nice. She worked at rearranging the refrigerator, as well, and when she shoved Roy-Ellis’s beer bottles out of the way, she snorted. After pushing them this way and that, she finally took all but one of the beer bottles out of the refrigerator and stored them in the bottom cabinet. But she handled them with only the tips of her fingers, and after she had moved them, she washed her hands. In the afternoon, Roy-Ellis and Aunt Bett said they needed to talk again, so Roy-Ellis gave me some money, and I walked with Molly and Little Ellis to town, where we got Popsicles at the little grocery store, and we ate them while we sat on a bench in the tiny park right in the middle of town. Then we went in the dime store, and I let Molly and Little Ellis look at all the toys. And everywhere we went, folks smiled sad smiles at us and clucked their tongues behind our backs.

When we came home, Aunt Bett and Roy-Ellis were sitting at the kitchen table, so I knew they had been talking again about “making arrangements.” I think Aunt Bett probably did most of the talking, because the next day, Wednesday, Mama’s funeral was held at Aunt Bett’s church. The lady who kept the nursery on Sundays even came in that afternoon so that Little Ellis and Molly and Aunt Bett’s little ones could stay with her, while the rest of us went into the sanctuary.

I didn’t like seeing Mama’s casket, but it was a right pretty one, and besides, I knew she wasn’t in it. Well, I mean that poor sick body was, but Mama wasn’t. And the whole time the preacher talked, I could almost hear her humming one of those honky-tonk songs I liked so much. I looked at Roy-Ellis, wishing he could hear it too, but he was just sitting there all stiff and miserable like if he moved so much as a single muscle, it would hurt him so bad he wouldn’t be able to stand it.

Once the service was over, I figured out some of what Roy-Ellis and Aunt Bett must have been deciding at the kitchen table. Because Roy-Ellis wanted the graveside service to be private—with just him there. We had already said our good-byes, and I guess he just wanted to have her all to himself one more time. I could tell Aunt Bett wasn’t too happy about that, but she must have finally agreed. We went along the hallway toward where the lady was taking care of the little ones, and I knew that I had to ask Aunt Bett a question. I wasn’t quite sure of how to ask it, but I meant to know.

“Aunt Bett, what kind of dress did my mama get buried in?”

She stopped walking. “How come you to ask such a thing?”

“I don’t know,” I answered. “I just wondered.”

But she looked so sad, I said, “I’m sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have asked.”

“It’s okay, honey.” She sighed. “You’re her very own daughter, and you should know. But I don’t want it to make trouble between you and Roy-Ellis.”

“What do you mean?”

“Dove, I went out and bought a beautiful white batiste nightgown with lace at the throat and wrists, and I paid a lot of money for it, but when I showed it to Roy-Ellis, he said he wasn’t about to send her off wearing a nightgown.”

“Then what did she wear?”

“Love have mercy!” Aunt Bett’s eyes filled up. “Roy-Ellis took one of those awful, honky-tonk, spangle dresses over to the funeral parlor, and my baby sister has gone to eternity dressed like that! Like a tramp or something!” Aunt Bett’s face had gone a deep red, and her chin was shaking.

I patted her arm. “It’s okay, Aunt Bett,” I tried to comfort her. “I’m pretty sure Jesus won’t mind one little bit about the dress.”

And I didn’t let her see me smile.

Aunt Bett dropped her
own children, and Molly and Little Ellis as well, off at her house, with Darlene to watch after all of them. “You all get out of those good clothes right away, you hear me? And hang them up! Darlene, you get some things out of the closet for Molly and Little Ellis.”

Aunt Bett was driving off, but with her head still out of the window, yelling her instructions to the children. Looking back, I saw Darlene laughing. On the way to our house, Aunt Bett said, “We have to hurry getting the food all set out. Folks will be coming any minute, I expect.”

“I think Aunt Mee may come to help,” I said.

“Aunt Mee! Why, I haven’t seen her in years.” Aunt Bett’s eyes went soft, and the corners of her mouth turned up just a little. So I figured she was remembering Uncle Frank who’d gotten himself killed by a runaway tractor when he was working old Mr. Carter’s land, way out on the Waynesboro Highway. I’d seen that same soft look and tiny smile once in a while when she looked at any of her children, and I knew she was seeing something of Uncle Frank in them—in the tilt of their ears or the line of their jaws. Because any time Aunt Bett thought of Uncle Frank, it was a beautiful thing. She didn’t seem to mind one little bit that he left her with nothing to help her in raising all those children. But she was doing all right. Because of her being so frugal and all.

When we got home, I found out just how right I had been about Aunt Mee. As soon as we came into the living room, we could smell the good food she was heating up. She had found a good tablecloth and had put it on the dining room table and had even put a platter of deviled eggs right over that blackberry jelly stain Mama had never been able to get out.

Not only that—Aunt Mee must have been watching and waiting for us to leave for the funeral, because she’d had time to run the vacuum cleaner and dust the furniture, and when Aunt Bett and I went into the kitchen, we could smell pine oil in addition to the good smells of the hot food. Aunt Mee was at the sink, with her arms in hot, soapy water almost up to her elbows. She turned and looked at us. “Good service?”

“Yes,” Aunt Bett answered, looking around admiringly at that perfectly spotless kitchen.

“Well, why don’t you ladies go lie down for a little minute. I’ll call you when folks start coming.” Why, Aunt Mee was treating us just like we were folks from across town and she was our maid. And her calling the both of us ladies had my mouth hanging open.

After a brief, startled moment, Aunt Bett said, “Thank you,” and without another word, she put her hand on my shoulder and guided me out of the kitchen. To my great surprise, she led me to the bedroom, where we saw that it, too, had been cleaned and dusted, and fresh sheets were on my cot and on the bed Molly and Little Ellis shared.

“We really gonna lie down?” I whispered, thinking that neither Aunt Bett nor I would be able to bear rumpling those crisp, spotless sheets.

“Of course not!” Aunt Bett snorted.

Because we both knew that to “lie down,” even for a “little minute” was something rich, pampered folks did. Not people like us, who knew all about working hard and keeping on with it, even if you were tired to death. So we stood in the room, not really knowing what to do.

“What are we doing?” I finally whispered.

“Heavens, child! I surely don’t know,” Aunt Bett confessed. Then she added “Doing whatever Aunt Mee said to do, is all.” So there we stood, not wanting to sit on the beds, and not wanting to go against what Aunt Mee had said for us to do. At last, we heard a car door slam, and Aunt Bett looked out of the window.

“They’re here,” she announced, and so we went into the living room, to greet the first arrival of Aunt Bett’s church people and Mama’s beauty parlor people, and Roy Ellis’s chicken plant people, all coming to comfort us.

All during the time
of visiting, Aunt Bett kept looking around for Roy-Ellis, even asking me if I had seen him one time. But I hadn’t. There were so many people and so much going on, I didn’t have time to think of Roy-Ellis. I must have said thank-you a hundred times to good folks who wanted to tell me how sorry they were about Mama. And I heard all kinds of comments when folks didn’t realize I was around:

“What’s going to happen to the children?”

“Roy-Ellis certainly can’t take care of them and work too.”

“I’ll bet you anything in this world that Bett will take them in. Her own sister’s children!”

“Bett’s already got enough to handle, what with trying to raise her own.”

It was late in the afternoon before everybody finally left, and when Aunt Bett and I went into the dining room, all the food had been cleared away. The kitchen itself was spotless, and the dishes we had to return to folks were all clean and shining and neatly set aside. The sink had been scrubbed, and in the refrigerator, the leftover food was neatly packaged and marked with little strips of masking tape that said what was in the package. Aunt Mee was gone.