The Darkest Child Read online

  Wallace was restless, and paced from the kitchen door to the front door, back and forth, and I noticed how, under my nose, Wallace had grown right over my head.Things had a way of doing that, I supposed.They just grew and grew and snowballed until no one could tell how anything had ever started. My family, people I had known all my life, were turning into strangers. I was at a loss to say why and when it had begun, but it was so.

  And, at the end of this dreary evening, Mushy did not return to Penyon Road with me. She called Richard Mackey, who came and took her away from the gloom of Skeeter’s house.

  Tarabelle was the only upbeat person in the room. She crushed out her cigarette in a dish provided by Martha Jean, then she turned to me and asked, “How’s Mama these days?”

  “She’s doing all right,” I answered.

  “Bugs still crawling all over her?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Well, Tan, I’m going to Hell,” she announced cheerfully. “I always wondered ’bout that, and now I’m certain. I got it straight from Reverend Nelson’s mouth.”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked, and glanced at the others to see if they were paying attention to Tarabelle.They were.

  “You know that ‘honor thy mother’ thing Mama always be making us say? Remember how they used to make us say it in Sunday School, too, and made us read it on the Sunday School cards.Well, I figured it must be in the Bible, so I asked Reverend Nelson. It’s true. He showed it to me, Tan, and read it to me ’cause I couldn’t figure it out. It’s in Exodus, and it say, ‘Honor thy father and thy mother.’ I told him I ain’t got no father and I already done beat up my mother. He said I need to ask forgiveness from God and Mama or else I’m gon’ burn in Hell. I ain’t gon’ ask neither one for forgiveness ’cause I ain’t sorry. Guess I’m going to Hell. What you think, Tan?”

  I just stared at her, as did everybody else.Tarabelle lit another cigarette, rose from the couch, and walked out.

  It was dark, a little after nine, when the rest of us left Skeeter’s house.Velman dropped me off at the turn of the bend on Penyon Road.“I’d go in with you if I thought it would do any good,” he said, “but I know it would just make things worse.”

  I nodded, and silently admonished myself for my stupidity. It hadn’t seemed so bad when I’d thought Mushy would be coming home with me, but now I was afraid. I eased my way around to the rear of the house, then slowly pushed open the back door and stepped into the darkness of the kitchen. Holding my breath, I listened for sounds of my mother’s presence, expecting her to leap from one of the corners like a jack-in-the-box. My heart raced, sending a pulsating echo through my skull, but nothing sprang out at me. Nothing happened.There was no sign of Mama, and when I dared to breathe, there was no scent of her.

  In the front room, I dropped to my knees and reached for the pile of folded blankets. My hand swept across a furry ball, like a small animal, only there was no warmth to this fur, and it did not make a sound. It was light as air and moved freely with the sway of my palm. As I raised my hand, particles of fuzz adhered to my fingers. I rubbed my hands together trying to sense what I had touched. Finally, I threw caution to the wind, and lit the kerosene lamp.

  A scream tangled in my throat as I stared in alarm at a floor covered with what appeared to be human hair. I pulled away the blankets that covered my sisters, and both girls awoke, saw me, reached out to me, and began to weep. I wanted to wrap them in my arms, but I could not move. I could only stare at their naked heads.Thin lines of blood had spiraled and dried around the few remaining strands of hair that jutted out from their scalps.

  “They said I could have it.”

  I whirled to the sound of my mother’s voice. Either she had quietly slipped into the room, or the pounding in my head had muffled her footsteps. How she had come was irrelevant; why she had come was crucial. In one hand she held a pair of scissors, and in her other a pair of pinking shears.

  “I thought you had done run off, Tangy Mae,” she said in a weary voice, as she advanced on me at a slow, steady pace. “I can’t have no mo’ of my children running off. It ain’t right. I need yo’ hair, and you said I could have it. I done figured out what was wrong. I never had enough hair to work the spell right.”

  There was no way I was going to stand still and let her butcher my scalp the way she had done Laura’s and Edna’s. I did not have to think about it. I dipped my shoulders and made a move to rush past her. She stepped in front of me to block my passage, and the pinking shears fell from her hand and clattered against the floor.As she leaned down to retrieve them, I darted behind the coal stove and rushed for the back door. I could hear Laura and Edna screaming, screaming, screaming, but I could not stop.

  My feet touched the porch, then I was on the ground. My mind reeled. If I ran for the woods, I would be blocked in by Mr. Barnwell’s fence, and God only knew what was on the other side. If I ran for Fife Street, my mother could get in her car and run me down. I knew I had to make a decision. If I continued to stand, frozen, in darkness, my mother would burst through the back door and seize me.Moving by memory, I turned the corner of the house and rushed past the front porch. I would go to Mushy, she would help me. I was moving fast when a voice out of the night calmly whispered my name.

  “Tangy Mae.”

  She was on the front steps, near the ground. I could not see her, but she was there. I heard the snip of the scissors, then I saw the sudden beam from a flashlight, and I heard my mother’s feet pounding the dirt behind me as I raced along Penyon Road toward Fife Street.

  A ray of light swept across the field, over my head, in the direction of the gully, as Mama searched for me with her flashlight. I thought I could feel the light on my back. In a second her scissors would sail through the air and pierce my spine and I would bleed to death, face down, on Penyon Road.Tears spilled from my eyes, and I fought the impulse to scream. If I screamed and brought shame to my mother, she would kill me over and over again. I ran, reached the top of Fife Street, then hid behind hedge bushes and waited for the sound of my mother’s car. After a long period of silence, I rose from the bushes and made my way toward the flats.

  fifty

  “Mama, what the hell have you done?” Mushy shouted.

  “All this time you been in town and ain’t once stopped by to see me,” Mama responded calmly. “Now you gon’ step up in my house raising yo’ voice at me?”

  Mushy sighed, keeping her distance from our mother. “Mama, what’d you do to these babies?” she asked.“I’m gon’ get the sheriff out here.You done went too far this time.”

  “Get ’im,” Mama said.“Ain’t no law say I can’t cut my children’s hair. If there was a law against cutting hair, half the town would be in jail.”

  “It ain’t right, Mama,” Mushy said.“How they gon’ go to school wit’ they heads looking like that?”

  Mama did not answer. She picked up her cigarettes from the table, shook one loose from the pack and lit it. She leaned her head against the back of the chair and blew smoke toward the ceiling. We stood in silence and watched.

  It was five o’clock in the morning, and we had walked from the flats to Penyon Road. I had waited on Skeeter’s porch for Richard Mackey to bring Mushy home. Although Velman wanted to know why I had returned, I would not tell him. I was too ashamed to share with him the price my defiance had cost my sisters, so I had waited for Mushy, who was nearly as much to blame.

  We stood in the front room and watched our mother blow smoke rings in the air. Mushy stared at Laura and Edna; I scanned the room for the scissors and pinking shears. Finally Mushy said, “I’m going back up to Skeeter’s to pack my things, then I’m coming on home.”

  Mama glanced up.“You telling me or asking me?”

  “I’m asking, Mama,” Mushy mumbled. She was wearing the same gray-and-white dress she had worn the night before, only it was wrinkled now. Her eyes were bloodshot, as though she had not slept a wink, and neither comb nor brush had touched her hair.
/>
  “Awright then. I guess you can stay for a spell,” Mama said.

  And it was over—like nothing had ever happened—like Laura and Edna did not resemble plucked chickens. Mushy would move in, make everything right, and we would get on with living. I suspected this peaceful scenario would fall apart at any moment.

  fifty - one

  Each time I glanced at my sisters, I felt the guilt of disobedience. Mama kept them home from school, and I was glad about that because the teasing they would have suffered would have been far worse than missing lessons. Mushy and Mama put their heads together and decided I should inform Mr. Hewitt that the girls had tetter. This would justify their absenteeism and explain their lack of hair.

  The relationship between Mama and Mushy was volatile. Mama could not forgive Mushy for not coming out to the house sooner and Mushy admonished Mama for her disciplinary tactics. There were days, though, when I would come in from school to find them rolling with laughter or planning a night out together. Sometimes they would compete against each other in an effort to entertain Laura and Edna with bedtime stories.Those were really nice days. The bad days were when they pooled their pennies to buy corn whiskey, or when Richard Mackey came to the house to take Mushy out, or when Mama pulled at bugs and Mushy’s left eye twitched.

  We made it through Thanksgiving Day without incident, but on Christmas Day, Mama and Mushy had their worst argument ever. It started when Richard bought Mushy a sweater and a watch. He had also given her money, which she had used to buy Christmas gifts.Then Brenda Mackey arrived at our house in a rage, wanting to fight with Mushy. Brenda and Mama had double-teamed Mushy with insults. Mushy handled it well; she had laughed at them both, then gulped down a pint of corn whiskey.

  We had been invited to the Garrisons’ to bring in the New Year. Mushy wanted to celebrate with Richard, but she told this to me, not to Mama.Mama knew though, and she kept reminding Mushy that Richard was married. Mushy put on her cheerful face, and agreed to stop seeing Richard, but her left eye twitched something awful.

  At the Garrisons’ house, Mr. Frank opened the door for us, then made himself comfortable on the couch and stared at the television screen as we removed our coats. Laura and Edna rushed over to join him in front of the television.

  Mushy purposely hung back in the corner by the coatrack. She waited until Mama was in the kitchen with Miss Pearl, then she whispered, “Tan, I don’t think I can stay too much longer in that house wit’ Mama. I’m thinking I might go back to Cleveland, and Richard is thinking about going wit’ me.”

  “He’s married, Mushy.”

  “I know. I hear it every day from Mama.Tan, you think Mama ain’t never been wit’ a married man? She’s a hypocrite, that’s what makes me the maddest.”

  I shrugged. It was true. Mushy shook her head as though she could read my thoughts, then arm in arm we went into the kitchen. On the stove, a pot of black-eyed peas sent a spray of steam into the air that mingled with the fragrance of collard greens and candied yams. My mouth watered for just a taste, but I knew the meal was meant for tomorrow.

  Mama and Miss Pearl had already filled their glasses from a holiday bottle of Seagram’s 7 Crown when Mushy joined them. I sat at the table and listened to the women swap stories about the people in our town.They were able to find so much to laugh about; I wondered who was sitting at a table somewhere laughing at us.

  When the giggling trailed off, Mushy asked with a slight smile, “Mama, when you start getting all that gray hair? I didn’t notice it out at the house under the kerosene lamp, but here you can see it real good.”

  Miss Pearl laughed.“Mushy, yo’ mama ain’t gon’ stay young forever. What you think?”

  “I didn’t think she was gon’ get old so fast, Miss Pearl.You ain’t changing.”

  “We all changing, chil’. I don’t get ’round nothing like I used to. Remember, Rosie, how we used to stay up all night, dancing and drinking, then go to work the next day like it wadn’t nothing? I can’t do that no mo’.”

  “Ain’t no gray in my head,” Mama said.“Tangy Mae, you get up and see.”

  I eased off of my chair and went to stand over her. I barely scanned her hair before I said, “You have a little bit, Mama, but it’s pretty.”

  I wanted to steer clear of any trouble, but they seemed to deliberately pull me in. Mushy sipped from her drink and studied our mother. “I remember when me and Mama could go out together and people thought we was sisters,” Mushy said. “They sho’ don’t think that no mo’.”

  “Mushy, why can’t I just sit here in peace?” Mama asked.“I ain’t old.Why you wanna start picking on me?”

  “Nah, Mama, I ain’t picking. I was just remembering, ’cause we used to have some good times.” Mushy turned to face Miss Pearl.

  “Miss Pearl, you ever been out to the farmhouse?”

  “What farmhouse is that?” Miss Pearl asked.

  “There’s a hundred farmhouses out through the country,” Mushy said, “but when you say the farmhouse, everybody know where you talking ’bout.”

  “I done heard about it,” Miss Pearl said evasively, “but I ain’t never been out there.”

  Mama was running her hands through her hair, attempting to wipe the gray out, I assumed. She gave a sour grunt, and said, “Pearl, you oughta be shame of yo’self.You the one showed it to me.”

  Miss Pearl glanced quickly toward the front room. “Be quiet, Rosie,” she whispered. “Frank ain’t got no business knowing what I used to do. I ain’t been out there in years.”

  Stunned into silence, I stared at Miss Pearl, trying to imagine her at the farmhouse. In my eyes, she was above the transgressions of that horrible place.Maybe she had danced in the parlor, or had a drink or two, and did not know what went on in the rooms upstairs.

  “Mr. Frank know all about that place,” Mushy said. “Ain’t that right, Mama? I musta been ’bout ’leven or twelve when Mama tried to get Mr. Frank to screw me.He wouldn’t do it though, and I always respected him for that. He looked at Mama and said, ‘Rozelle, you oughta be shame of yo’self bringing that baby out here. Get her up and take her home!’Them was his exact words. I ain’t never gon’ forget it ’cause he the only man ever came out there didn’t jump on top of me.”

  Miss Pearl placed her glass on the table and folded her arms across her bosom. Her face was tightly puckered as though the Seagram’s had suddenly turned bitter. Her eyes were like balls of burning coal as they shifted from Mama to Mushy.

  Mushy smiled with assumed innocence. “I always thought Mr. Frank hated Mama,” she said. “Just goes to show.Year or so before I left here, you couldn’t keep ’em apart. He was all time bringing things out to the house. Bought Mama a dress once that was too fancy to wear anywhere in Triacy County.You remember, Mama?”

  The hum of the television reached the kitchen like the swarming of angry bees, and I shivered. Miss Pearl’s erratic breathing caused her pudgy arms to bounce against her breasts. She gave Mama ample opportunity to refute these charges, and I willed my mother to deny them, but Mama would not. She made no denials, excuses, or apologies. She picked up her drink, took a sip, and stared defiantly at the woman she had wronged.

  Miss Pearl rose slowly from her chair. Tears flowed from her eyes, drenched her cheeks, and turned her angry face a darker shade of black. She balled her right hand into a fist and swung it with enough force to send Mama, and the chair on which she sat, tumbling to the floor.

  For a moment, I thought I saw something akin to shame in my mother’s eyes, but it was merely the blinking of astonishment. Her head rested on the kitchen floor, and she brought a hand up to touch her face. She was staring up at Miss Pearl when Mr. Frank entered the room.

  “What’s going on in here?” Mr. Frank asked, glancing first at Mama stretched on the floor, then at his wife, who had both fists balled.

  “Let me help you up, Mama,” Mushy offered.

  Mama brushed Mushy’s hand away.“Don’t you touch me!”

&nbs
p; Nobody touched her. I righted the overturned chair, then backed away. All alone, Mama pulled herself up, and Miss Pearl watched her do so.

  “Rosie, we can’t never be friends no mo’,” Miss Pearl said in a voice so calm it belied rage.“Nobody coulda told me that you’d do something like this to me. I’m coming out to yo’ house first thing in the morning, and you gon’ give me everything Frank ever gave you. Every stitch of clothes and every penny. Then I don’t ever wanna lay eyes on you again.”

  My mother winced from the pain in her jaw, twisted her lips into a smirk, then snorted indifference through her nostrils.We followed her as she brushed past the Garrisons to retrieve her coat. Mushy and I bundled our younger sisters in theirs, and when we were all ready to leave, Mama paused at the front door.“Here you go, Pearl,” she said, shoving Edna forward.“This all I got left belong to Frank.”

  “Rozelle, you get the hell on outta here!” Mr. Frank shouted.

  “I’m going, and don’t you put yo’ hands on me, Frank.Y’all just take good care of Edna Pearl.” She spat the last word at him, and Miss Pearl, standing beside her husband, howled like a mad dog.

  Mama let the screen door bang behind her, and I heard Mushy say to Mr. Frank, “If I was you, I’d get Mama for that.”

  “You get on outta here, too, Mushy,” he said.“I heard what you said to Pearl in there. How come you wanna hurt Pearl, somebody ain’t never done you no wrong, just to get even wit’ Rozelle?”

  “You right, Mr. Frank,” Mushy agreed. “I’m sorry. But I didn’t hurt her all by myself, did I?”

  “Get out, Mushy!” Mr. Frank repeated as he reached a hand toward his wife that stopped just short of contact.

  Mushy rushed back to the kitchen and returned with the bottle of Seagram’s before fleeing from their house. I knew my sister well. She would find a nice, quiet spot, and drink herself into a stupor.