Can somebody turn off that there TV?
Porsha turned it off.
You see what the woman done to me? Mr. Pulliam gestured to the white kitchen towel pressed to his head. I jus asked her to get my medicine. I’m sick.
Sick in the head.
Damn this woman. She sposed to be my wife. Look at what she done to me.
I can’t miss it.
Take her to jail. I worked a good job. I’m sick.
He struck me.
Law, I swear I never touched that woman. I swear on a mountain of Bibles.
Don’t let your nasty mouth mention the Good Book.
I’m sick.
He struck me.
Well, seem like what we got here don’t add up. Somebody talkin out the side they face.
Law, it ain’t me.
It is you.
You both want to go to jail?
I’m sick.
Not sick enough.
Well one of you is talkin sideways. Girl—
The white officer looked at Porsha.
— what happened here?
That’s right. My granddaughter here can testify.
That’s fine wit me. She saw what happen. Tell Law here what happen.
Porsha said nothing. She had something to say but the words wouldn’t come.
Girl look scared to me.
She from the city. Up North.
Maybe that explain it. City life. Come on here. The white officer took Mr. Pulliam by the shoulder and moved him toward the front door. We better see bout yo head. Now, ma’m. You be nice. I don’t wanna come back here. I do, both yall comin down wit me to the jail. We got plenty room.
Law, she attacked me.
The white cop looked at Porsha. Something mighty wrong wit that girl.
She’s a mamma’s girl. Lula Mae smiled. When she was a toddler, I used to call her Duck. Followed her mamma everywhere.
Well, pigeons never fly far from home, the white officer said. All wrapped up in them apron strings.
Young folks. Lula Mae smiled. What can you do? Who can you blame?
Blame? the white officer said. I know this, what you put down is what pops up.
Lula Mae gave the officer a hard look. Her brown eyes toughened like shit.
WHERE DID LULA MAE GET THE TREES? Porsha said. Did she plant them herself or were they already here?
I don’t know, Mamma said.
EACH MORNING, Lula Mae angled into her white dress, pulled old lady stockings over her cotton-scarred legs, slipped on her white rubber-soled shoes — nurse’s shoes she called them, tennis shoes she called them — fitted the helmet of her wig, clamped in her horse bit of teeth, stepped into her face — it shone like a powdered mask — checked her clam-shaped purse—Where my pocketbook? — then hustled off to clean some white folks’ house.
You be good while I’m gone. Don’t act up.
GRACIE STARTED IT.
No I didn’t.
Yes you did.
You started the whole thing.
You started it.
No I didn’t. You did. Mamma was crying now.
You a lie. You started it. Gracie was crying now too.
You the one that’s a lie. You know you started it.
I ain’t start shit.
Yes you did.
Why you wanna lie?
You know you started it.
SHE WOULD KEEP THIS FOR HERSELF. All those years she had never mustered the nerve to ask Lula Mae to give it to her. The photograph shows three card players in a bare-walled shack. Two brothers and a stranger. All three wear tattered clothing. The older brother, mustache and all, passes the younger brother a card under the table, passes the card with his toes.
COME ON HERE. We going to the dolla sto.
The dollar store on Main Street next to Kress’s (the five-and-dime), next to the bicycle shop where Porsha purchased her first real bicycle (without training wheels), across the street from the Rexall, where you could buy anything you wanted. Lula Mae walked to the dollar store every day and spent money simply because the spending was cheap. Items two for a dollar, four for a dollar, ten for a dollar. Stocking up.
Come on here. We going to town.
Meaning Memphis. Down Main Street to the bridge and across the bridge, the river beneath reaching up to touch you like a live cold hand, into Memphis, John Brown bent forward over the steering wheel, his two withered hands moving near his throat like they were adjusting his tie. John Brown always looked at Lula Mae as if she was something rare.
YOU THINK THIS WILL BE ENOUGH? Sheila said.
Porsha looked at the seven bottles of Mogen David wine in Sheila’s suitcase.
You got those from the Shipcos? she asked. Steal wasn’t the right word. If it was she couldn’t say it. Both she and Sheila knew that the Shipcos would hardly miss them. Even if they did, they had money to spare and could buy more.
Sheila nodded.
I guess they’ll do. You know black folks like sweet wine.
YOU BUY THE DRANKS?
Yes.
You thought I didn’t see you. Comin from Chinamen’s. Actin a fool.
What I do?
Actin a fool round those mannish boys.
When?
I can’t send you to the sto without you actin a fool?
I ain’t—
You better be careful. Can’t jus run fast and foolish when those boys bother yo principle.
I ain’t do nothing.
What I tell you bout talkin back?
I ain’t talkin back.
You mamma ain’t teach you no better.
She teach me.
You need to be churched, Lula Mae said.
That’s where we going? I don’t want—
Hush yo mouth.
— to church.
We going.
You gon dress me?
Why, child, why?
My mamma said don’t put none of them cheap earrings on me.
Lula Mae drew back her hand. Go on. Lip smart. Go on.
PORSHA STOOD IN THE KITCHEN and looked out the door to the backyard. Not ready to enter the yard yet. Let her toes feel the sun-heated grass.
Little Sally Walker
Sitting in her saucer
Weeping and crying for someone to love her
Rise, Sally, rise
Wipe ya weepin eyes
Put ya hands on ya hips
And let ya backbone slip
Shake it to the east
Ah, shake it to the west
Shake it to the one you love the best
Skip a song down the two long railroad planks that flattened the grass in a path to the lil house.
Here, kitty kitty. Here, kitty kitty. Lula Mae calling out the back door. Calling her cats. Cans of dog food (Chuck Wagon) waiting in the grass. She never let them in the house.
MAMMA? Porsha said. I wanna ask you something. How long was she gone?
Trolleys that carried you down the serrated palisade of Main Street, carried you past the poplar-filled and maple-filled square, by dingy brick three-storied houses or smoke-grimed frame houses with tiers of wooden galleries in grassless plots, junkyards, greasy spoons with rows of noisy backless twirling barstools, a lone tree out front, lop-branched magnolia or stunted elm.
A long time.
But how long?
I don’t know, but it was long.
Beulah says two years.
Way longer than that.
And Gracie says ten.
Not that long. We went to Houston to live with Daddy Larry and his wicked heifer.
The wicked stepmother?
Mamma nodded. Yes, the wicked stepmother. Ivory Beach. She never messed wit me or R.L., but she jus couldn stand Gracie.