Me & Emma

  “You don’t need to hide it, Carrie,” she says, pushing her glasses back up to the ridge that’s built into the crook of her nose for them. “I’ve seen it all week. What happened?”

  “Nothing, ma’am,” I say, crossing my hand over to cover what my sleeve cain’t.

  We both blink at each other, waiting to see where this conversation’s going.

  She breaks first. “Are there any more like it anywhere else?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  She cocks her head to the side and I can tell she’s deciding whether to believe me or not.

  “Now, Carrie…” She clears her throat again and points to the desk that Freddy Sprague sits in, so I use it and she squeezes her grown-up self into the one next door to it, where Ellie Frenden sits. “I know you may not believe me but I was once your age. I know how hard it is when you’re, ah—” her throat clears again “—living in a tough place. I had marks like that, too.”

  Then she stops talking. I’m supposed to say something. Jeez, what am I supposed to say?

  “So if you ever want to talk to anyone, someone who’s not your parents, I mean, well, you can come and talk to me.”

  The talking’s stopped again.

  “Do you have anything you’d like to tell me?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  There’s quiet between us, but it doesn’t feel like the quiet there was a second ago.

  “Well, all right, then,” she says, squeezing her hips back up through the space between the seat and Ellie Frenden’s desktop. “I guess that’s all.”

  I shoot out of the room like a bull pushes out of the gate at the rodeo.

  “Hey, Orla Mae, wait up.”

  “What’d Miss Ueland want with you?” she whispers to me. She’s arranging her books on the desk in the science room. The smell is all vapors and metal.

  “Aw, nothin’,” I lie. “She just chewin’ me out for not payin’ attention in her class.”

  Orla Mae nods her head. “Hey, can I come up with you to Mr. Wilson’s after school, watch you shoot? Maybe he’d teach me some.”

  “Yeah, maybe,” I say. “But you cain’t come today ’cause I need to get to the post office, remember? Plus Mr. Wilson don’t like new people. He didn’t even like us when we first met him. And his dog, Brownie, well she’s just a mean old dog,” I lie again.

  “What kind of a dog is she?”

  “She’s of the three-legged variety.”

  “Ain’t no such thing.”

  “Is, too. It’s how come she’s so mean. She’s mad she ain’t got four legs like all them other dogs.”

  “All right, all right,” she keeps on, “I’ll steer clear of the dog. I just wanna see you shoot, is all. Please?”

  Before I can say anything back, Mr. Tyler the science teacher pushes his way into the room like we’ve got some answering to do.

  “All right, now,” he starts class, “who’s the wiseacre who thought it’d be funny to soil all my glass slides? Huh?”

  Chapter Nine

  “Hey, Mr. Wilson,” I call ahead on my way up to his rickety house. “It’s me, Carrie!”

  But he ain’t nowhere to be seen.

  “Hey, Brownie,” I pat the dog’s head as she hobbles down to greet me. “Go on, now.” It’s annoying when she keeps on shoving her head under my hand to be pet. “Go on.” But she won’t go.

  “Mr. Wilson?” I holler up loud enough for my voice to carry through the screen door at the top of the steps but still nothing comes back.

  “Brownie, git,” I say, but she doesn’t mind me. “Go on!” I didn’t realize she was lighter than she looks so when I kick her to the side she yelps and goes a lot farther than I thought my foot would take her. She lowers her head and looks at me from the side and then limps over out of my way. That’ll teach her I mean business, as Richard would say.

  At the top of the stairs I put my hand in a salute over my eyes so I can see in through the screen door to check if Mr. Wilson’s there and just cain’t answer for some reason, but no sign of life. What’m I gonna do for a stamp?

  Before I realize it I’m tiptoeing through his front room, looking around for where he might keep them…or maybe some change so I can buy one at the post office. It’s impossible to think of where either might be in this mess. I need to get going so I get there before it closes, so after a minute or so I give up.

  “Whatchoo doing in my house, girl?” Mr. Wilson’s voice booms into my bones, which I practically have to scrape off the ceiling since he startled me so.

  “Um, um…”

  “Um, um, what? What you need?” he says, a bit softer, seeing how scared I look.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” I manage to say. “I called up but you didn’t answer and I need a stamp to send this letter to my Gammy and I wanted to get it in the mail today, ’fore the post office closed, and you weren’t around so I thought I’d just come on in and see if you had a stamp laying around, but I wasn’t gonna just take it. I’ll pay you back, I promise I—”

  “Now, slow down, sissy-girl,” he says, spitting his chewing tobacca into the plastic cup he’s always carrying around for that purpose. “I’ll git you your stamp just to git some peace and quiet around here.”

  He hobbles over to the sideboard with three drawers and rifles through it till he comes out with a brand-new stamp and holds it out for me to take.

  “Here ya are,” he says. “You can have it…ya ain’t got to pay me back or none if’n you can tell me who ’tis on the face of that stamp.”

  It looks familiar, this face with a dark beard. Stovepipe hat. “Abe Lincoln?” I say slow-like in case I see on his face that I’m wrong and then I can take it back and try again.

  “Bingo!” he says. “Man who brought this country to its knees. I reckon you be hearing all ’bout the war ’tween the states in school so I ain’t gonna start wit’ you now. Plus I want my house back to myself after the day I had, so go on and git to the post office.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Wilson!” I lick the stamp on my way out the door and fix it to the corner of the envelope I lifted from Mr. Tyler’s desk on my way out of science class. He was too busy taking care of Alver Quinten, who took the fall for the slides ’cause Odie Rice pointed to him behind his back when Mr. Tyler was scanning the room.

  Just like Orla Mae said, the blacktop leads me right to the post office and I get there in plenty of time ’fore it closes. My mouth waters when I pass the jar of lemon sticks, but I keep on going, seeing’s how I don’t have any money to buy none, anyway. Emma’d be mad as the Nutrena rooster if I came home without one for her, so I guess I’m better off all the way around.

  The clothes on the man behind the counter hang on his thin body like they would a hanger. He says nothing, just reaches out his bony hand with knobby knuckles for my letter and peers at the address and stamp by tilting his head back so his eyes will match up with his half glasses. He puts it with care on top of a pile of other letters sitting in a box with Outgoing written on it in perfectly shaped black letters. Then he turns to me and waits.

  “Is that it?” I ask him. Seems to me it must be harder than this.

  He nods slow-like.

  “Thank you,” I mumble so I can still consider myself polite even though I doubt he heard me.

  Now we just have to wait.

  On the walk back home I feel lighter for a bit, but by the time I’ve passed Antone’s department store with the faded Closed sign in the window next to the sign for Human Hair Wigs, I start thinking I should have written “don’t tell Momma I wrote this” on the letter somewhere. She’ll be hopping mad
if Gammy lets on I begged her to come. Shoot, I’ll be whipped no matter what so I might as well leave it be.

  Chapter Ten

  “You’re lucky I got too much to do today, little miss,” Momma says to me in a snarly kind of way, “otherwise I’d tan your hide darker than it’s ever been in your sorry little life. Now, go on. Take that rug outside and beat it good and hard. When you’re done, fill up the bucket and help me with these floors.”

  Momma was surprised about Gammy coming, all right. When I heard her holler for me after hanging up the phone I knew it was Gammy who called, and Emma and me, we stayed clear of her altogether for a whole day and a half.

  Gammy got my letter and called straight away to say she and Aunt Lillibit were gonna make the trip to see us. Now, I don’t know for sure if she told Momma I’d written her, but the meanness in Momma’s voice these past two days tells me she did. It’s the first time in my life I’m happy there’s a lot of housework to do. Momma’s puttin’ out the dog for Gammy. She pulled out the fancy nuts and everything.

  The fanciest thing I’ve ever seen is Mr. Peanut, with his eyeglass and cane and that big ole smile. I love how his stick legs look about to dance. And I love his fancy top hat. People here don’t ever dress up. Momma has a real pretty dress, but she almost never wears it because she says it makes her look like she’s expecting. Expecting what, I don’t know.

  I’ve decided I want to get this label that’s stuck on the can off so I can keep Mr. Peanut. After I do this I’ll do the rugs real good but first…

  There’s only one ridge of glue holding it on so I’m trying to slide my fingernail right up close to it so it doesn’t tear and then I can peel the rest off no problem. But the paper is getting jagged because the glue isn’t in a straight line.

  Almost there, almost there. I’m a little over halfway down the can from the plastic top you can pull off and put back on “for lasting freshness.” If I quit now, Mr. Peanut will get ripped off tonight and then he’ll be thrown away and who knows when Momma will buy nuts again. We’ve had this can for years, it moved with us from Murray Mill Road. Momma pours a handful of nuts into the milky white dish my grandmother gave her—a housewarming present she said, but someone should’ve told her dishes don’t make you warm—and if some are left over she carefully pours them back into the can and puts them back up on the shelf. My cousin Sonny once touched all of them after he scraped dog doo off his shoe and then didn’t even wash his hands (and I know for a fact Momma saw this, too) and Momma still poured the leftovers back in the can.

  * * *

  “Why doesn’t Momma want Gammy to come visit us?” Emma asks me. She’s squeezing the suds out of the rag she’s been soaking in the bucket. We’ve got a floor-cleaning system: Emma rinses and squeezes and I rub the floor until the rag’s dirty and then we do it all over again in a different spot.

  “I guess we’ll be finding out soon enough,” I say.

  “She’s not going to tell us anything.”

  “I know, stupid,” I say, pushing some of my hair back behind my ears so I can see better what all I’m doing. “But it’s bound to come out once she’s here, don’t you think?”

  * * *

  “That the way you greet your kin?” Gammy says, pulling her body out of the car. She’s talking to me and Emma. We’re hanging back closer to the steps to the house in case Momma decides now she’s really gonna cream us good, now that all the housework’s finished.

  “Come on over and give your gammy and your auntie a hug, right proper,” Momma says toward our direction. I can tell her voice is fake nice, but I don’t think anybody else could.

  Gammy’s traveling dress smells like Clorox bleach. Aunt Lillibit doesn’t lean down for us to hug her but instead reaches out to pat us on our heads and then pulls her hand back like she’s having second thoughts about that, too.

  Momma’s chattering up and down to them like a raccoon at a garbage can: How was the trip? You all tired? You hungry? I got corn bread, Momma, I can fix you up a slice. What about you, Lil? Ooh, looky your hair, all done up like it is—ain’t no place round here to get that done, I’ll tell you what. That too heavy, Momma? Lemme get it.

  Chattering away, she is. And me and Emma, well, I guess we feel like the dog that chases the car and finally catches it. We don’t know what to do now that Gammy’s come on out to see us for her ownself. The way she’s looking at us, I reckon she’s feeling the exact same way.

  * * *

  “Ow!”

  “Hold still, child,” Gammy says. “Hold ya head still.”

  “You’re pulling too hard. Ow!”

  “This hair of yours…” She doesn’t finish the sentence but stands up from the edge of the bed and pushes me to the side so she can get up from behind me. When she leaves the room I look back onto the bed. She left the brush, with my hairs stringing through it.

  When she comes back I do not like what I see.

  “Gammy, no!”

  “Hold still or it’ll be a lot worse’n what I have in mind,” she says, snipping the scissors into the air to get ’em all warmed up.

  “I’ll pull the brush through.” I try to slow her down, but fingers are gripping the top of my head, keeping me from turning and reaching the brush.

  “Your momma,” snip, “should’ve done this,” snip, “years ago,” snip, “’stead of lettin’ it git this bad.” Snip.

  “Gammy!”

  Snip.

  “Please, Gammy,” I cry. But it’s too late—the chunks of rats’ nests fall into my lap and, soon, to either side of me.

  “Hold still.”

  The snips match my sobs.

  “Why’d you have to come out here, anyway?” I ask her when my tears dry up.

  “Oh, hush,” she says. “You know as well as I do why I came, so just be quiet.” The cold metal of the scissors slides against the back of my neck and gives me shivers. “I’m just evening up the bottom here and you’re all done.”

  I never look in the mirror ’cause I’m too scared to reach up and tell how short it is.

  “Don’t look too bad, if I do say so m’self,” she says. “Now, run on and show your momma how clean you look.”

  I close my eyes and think of that blind and deaf girl we read about in school, Helen Keller, ’cause I’m feeling the way I look instead of rushing to a mirror.

  “It’s short as a boy’s hair!” And the tears come back like they never dried up in the first beginning.

  “Now, hush,” Gammy says, scooting me aside so she can get up again. “You look just fine. Now, run on…I got to git supper started.”

  “What’re we having?”

  “Nothing if that whine stays in your throat,” she snaps back at me. “Now, clean this room up and come on down and give me a hand when you’re done.”

  “How come you don’t cut Emma’s hair?” I holler after her, but she’s already on her way down the stairs. It’s not fair Emma doesn’t have to have a haircut, too.

  * * *

  “Shh, little baby,” he says, stroking my hair, “quiet now. You just had a bad dream. I’m here now. Shh…”

  “Daddy,” I say into my pillow, breathing hard after the word. “I keep seeing it.”

  “The same thing?”

  “Yeah, it’s this little-bitty house with nothing but shelves in it—rows and rows of chickens…”

  “Shh, now,” he says again.

  “…and they all have sacks over their heads but you can still hear the clucking. Clucking, clucking. It’s so loud….”

  He strokes my long hair over and over. The next thing I know it’s morning time.

  * * *

  “You ask me, it’s white trash lets her child run all over town looking like that one does,” Aunt Lillibit’s saying to Gammy. They think we’re
too busy playing jacks with the shells I saved from a beach vacation we took when Daddy was still alive to hear what they’re talking about. Emma’s been saving rubber bands for years, adding to the ball she started when we were back in Toast. It’s pretty bouncy now, her ball is. So it’s perfect for jacks.

  “Your turn. You have to beat fives,” she says, but I shush her so I can hear what all they’re saying.

  “That man’ll be the death of her if she don’t keep her head down and her mouth shut,” Aunt Lillibit’s saying.

  “I tried talking to her about it, but she don’t listen to her momma like she should,” Gammy says. “Never has. I s’pose she never will.”

  “You see the back of her head where the hair bumps out over that cut? She got to stop back-talking like she does.”

  They’re saying more but I cain’t make it out, and because I’m trying to hear I mess up and the ball hits the ground before I can swipe up the six shells I was fixing to swipe up.

  “And that Caroline takes right after her momma, you ask me,” I can hear Aunt Lillibit saying. “She’s got the welts to prove it. She and her momma need to take a lesson from Emma and be scarce.”

  “Hush, now,” Gammy says. “That’ll be enough of that.”

  * * *

  * * *

  “How come you never around in the evenings?”

  Mr. Wilson’s setting in his armchair that looks like it belongs inside instead of here on the front porch, whittling wood like he sometimes does when he’s thinking real hard on something.

  “How you know I’m not round come evening time?”

  I shrug, thinking he sees me but then I add, “I just know, is all. Where do you go?”

  He turns the hand-size piece of wood around in his big hand, looking at it like he’s seeing it for the first time.

  “You know a man can work on his carving his whole life,” he says to the nugget of wood, “and not git any better at it. Did you know that? Other things, well, you git better at ’em if you do ’em over an over again through the years. Not wood. You can stay just as bad a carver as you were the day you were born if that’s the way it’s s’posed to be.”