care of better than they are. Miss Wilkens, whether
Mrs. March comes or not," Felix said. "I'm--" "Oh, it's starting!"
She waved her hand at us to tell us to shut up
and leave her alone.
"I have to go talk to Lester now," Felix said, his
voice filled with frustration. "Just wait a little longer.
I'll return to see that you're getting your lunch." "I'm not that hungry anyway," I said.
He went out again. I thought a moment and
decided to walk down the hallway rather than go in
and watch a soap opera with Great-aunt Frances. The
kitchen was down the hall on the right. Just past it was
the dining room, and across from it was an office and
another door. All the furniture I saw looked old and
worn. Nothing was polished and sparkling like the
furniture in Grandmother Emma's house.
I opened the closed door and saw a stairway
going down into the basement. Then I heard Lester
Marshall's daughter Mae Betty filling the pail with
water somewhere behind me. so I closed the door and
went to the kitchen. Looking through it into the
laundry room. I saw her fuming over the sink and
mumbling to herself.
I was glad Felix hadn't come this far into the
house and seen the kitchen. If he thought the other
parts of the house were bad, he would think this was a
disaster. It looked like it hadn't been cleaned up not
only after breakfast but after last night's dinner and
maybe even yesterday's lunch. too. The table was
covered with dishes and glasses and some open food
containers. I wondered how long the bottle of milk
had been out and if it had turned sour.
The sink was filled with dishes. Why hadn't
they been put in the dishwasher? I wondered, but then
again. I didn't see anything that resembled a
dishwasher. The small refrigerator and the gas stove
looked old to me. However, although it was not nearly
as big as Grandmother Emma's kitchen, it was a nicesize kitchen with plenty of counter space. When it was
cleaned up, it would probably look very nice. I
thought.
"What's your name?" Mae Betty demanded as
she turned to me from the laundry- room doorway. "Jordan March," I said.
"I knew you was a March," she said, twisting
her lips. "Why you come living here?"
"My parents were in a bad car accident and my
grandmother had a stroke."
"They all dead?"
"No." I said emphatically.
"So? Why you here?"
"My grandmother is in the hospital. My father
is in a wheelchair."
"What about your mother?"
"She's in a coma in a hospital, but she'll get
better," I added.
"Right. And I'll be the queen of England
someday," she muttered, picked up the pail and started
out. "You'll see," she said after she passed me and
stopped in the hallway. "I'll get this place looking
decent and shell turn it back to a pigsty."
"Why are the dishes piled up in the sink? Isn't
there a dishwasher?'" I asked.
"Dishwasher? You're looking at the
dishwasher," she said. "but she don't make it easy.
She'll use a new dish and a new glass every five
minutes. I tried to get her to use paper plates and
plastic forks once and she threw it all in the garbage,
telling me her sister would be furious. What sister? I
asked. I ain't seen a sister here since I come, but you'd
think she visits her every day the way she carries on
about her."
She walked down the hallway to the front
entrance, pushed the coat hanger back, rolled up the
old rug, and began to wash the wood floor. As she
worked, she continued to mumble under her breath. I
thought I heard a slew of curse words. so I pretended
not to hear and instead started to clean up the kitchen.
Once in a while, back at Grandmother Emma's house,
her maid. Nancy, let me help.
I found the dish soap and began to do the dishes
in the sink. As I worked. I suddenly thought that
maybe this was what Grandmother Emma had meant
when she'd told me my great- aunt Frances needed
me. She didn't need me to work on her farm, but she
needed me to help with taking care of her home, with
taking care of her.
"Oh, my, my," Great-aunt Frances said, coming
to the kitchen doorway when her soap opera had
ended. "Look at you. Not here ten minutes and you're
helping out like a little trouper already. That's the way
I was when I was your age, too. I always helped out.
My sister never helped out. She always said. 'We have
servants for that. Frances. If you do their work, what
will they do? You'll put them out of work. Or you'll
make them lazy.'
"Now, guess what I have here for you." she said, coming into the kitchen and going to a drawer under the counter. She opened the drawer and took
out a large manila envelope. "You know what this is?" I shook my head.
"It's all the arrangements for your school." She
handed the envelope to me.
I wiped my hands on a dish towel and opened
the packet.
There were directions about the bus I was to
take, and there was information about my class with
my teacher's name. Mrs. Morgan. There was a
diagram showing where my classroom was, and then
there was a page about how we were to dress and
behave. Grandmother Emma had somehow taken care
of all the arrangements through her attorney. School
was starting the day after tomorrow,
"You should put all that in your room. dear. As
my sister. Emma, always says. 'As soon as you're
capable of brushing your own teeth, you're
responsible for yourself, which means you're
responsible for your own things.'
"Now what do we have for lunch today?" she
asked me. "Of course, you don't know. You just
arrived. Let's look in the refrigerator."
She opened it and stood back, nodding. "Wouldn't you just love peaches and cream? I
have the cream, and the peaches are in jars down in
the basement. I must have eaten all the peaches I had
Mae Betty bring up, or else," she added, leaning
toward me with her eyes on the doorway, "Mae Betty
ate them."
"I never had peaches and cream for lunch," I
said.
"Well now you will. Just go down the stairs and
to your right you will see the shelves and shelves of
canned peaches, tomatoes and onions. Lester Marshall
does that every year for me. I'll set out our dishes and
give you a glass of milk with a chocolate cream
cookie. too."
She looked at the table. I hadn't cleared it vet. "I'll make some room for us. It will be our first
meal together." she said. smiling. "I'll tell you all
about Hearts and Flowers, too. The peaches," she
reminded me when I didn't move. She smiled and
nodded at the doorway.
Peaches and cream sounded like a dessert not a
meal. I thought, but I didn't want to b
e impolite, so I
went to the basement door. She poked her head out of
the kitchen.
"Oh. Jordan, the light switch is on your right." she said. "Be careful. My cousin Arnold fell down those stairs and broke his ankle when he was ten. He was always a careless person, and eventually he got hit by a car and died. It was so long ago. I can't remember the exact day, but I still have a letter Emma sent me. She wrote. 'Arnold was hit by a car and died.' That's all she wrote and the date, of course. Emma always puts the date on her letters so we can look at it when we want and know exactly when they were
sent."
She pulled back into the kitchen. and I searched
for the light switch. A single dangling weak bulb
seemed to struggle to throw enough of a glow down
the stairway. There were so many cobwebs along the
walls and rafters that it looked like spiders had woven
the wallpaper. I certainly wasn't happy about going
down the stairs. The steps felt like they were on the
verge of cracking as I descended. I was practically on
tiptoe to keep from placing all my weight down on
them.
The switch at the top of the stairway controlled
another dangling lightbulb below. Although weak, it
did clearly show me the shelves. They were filled
with jars of peaches, tomatoes and onions, as she had
said. Just as I plucked one off the shelf. I heard the sound of a girl laughing, Then I heard some muffled conversation and looked toward the left, where there
was another door.
Who was down here?
Clutching the jar of peaches tightly, I went to
the door and listened. There were definitely two
people talking very low. The girl laughed again. I
tried the doorknob, and it clicked open. Very slowly, I
pulled the door back and gazed into this part of the
basement. Two windows in the foundation provided
enough light for me to make out what looked like a
living room thrown together with old furniture: a sofa,
a chair, a table. There were cartons and pieces of other
furniture all around, including armoires, dressers, and
chairs, some piled on each other.
At first I saw no one. Then a head lifted over
the wide-armed sofa and I saw a girl. She pulled back
even farther until she was sitting up.
She was naked to her waist, and her jeans
looked unfastened. Her bosom was small, but perky.
She had a silver cross on a silver chain that sat
between her breasts.
A boy, who had been beneath her, appeared
quickly, turning on the sofa.
He was wearing only his underwear. The sight
stole my breath.
They were both African Americans. The girl
noticed the light pouring in from behind me and
turned my way.
"What is it? Why you stop?" the boy asked her. "Who the hell are you?" she demanded, looking
at me and not bothering to cover up. She put her
hands on her hips.
I closed the door quickly, my heart thumping so
hard that I thought I wouldn't be able to catch my
breath. Without hesitation. I charged up the stairway,
not worrying about the weak steps. I switched off the
light and stepped into the hallway, closing the door
quickly behind me.
I stood there gasping like someone who had
been underwater a little too long.
"Good." I heard Great-aunt Frances say. She
was peering out the kitchen doorway again. She didn't
notice anything unusual about me. "Now let's have
our first meal together and get to be Great friends.- She clapped her hands.
I looked back at the basement door and then at
the peaches in my hand. I don't care what I imagined
you told me, Ian, I thought. Even you would think
about running out of the house and begging Felix to take you home.
3 Alanis and Chad
. Before I reached the kitchen, the front door opened and Felix entered, followed by an African American man a few inches taller, who. I imagined, was Lester Marshall, He had milk-white hair and a very closely cut white beard and mustache that looked more like rock salt sprinkled over his face. He was stout and wore a long-sleeved blue shirt outside his jeans and a pair of very dirty black shoe boots. His shoulders were thicker and wider than Felix's, but he had a little stoop. Grandmother Emma would make him parade about with a book on his head while she cried. "Posture, posture. posture!"
Felix pointed to the chandelier and said. "Well?"
"I asked her about it," Mr. Marshall said. "She told me she didn't want so much light in the house. She said she'd rather hide herself in shadows and not be reminded about how she looked. That's why I ain't done nothing with the ones upstairs either. I swear." he added, raising his right hand.
"Everything's changed now." Felix said. "There's a little girl here. Mrs. March wants this house brought up to speed quickly. You follow?"
"Yes, sir, I do. Nothing is seriously broken. I'll fix this door promptly and mend the porch in a day. She forgets, but I wanted to fix the doorbell and she told me not to bother. No one comes to visit. Plumbing is fine. Oil burner is fine. Ain't a single short in any of the electric either. Winter comes, this house be as warm as fresh toast.'
"All that doesn't explain why the grounds look like no one's lived here for years,"
"Oh. I had some back problems and some equipment broke down so it just got away from me. but I'll get it looking shipshape real soon."
"If Mrs. March drove up here with me today, you'd be on a ship all right, a ship sailing for the South Pole," Felix replied.
Mae Betty stepped out of the living room. She clutched bags of garbage in each hand as if she'd been holding two errant boys by their hair. She looked as worn and frazzled as a maid who had been working for hours and hours.
"This is just a tenth of it!" she said.
"I warned you that you had to stay on it or it would get far past you, girl," Lester told his daughter.
"Don't put no act on now. Daddy. You agreed it was a waste of time cleaning up this place."
"There's a little girl come here to live now." Lester told her.
"Well, how's I supposed to know about it? You never said so."
"I told her, but she forgot." Lester explained to Felix. "She works nights at the Canary Bar and--"
"I don't care. Just get it all up to speed quickly. I'll be back with Mrs. March soon, or they'll send me back with young Mr. March, and you don't want to disappoint the Marches, especially now with all their personal troubles. You'll be out of here in a
heartbeat," he warned.
"No problem," Lester said. He glared at his daughter, who pulled her shoulders back and headed toward me. Her eyes looked like they could shoot flames in my direction. I fled into the kitchen. My heart was still pounding from what I had seen in the basement, and Mae Betty's glaring at me didn't slow it down.
Great-aunt Frances was seated at the kitchen table. She had cleared away some space for two bowls and two spoons on napkins beside them. She had poured a glass of milk for me and laid two cookies beside it. I saw that the cream for the peaches was already in the bowls.
Mae Betty came in behind me, nudging me out of her way without saying "Excuse me," as she started across the kitchen toward the laundry room. Miss Puss practically leaped under the table to avoid being stepped on.
"Oh." Great-aunt Frances said. "I forgot it's hard to open those jars. You can't do it. and my hands are as soft as cotton candy."
"Don't ask me. I got more than enough to do with the mess you made." Mae Betty tossed back at us and
continued walking toward the laundry room.
Felix and Lester Marshall were walking by, and Gneat-aunt Frances called out to Lester.
"Yes, ma'am?" he said. stopping.
"Would you be so kind as to open that jar of peaches for us, Lester?"
"Glad to," he said, taking it from me. He clutched it in his big hand and almost effortlessly turned the cover. We heard it snap, and Great-aunt Frances clapped.
"Lester is about the strongest man I ever met," she told me.
"Not anymore, Miss Wilkens. I'm not what I was. Bones are creaking so loud, they keep me up nights. I'm about to reach Social Security."
When he smiled. I saw he was missing teeth on both sides of his mouth. He glanced at me with kind eves. He had the sort of face that gave birth to a smile around his eyes that rippled down to the corners of his lips. "Welcome, Missy," he said.
"Her name is Jordan. Jordan March." Greataunt Frances told him.
"A truly holy and wonderful name. You know it was in the river Jordan that Jesus was baptized?"
I nodded.
"Welcome. Jordan." "Thank you," I said.
He handed the jar of peaches back to me and hurried out to join Felix, who was taking him through a survey of the house. We heard them talking in the hallway. It was mostly Felix rattling off this and that for repair and Lester saying. "Yes sir. got it. Yes sir. I'll be on that right away."
"Scoop the peaches into the cream," Great-aunt Frances told me.
As I did so. Mae Betty returned from the laundry room. There was a door that opened to the outside, through which she had gone to dump garbage. She glared at us and shook her head as she walked by toward the hallway. She paused in the doorway.
"I ain't tending to that cat's litter box. That's not part of my job." she declared, and as she walked away, she added, "it's overflowing."
"I always forget," Great-aunt Frances said. "Miss Puss never makes a mess anyway. You take enough?"
"Yes." I said and handed the jar to her so she could scoop out peaches for herself.
I wondered if I should now tell her what I had seen in her basement. Surely, she should know there is a half-naked girl down there and a boy down to his underpants, I thought. but I was afraid of starting trouble so soon after I had come, especially with all this commotion going on. So I didn't say anything.
"You must tell me all about yourself, about living with my sister, about her grand house, about your mother and your father. You must tell me all the things you like to eat, too. I'll have Mae Betty and Lester buy them for us, but don't expect me to be as good a cook as Emma's cook."