Stella by Starlight

  44

  She Cried

  When Stella got back home, she ran immediately to her mother, her eyes meeting her father’s. She shook her head, and he bowed his. They’d known it would be a long shot. Neither of them had really expected Dr. Packard to come.

  But Mrs. Winston had come. She called to Stella to get some vittles. “You must be starvin’, girl.”

  Hot soup and warm biscuits appeared on the table. Stella hadn’t realized how hungry she was. She ate it all. “Thank you, Mrs. Winston,” she said gratefully. “Thank you.”

  Mrs. Hawkins began wiping Mama’s brow with cold compresses. “I brought a pot of the same kind of elderberry-willow tea your mama fixed for my Tony,” she said. “We been getting her to sip little bits.”

  “Is it helping?” Stella asked.

  “Well, her fever ain’t spiking, and the swelling hasn’t gotten any worse, so that’s a good sign,” Mrs. Hawkins replied. But Stella could read the fear on her face.

  Stella squatted by Jojo at the fire, where he was rolling two marbles between his palms, and pulled him close. Jojo rolled the marbles faster, and faster, and faster, and faster.

  Finally he whispered, “Is Mama gonna die, Stella?”

  “I don’t really know for sure,” Stella told him. “It looks pretty bad right now, but Mama is the strongest woman in Bumblebee, maybe in all of North Carolina.”

  “Uh-huh,” Jojo replied. But he didn’t sound convinced.

  Papa knelt down beside them. “I’m gonna be honest with you two. If it was a rattler that bit her, that venom can be fatal. Depends on the type of rattlesnake, where the bite is, and the type of toxin it carries. We really don’t know what bit your mama. But if it had been the most serious type, she’d already be gone.”

  Stella held Jojo tighter.

  “But a person can survive a copperhead bite, if that’s what got her. It ain’t pretty, but it is possible. Antivenom sure would make it a lot less painful, and a lot more certain. Doc Packard coulda helped with that, but he didn’t. So we’re gonna depend on our friends to keep her comfortable, and our God to pull her through. Understand?”

  They both nodded.

  “Now say your prayers and get some sleep. We have some long days ahead.”

  Stella grabbed a quilt, covered herself and Jojo on his bed by the hearth, and began to pray. She prayed and prayed, listening to the embers crumble, certain she would never be able to sleep this entire night. So she was confused and disoriented when the front door burst open and several people entered, all seemingly talking at once.

  Mrs. Odom, who usually dressed in demure long dresses and straw hats, had on a pair of men’s overalls and an old plaid work shirt. Her hair was unstyled and all over her head. Stella could tell she’d left home in a real hurry. Her daughter Claudia, looking sleepy, wore a nightgown. And Dr. Hawkins—Dr. Hawkins!—in his Sunday-go-to-meeting three-piece suit and fedora filled the room with his authority.

  Claudia spotted Stella. “Can I lie down with you and Jojo, Stella?” she asked, coming over. “We been in the car all night.”

  Stella hopped up, patted the place she’d been sleeping, and tucked Claudia in. Claudia was out before Stella even had the blanket fully around her. Then Stella ran over to the adults. Her father was in the midst of giving Mrs. Odom a bear hug. He pulled Stella into it.

  “Stella girl! Praise the Lord! Mrs. Odom here heard about the snakebite, got in her car, and drove all the way to Raleigh to get Dr. Hawkins from his medical conference!” Papa told her, mashing them both.

  Mrs. Odom extracted herself from the embrace, but her cheeks were flushed with pride.

  Stella felt she was going to burst. Mrs. Odom? She drove? The woman who wouldn’t ever take the car out for fear of getting dust on it? Praise the Lord indeed!

  “And there’s even better news!” Papa added, hope in his voice. “Doc Hawkins had some antivenom at his office. He’s giving Mama her first dose right now.”

  “So Mama’s not going to—I mean—she’s gonna, she’s gonna live?” Stella asked incredulously.

  “Nothing’s for sure yet,” her father replied. “But at least she has a fighting chance now. And you know what else, Stella?”

  “What?” Stella couldn’t imagine anything more.

  “Dr. Hawkins says that what you did out there in the woods was simply amazing. Cleaning and treatment of the snakebite the way you did probably saved her life, kept her alive long enough for him to get here.”

  Stella felt relief flood through her, and, for the first time since she’d found her mother, she cried.

  45

  Snakes

  STELLA’S STAR SENTINEL

  (maybe ill let somebody read this)

  SNAKES

  Reporter’s Note: I am typeing typinggg typing this while my mother recovers from snake bite.

  Thankyou to all our frends friends in Bumblebee who brought food. And healing teas. And the cakes and pies--yummy

  And to Mrs. Grayson who brought me a book on snakes.

  What i learned:

  -snakes are not mean. Mama probly probably stepped on it.

  -some snakes are hatched from eggs. i did not know that!

  -simtoms symtoms symptoms after being snake-bit are pain and swelling and throwing up. And thirstiness (is that a word?) and not breathing goo.d. good.

  -numbness and tingling in the face, and stomach cramps. Mama has those also.

  and her leg mightt be damged damaged for good. that isnot is not good.

  -antivenom is a gift fromf from god. And the proper name is ANTIVENIN. I don’t know why. Spelling is hard enough without docotrs doctors changing things.

  -Mama might have long-term reslts results like pain and swelling and difficulty walking

  -Mama is alive. Thank God.

  46

  Splash Scream Surprise

  It was cold. Too cold for Klansmen to burn crosses. Too cold for nightingales to warble. Too cold for sitting on the steps. But Stella couldn’t sleep this December night, so even though she knew her parents would disapprove, she’d tiptoed outside to think.

  She took a walk on the banks of Kilkenny Pond, trying to ignore the nippiness of the night, the troublesome memories of Mama’s ordeal. Despite her heavy woolen jacket, the cold still seemed to ooze into her bones. She figured it was about three in the morning. Nothing stirred.

  The sky was so clear that the glint of stars, the glimmer of the moon shimmered across the pond. Occasional small circles radiated from the center of it. Stella stopped and watched, then looked to the heavens and gave a simple prayer of thanks. Mama now lived with a great deal of pain, but she lived. She lived! Papa had carved her a sturdy cane; the blisters and sores had mostly healed, the shortness of breath all but gone. Her leg remained swollen and discolored, however. Dr. Hawkins said it might get better, might not. To Stella it seemed a small price to pay to live.

  Yawning finally, Stella turned back home. She hoped Jojo had remembered to bring in firewood; the logs had just about faded to ash when she’d tiptoed outside.

  But before she had managed a pair of steps, she heard a splash, followed by a sudden scream. Concentric rings grew larger and larger on the dark water, then gradually disappeared. An owl hooted. The wings of birds that had been sleeping flapped in surprise.

  Stella froze until the second scream came, this one louder, more desperate. “Help!” came a cry. “Help me!”

  Stella moved toward the sound, toward the splashing and wild thrashing that followed another gurgled cry. “I can’t swim! Help me!”

  Trying to find the source of the scream, Stella raced around the bank of the pond, then stumbled to her knees. She looked to see what she’d tripped over. A pair of girl’s shoes. Out a few feet, a pale arm extended from the water, reaching for the sky. A head bobbed up, momentarily, and just as quickly disappeared.

  Stella didn’t pause to think; she ripped off her jacket and plunged into the water, gasping as the cold grabbed her, soak
ing through her hair, a feeling she hated. Mama’s gonna kill me for messing up my hair, she thought insanely, wondering at the same time why such a ridiculous thought had come into her head.

  She swam hard toward where she’d seen the person go down. Stella could swim, but she preferred not to. Most colored girls she knew felt the same way—they didn’t swim because it took a whole Saturday afternoon to get your hair pressed and braided, and it was just too much trouble to mess it up on purpose. White girls wouldn’t understand.

  The water was deeper than she expected, and oh, so very, very cold. Still, Stella swung her arms through the water, searching, searching. Her fingers were growing numb. Still she searched. Her feet felt like stones. She searched until she couldn’t bear it—she had to get out or she’d die too. She propelled herself under one last time. And she hit something. Stella grasped at it—an arm! She pulled. The person dug their fingers into Stella’s shoulder. Stella twisted away but held on to that arm. She kept pulling until a head—a girl’s—popped above the surface, gasping and choking. The girl clamped onto Stella, grabbing at her, dragging them both down, thrashing, under the waters of Kilkenny Pond. Stella kicked and kicked, forcing them back up to the surface.

  “Stop!” Stella cried when their heads broke the surface once more. “Stop or you’ll kill us both!”

  Sputtering and choking, the girl kept pulling at Stella’s arms, hair, anything she could grab. “Can’t swim!” she gasped.

  “But I can! Stay still. Don’t move! We’re nearly to the shore.” At this point, feeling more angry than frightened, Stella, with strong, sure strokes, slowly made her way to the bank of the pond. The girl clung to her desperately, but she stopped flailing while Stella made sure the girl’s head stayed above water.

  When her feet could feel the bottom, Stella heaved the girl onto the bank. She was surprisingly heavy.

  When at last Stella had her safely up in the grass, the girl’s eyelids fluttered open. She looked around in alarm, then rolled over and threw up, water splashing everywhere. Stella helped her sit up, and, finding her own coat, wrapped it around the girl’s thin shoulders. Her long blond hair was a tangled mess, and her blue eyes looked wild. It was Paulette Packard.

  Stella stared. Dr. Packard’s daughter! “Are you all right?” Stella finally asked. When Paulette nodded, teeth chattering, Stella asked, “What in blazes were you doing in the pond in the middle of the night?”

  Paulette looked around in a daze, then buried her face in her hands and burst into tears.

  Stella, mystified, let her cry, until she, too, was shaking with cold. “So, you decided to go for a midnight swim?” she finally pressed.

  Paulette wiped tears against Stella’s coat sleeve. “No,” she said at last. “It’s pretty obvious I’m not much of a swimmer.”

  “That’s for sure.”

  Paulette pulled Stella’s jacket tight. “You—you—saved my life!” she suddenly exclaimed, as though stunned by this realization. “Oh my goodness, you saved my life! Thank you. Oh, thank you!”

  “Yeah, I guess I did,” Stella said, her teeth now chattering. “Look, we have to get to my house,” she added, “or we’ll catch pneumonia or something.”

  Paulette hesitated.

  “It’s just down that path,” Stella explained. She started to stand.

  “Wait,” Paulette said. “I need to explain.”

  Stella waited. Fatigue was quickly replacing the adrenaline. Her skin felt frozen. She wanted to go home. But she asked again, “So why were you in the water?”

  “I like the pond at night,” Paulette replied. “My daddy would tan me if he knew—it’s a good piece from my house—but lots of times I just come to sit and think.”

  Stella thought about this, surprised. “Me too,” she finally answered.

  “Well, tonight I came out here because my parents were fighting—again. They never even notice that I’m gone.”

  “Does that happen a lot—the fighting?” Stella asked.

  “Yeah. Pretty often.” Paulette stared at the ground, her hair dripping around her face. “Sometimes it gets so bad I just have to get out of there.” She looked up at Stella. “I like to write. Every once in a while, I bring a notebook out here and write about animals and stuff. Anything to get my mind off things going on at home.”

  Amazed, Stella asked her, “So why did you take your shoes off? It’s freezing out here.”

  Paulette started crying again. “I was, uh, being stupid. . . . I thought maybe . . .”

  “You didn’t go in on purpose?”

  “I didn’t! I swear! Well, not really. But—I was just so upset! I figured if my daddy . . .” she dropped her head and sniffled. “If I got, well, sick with something really awfully bad like pneumonia or cholera or something . . .”

  “You can’t get cholera from cold water,” Stella scoffed, crossing her arms.

  “I know. I know. But I wanted to get sick with something really bad so he’d pay attention to me for a change! He’s a doctor—if I had to go to a hospital or something, maybe he’d remember he had a little girl. Maybe my folks would stop fighting.” She started to cry again.

  Stella frowned. She wasn’t sure how to react to the shivering white girl. How unhappy she had to be!

  Paulette continued. “But the second my shoes were off, I changed my mind. And that’s when I slipped. That’s the truth. Golly, that water was so COLD!”

  “Amen to that! It was butt-freezing cold. Plus, you almost drowned me!” Stella added, her whole body now trembling.

  “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry! My father will be really angry when he finds out,” Paulette said even more miserably.

  “Not glad you are safe?”

  “No, he’d first be worried I mighta told anybody what was going on at home.”

  “Your father is mean,” Stella said bluntly.

  Paulette raised her chin. “I know.”

  “He hit me once, when I was little. He made my mother cry.”

  “I’m really sorry, Stella.” Paulette took a deep breath. “He’s hit me, too.”

  “Really?”

  “I’ve learned to stay out of his way.”

  Stella dug her toe into the muddy ground, but the fury she felt toward Dr. Packard flared up, and now there was no holding back. “Your father . . . your father . . . wouldn’t treat my mother when she got bit by a snake. He had some of the antivenom that could have helped her.” She yanked the jacket away from Paulette and wrapped it around herself. “But he refused to share it with a colored lady.”

  “Oh no!” Paulette cried out. “Maybe I can talk to him about helping her in the morning. Even though he roughs me up sometimes, I know he loves me. He gives me money and buys me stuff.” Water continued to drip from the ends of her hair.

  But Stella did not care, not one little bit. She shrieked, “You don’t understand, Paulette! My mother could have died! Died—do you hear me? It’d be too late for your daddy to do anything!”

  Paulette’s pale face went paler still. “Oh, Stella, I’m so sorry. Please forgive me. Please forgive my father.” She climbed shakily to her feet and reached out her hand.

  Stella backed away, too livid to stop. “Let me tell you something else about your sweet daddy! Your father is a member of the Ku Klux Klan! I saw him near this very pond, burning a cross. I saw him on the road after the Spencer house got burned down. I saw him. I saw your daddy!”

  Now Paulette poked a toe in the dirt. “Don’t you think I know? I watch my mother starch and iron that stupid white uniform every single week. He’s prouder of that uniform than he is of us.”

  “Proud? People have lost their lives because of the Klan!”

  “It’s been like this all my life,” Paulette confessed. “He’s always ranting and raving about how awful colored people are. That’s when he’s not yelling at my mother and smacking her around.”

  This caught Stella up short. “He hits your mother, too?”

  “All the time. She’s real
ly good at covering the bruises.”

  Stella didn’t get it. “Why does she let him get away with it?”

  Paulette shrugged. “He’s the town doctor. He’s got money in a town that’s mostly broke. They get the best pew in the church, the best tee times at the golf club in Spindale. She’s not about to give all that up and be a nobody.”

  “A nobody like me and my family?” Stella asked, the anger flaring again.

  Paulette looked away.

  “My mother almost died, will never be healthy again, and it’s your father’s fault!” Stella fumed. “I’m gonna tell.”

  Then to Stella’s utter surprise, Paulette touched her shoulder and said, “I think you should.”

  Stella blinked hard. “I wasn’t expecting you to say . . . that.”

  “I wasn’t expecting you to save my life,” Paulette replied, offering Stella her hand for the second time.

  Stella hesitated, but this time took it. After a moment she said, “I’m gonna take you to my house. It’s freezing out here. We gotta get out of these wet clothes and talk to my folks. They’ll know what to do.”

  47

  STELLA’S STAR SENTINEL

  THE ELEMENTS

  Earth. Water. Air. Fire. We lerned learned in science class that anceint ancent ancient people used to beleive that was what life was made of. i guess it makes a little sense.

  Earth. Thats dirt. what farmers plant in. Where people get buried. On a dare I ate some dirt once. It tastedd tasted like ripe potatoes.

  Water. We need it to live. But we cant breeth breathe it. We can drown. everything drinks water for life. i have even seen burds birds sipping drops of water from a leaf. Water tastes like—like life

  Air. without air, we die. it blows and swirls sometimes, joining up with water to make sturms storms. Air can move water, but I don’t think water can move air.

  Fire. fire destroys. But without it, we could not cook our food or warm ourselfs ourselves. I’ve never tasted fire, but the smoke from it makes my mouth feel thick.

  Truth. i think that is the last basic element. Paulette would have died if I had not been out there. I almost died too. That water didn’t care what color we were.