A Piece of Mine (7 page)

Letta’s father lived on another four or five years then he passed away too. She buried him lovingly, too. I began to look at Letta kinda funny then. Was somethin wrong with her? I mean, how can one person do everything right? Was she human? This was goin too far! She was too good to be true! I got kinda mad at her … not jealous … mad! She was my friend, but I didn’t like her bein so good! Well, you can just call me Ms. Shamed cause I’m shamed I forgot all she had done been through
ALL
her life. The Lord had to have given her strength and there I was getting mad at her for havin it! Just call me Ms. Shamed! How I know how tight she was holding on? Or how close she was to lettin go, losin her
hold? Well, I done already told you once, you could call me Ms. Senseless!

Two or three months after the father passed, Letta came by my mama’s house. I had done lost mine, my husband built for me. Had taken a few loans out to help my kids in some personal and sickness problems and taken a few more later on for some police problems and the kids had done moved away somewhere else and I couldn’t pay them notes and so they took my million dollar home for $400, and I moved back to my mama’s. She was down and I was taken care of her anyway. I loved her and she had been good to me. She was dyin too tho. Well, she was old. Hell, I was old! Seemed like I was always just between life and death, life and death. Scared of life and scared of death. Call me Ms. Scared, cause that’s the way I was runnin then.

Anyway, Letta stopped by the house one day and said, “I want you to bring me some of them fancy ladies clothes magazines from your job sometimes, if you will, Ms. Friend.” She always call me “Ms. Friend.”

I said, “I sho will, Letta. You mean the real fancy ones?”

“Real, real fancy, Ms. Friend.”

“You want some of the recipes magazines?”

“Yea” she smiled, “bring some of them too, I got a plan!”

“You got a plan?” My ears perked up.

“Yes.” Her smile was what you would call
BRIL-LI-ANT
. “Been thinkin about my life … now that it’s mine to do with whatever I want! All mine!” I looked at her and she did look rested and better and I would say younger except you don’t have to be younger to look good! So I asked her, “You ain’t gone fly off to no big city and leave me here is you?” I laughed, but I sho didn’t want her to go. Misery lovin company I guess, but … well, shame, shame, shame. She laughed back, “No, I’m too tired for a big city. I just want a good husband and I got a plan to get the kind of man I want … I think!”

“Plenty of these men roun here want to marry you now,
Letta!” She frowned up her face “Yea, now that I ain’t got any problems! But they the ones with the problem now … they are all poor, cept for the ones already married, and I have decided I do not want a poor man or a poor nothin! I have already done all the poor I can take! Sides, I want to be in love and be loved!” I was gettin excited cause I wanted to talk bout things like this and never did know I had anybody to talk bout them with! I said, “I would just like a man of my own!” She answered me right back, “I don’t just want a husband, a man, Ms. Friend, they ain’t all that hard to get. I want somethin special! Somethin different! Somethin else from all what I know!”

I couldn’t say nothin but “
YEA!
”

She went on, “See, I got this plan. Now I may not win at it, maybe I’ll lose at it … but one thing, I won’t regret tryin it! I want
LOVE
and I think I know somethin!” She laughed a little girl laugh, “Anyway, I got a plan!” She left then and I wanted to follow her home and talk some more but I heard my mama callin me. I thought about her plan and love all night. I rushed to work so fast the next day the lady I work for musta thought I was goin crazy and if she hadn’t given me them books, I might’ve gone crazy for real all over her.

I took them magazines over to Letta’s soon as I could cause I wanted to hear bout that plan! She was playin her new second-hand piano when I got there. She was takin lessons again for the last year or so and was soundin real good! She was playin a spiritual, with great big dips and curves and deep bass bumps in it! You can just call me Ms. Spiritual, cause I loves them! The house was beginning to look different. Not new but with more life in it. New curtains, slip covers and things like that. Say what you willomay, hope shows! Anyway, we got together over them books and this is what Letta told me. She say, “See, I been close to death for years and years. It don’t scare me none. I’ve even seen some beauty in it. Death is mighty powerful but it can be kind and gentle too. And I done been to a lot of funerals, too
many maybe, but I plan to go to a lot more fore its over.”

Now, I lowered my voice to the correct funeral tone and said, “Oh, I hope not Letta.”

But she said, “Oh I hope so! Not wishin nobody to die, still they gone do it whether I want them to or not! And I been noticing … if a woman die, a man is left alone! If a man die, his friends come to the final hours and some of them is single and good men!” Well, right there I began to see. You can call me Ms. Quicksee now! She went on, “Well, I can sew and now I got a little extra money to spend on myself, I been makin me some beautiful clothes, bettern any I ever seen anyone wear round here!”

Well, she sure was right about that! That sewin can sure help your closet!

She went on, “Only chance I get to dress is for a funeral! And I’m the best dressed thing there! And everybody brings food and my cakes are the best lookin and best tasting, except for the real old ladies been bakin a long time, cause I been makin them for a livin! Now, I’m readin these French recipes and Italian recipes and I’m learnin plenty new ways to make a cake look like a angel baked it!”

Well, she was talking to her friend so a little braggin didn’t hurt nothin!

On she went. “I’m playin the piano better and better, so now is my time to stretch out! There is funerals around here up to 20 or 30 miles away I can go to, and even further out where I have some relatives! Why, Ms. Friend, I can find a good husband if I just make the best funerals!!”

Well, she looked so happy and hopeful I didn’t have the heart to say how terrible it all sounded to me. She saw my look tho and said, “You better quit frowning and try to get your own self together! You too young to be alone the rest of your life less you want to be! Do you want to grow old all by yourself?”

I shook my head “No” cause what she said was true, I was too young! I also didn’t want to keep runnin behind some
bush with a man what wasn’t mine, every now and then only, you know?

“Well,” she said, “this can work for you too! Start doing somethin with yourself! Do you feel old?”

“No!” I shook my head again.

“Well, you bettter get on the ball and bounce up and do some planning of your own!”

“Yes!” I nodded, my head like to flew off, and you can call me Ms. Grinning cause it suddenly seemed alright! I grinned my butt off all the way home cause I had a plan too! That’s the first day I really cleaned that house up and cooked a full, delicious meal for me and mama in a long time, since my husband died almost, cept for holidays!

Letta was ahead of me tho, she was still slim from all that work she used to have to do and she could really do her hair. And she really read them books and could copy a pattern down to the ace degree! Me, I decided I would settle for a medium kind of man. Well, facts about it, I had to! I had let some things go down I never would get up no more!

Letta started going to them funerals and taking cakes to the wakes and things. She would play the piano
AFTER
the funeral. She said, “No jobs, just sit and cross them clean pretty legs and look around.”

Sometimes Letta went 30 miles or so … on the bus! She had to win! She had what it took! Bout four months later, a very well to do mortician asked her to play chamber music sometimes before the funeral. Like, you see, come early. He was single and bout her age. His business was bout 35 miles away and he took to sending a car for her. A big, long black Cadillac. She was in style! Chile! Other mens came to see her but she wouldn’t carry on with none of them. She said, “I might like somethin they do and end up in love with a poor man and I don’t want to, so if I am not around them, I can’t grow to like them!” That was that!

She always came home on the same day she left at first, but pretty soon, she didn’t come home the same day! Her and
that mortician was getting pretty close. Then one day, she stayed home three weeks without going anywhere. Told me, “I like that man and I could love him, but I don’t want no job. I want love and a husband and that’s what I know I can get! Hope it’s him, but if he ain’t right, he can do it with them dead folks for all I care! I sure could love him though!”

I was so busy going to funerals and learnin how to sew I didn’t see her for a little while, a week or two, but when I did see her she flashed a smile and a engagement ring on me and you couldn’t tell which one was the brightest! She began to drive her own big car, I don’t know what it was, but it was not black! Well, Letta married that mortician and it’s like her life just started! I been over there to see them, at the funerals, you know! They both look like they in love. He watch her with such pride, she watch him like to say “I’m glad I’m where you are.” Funeral long gone out of their minds and they right there in the middle of it! “I understand” she tells all the bereaved.

Me, I’m still working the plan, for real now, sho nuff! Cause the other day at a funeral, a man got up to say something bout the deceased. I’m learning all the words now, I used to say, dead or passed on. Anyway, he happened to say he wasn’t married. He just bout my size too. I liked his looks. After the funeral, when he was blowin his nose and wiping his eyes, I walked over, patted him on the back and said, “I understand.” He looked at me real bright and reached out to shake my hand and hug me. I paid good attention to how it felt to be in his arms, had to do it real quick but I liked it. I invited him home to a good ole-fashion, home-cooked meal. I didn’t take time to be smart like Letta. When he accepted and we was on our way to my house I wondered if he had a plan too! But I don’t care. I’ll tell you somethin, they say a good man is hard to find, well, a good woman is too! Anything good is hard to find and if you got any sense you don’t want nobody else’s. Like me, I want mine! So, when we was walkin along and talkin you could
just call me Ms. Happy Hopeful cause I was!

So, now I am cuttin him a piece of dessert cake I just made this morning from a new recipe. See, I got a lot to share and you can catch more bees with honey than you can with butter, so now I’m goin on in my fresh clean livin room where this new man friend of mine is helpin my mama get comfortable and take him some of this delicious cake! You can just call me Ms. Honeybunch, cause I’m on my way!

(But He Did Himself Wrong)

I
HAVE
always been the kind of person who wonders about people and things and I have some neighbors who have kept me pretty busy with plenty to wonder about! It’s not real important how or where Smitty and Della met, the main thing is they were married nine years when I got to know them. At first, because of the way the world looks at things, they seemed an unlikely, funny couple. He was short, 5 feet or so, 125 pounds, while Della was 5′7″ or so, and 207 pounds. You pictured them making love and in your mind it was real funny, but you shouldn’t do that picturing stuff because making love, real love, is never funny! Remember the heart has its own way of picking a partner and never asks for measurements.

Anyway, Smitty was a feisty, loudmouthed, bragging, aggressive little man. Always trying to out-talk or out-do some taller man. But Della loved him even beyond the love-is-blind thing. Anything Smitty did was alright with Della.

I mean even the way she cooked his meals; he had so many things he disliked and his food had to be just right. I mean
JUST RIGHT!
He was the kind of man who even liked
gravy on his lamb chops! Very few vegetables, hardly any fruit and all that! All of which made Della gain more weight because of course she had to taste it to be sure it was just right. She could make home-made bread that would make you kill yourself. She did everything, Della did. Wash, cook, clean, garden, shop, chauffeur, watch football games, listen to him lie, pet, massage and make love too. Maybe more, you know, I don’t know everything.

I know he was proud of Della, he was always bragging down there at the pool hall and at work about her, but he never told her, thinking just staying with her was enough. Well, after nine years, maybe he was right. Their marriage musta been strong because they got over some real big hurdles which made me wonder at the way it all turned out.

Like, one time I ran over to their house. They had a nice little house, sitting all by itself on a neat little lot, that they rented. Anyway, I went over there and he was standing on a box directing her how to tie a rope over a beam so he could hang her.
SHOUTING
“I am the man! You gon have to do what I say! I ain’t taking NO shit!” Della just crying, trying to tie that rope like he telling her. Well, I talked them out of it that time. I think he was glad because he didn’t know no other way to back down and give her her life back. I told her later “You are a fool! Big as you is, you gonna let that littler man kill you? Help him kill you?!” That’s when I found out it wasn’t the first time. Anyway she just said, “I don’t think he was really gonna do it!” and smiling, went on about cooking him something special. I just really want you to know she thought he was special, that he had power, black and otherwise! Whatever he said she believed him. I mean … that man had him a woman!

Now there’s always a little hell waiting round paradise and Della’s hell was that every once in awhile, Smitty hit her, abused her. It hurt and it didn’t hurt! But it seemed to do so much for him, being so small and all, hitting a woman so large, she never tried to hit him back. He would tell everyone
down at the pool hall and work (again) that “I know I am boss!” He pranced as he told them, his chest stuck out in pride, he had a lot of that! He had whipped his woman, all 207 pounds of her!… all those pounds that loved him.