Cruel Harvest (25 page)
“I gotta go pee pee!” she shrieked.
“Hush, sweetheart,” Millie said over her shoulder.
She looked at Daddy as if wondering why he would not stop. I could see his grip on the steering wheel tighten, and I felt a deep panic coming over me. I looked away and tried to close my eyes. But closing my eyes in the car filled my head with visions of barbed wire and the sound of crashing metal and breaking glass. I opened my eyes again quickly.
Mary Anne screamed again. Suddenly, Daddy spun around so fast I barely saw him. I dodged as his hand came crashing back at us. This time, I was not the target. It was Mary Anne. His hard slap crashed across her face, and her small body went flying back against the seat as if she weighed no more than her rag doll.
I could not believe what I saw next. Millie smacked Daddy hard across the face with her open hand. I had never seen Mama raise a hand to him. She survived his abuse by not fighting back. Millie, I knew then, was very different. She lashed out at him like a mother bear protecting her young. Mary Anne was wailing in the backseat in pain and shock. Daddy pulled off the road in a hurry, slamming his foot on the brake and screeching to a stop.
Daddy grabbed a handful of Millie's hair and tried to drag her across the car and out his door. I had seen him do the same thing to Mama before, but Millie did not budge. She was bigger than him and outweighed him by at least fifty pounds. Instead, she tore away from him and jumped out her door. He raced after her, and they came together like two rams crashing horns on a hilltop.
Millie was no match for Daddy. She never stopped fighting, though, and she took his punches, but he was used to fighting grown men. She didn't have a chance. He beat her until she could not lift a fist in retaliation and then beat her some more.
Mary Anne cowered in the backseat, sobbing.
“Hush now,” I whispered, petting her with shaking hands. “You must be quiet, or it'll make him worse. Please, don't cry, baby.” I tried to soothe and warn her at the same time. “You must be quiet, honey. Please sit down,” I pleaded.
It was too late. Daddy heard her and swung open the back door. He tore Mary Anne out of my grasp, lifting her out of the car by her hair. She hung, her feet suspended above the ground, and she cried out in fear. Daddy punched her square in the face.
Mary Anne had never endured or witnessed any violence before. Her bowels let lose as she gurgled and sputtered to breathe. Blood dripped out of her nose, and Daddy threw her to the ground. He walked back to Millie.
“Get your no-account brat cleaned up and back in the car before I kill her,” he said.
Millie had lost her fight for the moment. She looked pale and shaken; bright red blood spouted from Millie's ear, and her eye was swollen, but she concentrated on her daughter. Mary Anne's body shook as if she was crying, but no sound came out. Millie took off the soiled dress and left it on the side of the road. She wiped Mary Anne's face with the end of the dress and put a clean dress and fresh underwear on her while Daddy growled and threatened to run off and leave them. When Millie laid her in the backseat, both Nellie and I shied away, keeping one eye on Daddy. We knew if we dared misstep, Daddy's rage would fall on us next.
Once Millie was back in the car and Daddy started the engine, I inched closer to Mary Anne. I carefully placed her small head in my lap. A tear slid down my cheek as I caressed her silky black hair.
We traveled from
small town to small town that winter, and Daddy eked out a living by working in gas stations or mechanic shops. If we could not work alongside of him, he worked only long enough to get gas money and move on. Daddy would often drive at night, as if he thought the police were hunting for him everywhere we went. During the day, he would park the car off of a dirt road and kick us out so he could sleep. Since I could no longer sleep in a moving car, I spent weeks living on little more than catnaps. Days started melting together. I had a hard time even telling where we were when we stopped for a week or two of work.
Often, we did not find a place to stay when we stopped over in a town. We lived out of the car instead. At least it was not moving at night, so I could sleep. In many ways our lives were better with Millie there. Daddy never bothered Nellie or me when we went to bed. But still, it was horrible when Mary Anne got beat up or when he would yell at her. She was so small and innocent, and she did not understand how to stay out of his way.
As winter's icy hand pressed harder down on us, work turned scarce. Daddy's anger flared more often when he couldn't get his alcohol. He beat us all and constantly got in knockdown, bloody fights with Millie. When they would start, I tried to get Mary Anne out of his sight as quickly as possible. Often we walked off into the woods. Sometimes I would look for a good climbing tree and pass the time teaching her how to climb up beside me. She was a natural, and soon we were able to scurry up a tree together and weather out the worst of Daddy's maniacal moods.
Sometimes, though, I could not save her. Once, while we were stopped for the day next to a reservoir, Daddy and Millie were trying to sleep in the car. Nellie, Mary Anne, and I were outside playing on the gravel road. I was trying to skip rocks off the sparkling surface of the water. Ice laced the edges of the man-made lake, and Mary Anne kept herself busy pulling up pieces of ice and pretending to make dinner for us all.
I walked away from her, looking for the perfect stone to skip. Nellie's nose was in a book we'd found in a church a few stops back. Mary Anne must have slipped because I heard a splash followed by the loudest shriek I'd heard her make. I raced over, but was too late. Daddy exploded from the car and was on her as fast as lightning.
“What is wrong with you?” he screamed.
I could not see Mary Anne due to the dipping bank around the reservoir, but I did see Daddy reach down. He yanked her out of the water and threw her behind him. Water cascaded from her clothing as she flipped in the air and skidded to a stop on the gravel road. Her screaming grew louder. I took a step toward her but saw the murder in Daddy's eyes. It froze me. I watched as he walked toward her.
“That lowlife father of yours ruined you. Are you a dummy or what?”
Daddy's foot reared back. I couldn't watch anymore. I bolted for the woods, tears running off my cheeks as I heard Mary Anne's screams grow louder.
That evening, Daddy decided we would stay in that place for a while. He left us to go out drinking. I sat on the ground by the campfire, watching Millie clean the blood off of Mary Anne's face with water she had drawn from the reservoir. I had no idea where Nellie was, nor did I care. I just stared at Millie.
As the sun set, reflecting a rainbow of pink, orange, and purple over the surface of the water, Mary Anne fell asleep on Millie's lap. I inched closer.
“How can you let him beat her like that?” I asked.
Millie looked at me. I think I expected anger. Maybe I wanted to make her mad because I was so upset by seeing Mary Anne hurt with nobody to protect her. But Millie only looked confused.
“'Cause it only makes him worse if I fight.”
They were simple words, but they somehow forged a bond between me and Millie. It was not that I loved her, or even trusted her to protect Mary Anne. But I did understand her. She knew the reason I had run off during Mary Anne's beating. There was no stopping Daddy. If there had been, I would have done it long, long before.
I sat there looking into the fire, feeling the cold wind cutting into my back and thinking about a night long ago. Brenda had meant it when she planned to kill him. I was sure of it now, and I understood it completely.
Spring crept over
the land and left the dull ache of winter behind. I was twelve that year, and Nellie was fourteen. One day in April, Daddy came home from the gas station he had been working at and told us to load up. We took off and headed southwest. It was time for another cycle of farms: peas, strawberries, cotton, and apples.
We hadn't been working the farm circuit long when we met up with some familiar faces. The one family I looked forward to seeing that year was the Willoughbys, and when we reached Arkansas, there they were.
Nellie, Judy, Faye, and I rekindled our sisterhood without hesitation. We tried to work close together during the day, although there was no time for horseplay. Sometimes in the evenings, especially when Daddy went out drinking, we went to their cabin. Their mother fed us, and we girls sat outside and talked about what each of us had been doing in the time we were separated.
One evening not long after arriving, Millie sent me over to the Willoughbys to borrow some flour so she could make water gravy for our dinner. When I got to their cabin, I found Mrs. Willoughby's six-year-old son by himself. He was standing up on a chair beside their wooden table with a knife in his hand.
“What are you doing?” I asked, afraid he was going to hurt himself.
The little boy had a serious expression on his face. His big brown eyes looked at me from under a wrinkled, dirty brow.
“I'm cuttin' this dirt offa my arms.”
I raised an eyebrow. Then I looked down at my own arms. They, too, were caked with dirt and grime, as they always were.
“Don't do that,” I said. “You're going to cut yourself. Come on with me.”
I took the little boy by the hand and led him down to the creek. I dunked the hem of my dress in the water and scrubbed at his arm. It took awhile, but I got most of the dirt off him.
“I hate being dirty,” he said.
“I do too. But you can't go cutting it off with a knife.”
“But it'll just come back.”
“And you can wash it clean again,” I said.
“I hate it though,” he muttered as I walked him back to camp.
When I arrived at the cabin, little boy in tow, Mrs. Willoughby was there. She looked at me with curiosity on her face.
“Frances, come on in. What are you doing?” she asked.
“I just helped your youngest son wash his face and arms.”
Her son ran back out to play as Mrs. Willoughby sat down at the table. She started to peel potatoes as she spoke to me.
“How's your daddy?” she asked without looking up.
“He's okay.”
“How long has he been traveling with that girl Millie, now?”
“About a year,” I answered.
“I seen her little girl this morning.” Mrs. Willoughby looked at me over the half-glasses she wore. Wisps of her black hair covered one eye, but from the other I could see that she was turning something over in her mind. “Is there anything wrong with that little girl?”
I shook my head. “No, she's okay.”
“She seemed mighty quiet to me.”
I didn't know what to say. I, too, had noticed a change in Mary Anne. Unlike Mrs. Willoughby, though, I had no question about the source of that change. My friends' mother just watched me with that one eye, searching for an answer. Even though I said nothing, I think I gave it to her.
“You better head on out before your daddy gets mad and comes lookin' for you,” she said. “Do you want a piece-a tater to take with you?”
“No, thank you. Millie asked me to borrow some flour so she could make gravy for dinner.”
I left her cabin with a cup of flour and rushed back to ours. Millie was outside watching me.
“What took you so long?” she asked.
“Mrs. Willoughby got to talking.”
“To you?”
I nodded.
“What about?”
I paused. “Nothin'.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“I better go gather up some wood,” I said, passing the cup of flour to her.
I rushed out before she had a chance to ask anything else. The conversation with Mrs. Willoughby stuck with me for a while, but I was soon distracted by the burning in my muscles that came from dragging long limbs up to the cabin to be cut into firewood.
Mrs. Willoughby often
drove into town in the evening to pick up supplies. On most occasions, she would take one of the camp children along with her. Sometimes it would be one of her own, sometimes someone else's child. She liked the company, and even more, she appeared to love the fuss we made over her.
“I'm heading to the store if anyone wants to come!” she announced in the center of camp.
A number of us children were out playing a game. I rushed over with everyone else, jumping up and down with my hand in the air. I hoped she would pick me, but I was way in the back.
“Frances, come on, get in the car,” she called out.
I barely heard her over the din of the other children, so I was sure I was mistaken. I stood there for a moment.
“Come on, if you want to go with me,” Mrs. Willoughby called out, looking right at me.
The other children groaned and muttered as I pushed my way through the crowd. I was smiling, basking in the attention. Their envy did not bother me one bit. I climbed into the Willoughbys' truck and we drove away.