Rails Under My Back (64 page)

No. Why you askin me?

Jus wonderin, that’s all.

What, you ain’t heard from him?

Did I say that?

You don’t have to say it.

The phone rang. Mamma took her time about answering it.

Porsha leaned back in the chair and stared into the empty kitchen. In the quiet, she could hear ghosts flit across the ceiling, bump into walls, tiptoe from room to room. She touched each pearl of her necklace carefully like sore teeth. She thought about it all as if the thought would be answered in the asking. Whether by will or circumstance, a man leaves much when he leaves his own bed. She found much satisfaction in the idea. She heard Mamma approaching down the hall. She finished her tea, hoping that heat and taste would remove any trace of the thought from her face.

She’s dead, Mamma said. She leaned her shoulder into the white refrigerator.

Who? Who’s dead?

Lula Mae.

Porsha said nothing.

Now I have nobody.

THAT’S NOT WHAT I SAID, Gracie said.

Well, what did you say?

Sheila, you think you know everything.

You jus don’t want to admit when you wrong.

And you always right.

I didn’t say that.

I know what you said.

I—

The flight attendant brought them both cups of water.

Sheila drank—the water was cool going down; it brought her back to herself—and thanked. Gracie drank but said nothing. Her heavy Bible rested like a paperweight on her narrow lap to keep her from blowing out of her seat. She sat on the aisle. Sheila had allowed her that. Her comfort and more comfort in the knowing. But Gracie was ungrateful, face frowned up as if the water was poison.

Can I get yall anything else?

No, Sheila said. Thank you.

Just call.

The plane hummed through the deep sky. The sisters sat in remembering silence.

He’s a good boy, Lula Mae said.

I know, Gracie said.

He’s a good boy, Sheila said.

She jus said that. You my mamma too?

Well
—

She’s right. He would make you a good
—

Sides. He ain’t no boy. He a man.

Marry him.

Nawl.

Why not?

I don’t want to, that’s all.

Quit thinking bout yoself.

Who said I’m thinkin bout me.

Think about
—

I don’t care.

But
—

Why don’t yall jus leave me alone.

Sheila looked at the sea of shifting clouds outside the small window. Traveling clouds. Great flocks of memories. Flurry of claws. She fastened her seat belt. They would be landing soon.

THE MEMPHIS HEAT almost pushed her back onto the plane. She’d left home only an hour ago. The sky was sharp and clear and hot in the morning silence, telling you that, yes, you were someplace else. How many times in the last months had she made this trip? Now, she saw the pattern complete, first stitch to last. Lula Mae on loan, body and soul, both to be returned to her creator.

How you, Miss Pulliam? the white nurse said.

I been better.

Yo cancer actin up?

Lula Mae looked at Sheila, her secret revealed. She had hidden the cancer for five years. I didn’t want yall to worry, she said.

In the following months, she waited patiently for death. This cancer gon kill us all, she said. Now she had passed, moved on to the world to come.

The bridge was steel and stillness and silence. A pyramid of rails and cables. Memphis this side, West Memphis the other. The river below was bright and clean, rocks on the bottom distant but clear, large and white as plates. Just a ways down the river, the dog track sat like a giant oil silo in the sun. Memphis’s best greyhounds chased circular rabbit motion. Real rabbits once. But that too had changed.

The yard across the road was peaceful now, no longer crowded with scurrying chickens. A colorful rooster or two. You would go there and buy fresh brown and green eggs. Now it stood empty and yellow. And on this side of the road where Lula Mae lived an empty field had replaced John Brown’s house. Both the man and his house gone—Brown first then the house—many years now. The promised construction had never begun. John Brown dead a good ten years or more already. Sheila couldn’t say for sure. John Brown would stand in the yard and point up into the tree. See the monkey. See the monkey.

Shell-shocked, Lula Mae said. But he treated her good. Took her anywhere she needed to go in his old pickup truck (gray? blue?), shaking and shuddering and steaming like a train. He believed it to be the only vehicle of its kind in Memphis or West Memphis.

Sheila let Gracie go first on the splintery wood placement—like an old railroad plank, which perhaps it was—that offered a skinny path across the grass-covered drainage ditch. Gracie opened the chain-link fence and charged through the yard as if it all had ordinary meaning to her. Sheila watched from the sidewalk and fought to still her insides. A half-circle of spokes poked through the grass, straighter than peacock feathers. Wrought-iron lawn furniture, painted silver in the sun (
Lula Mae hid the red rust with seasonal coatings of silver paint
), was positioned in front of the green-and-white two-story house—well, the second story with the miter-shaped roof was an attic—for the right combination of sun and shade. A motherly awning reached over and sheltered a snug little concrete porch. No sides or banisters. Barely room for a chair. A porch for looking, not sitting.

TAKE CARE OF EVERYTHING.

I will.

Make sure Hatch has everything he needs.

I will.

You know how he forgets.

You don’t have to remind me.

And try to get here Friday night at the latest. The funeral gon be Saturday morning.

We’ll come well before that.

Don’t be in such a rush. Give your father chance to return.

We will.

Maybe that damn fool John’ll be with him.

More than likely.

You take care and I’ll see yall when you get here.

Okay.

Bye.

Bye. Oh, Mom.

What?

Should we tell Jesus?

You decide.

THIS WAY, Reverend Blunt said. The young and handsome reverend took Sheila by the elbow. He led her down the hall. Sheila looked back to see Gracie still standing at the front door, her Bible tight at her side.

Aren’t you going to come? Sheila said.

The reverend never stopped walking.

No, Gracie said. I’ll see her later.

Well, stay away from that sun, the reverend said, looking back, still walking.

Gracie looked at him as if he’d spoken to her in a foreign language.

I’ll have my boy bring you some tea.

Keep it, Gracie said.

The words caused the reverend to blink. Please, ma’m, keep over there in the shade or you’ll catch heatstroke. Outside, the day’s heat was still rising. Gracie didn’t budge.

The reverend took Sheila where he needed to take her, then stopped and stood sentinel-still. I’ll wait here, ma’m.

Sheila entered the room. She saw the body, open in a casket already chosen. Lula Mae’s face was gray as the quilt that covered her. The dew of death on her breath. Sheila searched for the old image in the sunken face. Searched but did not find. The body had been emptied of both life and memory. She stayed as long as she needed to stay, then she went out.

We gon make everything perfect, the reverend said. He retook Sheila’s elbow. Miss Pulliam already made all the arrangements. If there’s anything you want to change or add … We’ll bring her over to the church Friday evening for the viewing. Come on in here and we can go over everything. I’ll just need you to give me cash or a certified check. My credit-card machine ain’t seem to be workin today. His hand was a crane lifting her up at the elbow. Boy, bring her some cold tea.

Yes, suh.

And check on that lady out front there.

HOW SHE LOOK? Gracie said. She was a long time rising.

Fine. They did a fine job.

How she look?

LULA MAE WOULDN’T LIKE THAT CASKET, Gracie said. She returned the brochure to Sheila.

Well, we can go back and you can help me find one that you like.

It ain’t about what I like.

It’s the one she chose.

They sat for a long time. Sheila felt the silence all around her. When she spoke her voice was lost. Well, I guess we better be gettin on to the church.

Gracie leaned forward. She put both hands to her face. She sat like that, both shoulders moving.

THE SLOW GRAY PREACHER took Sheila’s elbow to help her negotiate the collapsed steps leading up to the church. Gracie followed behind, carrying her heavy Bible like a suitcase at her side. The preacher took them into the small chapel and showed them all there was to see. The wake and funeral would be held here, the church that Lula Mae had attended just blocks down the road from her house.

Why we got to have it here? Gracie said. It’s old. Dirty. Unclean. Stinks.

Lula Mae wanted it here.

I don’t see why.

SHE WOULDN’T WANT TO BE BURIED IN THAT DRESS, Gracie said.

This is the dress she told me, Sheila said.

Well, she didn’t tell me that.

She didn’t have to tell you.

You know everything.

It’s what she wanted.

You always right.

Gracie, what’s wrong with you?

You always gotta have everything yo way.

I TALKED TO BEULAH. She’ll be here tomorrow.

They driving? Gracie said.

Yes. Rochelle’s husband rented a van.

That’s a long drive from St. Paul to here.

I know. But that’s the only way they can afford to come.

Beulah can’t stand no long drive.

I offered to send for her but—

That’s a long drive. Too long. Beulah is ninety—

Yes, well, Jacky and Lil Judy coming too.

Gracie half turned to her with some new complaint.

WASN’T NO LAUNDROMATS in the old days. Jus soap, water, and yo two hands. Wash the clothes in a big steel tub, scrub them hard across the scrubbing board, and lay em across the line to dry in the sun. Took a lot out of a person. That was the way Lula Mae had washed. That was the way Sheila was washing now. After she finished the laundry, she started on the floors, walls, and windows. She took little time to rest. Then she ironed the outfit she would wear Saturday, cut, color, and fabric chosen many months before. (She would wear it with Lucifer’s gift, the yellow bird made of unidentified Brazilian stone.) That done, she went on to her next task. She knew what she needed to do beyond knowing, and knowing, knew that she had turned knowledge into obligation, duty, and the fulfillment of that obligation and duty.

Her hands are anything but idle. She must put the house in order. The house will be rocking with people come Saturday. And she has to sort through Lula Mae’s belongings. What will she keep for herself? Those things dearest to her heart. Can she lug it all back to the city? What she doesn’t keep Gracie and Lula Mae’s friends can have. Whatever they don’t want, she will try to sell. She will—

What are you doing? Gracie said.

Sheila turned and faced her. Trying to sort through all these things.

Why you ain’t tell me?

Sheila looked into Gracie’s eyes and saw the calculation in them.

I already told you.

Gracie said nothing.

Why don’t you come help me? When Porsha gets here, she and Hatch can go through the attic.

Gracie said nothing.

They can do the little house, too.

Gracie turned and left the room.

SHE SAT ON LULA MAE’S BED and listened to the night frogs and crickets. She had accomplished all she could and deserved rest. She saw very clearly how her life had led to this moment. A moment that demanded perfection. It would take everything she had to grant a wish, but she would pay it. That much she owed Lula Mae. She had refused money from the Sterns, from Porsha, from George. She had bought her plane ticket and Gracie’s. She had paid for the wake, the funeral, the burial arrangements. She could breathe easy and Lula Mae could rest without worry, knowing that her death had been placed in Sheila’s loyal, dutiful, and determined hands. Sheila was the host that Death had promised her.

Tell Gracie to stay home, Lula Mae said. Don’t come here no mo. All she do is set up in that rocking chair and accuse and pity.

When Cookie died, Sheila had had to make all the arrangements, pay all the expenses. Gracie moved slowly and stiffly, her heart beating at a heavy cost, carrying in her blood the lead fact of the death of her firstborn. After the funeral, Sheila helped Gracie put Cookie’s wheelchair into the closet of the Kenwood apartment they shared. From there they pushed it to the patio of the May Street apartment and finally into the basement of the house on Liberty Island, where it waited in the corner, uncovered and empty. The house on Liberty Island with a real hearth where a fire could burn. Where Cookie’s photograph held command on the mantel above: a will-less face and loose eyes that looked in two directions at once; a white-and-pink bow; a pink dress with white collar and black belt; black patent-leather shoes; a white cloud surrounding her body, Cookie standing out like a gem against cotton.

She had defended Gracie from Ivory Beach, the wicked Houston stepmother who staked claims during Lula Mae’s New Mexico absence, the swamp woman who found daily satisfaction in tormenting Gracie. And, many years later, she exacted payment in Gracie’s name and memory. She saw a woman standing old and thin and alone on Sixty-third and Church Street. The sight slowed then stopped her feet. No, it couldn’t be. Surely her eyes deceived. Illusion. Mirage. She stood thinking that her cold desire for revenge and justice had caused the woman to crystallize. The woman’s eyes jumped with recognition. She started to turn her face away. Thought twice about it. Why, why, Sheila.

Sheila listened to the remembered voice and said nothing.