Seeing Red (27 page)

“So nobody says anything?”

“Well,” Mama said, “some people do, like the hippies and peaceniks, but they’re considered the crazies. Nobody wants to speak up and be one of the crazies.”

“So everyone just sits there and says nothing? How’s anything ever going to get better?”

Mama looked down at the braided rug like it was suddenly real interesting to see how those colours coiled around into a tiny little circle of black in the centre.

“It’s all confusing to me,” Beau said.

“It’s not just you, Beau,” Mama said, and I could tell she wasn’t just saying it to make Beau feel better because her eyes had that faraway look as she held her iced tea glass with one hand and ran her finger around the rim with the other. “It’s a confusing time. Even in the 1940s when we were at war, we knew where we stood. And in the 1950s it seemed like we had it all.” She sighed. “Then the cracks started showing because we’d only been covering up the problems. It seems like the past few years it’s been nothing but war and uproar, assassinations, fighting battles like civil rights, women’s lib—”

“But those ain’t all bad things, Miz Porter.”

“Oh, I don’t mean it’s all bad. Some of it’s good – change we needed, like civil rights. In fact, we need more change when it comes to civil rights. We still aren’t treating people equally or fairly.” She sighed.

I wondered if she was thinking about Thomas. I was.

“But,” Mama went on, “change can still be hard for people. It’s confusing and sometimes even painful.” She smiled at me. “Like growing pains.”

I didn’t know if it made me feel better or worse that the rest of the country was in an uproar like my life seemed to be ever since Daddy died. On the one hand it meant I was like everyone else in the country. On the other hand, if grown-ups couldn’t even make sense of everything that was happening, how the heck was
I
supposed to?

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Beau’s Plan

Before school Monday morning I was puzzling over the old map when I smelled something unusual in the kitchen. Hot food. I bumped into J as we ran for the kitchen.

Beau was making pancakes. Mama didn’t even have to teach him because he said his mama had taught him how. She made some Nescafé, though, with milk and sugar, and set the NASCAR mug in front of me.

“Your coffee, sir,” she said with a smile, and I couldn’t help grinning back at her.

I must’ve eaten eight pancakes before I stopped for a breath because they were real good and I was still making up for going a long time without hot breakfasts. Even J was cramming them in.

“Boys!” said Mama. “You have plenty of time before the bus comes. Slow down or you’ll get a stomach ache.”

“Miz Porter?” Beau said, sitting down in Daddy’s chair. “I got me an idea how you can stay right here in Virginia.”

That stopped me from eating. “How?” I said with my mouth full.

“You can sell your place and still stay in town. Y’all can just move into my house. I got three bedrooms. Miz Porter, you could have Mama’s, and the boys can share. For free, because it’s done paid for.”

I looked at Mama.

“I – I don’t know what to say, Beau.”

“Miz Porter, your family has always been more than kind to me.” He reached up to tug at his hair. “Now that Mr Porter’s gone, it seems only right that I should help take care of ya’ll for a change.”

“But, Beau, that would be too big of a change. There are three of us…all living at your house?” She looked across the table at J bouncing in his seat and shook her head. “You’d never get any peace and quiet.”

“But…I don’t like peace and quiet, Miz Porter. I get lonely all by myself.”

Mama chewed her lip and looked around the room, her eyes settling on everything like maybe, hopefully, she was figuring out how to move it to Beau’s house. When she gazed into the dining room and beyond, Beau lit up.

“I got me a nice big colour TV, Miz Porter. We can sit and watch all those TV women who are like you.”

Mama tilted her head. “What women?”

“You know, those women who are doing something constructive with their lives.”

I held my breath because if I’d said that, Mama would know I was poking fun at her. But she didn’t look mad at all. In fact, she held her head up and was half smiling. “That’s a lovely offer, Beau, but I—”

“You just think about it, okay? It’s a real big question. I need a lot of time for questions like that to run around my brain before they settle. So you take your time, all right?”

She smiled. “All right, Beau. I’ll think about it.”

When Mama turned away I gave Beau two thumbs up.

At school, Miss Miller let us work on our Foxfire projects, “independently or in small,
quiet
groups,” she said, her eyes flicking to the door. She patrolled up and down the rows of desks just to make sure we kept it down to a low hum.

She stopped at the front of my row, my desk, and crouched down. “I know you were concerned about the date on that grave marker,” she said, “so I tried to find out at the county courthouse.”

I stared at her, because I didn’t know you could look that kind of stuff up, and also I was surprised she’d go out of her way like that for me.

“Unfortunately during the Civil War and for some time afterwards, the county didn’t keep birth and death records, not very thoroughly, anyway, and the state didn’t take over doing it until the early 1900s, so I’m afraid he’s lost in that gap.”

I tapped my pencil on my desk a few times. “Does that mean there’d be no information about Freedom Church, either?”

She nodded. “Bill – Mr Reynolds has combed those records and he hasn’t found—”

“Why is he looking that up?”

Her face went a little pink, like maybe I’d caught her at something. “I-I think he just wants to find out the truth.”

I let that sink in for a moment. Since he was a lawyer and he had to follow the law, maybe it was a good thing for him to be working on this case. Maybe he could find where on the Dunlop land the church had been. I knew he could stand up to Mr Dunlop. And I knew he didn’t like Mr Dunlop, either.

Miss Miller was talking, and the edge in her voice was what got me to tune in. “…and while I know you don’t care much for him, he is—”

“I changed my mind about him, Miss Miller. I think he’s okay. Mostly.”

“Oh.” She smiled, and her voice went back to normal. “Well, I’m glad to hear that. Mostly.”

She stood up again to continue her patrol, and I got an idea. I scribbled the words on a piece of notebook paper and tore it out of my binder. “Miss Miller?”

She was halfway down the row, but she turned around and walked back to me.

I dropped my voice to a whisper. “Could you give this to Mr Reynolds and see if he can translate it?” I folded up the piece of paper so no one could see the words
Fieri Facias
and handed it to her.

“Okay,” she said slowly. “Is there anything he needs to know about it?”

I shook my head. “I don’t even know if it means anything, but it’s the only thing on the—” I stopped myself just before saying
map
. “It’s the only thing I can’t figure out.”

“Ah, like a piece of a puzzle.” She smiled. “I’ll let you know what he says.” And she went and put it right in her suede purse so I knew she realized how important it was.

When I got home from school Reverend Benson was in the living room. Mama was crouching on the sofa, looking pale and small. He insisted I join them because, he said, “If you’re grown up enough to decide whether you go to church or not, you’re grown up enough to understand this discussion.”

“Is it Rosie?” I asked.

Mama shook her head. “Rosie’s fine.”

“You see, Red, your mama has this notion of y’all moving in with Beau.”

“I know,” I said.

Reverend Benson cleared his throat. “Well, your mama being a widow and Beau being a single man, that would be living in sin, the two of them living together without being married.”

“It’s not like that! Plus, it’s not just them; it’s me and J, too.”

“Ex-act-ly,” he said triumphantly, turning to Mama. “Think of the message you’re sending your boys. They’ll believe they can pick up with any floozy – oh, not that I’m implying you’re a floozy, no, ma’am—”

Mama’s foot started shaking up and down.

“—but just think of how it looks. Think about your reputation. And your responsibility to your boys, to your whole community, and to Beau.” He stood up and grinned at both of us. “I know you’ll do the right thing.”

Mama had barely shut the door behind him when I was after her. “You don’t have to listen to Reverend Benson. You don’t even like him!”

Mama started tapping her foot. “Whether I care for Reverend Benson is not the point. In this case, I’m afraid he’s right.”

“But that’s just dumb, Mama. Everyone knows Beau is like my brother. Daddy and you always thought of him like a son. So, who’s going to think bad about you?”

“It’s not just me. I have to think about Beau’s reputation, too. They might think I’m using him by taking over his house without paying him rent or anything.”

“Then we’ll pay him!”

“With what, Red? We’re in debt. Even after selling our property, there are so many bills to pay, we’ll only have a tiny bit of money, and that won’t last long. Back home, we can live with your aunt Patty, at least until I get on my feet.” She shook her head. “How could we possibly pay Beau rent?”

“By getting a job!”

Mama froze, and her face went thoughtful, almost surprised. “Things
have
settled down, now,” she said slowly, “and you boys are in school… You’re right, I suppose I could look for a job.”

“I meant me, Mama, not you.”

“Why not me?” Mama asked.

“What can you do?”

“What can I do? There are a lot of things I can do, young man! You, on the other hand, need to go to school and do your studies so that one day you’ll be able to take care of yourself.” She marched into the kitchen and I heard pots and pans banging, so I guessed that was the end of that. I just hoped she’d think of some job she could do because without Beau’s house as an option, Ohio was getting closer and closer.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Mama and Rosie

Mama plopped the macaroni-and-cheese dish on the table and sat down to supper with the rest of us. She didn’t serve herself, though. She was busy folding and unfolding her napkin as she told Beau that we couldn’t move in with him and explained what Reverend Benson said.

Beau swallowed his forkful of macaroni. “Oh. Okay. Reverend Benson knows what’s right, so whatever he says I guess we have to follow.”

I snorted.

“Well,” Mama said, her foot starting to shake, “I’m not sure he’s right about everything, but I think he may be right about this issue.”

“And peach pie,” J said.

“What does peach pie have to do with anything?” I asked him.

J looked at Mama. “Reverend Benson said his wife is always in the kitchen, where women should be, spending their time making his favourite things to eat, like peach pie.”

I looked across the table at Beau and I bet my eyes were as big as his. I swear we both scooted our chairs back from the table at the same time, ready for Mama to blow a gasket.

Her foot was shaking faster than a timing light, and she was rocking her fork between two fingers as fast as a gauge gone berserk. Her eyes and lips were tight. “I don’t have the time – or the inclination – to bake pies all day.”

“But I like your pies, Mama,” J said.

“Then you should learn how to bake them.”

“I’m not a girl! I shouldn’t have to cook stuff!”

Mama’s fork flew out of her hand and clanked on the floor at the same time her hand hit the table so hard the lid fell off the sugar bowl.

J’s mouth dropped open. First, he stared at the fork on the floor, then at the sugar bowl, and finally at Mama.

Even Mama looked surprised, but that didn’t stop her from talking. “I thought I’d made it crystal clear that cooking and housework are not just for women to do, but apparently there’s still some confusion.” She stood up from the table and marched out of the kitchen.

“Man, J,” I said, “how stupid are you? Don’t you know saying stuff like that is only going to make her mad?”

Mama reappeared in the kitchen with her coat and purse, glaring at me now. “It’s not just the talk that upsets me, it’s the thought behind it. I have a perfect right to be angry about that. It’s my
life
!” She dropped her purse on the counter as she put on her coat. “You all can clean up after supper. This kitchen floor needs scrubbing, J,” she said pointedly, “and the whole house needs dusting and vacuuming.” She glared at me and Beau.

“Yes, ma’am, Miz Porter,” Beau said.

“I’m going out. And I want you
gentlemen
to think about—” She let out a sound between outrage and disgust, storming out of the kitchen and out the door. We listened to the car door slam and the gravel spin as she took off.