Such Sweet Thunder (58 page)

“Is that rosewood?” he asked Viola.

“Naw, it’s walnut.”

“Aw,” thinking: Walnut Street. English! Realleh! Wall-nuts — aaaaaaaaw!

“M-a-n!” he exclaimed, as he beheld the new coolerator that had suddenly replaced the old icebox.

“Oooooo-whee!” Bra Mo exclaimed, sweat dripping from his smiling face, “sho gotta have it to git it up there with this one!”

“Seventy-five pounds!” he said proudly, noticing the feather edge of gray that ringed Bra Mo’s head, reflecting that his face seemed to wrinkle more than it used to when he smiled, and that one of his strong white teeth was missing. He shoved the ice into the box as though he were glad to be rid of his burden.

“Look!” Amerigo exclaimed proudly, “I’m almost as big as you!”

“Yeah, I see you catchin’ up with the old man!”

“Mom said she’ll pay ya Sad … you Saturday.”

“Aw … eh … that’s okay. Yeah, that’s all right.”

He took out his dirty little flap-eared book, which also appeared to have grown old, and wrote down his account with the ancient blunt-edged pencil.…

The little corridor between the middle room and the dining room was just large enough to fit the new cedar chest where Viola kept the sheets. Rutherford had screwed hooks into a panel along the wall above where you could hang your hat and coat, and there was enough space between the end of the chest and the wall for umbrellas and things like that. This little corridor gave onto the bathroom, which contained a south window over a bathtub, and between the tub and the door were the washbasin and the toilet. To get hot water you had to heat the long cylindrical boiler in the kitchen next to the gas stove. Rutherford had made a shelf in the corner over the bathtub for the toilet articles, and Viola had hung the hot-water bottle with the long tube with the plastic nozzle with the holes in the end of it on a hook screwed in the back of the door, which, along with all the woodwork, was painted apple-green and the floor was lacquered mahogany and there was a soft yellow rug in front of the toilet stool, you put your feet on when barefoot. Another larger one draped over the side of the tub.

“Nice! nice! Nice!” he heard Miss Parks — the seventh-grade teacher, instead of Miss Tucker who had retired before he had had a chance to sing:
Some think the world was made for fun and fol-ly — and so do I!
— say: “There are
many
words in the English language besides the word
nice — interesting, charming, pleasant, agreeable — anything
but
nice!
” It’s realleh cha’ming! he thought, stepping over the freshly lacquered border of the floor into the corridor and went into the kitchen. It was just like the kitchen of 618, only there was no toilet door in the northwest corner of the wall near the window.

Viola had painted the cupboard white and the chairs white with green leaves on the side panels and on the backs of the chairs, like the green leaf on the big red apple that the Spanish lady had been holding in her hand longer than he could remember.

He walked down Troost, the new way to Aunt Rose’s, the new way out south, cutting across the busy juncture at Twelfth Street and down past the ice cream factory. He waited for the light to change at Fifteenth
Street and dropped down to Seventh Street, past apartment buildings gray in the sun with grass yards, stores closed on Sunday. Just as he reached the corner he gazed up at the porch of a weatherworn house that was bathed in the shade of a large tree. Suddenly a blast of brilliant sunlight blinded his eyes and his heart pounded violently in his ears. Children’s giggling voices filled his ears. On the porch, in the swing, within the cool aura of shade sat an old lady with a wizened purple face and thin faded purple lips. She sat very still with her arms folded in her lap, with her shoulders straight and her head erect, as though the slightest movement would cause the tower of long coiled iron-gray hair, held in place, he knew, by a huge white comb, topple down.

The Queen!

He stood in the path leading to the porch, whispering softly to the still waxed figure: “Miss Moore?”

“Eh? Oh, what is it? What did you say, young man?”

Her voice was very old and thin, but precise and clear. Not like Old Lady’s, like a witch, but like a queen, like an old dead queen that’s been put under a spell and has to wait a long time on the porch and not say a word … until the prince comes … and kisses her on the cheek and she wakes up, a new and beautiful queen! With tears of joy running down her face. Oh my beloved! she has to say, and then he says, Oh, my beloved! I’ve found you at last! And then they return to her father’s kingdom where the wedding bells ring out, and they live happy ever after.

“Miss Moore?” his voice was saying, “don’t you remember me? My name is Amerigo Jones from the first grade.”

She looked dreamily at him. A vague distant smile wove a web of wrinkles in her face, and she touched her hair with the thin pale fingers of a tremulous hand.

“Amerigo Jones!”

“Yes’m! My mother’s name is Viola Jones and my father’s name is Rutherford Jones, and they used to be in your class, too!”

“Oh, yes,” she whispered, as if in a dream. “My! Eh, won’t you sit down? Yes, sit, do sit down. Eh … how old are you now?”

“I’m twelve and next year I’m going to R. T. Bowles Junior High.”

“Hum? Ah, yes, that’s … that’s fine!” She lapsed into an absentminded silence that lasted for some minutes. Suddenly a car whizzed noisily by and startled her. “Uh! What’s that? Ah, yes, I see. That’s nice.”

“She’s dead. Asleep.”

He wanted to kiss her on the cheek, but he only gazed at her in silence. From somewhere within the house a clock was ticking. Gradually he grew impatient within the pale aura of her dream.

“I have to go now.”

“Yes yes, that’s fine.”

“Aunt Rose is waitin’-waiting.”

“You must come to see me again sometime, young man. Eh, what did you say your name was? Ah yes — eh —”

“Amerigo. Amerigo Jones.”

He bowed to the Queen.

“Ah yes. Yes.”

The giggles swirled through the channels of his ears and washed him down into the street and up the hill. After a while he turned into a pleasant little yard and stood before the screen door. From the shaded interior of the room he heard the clock ticking, and he was amazed that time had followed him, had
overtaken
him.

He rang the bell, and a tired but familiar voice bade him to enter. She’s getting old.
Now I lay me down to sleep…
.

“How you like your new home?” Aunt Rose was asking.

“All right.” He sat in the rocking chair near the bed — it took up almost half the space in the little room — a brass bed with shiny bedposts the tops of which you could screw off and hide things in. The mattress was very thick and soft and the sheets were very white and the blankets were very fluffy and light and clean. She lay with her head propped up on a huge white pillow, very brown and wise and clean and quiet. She gritted her teeth now and then because of the pain in her heart. He pretended not to notice. He looked at the three long windows with the green shades that diffused a soft green light throughout the room, and stared as long as he could at the pinpoints of light that broke through the shades behind the embroidered curtains. Like a church … a very small church. He noticed that the light was further diffused by the narrow mirror in the vanity dresser with wings on either side, so that you could close the panels toward the middle and cover up the larger mirror, if you wanted to. Like the pictures of Jesus and the Virgin Mary in the middle and the angels and things on the sides. Triptych. Tri means three, like in triangle.

“All right,” his voice was saying. “We got a new icebox, a coolerator, and a new dining room set made out of walnut on credit. I have
to go down to the furniture store on Twelfth and Main and pay the bill every month.”

“Well … that’s nice,” in a weak, breathy voice.

“Is there anything I can do for you, Aunt Rose?”

“Naw, honey, ain’ nothin’ nobody kin do — ’cept the Lord.”

Pray, he heard Miss Jenny say, wondering how it would be if Aunt Rose died, how the world would look, what would happen to the house and the grass and the flowers and Queenie and Viola and Rutherford … and
me?
If she wasn’t there when they needed something or somebody, not just to give you something, but to talk to and be around and look at. He bent down and kissed her.

“Boy! You better
git
away from here — with your foolishness!” she muttered in a breathless spasm of painful embarrassment and joy. “You gonna come up to see me when you start to high school? I know your old auntie ain’ much, I ain’ got no education an’ all —”

“Aaaaaaw! I’m comin’. It’s just right down the hill. I kin come almost every day!”

“You got a sweetheart?”

“Aaaaaaaaw shucks!”

“Well, you gittin’ to that age. Your momma an’ daddy wasn’ much older’n you when you was born. Little big-eyed devil! You bring your girlfriends around when you wanna an’ let your auntie see what kind a company you keepin’. I’ll be up an’ out a this bed one a these days, the Lord willin’.”

“Yes’m.”

If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to …

“Next thing you know, you’ll be goin’ to North High,” she was saying, “an’ then we’ll have to think about you goin’ to college.”

“Yes’m.”

And suddenly he was looking around the corner to see if he could see September coming, just before he crossed over to Twenty-Second Street. Gradually he became lost in a usual late-summer Sunday, except that it was a little sad, its heart was weak, diffused with a mellow somber heat agitated by subtle airs that issued from winter’s thin purple lips.

As night fell he walked the familiar way home, until he got to Eleventh Street, then he cut west to Harrison and turned up the hill and into the little yard where the sunflowers stood almost a story high, bowing their heads toward the wild grass that Mr. Christian had freshly cut. The scent filled his nostrils as he climbed the stairs. He
stood on the porch and looked at the city by night. Scattered clusters of light shone from the tall buildings, and the lights from the shops and lampposts shone from the streets.

The front looked the same as the old one, almost the same. He tried to discover what was different and decided that it only looked cleaner and fresher, newer. Everything was in its old place, but in a new way. Like in the middle room that isn’t really — realleh — the middle room because of the other room that’s got the new ice — coolerateh — and walnut dining room table and flowers in the window with the trunk in the corner. Eh!… with the big medical book behind it with pictures of men and women all cut up in little pieces, just to show how babies are born, and how men and women look on the inside naked. They put it theah on purpose!

He thumbed the pages and inspected the bodies, the round red chamber where the baby lay with its head down and his feet up, like he was doing a somersault!, spinning through cool blue worlds of light that emptied into the deep alluvial regions of the black room, and then the red room:

“Them’s the facts of life, men!” Turner was saying.

“What?”

“You ain’ a man till you git the claps!”

“What’s that?” Willie Joe asked.

“Gonorrhea,” Tommy said.

“Aw.”

“Kids!” Turner exclaimed.

“Well,” Tommy said, “I don’ want
nobody’s
claps!”

“It ain’ what you want that makes you fat, it’s what you git!” Turner exclaimed with a knowing grin.

“Man — you crazy!” Tommy said.

“
I
sure don’ want ’um!” William exclaimed.

“M-m-m-me n-n-n-neither … me neither!” Toodle-lum said.

“How you gonna git the claps when you ain’ even had no pussy!” Carl said. “Toodle-lum! Aw haw! haw! haw!”

“M-m-m-m my n-n-n-name is Charles! My name is Charles. I ain’ studyin’ you, now … ain’ studyin’ you.”

“I bet
you
ain’ had none! Ha! ha!” William said to Carl.

“What you wanta bet?”

“I’d like to git ol’ Etta!” Turner said. “I bet she got some good booty!”

“Old Etta! M-a-n! I bet she kin really do it!” Willie Joe said.

“Listen to that little niggah!” Turner exclaimed, thumping Willie Joe on the head.

“Ouch!”

“That little cat can’t even git a pee hard-on! Ha! ha!”

“Tee! hee! hee!” Lem squealed.

“Ha! ha! ha!” Amerigo laughed.

“What
you
laughin’ at?” Turner said. “You ain’ had none. Old Maxine wants to give it to you, but you too chicken to take it —”

“That’s somethin’ bad!”

“How you think you got here?”

“What you mean, niggah?”

“I mean your old man had to pull down them pants!” Turner said. “Ask Tommy, if you don’ believe me!”

“You niggahs sure are nasty!”

“Come on an’ git it!” Viola cried at suppertime the next evening.

“Mom?”

“Well, it’s about time, you hear me!” Rutherford exclaimed, stepping up to the sink to wash his hands. He looked at his father with great emotion. He watched the huge muscles in his arms ripple as he rubbed the soap between his hands. He suddenly saw his father naked that time when they went to the bathhouse and dressed in the same locker. He trembled with embarrassment and rage.

“Wash your hands, too!” Viola was saying. He beheld her naked, her breast protruding between his upturned eye and a bearded face with a booming bass voice that made him sink tremulously into his chair and bite into his hot dog sandwich with exaggerated gusto.

“Did you hear your momma tell you to wash your hands?” Rutherford asked.

He rose from the table and guiltily moved toward the sink. The gummy bread stuck to the roof of his mouth and almost choked him when he tried to swallow. Finished, he sat back down.

“An’ don’ fill your mouth so full,” Viola said, “that food ain’ gonna run away. Take your elbows off the table. Somebody’s think you never learned no table manners at all!”

A sudden naked impulse caused the telephone to ring.

Now?

The shrill reverberation filled the darkness of the black room and pictures flashed through his mind like the pictures on the silver screen: a woman, prostrate, naked, upon a big white bed. The man stood over her, naked, trembling.