Color Me Butterfly, page 12
Angie, age 3
“I betta’ hurry and check on that faucet and be on my way,” Roy finally said. “I’ve got six more jobs to finish before my schedule ends.”
“Well, you can cross one of those jobs offa’ your list. My faucet workin’ just fine.”
Roy smiled and stood up to leave. In that moment, he knew the old woman was special. He thanked Mrs. Lola for the food and hospitality. And when he said good-bye, he knew that it would not be the last time he would see her.
“You welcome to come back anytime you like,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am. Next time, I’ll bring the food so you don’t have to cook.”
Roy went home and told Mattie all about Mrs. Lola. “She’s very special,” he told her. “She told me about her family and about the son that she recently lost. She says I remind her of him.”
For the first time in her life, Mattie saw a calm in Roy. It was as if the old woman had a way of quieting the strife simmering in his soul. She was glad to see her husband so enamored with Mrs. Lola. Roy had never spoken of anyone the way he spoke of her.
“Can you make somethin’ for me to take to her?” he asked Mattie. “I’d like to pay her back for the breakfast she fixed for me.”
A few days later, Roy took a dish of smothered pork chops and rice that Mattie had fixed.
“Boy, you didn’t have to put your wife through all this trouble,” Mrs. Lola said when she saw the meal he had carried to her.
Mrs. Lola heated the dish, and they had lunch together. This time, Roy told her about his family and work. When he talked about his kids, his eyes lit up, but Mrs. Lola could see a hidden sadness. His voice lowered when he spoke about Mattie.
“Is everything okay between you and Mattie?” she asked him.
“We sometimes go through things,” he finally said, when she reached for his hand.
“You know you can talk to me ’bout anything.”
But Roy was ashamed. He was too ashamed to tell her about his anger and how he sometimes took it out on his wife. Or about how he felt like he was less than a man because he was sometimes unable to properly care for his family, and how he found solace in a bottle. It was too hard for him to look Mrs. Lola in the eyes and talk about those things.
“I better be goin’ soon. I need to get back to work.”
This time, Mrs. Lola didn’t pressure him to stay. She knew he was hurting and that, in time and in his own way, he would open up to her.
“You know you always welcome to stop by.”
Roy nodded and left.
He stayed away for weeks, unable to bring himself to open up to Mrs. Lola, to tell her he was not befitting of her son’s memory. He missed her while he was away. And when he felt restless and tired, he finally went back to see her. This time, he didn’t clam up when she asked him if everything was okay.
“No, ma’am,” he told her. And then the floodgates opened.
Mrs. Lola just nodded with understanding. She could see the good in Roy. “It’s gonna be all right, baby,” she told him. “It’s gonna be all right.”
Before long, Roy was visiting Mrs. Lola at least three times a week. He no longer hid anything from her. He trusted her. Felt like he could tell her anything. She made him believe he could be a better man. And as strange as it was, he was beginning to feel the same way.
“Earl always made me feel special, no matter how angry he got. Marriage is hard, Roy, but you gotta work at it. Earl and I stayed married for so long because we respected each other, we loved each other no matter what. We had hard times, times when we didn’t know where our next meal was comin’ from, but we got through it. You gotta learn to do the same,” Mrs. Lola encouraged.
Whenever Roy spent time with Mrs. Lola and then went home to his family, he saw past the shame and the bottle. He saw how much he loved his family. With Mattie’s love and Mrs. Lola’s support, he slowly began to change. Each day became a little bit easier.
As the months went on, Roy continued to do right by his family. He went to work every day, he visited with Mrs. Lola whenever he could, and he did what he had to do to keep his family together.
19
Mattie prepared dinner while the children sat at the kitchen table completing their homework. Angelica sat in the corner with a coloring book, mimicking them. Mattie moved around the kitchen, humming to herself. Despite the strange dream she’d had of a robin pecking at her window, she was in a good mood.
She had just finished clearing the children’s dishes when Roy came into the kitchen. “That fish sure smells good,” he said.
“You ready to eat?” She could smell the vodka on his breath.
“Yeah. I saw Grant on my way up. He said he and Paulene are gonna stop by. He wanna play some poker.”
Paulene, one of Mattie’s younger sisters, and her husband, Grant, had recently moved into an apartment in the same building.
The evening passed quickly, and the vodka was gone by the time Roy and Grant started on their fourth round of poker.
“Grant, come on and let’s run to the bar to get a six-pack,” Roy said.
Mattie rushed in from the kitchen when she overheard him. “Roy, you promised me that you were gonna stay in tonight. Why do you wanna go out this late? Ain’t you had enough to drink?”
“We’re only going to get a six-pack. We’re comin’ right back. It shouldn’t take that long.”
“Well, we’re gonna go with y’all,” Mattie said.
The temperature had dropped thirty degrees, and the night air had a bite to it. They walked the twelve blocks to YoYo’s Bar, and when they arrived, Roy ordered a round of drinks. “Give me a six-pack to go, too,” he told the bartender.
An hour had passed before they finally got up to leave.
“I wanna make a quick stop to see Mrs. Lola,” Roy announced.
“Let’s just go home, Roy,” Mattie pushed. “You can see Mrs. Lola tomorrow.”
“No, I need to see her tonight. I ain’t been there in a few days to check on her.”
“Well, can’t it wait till tomorrow? I’m sure she’s okay.”
Despite Mattie’s protests, Roy took a left turn in the direction of Tasker Homes.
They walked down 29th Street and turned onto Snyder. The short distance immediately gave way to the invisible dividing line between the black and white neighborhoods. Many Italian and Irish people owned the beautiful brick homes that occupied the fifteen blocks between Wilson Park and Tasker Homes.
“I gotta go to the bathroom,” Paulene said as soon as they turned onto Snyder.
“Well, can’t you hold it till we get to Mrs. Lola’s?” Mattie asked, her pace quickening.
“I ain’t gonna be able to hold it much longer,” Paulene answered.
Grant pointed to a small space between an old Cadillac and a Buick. “Here, you can go right there.”
Paulene stared at the space and rolled her eyes, offended that he would even suggest she pee in the street.
“There’s a bar on the corner up ahead,” Roy said. “Run in there and go.”
They walked the two blocks to the bar.
A roomful of pale faces gawked at them when Grant opened the bar door, daring them to come inside.
Paulene panicked. “I ain’t going in there with all those white people.”
“Well, you’re gonna have to either go inside or hold it till we get to Mrs. Lola’s,” Mattie said.
As they stood in front of the bar trying to convince Paulene to go inside, the door pushed open and two men came out. One walked with a swagger, the other with contempt. They spelled nothing but trouble. One of them, obviously drunk, bumped into Roy.
Mattie heard Roy say, “Man, say excuse me.”
“Nigger, what did you say to me?”
Mattie barely heard the man’s words and didn’t even see the knife. Then everything became a blur.
“Run, Mattie,” she finally heard Roy say after her mind came back to her. But she couldn’t move. Her legs were heavy, and she felt frozen. All hell broke loose. Then she saw blood.
“Mattie, run,” Roy shouted again. When he saw that she was paralyzed with fear, he ran and grabbed her hand, pulling her down the street with him. Paulene and Grant followed.
The men chased them until they saw a police car coming around a corner, and then they ran the other way.
“Did he stab you?” Mattie asked Roy urgently.
“Yeah,” Roy said, his hand shrouding the blood that poured from his neck.
They flagged down the police car.
“Sir, a man just stabbed my husband, and he’s bleedin’ real bad,” Mattie said to the officer, her voice filled with fear.
“Which one is your husband?”
Mattie pointed to Roy, who stood behind her, his hands and jacket covered in blood.
“Do you know who stabbed you?”
Roy shook his head.
“What are y’all doing around here anyway?”
“We were on our way to visit a friend in Tasker,” Mattie explained.
“Where do y’all live?”
“Wilson Park,” Mattie answered impatiently.
“Get in,” one of the officers finally said.
More than twenty minutes later, they arrived at the emergency room. Roy handed Mattie a large knife that he carried in his coat pocket. “You hold on to this,” he told her.
Mattie took the knife, which was soaked in his blood, and shoved it in her pants.
In the hospital, they immediately took Roy to the back and left Mattie, Paulene, and Grant standing in the waiting area. Two hours later, the doctor came out to see them.
“Mrs. Madison,” the doctor said anxiously, “your husband has lost a lot of blood, and his injury requires surgery. We would like to prep him immediately, and I need your permission to operate.”
Mattie stared at him blankly, then nodded her consent.
“Why don’t y’all go on home and check on the children,” Mattie suggested to Paulene and Grant. “I’m gonna stay here and wait till Roy gets out of surgery.”
Four hours later, the doctor came out to see Mattie again. He sat next to her, the smell of soap seeping from his pores. His eyes squinted in an uncomfortable way, as he brought his face closer to hers. “Your husband has lost too much blood, and he went into shock while we were operating. He’s in a coma, and it’s not likely he’ll wake up. If he does, it’s likely he will have lost some of his physical and mental capacities.”
The smell in the waiting room suffocated Mattie. She looked toward the door that led to her husband. “Can I see him?” Her voice sounded small and far away from her, like it was devoid of oxygen.
“Yes, he’s been moved to intensive care. I’ll take you there.”
Mattie followed closely behind.
Roy lay still in the bed, an intravenous line running from his left arm and white gauze with a clear tube at its center covering his neck. His arms were at his sides, and white patches covered his eyes.
Mattie noticed the white sheet that neatly covered his body, folded over at his chest. He looked like he was asleep, and the slow rise and fall of his chest was the only indication he was still alive.
Over the next few days while she sat at Roy’s bedside, Mattie thought hard about the past ten years she and Roy had shared, about the good and bad times. No matter what had happened in the past, she still loved her husband deeply. Seeing him so fragile haunted her day and night. Every evening, before bed, she got down on her knees and said the same prayer over and over again. She asked the Lord to bring her husband back to her.
One evening, not even a week later, Mattie lifted herself from the tub, dried off, and put on her nightdress. She was tired from the long days and nights spent at the hospital. She went to check on the children, who were all asleep, still unaware of the seriousness of their father’s condition. After she pulled the covers over them, she returned to her bedroom, said the same prayer she’d said every night, and then lay down.
She had not even shut her eyes when she looked at the foot of the bed and saw Roy standing there, the same patches covering his eyes. When she shifted her body and mind to be sure it was him, he slowly removed the patches and looked at her. Their eyes met, and then he disappeared.
As miraculous as the moment was, she was not afraid; a single thought gave her peace—Roy must have awakened from the coma. He’ll know me when I visit him tomorrow. Then she turned and slept.
Mattie awoke to a loud knock on the door. She put on her robe and rushed to the door. “Who is it?” she shouted.
“Ma’am, it’s the police,” a deep voice replied.
Mattie opened the door.
Two uniformed policemen stood there. One of them spoke up: “Ma’am, I’m sorry to tell you that your husband passed away during the night. You need to call the hospital immediately.”
Mattie stood dazed and confused, empty. “No. No, he ain’t gone,” she screamed as she broke down in tears. Roy was just at her bedside only hours ago, gazing at her, giving her hope. The children heard her cries and got up from their beds. Mattie shooed them back inside. It took the police officers twenty minutes to convince her that he was gone.
She had no more strength to give.
During the days that followed, Mattie moved around in a trance. Roy had not reached his thirtieth birthday, and she missed him terribly. Grief engulfed her, but it would have to wait. She needed to be there for her children, to prepare them for the news and then, ultimately, the funeral. She and Miss Esther made the arrangements. A viewing would be held in Philadelphia, and then Roy would be returned to Ash, North Carolina, for the funeral and burial. There, he would lay in rest with his ancestors.
On the morning of the funeral, a black limousine came for them at exactly ten thirty a.m. The funeral was to start at eleven. Mattie had already seen her husband since his passing. She had viewed his body at the coroner’s office and then later at the funeral home, when she took the dark blue suit, light blue shirt, and black shoes he was to be buried in.
Mattie slowly walked down the church aisle, a black veil covering her face. Her five brave children surrounded her. When she got close enough to see Roy lying in the casket, she fainted. Roy Jr. and Eileen walked up to the casket on their own. Anthony, Lydia, and Angie followed.
“Do you want to see your daddy?” a strange voice asked Lydia and Anthony, as they stood on their toes trying to peep inside the casket.
Anthony nodded, and Lydia mimicked him.
The man picked them up, holding one on each side of him. They stared into the casket, and for the first time, they understood. Tears gathered in their eyes, as they looked down at their father, who lay in his dark blue suit, resting peacefully.
Roy, age 29
PART TWO
Lydia
20
Lydia was roused by the smell of sizzling bacon and homemade biscuits swirling its way from the kitchen to her nostrils. She shifted the pillow away from her nose so she could more fully take in the pleasant aroma. Never an early riser, her consciousness continued to float between her dream and her mother’s blaring voice. “You girls get on up and get ready for school.” Today, Lydia would be starting third grade. The excitement of it hadn’t yet filtered into her awareness.
As Lydia listened to her mother’s footsteps make their way down the hall toward her brothers’ room, she slowly began to awaken. She could hear the even breathing of her little sister, Angie, who lay tangled in a blanket in the bunk beneath her. Across the room, she could hear the grunts of her elder sister, Eileen.
Lydia pushed herself up from the comfort of her light blue cotton blanket and squinted as the sunlight crept through the sheer curtain, its rays temporarily blinding her. She jumped down from her bunk and staggered toward the dresser the three girls shared, taking care not to bump the drawer against Eileen’s bed, as she usually did. She was in no mood for another scolding from her older sister, the kind she always got when she challenged Eileen. Though Lydia was eight years old—No, eight and a half, which was what she told her sisters and brothers when they treated her like a child—she still felt like she and Angie got the short end of the stick no matter what.
Quietly, she pulled out the new blue polyester pants and pink pullover top that her mother had bought for the new school year. Just when she thought she had avoided a confrontation, Eileen stirred and gave her a look of warning as she turned and pulled the covers over her head. That was close, Lydia thought. Eileen’s breathing was still choppy when Lydia slipped out of the room and across the hall to join Angie in the bathroom.
The children moved the morning along like clockwork. Lydia and Angie usually shared the bathroom for the first few minutes until Eileen shuffled in and joined them. Then, muffled thumps and slow movement barged from the back bedroom, where Roy Jr. and Anthony came to life.
Within half an hour, they were all gathered around the table for a hot breakfast.
It had been a memorable summer.
It was the summer Lydia had been caught stealing a Tastykake from the Pantry Pride grocery store. The security guard, Mr. Robinson, told her brother Roy Jr. and made him promise to tell their mother. Instead, he made Lydia do all his chores, with no lip, in exchange for his silence. The summer Lydia and Eileen had their biggest rivalries, ones that often ended in a brawl that Eileen usually won because she was so much bigger than Lydia. The summer that Lydia and Anthony became very close and began to share everything, including their secrets and friends—and the summer that Roy Jr. made Lydia realize for the first time how different she was from the rest of them. She was the only one of the bunch that had lighter skin and red hair. She was unlike the rest of her siblings, who were dark skinned with coarse hair and dark eyes. But most of all, it was the summer that Lydia understood just how tired and sad her mother was. When she looked at her mother really closely, she could still see that look in her eyes, the same look she had the day of their father’s funeral.
More than two years had passed since Roy’s death. The children watched their mother grieve silently for their daddy, and then, somehow, she found the strength to push on, for their sakes.
“I betta’ hurry and check on that faucet and be on my way,” Roy finally said. “I’ve got six more jobs to finish before my schedule ends.”
“Well, you can cross one of those jobs offa’ your list. My faucet workin’ just fine.”
Roy smiled and stood up to leave. In that moment, he knew the old woman was special. He thanked Mrs. Lola for the food and hospitality. And when he said good-bye, he knew that it would not be the last time he would see her.
“You welcome to come back anytime you like,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am. Next time, I’ll bring the food so you don’t have to cook.”
Roy went home and told Mattie all about Mrs. Lola. “She’s very special,” he told her. “She told me about her family and about the son that she recently lost. She says I remind her of him.”
For the first time in her life, Mattie saw a calm in Roy. It was as if the old woman had a way of quieting the strife simmering in his soul. She was glad to see her husband so enamored with Mrs. Lola. Roy had never spoken of anyone the way he spoke of her.
“Can you make somethin’ for me to take to her?” he asked Mattie. “I’d like to pay her back for the breakfast she fixed for me.”
A few days later, Roy took a dish of smothered pork chops and rice that Mattie had fixed.
“Boy, you didn’t have to put your wife through all this trouble,” Mrs. Lola said when she saw the meal he had carried to her.
Mrs. Lola heated the dish, and they had lunch together. This time, Roy told her about his family and work. When he talked about his kids, his eyes lit up, but Mrs. Lola could see a hidden sadness. His voice lowered when he spoke about Mattie.
“Is everything okay between you and Mattie?” she asked him.
“We sometimes go through things,” he finally said, when she reached for his hand.
“You know you can talk to me ’bout anything.”
But Roy was ashamed. He was too ashamed to tell her about his anger and how he sometimes took it out on his wife. Or about how he felt like he was less than a man because he was sometimes unable to properly care for his family, and how he found solace in a bottle. It was too hard for him to look Mrs. Lola in the eyes and talk about those things.
“I better be goin’ soon. I need to get back to work.”
This time, Mrs. Lola didn’t pressure him to stay. She knew he was hurting and that, in time and in his own way, he would open up to her.
“You know you always welcome to stop by.”
Roy nodded and left.
He stayed away for weeks, unable to bring himself to open up to Mrs. Lola, to tell her he was not befitting of her son’s memory. He missed her while he was away. And when he felt restless and tired, he finally went back to see her. This time, he didn’t clam up when she asked him if everything was okay.
“No, ma’am,” he told her. And then the floodgates opened.
Mrs. Lola just nodded with understanding. She could see the good in Roy. “It’s gonna be all right, baby,” she told him. “It’s gonna be all right.”
Before long, Roy was visiting Mrs. Lola at least three times a week. He no longer hid anything from her. He trusted her. Felt like he could tell her anything. She made him believe he could be a better man. And as strange as it was, he was beginning to feel the same way.
“Earl always made me feel special, no matter how angry he got. Marriage is hard, Roy, but you gotta work at it. Earl and I stayed married for so long because we respected each other, we loved each other no matter what. We had hard times, times when we didn’t know where our next meal was comin’ from, but we got through it. You gotta learn to do the same,” Mrs. Lola encouraged.
Whenever Roy spent time with Mrs. Lola and then went home to his family, he saw past the shame and the bottle. He saw how much he loved his family. With Mattie’s love and Mrs. Lola’s support, he slowly began to change. Each day became a little bit easier.
As the months went on, Roy continued to do right by his family. He went to work every day, he visited with Mrs. Lola whenever he could, and he did what he had to do to keep his family together.
19
Mattie prepared dinner while the children sat at the kitchen table completing their homework. Angelica sat in the corner with a coloring book, mimicking them. Mattie moved around the kitchen, humming to herself. Despite the strange dream she’d had of a robin pecking at her window, she was in a good mood.
She had just finished clearing the children’s dishes when Roy came into the kitchen. “That fish sure smells good,” he said.
“You ready to eat?” She could smell the vodka on his breath.
“Yeah. I saw Grant on my way up. He said he and Paulene are gonna stop by. He wanna play some poker.”
Paulene, one of Mattie’s younger sisters, and her husband, Grant, had recently moved into an apartment in the same building.
The evening passed quickly, and the vodka was gone by the time Roy and Grant started on their fourth round of poker.
“Grant, come on and let’s run to the bar to get a six-pack,” Roy said.
Mattie rushed in from the kitchen when she overheard him. “Roy, you promised me that you were gonna stay in tonight. Why do you wanna go out this late? Ain’t you had enough to drink?”
“We’re only going to get a six-pack. We’re comin’ right back. It shouldn’t take that long.”
“Well, we’re gonna go with y’all,” Mattie said.
The temperature had dropped thirty degrees, and the night air had a bite to it. They walked the twelve blocks to YoYo’s Bar, and when they arrived, Roy ordered a round of drinks. “Give me a six-pack to go, too,” he told the bartender.
An hour had passed before they finally got up to leave.
“I wanna make a quick stop to see Mrs. Lola,” Roy announced.
“Let’s just go home, Roy,” Mattie pushed. “You can see Mrs. Lola tomorrow.”
“No, I need to see her tonight. I ain’t been there in a few days to check on her.”
“Well, can’t it wait till tomorrow? I’m sure she’s okay.”
Despite Mattie’s protests, Roy took a left turn in the direction of Tasker Homes.
They walked down 29th Street and turned onto Snyder. The short distance immediately gave way to the invisible dividing line between the black and white neighborhoods. Many Italian and Irish people owned the beautiful brick homes that occupied the fifteen blocks between Wilson Park and Tasker Homes.
“I gotta go to the bathroom,” Paulene said as soon as they turned onto Snyder.
“Well, can’t you hold it till we get to Mrs. Lola’s?” Mattie asked, her pace quickening.
“I ain’t gonna be able to hold it much longer,” Paulene answered.
Grant pointed to a small space between an old Cadillac and a Buick. “Here, you can go right there.”
Paulene stared at the space and rolled her eyes, offended that he would even suggest she pee in the street.
“There’s a bar on the corner up ahead,” Roy said. “Run in there and go.”
They walked the two blocks to the bar.
A roomful of pale faces gawked at them when Grant opened the bar door, daring them to come inside.
Paulene panicked. “I ain’t going in there with all those white people.”
“Well, you’re gonna have to either go inside or hold it till we get to Mrs. Lola’s,” Mattie said.
As they stood in front of the bar trying to convince Paulene to go inside, the door pushed open and two men came out. One walked with a swagger, the other with contempt. They spelled nothing but trouble. One of them, obviously drunk, bumped into Roy.
Mattie heard Roy say, “Man, say excuse me.”
“Nigger, what did you say to me?”
Mattie barely heard the man’s words and didn’t even see the knife. Then everything became a blur.
“Run, Mattie,” she finally heard Roy say after her mind came back to her. But she couldn’t move. Her legs were heavy, and she felt frozen. All hell broke loose. Then she saw blood.
“Mattie, run,” Roy shouted again. When he saw that she was paralyzed with fear, he ran and grabbed her hand, pulling her down the street with him. Paulene and Grant followed.
The men chased them until they saw a police car coming around a corner, and then they ran the other way.
“Did he stab you?” Mattie asked Roy urgently.
“Yeah,” Roy said, his hand shrouding the blood that poured from his neck.
They flagged down the police car.
“Sir, a man just stabbed my husband, and he’s bleedin’ real bad,” Mattie said to the officer, her voice filled with fear.
“Which one is your husband?”
Mattie pointed to Roy, who stood behind her, his hands and jacket covered in blood.
“Do you know who stabbed you?”
Roy shook his head.
“What are y’all doing around here anyway?”
“We were on our way to visit a friend in Tasker,” Mattie explained.
“Where do y’all live?”
“Wilson Park,” Mattie answered impatiently.
“Get in,” one of the officers finally said.
More than twenty minutes later, they arrived at the emergency room. Roy handed Mattie a large knife that he carried in his coat pocket. “You hold on to this,” he told her.
Mattie took the knife, which was soaked in his blood, and shoved it in her pants.
In the hospital, they immediately took Roy to the back and left Mattie, Paulene, and Grant standing in the waiting area. Two hours later, the doctor came out to see them.
“Mrs. Madison,” the doctor said anxiously, “your husband has lost a lot of blood, and his injury requires surgery. We would like to prep him immediately, and I need your permission to operate.”
Mattie stared at him blankly, then nodded her consent.
“Why don’t y’all go on home and check on the children,” Mattie suggested to Paulene and Grant. “I’m gonna stay here and wait till Roy gets out of surgery.”
Four hours later, the doctor came out to see Mattie again. He sat next to her, the smell of soap seeping from his pores. His eyes squinted in an uncomfortable way, as he brought his face closer to hers. “Your husband has lost too much blood, and he went into shock while we were operating. He’s in a coma, and it’s not likely he’ll wake up. If he does, it’s likely he will have lost some of his physical and mental capacities.”
The smell in the waiting room suffocated Mattie. She looked toward the door that led to her husband. “Can I see him?” Her voice sounded small and far away from her, like it was devoid of oxygen.
“Yes, he’s been moved to intensive care. I’ll take you there.”
Mattie followed closely behind.
Roy lay still in the bed, an intravenous line running from his left arm and white gauze with a clear tube at its center covering his neck. His arms were at his sides, and white patches covered his eyes.
Mattie noticed the white sheet that neatly covered his body, folded over at his chest. He looked like he was asleep, and the slow rise and fall of his chest was the only indication he was still alive.
Over the next few days while she sat at Roy’s bedside, Mattie thought hard about the past ten years she and Roy had shared, about the good and bad times. No matter what had happened in the past, she still loved her husband deeply. Seeing him so fragile haunted her day and night. Every evening, before bed, she got down on her knees and said the same prayer over and over again. She asked the Lord to bring her husband back to her.
One evening, not even a week later, Mattie lifted herself from the tub, dried off, and put on her nightdress. She was tired from the long days and nights spent at the hospital. She went to check on the children, who were all asleep, still unaware of the seriousness of their father’s condition. After she pulled the covers over them, she returned to her bedroom, said the same prayer she’d said every night, and then lay down.
She had not even shut her eyes when she looked at the foot of the bed and saw Roy standing there, the same patches covering his eyes. When she shifted her body and mind to be sure it was him, he slowly removed the patches and looked at her. Their eyes met, and then he disappeared.
As miraculous as the moment was, she was not afraid; a single thought gave her peace—Roy must have awakened from the coma. He’ll know me when I visit him tomorrow. Then she turned and slept.
Mattie awoke to a loud knock on the door. She put on her robe and rushed to the door. “Who is it?” she shouted.
“Ma’am, it’s the police,” a deep voice replied.
Mattie opened the door.
Two uniformed policemen stood there. One of them spoke up: “Ma’am, I’m sorry to tell you that your husband passed away during the night. You need to call the hospital immediately.”
Mattie stood dazed and confused, empty. “No. No, he ain’t gone,” she screamed as she broke down in tears. Roy was just at her bedside only hours ago, gazing at her, giving her hope. The children heard her cries and got up from their beds. Mattie shooed them back inside. It took the police officers twenty minutes to convince her that he was gone.
She had no more strength to give.
During the days that followed, Mattie moved around in a trance. Roy had not reached his thirtieth birthday, and she missed him terribly. Grief engulfed her, but it would have to wait. She needed to be there for her children, to prepare them for the news and then, ultimately, the funeral. She and Miss Esther made the arrangements. A viewing would be held in Philadelphia, and then Roy would be returned to Ash, North Carolina, for the funeral and burial. There, he would lay in rest with his ancestors.
On the morning of the funeral, a black limousine came for them at exactly ten thirty a.m. The funeral was to start at eleven. Mattie had already seen her husband since his passing. She had viewed his body at the coroner’s office and then later at the funeral home, when she took the dark blue suit, light blue shirt, and black shoes he was to be buried in.
Mattie slowly walked down the church aisle, a black veil covering her face. Her five brave children surrounded her. When she got close enough to see Roy lying in the casket, she fainted. Roy Jr. and Eileen walked up to the casket on their own. Anthony, Lydia, and Angie followed.
“Do you want to see your daddy?” a strange voice asked Lydia and Anthony, as they stood on their toes trying to peep inside the casket.
Anthony nodded, and Lydia mimicked him.
The man picked them up, holding one on each side of him. They stared into the casket, and for the first time, they understood. Tears gathered in their eyes, as they looked down at their father, who lay in his dark blue suit, resting peacefully.
Roy, age 29
PART TWO
Lydia
20
Lydia was roused by the smell of sizzling bacon and homemade biscuits swirling its way from the kitchen to her nostrils. She shifted the pillow away from her nose so she could more fully take in the pleasant aroma. Never an early riser, her consciousness continued to float between her dream and her mother’s blaring voice. “You girls get on up and get ready for school.” Today, Lydia would be starting third grade. The excitement of it hadn’t yet filtered into her awareness.
As Lydia listened to her mother’s footsteps make their way down the hall toward her brothers’ room, she slowly began to awaken. She could hear the even breathing of her little sister, Angie, who lay tangled in a blanket in the bunk beneath her. Across the room, she could hear the grunts of her elder sister, Eileen.
Lydia pushed herself up from the comfort of her light blue cotton blanket and squinted as the sunlight crept through the sheer curtain, its rays temporarily blinding her. She jumped down from her bunk and staggered toward the dresser the three girls shared, taking care not to bump the drawer against Eileen’s bed, as she usually did. She was in no mood for another scolding from her older sister, the kind she always got when she challenged Eileen. Though Lydia was eight years old—No, eight and a half, which was what she told her sisters and brothers when they treated her like a child—she still felt like she and Angie got the short end of the stick no matter what.
Quietly, she pulled out the new blue polyester pants and pink pullover top that her mother had bought for the new school year. Just when she thought she had avoided a confrontation, Eileen stirred and gave her a look of warning as she turned and pulled the covers over her head. That was close, Lydia thought. Eileen’s breathing was still choppy when Lydia slipped out of the room and across the hall to join Angie in the bathroom.
The children moved the morning along like clockwork. Lydia and Angie usually shared the bathroom for the first few minutes until Eileen shuffled in and joined them. Then, muffled thumps and slow movement barged from the back bedroom, where Roy Jr. and Anthony came to life.
Within half an hour, they were all gathered around the table for a hot breakfast.
It had been a memorable summer.
It was the summer Lydia had been caught stealing a Tastykake from the Pantry Pride grocery store. The security guard, Mr. Robinson, told her brother Roy Jr. and made him promise to tell their mother. Instead, he made Lydia do all his chores, with no lip, in exchange for his silence. The summer Lydia and Eileen had their biggest rivalries, ones that often ended in a brawl that Eileen usually won because she was so much bigger than Lydia. The summer that Lydia and Anthony became very close and began to share everything, including their secrets and friends—and the summer that Roy Jr. made Lydia realize for the first time how different she was from the rest of them. She was the only one of the bunch that had lighter skin and red hair. She was unlike the rest of her siblings, who were dark skinned with coarse hair and dark eyes. But most of all, it was the summer that Lydia understood just how tired and sad her mother was. When she looked at her mother really closely, she could still see that look in her eyes, the same look she had the day of their father’s funeral.
More than two years had passed since Roy’s death. The children watched their mother grieve silently for their daddy, and then, somehow, she found the strength to push on, for their sakes.
