Creatures Here Below, page 18
The old mattress, abused over the years and soft as dough, enveloped him. The sheets were still damp and clingy.
The woman said nothing. She moved over him. Her hands manipulated him. Mason felt as if he were smothering, sandwiched between her skin and the sheets. Her breasts were in his hands one moment, then pooled on his chest. She inserted him. A thin line of breath snaked into his ear. The thick air, full of her scent, did not seem enough to sustain him. Each lungful seemed less than the one before. Then he smelled something that froze him, a scent that, once he’d noticed it, pervaded the bed and his nostrils: his father’s cologne. It was there, riding him in waves just as the woman did.
He told her then to stop. “Get off of me,” he gasped and pushed against her weight. He had to get free of the cloud he pulled into his lungs with each breath. Pony’s cologne scalded his airways. He fought only to disentangle himself, he thought, but the woman began screaming his father’s name over and over. Mason said, “I ain’t Pony. I ain’t Pony,” as he fought to get free.
Abruptly, he was hurled backward from the bed. He landed hard on the floor, striking his head on something behind him.
Light streamed in from the living room and Pony stood next to the bed. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing, boy?” Pony hollered.
The woman was clutching at her belly, “God damn it,” she kept saying. Blood formed a trickle over her left eye and under her nose. The blood rounded her lips and dripped to the sheets.
“What’s wrong with you?” Pony asked. “Did she do something to you?”
The woman said, “I didn’t do nothin’ to the little nigger.”
Mason swept up his clothes in his arms and sprinted from the room, pursued by Pony, who kept asking for an explanation. Mason only glared at his father while he quickly dressed. He slipped into his sneakers without tying them. Finally, he said, “She’s a smelly bitch,” though it was Pony he wanted to call names.
He backed his way to the door while Pony watched him retreat without making a move to stop him. His father looked more perplexed than angry.
Mason slammed down the apartment building steps. He gulped in the chilly night air. Those clean breaths could not erase the odors that hung about him.
Pony’s Bonneville sat at the curb and Mason ran up to it and kicked the passenger-side door several times. He stepped away, furious. Tears streamed down his face. He yanked a fistful of his shirt up to his nose. Everything reeked. He thought of the woman moving on him and his stomach tightened toward his spine. He thought he would vomit. He bent over, but nothing came out.
He walked two blocks up the street before he got his bearings. Down one avenue, he sighted an ornate column supporting a corner of the old courthouse. Using that landmark, he knew which direction to go, and a half-hour later was home.
He threw himself across his bed. He was pretending to sleep when Gail peeked in on him.
ANNIE
By November, there was still no word from Mason and the Mondays were increasingly hard to take. Mondays she missed Mason the most. In their hectic sprints to grab breakfast, take a shower, make a lunch, get the baby ready, and find textbooks or keys, Gail, Jaclyn, and Tyler left Annie in their wake. Everyone else had schedules, appointments, things that just had to get done, and they drained their coffee cups while pulling on their coats and hunting for their purses. Gail and Jaclyn fled to the bus stop, while young Ty hopped in a friends car.
So soon the huge boardinghouse was empty, the high-ceilinged rooms quiet as mausoleums, except for the slow, foot-dragging steps and sometimes jerky movements of Annie Gant—one hundred two pounds, five feet one inch tall when as straight as her back allowed, and the survivor of eighty-nine years on this earth. Today, Annie decided to make up all the beds and maybe dust around a bit since lately Gail had let things go. Annie was certain Gail would appreciate the help.
She made up Tyler’s bed first, and though her hands frequently trembled, she worked efficiently and meticulously. Her hands skimmed along, flattening the spread, and tucking the excess under the pillows. Tyler had a piece of sheet music on his desk. Annie brought it close to her face to get a good look at it. She could not read music. But she thought the tiny notes fit well. Neat and pert, they seemed to be hopping and dancing along the lines they’d been drawn against, some with little round feet and others with wings for heads. “La, la, lah, lah; la la lah,” she sang, studying the notes as she did so as if reading. A finger traced the notes in the air. “La, la, lah.” In a moment, thinking Tyler a remarkable boy, she returned the paper to the exact spot, as well as she remembered, that she’d picked it up from. She stooped for a pair of soiled socks on her way out of the room and placed them in the hamper near the bathroom.
In Gail’s room, she made up the bed, but then sat on the edge of it for a brief rest. She thought back to an exchange she’d heard several nights ago between Gail and Reverend Wilson from Calvary. The osteoarthritis had locked up her knee again, and Annie lay awake suffering through it and heard the muted voices from a floor below. The reverend asked Gail about Annie, several questions Annie herself could’ve answered. They spoke about her as if she were not just upstairs, not within hearing, but already on that journey for which they contemplated the finances.
“Is she provided for when the time comes?” the reverend had asked Gail.
I have money enough, Annie thought. Me and Joseph done saw to that. The reverend’s question did not scare her exactly. Annie had little cause to worry over how the laws of God and nature dictated people’s lives. You are born, with love you grow, and you work, and if you are blessed you find someone to love, if you are blessed and lucky you give birth and life to others—and Annie and Joseph were never that lucky. Finally, when you had done what you were supposed to do, God lifted you up and gave you rest. A simple process, as Annie saw it, made complicated by fearful people. She did not fear death. For nearly nine decades, she had held vigil by enough bedsides to know it was nothing. What burned Annie about the reverend’s question was not that he asked it, but that he asked it of her landlady, not of her.
Annie wanted dearly to know when, how, by whose decision had she become someone to be talked about, but not talked to? What did Gail say to Jaclyn? We have to watch her like we watch Cole. No! Annie’s fists shook, all joints and veins. She saw them in the mirror over Gail’s bureau and pressed her hands to her lap. The evolved face in the mirror would not show her anger, but she said aloud, “I’ll go when I go. But I refuse to start over. I did not live this long just to be a baby again.”
She nodded her head once in total agreement with what the reflection had said. With that she got to her feet; one more bed remained to be made, and she refused to let this be one of those days when she did not venture down the stairs at all. To hell with the leg. If it wanted to go now, let it. The rest of me will stay a bit longer. Now full of defiant energy, she proceeded down the stairs, her pack of canines nonexistent for the moment. She gripped the banister and let her right foot lead with each step.
Jackie’s bed was in such chaos that Annie did not even attempt to make it up. Cole’s toys got underfoot with each step. As she had done in Gail’s room, the old woman sat down on the edge of the bed. She picked up a toy near her feet. It was a bright yellow school bus of molded plastic with soft, rubber tires. She smiled, delighted. It was a wonderful toy! Inside the little bus, behind the smiling driver, sat rows of paired-off children with happy faces painted on their round heads. To Annie’s joy, the children had been painted all different colors, white children with yellow and red hair and black children with brown and black hair, even yellow children grinning with narrow eyes. Annie remembered walking past the playground of the big brick school for the white children in order to reach the one-room house where colored children of all ages learned their letters, numbers, and the laws of the land.
Small George would ask his big sister, “Why can’t we learn there? It’s closer and they got swings.”
Annie didn’t remember if she answered Small George. She recalled seeing the white girls on the swings, though, their hair and pretty dresses trailing as they swept in arcs into the air. But now, look at this little toy! All children smiling and going to school together, Annie thought. If you just live long enough … Everything will be even better for Cole, she supposed. He won’t even know what it took to get these different colors of paint on the same bus. He’ll think all children going to the same school is the way it’s supposed to be. Annie smiled. And he’ll be right.
She did not get to see Cole much lately, at least not since Perry Sullivan had finally showed up. It had been Annie who’d answered the door to find him standing there with his back to the door, sporting the strangest haircut she’d ever seen, short as a soldier’s on the side and as long as a lady’s on top and in back. He turned to face the door and he looked surprised to see Annie.
“Yes?” Annie asked. She had not seen him before and did not know who he was. But afterward, when she knew, the resemblance to his baby boy was clear.
“Hi, ma’am. I’m Perry, here to see Jaclyn.”
Annie let him in. He stood in the middle of the foyer with his hands dug deeply into his pockets. He looked about, and Annie glanced back at him, as if to make certain he would stay put, before going for Jackie.
Jackie lay across the bed on her stomach reading a magazine spread open on the floor. Cole beat against the rails of his playpen.
“Boy named Perry here to see you, child.”
Jackie sat up quickly, craning to look around Annie. He’s here now? She mouthed the words, disbelief on her face.
“He’s the one, Jackie? Cole’s papa?”
The girl brought her hands to the sides of her head. “Oh, God, my hair. Damn it. Now he shows up when I look like an old mop.”
“Don’t worry about your hair. You ain’t seen his yet.”
Jackie jumped to the bathroom. “Miss Annie, what did he say?” she whispered, frantic now. “It’s matted! It’s a kinky matted mess. I hate men, Miss Annie. I looked all over the damn tri-state for that—and he shows up now.” She fought to pull a comb through her hair. She still whispered. “Tell him I’ll be a minute. No, forget that. Just let him wait, damn it.”
The little woman scurried from sink to closet and back. She pulled off her sweatshirt, tossing it over her back in Cole’s direction. She pulled on a sweater. She put on a touch of lipstick, seeming to calm down a bit after that. Her lips pressed together, then made a kissy sound. “That’s all the damage control I can do now.”
“Child …” Annie reached out to touch Jackie’s shoulder in order to get the distracted girl’s attention, but Jackie moved by her too quickly. “Jackie,” Annie said louder just as the girl was about to head down the hallway.
“What is it, Miss Annie?”
“Girl, you’re a tried and true mess.” Annie grasped Jackie’s wrist.
Jackie touched at her hair again.
“Naw, I don’t mean that. You keep your head about you. From what I know, you ain’t oughtta be worrying what he’s thinking. He oughtta be worrying what you thinking. You hear?”
A faint smile served as a reply. Jackie pulled her arm away.
“Child? Do you want to bring the baby? You should.”
“No. You watch him for me, Miss Annie,” she said, looking at the baby for the first time since Annie had entered the room.
Annie went to the playpen. “I think you too heavy for me to lift out of there,” she said.
Cole eyed the hallway his mother had just disappeared down.
“Yeah, well, I want to know what’s going on too,” she told Cole. She tried to wait. A couple of minutes went by, during which she could barely hear the voices in the front room. When everything got quiet, Annie leaned over the playpen railing and dragged Cole over it and into her arms. Her breath came short and quick for a moment. “Like lugging a full pail of water, boy.” She carried him with her to the front room.
Little Jackie was on her tiptoes, barely, almost lifted fully off the ground. Her face was pressed into Perry’s. Their open mouths gobbled at one another. They certainly made up quick enough, Annie thought.
Perry eased Jackie back to the floor. “Okay, so I missed you too.”
“I’m still mad at you,” Jackie said. Her back was to Annie and Cole and she did not know they were there until she saw Perry looking past her. “Annie …” Jackie looked exasperated for a second. “Did you miss your son too?” she asked Perry. She crossed the room and took Cole from Annie’s arms.
The white boy suddenly appeared very nervous. His eyebrows arched high and his hands tunneled back into his pockets as Jackie brought the baby to him. He pulled them out, with effort it seemed. “Oh, my, he’s gotten so much bigger now. Look how big he is.”
“We know,” Jackie said. Cole cooed something unintelligible directed at his father.
Perry looked at Jackie then Annie, to whom he nodded, then eyed his son, running his fingers over Cole’s forehead and sweeping the boy’s hair to the side.
Jackie said, “He just jabbers and drools a lot.”
“Can I?” Perry brought his hands up to take the baby from Jackie, who handed him over with more care than Annie had seen her use in a long time. Grinning, Perry lifted him toward the ceiling. “Hey, boy, you know I’m your daddy, don’t you?”
“He looks more like a Sullivan than a Bell,” Jackie said. “Favors your mom a bit.”
“Yeah. Mother said she met you,” Perry said and brought Cole back down. “Some meeting,” he said.
“She thinks I’m stupid, don’t she?”
Perry chuckled and shrugged. “Stocking footed on a cold night, peeping into garages? No, she just thinks you’re boy crazy or a bad cat burglar. Jaclyn,” he licked his lips quickly, “I told her everything.”
“You did?”
“Everything. She wants to meet you again and definitely wants to see her grandson. I’m not hiding you two anymore.”
Jackie threw her arms around his neck upon hearing that, squeezing the baby between the two of them.
Shaking her head, Annie left them alone. She could not feel happy for the girl then, nor now as she sat on the edge of her bed with Cole’s little yellow bus in her hands. She could not say why she did not trust the reunion she had witnessed. It looked too easy. In her experience, a relationship or anything else that came easily only seemed so after someone had worked hard for it. And she did not think Perry and Jackie had worked hard yet.
Annie had told Gail about Jackie and Perry, but Gail had not shown much interest.
“It’s not my place to tell that girl nothing, Annie,” Gail had answered. “She’s got to stumble until she falls. We all do.”
Annie placed the bus on the floor and gave it a shove. It rolled until it collided with one of Jackie’s house slippers. Her mind shifted from Jackie and Cole back to those long-ago walks to school and the lanky, long-armed shadow who hopped at her heels, the boy who attended school only so he could walk with Annie on the trips, the simple, nappy-headed boy in soiled coveralls, laughing and hunting rocks with Small George. “What did we call him, Small George?” Annie asked aloud. “Some silly name.” His mother used to chase him helter-skelter about the field behind their shack, brandishing a raised switch. He’d run to Annie’s mother for sanctuary.
“Hide me, Miss Dabney. In Jesus’ name!”
Despite his many offenses, invariably Annie’s mother would let him slip under her bed or down in the cellar. And the Dabneys would try to keep from laughing when his mother showed up shaking her switch and cursing up a streak. What was that nappy-headed boy’s name?
Her hands trembled like scared birds in her lap. After all, this was the only job left to her: to keep alive in memory all those who had gone before. And that was everyone. Joseph, and Mama, and Daddy, and Small George and the nappy-headed boy and Mrs. Buckler—all gone. They had left Annie Gant with her memories. She solemnly owed it to them to remember, a charge to spare them from oblivion on earth until she could rejoin them in heaven.
Annie collected herself, stood, and moved through the quiet of the big house. She went to the windows in the living room and parted the curtains. If she stood to the far left side of the window and looked to the right down the block, she could see the old Buckler house. She wanted to go there, though in all practicality it lay a lifetime away at the end of a very long block. That last walk home from church a few weeks ago had scared Annie. Her leg had hurt her tremendously. She’d never felt so tired. Fortunately, cold and wet weather had forced them to get rides from friends the last two Sundays. Annie wondered if she had many more walks left in her.
More than fifty years had passed since she’d been in the Buckler house. She had thought her life could get no better than to work for the stormy Mrs. Buckler, the mister, and their three sons. Joseph Gant proved her wrong, but that had been a happy house and Annie always felt privileged to have been part of it. Herr Buckler died in 1958 and his dominating frau passed in 1970. Annie had been long out of touch with them by then. “We are going to pick out some beautiful fabric, Anna. Beautiful,” Mrs. Buckler had said, “and together we will sew you the finest dresses so when the Gant boy comes back, ja, he must leave his heart!” The idea of visiting the Buckler house took on the form of a pilgrimage. “You’re the only one I trust to care for my boys, Anna. Ach! I trust you more than I do the mister,” she had said. The creases in Annie’s face deepened, turning up around the eyes and mouth. There would be no one to offer her an arm to cling to should she falter, but she must go.
