Commune of Women (35 page)

The mud is whipped up from all the wheels churnin through, what with the wagons an mule teams goin back an forth. It’s lak quicksand, black, gooey, watery, stirred with wood splinters, hunks a bark and snarls a wire.

The whole conglomeration sinks an don’t surface again til the hot weather, when the mud turns ta dust. In summer, Pearl’s barefoot, pickin her way cuz spikes a wood is angled lak spears trapped in the dry mud an buried outta sat in dust. Once, she hit her foot on a spike. She thought it warn’t nothin but a flesh wound, but she couldn’t dig it out with her lil pocketknife. She din’t worry none cuz in a couple a days it should fester an the pus’d jes raft the splinter rat out.

In a couple a days, though, it’s hurtin purdy good. She squeezes an squeezes. Pus comes out – but the splinter don’t.

Pearl don’t want ta tell her Mama cuz that means her Daddy’ll come at her with his big ol pocketknife an whittle the damn thing out. But her Mama catches her limpin along an she’s busted.

When he comes home from work, smellin a smoke an pine pitch, her Daddy holds her foot in his big ol paw, skin lak sandpaper, the roughest grit, with a grip lak Death Hissef. No amount a wrigglin a her upper body cain budge what’s trapped down lower.

He makes some beginnin pokes that even her gritted teeth cain’t keep the scream in. But her Daddy don’t get mad lak she espects he will. He looks kinda puzzled lak an holds her foot up closer ta his eyes – not seemin ta realize it bout twists Pearl’s leg outta the socket ta do it.

Then he says ta her Mama, who is kinda hoverin round lookin white, “Git me some plars.”

Now, Pearl ain’t sure if the pain or the terror gots her more. She gots the feelin a trapped animal must get, the ones that gnaws they own feet off ta get free.

Her Daddy takes them plars an he grabs the end a that splinter an he gives a maty jerk that yanks Pearl’s foot rat off his knee an two foot in the air. An thar’s her foot, hangin up thar by his face, still danglin by that dang splinter which is still in the side a her foot lak it was another bone she done sprung.

Well, the look on his face is almost worth the pain! He couldn’ta been more surprised if Mama’d said they’d won the lott’ry. He jes stares kinda slack-jawed at her foot hangin thar from them plars, til Pearl’s howlin wakes him outta his trance.

Theys a kitty her folks kept in a ol coffee tin on the top shelf in the kitchen. Down it comes, an her Daddy says, “Take her ta Doc Lamb.” An that’s that. Out they go, her hand clamped in her Mama’s.

Her Mama marches her down the street with Pearl hoppin along on one foot an touchin t’other down, as if it was plantin itsef on a hot griddle with ever step.

In they go, ta the waitin room a Doc Lamb’s office that smells a bleach an antiseptic an starch from Wilma’s uniform.

Wilma’s Doc’s nurse an, bein no fool, she cain see rat now this is somethin that ain’t gonna wait. She don’t even have ta say nothin ta the folks settin round in chairs waitin. Wilma jes opens the door ta the exam room at the back an jerks her head fer Pearl’s Mama ta come rat on through.

Old Doc Lamb comes shufflin in after a piece in his starched white coat. He gots his heavy jowls an bent back on, same as always. He gots the look a someone who ain’t never bothered ta straighten up betwixt exams.

“What’ve we got here?” He looks at Pearl. He’s talkin ta her! At home, don’t nobody talk ta her. Her job is ta shut up.

Pearl stares at him. He jes keeps on starin back, waitin fer a answer.

Finally, Pearl whispers, “Mah foot got hurt.”

She’s lookin down at the floor with its beigy, worn carpet an her big, bare, dirty, swollen foot planted rat on it – not at him, with those big eyes that don’t blink.

“Ah!” says he. “Did you bring it with you?”

Pearl looks at him, then. What in the world is that suppose ta mean? Did she bring it with her? Her foot? The splinter? The hurt?

A regular eternity passes.

Then she realizes he’s makin a joke. She smiles, a thin lil lick of a smile, unsure an wan. She nods an whispers, “Yes,” in a lil breath, lookin down again.Doc beams. She cain hear his satisfaction in his voice. “Let’s have a look.”

Then she’s hoisted onta the exam table in a big high arc. Out comes the lil drawer in front ta support her leg. Doc bends his bent shoulders some more an breathes on her skin, ticklin her.

“Hmmmmm...” he says. “I don’t know which is bigger, yer foot or this piece a wood you got lodged in it! Let’s get this thin out an you cain take it home ta use fer kindlin.”

He turns ta Wilma who is standin by, with Pearl’s Mama hoverin behind. “Get me a syringe a pain killer,” he says. He actually says the name a some drug, very specific, but this is a hunert years ago an Pearl cain’t remember what it was.

But she sure as hell remembers that syringe! Good Lord have mercy! That thing was a block long an thick as a knittin needle! Doc come at her with that thin an she thinks she’s about ta puke. But fear ain’t
nothin
compared ta when he rams that sucker rat inta that poor red, swollen flesh.

Lord God Almighty! She done fainted dead away.

When she come to, thar’s a big ol white bandage on her foot, layers an layers a white gauze, an the smell a adhesive tape still in the air. Her Mama is standin next ta the table holdin the upper half a Pearl, which jes done leapt rat off the side, by her best reckonin.

Then she realizes a few thins all at once. Her foot don’t hurt cuz a the shot. Doc an Wilma is kinda standin off, dryin they hands, lookin satisfied. An Pearl’s Mama is holdin her.

Holdin her!

An fer that instant, Pearl feels as happy as she ever felt – safe, warm an cared fer. It was a revelation! It was all of a piece: the white walls, so clean an cheerful, the clock tickin, the smell an rustle a starch, an especially the scent a her Mama, the soft, greasy feel a her apron bib under Pearl’s cheek, an her strong arms under her.

When Pearl dies an goes ta heaven, it don’t have ta be nothin more’n that ta satisfy
her!

Well, they house was in the mill yard rat thar betwixt the road an the backside a the log decks. Them big pyramids a logs stacked up, bleedin pitch from the ends, jes kinda hunkered round that house lak big animals.

Finally, Pearl’s Mama made the mill stack em endwise ta the house.

“What if they started ta roll?” she axed, holdin Pearl’s hand, leanin in toward the mill boss. “They’d flatten that house lak a rollin pin on pie dough!”

So they was a flurry a work – men with cant hooks, the house fillin up with grunts an shouts, an the thunder a logs rollin. Three a the log decks was skidded out, then dragged back with the butt ends a the trees facin the house.

It was a lot a work an her Daddy was mad. He got the flak fer it an they docked his wages ta pay fer the time it took four men an two mules ta do the job.

Even then, her Mama warn’t satisfied. “You be careful out thar in the mill yard,” she’d say ever time Pearl set out with her Daddy’s lunch bucket. “Them decks cain shift. You keep a eye an a ear out, you hear?”

Pearl’s Mama was kinda psychic. She knew thins. She saw thins fore they happened. The mill yard was dangerous. She saw that. She knew.

Pearl had a friend – her first friend – an Bonnie Lee was her name. Two names she gots, not one lak Pearl. Bonnie Lee was a year older then Pearl. Her house was across the road, a shack no better’n Pearl’s, built low an slopin, without benefit a no T-square nor chalk line.

Bonnie Lee had fine blonde hair with a bit a curl ta it, so it was always tied in little knots an snarled, an stuck out from her head in a little halo a neglect. She gots a bath once a week in a big ol galvanized tub in the middle a the kitchen floor jes lak Pearl. In between baths, she was smeared an grimed with food an mill dirt – also jes lak Pearl.

Bonnie Lee was fine-boned an delicate, though, even in her raggedy dress –
not
lak Pearl. Pearl thought she was beautiful.

They use ter come across one another out thar in the mill yard, totin lunch buckets back an forth. “Hi,” Pearl’d say.

Bonnie Lee’d smile this barely-thar smile. “Hi.”

Sometimes, they’d go down ta the crick an grub around fer frogs, or wade when it was hot, or play with Lucky, they poor ol black dog with long matted hair an skin an bones from worms. They’d throw a stick an Lucky’d run an fetch it, then chew it up. That was the game. Sometimes, if they had the strength, they’d play tag.

Pearl reckons she was five when it happened. Somebody come ta the door an she cain remember her Mama thar bent out the doorframe, whisperin. She cain still see her backside, with that limp apron bow, a cotton print skirt hangin down her skinny brown legs, an baggy socks an scuffed tie-up shoes.

Pearl strains ta hear but it’s jes
Buzzbuzz
from the neighbor lady an then
Buzzbuzz
from her Mama. But thar was a energy ta it that told Pearl it warn’t good.

And she cain remember ta this day how her Mama looked when she turnt back inta that room. Her face was dazed, kinda, an long-lookin, an hard, lak what lil plumpness they ever was thar was sucked off, sudden-lak. Her eyes din’t blink an she looked ta be starin a-far off, even though it was jes at the planks on the floor.

An jes lak that, Pearl knew. She knew it was Death. She din’t know whose, but she knew fer sure that a black shadder done stooped over them that day an wiped somebody clean away, lak a eraser on a chalkboard.

“That’s the Injun in mah Mama an me. Us Choctaws, we gots the Sight.

“An that was the end a mah friend, Bonnie Lee, cuz it was her that got took. Thar she was in the mill yard, an the deck shifted. The top log rolled off, pickin up steam as it come, an Bonnie Lee, her daddy’s lunch bucket an all, was jes flattened lak dough under a rollin pin.”

That thar was Pearl’s first funeral. Her Daddy was good with his hands an he built Bonnie Lee a little coffin usin wood from the mill, still bleedin pitch. Her Mama an another lady, Alice, done stitched her up a new organdy dress.

First one she gots, ever, an she was dead an couldn’t enjoy it. Ain’t that the way life goes, though?

Thar was a lid on the coffin. Pearl wanted ta see her friend ta say goodbye but they wouldn’t let her. She heerd some a the ladies gossipin an they said Bonnie Lee’s skull was cracked lak a egg, with brains oozin out lak yolk. Hell, a strong backhand’d a done that, she was so fragile – let alone three tons a rollin log!

Pearl heard her Mama an her Daddy talkin in the nat bout how it coulda been Pearl, an how her Mama was jes about ta send her off with the lunch bucket when the word come.

Her Mama wanted ta leave that place. She never did lak it much an after that she jes lost all heart. Thar was cracks betwixt the kitchen floorboards a inch wide an she’d jes stand thar with her broom, anglin dirt down them cracks a hour at a shot, lost in a dream. Maybe she was stretchin out her mind, searchin out the next place whar they’d be movin. She was lak that. She saw thins in advance.

Seems lak it warn’t but a week or two after Bonnie Lee died, ol Lucky up an died, too. Pearl was the one who found him, layin by the crick with his snout in the water lak he got took rat in the middle of a drink.

Pearl wanted em ta bury him next ta Bonnie Lee, but everbody jes laughed at her. The men come an fetched him an threw his body on the big heap a sawdust under the main saw, down under the mill.

Pearl slipped round thar, when nobody was lookin. His body was already half-buried. With ever board that was cut, more sawdust jes drifted down. In a hour’s time, he’d plumb disappeared.

Don’t seem rat that a body can jes be wiped away clean lak that, with no ceremony an no one grievin. Even a dog.

So Pearl made up this story bout how Bonnie Lee was thar waitin fer him. An how they went off inta a beautiful meadow full a flowers, an how God give em a big basket a food ever day, settin it on a big rock out in the middle a the grass. An bout how happy they was an how purdy Bonnie Lee looked in her yaller organdy dress.

If some preacher axed Pearl what heaven was lak, she’d tell em that story. She espects theys playin thar yet, Bonnie Lee an Lucky. An when
she
crosses over, the three of em’ll go down ta the crick an chase pollywogs again.

Cuz this much she knows: once childhood’s over, they ain’t
nothin
a heaven in this life after that.

Well, that story took a morbid turn, after Pearl done left Doc Lamb’s office. She din’t mean ta make thins worse, but from the looks on ever face that’s what she’s gone an done.

But then that Heady gal, she says, “Pearl, I think you’re telling us what we need to hear. It’s a somber day. Why don’t you just keep on going?”

So Pearl sets a spell loadin her pipe an she thinks about all the thins that’ve befallen her in this long life – an she discovers that
she’s
in a funk, too. An so she thinks,
What the Hell? I may as well tell it all.

Well, Pearl’s husband, Abel Johns, he never gots much of a bringin-up. Nobody never taught him not ta spit inta the wind, so ta speak. So he jes ended up gooberin hissef an everbody that done got close ta him. He was lak a big baby, goin through life wavin his fists an gettin mad at whatever done crossed his path, over nothin. Fightin his fate you mat say, when he was the one creatin most a it, hissef.

An he was a drunk. An not the happy kind that laughs an stumbles round lak a fool. No, he was a
mean
drunk an when he was in his cups, thar warn’t nobody – neither man nor beast – that could face him.

Ever livin thin jes annoyed the heck outta him on sat when he was drinkin. Jes livin an breathin was enough ta outrage him an make him want ta kill. Many’s the nat Pearl hustled the kids outta the house an hid with em somewhar – the woods, a barn, under the house. Jes anywhar outta his sat an mind.

With his temper, thar was always trouble. So Pearl had ta be prepared ta move at a moment’s notice. She’d jes throw everthin they owned inta gunnysacks in about five minutes flat an off they’d go. Sometimes, they gots a ol dilapidated car. Sometimes, they gots ta hitchhike. An most times, they’d have ta sneak outta town through the woods or fields cuz somebody was lookin fer Abel Johns ta beat him up, or with a shotgun ta finish him off.