Delicious Foods (7 page)

The third tale was about his own uncle, Louis McKeon, who had refused to give up a parcel of land to a white man and gone missing soon afterward.

My cousin Grant wasn’t but six month old at the time. You tell me what McKeon man gonna leave off his new child like that, Sparkplug said, never hearing hide nor hair of him again. I tell you it never happen—we honorable folk. My cousin Geneva? Said she heard some white man talkin ’bout that they dumped Uncle Lou’s body in the Mississippi and watched the gators feedin on it, and they was jus a-laughing, taking bets or some shit. And white folks say niggers is animals, that we next door to a ape. I tell you I’d rather be next door to a ape than next door to a goddamn cracker. At least a ape be my friend from Africa, wouldn’t sell his damn house on Tuesdy if I move next door on Mondy. See, to these folks, a animal is even more of a nigger than a nigger is. And you know animals is some beautiful creatures of God. What they think so bad ’bout being a ape?

And yet the residents of Ovis appeared to have accepted the injustices they’d suffered as inescapable. Nat felt he could’ve knelt down in front of their strained smiles and gathered their impacted anger in his hands as he went door to door and filled baskets with the harvest, but his attempts to plant it or grow it into any kind of action often proved futile.

Well, he’d ask Sparkplug, why don’t you register to vote, my man?

Sparkplug, the most frankly angry man for miles, often in the process of arranging his poker hand, didn’t usually look up. The one time he did reply, he said, Vote for who? The son of the cracker sumbitch killed my uncle?

The men passed laughter between them like beer, mollifying a shared disappointment, frustration, and rage intense enough to turn murderous if you provoked it, though the opportunity to vent wouldn’t ever arrive. Even if they got a chance, the talons of injustice would swoop down soon enough, dismember these men, and be gone, and everybody would forget that any of it had happened, leaving no trace aside from a lingering miasma that might rise into the Spanish moss.

Gradually, though, some of the men and women came to Nat privately, and he began to convince these few to see past their hopelessness and wrath into an easier future, if only a slightly easier one. A few signed up. They joked about a time when their despair would lift, when someone would cut them a break, and with a proud smirk, Nat saw that they’d taken the first step toward shedding their perpetual despair. But all his activity, despite the optimism at the heart of its politics, quickly attracted negative attention in the form of threatening phone calls, unpleasant words on the street, and bad service in local businesses. They’d been through this sort of thing before, from their own people, Nat reminded Darlene, so they should know not to pay it any mind. Still, Nat tended to measure these minor wrongs against far larger ones, like the atrocities committed against Henry Marrow, Medgar Evers, and Emmett Till, so he failed to see them for what they were: the opening moves of a chess game he could never win, considering how many moves ahead his opponents were already thinking.

T
his chick standing by that navy blue minibus parked at the side of the road seem okay to Darlene—better than okay. Firstly the woman had on a
clean
blouse, in a multicolored African triangle pattern, almost like a stained-glass window. Only a couple holes in that shirt—same with them acid-wash jeans and them skippies on her feet. The minibus seem sorta new, mostly. Wasn’t no scratches or dents you could see under the white light in front the Party Fool, the next lot over from the one where Darlene just lost three teeth. The minibus tires was all waxy shiny, the hubcaps too. The sliding door slid open smooth, and you could smell the plasticky new-car odor inside even from a couple feet away. Them windows be shining, them seats look like they could actually bounce, and when Darlene leant sideways round the woman and peeked inside, she could tell the brothers in the back was comfortable.

The lady—said her name Jackie—done started in like some direct-marketing TV huckster, talking fast ’bout this place and this job that sounded real good, and that Darlene and I should go with her. A wet Jheri curl went sproing on her head, then it gone partway down the back of her neck, with the hairpins pushing the sides above her ears for that business-casual look. Darlene ain’t concentrated on nothing Jackie said, though, ’cause she said more than need be, the way people do when they already decided that you gonna turn down they pitch.

While we listening, Darlene had to plant her feet to keep from shouting with joy, even with all that dried blood caked up in her nose and gums and them scratched-up knees. Sound like this lady had a job they wanna
give
her, without no interview or nothing, hard work but good work, no more tryna sell her body and getting stabbed or having to watch no shame-loving Cajun get busy with no melon.

Jackie said, The company’s associates do agricultural work, harvesting a wide variety of fruits, vegetables, and legumes. She actually said them actual phrases, like it’s out a book she ain’t never finished reading herself.

Darlene grown up doing that shit in the first place, so she got lonely for her childhood. On this job she gon be picking fruits and vegetables, like she a innocent little girl again. Jackie also made the farm sound like the kinda place where Darlene and I could go together and wouldn’t nobody stop us from hanging out and doing our thing, and that seemed so perfect that we wondered if we mighta made it up ourself.

A image come up in Darlene mind, of a bodacious-ass horn of plenty that had all kinda green and red peppers and shit spilling out, and bananas and carrots and grapes and whatnot, and everything be cold, crispy, fresh, and wet with morning dew on account a being just picked. In her head, somebody snapped a carrot and it sprayed a li’l bit of mist up into the air.

Darlene said to me, See, Scotty. The book works. I put positivity and love out on my antenna and the universe sent it back to bless me.

Jackie said,
Three-star accommodations.
She said,
Olympic-size swimming pool.
Said,
Recreation activities. Competitive salary. Vacation.
Then she showed Darlene a picture of some condo-type complex with a motherfucking kidney-shaped pool smack-dab in the center. Then Jackie top it off with benefits, health care. We got a dentist that could help out with any problems you might have, Jackie said, looking at Darlene mouth, as well as day care. To be honest, she said, the pay ain’t super-high, but we offer our workers a salary above minimum wage, the competitive rate in the field.

Darlene appreciated the honesty. Even better than getting a high salary was the feeling that you working with people you could respect, who told your ass the truth, motherfuckers you could communicate with. This here felt like the first luck Darlene had touched in the whole six years since she lost Nat. Above minimum wage? She thought she could reach up to that luck and stroke it and the luck would go
purr
.

Now Jackie talked a long stream, you couldn’t dip in your damn toe. Girl had heart-shaped lips with brick-color lip gloss slathered on em, and the edges was shining. Sexy red plums. Her tongue always going somewheres when she talked. Sometimes she licked the corner of her mouth to keep it from getting dried out from all that talking.

Jackie. Jackie? Jackie, Darlene said every so often, trying to butt in, to let her know how much on board with it she already was.

Jackie eyes still ain’t said nothing—they could only say
The deal, the great deal, the wonderfulness of the deal.
She acting jittery—and I knew why. I recognized her as a old friend. Finally I had to introduce the two of em. Jackie stopped the hard sell for a hot minute.

May I call my son? Darlene asked.

Sometime Eddie say that Darlene didn’t never care about him, especially when it come to the particular moment we talking ’bout now, but she ain’t never stopped tryna make sure she could get in touch. Eddie probably thought his mom loved his dad more than him, and that mighta been true, but she thought ’bout Eddie all the time. Love’s a mother to start with, so when sonofabitches start fighting over who love who more, and tryna say that this action you done today gotta line up with that verbal statement from yesterday ’bout how much you loved somebody, and they pull out they love-o-meters and start measuring shit out to infinity, I get pissed. Me, I think people could love me, or somebody like me, and still show they obligations to the other people in they life as number 2 and 3 and 4 and so on down the line and it ain’t no thang.

When Darlene asked about calling her son, Jackie got activated again. Course you could call your son, she said. We’ll let you use the phone when we get there. Free of charge!

Jackie be showing off the open door of the minibus with her hand like she on
The Price Is Right,
and Darlene thinking she could hear the sucking of pipes and the popping of rocks in there. The darkness and the tinted windows had kept her from seeing much, and in them days, she always hearing rocks in the background of everything anyhow.

I said to Darlene, I know these folks. I approve. Honey, get the fuck in before the people out in them bushes behind the Party Fool who be listening to everything we say find out ’bout this terrific opportunity and try to come with us. Darlene said yes and jumped over to the minibus without no reservations whatsoever. And when she done that, she noticed a plush carpet on the minibus floor, a carpet laid out in front of us on the road to prosperity.

Darlene hesitated on account a she ain’t know if she could get up into the van. Her eyes rolled into her head and she swooned, almost ’bout to fall. She gripped the footrest to get a balance and flopped onto the floor of the van, next to the center seat. Her hand went swoosh over the beige shag and she remembered being a child and petting a sheep her father had named Luther.

At the wheel, with just the front-seat overhead light on, a red-eyed brother be sucking the last from a juice box, making a racket. When he got done, he pushed the box through the slit in the window out to the road, and a breeze blew it into the center lane and a passing semi done crushed that shit flat.

Jackie laughed, and the driver looked around and gave a broad smile without opening his mouth. Four others sitting in the rest of them seats, all of em hunched-over shadows made by the headlights coming from the opposite side the road. Red Eye turnt the ignition, the door closed, and they was on they way.

Darlene found herself a seat and look at Jackie. I grew up on a farm, Darlene said.

Did you now? That’s sure gonna come in handy.

What time is it? I need to call my son, okay?

Okeydokey.

How far is it from Houston?

Just up the road here, an hour or so.

That close? Okay! Darlene seen a bunch of dark shapes, three in the very backseat and one in the seat in front of that, passing round a little red light. The one in front took it in his palm, and she bugged out when she saw that pipe. The man put it up to his face, and the light be getting brighter as he sucked it in and the pipe start fizzing that fizz that gave Darlene a orgasm of hope. She love the sound of my voice.

You feel like lighting up, go on ahead now. This ain’t company time! Jackie said, and giggled.

Darlene nearly had a conniption. You don’t mind? she asked.

Jackie talked all calm and businessy. This company really takes care of their workers! We don’t judge.

Seriously? she asked Jackie. Seemed to Darlene someone should nominate them for Best Employer the World Has Ever Known.

Seriously, Jackie said.

Word, said one the brothers in the back.

What’s the hitch? Darlene asked.

The hitch is that there ain’t no hitch.

Jackpot! One the brothers passed the pipe up front and Darlene sucked it like it’s a pacifier. She thinking how we could spend time together, but she also gonna have real, honest-to-God work at a place where they understand our relationship and ain’t try to stop it or make her stay away from me. Too good.

This is an incredible opportunity, Darlene gushed. She felt like Miss America taking her first walk with that motherfucking tiara on, carrying them roses in her arms and waving and crying.

I rushed into the few doubting and unbelieving parts left in Darlene’s mind and I shouted, Babygirl, surrender to yes! Say yes to good feelings! Say yes to pleasure! Fuck pain. All that damn pain? Leave it behind you. Ain’t that what the book say to do?

Good thing I ain’t run into no resistance up in her mind, ’cause I wanted to go to that farm just as bad…Now, I get that when somebody walk up to your house and offer you heaven on earth, the delivery truck don’t usually be idling at the curb. That goes extra-specially in Texas. But we couldn’t think on that. Darlene already had way too much shit not to be thinking ’bout.

Once the minibus got moving, Jackie passed the recruits a clipboard and a pen, like when you getting a
job
job, and she goes, This the contract.

Somebody already done folded that sucker over to the last page and put a bright yellow tag in the place where you supposed to sign. A beefy brother with giant teeth and idiot eyes name of TT squinted at the page and scribbled on the signature line. Sirius B, who a intense, silent type sitting cross the aisle, took the contract out from under the clip, fold it to the first page, and held it like he wanna read that shit in the streetlamp light that they whizzing through.

Jackie leant into his personal space and said, Don’t sweat it, bruh, you just sign.

Before she seen what anybody else done, Darlene slipped that pen out that clip and joyfully wrote
Darlene Hardison
right on the line. A screen rolled down over her world that showed a sparkling future of joy, just like the book told her she gonna get by asking and believing that she gonna receive.

Picture Darlene not thinking. Imagine her ass floating above that bus, having a long-term hopegasm, rivers of happy sliding from her mouth to her crotch and back, warm and smooth, curling around her body like a combination of pure maple syrup and sex. Picture me fucking her deep, slick, and slow, a body made of smoke, telling her I love her more than her mother ever did. Picture Darlene starring in a Hollywood movie called
The Lady with the Damn Good Job.

After she had got to know some her future coworkers and everybody shared stories and drugs, the bus hushed up a minute and Darlene put her head back, relaxed her pelvis, and got all philosophical. She goes, Drugs are good, and she threw a smile as easy as you’d throw a 45 onto a turntable back in the day. The minibus had a smooth, bouncy suspension. Jackie turnt back to listen, stretching them shiny lips across her face. Darlene had thought shit like that even on sober days, now it fell out her mouth like a little stump speech.

Drugs’s
good!
She said it with extra
o
’s. But not just! she said. Everything in this country that they tell you is bad? It’s
good!
She counted on her fingers. Sex is good, fast food is good, niggers are good, dancing’s good, and you
know
alcohol’s fantastic. That’s why they—they rape it into your head that it’s all bad, because if everybody realized how good, nobody would do anything else! Wouldn’t waste time going to a stupid school where nobody will hire you once you graduate, or working for some big company that steals your life. She sat back again and sighed. I have spoken, she said. Now pass the peace pipe!

You know the minibus be rocking with laughter and agreements on that one.

A while later they turnt off Interstate Something and start down a state or a county route, one without no streetlamps nowhere, maybe without no number. The driver clicked on the brights. Out the left side the minibus played hit radio, all staticky—the right-side speakers ain’t worked. The station played “Need You Tonight,” and “Sign Your Name,” and “Get Outta My Dreams, Get into My Car”—I told Darlene that I knew the DJ and he playing them songs just for us. Then that song “Never Gonna Give You Up” came on and I went, That’s ’bout you and me, honey.

Out on the highway you could sometime make out some misty farms with little shrubs next to em, and out yonder on the road, the lights of cars was shrinking and falling into the past. In spite of her state of mind, everything Darlene ain’t thinking ’bout stayed with her, the way that a sound too high for your ear to hear still out there and dogs or whatever could hear it, or radioactivity your eye couldn’t see could still spread out everyplace in front of you and fuck your shit up. I couldn’t completely keep her mind off her thoughts, even though she kept begging me to—she wanted me to wipe out the experiences that be rising up like the undead, chewing on her will to live. But I do things different. I like to get people hyped up, to loosen they fear, give em some extra courage, put a little english on they stride.

So while Darlene smoked with the men in the back of the van, she could still hear something whispering,
He’s gone, he’s gone, nothing matters, never did. We will all be dead soon. Then the world will end, so why go on? Go to him. Be with him.
I swear that part did not come from
me.
’Cause when folks really wanna die, that’s a substance more powerful than Scotty—imagine a drug that you do it once and you guaranteed dead. Right, that’s called poison. Na-aah, no, thank you, not my job. All I ever said was Smoke it up.