Finding My Thunder (20 page)

I
thought of Felix and what he would do with this space. Everyone in heaven would
be naked and sharing a toke. In hell they’d be in church. Or painting a church.
With Derrick.

He
was on fire about this mural. I said, “We can’t do it without permission.”

He
said, “They don’t like it we’ll just paint over it…that same dull-ass white. C’mon
it will liven this place up.”

I
was too weak to argue so he got a pencil and started to sketch this big scene
and I told him, “It can’t be civil rights.”

He
said, “I know. Think I want the Klan coming in here carrying off Naomi and the
church ladies?”

I
wasn’t worried about the Klan. It wasn’t likely they’d be coming in here. But Naomi
would be, and she would take this serious.

So
while I painted…alone, he sketched, then ran home for some paints and started
in. He had a big white dove, like he said, carrying an olive branch which he
thought would be hysterical if he made it a marijuana plant, but I told him
don’t even think about such, and he laughed.

I
said, “Is this you rethinking Jesus?”

“Call
it a parting gift,” he said grinning and painting.

So
by late afternoon we had a big white bird holding the olive branch with a giant
cross behind him and rising from the back of a cross a giant black fist
clenched in the symbol of black power.

“Are
you kidding me?” I yelled at him cause I’d been laying on the floor for a long
time painting along the mopboard and that fist hadn’t been there last time I’d
looked.

“It’s
perfect,” he said. “You got to understand it. It means black power has to come
through the cross and the love of the dove. Can’t you see it? It’s Dr. King’s
message.”

“With
a little Malcolm and Jessie thrown in,” I yelled. “She’s going to behead you,”
I said. “And I’m going to hold you down.”

I
set my brush over my bucket and tried to work the kinks out of my back. Then I
walked to where he worked. “You have to paint the fist out. Then it’s good.”

“The
fist stays, Grunier,” he said. “You need to broaden your mind.” Then he went on
about how broadened his mind already was and after a few minutes I spoke over
him and I said, “If other white people ever come in here….”

“You
ain’t white,” he said, his brush dripping over the pan.

We
just stared at each other. He hadn’t said this to me in a while. He used to say
it all the time until Naomi spoke to
Lavinia
. Naomi
said it was a crush. Danny used that word, said when he was little he had a
crush on me. And both of them had pretty well crushed me in different ways.

“Still
the Queen of Egypt,” he said, meaning I was still in denial. “They talk about
it round here. Don’t they say nothing at school?” This wasn’t the same juvenile
teasing. This was real.

I
shook my head. “I know there’s talk. I’ve heard. It’s all my time growing
up…two worlds,” I said quoting Nina.

“It’s
more than that. Look at yourself, girl. There’s some coffee in that milk.”

“You
know me so well?”

“You
been looking at yourself so long you don’t see what we do.”

“The
Negro community? You speak for them all now? How about painting out that fist
while you preach.”

“I
ain’t…
doin
’ that. I’m just telling you to quit
passin
’.” He slapped more paint on the wall and went about
his business and I was stuck staring at him.

“Hey
Derrick…if I throw this bucket of paint on you…you’ll be white, too. A lot of
milk in the coffee,” I said. He didn’t know about the Coca-Cola bottle I’d
thrown.

“Girl,
you ain’t gonna do that. Now let’s get this painting done so I can give you your
first driving lesson.”

I
stared at him. “Really?”

The
freedom to drive? “I don’t have a car,” I said.

“One
thing at a time, pumpkin!”

I
had to laugh at that. But the wheels in my mind were already spinning.

“How
long does it take a person to learn driving?” I asked.

“Depends
on the person,” he said leaning into his work.

 
I just kept thinking. “Hey,” I said after a
minute, “you got a car?”

“Where
someone like me gonna get a car?”

“Well…I
need to get to Memphis.”

He
stared at me long enough to set down his brush.

“How’s
that?” he said.

“I
need to get to Memphis day before school starts.”

“Take
the bus.”

“I
can’t.” Danny would be taking the bus. I couldn’t chance getting on the same
one.

“If
I can get Naomi’s car…could you drive me?”

“I’ll
be gone for school.”

“Could
I learn to drive by then?”

“Maybe.
But you got to pass the driver’s test to get a license. And then you should
have insurance…and Memphis…you should have some experience…and a map
definitely.”

“Can
I drive without all that?”

He
was shaking his head. “Anything’s possible. But…what are you
fixin
’ to do?”

Finding My Thunder 30

“Nah!”
Derrick said when I’d mixed up the gas for the brake and plunged us forward
only to figure out my mistake and slam us to a halt.

“Hilly…let’s
just go to the car place. You’re not going to get better and maybe you’ll luck
out and the guy will be so scared he’ll just pass you.”

Lavinia’s
big Buick shuddered as I let off the gas and
pulled into the empty street.

“Now
you’re going to have to really pay attention,” Derrick said because we were
fixing to get into some actual traffic as we neared Corning.

“Just…you
make me nervous,” I said.

“I
make you nervous?” he said. Emphasis on ‘you.’

He
did. But if it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t be driving at all, so…gift horse.

Well,
Naomi had almost dropped over when she saw that mural over the pulpit. And he
had explained it to her, the art behind it and she said it could stay for the
time being if he would come back to church, and he said, “Sister Naomi I’m
going to college.” She said, on Christmas break, spring break, any break she
wanted to see his face, and on she went and she had him against the wall pretty
much. But she told him if the congregation didn’t want the big black fist he
had to paint over it before he went to school. She liked the rest of it…or
pretended to. Actually I couldn’t believe it…the lengths she’d go to as a
fisher of men.

But
things I could not believe kept on coming. I made it to town, driving careful,
like an old person, our oldest member of Temple, Sister Tremont. That’s who my
driving reminded Derrick of, he said, especially with me gripping that big
wheel, sitting forward, barely able to see over it.

I
had to put up with his ramblings and couldn’t tune them out like usual because
every once in a while he reminded me of something like a tree or another car or
a curb or a person trying to cross the road or something. And as I drove, he
taught me to drive, what everything meant. He was a good teacher. When I told
him so, of course he agreed.

I
was a wreck. Derrick accompanied me into the office and I took a number and sat
there bouncing my knees. He called my name and Derrick had to nudge me and say,
“That’s you.”

Well
the guy looked from me to Derrick, where he sat. “You Lonnie’s girl?” he said.

“I’m
Hilly Grunier,” I said, guessing there was no way around it.

He
looked back at Derrick like maybe he’d kidnapped me or something.

“Well
come back here for the written test,” he said. So I went back there and he gave
me the test and told me the time on it, and I hoped it was enough.

I
opened the book and it didn’t seem so hard. I guessed a couple times but I
ended up passing, and Derrick laughed so hard and said, “Excellent teacher.”

I
hugged him, and he laughed some more and said, “If you pass the next part, the
driving part, what I get then?”

And
I said, “A smack in the face.”

He
laughed more and that guy giving me the test didn’t look too kindly on us.

So
the officer got in on the passenger’s side and I took off and Lord I was a
wreck all over again. It had seemed kind of reasonable with Derrick telling me
what to do, but I wasn’t sure. I rounded a corner and didn’t put on the brake
and it seemed like I was going to lose control and he yelled, “Young lady put
that brake on!”

And
I did and he lurched forward and put his hand on the dash and his clipboard
fell onto the floor. He was mad. He told me how to drive back to the station. The
test was over.

“When
can I take it again?” I asked.

“Three
days,” he snapped. “Get some instruction.”

“Yes…sir,”
I said.

Derrick
was standing out there waiting to see me parallel park so he could have a real
good laugh.

“You’ll
get it,” he said getting in.

I
drove home, slowly, carefully. We passed by Lonnie’s shop, and the front window
was boarded up. I got sick to my stomach, not about the window, but about Danny.

Then
I saw him, in Mac’s parking lot holding a bottle of Coke, talking to Tahlila
and Lauren. Danny. Black, brown, white, red…my heart. Derrick was screaming at
me and I kept the car on the road just in time. I’d nearly grazed another car. “Sorry,”
I said, and these tears burst out of me and he kept his hand on the wheel and
helped me get off the square. As soon as we were on a side street I pulled
over…with his help. Then I just collapsed there, and he was kind, patting my
back, and it poured out of me. How Danny had broken with me. How I wanted to
drive so I could see him off in Memphis. Just see him that last time before he
left for California cause I didn’t know if he’d ever come back before Vietnam.

“You
are crazy,” he said. “Danny Boyd is…you can’t be for real Hilly? Those girls
will slit your liver open. He was right. Stay away from him.”

“I’ve
got as much right as anybody…you talk all the time about rights…you of all
people.”

“You
notice how hard we are fighting for some rights? And even then…you can’t just
rise to the top like that! You ever hear of a lynch mob! Burning crosses! As
real as those things are, girl they are also symbols of a thousand other
creative ways the white man has to make sure you die.”

“The
color of my skin is not the problem, Derrick.”

“Ain’t
you noticed? You got no standing in the white community. Your own daddy
disowned you. You live with a black woman. Black…black woman. You got a big old
question mark stapled on your skin. And truth be told…your mama…folks
said…troubled in the head. There’s just all kinds of reasons….”

“Job’s
comforter,” I yelled.

“Pardon
me for telling the queen she is naked!”

“What?”

“That’s
the real problem. You’re too good for this place. You don’t fit here. You don’t
fit in Snyder either. That’s the truth.”

“Just…,”
I looked out the window, “shut-up.”

So
he did for minute. “Hilly,” he finally said, “us sitting here in this car
together in a white neighborhood…Bixby gonna be by any second.”

“Derrick…how
do you know that…about my father?”

“My
mother.”

“Is
that all they do is talk about me?”

“When
they ain’t talking about me throwing off Jesus and Dr. King.”

We
laugh but it’s weak.

“Some
say…Eugene. For you. Some say…pretty much they all say Eugene. They knew him. He
was around Snyder town. He was the man.”

“Naomi
would have told me that. I’ve asked her. She says I got to face it…I come from Lonnie
Grunier.”

He
laughed so hard I thought he would die.

“It’s
not funny,” I kind of yelled. I might have shoved his shoulder, too.

He
settled down some. “The timing, Hilly. What about that? That’s what they say.”

“It
was long after the war. I was born in fifty-two so don’t tell me Lonnie wasn’t
around by then. He was.”

“It’s
all there if you want to see it. He kept the yard when your Daddy fought. They
was friends Eugene and your Mama. Close in age. It’s like a movie…that old
Imitation
of Life
where the daughter is always passing for white and one day her old
mammy shows up at school in front of her friends and she says she don’t know
Mammy.”

“Is
Naomi Mammy?”

“Yeah,
and you’re the one won’t claim her…the daughter that passes.”

“Lovely
little summary of my life.”

“Or
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
with my man Sydney. It’s some of that, too,
white daughter coming home and oops, guess who she’s got on her arm…Hello
Boss!”

“Has
nothing to do with me.”

“No…that
would be your Mama.”

“Anyone
get by with talking about your mama lately? First you call my mama crazy and
now an
adulteress
,” I said angry, shoving against him
again.

He
had his hands up but he kept talking. “Eugene had women after him in Snyder
Town, could have had anybody is what I heard but he didn’t want none of them. They
said he already had him a woman. Naomi raised him to think too much of himself.
Didn’t know who he was. They say she did the same with you. That’s pretty much
what they say.”

I
went for him, but he got out quick and went to the driver’s side.

I
locked the door and he stood there looking in the window at me. “You should
know. I been trying to tell you for years. It’s one of the reasons I never felt
I could listen to Naomi…believe anything she said.”

He
was looking at me without apology. He’d wanted to say all this for a long time.

I
unlocked the door and got out of the car.

“Get
back in, Hilly. I ain’t
bein
’ evil. Ask me…it’s been
evil not to tell you. Somebody had to. All those years we were put together…you
never really fit in…like our royal guest. Just a guest wherever you were…even
at school. You got to get this settled, don’t you think? Don’t you think you
got a right to know? Don’t you want to know who you are?”

“I’m
gonna walk,” I said. “You best go on.”

“I’m
leaving in two days,” he said.

“Well…good-bye
then.”

“Don’t
be all mad. Are you mad at me?”

“No,”
I said.

“I
ain’t going to paint out that fist,” he laughed.

I
looked at him. “Like I didn’t know?”

He
stepped toward me and awkwardly hugged me, but I didn’t hug back.

“Take
care of yourself little sister,” he whispered.

“Yeah…you
too,” I said, the road under my feet as thin as onion skin, ready to let me
drop through.