Forever Never Ends (7 page)

Mayzie and her husband moved to Windshake forty years ago, fresh from between the honeymoon sheets, to take jobs at the new sock factory. Had settled in this house, filled it with love and a baby and linen curtains. But the baby had died of what they now called Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, only back then they called it “baby just up and died.” Uncle Theodore had followed their baby to heaven three years later in a factory accident, when the cotton press had grabbed his sleeve and pulled him into its iron jaws.

Mayzie had gotten some money from the factory, enough to pay off the house. Black lives were cheap, especially back then, but housing was cheap in those days as well. So Aunt Mayzie had kept working at the factory and tending her marigold beds and became a local fixture as the "town nigger." The Civil Rights turmoil bypassed Windshake, as had most everything else. Then her diabetes had taken a turn for the worse and she had retired to her little house with her television set, tabby cat, and the ghost of her right foot.

Now she was a part of the house. She
was
the house. The framing studs were her bones, the rafters her ribs, the slate siding tiles her skin. Her nerves were lined on the shelf, in a collection of animal salt shakers and miniature teapots. Her lungs were the screen doors, opened during the summer to let in the mountain breeze. Her eyes were the windows, watching as the forsythia bloomed and bluejays scrapped and dandelions filled the cracks in the sidewalk and Old Man Thompson doddered by to deliver her mail. And her heart was the photograph on the mantel, a cracked black-and-white portrait of a smiling young Theo holding a round-cheeked infant.

"Looks like the rain has done passed on," Aunt Mayzie said, looking out the window over her corner of Windshake. "And look yonder, the crocuses are starting to poke up.”

"Maybe spring's finally getting here. It sure took its own sweet time. Hard to believe this is the South. I thought it was supposed to be scorching down here."

"The mountains is a land unto itself. And the bad makes you appreciate the good. It's going to be the kind of day makes you forget all that snow.”

"Yes, ma’am." James watched the wind press against the stubby balsam shrubs that lined the walkway. "Maybe we can go for a walk after I get off work."

"Walk, nothing. I got an appointment with Dr. Wheatley today. I ain't got to walk nowhere when I got to walk
somewhere
."

"You didn't tell me."

"I most certainly did. Last night. But you had your eyes glued on that basketball game like they was giving away money.”

"Georgetown was playing, Aunt Mayzie. I've got to keep up with my old school. What's this appointment for? Something wrong?"

"Just a checkup, is all. Anyways, my appointment's at three o’clock and I know you can't get off work. And I don't even want you to ask. I done fine for myself for thirty years, and I hope to do for at least a few more, the Good Lord willing."

Yes, but for most of those years, you had two good feet and one strong heart. And you can't use my Honda because you never learned how to drive. Always a walker, you were. A mile to the factory, half mile to the Save-a-Ton, two miles to church. Three miles to catch the Greyhound for the annual family visit. Miles and miles put on those wide black feet, their experience now halved.

"Let me set you up with a cab, then." James put his hands on his hips. He felt ridiculous trying to stare down the woman who could stare down his own mother.

"Ain't setting foot in a car with that fool Maynard. Keeps a bottle under the seat and a cinder block on the gas pedal. No, I reckon a little stretch ain't gonna do me no harm."

James pictured Aunt Mayzie crutching down the sidewalk, wearing the purple velour coat James had gotten her for Christmas, a diaphanous red scarf knotted under her chin. Nodding to the white folks, stopping once in a while to rest her armpits, wearing the submissive smile that had hardened on her face like lava turned to obsidian.

"It's only a few blocks, James. Now you go on and don't worry about me. You're going to be late for work."

James glanced at his Timex. He'd have to run, and he hated to sweat. The steam from the Tin Man was bad enough. He had to be cool. Not like one of those shuffling gangsta stereotypes that populated the rap videos. No, cool like Frederick Douglass and George Washington Carver and Colin Powell.

"You sure you'll be okay?" James asked, his dark brow crinkling.

"I ain't helpless yet, James, even if you seem in an awful hurry to get me that way."

She turned her attention back to Oprah. James looked at the television. Now there was an African-American who knew how to rake in the bucks. Oprah's stardom had jumped the bounds of racism, even though she had awful taste in literature. Like Bill Cosby and Michael Jordan, she'd never be thought of as a nigger.

All you had to do was get rich and famous, and you were accepted. Well, at minimum wage plus a quarter, he'd be accepted in seven centuries or so.

He bent down and kissed Aunt Mayzie's cheek. "Call if you need anything, you hear?"

"Old Buddy'd love that, wouldn't he? ‘Don't pay you to talk, boy,’" she growled, trying to imitate the cook. Her laughter rattled the faded wallpaper.

James smiled despite himself. He was a chronic worrier with a streak of paranoia, that was all. The sun was out and the birds were mating and springtime was almost here and Aunt Mayzie was far from defeated. And Georgetown had advanced another round in the tournament. Even living in a white town, things weren't so bad.

"You take care on your way, Aunt Mayzie," he said at the door. "Love you. Bye, now."

James stepped into the sunshine and the breeze and the white eyes of Windshake.

***

"Where's Sylvester?"

"Like I would know." Peggy Mull pulled the phone away from her mouth so she could draw on her cigarette. She huffed out the smoke in a long, sighing trail. "Bryson's called and asked how he was feeling and to see if he was up to coming in after lunch. That's two days in a row he's missed."

"Reckon where he is?"

"Probably off in the woods somewhere, stroking that rifle of his. Anyways, I told them he wasn't even able to get out of bed. If his sorry ass loses that job, I'll be up shit creek with a toilet brush for a paddle."

"There's ways to get money. Don't you worry your pretty head none."

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing,” Jimmy Morris said at the other end of the line. “If Sylvester's off hunting, how about if I come over? You said yourself he usually stays till the sun drops."

"I don't know, Jimmy. I think he's starting to suspect something. It's hard to keep a secret in a damn trailer park."

Peggy knew that firsthand. Old Paul Crosley next door had noticed Jimmy's comings and goings, and Peggy had had to serve
him
a helping of home-baked panty pie to keep his wrinkled mouth shut. Not that Peggy minded much. She just hated to feel obligated.

"Peg, you know what you do to me. Just your voice is driving me nuts."

Peggy pushed away the pile of dirty dishes that covered the cracked Formica counter.
Thank the Lord peanut butter doesn't mold. Probably the oil in it. But I’ll have to take a hammer and chisel to those egg yellows. Maybe tomorrow.

"Tell you what, Jimmy. Why don't you get a fifth of that Millstream and swing by, and maybe we'll talk about it?"

"Talk, hell. I want to do more than talk."

Peggy giggled like a teenager. "Well, the kids
are
off at school."

"I'll bring back that old lawn mower and stick it out in the shed so's the neighbors will think I've been fixing it."

"You're a regular fix-it man, that's for sure. You gonna fix me up?"

"Let me check my tool, darling. Yep, raring to go."

Peggy stubbed out her cigarette and rummaged through her purse for another. Her fingers felt the ring of her Earnhardt key chain, the one Jimmy had given her. Sylvester hadn't given her a damn thing except a hard time, and not the good kind, either. "Say, Jimmy . . ."

"Yeah, honey?"

"Why ain't
you
working today?"

There was a silence on the other end of the line, and Peggy listened to the faint electronic hum as Jimmy got his story straight. She glanced out the window and noticed that the trailer park was deader than usual. The curtains were drawn in Paul Crosley's Silverstream and the sawed-off Bronco was gone from the Wellborns' puddle-filled driveway. A patch of lilies poked up behind a rotted row of railroad ties at the park’s entrance.

"Lemly Building Supply didn't drop off the blocks like they was supposed to. No need to mess around that muddy foundation all day for nothing. Can't lay what I ain't got."

"And you ain't got
me
yet."

"I'm working on it. See you in about twenty minutes?"

"I'll leave the door unlocked. And, Jimmy—"

"Yeah?"

Peggy found a half-f cigarette pack and crinkled the cellophane trying to spill out a fresh smoke. She looked at her hand, red and raw and aging, a hand that had been delicate once.

"Tell me you love me."
Even if you have to lie.

"I love you, Peggy."

"Bye now," she said faintly, slowly pulling the phone away from her bleached hair and hanging it in its cradle. She lit the cigarette with her bloodshot hand.

Tamara picked Kevin’s baseball glove off the floor and tucked it in the hall closet amid fishing poles, deflated soccer balls, windbreakers, and tangled piles of Christmas lights. One of these days they’d have to get around to spring cleaning. Because spring was here. The season of hope.

Yeah, right. Hope is a dirty word. I hope Robert will talk to me before our marriage slides the rest of the way into hell. I hope we can understand each other, because he’s in a mid-life crisis and I’m in the same old sanity crisis. I hope hope hope
.

She opened the living room window and the breeze pushed the scent of flowers through the screen. Dampness still clung to the air, but the sun was strong, and in its glow the mountains were deep blue. Tamara’s gaze traveled up the slopes, over the ripples of dark ridges to the gray stone face of Bear Claw. The familiar tingle trickled through her, and she tried to ignore it and concentrate on the coming day’s lecture instead. But the sound cut through her thoughts.

Shu-shaaa
.

She had no idea what the word meant, or if it even was a word. She tried it on her tongue.

“Shu-shaaa.”

As she said it, something drew her attention back to Bear Claw. She thought she saw a flash of green light near the distant peak, as if someone had signaled with a piece of mirror. A secret signal directed at Tamara.

No. Probably just a reflection off a rock.

Because you do not hear voices. You do not dream the future. You do not see invisible lights. You are NOT crazy.

You are a teacher, a mother, a wife, a sensitive soul who needs to grow a thicker hide. Maybe that’s not the right order of things, but brush your teeth and get down the mountain, and stop staring off into space waiting for spy messages to zap themselves into your brain
.

If she wasn’t crazy yet, she might soon drive herself there.
Shu-shaaa
was a cavity and her mind was a tongue, probing, exploring, curious, even though the rot would only continue spreading until the hole was bigger than the tooth. She slammed the window closed and went down the hall, away from the secret lights of Bear Claw.

***

"So that whole mountainside belongs to one family?"

"Yes, sir. And they're in a selling mood. I talked to one of the sons already. His father got rid of a chunk of it a few years back."

"Cheap?" Emerland handed the binoculars back to his assistant.

The assistant strung them over his neck, the strap tangling with his tie. The wind ruffled the papers on his clipboard. "Ninety thou for twenty acres. Can you believe it?"

"The people are strange up here in the mountains. One minute they're giving it away, and the next they want an arm and a leg and your firstborn thrown in as a down payment."

Emerland gazed at the blue, stubbled face of Bear Claw, picturing three ski slopes, a glass lodge, and a condominium complex. The outlying areas that were too steep for serious development could be carved up into tiny lots and dotted with log cabins. The environmental regulations would be a bitch, with these new run-off laws, but Emerland knew how to go around or through red tape. He'd built Sugarfoot without much of a problem and he could do the same thing again. Maybe more than twice. There were mountains as far as the eye could see.

"Who did you say you talked to?" he asked his assistant.

"Johnny Mack Mull is the name."

"Johnny Mack, huh? What does he say?"

"Apparently the father doesn't want to sell out completely. Now that he's got some money he feels like he's set for life. And the two sons don't get their share until he's out of the picture."

"How far is the father from the edge of the picture?"

"He's sixty-seven but in pretty good health. Johnny Mack was asking me if there was some way they could have his father ruled incompetent. Says he's got mental problems."

"If the old man's out of the way, then we'd have to work with
two
owners. What about the other son?"

"Sylvester Mull. Delivery truck driver. Lives in a mobile home. Has two kids. Probably an easy sell there."

“And Herbert DeWalt bought a piece?”

“Yes, sir.”

“DeWalt’s got to be making a play. He’s never gone small on anything.”

Emerland squinted into the sun, listening to the wind bending the pines in the valley below. He felt like a conqueror, like Napoleon or Balboa, looking out and knowing that all this could be his. He had the investors. "And Johnny Mack?"

The assistant cleared his throat. "All he talks about is moving to Florida. But he'd probably want lawyers and residuals. He's not too bright, but he knows how to pick a wallet."

"Best to try the old man first. I'll make the contact."

"Yes, sir."

"There are ways to deal with these people. You’ve got to open a dialogue. Speak their language."