My Jim (9 page)

I aint says nothing.

Next day when I comes my Lizbeth already there. I burning mad but I acts like it aint nothing out the ordinary. I gives Lizbeth the basket to go get some eggs. Then I turns to Mas.

If you touch my daughter I says your hand gonna fall off. Your teeth gonna fall out. Then every living part of you gonna fall off till you aint nothing but the memory of flesh.

Bring me my breakfast nigger. Thats all he say.

Every time Mas aint looking I goes out and gathers poison. Foxglove spiceberry pokeberry. Blue iris root. Whatever I can finds. I puts them in my bowl and pounds them to a powder. I tries to remember what my mama learn me. I calls upon the spirits to give me the heart.

I takes that powder and puts it in Mas food little by little. At first he aint notice nothing. Then he say Sadie what you putting in my food. You serving me rotten eggs gal. I swears you trying to poison me.

Working cures all I knows Mas. I aint never poisons nobody. Just something going round.

Well it better not come round here.

All the niggers sick I tells him. I dips my finger in the powder and puts it in my mouth. I wants Mas to see me sick. My eyes feel like they want to pop out my head. My head all dizzy and swole. Something going round.

You brings your bowl and work me a cure then he say. Just like you do for the niggers. Cept dont bring me no snakeroot. And I aint gonna chew no black walnut bark.

Mas getting sicker by the day. He holding his stomach and cant hold nothing down. The pain bad now. He double up with it. His tobacco and whiskey all he got. He too sick to bother me. Talking bout calling the white doctor. I scared of what the white doctor say.

You bring them plants in your bowl Mas say. I wants you to crush them where I can sees them. I wants to know what you putting in my cure.

I does like he say. I brings dandelion root and five finger root and root of columbine. I heats up some salt.

When I comes in the room Mas already sleep. I should of killed him all them years ago. Fore me and Jim marries. Fore the children come. After Mama dead and Gwen sold. When I aint got nothing and nobody in the world. Then it aint matter what they do to me. But now I gots my children and I waiting on my Jim. So I gots to kill Mas right this time. So he never come back and they never catch me.

I sets my bowl down on the chair and feels for my knife. I brings it over my head. Knife so small I got to hit him right. I scared I gonna miss. He gonna wake up and kill me. White folks gonna find me with blood on my dress and tear off my arms and legs. Set me on fire.

I sees his cane leaning next to the bed. Cane got more power than leaf or root. I moves closer to it. Many times I tries to draw the power from it. So it gonna break when Mas lean on it. So he gonna fall and break with that cane and his evil be done with me.

I takes the cane in my hand. My skin itch all over. Cane aint nothing but wood and he aint nothing but meat. If I strikes him hard in the head I can kill him with one blow. Then I throws him and his cane in the fire and never looks back.

I picks up the cane. I aint seen Mas wake up. I aint feels him looking at me. Fore I knows it he jump out the bed. I drops the cane.

Pick it up gal. Thats all he say. Give it to me.

I knows he gonna beat me with his cane. When I hands it to him I gets down real low and covers my head. Tucks down low to the floor so he strike my shoulder and back not my neck and head. Waiting to feel that cane cross my back. Waiting to hear it cut cross the air. But that aint the sound I hears. I hears the sound of wood tapping clay. Mas got my bowl in his hand.

I starts to rise. He stop me with his cane. Point it at me like a gun. Like he gonna run it right through me.

No Mas. Please Mas.

He place my bowl on the tip of that cane and spin it.

Bowl crash to the ground. I aint sees nothing after that. My hands reaching round like a blind person trying to gather up the pieces and all the time he crushing them under his cane. Under his boots. Till my bowl aint nothing but dust. Nothing but powder on the floor. Cept this one little piece I save all these years.

See that line. That line one day be a circle again. All the spirits cross over gonna come back round.

Tooth

Lizbeth got a button. Its something the Widow Douglas give her. The Widow Douglas Miss Watsons sister. Her husband die young and leave her alone on the hill. When Mas Watson die Miss Watson move in with her. Thats where she take my Jim.

Since they believe Jim dead Miss Watson and the Widow Douglas take a good Christian interest in me and the children. They come out in they coach to see us. One day when Mas Stevens drunk they convince him to let them take us to church. Ever since Mas Stevens catch me with his cane he aint want nothing to do with me. He say you can go just so long as I aint gots to come looking for you.

We dress like we going on a picnic. Lizbeth put on her apron. Jonnie tie a rope round his shirt. I wears my head scarf under my straw hat so the holes aint look so bad.

Widow Douglas got a coachman. Old black man with a white beard. He a kind man. Put his hand on Jonnies head like he know how much Jonnie want the touch of a father. He wearing dirty gloves and a red coat. Lizbeth think that coat pretty. She say so. He help us in the coach.

Widow Douglas say thats the red coat of a English soldier. Somebody must of killed him to get it off. See that hole there. Thats the hole from a musket shot.

But Lizbeth aint looking at the hole. She see something shiny like a medal and she reach up to touch it.

Miss Watson say aint that a pretty button.

Lizbeth aint say nothing. She got a big eye for that button. Gold button on a red coat. All the other buttons gone only this one left. Old torn dirty coat. Lizbeth never seen a button so pretty. It hanging by a thread.

Widow tell the coachman give Lizbeth that button. He dont need to wear no button. He dont need to be so proud. Coachman do like she say.

Lizbeth holding that button like it gonna buy her freedom. Widow look at her and shake her head. She give the button to Lizbeth cause she feel sorry for a girl cant hear. Girl just loss her daddy. Girl who always be a slave.

At first I tells Lizbeth throw that button away cause the widow aint mean you no good by it. But then I sees how the child so glad for that button. Maybe the button a charm. Emma say Lizbeth need something to hold. Something she know all the way hers. I lets her keep the button and I aint bothers her bout it none.

Lizbeth pray every night. She learn how to pray fore she loss her hearing and she put her hands together every night. She pray her daddy come home safe and sound. She pray holding onto that button.

Her prayers a comfort to her but they make me want to cry. My comfort in my dreams.

I dreams Jim asleep in my arms. Sometime I holds him. Sometime he hold me.

After Nate tell me bout Jim I wants to tell Lizbeth and Jonnie. Daddys alive. But I dont dares say nothing to nobody.

I dreams Jim walking cross the river.

I dreams Jim swimming cross the sea.

I dreams Jim riding up to heaven but he gone without me.

I starts to hate him. Maybe he got his freedom already and he take another gal. Maybe he in Illinois or Ohio. On his way to Canada. Maybe freedom a starting over place and he aint want nothing from his slavery.

After Mas break my bowl he order me out the house. He aint beat me or let Banes whip me. He just aint pay me no mind no more. I works the fields bending and stooping. Sometime I stands and looks up. Sky the best thing when you trap. Banes tell me go back to work.

I waiting on my Jim like a child wait. Without my bowl I cant thinks bout no cures cant brings down no powers. I done loss the line connecting me to everything.

And Mas got my Lizbeth.

He got her up in the house with him. He got a old woman name Rose doing the cooking. We back to cornmeal every day. When Rose at the cabins or out in the fields I asks her bout my daughter.

She with Mas now.

He forcing her.

He aint got to force her. He just got to feed her.

I aint wants to hear it but I knows it true. Lizbeth seen what I goes through with Mas. She aint got the stomach to fight.

Seem like the longer Jim stay away the less he got to come home to. I starts to wonder if he ever coming back.

Jonnie come to sleep in my cabin. Them folks Mas put him with done put him out. They sleeping all crowded and I sleeping by myself.

Go sleep with that devil done birth you they say. They tell Jonnie all kind of lies bout me. Say I aint no Christian and I going to hell. They in hell and they worrying bout going to hell. Everywhere they look Christians see a black devil. They think God a white mas.

I never makes friends with Mas Stevens slaves but I sings with them. Pass a song down a row of tobacco. Change the line when it get to you. Take up the line somebody give you. Fill it out with one lower or one higher. Speed it up when the work lagging. Slow it down when the night come.

They send Jonnie to me with a bruise face. His eyes big with worry. I tries to touch him and he turn away.

You aint want to see your mama. You scared of me.

He start to cry. He still a little boy.

Whats wrong I says. You look like you seen a ghost.

My tooth hurt he say. They hit me.

His lip swoll and bloody. Open your mouth I says.

He aint want to open it. I brings his head close. Sticks my finger tween his teeth.

He scream and holler.

Shut up I says. And pulls the tooth.

He act like I kicks him in the mouth.

I aint wants you to pull my tooth. I aint wants you to touch me. He yelling like a fool.

Little itty bitty tooth. Next time I slaps it out of you I says. I takes the tooth and wraps it in a cloth.

I aint wants you to bury it he scream. Dog gonna dig it up. Somebody get hold of my tooth and put something on me. I aint wants no witch to take my tooth. He throw hisself on the floor.

I so hurt I can hardly breathes. Jonnie aint got the heart to look at me.

Go to sleep I says. Aint nothing but a tooth. You think I gonna work something on you. Your own mama. You been listening to fools preaching all that sin. They the ones know evil. They know it like they own children.

Jonnie so small when Mas Stevens buy us. Right away he put to work feeding the pigs and sweeping out the stables. He never complain like the other children. At night he cry in the corner.

Now I gives him the piece of his daddys hat to hold. He smell it and put it on his lips. I shows him how to press it tween his palms and call his daddy back to him.

He hold his mouth where the tooth use to be. I makes him open and show me. He got two rotten teeth.

Clove good for toothache. When children teething I likes to pound a little clove. Put the powder on my finger and stick it in they mouths. But most the time I cant gets clove. Only the bark of a black walnut tree. Jonnie aint like chewing bark but he love the clove.

Mas got some in his pantry. He got all kind of spices and sweet smelling leaves. He mix them with his tobacco. He put some crushed clove in a piece of paper roll it up and smoke it.

I goes and stands under the kitchen window. Just stands there looking in. Fall coming on fast. Aint never been so lonely. Lamp casting a soft light. Lizbeth cleaning up. She just a girl but her face getting grown. I stands in the dark watching my child. She up high I down low. She in the light. Starch white apron round her waist. Aint been with Mas but two weeks. Already she look old. Putting on a little flesh. Me and Jonnie skin and bones.

I just waits there till she feel me. All us slaves can feel things. Only now with the freedom folks aint feel nothing.

Lizbeth come to the door. She take my hand and pull me inside. Quick fore Mas can see she say. She grab me and hold me. I stiff she soft. I shakes she hold steady. I aint knows what to say. She put her finger on my lips.

I points to the pantry. We hides there. I goes through them jars till I finds the clove.

Jonnie got a toothache I says.

She make a face. Tear roll down. She miss her Jonnie. Look like she maybe want to tell me something. She aint get the chance.

Mas come in and see me standing in his kitchen with the clove in my hand. I turns round to leave. He come at me with his cane. Push me from behind.

In the morning Banes come to my cabin and take my boy away.

Mas hate me so much. I the only one dont abide him. I all the way fights. I believes he sell my boy cause he want to watch me suffer. But maybe its just for money. He drinking all the crop.

I aint never screams like I do that day. I tear at Banes with my teeth. I fights and kicks. He knock me down. He got Jonnie under his arm. Jonnie trying to grab hold to me.

Others standing in the yard watching. Some turn and go back to they cabins. Banes push me away again. He push me hard. I falls down in the dust. He walking away with my Jonnie under his arm.

I walks round the yard in circles. I tears at my hair and clothes. I takes my knife and starts stabbing at my skin. Only it aint my knife but the shard from my Congo bowl. It leave marks on my skin. White lines like a cross.

Workers starting for the packhouse take up a song. Pass it round the yard. Circle me with it. Song bout hardship. Sometimes I feels like a motherless child. I believes that song the only thing save me from losing my mind.

Thats your Uncle Jonnies tooth.