Jilo (Witching Savannah #4)(14)

“We could stay a few . . .” Porkpie began, but then he caught something on Betty’s face, something the glare hid from May’s view. “Yes, I reckon it would be best to be getting on. But thank you for your kind offer, ma’am.”

“You at least gonna come in and get the girls settled?” May asked.

“No, no,” Betty said. “I think they’ll do better if we just slip away now.” She turned quickly on her heels and strode toward the car.

Porkpie doffed his hat once more. “Mrs. Wills.” He scurried to open Betty’s door.

“You just remember”—he stopped at the sound of May’s voice—“that that woman with you was once Mrs. Wills, too, and she got three girls here who need their mama.”

“Go on,” Betty commanded Porkpie. He nodded several times in quick succession, whether in response to her or May, May would never know. As soon as Porkpie opened the passenger door, Betty slid into her seat, backside first, and swung her legs up through the opening. Once she was settled, he jogged with a heavy gait around the front of the car to the driver’s side and opened his door. “Ma’am,” he called out once more, then hopped into the driver’s seat and closed the door with loving care behind him.

May hurried down the porch steps, managing to grab ahold of the opening in the passenger side’s window just as Porkpie fired up the engine. Betty’s eyes flashed, and her lips pursed as she looked out at May.

“When you coming back?” May asked.

“Soon,” was all Betty offered. She rolled the window up and patted Porkpie’s arm. He shifted the car into drive, leaving May to watch as it jostled away across the roots and ruts of her yard.





SEVEN


It took an hour or so, but May’s three granddaughters finally allowed themselves to be calmed, then washed and readied for bed in their daddy’s old room. Chatterbox Opal kept parroting her mother, talking about how good life would be once Mama was singing in front of those big bands. Tearful Poppy, accustomed now to electric light, was afraid of the shadows cast by the flame of the kerosene lamp. Angry, squalling Jilo seemed somehow more deeply aware of her mother’s betrayal than her older sisters. Finally, though, May had them settled for the night.

May worried she was too old to raise these three, but she couldn’t let the fear linger. If she didn’t see to their well-being, who the hell else could she count on to do so? She had only just gotten used to being alone in the house, but the thought of trying to carry these girls into womanhood left her feeling something the loss of her loved ones had not.

She felt lonely.

For the first time in her life she understood those folk who would pay good money to sit at rocking tables and listen for voices from beyond the grave. The good Lord knew what she’d pay to feel Reuben’s reassuring touch again or see her Jesse’s face. She’d gladly hand over her last dime even if all she got from the other side was an echo of her mama’s voice telling her to quit her nattering.

Outside, the chat of mockingbirds, sleepless beneath the bright moonlight, tugged her back into a childhood memory, another full moon night such as this one, when she had complained to her mother about the filching habit that had earned the birds their name. “Why they gotta steal the other birds’ songs anyway? Why don’t they sing their own song instead?”

Her mama had pinched her cheek, forcing her to smile. “They ain’t stealing nothing, baby,” she had said, winking at May. “They just trying to imagine what it’s like to be one of those other birds. Of course they may get the melody wrong in places, but it’s love that make them try in the first place. They just trying to see things through others’ eyes. Be a lot better world if people did that, too. Now you leave those poor mockingbirds be.”

May extinguished the kerosene flame in the living area, its glow giving way to the silver moonlight that reached in through the window to keep her company. Morning would come soon enough, and May would have to be up and out before the moon had left the sky so she could walk the three miles into town where she worked as maid for the Pinnacle Hotel. She daren’t be late.

Even though the infusion of Mr. Truman’s money had begun to ease the economy’s palpitations, May done had three strikes against her. Older Negro woman that she was, she was lucky to have employment of any kind. Management at the hotel made sure she was reminded of that on a near to daily basis. “Yessir,” she’d say whenever Mr. Porter rubbed her nose in it. “It’s very kind of you to keep me on.” She’d smile. Force her eyes not to betray how she really felt. Angry? No, she was past being angry. Weary, that’s how she felt. Weary over the fact that these buckra could never look at her and see a woman, a human being, a child of God. An equal.

Then May remembered her sleeping grandbabies. Would they grow up in the same kind of world she’d known, where they would be forced to smile at smug and yammering white faces that constantly reminded them of the natural order of white over black, male over female? Heat prickled across her skin. Ah, yes. There it was, that anger she’d thought she was past.

She settled into her mother’s armchair, letting herself think for a spell on the worries of the immediate future. May didn’t have an idea what she would do with the girls while she was at work. Opal and Poppy would be old enough for school come fall, but what about the baby? Guilt struck her as she realized she, too, might end up having to saddle Opal with responsibilities beyond what her age should require. Responsibilities that could prevent her from bettering her own lot in life. No. Come fall, she’d have something figured out. She sighed and leaned back in the chair, intending to rest her eyes for a few moments.