Jilo (Witching Savannah #4)(35)
She heard the springs of the screen door protest as her latest client entered her home. May drew a steeling breath, which she then exhaled in a prayer for patience. The buzzing of a fat bumblebee sounded in response. May saw it appear out of nowhere, pushing through the blue wall as easily as if the wall were the sky it mimicked. This happened from time to time, the unannounced arrival of an emissary from her patron. “Oh,” May addressed the hovering insect. “She interested in this one, hey? Got some sweet nectar she wants to taste for herself?”
The bee bobbed in the air, shooting up, then descending in a slow, lazy circle, until it landed on her shoulder. The sound of high heels clacking across her living room pulled her back to the present. A woman. May worked to put on her most imperious look, so that when the caller reached her, she’d perceive May not only as a woman of power, but as a woman whose time should not be wasted. She straightened her spine and grasped the arms of her chair. Clearly not bothered by her movements, the bee adjusted its position only slightly before commencing to preen itself. May shifted her focus to the entrance of her chamber, raising her head proudly to greet her latest visitor. Then the sound of a voice she’d never expected to hear again on this side of glory knocked the wind right out of her.
“Jilo, girl, you get over here. Don’t you recognize your own mama?” Betty’s words chased Jilo straight into May’s chamber. May’s other grandbabies experienced vertigo upon entering the room, but it didn’t faze Jilo one bit.
“Nana, there’s a crazy white woman out there,” Jilo said, panic nearly turning her words into a shriek as she ran into the shelter of May’s arms. The bee took off, no doubt rising to observe the scene from a better vantage point.
In the next instant, Betty, or at least a faded version of her, appeared in the doorway, shopping bag in hand. She wore a navy-blue dress, a quiet color May would never have expected of her, and even though the day beyond the lowered shades and oscillating fan of May’s living room was stifling, there was a fur stole around her shoulders. Betty stopped at the threshold, teetering on her high heels, and grasped the door frame to steady herself.
“What is all this, then?” Betty asked, her words coming out with a practiced accent that said she belonged in the city, not out in the sticks.
May placed her arm around Jilo, squeezing her right shoulder and tugging her closer in the same movement. She understood the girl’s confusion. This woman standing before her looked like any of the fancy buckra ladies who paraded themselves around the Pinnacle. Her hair was as long and straight as any white woman’s. Its color wasn’t the shade with which Betty had been born, but neither was it the obviously out-of-the-bottle red it had been when May had last laid eyes on her former daughter-in-law. It was brown. Chestnut brown. White-woman brown.
Betty’s skin no longer held any of its former warm tones. It showed tan, maybe olive, like she was one of those Italians. May felt certain Betty had been bleaching herself, and she doubted the woman had spent more than a minute in the sun in the five years she had been away. May released Jilo, but let her hand slide down the girl’s back and grasp ahold of her tiny fingers. She held the girl’s hand tight as she pushed herself up and advanced on the prodigal mother.
“What’s all this, then?” May parroted her, waving her free hand at Betty.
Betty released her grasp on the frame and took a backward step into the hall. May continued to will her back, away from her special place and into the sitting room. A pout formed on Betty’s lips as she took several awkward reverse steps. May’s eyes followed Betty’s, which were well fixed on Jilo. “She doesn’t even recognize her own mama. She doesn’t recognize me at all.”
May reached behind herself to close the door to her room. “How in the hell do you expect her to? You up and disappeared on her before she could walk a straight line, and now you’ve come here with no warning, looking like you stepped right out of Imitation of Life.”
Betty’s shoulders went slack and her face turned down. “I just thought she’d know . . . somehow.” A sorrowful glint in her hazel eyes very nearly touched May’s heart.
Jilo’s hand slipped from May’s grip, and the child took a few furtive steps forward, stopping just beyond Betty’s reach. Betty knelt and set her shopping bag down beside her. Her shoulders pulled back, as if in preparation to open her arms wide for a hug, but instead she turned a little to grasp the bag and set it between herself and her daughter.
Jilo turned back toward May. “Is she really my mama?”
May struggled, but couldn’t prevent a tear from falling. She couldn’t bring herself to speak, so she answered with a few quick nods, her heart breaking as wonderment filled her grandbaby’s eyes.
“Why, yes,” Betty answered for her. “I sure am your mama.” She reached into the bag. “And I brought you a present, too. You want to see it?”
Jilo cast another glance at May, her wide-open eyes questioning whether it was safe to approach this woman. Again, May signaled with a nod, trying to force a smile to her lips. She wanted Jilo to feel good about who she was, which would be a lot easier if she felt good about her mother. May felt in her bones this was only a visit. Nothing permanent. This could very well be the only chance Jilo ever had to lay eyes on her mama, and May would not take that away from her.
Following her nana’s lead, Jilo responded with a nod of her head.