Passing through Perfect (Wyattsville #3)(57)

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Isaac,” he answered.

“How come you’re sitting here?”

“I’m waiting for Daddy.” Isaac motioned to the sewing room.

Jubilee walked over to the room and peeked in. “Are you Isaac’s daddy?” she asked Benjamin.

“Unh-huh,” he nodded. “Is he misbehaving hisself?”

“No, he’s just sitting on the step.” By then she’d noticed Paul’s arm and bombarded him with questions about it. When Paul told of the accident and recounted how Isaac’s daddy had saved his life, she crossed the room, gave Benjamin a hug, then disappeared out the door.

Not long afterward, Paul heard Carmella in the kitchen. When she hollered that breakfast was on the table, Benjamin helped Paul hobble to the dining room.

The table was longer than it had been last night, and there were now six chairs where there had been just four. Sid sat at the head of the table; Jubilee and Isaac sat next to each other on one side. Still keeping his leg cocked at that half-bent angle, Paul lowered himself into a side seat and motioned for Benjamin to sit beside him.

There was a bowl of butter and a basket of biscuits on the table, but moments later Carmella came in with a platter full of scrambled eggs, sausages, and ham. Sidney’s eyes lit up.

“Well, well,” he said. “Isn’t this a nice surprise.”

With a rather pleased look on her face, Carmella said, “It’s Saturday and we’ve got company, so I thought something special was in order. Don’t get used to it,” she added. “On Monday, you’re back to oatmeal.”

While she poured the coffee, Paul told how he and Benjamin had struck a deal.

“Benjamin’s going to stay and help out in the store until I’m healed,” Paul said. “My right arm’s okay, so I’ll work the register and he can help out with the heavy stuff.”

“That’s good to hear,” Carmella said. “I worry about Sidney overdoing it. You know a man his age…” She let the rest of her thought trail off.

“Even though we’ll have company,” she added jokingly, “it’s still oatmeal on Monday.”

“I like oatmeal too,” Isaac said as he stuffed a piece of sausage in his mouth.

Benjamin knew he had to say something. “Miss Carmella,” he said apologetically, “we’re not gonna be here on Monday. I’m happy to be working in y’all’s store, but we got to get our own place.”

“Nonsense,” Carmella said. “We’ve got plenty of room.”

“That may be,” Benjamin replied, “but colored folk and white folk needs their own separate places.”

“That’s a very bigoted statement,” Sidney said. His words had a sharp sound to them.

Benjamin turned. “I don’t mean no offense, Mister Sidney, but—”

“That’s what all bigots say—I don’t mean any offense—but it doesn’t end the hate!”

“Stop it, Sidney!” Carmella said angrily. She turned to Benjamin. “Please forgive Sid. He lost two cousins in Germany and—”

“You don’t need to make apologies for me,” Sidney snapped. “Bigotry is bigotry, whether you’re Jewish, black, or white. It’s people hating people they don’t even know who started that war! Sooner or later somebody’s got to say something!”

Sid angrily pushed back from the table and sat there steaming.

The clatter of forks was suddenly gone; there was only a big heavy silence hanging in the air.

Jubilee was the first to speak.

“I don’t hate nobody,” she said. “Me and Isaac’s friends.” She stretched out her skinny little arm and wrapped it around Isaac’s shoulder.

“I don’t hate nobody neither,” Isaac added.

The hard set of Carmella’s mouth softened. “That’s because you’re children,” she said. “Children only hate when they’ve got reason.”





Benjamin





I know Mister Sidney and Miss Carmella are trying to show us a kindness ’cause of bringing their boy home, but to me it’s got the feel of charity. Sleeping in such a fancy room is like taking something that don’t rightfully belong to me, and it plain out don’t sit well. I’d sooner be sleeping in the back of the truck.

When a man’s already down low, he sure don’t need anybody feeling sorry for him. I left Grinder’s Corner ’cause I was too ashamed to stay, and I done made up my mind I ain’t never gonna let Isaac see me that way again.

A boy has got to be proud of his daddy. If he ain’t proud of his daddy, he ain’t never gonna be proud of hisself.

That sure ain’t what Delia wanted for Isaac.





Coming to Agreement





When the silence became thick as early morning fog, Carmella tried to poke holes in it with meaningless bits of chatter. She spoke of the biscuits being slightly burnt, the price of apple butter going up two cents, and the weather forecast for rain in the afternoon. No one listened. When the silence stayed, she shooed the children away from the table.

“You’ve finished eating,” she said. “Now go on outside and play before that rain gets here.”