Glory over Everything: Beyond The Kitchen House(77)
He went on to say again how grateful he was to have me return with them to their empty home, where my presence would serve as a buffer for the girls and a distraction for him as well.
CHAPTER THIRTY
1830
Pan
WHEN I FINALLY get my feet under me and feel good enough to start walking around, I ask Sukey to put me to work. I remember working hard for Mr. Burton and how he keeps me on. I think maybe I can do the same with Sukey and work for her until Mr. Burton gets here.
Sometimes if my legs get shaky, she makes me lay down, but I don’t like to lay back, ’cause then I start to worryin’. It scares me thinking about how mad my daddy’ll be that I went down to the docks and got took, just like he said. But I don’t care. He can whoop me if he wants to. I just want to see him again. I worry, too, why Mr. Burton don’t come. What’s gonna happen if he don’t find me? I want to get home!
I don’t mind helping Sukey out with the women who have babies, but one day they bring in a man they call a runner. Right away Sukey washes down his back, but when I’m wringing out the rags and handing them back, I can’t hardly look ’cause he’s so tore up. I’m holding a jar of her weed medicine that she’s going to put on his back when in walks two white men. The room goes quiet. The runner stops his moanin’ and even the two women having their babies don’t call out no more. It feels the same way like after the thunder when you wait for the hit of lightning. The quiet scares me and my legs feel shaky, so I sit down on one of the beds. The men come on over to see what Sukey’s doing, then they start telling the runner what’s gonna happen next time he tries to leave the place.
The two men are laughing when the one with the missing teeth sees me and walks over. He makes me stand up and then he starts poking on my head. It hurts and I want to tell him to cut it out, but the way Sukey’s got her lips squeezed together, I know to keep quiet.
“Is he getting steadier on his feet?” he asks Sukey.
She shakes her head.
He pushes me and I fall back on the bed. “Talk about a waste of money!” he says. “A runt, and now he’s sick to boot. Won’t never get no decent kinda work outta him. Better off he’d a died with the other one. Less trouble all around.”
I get scared and stand up. “I’m a good worker for my size,” I say.
He takes a good look at me. “Oh! You don’t say?”
“Yes, sir,” I say. “I know how to lay fires and how to polish silver and—”
“Well,” he says, smiling at the other man while he’s talking to me. “Sounds to me like you work like a girl.”
“No! I’m no girl! That’s what I did for Mr.—”
Sukey gives out a loud grunt at the same time the runner lets out a yell that makes all of us jump. The two men tell the runner to shut up, but he keeps callin’ out for Jesus Lawd to help him with his pain. Sukey’s standing beside his bed and waves at me to bring the medicine for his back. I take over the jar while the two men start walking away.
The one missing his teeth looks back at me. “I’ll talk to Thomas about selling him off. Trader’s coming through. Least we’ll get a little somethin’ for him that way.”
Soon as they go, the runner stops callin’ out, but Sukey gives me a look that says I done wrong. “What did I do?” I ask her. She pokes the runner’s hand and he speaks for her. “You got to learn to shut up, boy,” he says, sounding mad as Sukey looks.
My head is hurting and I go to my bed to lay down. I didn’t do nothing wrong. I was just talking up for myself. And now what? They were talking ’bout sellin’ me off? What if they do it before Mr. Burton gets here? Then how will he find me? When nobody’s looking, I start to cry.
THAT NIGHT WHEN the cook brings in the food, the grits look like they always do. I set down the wood bowl ’cause I don’t feel like eating. I lay back on my bed, wondering how I can get myself out of here before they sell me for a slave. I’m crying when Sukey comes over with the can of grease. After she sits, she surprises me and grabs hold a my hand and starts rubbing it down. Least she isn’t mad at me no more, but I still can’t stop crying. I want to go home! I want to see my daddy. And where is Mr. Burton? Don’t he know I’m waitin’ on him?
She keeps rubbin’ away until I settle down some, and then I figure out that she scratchin’ out words in my hand. I’m a good speller, but it takes a while for me to figure out what she’s saying. Why don’t she just talk like everybody else?
“You got to be strong like my boys,” she writes.
Soon as I figure out what she’s writing, I sit up! She got boys! I wonder where they is. When she sees I’m going to talk, quick she holds her finger to her mouth. “You got boys?” I whisper.
She nods and squeezes her eyes tight before she looks at me again. I look around, and even though everybody’s sleeping, I whisper: “Are they here?”
She shakes her head.
“Are they slaves?” I ask. She nods again, but then she looks away and her chin starts wobbling like she’s gonna cry. Before I can say something, she gets up and goes to her room and shuts the door, and then I think I hear her crying.
All night I wonder where her boys is at and what’s going to happen to me.