Glory over Everything: Beyond The Kitchen House(84)

The first time I sing to that child of hers, Emma look at me like she gonna grab that baby away. Instead she goes stomping off, but she don’t stop me. I never know a mama like this who don’t have no feelings for her own baby.

One day when Emma and me is sitting beside the house and shelling beans, real careful, I ask her why she don’t care nothing about her baby. She turns her head at me, her eyes half closed, and shoots me a mean look. I don’t look back at her, I just keep shelling.

“They gonna get them anyway,” she say. “?’Sides, I don’t like babies. The only baby I ever care for was my first one. She was four years when they took her. She was nothin’ like me. She was little and never did nothin’ but laugh. Four years old and she talked like she was a growed woman. When they took her, I was working the fields. When I come back, she was gone. Nothin’ I could do about it ’cept have the one I was carrying. Now don’t ask me no more.”

I don’t ask her no more, but I still take care of her baby. In time I start to notice that she stops leaving him by himself and brings him along in his basket to wherever I’m working, so when he fusses, I’ll go to him.

Then one day, after she’s talking to some others down in the quarters, she comes stomping over to me. “I’s hearin’ that your boys is trouble. You best watch out. They send them off if you don’t get hold a them.”

First I think to tell her that my boys is none of her business, but I think better of it and keep quiet. That night I sit them down and try to talk to them; when they start sassin’ back, I know that I got to paddle them. When the moon comes up, all three of us are crying ourselves to sleep.

In the morning both of those boys is curled up next to me. I kiss their baby hands that still got some fat on them. I know about the God in the old preacher’s Bible, but I’m thinking maybe He only looks out for white folks. I talk to Him anyway and ask for His help.

The boys are seven years old the summer they are put to work bringing water to those in the fields. A couple of weeks in, I don’t know what went wrong, maybe one got to sassin’ and the other one stood up for him, but that night they both come back with a beating. Monday afternoon of the next week, Emma comes running up from the quarters to tell me they are sold and the cart is heading out.

I run, but when I get there, they are gone and dust is all I see. I run down the road, and when I think I hear them calling for me, I start screaming for them. One of the overseers gets ahold of me—“Stop your screamin’!” he say, but I can’t. Two overseers got ahold of me, pulling me back, but that don’t stop me. Some of the workers from the fields stop their work and are walking over, carrying their hoes. Then a couple of the women start calling out for them to let go of me.

One of the overseers shoots his gun up in the air and tells them to get back to the field. I’s still yelling for my boys, and they pull me back behind the quarters, where one of the men knocks me down, stands over me, and tells me to shut up, shut up! When the other one starts kicking me, it’s like he’s lighting a fire, and something lets loose in me. I jump up. I go after the first one, catch hold of his hand, and bite down, his blood tasting good in my mouth. He gets loose and I grab hold of a stick. Then I go after the other one. I run at his face, and before he can stop me, I get it into his eye. All the while I’m calling out for Nate! Nate! Nate!

Why I start yelling for him after all this time, I don’t know. Maybe something in me knows that I never get to say his name again, ’cause after they tie me up, they take my tongue.

First I get lost in the pain, then I get lost in the fever. The master comes, takes a look, and Emma say he’s not happy about what’s been done, but it’s too late to fix it. For a couple of weeks my mind don’t know where it’s at. After the fever passes, Hester and Emma get me up walking, and slow but sure, those two bring me ’round. Emma gets me to drink a mix that softens the burn, but I choke on it because I don’t know how to drink with no tongue. After I start keeping the drinks down, in the next days Emma comes at me with mashed sweet potato. She steps back when I bring it up. That night she comes with more. This time the sweet potato got molasses.

It takes a long time to work it down ’cause every swallow makes me feel like it’s going to get stuck. One night I figure out that I can die if I don’t let no food stay down, but Emma works so hard to get it in me that I wait for her to go before I bring it up again.

And that’s what I do every time Emma leaves, until one night she catches on. I lay down and make like I’s going to sleep so Emma will leave, but instead she comes over to my pallet. “Scoot over,” she says, then lays down beside me. “I gon’ stay the night.”

What’s she doing? I wonder. We lay there looking at each other. “You got to cry, girl,” she says. I look at her real long. I don’t feel like crying. I don’t feel nothing but that my babies are gone and there’s a fire in my mouth. Besides, what’s Emma doing telling me to cry? If there’s one woman on this place who don’t cry, it’s Emma. Everybody knows that.

So Emma and me just lay there looking at each other. She takes a rag to wipe my mouth. I’m still so sore that I don’t know there’s spit and maybe some blood dripping out the side. I close my eyes, hoping she will go so I can throw up the potato.

“Suk,” she say real soft, but I keep my eyes closed like I’m sleeping. “Sukey,” she say again, “you got to live, girl. They never should a done this to you. What my baby boy gonna do if you gone?” When I hear a noise like she’s choking, I open my eyes. I never hear that sound coming out of her. Then I see her whole face is wet, and I know she’s crying the best she remembers how. My arms feel like logs, but I reach over and take the rag she got and I wipe down her face. More choking sounds come from Emma until her whole body is wet and shaking like she got a bad fever, so I put my arms ’round her like she one of my babies.