The Pecan Man(30)

I sent the twins to the guest bedroom and Patrice to Walter’s old room, which hadn’t been used once since his death. Blanche kept it clean and changed the sheets every couple of weeks, but I had scarcely opened the door in the past year.

I couldn’t remember exactly when or why Walter had moved out of our room and into what used to be the guest room. Something about his snoring disturbing my sleep - or my restlessness disturbing his - I can’t remember which came first. One day he moved to the extra bed in the middle of the night. Then he moved his clothes from our closet so that he wouldn’t wake me up when he got ready for work. Eventually we started calling it his room, which necessitated the decoration of my old sewing room as the new guest room.

Patrice was just happy to have a bed to fall into after her long, long day. I took blankets down to cover Grace and Blanche, turned off the tree lights, locked all the doors and returned to Patrice’s room to check on her before retiring myself. She was buried in the covers with pillows piled high under her head.

“You comfortable?” I asked, knowing the answer already.

“This is the best bed I ever slept in, Miz Beckworth. I slept at my friend’s house a couple of times, but I’ve never slept anywhere all by myself.”

“Never?”

“No’m, not ever once.”

“You don‘t have your own room now?” I asked.

“There’s only two bedrooms in our house. One’s got two twin beds and Mama just has a double.”

“Goodness, that’s not many beds for all you children! How do you manage?” I couldn't seem to help being nosy.

“Well, me and Gracie sleep in one bed and the twins in the other. Marcus used to sleep on the sofa when he was home or, every once in a while, with Mama. I guess I could sleep on the sofa if I wanted to sleep by myself, but it just doesn’t seem right somehow.”

“You miss your brother, don’t you?”

“Yes, Ma’am, I do sometimes. Long as I just pretend he’s away at boot camp I do pretty good. I can’t hardly look at a semi truck now, though. It makes me remember too much.”

“I’m sorry about that, Patrice.”

“Nothin’ for you to be sorry ‘bout, Miz Beckworth. You didn’t do nothin’ wrong.”

“Anything wrong,” I replied. I can’t for the life of me figure out why correcting her grammar seemed like the thing to do at the time.

“Yes, Ma’am,” she smiled sheepishly.

“You sleep tight now, okay?”

“I will,” Patrice murmured sleepily. “Real tight in this comfy ol’ bed.” She turned away from me then, rolling to her right side.

“I sure am sorry about what happened today,” I said gently.

She turned her head back to look at me with calm acceptance. “Oh, it’s all right, Miz Beckworth. I’m kind of used to it by now.”

Her reply stung me worse than the horror we faced in the department store, because she told the pure truth of it.





Sixteen





The next day, after Blanche and the girls had eaten breakfast and gone on home, I walked down to the Woolworth store to buy stockings and little gifts for Blanche’s girls. I had an awful lot of fun choosing perfumes and bath oils and shiny hair clips for each of them. And I bought Blanche a big box of chocolate turtles, which I knew were her favorites.

I had just finished making all my purchases and was about to head for home when I saw a rack of bicycles in the front window of the store. I somehow missed them on my way in and they were marked for clearance, it being so close to Christmas Eve.

They had ten-speeds in every color and size, and smaller bikes with banana seats and tassels hanging from the handlebars. I thought about Blanche and her girls walking everywhere and, although I couldn’t imagine Blanche heaving her ample behind onto a bicycle of any shape or size, I thought it might be good for the girls to be a bit more mobile.

I stood there contemplating the purchase of four bicycles and how much it would cost, sale or no sale. I had almost talked myself out of spending the money when a something occurred to me that stopped me in my tracks. What if Grace had ridden a bicycle to my house the day that Skipper Kornegay had stopped her in the woods?

I bought four bicycles. The largest was for Patrice, a 21 inch yellow ten-speed with curved handlebars like the racers use. Two smaller ten-speeds were perfect for the twins, just alike except that one was bright orange and the other purple. I bought a pink bike for Gracie, with a white basket in front and glittery plastic tassels hanging from the handlebars. It was the perfect size for her, big enough that she could ride without the training wheels that were attached, but small enough that they came with it. I had no idea whether any of the girls could ride the bicycles, but I sure felt better once I bought them. I arranged to have them delivered on Christmas Eve. I would put them in the garage until Christmas morning.

I stopped at the soda counter after I made my purchases. I had intended to go home to have lunch, but I thought of the hot dogs on grilled buns Walter and I used to enjoy there on Saturdays. And cherry cokes. Real cherry coke, not the store-bought canned ones you get today. I sat at the counter, feeling shaky and unladylike on the wobbly stool, but I stayed right there. I ate my hotdog with plenty of mustard and relish and I felt right proud of myself for all I’d accomplished in one morning.