Memphis(65)

“Sometimes even closer than that, Mr. Koplo. They’ll both be running Memphis before long,” Hazel said.

Stanley threw up his hands as if swiping at a fly. “This is a fact, I know,” and then, coy smile on his face, he said, “And I’ve got something for them.”

Hazel saw delight in Stanley’s face, a sparkle in his eye. “Oh God, now, Mr. Koplo. What did you get the children now?”

“Just some plum preserves. Throwing in a jar.” Stanley held up a finger. “Just one. Don’t look at me like that; I know Miss Miriam likes them. For all her A’s. But not that B. Tell her not that B. That won’t do.” He added the small jar covered with a red cloth to Hazel’s basket.

Hazel put her gloved hands on her hips and continued to shake her head. “I’ll send you back a plate of this fish,” she offered.

Stanley shook his head, went back to collecting her groceries. After a moment he said, “But I’ll take one of your lemon meringues.”

Hazel cut her eye. “Go ahead and throw in some lemons into my order, you crafty old man.”

The television above the door, which had been showing an orchestra rehearsing Bach, cut suddenly to a rainbow of colors, made a screech, went black, then cut to a white newscaster.

Both Hazel and Stanley turned their heads toward the TV.

It was Hazel’s turn to frown. “I could’ve sworn he comes on later?” She posed this as a question.

“Good evening. Less than a week after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination, another leading civil rights activist has been shot to death in Memphis, Tennessee.”

Hazel froze. A coldness she hadn’t felt since Myron’s murder seemed to ice her veins, paralyzing her. She heard a name she’d only whispered at midnight in her prayers.

The newscaster was still speaking, somehow. Hadn’t the world stopped? Hadn’t an Arctic abyss claimed them all? She shivered and felt her teeth rattle. “He was a stalwart in the march for equality and civil rights in this country, an apostle of nonviolence in the civil rights movement. Police have issued an all-points bulletin for a well-dressed young white man seen running from the scene. Officers also reportedly chased and fired on a radio-equipped car containing two white men.”

Stanley dropped the bag of lemons, and they scattered like tennis balls across the store’s floor. Hazel, for the life of her, could not move an inch to pick them up. She was still so cold; she didn’t figure how gravity existed anymore, how the lemons themselves hadn’t frozen midair. Her face was glued to the television.

She would not look away. How could she?

The screen was showing the face of her now-dead lover.

“The Negro leader had recently returned to Memphis to assist in the Sanitation Workers’ Strike. He was at a gas station this afternoon, filling his car up, when, according to a companion, a shot was fired from across the street. In the friend’s words, the bullet could only have come from an expert marksman. The gas station was crowded. It was three o’clock in the afternoon.

“Police responded to the scene within minutes. Medical personnel soon thereafter, but nothing could be done. The wound was fatal.

“Police said they found a high-powered hunting rifle about a block from the station, but it was not immediately identified as the murder weapon.”

Hazel cursed God then. As much as she loved the Lord, He just didn’t seem to stop taking from her. All He did, it seemed, was take and take and take from Hazel.

While the journalist spoke, Stanley placed Hazel’s basket on the counter, turned his back to the television, and spat on the floor in disgust. He let the lemons be.

No one spoke in the deli. Stanley bent down and began to retrieve the lost lemons, placed them in Hazel’s basket. But Hazel didn’t take it. She was a stone. She did not scream and curse. She did not cry. She held a gloved hand to her open mouth. She stood for some moments staring at the television. Then she exhaled one long breath. “Myron died for no reason. Not a single, goddamned reason,” she said.

Stanley was the one to wipe away tears. Used the crook of his arm. Through sobs, he was able to articulate that he’d carry these groceries all the way home for Hazel. Wouldn’t hear of anything less. “No trouble at all.”

Later, after everyone had left Hazel’s front room and kitchen, Hazel gestured for a cigarette, and Miss Dawn, raising an eyebrow, obliged her one. They stood at the entryway of Miriam and August’s bedroom and watched them sleep. Quilts covered the walls of the room. Hazel had placed Della’s Singer in one corner. The adjoining anteroom, now stacked with dolls, had once been her babies’ nursery.

Hazel took a quick intake of cigarette smoke. Fought back coughs. They came regardless. She cupped a hand to her mouth to stifle them.

Miriam stirred in her sleep. Turned over in her bed.

“Get in the kitchen before you wake the girls,” Miss Dawn whispered.

Hazel acquiesced and led the way down the hallway, still coughing slightly.

Miss Dawn took a seat on the emerald cushion of the kitchen bench. “You got any whiskey?” she asked.

It was Hazel’s turn to oblige. On tiptoe, she reached for the bourbon hidden away in a cabinet over the stove. It took Hazel some reaching, but bottle retrieved, she pulled out the stopper and poured Miss Dawn two fingers’ full. Hazel handed Miss Dawn the whiskey, saying, “To the fallen.”