The Dry Grass of August(10)

I broke my silence. “Why are your feet so big?”

“To keep me from falling over.”

It pleased me that an adult took me seriously.

Once, when I asked her what she thought of me when we met all those years ago, she said, “Seem to me you were struggling to give up being the youngest.”

I touched her arm and she turned to me. “Hm?”

“Do you remember the little house in the woods off Selwyn Avenue, where we lived when we first moved back to Charlotte?”

“I remember.”

“That’s where you started working for us. I was five.”

“Uh-huh. You had a head full of blonde curls. Always following me around.”





As we drove through Pensacola I tried to take in everything about the town where we’d be spending the next week. We whizzed by a sandwich-board sign with a shimmering, come-hither eye in the middle of it. The only words I caught were “Three-Legged Girl.”

“Ye gods,” I said, “did y’all see that sign?”

“Watch your tongue, young lady,” Mama said. “We’re almost to Taylor’s.”

We were passing an amusement park, Joyland by the Sea. A Ferris wheel turned in the afternoon sun, and lively music filled the air. “Oh, Mama, look. We’ve got to go while we’re here. It’s fabulous.”

“They are always fabulous from the car.”





Stell Ann read directions from a map Uncle Taylor had sent. “Take ninety-eight over Pensacola Bay and Santa Rosa Sound.”

We rode in silence across the water. It only took a few minutes, but I looked out on the wide expanse of sparkling blue, no land in sight, and pretended our car was a ship, skimming the waves. I glanced at Mary. Her eyes were large in her solemn face.

At Uncle Taylor’s, Mama set the brakes and said, “Three thirty! We made good time. Grab something to carry, and be sure . . .” We scrambled from the car and ran up the front walk. Only Mama knew what she wanted us to be sure of.

Nobody answered the bell, and Mama went right on in. There was a note on the table in the shadowed foyer:



Pauly, we’re at the beach. Ring the brass bell on the back porch so we’ll know you’re here.

Welcome!!!

Taylor





The Welcome was scrawled across the note. Beneath it, Uncle Taylor had signed his name in neat script. Puddin ran through the house to the back porch and rang the bell, which sounded like ships’ bells I’d heard in movies. “We’re here!” she yelled. “We’re here!”

I went back out for the luggage. A strong wind lifted my hair, smelling of salt and sun and far-off places across all that sparkling water, so much bluer than the Atlantic, the only other ocean I’d ever seen. Ocean? No, not an ocean, I remembered from my geography lessons. The Gulf of Mexico.

I brought in Mary’s cloth carryall, Mama’s vanity case, and the paper bags of stuff that wouldn’t fit into our suitcases, piling everything in the front hall until Uncle Taylor could tell us where we’d be sleeping.

Was his house always so neat, or had he straightened up because we were coming? No toys, no books on the coffee table or newspapers on the sofa, none of what Mama called clutter. How would it feel to live in such a neat house?

Mama cleared her throat. “Mary, please get me a glass of water. I’m parched.”

Mary looked uncertain where to go, but she went.

In the living room, I sat in a sloping green chair with no arms, low and comfortable. The room was filled with angles and circles, blond wood and pastels. Had Aunt Lily decorated it from a picture from House Beautiful? A beige sofa with a curved back was more inviting to lie on than Mama’s burgundy velvet Sheraton. The end tables with slanted legs looked like robots, and a chrome floor lamp near Mama seemed to make her jittery. She walked back and forth with Davie on her hip, the vertical blinds moving in her wake.

I thought of our living room, the baby grand, the oriental rug and brocade drapes, the queen chair by the mantel.

Stell said, “This is a delightful home.” She’d been talking that way ever since she got saved.

Mama shifted Davie from one hip to the other. “You girls are going to have to mind your p’s and q’s. Taylor keeps things shipshape.”

Mary came back to the living room and handed Mama a glass of water. Mama took a long sip and wrinkled her nose. “Beach water, such a horrid taste. I’ll drink tea the whole time I’m here.”

Puddin ran into the living room. “Uncle Taylor and Sarah are coming up from the beach. That bell works great.”

Mama handed Davie to Stell and pushed at her hair, smoothed her skirt. “I’m going to fix my face.”

I hadn’t noticed Mary going out, but I saw her through the blinds, walking in the front yard. “I’ll get Mary.”

She was standing by the walk.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Looking at Florida. A strange place, seem to me. Almost no trees, just scrubby things bended down by the wind. And them,” she said, pointing at the palm trees that lined the street, “looks like somebody took good trees and gave ’em a shave.”

“Those’re palm trees. You remember Palm Sunday, in the Bible?”

“Course I do. Hosanna and praise Jesus. The hour has come to sing His—” She stopped. “You mean like the palm branches they waved at Jesus?”