Sula

“Hope I didn’t speak too soon. Kids run in and out of here so much.” Nel bent to open the icebox.

“You puttin’ it on, Nel. Jude must be wore out.”

“Jude must be wore out? You don’t care nothin’ ’bout my back, do you?”

“Is that where it’s at, in your back?”

“Hah! Jude thinks it’s everywhere.”

“He’s right, it is everywhere. Just be glad he found it, wherever it is. Remember John L.?”

“When Shirley said he got her down by the well and tried to stick it in her hip?” Nel giggled at the remembrance of that teen-time tale. “She should have been grateful. Have you seen her since you been back?”

“Mmm. Like a ox.”

“That was one dumb nigger, John L.”

“Maybe. Maybe he was just sanitary.”

“Sanitary?”

“Well. Think about it. Suppose Shirley was all splayed out in front of you? Wouldn’t you go for the hipbone instead?”

Nel lowered her head onto crossed arms while tears of laughter dripped into the warm diapers. Laughter that weakened her knees and pressed her bladder into action. Her rapid soprano and Sula’s dark sleepy chuckle made a duet that frightened the cat and made the children run in from the back yard, puzzled at first by the wild free sounds, then delighted to see their mother stumbling merrily toward the bathroom, holding on to her stomach, fairly singing through the laughter: “Aw. Aw. Lord. Sula. Stop.” And the other one, the one with the scary black thing over her eye, laughing softly and egging their mother on: “Neatness counts. You know what cleanliness is next to…”

“Hush.” Nel’s plea was clipped off by the slam of the bathroom door.

“What y’all laughing at?”

“Old time-y stuff. Long gone, old time-y stuff.”

“Tell us.”

“Tell you?” The black mark leaped.

“Uh huh. Tell us.”

“What tickles us wouldn’t tickle you.”

“Uh huh, it would.”

“Well, we was talking about some people we used to know when we was little.”

“Was my mamma little?”

“Of course.”

“What happened?”

“Well, some old boy we knew name John L. and a girl name…”

Damp-faced, Nel stepped back into the kitchen. She felt new, soft and new. It had been the longest time since she had had a rib-scraping laugh. She had forgotten how deep and down it could be. So different from the miscellaneous giggles and smiles she had learned to be content with these past few years.

“O Lord, Sula. You haven’t changed none.” She wiped her eyes. “What was all that about, anyway? All that scramblin’ we did trying to do it and not do it at the same time?”

“Beats me. Such a simple thing.”

“But we sure made a lot out of it, and the boys were dumber than we were.”

“Couldn’t nobody be dumber than I was.”

“Stop lying. All of ’em liked you best.”

“Yeah? Where are they?”

“They still here. You the one went off.”

“Didn’t I, though?”

“Tell me about it. The big city.”

“Big is all it is. A big Medallion.”

“No. I mean the life. The nightclubs, and parties…”

“I was in college, Nellie. No nightclubs on campus.”

“Campus? That what they call it? Well. You wasn’t in no college for—what—ten years now? And you didn’t write to nobody. How come you never wrote?”

“You never did either.”

“Where was I going to write to? All I knew was that you was in Nashville. I asked Miss Peace about you once or twice.”

“What did she say?”