“It’s not good for you to stay here.” Aunt Linda had brushed back the hair that fell into her face. Her cheeks were colored bright pink. It’s hard to stand up to Momma, but she had. Yes, she had.
And Momma had said, “This is my place. Don’t you forget it. You hear me, Linda?” The words squeezed between her teeth. Shot into the air. Hit their target.
Momma had drawn the guns that day.
The thought of that fight still made me ache. And it was more than a year ago.
“Don’t go there,” I said, and started working on breakfast.
I had pancakes and eggs frying when Momma came down the stairs dressed for her first day of work. The window over the sink was cracked open an inch, and a morning breeze came in at us, freshening the room some, pushing pancake smell around. Momma’s steps were slow and quiet—almost like a ghost. Outside green tree frogs called for rain.
“Close the window, Lacey.” Momma flung her hand in a get-away gesture, like the motion could shut out the air, close the window itself. “You know they can’t be opened. Not a good thing. Too much comes in through openings like that.”
“Right,” I said, and pushed the glass shut.
“New day for both of us,” Momma said. “How do I look?” She turned in a little circle to model her Winn-Dixie apron. Her almost-black hair was swept up in a loose ponytail. I could see she was clean. Good, good.
“Whoo-eee!” I said. “Momma, there won’t be a prettier checker in all the Winn-Dixies in the whole wide world.”
She gazed at me, big-eyed. Her voice got all soft. “You mean it?”
“I do.”
She was quiet a moment, leaning onto the counter. Thinking right over the top of my head. “Your granddaddy? I bet he’d be proud of me this morning. Yes, Daddy would be proud.” She straightened tall, then glanced over her shoulder, toward the stairs that entered the kitchen. “Wouldn’t you, Daddy?”
There was no answer.
“Absolutely he would,” I said, throwing a quick look in the same direction. “Starting a new job and all.” Outside, the sun fell through the trees and lit up the yard in splotches. I could see the bushes move with the wind. A squirrel sat at attention waiting for something.
Momma didn’t say anything about my new job, just let out a sigh. A little grin came to her face. “I’ll wait in the dining room,” she said after a minute.
“And I’ll serve you like you are a queen.”
She cocked her head like a bird. “Your granddaddy used to say that to me and Linda all the time. All the time when we were girls just your age. Just ten and twelve. Called us his queens.”
“Really?” Her words kinda gelled up my guts some. Had Granddaddy told me what to say in my sleep? Whispered it from the past? From out of the closet? She’s a queen. My queen. Had he said that?
I shook myself free of the cold sensation. We had to get moving. I had to. “Now I’m saying it.” My voice sounded thin. “I’ll have breakfast to you in a minute and then we can go and wait for the bus.”
Momma nodded and stepped light-footed into the dining room.
I let my breath out in a slow puff. Real careful I opened the window a little just so I could hear the call of the frogs. I moved the curtain some so it hid what I had done. Then I went back to cooking.
In a few minutes I took Momma’s breakfast to her and set it on the dark wooden table. The room had a closed feeling—tight and hot. But the food made the air smell yummy.
“Mmm,” Momma said. She looked up from the paper that spread in front of her.
“How’d you get that newspaper?” I asked. I set her plate down.
“Granddaddy gave it to me.”
I peered around the room. “You didn’t talk to him, did you?”
That’s the last thing I needed. My grandfather poking his head in here at this time of day. Especially seeing the plans Momma and me had. He sure could mess things up. Sure could. He sure had.
Momma shook her head and with her fork picked at the pancakes. Her hands, I noticed, shook. I poured the maple syrup for her, watching the pat of butter that sat in the middle of the pancake flatten out and follow the syrup down onto the blue plate.
“Eat a lot,” I said. “You wanna make sure you got enough energy to make it through the day. And eat those eggs. You need the protein.”
The Gainesville Times covered half the table. I knew without looking that my mother had been reading the section that talks about catastrophes near and far. She seemed all right, though. Not too jumpy. Not ready to head back to bed. Just a little worry rimming her eyes. Shaking in her hands.
Please.
I settled into the chair next to her and started in on my food.
“Are you going to be fine without me?” she asked after a moment.
I looked up into her wide eyes. All of us, Momma and me and Aunt Linda and even Granddaddy have the same color eyes—dark like a troubled sky. Momma leaned toward me and smoothed my face with her hand. “You going to be able to do it?” Her hand was silky and cool. Gentle on my face. Tender.
I held still and let her pet me. I imagined her like somebody’s momma from school. She’s like any other person, I thought, though I knew it wasn’t true at all.
“Will you be fine?” she asked again. She moved away, settling her hands on the table, like a bird resting.
“Yeah,”
