He wondered sometimes whether if he washed and washed his face and hands, he would ever be white. Someone had told him once that blackness was only skin-deep. … And would he ever have a big house with electric lights in it, like his Aunt Tempy—but it was mostly white people who had such fine things, and they were mean to colored. … Some white folks were nice, though. Earl was nice at school, but not the little boys across the street, who called him “nigger” every day … and not Mrs. Rice, who scolded his mother. … Aunt Harrie didn’t like any white folks at all. … But Jesus was white and wore a long, white robe, like a woman’s, on the Sunday-school cards. … Once Jimmy Lane said: “God damn Jesus” when the teacher scolded him for not knowing his Bible lesson. He said it out loud in church, too, and the church didn’t fall down on him, as Sandy thought it might. … Grandma said it was a sin to cuss and swear, but all the fellows at school swore—and Jimboy did, too. But every time Sandy said “God damn,” he felt bad, because Aunt Hager said God was mighty good and it was wrong to take His name in vain. But he would like to learn to say “God damn” without feeling anything like most boys said it—just “God damn! … God damn! … God damn!” without being ashamed of himself. … The Lord never seemed to notice, anyhow. … And when he got big, he wanted to travel like Jimboy. He wanted to be a railroad engineer, but Harriett had said there weren’t any colored engineers on trains. … What would he be, then? Maybe a doctor; but it was more fun being an engineer and travelling far away.
Sandy wished Annjee would take him with her when she went to join Jimboy—but then Aunt Hager would be all by herself, and grandma was so nice to him he would hate to leave her alone. Who would cut wood for her then? … But when he got big, he would go to Detroit. And maybe New York, too, where his geography said they had the tallest buildings in the world, and trains that ran under the river. … He wondered if there were any colored people in New York. … How ugly African colored folks looked in the geography—with bushy heads and wild eyes! Aunt Hager said her mother was an African, but she wasn’t ugly and wild; neither was Aunt Hager; neither was little dark Willie-Mae, and they were all black like Africans. … And Reverend Braswell was as black as ink, but he knew God. … God didn’t care if people were black, did He? … What was God? Was He a man or a lamb or what? Buster’s mother said God was a light, but Aunt Hager said He was a King and had a throne and wore a crown—she intended to sit down by His side by and by. … Was Buster’s father white? Buster was white and colored both. But he didn’t look like he was colored. What made Buster not colored? … And what made girls different from boys? … Once when they were playing house, Willie-Mae told him how girls were different from boys, but they didn’t know why. Now Willie-Mae was in the seventh grade and had hard little breasts that stuck out sharp-like, and Jimmy Lane said dirty things about Willie-Mae. … Once he asked his mother what his navel was for and she said, “Layovers to catch meddlers.” What did that mean? … And how come ladies got sick and stayed in bed when they had babies? Where did babies come from, anyhow? Not from storks—a fairy-story like Santa Claus. … Did God love people who told fairy-stories and lied to kids about storks and Santa Claus? … Santa Claus was no good, anyhow! God damn Santa Claus for not bringing him the sled he wanted Christmas! It was all a lie about Santa Claus!
The sound of Hager pouring coal on the fire and dragging her washtubs across the kitchen floor to get ready for work broke in on Sandy’s drowsy half-dreams, and as he rolled over in bed, his grandmother, hearing the springs creak, called loudly: “You Sandy! Get up from there! It’s seven and past! You want to be late gettin’ to yo’ school?”
“Yes’m, I’m coming, grandma!” he said under the quilts. “But it’s cold in here.”
“You knows you don’t dress in yonder! Bring them clothes on out behind this stove, sir.”
“Yes’m.” So with a kick of the feet his covers went flying back and Sandy ran to the warmth of the little kitchen, where he dressed, washed, and ate. Then he yelled for Willie-Mae—when he felt like it—or else went on to school without her, joining some of the boys on the way.
So spring was coming and Annjee worked diligently at Mrs. Rice’s day after day. Often she did something extra for Mrs. Rice’s sister and her children—pressed a shirtwaist or ironed some stockings—and so added a few quarters or maybe even a dollar to her weekly wages, all of which she saved to help carry her to Jimboy in Detroit.
For ten years she had been cooking, washing, ironing, scrubbing—and for what? For only the few weeks in a year, or a half-year, when Jimboy would come home from some strange place and take her in his strong arms and kiss her and murmur: “Annjee, baby!” That’s what she had been working for—then the dreary months were as nothing, and the hard years faded away. But now he had been gone all winter, and, from his letter, he might not come back soon, because he said Detroit was a fine place for colored folks. … But Stanton—well, Annjee thought there must surely be better towns, where a woman wouldn’t have to work so hard to live. … And where Jimboy was.
So before the first buds opened on the apple-tree in the backyard, Annjee had gone
