I sat back on the porch with Wil ie Mae and the pan of peas. She broke the seal of each pod with her fingernail and shoved the glossy peas out with her thumb.

“She’s out there breaking his heart, huh?” Wil ie Mae said, without looking over at me.

“We are going to keep everything like it is,” I said.

Wil ie Mae shrugged. “It’s her life.”

I struggled for a while with the peas, while Wil ie Mae’s hands zipped through the task.

“She asked me who I wanted for my daddy.”

“She did?”

“I told her I wanted to keep my same daddy.”

“Gwen should know better than to put that weight on you.”

“Is she going to tel Uncle Raleigh that I didn’t want him for my daddy?”

Wil ie Mae put the pan of peas on the floor near her feet. “No, honey. Gwen would never sel you down the river like that. Whatever you want to say about her when you get grown, you can never say that she betrayed you.”

RALEIGH AND MY MOTHER had their conversation in the backyard among the laundry. The sheets provided wet curtains, sealing them in with the clean-soap sweetness and the unforgiving scent of bleach. They were standing where Wil ie Mae had taught me to hide the secret things, the clothes you didn’t want visible from the street. I asked her to hang al my things there, not just my underwear, but my shorts, T-shirts, socks, even the towels I used. She laughed but did as I asked.

Wil ie Mae and I moved ourselves to the kitchen, where the women stirred pots and wiped sweat from their faces. We kept our eyes on the screen door, but we couldn’t see anything but the sheets, stil and impassive.

“Just keep your ears open,” Wil ie Mae said. “You never know what a man wil do when you try and quit him.”

“Uncle Raleigh is not going to do nothing to my mama.”

“This is not about your uncle, honey. It’s just about being grown. Just listen for anything that doesn’t sound right.”

I listened, but al I heard was the sounds of canning. I couldn’t make out their voices. I didn’t hear the click of the camera shutter, but I know that Raleigh took pictures; I’ve seen them. Close-ups of Mother’s face, eyes cast down. There is a photo of just her feet, the slender heels of her satin pumps sinking into the Alabama dirt. There is one of the palm of her hand covering the lens. The last in the series are six or seven of his own stricken face, his arms extended to hold the camera. These he must have taken once my mother had left him out there with the laundry, running to the kitchen and Wil ie Mae’s waiting arms.

“I told him,” she said.

“What did you say?” Wil ie Mae wanted to know.

“I told him that I couldn’t do it to Dana. That she needed her real father. He started saying, ‘Do you love me, Gwen? Do you love me, Gwen?’ I told him that this wasn’t the point, that it wasn’t a game.”

“Are you okay?” Wil ie Mae said.

“Yes,” my mother said. “It could have been worse. It could have been so much worse.”

I stood at the screen door staring out at the sheets. We had hung them out early in the morning, but here is was after noon and they were stil sopping wet. Under the house, puppies whined, waiting for Wil ie Mae’s mother to set out yesterday’s table scraps. The puppies were fluffy and pretty, but I wasn’t al owed to touch them, because they hadn’t had any shots.

I pushed open the screen door.

My mother said, “What are you doing?”

“I’m just looking at the puppies,” I said. “I won’t touch them.”

“Okay,” my mother said.

I opened the door and eased outside. As the screen door slammed against the frame, I ran to the clothesline. A wet sheet hit against my face as I pushed by it. I found Uncle Raleigh standing, staring up at the sky.

“Hey, Uncle Raleigh,” I said.

He didn’t answer.

“Are you mad at me?”

“Naw, Dana,” he said. “I could never be mad at you. You are a sweet girl.”

“Do you want to take my picture?”

He shook his head. “I am tired of taking pictures for now. I’l take your picture next time.” He sat down on the earth, which was wet with the drippings from the clothes. “Dana, I’ve had a very hard life,” he said, holding his arms out. “Come sit with me for a while.”

I remembered Wil ie Mae’s uncle, who had said the same thing. I shook my head. “I’m not al owed.”

“That’s fine,” he said, and I pushed through the wet curtain of sheet. “Tel her I’l be there in a minute,” he said. “Tel her I’m getting myself together.”

THE DRIVE FROM Opelika to Atlanta is about two hours if you take 1-85 straight down. Raleigh opted to take the surface streets, saying that he wanted to see the countryside. My mother argued at first, saying that she didn’t want to be three black people in a nice car roaming around the back streets of Dixie. Raleigh said any redneck passing by wouldn’t see three black people, they would see a white man, a black woman, and a little girl.

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