horrible for days. The end of her sadness came because she willed it. She had taken a part of her heart and boxed it up for storage, sealed against damage or further wear, like a cherished bridal gown. The contents were still there, still took up space, but she would never open it again.
I miss my sister. I miss her in the summer. There aren’t any more tobacco fields, at least none I can see. Farmers can’t make a living. The same fields I worked and played in are shiny neighborhoods with twenty or more houses on what amounts to no more than a postage stamp of land. I can’t catch up with all the change. I don’t want to catch up. When August comes, hot as it ever was, I would give any- thing to be hiding from Callie, sitting in the dirt, digging my bare
feet in deep enough to find a place that’s cool and damp, eating candy as fast as I can so I won’t have any left when she finds me, hearing her rustling through rows of tall tobacco, mad as a wet hen, looking for me. I can feel my heart speeding up as she gets closer. I don’t move, don’t breathe, I keep chewing. I can’t wait to be found.
ch a p t e r f i v e
Lorraine
I
get to church early when I can. April knows I like to have some time to myself before the service starts, so she don’t make me late when she’s home from school. If you’da told me I’d have a daughter in college one day, I would have said you’d lost your mind. Where was I gon find enough money for anybody to go to college and me working as a LPN? But the good Lord provides, because she didn’t need my money or anybody else’s. She got herself a scholarship and is sittin up there on her own in Raleigh at Shaw University. Says she’s gon be a doctor. I want to tell her, “Being a doctor is a long ways off, child,” but I don’t. I don’t want her to feel like whatever it’s good to want is always gon be slightly out of reach. It don’t matter that I’m tryin to pro- tect her from being disappointed. Too many people think that way, and where in the world has it gotten them? So I want to say right here in the house of God, why not? Why not a doctor? Why not anything? If God ain’t a God of “why nots” then I say why bother? And I don’t think that’s taking His name in vain, I think it’s tellin the truth about what people need. We’re all people last
time I looked.
The choir’s in front now, behind the pulpit. I look over at April and she’s staring straight ahead. She loves a good choir. She always says the music is her favorite part of church. Mine too a lot of times, but I do like a good preacher when you can find
one. They’re harder to come by than they used to be, seems like. I didn’t notice ’til now that April and I have both got on yellow. Hers is brighter than mine. I must look like a big old sunf lower beside the first daffodil of spring.
Our God is a migh-ty God!
The choir sings the word “mighty” so short and loud it feels like something punching you in the stomach. That’s what “mighty” ought to sound like, powerful. Like it takes your breath away, which is ex- actly what I expect would happen if we could get that close to God, which we can’t. Thank God. I am in my usual place; all the regulars go to their own places. We’re in a pew on the right-hand side of the sanctuary, about halfway back. I crane my neck to both sides to look around. Everybody in here looks real good, as good as they can, and it makes me feel good to look at em. All these women in dresses and hats, some with a pair of gloves on and a nice pocketbook in their laps so ladylike. Old men sitting dignified, and little two- or three-year- old boys in coats and ties. I feel so proud I sit up straight and adjust my hat to make sure it’s on right. I’ve always believed in dressing to go to church, April can tell you. Workin at the rest home, I’ve been to too many churches and too many funerals with people wearing anything they want. My Mama taught me that when
I miss my sister. I miss her in the summer. There aren’t any more tobacco fields, at least none I can see. Farmers can’t make a living. The same fields I worked and played in are shiny neighborhoods with twenty or more houses on what amounts to no more than a postage stamp of land. I can’t catch up with all the change. I don’t want to catch up. When August comes, hot as it ever was, I would give any- thing to be hiding from Callie, sitting in the dirt, digging my bare
feet in deep enough to find a place that’s cool and damp, eating candy as fast as I can so I won’t have any left when she finds me, hearing her rustling through rows of tall tobacco, mad as a wet hen, looking for me. I can feel my heart speeding up as she gets closer. I don’t move, don’t breathe, I keep chewing. I can’t wait to be found.
ch a p t e r f i v e
Lorraine
I
get to church early when I can. April knows I like to have some time to myself before the service starts, so she don’t make me late when she’s home from school. If you’da told me I’d have a daughter in college one day, I would have said you’d lost your mind. Where was I gon find enough money for anybody to go to college and me working as a LPN? But the good Lord provides, because she didn’t need my money or anybody else’s. She got herself a scholarship and is sittin up there on her own in Raleigh at Shaw University. Says she’s gon be a doctor. I want to tell her, “Being a doctor is a long ways off, child,” but I don’t. I don’t want her to feel like whatever it’s good to want is always gon be slightly out of reach. It don’t matter that I’m tryin to pro- tect her from being disappointed. Too many people think that way, and where in the world has it gotten them? So I want to say right here in the house of God, why not? Why not a doctor? Why not anything? If God ain’t a God of “why nots” then I say why bother? And I don’t think that’s taking His name in vain, I think it’s tellin the truth about what people need. We’re all people last
time I looked.
The choir’s in front now, behind the pulpit. I look over at April and she’s staring straight ahead. She loves a good choir. She always says the music is her favorite part of church. Mine too a lot of times, but I do like a good preacher when you can find
one. They’re harder to come by than they used to be, seems like. I didn’t notice ’til now that April and I have both got on yellow. Hers is brighter than mine. I must look like a big old sunf lower beside the first daffodil of spring.
Our God is a migh-ty God!
The choir sings the word “mighty” so short and loud it feels like something punching you in the stomach. That’s what “mighty” ought to sound like, powerful. Like it takes your breath away, which is ex- actly what I expect would happen if we could get that close to God, which we can’t. Thank God. I am in my usual place; all the regulars go to their own places. We’re in a pew on the right-hand side of the sanctuary, about halfway back. I crane my neck to both sides to look around. Everybody in here looks real good, as good as they can, and it makes me feel good to look at em. All these women in dresses and hats, some with a pair of gloves on and a nice pocketbook in their laps so ladylike. Old men sitting dignified, and little two- or three-year- old boys in coats and ties. I feel so proud I sit up straight and adjust my hat to make sure it’s on right. I’ve always believed in dressing to go to church, April can tell you. Workin at the rest home, I’ve been to too many churches and too many funerals with people wearing anything they want. My Mama taught me that when
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