with a brush of his mustache, once again neatly groomed, across my cheek and a reminder to “find something pretty for yourself.”
Perhaps I had dreamed the skirt and blouse, an omen of Elikah’s sudden generosity. A store-bought dress. Something I had never owned until that very night. And something I certainly had never considered walking into a store and buying. A dress cut out and made up in a shop.
I sat at the table and finished my coffee, knowing that the first order of business was to take the skirt and blouse back to JoHanna’s. What had the doctor in Mobile said about Duncan? I could ask that and hope that Will was not at home when I returned the package. The thought of looking at him as I handed back his gift was too terrifying.
I was struck so numb by my next thought that I almost dropped the coffee cup. What if JoHanna didn’t know Will had left that gift for me? Surely that was impossible. But what if he was gone and I went there, gift in hand, only to open the door on a situation that looked bad, for both Will and myself?
A mockingbird fluttered into the chinaberry tree by the kitchen window. It watched me with sharp black eyes, head shifting from side to side, as if assessing the purity of my thoughts. I did not want to give up the skirt and blouse; had I found an excuse to keep it?
I put water on the stove to heat and dragged out the bathtub and dumped the cold water from the night before into the yard. The cool water last night had washed away the heat, but I wanted to soak in hot water. Once clean, I pulled the box out from under the bed and slipped into the blouse. The skirt drifted over my head like a mossy green wave. I buttoned it around my waist and knew I would not give it back. I could not make myself, no matter the cost.
Four
“Y OU’RE as flushed as a new bride, but then you are right new at it.” Olivia McAdams pulled a pale yellow dress from the rack where it hung. “It’s a day dress. Cool. Folks around here need to make some concessions to the heat.” She looked at the gray flannel I was wearing with a sympathetic eye.
She wore a white blouse and dark skirt with dark shoes, a look some of the magazines advertised as “business girl.” She also wore lipstick and dark stockings.
“Elikah said green.” I spoke before I thought, so I had to finish it. “And I have to be able to bring it back if it doesn’t suit him.”
Olivia laughed out loud. “Well, he’s paying for it, I guess. Look around and I’ll see what we have right here in the sale rack. Maybe get you a good price so there’s something left over for some shoes.” She pointedly did not look down at my feet but turned her attention to some dresses hanging far against the wall.
Gordon’s Dry Goods was a big wooden building divided roughly in half. On the west side were hardware and staples, overalls and long johns, candy and guns, dressmaker patterns, bolts of material and ribbons. There was always the smell of metal and the acrid bite of new lumber, the fatty pine resin still weeping on some of the boards that were dry-stored in the back. Men sweaty from the fields came in to buy a piece of harness or oil for a tool. They lingered as they did at the barbershop, not for long, but enough to pass the time and glean a tip about who was buying what. Or if the women came in, they bought their clothespins and bluen for their laundry and discovered that Mrs. Johnson had a new recipe for seven-egg pound cake that required one of the “just arrived from Mobile or New Orleans” heavier baking pans.
Ready-made clothes were sold out of a separate register on the east side of the building. Here, light filtered in through a big glass window where displays had been set up to show off the smartest clothes. No wall divided the store, but there were two separate doors so that a customer could signal his or her intent upon entering, as if the whiff of perfumed powder or aftershave wasn’t enough to mark the difference of
Perhaps I had dreamed the skirt and blouse, an omen of Elikah’s sudden generosity. A store-bought dress. Something I had never owned until that very night. And something I certainly had never considered walking into a store and buying. A dress cut out and made up in a shop.
I sat at the table and finished my coffee, knowing that the first order of business was to take the skirt and blouse back to JoHanna’s. What had the doctor in Mobile said about Duncan? I could ask that and hope that Will was not at home when I returned the package. The thought of looking at him as I handed back his gift was too terrifying.
I was struck so numb by my next thought that I almost dropped the coffee cup. What if JoHanna didn’t know Will had left that gift for me? Surely that was impossible. But what if he was gone and I went there, gift in hand, only to open the door on a situation that looked bad, for both Will and myself?
A mockingbird fluttered into the chinaberry tree by the kitchen window. It watched me with sharp black eyes, head shifting from side to side, as if assessing the purity of my thoughts. I did not want to give up the skirt and blouse; had I found an excuse to keep it?
I put water on the stove to heat and dragged out the bathtub and dumped the cold water from the night before into the yard. The cool water last night had washed away the heat, but I wanted to soak in hot water. Once clean, I pulled the box out from under the bed and slipped into the blouse. The skirt drifted over my head like a mossy green wave. I buttoned it around my waist and knew I would not give it back. I could not make myself, no matter the cost.
Four
“Y OU’RE as flushed as a new bride, but then you are right new at it.” Olivia McAdams pulled a pale yellow dress from the rack where it hung. “It’s a day dress. Cool. Folks around here need to make some concessions to the heat.” She looked at the gray flannel I was wearing with a sympathetic eye.
She wore a white blouse and dark skirt with dark shoes, a look some of the magazines advertised as “business girl.” She also wore lipstick and dark stockings.
“Elikah said green.” I spoke before I thought, so I had to finish it. “And I have to be able to bring it back if it doesn’t suit him.”
Olivia laughed out loud. “Well, he’s paying for it, I guess. Look around and I’ll see what we have right here in the sale rack. Maybe get you a good price so there’s something left over for some shoes.” She pointedly did not look down at my feet but turned her attention to some dresses hanging far against the wall.
Gordon’s Dry Goods was a big wooden building divided roughly in half. On the west side were hardware and staples, overalls and long johns, candy and guns, dressmaker patterns, bolts of material and ribbons. There was always the smell of metal and the acrid bite of new lumber, the fatty pine resin still weeping on some of the boards that were dry-stored in the back. Men sweaty from the fields came in to buy a piece of harness or oil for a tool. They lingered as they did at the barbershop, not for long, but enough to pass the time and glean a tip about who was buying what. Or if the women came in, they bought their clothespins and bluen for their laundry and discovered that Mrs. Johnson had a new recipe for seven-egg pound cake that required one of the “just arrived from Mobile or New Orleans” heavier baking pans.
Ready-made clothes were sold out of a separate register on the east side of the building. Here, light filtered in through a big glass window where displays had been set up to show off the smartest clothes. No wall divided the store, but there were two separate doors so that a customer could signal his or her intent upon entering, as if the whiff of perfumed powder or aftershave wasn’t enough to mark the difference of
Similar Books
