SEVEN
By: Debbi K. and Nancy W.
Nathan watched as JD set up the piñata so that Billy would get a good, solid whack at it. He supposed it was some unwritten rule that the guest of honor should get to be the one to break it. That was part of the fun.
His childhood as a slave hadn't left him with a lot of happy memories. The year he was seven – Billy's age – had been one of the worst of his life. He had been sold to a plantation in Alabama, along with his father and his three sisters. And every night he had prayed that somehow, some way, Mama would get too, so she could be with them. He had missed her so much, even though now, he couldn't picture her face in his mind, no matter how hard he tried. He remembered how soft her touch was, even though her hands were calloused and rough from slave's work. But was she pretty? Homely? Thin? Plump? He couldn't remember. It would seem that his fading memories would have made the pain of losing her easier as time went on. But somehow the fact that he was left with nothing of her. . . no picture, no lock of hair, not even the memory of her face. . . had left an ache in his heart that had never gone away.
He watched the Potter children, whose father had been murdered in cold whose father had just two years before. No doubt they still grieved for his loss, but like Billy, who had seen his own father gunned down before his eyes, they had already learned to laugh and smile again. Billy was proof of what a remarkably resilient being a 7-year-old could be. So as bad as that year had been for him, Nathan also recalled it as a time of wonder and great discoveries which gave the promise of hope even to a little slave boy...
"W"
It was one of those hot July days when even the bugs stayed in the shade. The only folks out and about were them that were too danged dumb to keep out of the heat, like Master Jackson, and those who had no choice, like Nathan and his father who had accompanied the old man on his weekly trip into Wetumpka. It was a long stretch of dusty road between the plantation and the town, but Nathan knew they were near their destination when they past the black-and-white sign that his daddy had told him said "Wetumpka."
His daddy didn't know how to read, so Nathan figured he was only guessing what the sign said. But, it had a word on it, the town was Wetumpka, so it was a good guess.
They pulled the wagon up to Wildon's Mercantile. Nathan's daddy would load up the supplies while Master Jackson talked with the owner of the store. Nathan was expected to stand nearby to run whatever errands Master Jackson wanted done.
"Come on up to the porch and set a spell," old man Wildon told Master Jackson. "Sure is a hot one."
Master Jackson agreed, taking off his hat and mopping his brow as he shoved Nathan aside to get to the shady porch.
"Fetch me a cool drink, boy," he said to Nathan.
Nathan's body, conditioned by a deftly applied switch, responded before his brain did. He was already moving to do Master Jackson's bidding before he knew where he was going. This made the Master and old man Wildon both laugh at the sudden look of confusion on the boy's face.
Old man Wildon pointed to a rickety bench just inside the door. "Water barrel's right there, boy, and mind you don't knock nuthin' over."
Nathan moved quickly, but was again thwarted by the sight of not one, but two barrels. He could hear the white men snickering. He couldn't read the words painted on the barrels, so didn't know which was which.
He had two choices. He could go back and ask old man Wildon which barrel had water, or, he could sample the contents, which might get him beat. As he was thinking it over, he heard Master Jackson say, "Now, Wil, ya know my niggers don't know whiskey from water from piss. Ya gotta show 'em everything."
Wildon laughed. "C'mere boy," he said.
His face burning with shame, Nathan complied.
"Now, one o' them barrels is water. The other one is whiskey. How 'bout you take a big taste o' the one you think is water."
Nathan was baffled. "But, massah, I don't know which one."
Wildon smiled genially. "I'll tell you what. . . you pick one. But whichever you pick, you gotta drink a big ol' swallow o' whatever's in it."
Nathan didn't like this stupid white man's game. He knew he was being made the fool. But he pointed with confidence at one of the barrels. "That one."
Wildon didn't offer him a tin, but had him cup his hands under the spigot.
Even before it touched his lips, Nathan knew it was whiskey and not water by its familiar odor. It didn't smell bad, but when he gulped it down, he immediately felt an unpleasant burning in his nose and throat. He wanted to spit it out, but he knew that was what Wildon wanted him to do.
His eyes watered while Wildon and Master Jackson laughed. Nathan looked to his father, who wasn't laughing, but knew he couldn't do anything. Wordlessly, he fetched the tin beside the barrels and filled it from the one he hadn't drank from. . . wishing it was piss instead of water.
And as the murkish liquid filled the tin cup, Nathan noticed something. The first letter in the words were the same. That they both had the same pointy letter that looked like two arrowheads pointing down. "'Whiskey' . . . 'water' . . . ." And he remembered he'd seen that same pointy letter somewhere else. . . the sign that said, "Wetumpka."
Whiskey . . . water . . .. Wetumpka. . . .
His eyes moved to the sign on the store window. "Wildon's" was the name of the store.
Yep. There it was. That same soft whistly sound, and that same pointy letter.
"BOY! Watch what you're doing!!"
Nathan jumped as the water overflowed the tin. He almost dropped it.
"Sorry, massah Wildon," he said humbly, then handed the tin to Master Jackson, who shoved him aside.
"Go set yerself somewhere out of the way," Master Jackson told him. "And mind you don't make any trouble."
Nathan sat down in a corner of the porch. Whiskey, water, Wetumpka, Wildon. . . . he found a rusted nail and an old wooden shingle. Then, trying not to attract attention, began to copy the markings on the barrels and the store window. Whiskey. Water. Wildon's Mercantile . . . Wat-ER . . . mER-can-tile. E-R . . . 'er'. . . and there was that "t" sound in both mercantile and water. His eyes looked to see what letters those words had in common. T? The one that looked like the Cross of Jesus? "Wetumpka" had that sound in it, too. He'd have to look at the sign on the way out of town to see if it had a cross in it too. He was sure it did.
His heart was racing with excitement. He wanted to jump up and shout his discovery.
But he knew the white folk wouldn't like it, and his daddy wouldn't like it what the white folk didn't like.
So he kept silent that July afternoon, keeping his smile to himself as they rode out of town. He used his nail and shingle to copy down each letter on the familiar Wetumpka sign.
The cross was there, just like he thought it would be . . . and there was "w-A-ter", and "Wetumpk-A-". Another pointy letter with a bar in it. Ahh. . . .
All the letters made their own sound. They made their own sound!!! That is how you knew how to say what was written down!
Nathan smiled, but decided that for now, he would keep his wonderful secret to himself.
The piñata exploded as Billy gave it a good, solid crack with his stick, scattering candy and gumdrops that were scooped up by eager little hands. Buck Wilmington wasn't watching the children grab the treats, though. He was looking across the dusty street, at a dirty little girl in an equally dirty dress. She was watching the festivities with big, sad eyes, but not daring to come any closer.
Buck had seen her around, but didn't know who she was. She looked about Billy's age, but one look at her was enough to know why she hadn't been invited to the party. Mary was careful who Billy played with, and it was clear the little girl did not come from the type of people Mary wanted Billy to know. . . .
WORKING GIRL
"My mommy said you're a 'bastard'," Geneva Noles was telling him.
Buck didn't know what that word meant. "So?"
"So, it means you're dirty."
"I am not!" While it was true that he didn't much like taking a bath, his ma made him do it anyway. She had just about scrubbed his face off before sending him to Benji Cutler's birthday party. "What do you know, anyway?" He moved passed her and went to join the other children who were starting a game of pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. Buck loved that game.
He set the present he'd brought for Benji on the table beside the cake. It was a big blue and white marble . . . a shooter. It had cost him 2 whole cents.
As he gave the cake a hungry glance, he noticed Benji's ma talking to someone other mas. One of them was Daisy Beckman's mama. Daisy's family was the richest one in town because her pa owned all the money in the bank. Everyone knew that, even though Daisy never said nothing about it. One of the mothers pointed at him. Buck smiled at Benji's ma, but he didn't like the way some of the women were looking at him. He knew something bad was going to happen from the look on her face when Benji's ma started walking towards him.
"Howdy, Mrs. Cutler," he said anyway.
She bent down and put her hands on her knees. "Honey, I'm sorry, but there was a mistake. This party is only for invited guests."
Buck frowned. "But I'm in Benji's class at school. Mrs. Gordon said the whole class was invited." He quickly scanned the guests. Yep, just about Mrs. Gordon's whole class was there.
"Well, you are just a little old for some of these children."
"But, I'm seven, just like Benji," Buck explained, and then pulled himself up to his full height. He was the biggest boy in his class. "I'm just tall fer my age," he said proudly.
Mrs. Cutler sighed. "Buck... try to understand, son. Some of the parents think it would be better if you didn't play with their children."
"Huh? Why?"
"Because you're a bastard," Geneva Noles piped up. She sure seemed to like saying that word. "And because your ma is a whore."
"GENEVA!" Mrs. Cutler snapped. "You mind your tongue or I'll tell your mother to take some soap to that mouth of yours!"
Now, Buck thought she was mad at Geneva, but she turned to him and said "Go home, Buck. You don't belong here."
Buck was about to protest the fact that Geneva was not being asked to leave, but Mrs. Cutler grabbed him by the shoulders, turned him around, and shoved him. Not hard enough to make him fall or anything, but enough so that he got the message.
Buck didn't know what he had done wrong, and he suddenly felt like he had sand in his eyes or something. He wanted to just run on home, but instead he turned back to Mrs. Cutler. "But what did I do wrong?" he asked, and couldn't keep his bottom lip from shaking.
"Ask your mother to explain it to you, son," Mrs. Cutler said.
Buck just stood there while, one by one, children were moved away from him like he had cootie bugs crawling on him or something. They didn't even look at him, except for Daisy's ma, and he couldn't tell what she was thinking. She was a pretty lady, with nice eyes that didn't look mad at him.
Angrily, he grabbed the gift he'd brought and then raced down the street to the big red building near the outskirts of town. He had to run all the way around it. Clara Jean, who was the boss of everyone, had told him never, ever to come in the front door. He'd done it once, and she'd taken a switch to his bottom.
He went in through the kitchen door and took a seat at the table. He was supposed to wait there until Clara Jean told him it was okay to go talk to his ma. He felt hot tears running down his face, and luckily, he didn't have to wait long.
Orlie, the cook, went and told his ma he was there. She came in and scooped him up in her arms like she always did when he was sad or sick or tired. She sat him on her lap, even though he was getting so big that his feet almost touched the floor when she did that.
He told her what had happened. "What's a bastard?" he asked her, sniffling.
She hugged him tighter but didn't answer him.
"Geneva Noles said you was a . . . a . . . I don't remember the word."
She ran her fingers through his hair. "Bucky, you are going to hear a lot of people call your mama a lot of names. Some of them won't be so nice, but it don't hurt me none to be called those things, so I don't want it to bother you, either, you hear me? When someone says 'your mama is this', or 'your mama is that', you hold your head up. You look 'em in the eye, and you say 'Yes, she is.'"
"But ma . . . ."
"No buts, Bucky. . . think about it. They are saying those things to make you angry . . . to make you fight. If you don't do either, well, it kinda takes all the fun out of it for 'em."
They sat quietly for awhile, as she held him, rocking him gently. Buck loved that, and he didn't care if he was getting too big for it. But after a few minutes he had to ask, "Ma . . . do they call you those names because you . . . work?"
He didn't know what his ma's work was about, but, he did know that nobody else's ma was a 'working girl' so maybe that wasn't a good thing to be.
"I 'spose they do, Bucky."
"Lord'a' mercy . . . would you look at this!" Orlie interrupted from the other side of the kitchen. "C'mere Francie, you gotta see this," she said.
Buck and his ma looked at each other and decided they should go see what Orlie was gawking at. Together, they peeked into the parlor where they could see someone standing at the front door.
"That's Daisy Beckman's ma!" Buck said when he recognized the woman.
"What do you suppose she wants?" Buck's ma asked.
"Probably looking for her man," Orlie laughed.
"You hush, Orlie! You're talkin' about decent folk. Her husband ain't never set foot in this place and you know it!"
"Well, what's she want then?"
Clara Jean was walking towards them, with that big scowl on her face she always had. Buck thought if Clara Jean ever smiled, her face would crack.
"She wants to see the boy," Clara Jean told Buck's ma, and pointed at him.
Francie pulled him close. "Why?"
"Ask her yerself, doll. I ain't got the time for nonsense."
Buck's mother walked with him to the door. Mrs. Beckman extended her hand. "Mrs. . . . Wilmington?" she said.
Buck hadn't ever heard his ma called that, and he figured it must be wrong because his ma said, "It's just Francie, ma'am," as she took Mrs. Beckman's hand.
"My daughter and I would like to invite Master Buck over for afternoon tea."
"I don't like tea," Buck said, and was quickly corrected by a stern nudge from his mother.
Mrs. Beckman just laughed. "How about lemonade and cookies then?" she asked him.
"Mrs. Beckman. . . ," his ma began. "Are you sure. . . I mean, people will talk. . ."
"Miss Francie, my husband, as you know, owns more than half of this town. I assure you that whatever anyone might have to say will be of little consequence."
"I got a big swing and a hobby horse!" a little voice piped up. It was Daisy. "You can play with them if you want."
"What about Benji's birthday party?" Buck asked.
"I don't like Benji. His hair smells like bacon," Daisy made a face.
Buck was glad his ma liked to put rose water in his hair, even if it did smell kind of sissy. "Can I go, ma?" he asked.
His ma looked down at him and stroked his hair, but she spoke to Mrs. Beckman, "Thank you," she said.
Mrs. Beckman smiled and nodded. Later, Buck's mom would tell him she was a true lady. It would be years before he understood what that meant, but eventually, he knew.
He was shaken from his reverie when he noticed Mrs. Travis had crossed the street. He held his breath as she approached the ragged little girl with the sad eyes. Only letting it out when he saw the elegant and graceful woman reach out and take a grubby little hand in her own, leading the child to the others.
Yup. A true lady.
