Whistling Past the Graveyard Read online

Well, the look in his eyes when he’d pushed me under told me he did mean it. But I was too scared of starting trouble again to say that out loud with Wallace so close.

  He put a wide board across the window and started nailing it in place. Every hammer blow was a fresh stab of hopelessness.

  Eula held me by the shoulders and pulled me so I was sitting on the floor between her legs with my back against her chest. I was too weak to fight it. She wrapped an arm around me and rocked side to side as she spoke soft against my ear, “He stop hisself.”

  I remembered the hand suddenly gone. I remembered Eula still trying to climb up out of the swamp.

  I wanted to ask, Why? Why did he stop? But the words jammed up in my throat.

  Then I remembered Eula coming up out of the truck bed when Wallace grabbed me up off the road. “Why was you in the back of the truck?” I whispered.

  “Wallace goin’ without me. I jump in when he turnin’ the truck around.”

  I wondered if she’d cut her cheek and lip then, or if Wallace had opened them up for her before he got in the truck.

  “I always keep you safe,” she said as she brushed my hair back.

  Eula was crazy if she thought she stood a chance if Wallace got it in his head to kill me again.

  Another board thumped up on the window. The room was getting darker fast. And the rest of the world farther away. I was gonna spend the rest of my life locked up in this breathless room. No one would ever know what happened to me. I’d grow up. I’d never get a record player. I’d never get to work as a curb girl at the drive-in.

  When I opened my eyes, I kept them on a gouge in the linoleum, the only thing that didn’t have power over me.

  Someday Wallace had to get old and die. By then would I be too old and crazy to ever live anywhere else but this hid-away house? Would I be like old Chester Potts out near the dump, crazy as a loony bird, shoutin’ and swearin’ at everyone who went by his house? Mamie said he was crazy ’cause he’d been born to strange folk and had lived locked away from people his whole life.

  “It over,”Eula whispered.“He understand now. It ain’t Wallace’s nature to—” She snapped her mouth shut, but I knew what she was going to say: kill, not in his nature to kill, murder. “We be a family.”

  “We’re not family.” My voice sounded so weak and broken that it made me mad. I decided I wasn’t gonna talk anymore.

  The last board went up on the window, washing us in dimness. The light we did have came in dull, flat slivers and got ate up before it reached deep in the room. Not only would I be crazy by the time Wallace died, I’d be blind like a mole in sunlight, too.

  “Sometimes Wallace, he get lost,” she said against my hair. “But he always find his way back.”

  Again I felt the palm of his hand pressing on my head, then suddenly letting go. What if he hadn’t found his way back just then?

  Didn’t matter. Sooner or later I probably was gonna die here.

  I pulled myself away from her and grabbed my quilt. I crawled to my pallet and curled into the smallest ball I could. Pulling the quilt over my head, I sank into a dark place where no one could touch me.

  I don’t know how long I laid there wrapped up in that quilt, hanging somewhere between sleep and feelin’ sorry for myself. Truth be told, I didn’t have a lot of experience with feelin’ sorry for myself—not like being hoppin’ mad, or feeling like I’d come out of my skin if I didn’t try something. Those were plenty familiar. Feelin’ sorry was a place for babies and wienies. I wished I could just go to sleep for a long time, but sleep wouldn’t settle in.

  Back home when I was too worked up at Mamie to get to sleep, I reached deep into my memories and pulled out one that made me feel happy. It was so old that it was worn down to sounds and feelings and not a real picture in my head. We—Momma, Daddy, and me—lived in our own apartment in the upstairs of a nice old lady’s house. She gave piano lessons. I remember hearing the beautiful mystery of her music coming up thorough the floor. . . . I also remember the plinkyplonky sounds of her students. Daddy helped her by cutting the grass and whatnot so we could afford to live there (I don’t remember that part, but Mamie tells me about it when she’s mad at Momma for being lazy and irresponsible). Momma and Daddy had tucked me into bed, both of them together. My room smelled like baby powder and Momma’s hair. Mr. Wiggles was soft against my cheek, held tight in the crook of my arm. Momma and Daddy were talking real soft in the other room, Daddy’s voice low and kind of rumbly, Momma’s light and happy. Momma laughed . . . not in a big ha-ha way, but quiet like water tripping over itself in a creek. Those sounds wound themselves together and wrapped me up, just like a blanket. My insides got all quiet, which didn’t happen often ’cause my insides was always busy. I floated on the cloud of their voices. It was the best falling asleep ever.

  I ran that memory over and over in my head, but it didn’t do any good.

  Later, when Baby James woke up crying, Eula came and took him out. She didn’t bring him back. I was too broke down to worry about him. A dark, wet blanket had covered my mind.

  Eula brought me food. I couldn’t even look at it. I pinched my nose and breathed through my mouth so I couldn’t smell it. She asked me how I was feeling and I ignored her. She sighed, patted my shoulder, and went away again.

  Sleep stayed away, but the mind darkness came back.

  At some point Wallace raised his voice so I heard it clear. “Gimme ’nother jar of that catdaddy.”

  Eula’s soft footfalls were followed by the sound of the jar hitting the table. I kept my ears perked, since Eula said the juice made Wallace to forget hisself. I smelled baking again. Eula hadn’t left, so I wondered how much pie two people—even if one of them was a giant—could eat.

  Sometime later I heard him grouching around and Eula helping him to bed. The springs squeaked. Two shoes hit the floor. Once I heard him start snorin’ good, I finally relaxed.

  Crickets chirped and a hoot owl called from the trees. Eula tiptoed into the room and put baby James in the cradle.

  After she tucked him in, her footsteps stopped right beside me. I pretended I was asleep, eyes tight and breathing slow.

  Just go away.

  She got down on her knees and stayed there a long while. When I heard her whispered “Amen,” I knew she was praying over me. Then her hand settled soft as a butterfly on my head. She let it stay there gentle and kind as she pulled the quilt away from my shoulders—I was hot under there, but pretended to sleep on.

  “Oh, baby girl,” she sighed. “I will keep you safe. No matter what.”

  Her lips brushed my hair and then she stood up.

  I’d never been tucked in so tender. A tear rolled across the bridge of my nose, but I was careful not to sniffle.

  I waited to hear the door open, but it didn’t. Instead I heard her rustling, then sigh. When I sneaked a peek through tiny eye slits, I saw she was over by baby James’s cradle, laying on her back with her arm over her eyes. She was so skinny she was barely a shadowy bump on the floor, except for that sharp elbow stickin’ up.

  As I listened to her breathing even out and slow, sleep finally come over me.

  I felt him there right before I smelled his sour, juiced-up breath; right before the big hand closed around my throat. I tried to kick, but he’d straddled me, his weight settled on my stomach and his feet hooked around my ankles holding them to the floor.

  Pain stabbed my throat. Air wouldn’t come.

  Eula!

  My voice stayed silent.

  I tried to buck, bow my back, but I was pinned.

  A thudding swish filled my ears.

  Help me, Eula! You promised.

  My eyeballs felt ready to pop.

  Promised. Promised. Prom—

  A scream shot through the air, wordless, shrill and terrified. Eula!

  Wallace suddenly rocked to the side, his grip loosening enough that

  I jerked in a breath before he tightened it again. There was a crash. Eula’s s
cream cut off.

  No, no, no, no . . .

  James cried, but it was getting farther away.

  Suddenly the hand left my throat and Wallace’s weight shifted to

  the side and he went limp. Something heavy thudded to the floor. Air tore down my throat, hurting as much as Wallace’s cruel grip. Eula screamed, “Oh, Lord, oh, Lord, oh, Lord!”

  Her hands pulled at my shoulders. I pushed with my feet. Once my

  legs were out from under Wallace, Eula wrapped me tight in her arms.

  I tried to pull away, needing space, needing air.

  “What have I done? Oh, Lord, what have I done!” Eula’s voice slid

  to a pitiful whisper. “Wallace?” She let go of me and crawled toward

  him. “Wallace? Wake up. I didn’t mean—” Her words disappeared into

  sobs as she got up and ran out of the room.

  I was still gasping when she ran back with towels and a lamp. She

  pressed the towels to the bloody dent in the side of Wallace’s head. The

  light showed a dark puddle on the floor. Eula’s iron skillet was next to

  him.

  “Come on, Wallace. You be all right,” she mumbled as she held a

  towel to the wound. “You be all right.”

  It didn’t look to me like Wallace was gonna be all right ever again. And I was glad.

  Eula sat at the table across from me. Four pies was sitting between us. None of ’em been touched. The lamplight made her cheekbones stand out over the shadows below. Her eyes looked strange and I would have thought she’d gone away from herself again, except for her hands. They was restless and twitchy on the tabletop, twisting, drumming, palms sliding over the surface, then twisting again.

  Neither of us looked into the little bedroom.

  Once she’d figured out Wallace was good and dead, she’d covered him with a sheet and had me move baby James’s cradle into the kitchen. She’d pointed to the table for me to sit down and then looked at my neck, her eyes streaming and hands shaking the whole time. Then she’d gone to the pump, wet a cloth, and wrapped its coolness around my burning throat. After that she’d spent a real long time just sitting there crying—even while she fed baby James.

  He was asleep now, not knowing anything about what had happened. He was lucky. Lucky, lucky baby.

  Mamie always talked about things that once done can’t be undone, how I had to think before I acted, how one second could change everything in your whole life. She’d been talking about things like breaking Jimmy Sellers’s nose and me getting locked in the trunk of the car. But now I saw it was more than that. Being almost killed twice had changed something deep inside me. I couldn’t tell what exactly, ’cause it was just settling in. But I wasn’t never, ever gonna be the same again.

  The rooster crowed, even though it didn’t look to be getting light out yet.

  Finally, Eula’s hands settled. She blinked and put one hand over her heart as she stood up. She wobbled just a bit and put her fingertips back onto the table. “Reck—” Her voice was low and raspy before it stopped altogether. She cleared her throat and focused her eyes on the door. “Reckon I’d best go get the law.”

  I couldn’t believe my ears. “What!” My voice was croaky, but she understood me fine.

  She sighed, then sniffled. “Tell I done killed Wallace.”

  “The law? You crazy? What about baby James?”

  Her shoulders curved and she breathed deep, letting it out long and slow. She reminded me of a dog Jimmy Sellers had once kicked. “Don’t matter now. I goin’ to jail anyway.”

  I’d been doing plenty of thinking on my own while we’d been sitting there. Wallace was a bad man—no matter how he used to be when he and Eula met. Nobody should care he was dead.

  “You only killed Wallace to keep him from killin’ me!” My throat hurt like my neck was being wrung again and I had to stop and take a slow breath. I went on, more careful to keep my voice quiet, “The law can’t lock you up for that.”

  “Maybe not. But they’ll know ’bout James.” She looked more brokenhearted about losing that baby than knockin’ the life out of Wallace. “That’ll get me worse’n jail.”

  I thought of that man Shorty getting dragged behind a car for being colored and shivered. I couldn’t let something like that happen to Eula. “So you can’t tell!”

  Her brown gaze turned to me. “I done killed him.” She caught a breath like she’d been running. “I got to tell.” She turned away from the table and started toward the door.

  “Wait!” I jumped up. “Just wait a minute. He ain’t gonna get any deader if we think about this for a bit.”

  She came back to me and put a hand on my cheek. “You a good girl. But no thinkin’is gonna make a difference. I done it. Now you stay with James while I go.”

  I thought about taking James and running while she was gone. Then nobody’d know she took him. But then I wouldn’t be here to tell the law how she saved me. I had to figure out something.

  “No!”I grabbed her arm as she started to turn away.“Just . . . just . . .”

  She looked down on me with a sad smile. “It be all right. You’ll get to your momma”—she paused—“or wherever you supposed to be.”

  Momma!

  I still had hold of Eula’s arm, so I tugged her back to the chair. “I got it!” I made her sit. “You and me and James will go to Nashville! Momma’ll help us. She’ll be so grateful you saved me. She’ll help us figure out what’s best to do ’bout Wallace and the law.”

  It didn’t look like I was changing her mind, so I pushed some more. “You’ll know I’m safe with Momma then. And it’ll give us time to think on it ourselves. We don’t want to ‘run off half-cocked.’” Which Mamie said I did all the time.

  Eula didn’t say anything.

  “Do it for me,” I said. “We’ll figure out what do ’bout Wallace. I promise. But take me to my momma. Please.” Momma would save Eula.

  For a long while Eula just sat there, staring at the window that was just graying with dawn. My heart beat fast and I realized I was as scared for Eula as I’d ever been for myself.

  Finally she looked at me and breathed out a long sigh. “I take you to your momma afore I go to the po-lice. I owe you that.”

  My knees felt wobbly. (Thank you, baby Jesus.)

  10

  b

  y nine o’clock we’d been bouncin’ along in that truck for almost an hour. The air was like a rubber raincoat, which didn’t help my rolly stomach one bit. Baby James seemed fine with the heat, sleeping on the truck’s floorboard between my feet and wearing just a diaper. But Eula looked sickly as she drove so slow we coulda been outrun easy by a turtle. Even creepin’ along, the truck rattled like we was probably droppin’ parts along behind us. I didn’t complain about our slowness. As Mamie was forever reminding me, I needed to count my blessings. At least Eula hadn’t gone straight to the law like she’d wanted to. And we were moving away from that big dead body.

  Before we’d left Eula’s house, we wrapped Wallace up in a sheet and drug him down to the springhouse so he wouldn’t rot so fast. I didn’t know why Eula cared, but she did. It was a miserable job and we only got it done because it was downhill and we rolled him most of the way.

  Eula’s Holy Bible sat on the truck seat between us, its gold letters rubbed to a thin shadow and its worn-out, cracked-edged cover flappin’ in the wind that rushed through the windows. That Bible had been the first thing Eula had insisted on bringing with us. She’d snatched it up and held it tight to her chest the entire time she packed everything else, like she was afraid to set it down. We brought the picture of grown-up Jesus from her bedroom, too. Course with her hanging on to that Bible like she was, I’d had to stand on the bed and take it off the wall. It was in the back of the truck now with her grip—which is what she called the little tan-and-brown suitcase she’d pulled from under her bed. I’d seen better suitcases in the alley trash. But it held her few things jus
t fine. I can’t say why she brought her church hat, though, if she thought she was going to the law as soon as we got to Nashville. My seeing it go into the suitcase had made me hope she’d come round to my way of thinking.

  Once her clothes had been packed, we’d gathered up all of the food we could eat on the road, which wasn’t much. When we’d finally walked out of that saggy house, she’d stopped dead and looked around. I guess she figured she’d never be back. If I was her, that would be okay with me; who wanted to be reminded of Wallace’s meanness every morning when you opened your eyes?

  I know it ain’t Christian, but I was happy that man was dead. Truth be told, Eula should be, too.

  I watched the trees, cotton fields, and crooked, tin-roofed shanties go by, chewing on my thumbnail, sorting out the details of my plan. Everybody knows the details color your words truth or lie, so I had to get them straight and keep them straight. Eula’s whole life depended on it. Once I got it all laid out in my head, I’d have to convince Eula it was the right thing, which was gonna take some doing—even with her Sunday hat in the suitcase.

  Out of the corner of my eye, the waving cover of Eula’s Bible was trying to get my attention and make me feel guilty over my lie buildin’. I turned my head so I couldn’t see it anymore. I hoped baby Jesus would understand; he couldn’t want a woman as good as Eula to get punished for protecting a baby and a little girl.

  Next to the Bible was Eula’s pocketbook, which held all the money we had, four dollars and seventy-five cents from her pie delivery on the Fourth of July—three cherry, one buttermilk, and a chocolate chess. I only knew that ’cause Eula spent the whole time she’d been packing talking nonstop. Some folks was like that, all chattery when they was scared, so I’d just let her talk. Once we got on the road, she’d clammed up tight, even though she still seemed plenty nervous.

  For a minute I let myself wonder where I might be right now if those people hadn’t ordered pies from Eula. It turned out Nashville was a whole lot farther away than I’d thought. Eula said it would likely take at least two days—maybe longer since she wanted to stay off the highways as much as possible. How would I have made it on my own with no money and no food?