“Great God in heaven!” I thought I would collapse! Collapse and die right on the spot! “I had better sit down.” The shock was too much for my delicate nature.
“Oh! Please,” she said and took my arm. “Come inside!”
I let her lead me in to her couch and allowed myself to fall back against the pillows. It was a pretty couch, slipcovered in ivory linen, but not very practical. “Thank you,” I said.
“I’ll get you a glass of water,” she said.
Well, this gave me a moment to look around her living room. Not that I approved of snooping, but you can tell a lot about a person by their possessions. She had a very nice bookcase that looked foreign, but very nice all the same. And she had one ton of books. Maybe she was a teacher after all. Well, I would find out. Anna Lutz! She had been a nice little girl, high-spirited, but nice.
She returned and handed me the glass of water, which I was very glad to have. I took a long drink and laid back against her sofa again.
“This is a shock!” I said. “Why didn’t you tell me who you were?” Suddenly, I was provoked with her for playing this game with me.
“Miss Mavis? I wasn’t sure it was you either, and when I realized who you were, you were already halfway out the door. I figured we’d get around to this conversation sooner or later. Do you remember when I used to steal your plums?”
“Do I? Humph! All you sassy little children running around here, making noise and driving me crazy! Oh! Those were wonderful days!” I took another drink and put the glass on the coffee table, feeling much, much better.
“Yeah,” she said, “they really were.”
“Little Anna Lutz! Where do the years go?”
“I don’t know, Miss Mavis, I surely don’t know.”
Well, she sat down opposite me on the edge of her coffee table and we just started to talk. Glory! It felt so good! Everything was going along so nicely until she brought up her mother. She started to get upset.
“I never got over it, the horrible embarrassment she was to all of us. Poor Daddy. Then my grandmother Violet all but wrecked my life . . .”
“Now wait just a minute, young lady,” I said. “See here! I think you’re old enough to consider both sides, aren’t you? I knew your mother. She was a beautiful woman! And a good woman too! She tried and tried to please your father, but let me tell you this, and if you repeat one word, I’ll say you’re lying . . .”
“Promise,” she said. She had a funny look on her face.
“In those days, your father was a difficult man, Anna. He probably still is.”
“Aren’t all men difficult?”
I had to agree on that. “I imagine they are, but your daddy had a way about him that, I swanny, well, it wouldn’t have made even me cut up the fool, ’eah?”
“What do you mean?”
Here sat this nice young woman, years after she had gotten over her mother’s death. Was it my business to tell her what I knew? Yes, I decided, it was. Somebody needed to set her straight. Why was I always the one who had to do this?
“Anna, there was a time when your momma and daddy first moved over to the island. We were great friends—Percy and I along with Mary Beth and Douglas. We were all young and gay, going up to the Seaside for a drink together or sometimes we would play canasta. When your daddy was at work, your momma would come sit in my kitchen and tell me stories about your daddy and the war and all the hell he went through along with his parents. They only wanted to get here, become Americans, work hard and be somebody.”
“Daddy never talks very much about his parents or immigrating, and when he came here he was just a kid.”
“Well, that may be, but your momma had plenty to say. Someday I’ll scratch my head good and try to remember some of the stories. You just need to know this much today. First, you take a young, beautiful, high-strung woman and marry her off to somebody a lot older, who’s never home. Then you stick her in a drafty old beach house at the end of this island. And, finally, you let your mother run your marriage and never give your wife any spending money. You think that’s a pretty picture? Now, it’s ten o’clock. I gotta get myself to eleven o’clock Mass by ten-thirty or I won’t get my seat.”
I stood up to leave then turned around and had another look at her. Her jaw was hanging open and her confusion was as plain as day.
“Don’t go,” she said, “wait. Please. Talk to me.”
What was I supposed to do then? Leave this child all upset? Heavens to Betsy! What a predicament! I just couldn’t forsake my religious obligation. I was too close to death to take any chances on earning more time in Purgatory.
“I’ll tell you what, dear. You come over for dinner and I’ll talk to you all you want. Angel always makes fried chicken and red rice for Sundays. We eat at three. All right?”
“Yes, thanks. I will.”
“Now, let’s have a smile, okay?”
Finally, Long Tall Sally smiled and I let myself out the door. Walking across the yard, I hollered back to her. “Three o’clock!”
“I’ll be there!” she called out.
Do you want to know something? Knowing too much about people can be a terrible burden. It’s unfortunately true.
Ten
The Chicken Was Committed
THREE o’clock had almost rolled around but not before Lucy had the chance to look in on me. I was starting to wonder heavily what these people did with their time before I bought this house.
“Hey! Anybody home?” Lucy said, calling through the screen.
“Come on in!” I said, calling back.
“Wow! What’s that smell? Lord, chile! Gimme a bite!”
I was in the kitchen, which as you know was so small you could stir a pot on the stove and empty the dishwasher at the same time. A one-fanny kitchen by anyone’s definition. I was pulling a sheet of chocolate chip cookies from the oven. My chocolate chip cookies were pretty darn good, if I said so myself. I figured after the tonnage of Miss Angel’s cookies I had eaten years ago at Miss Mavis’s the least I could do was to show up with something.
“I made cookies for the Snoop Sisters,” I said, lifting one with a spatula and offering it to Lucy. “I’m going over for dinner in a few minutes.”
“You must be crazy as hell, ’eah? Gonna be cat hair in the soup. You wanna get a hair ball?”
“Ain’t no cat gonna get between me and my dinner. Don’t worry.”
“Damn, gir’! Thith id tho goot!”
“Hot?”
Lucy shook her head up and down, whooshing air through her teeth trying to cool her mouth. I poured her a glass of water and handed it to her.
“Got milk?”
“You sound like an ad campaign.”
I poured her a glass of milk and she took it and another cookie, blowing on it first.
“Thanks,” she said. “So what’s the occasion? I mean, is there any reason for the invitation besides their usual nosiness?”
“You’re not gonna believe this,” I said, “because I can hardly believe it myself.”
“That one’s broken. Can I eat it?”
I looked at my watch and saw that it was almost three, quickly deciding to tell Lucy about the Mother of all Mother Discoveries later.
“Of course,” I said. “Oh! I’m almost late! I’ll tell you what.” I began gathering up the cookies and stacked them on a plate. “I’ll come knock on your door after dinner and I’ll tell you all about it.”
“I’ll make you supper. Should I call Dougle?”
“Sure, call him. Ask him to make pierogis. Kielbasa. Golabki. Tell him I think we might have the beginnings of an interesting conversation coming up.”
“O-kaaay! This sounds mysterious. Fun! We could use it!”
“No doubt about it.”
I left Lucy and with my plate of cookies covered in aluminum foil, I crossed the yard between the oleanders, almost pulling my hair out of my head.
“Ow! Damn! That hurt!” I would definitely take a machete to the o
leanders at some point. Damn things were dangerous.
But I forged on, yanking my hair out of the branch. What could Miss Mavis tell me that I didn’t know? I couldn’t imagine that she knew much. In fact, I was very, very annoyed that she thought my mother was worthy of anything. How dare she? My mother was a huge and horrible part of my life. Okay. Maybe that wasn’t the most loving way to describe my feelings but I hadn’t had much time to prepare. Tongues of fire were waiting to throw flames, mine included.
Wait! Was I going next door to fight with a couple of old ladies? What was the matter with me? Why shouldn’t I listen to them and then think about it?
Hellfire, Anna, all they want to do is feed you and tell you how they saw things. Calm down! Isn’t anybody entitled to a point of view besides you? You claim to be such a good listener—then be one!
This dialogue with my little internal voice was about to save my ass for the billionth time.
Composed, repressed and in hospitable humor, I knocked on their door. Miss Mavis answered it and the minute I stepped inside her living room a thousand years came sliding back. I could smell the frying chicken. Delicious! And the same damn pine-scented frogs from Glade that she used to mask the cat box smell of her nasty cats. All at once I was ten years old. But if that was true, how did Miss Mavis get so old? I caught myself mid-daydream.
“I made some cookies for you,” I said.
“Oh!” she said and choked up a little. “Thank you, Anna. Come on in.”
I could have sworn she was crying or had been crying or at the very least was emotional about something. I would find out, I told myself, but wasn’t sure I really wanted to. I followed her to the kitchen, where Miss Angel was turning out chicken onto paper towels spread across the counter.
“Well, well! Look who’s ’eah! Miss Anna! Let me look at you!”
She put down her tongs, wiped her hands on the skirt of her apron, and came to stand right in front of me.
“Miss Angel,” I said. “Isn’t life strange?”
“No, life is wonderful, ’eah?” She stood back from me with her hands on my upper arms and her eyes went from my head to my toes. “This does me so much good to lay my old eyes on you.” She sighed deeply and shook her head.
Miss Mavis, watching Miss Angel’s lips said, “Mine too, mine too.”
“It’s good to see you, Anna.”
“It’s so good to see y’all too,” I said. I meant it.
“I mean to say that it’s so good to see you on this ’eah island, because this is where you belong.”
“Thanks.” I stopped for a moment and, looking at her dead on, I said, “I think so too. It’s like coming full circle or something.”
“What?”
“She say she glad to be home!”
“Don’t holler so, Angel! Well, you poor thing, you probably have a mortgage that could kill you,” Miss Mavis said.
“It’s not too bad. But things have changed around here a lot. What do y’all think about the new shopping center in Mount Pleasant?”
“What? What was that? I missed it,” Miss Mavis said.
“She say, How do you like the new shopping center in Mount Pleasant!”
“Oh. Well, I’m too old for some of those crazy stores, but it’s nice to have a Belk’s.”
“I had actually looked at a house over there before I saw this one.”
“What? Are you crazy, girl? You’re an old island Geechee, just like us. And that traffic! Mercy! Drive you right out of your mind, ’eah?”
“Let’s get this ’eah meal going, girls,” Miss Angel said. “This chicken gave up he ghost for y’all.”
“And, you too!” Miss Mavis said, turning to me, whispering. “She can be so bossy sometimes!”
“I hear you!” Miss Angel said from the kitchen.
Miss Mavis’s expression was like the skipping line of a heart monitor before it went flat—the disease had been diagnosed but there was still some fight in the patient, and without an end in sight.
Their little bickering act improved my mood and I helped them take the food to the table.
The platter of fried chicken was the centerpiece, and I’d like to take a moment to discuss its attributes. It was golden brown and not in the least bit greasy. Miss Angel had a batter recipe that would send the Colonel off a tall building in shame. It was the kind of magazine photograph chicken that made you want to pick off chunks of crunchy batter when no one was looking.
There was also a covered dish of red rice, another one of string beans boiled with onions and ham, a plate of deviled eggs, and finally, a basket of steaming hot biscuits, and no doubt the basket had been woven by Miss Angel. Miss Mavis had set the table with her best china and silver and I knew that this was something of an occasion for them. I was very pleased that I’d brightened up my attitude. They may not have had tons of company to help them pass their Sunday afternoons, but I’ll tell you this. If anyone knew how Miss Angel’s chicken melted in your mouth, they’d have a single-file line from their front door to Shem Creek every single weekend.
“Let’s say the blessing,” Miss Mavis said, and we bowed our heads. “Dear Lord, please bless this food, forgive my mouth for what I am about to tell this young woman, and thank you for teaching Angel how to fry chicken that doesn’t make us too fat. Amen.” She raised her head and looked at me. “I forgot something.”
“That’s alright, Mavis, you just go on and say it.”
She cut her eye at Miss Angel and bowed her head again. “Lord? You still there? Well, today is very special for us because one of our own has come home. I hope that when the time comes for me and Angel to come home that somebody in heaven might be half as excited as we are. Thank you, Lord. Amen.” She opened her eyes and looked at Miss Angel, adding, “If the Lord lets you in, that is.”
“Humph,” Miss Angel said.
Well, that was it. I felt the pain of my entire life coming up my throat.
One of our own has come home.
My eyes burned and I felt ashamed for having dragged Daddy’s story through the years, never once thinking or asking if there had been another side. Worse, I had forgotten about the sense of belonging the island had always given me. Loving it was one thing but it was marvelous to actually belong someplace. How many years had I spent feeling that I didn’t belong anywhere that I was? How many people never felt that they belonged in the space they inhabited?
Taking some chicken, a large breast and a hefty second joint, I cleared my throat so that I wouldn’t get weepy, already knowing that I would eventually cry like a pig. I wanted Miss Mavis and Miss Angel to hurry up with the story. Impatience and anxiety were eating me alive.
Miss Mavis heaped a mound of red rice on my plate and two spoonfuls of snap beans. I took three deviled eggs. Miss Angel offered me a biscuit; I grabbed two and slathered them with butter. I couldn’t wait to get the hot dripping things in my mouth.
“Angel can fry some chicken, ’eah?”
“She always could! I can’t wait to taste it! See if she lost her touch.”
“Humph. Lost my touch? When’s the last time you ate, girl?” Miss Angel said.
“Miss Angel? You are still so, so bad!”
We laughed and Miss Mavis said, “What’d she say?”
“Deaf as a doornail,” Miss Angel said to me under her breath and then loudly to Miss Mavis, “I said, She seems mighty hungry!”
“Don’t pay her any mind,” Miss Mavis said, “she’s just an old woman. Would you care for tea? And you! Quit yelling at me, you old coot.”
We began to eat and the standard pleasantries were exchanged. I told them that Daddy had never remarried, that I worked at a salon in Charleston, and that I was divorced. I told them all about Emily and how wonderful she was. Miss Mavis bragged on Miss Angel and how her baskets had won a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. Miss Mavis went on to say that Fritz (a.k.a. Thurmond) was up for a part in The West Wing and that he was doing well, determined not to ever need
rehab again. I didn’t ask what had taken him to rehab to begin with and, cross-checking all my mental gauges, I decided that I was acting well enough.
We all admitted that the men in our lives were scarce but that had been all right since we were always too busy to worry about it anyway. But mostly, we talked about how much I had wanted to come back to the Isle of Palms and that’s when Miss Mavis took a deep breath and began to talk.
“It’s important and right that you came back, Anna.”
“Yeah, I dreamed about it for years.”
“There’s very little more important in this world than knowing where you belong.”
“Why is that? I mean, coming back to the Isle of Palms has always mattered to me so much. I’m just not sure why.”
“Anna,” Miss Angel said, “you know you’re in the right place when you can feel it under your feet. Now maybe that sounds crazy, but when I stand on this island, it ain’t even close to how I feel when I stand on the sidewalks of Charleston.”
“Not weird at all,” I said. “On top of that I think my heart rate lowers here. I mean, I really feel different. Relaxed. You know?”
“We’ve always thought so,” Miss Mavis said, looking at her fork of rice and then putting it back on her plate. “Did your daddy ever tell you about his brother?”
“Daddy doesn’t have a brother,” I said, thinking that she was a little addled with age.
“Well, he did. His name was John. Johnny. He died when he was two years old. Terrible. But those were terrible times for your grandparents and for your father too.”
“I had an uncle? Why have I never heard this story?”
Miss Angel pushed back from the table. “I’m gonna get us some more ice for the tea. Anybody want lemon?”
No one answered her and she went to the kitchen without another word. Maybe she didn’t condone all that Miss Mavis had planned to tell me.
“Probably because it was so horrible to talk about. He caught the measles and there was no medicine. Well, there was, but they weren’t handing it out to displaced persons working in an underground airplane factory. That’s for sure. He died in your grandmother’s arms. The poor woman! Lord, have mercy!”