Part Two Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered
We in big trouble.
On Sundays the market in the center of town opens up to all kinds of folks once church service lets out, but that don’t mean people like it much.
Our services at the covenstead meet at night, so in the mornings we free to wander the sellers’ booths before all the white folk make their way out there too.
This morning we was down there playing around, talking to some of the boys on break from the mill—well, not me, I suppose, since I already got my Earl.
My belly ain’t even big yet, so they was looking at me and smiling, but I ain’t pay them no mind, not with this miracle swimming inside me, depending on me.
Well, the weather has started to cool, so we was all in layers and coats.
Mama just bought me these leather gloves that she saved up for, and Earl was wearing one of those new hats with the flat brim.
Not sure how it’s supposed to keep him warm when it don’t even cover his ears, but I guess that don’t matter no way.
Anyhow, Lucille and Dorothea was out there playing around like everybody else, running through the stalls of the market.
Lucille was busy teasing the tallest mill boy, John, his midnight skin gone dusty with the dirt from the pickin’ rooms. He eyed her heavy skirts that rounded out her bottom half, and she laughed as she showed off for him, spinning circles with her head flung back.
She wasn’t paying no mind to where she was going when this man just stepped out in front of her.
I swear I saw him notice her, the way she was smiling and laughing and all that, and he twisted up his face and just stepped out into her way.
She ran smack right into him, and he stood there like a statue as she fell back onto the table, knocking down a crate of apples.
The whole market got quiet after that. White men craning they necks to see how this man was gon’ react to it all.
Dorothea rushed over to Lucille and helped her up, her face all screwed into a knot ’cause she had seen what I seen too.
The man got so mad! His face and neck flushed red, and he was sweating ’cause by the middle of the day the sun comes out and warms everything back up.
“You stupid girl!” He was yelling at her like it was her fault he stepped in her way like that. His voice was muffled by the tobacco tucked in his lip. “You gon’ pay for these here apples, girl!” He was practically spitting at her, his finger jabbing at her face like a knife.
“B-but I ain’t got no money.” Lucille could barely get the words out.
Her eyes kept bouncing to the mill boys, but they was backing away like a bunch of cowards, not wanting to get in trouble.
I could see it in her eyes though, how mad she was.
Sometimes Lucille got problems with keeping control of herself.
Mama said she gon’ get herself killed like that one day.
Lucille’s hands kept twitching at her sides like she wanted to call the power, and I was busy praying that she’d know better than that.
When it seemed like maybe she wasn’t gonna be able to hold it all in, I took a step forward, but Dorothea cut her eyes to me, and they was blazing with warning.
She flicked her gaze down to where I rested my hand on my belly and shook her head. It wouldn’t take nothing to make this man mad enough to swing, and she ain’t want nothing to happen to the baby, I guess.
“That ain’t my problem, now is it? You’s the one to knock ’em down, you’s the one that’s gotta pay!
” Lucille started at his words. She was shaking so bad, I could practically hear her teeth chattering.
I could see it all the way from where I stood.
Dorothea put her arm in front of Lucille and took a step forward.
“Don’t talk to her like that! You’s the one stepping out in front of people! I saw you do it!” Now she was the one with her finger wagging in the air.
I sucked in a breath. Dorothea’s not the type to talk back like that, ’specially after what happened to her daddy last summer. But maybe that’s the thing that broke her. Seeing him like that—his blood soaking into the roots of the poplar.
The man spit into the metal can he was holding, and it hit the side with a loud ping before he tossed it over his shoulder and reared his hand back so far, I was flinching before he even swung.
When his knuckles connected with Dorothea’s cheek, she damn near flew in the air before landing hard on the ground.
“You better watch your mouth, you ignorant negro bitch!”
Everything was happening so fast, I could barely keep up.
One minute the man was yelling at Dorothea, and the next he was choking on the air, grabbing his neck as he turned even redder, then purple, then blue, falling to the dirt with a heavy thud. Dorothea just sat there, staring at him as people went rushing to his side, screaming for help.
Couldn’t no one prove a thing. She didn’t move a muscle as she sat there and watched him suffocate to death. But as Lucille, Dorothea, and I slipped into the crowd and back out of town, the truth was busy damning us.
Dorothea had just killed a man. A white man. I don’t know when or how, but I know what I feel is true.
We gon’ hang for this.
—Nora