Chapter 3
I never had a real sister. It was just me and Mama.
We lived about twenty miles outside Oxford in a little house called A Rental, which means it costs every month, you don’t just pay the one time.
Before that we had been in a one-room up in Memphis.
We left when I was four because Mama said a big girl needs her own bed. I have been known to kick in my sleep.
Mama got lucky answering a thing in the paper.
Her new job was to clean and look after the kids for a rich family, the Coopers, that had moved to Mississippi and picked up a plantation for cheap.
Since they were Yankees, they did not know they were supposed to hire a colored to do that type of household labor.
Mama had impressed the lady in her letter about how she could teach her two little girls good table manners and which fork to use and not to say ain’t since a person picked that up around here.
Mama said a girl picks up ain’t easier than ringworm.
Living out in the country, we could run a clothesline from magnolia tree to mule hitch like proper people now.
There were cotton fields on all sides of us, and though the house needed a paint job, it was wired up with lights and even piped with water so Mama said it would do fine.
The yard around it was just weeds, but we picked us up some gravel from the road to make a path to our door.
Mama called it a brand-new life. She had been working up in Memphis at a dance place called Paradise Hall. It sounded like fun to me, but she said she was Sick. And tired. Of working long nights. She said she was ready to start fresh.
I remember our house in the cotton field, every nail in a board.
It came already set up with a few kinds of furniture.
A blue dinette set with all the pieces matching.
Our beds were in two different rooms. Mama had her a little wood dressing table with a mirror attached so she could sit and curl her hair.
Her hair was short and dark, just below her ears.
She cut it herself. Mama could whip up a outfit right out of the magazine too, generally a cut-on-the-bias deal.
She always was going on about a dress cut on the bias.
She had the kind of legs that made men whistle and say, Look at those gams!
In the sitting room, we had us a radio set, and my mama knew every dance there was.
She would put a station on and teach me the Charleston, the Big Apple, the waltz, and the boogie-woogie.
We whirled around on that blue rug until the room spun even when I was holding still.
Lord, those were the days, whirling with clothespins fastened to our hems to make our skirts twirl higher.
When the old lady who rented us the house asked, Where’s your husband? Mama said, He’s with Jesus now. He died in the war. And then Mama nodded, she did not shake her head or fiddle with her buttons because I am telling you she was good.
If I asked where my daddy was, Mama took a deep breath and said, He left. Like that, two words, close the book, end of story. She would hug me in a way that said, Please don’t ask me any more questions, Meg.
I was curious, though. There was not a picture of him anywhere. I got to a age where a girl wants to know things like that.
Mama was not the type to sit still, so I would follow her around asking, Where did he go to? Was he tall or short? What color was his hair? Dark like yours or was it near white like mine?
She would say, Please, Meg, I’m doing the best I can.
She was all the time saying that.
When I turned nine, she finally said she would answer what she could just this one time and I should get all my questions out at once. I learned he was medium height, had medium-color hair, grew up in Carroll County, and was in the army when they met. He left when I was a baby.
Did he hold me? As a baby? I am mad now I asked that when I could have asked more important things like his actual name or why he left or was he ever coming back.
She shook her head. No, he never got to hold you as a baby.
Does he know my name is Margot Louise and Meg for short?
Yes, he knows. Louise came from his side of the family.
Why don’t you like to talk about him? Was he mean or something?
She said, No, he wasn’t mean. But it hurts to think about him. You’ll understand it when you’re older.
I wanted to know more. That is just my nature. But I did not want to hurt her anymore.
I know my mama tried to be patient with me, but Lord would I hear it if I didn’t do something.
She would say, I am only going to ask you this once, Margot Louise, but that was not true one bit.
She would ask as many times as it took and was all the time telling me to comb that tangled hair of mine and wash my face and use a tooth powder I did not like the taste of.
Mother Mary and Joseph, Meg, you look like a hobo.
This time use soap. She was what you call petite in French but do not let her size fool you.
When she got to scrubbing things, she had more arms than a octopus.
And when it came to manners, do not even get me started.
When she was a little girl, she worked alongside her mama, cleaning houses and serving luncheons and clubs, and she learned how to do things right.
She taught me to put my napkin in my lap and eat what she called European style where you do not switch hands with the fork.
She found a magazine picture of a silverware set with twenty-seven pieces.
We sat and cut every spoon knife and fork out with the kitchen scissors.
Those forks were hard to cut on account of all the prongs.
Then she would slice out a meal from the cooking page like a fish and asparagus with sauce or baked oysters on the half shell and a drink.
Oh we had us some good magazine meals. She would say, Alright, set the table.
Which fork which spoon which glass. And I would have to pick and then sit down and pretend to eat it.
I thought she was teaching me how to serve ladies so I could have a skill, but she said, No, I am teaching you to be a lady, Meg.
She said she could spot the difference a mile away.
I would be starting school that fall and I would not show up acting like a hick.
The little blue schoolhouse was all the way at the end of Unimproved Road.
Mama drove me the mile there until I was old enough to walk alone.
It was a nice school for poor folks. People said so.
We had enough primers to share and a proper chalkboard up front and somebody even set up a whirligig on the playground.
My first week there, Miss Pettybone organized us in three groups: Slow Learners, Regular Learners, and Exceptional Learners.
I told Mama what group I was in and Lord she was proud.
There were only girls in the Exceptional Learners, which Mama said sounded about right.
She said later in life I would find that most men belong in the Slow Learners group.
At the time, I did not know our family was different from most in the area.
It wasn’t just that there were only the two of us with no daddy or brothers and sisters or old people.
We also did not go to church. Mama had her a set of rosary beads and a picture of Mother Mary by her bed but she said the rest was horseshit.
She did not need some man pointing his finger at her, telling her what to do.
On one of my first days at school, Miss Pettybone gave a lesson on Adam and Eve. She was all riled up to tell us how God created heaven and earth and animals and then he finished up by making man in his own image. She nearbout ended the story with a flourishing scarf.
I raised my hand and said, My mama said she heard we might come from monkeys.
Well the whole class started laughing and making monkey noises. Miss Pettybone put her hand to her chest and said we needed to have a talk.
While the rest went to ride the whirligig for playtime, she called me up to her desk. She said that monkey business was heathen material and had been banned by the state and what kind of church did my family attend and if I saw that kind of material at home I ought to tear it up quick.
I told her me and Mama do not go to church.
She nodded and made a special mark in her red book and asked where my daddy was. So I said, He left. Two words like that, do not discuss it. I had plumb forgot to say that he died in the war.
She marked that down by my name too and told me to tell my mama she needed to come and see her.
I was not looking forward to telling Mama any of this. But Mama saw I was upset and tricked me by rubbing my back until I started talking.
She said REALLY.
She said IS THAT RIGHT.
And then Mama was out the door and in our little car with her cheeks flashing red. To see her marching up to that schoolhouse so furious with a chin that could lead the band, I got worried I would never get called on in class by Miss Pettybone again.
Mama told me to wait outside, but I heard it in bits and pieces.
Don’t you tell me what I can and cannot say in my home.
Even in this godforsaken backwards state, that is my business.
And when she could get a word in edgewise, Miss Pettybone said, cool as clay, Meg tells me you don’t attend church, and your husband left you. Is that right, Mrs. Lefleur?
She did not say it nice, more like that was Mama’s fault.
Before Mama could get anything out, Miss Pettybone told her, If I hear that filth in my classroom again, Mrs. Lefleur, I will go straight to the police authorities, and they will make sure somebody raises this girl in a wholesome Christian manner.