style="font-size:15px;"> I didn’t know what else to say so I just walked away, straight up to Miss Lena’s store where I spent a nickel and bought ten peanut butter logs. They were small sticks of candy with a thin coat of peppermint on the outside and peanut butter in the inside, sealed in clear cellophane paper. I ate two and stored the others in my canvas bag.
Just before I turned onto Friendship Road toward home I stopped for one last look down toward the sawmill and saw Jake with a big shovel transferring more hot coals to his fire. I supposed he was getting ready to cook his supper and I felt bad knowing he had to eat alone, but there was nothing I could do, so I turned the corner walking toward home.
It wasn’t far to the first house where Earl and Merle Hicks lived, who weren’t any kin to me, but they were friends of my mother and father. I didn’t see anybody stirring about so I kept walking. Just past their house was the road to my grandfather Murphy’s house, which was farther off the road than the Hicks’. I looked down the little road and I could see him sitting in his rocking chair on the front porch. I wished I had saved a paper for him. I made a resolution not to be so selfish next Saturday and save one for him. I knew his poor vision prevented him from seeing me, and it wasn’t long before sundown, so I walked on.
There were no more houses between there and home, just that old dirt road with thick woods hanging over it from each side, but it was only about a mile farther.
While I was walking that mile I started thinking about Jake. He had told me where he was going, but not where he came from. I decided I would have to ask him about that sometime soon. Those faraway places he talked about made me feel very small and isolated. I knew we lived in the lower part of Alabama close to the Mississippi state line. I also knew we lived in Clarke County and that Grove Hill was the county seat, twenty miles east, and I had been there a few times.
I had been to Coffeeville many times, which was only nine miles from Miss Lena’s store, straight on out Center Point Road which turned from dirt road into blacktop just before you got into town—that is if you wanted to call it a town. There was a store which was a lot bigger than Miss Lena’s, a gas station, a feed and seed store, and a cafe with no name.
That was about it, except, oh yes, there was the big red brick school house where I was soon to be incarcerated. And I almost forgot, there was also the river at Coffeeville, the Tombigbee. It was a big old river, deep, wide, and muddy. On a foggy morning you couldn’t see across it. Sometimes we ate fried catfish my father caught out of it.
When I reached the top of the big hill I noticed the sky had gotten darker, but I knew there was an hour or so of daylight left. Looking toward the west I saw a dark gathering of clouds and knew there were thunderstorms on the way. I quickened my step, descended down the big hill, and didn’t stop until I reached the top of the little hill. I had a decision to make there. I could turn off the road and take the trail through the woods, which was a shortcut to my house, or I could stay on the open road and take the long way home. I decided on the latter since the shadows were beginning to lengthen. Besides, sometimes my brother Fred hid on the trail and tried to scare me.
When I turned off Friendship Road onto the sandy road leading toward home, I could smell supper and it reminded me how hungry I was. The first thing I saw was my oldest brother Ned carrying a big armload of stove wood toward the back door. I knew something was wrong. Ned’s job was to saw and split the slabs from the sawmill into small sticks which would fit into the wood-burning kitchen stove, and it was Fred’s job to carry it in.
Then I saw my mother standing on the front porch brandishing a long switch from one of her peach trees, and my heart sank. Someone must have seen me at the sawmill after all.
3
It turned out that the switch was meant for my brother Fred, who didn’t show up to do his assigned chores. I figured this out when I approached the front porch expecting to feel the sting of the switch and heard my mother ask, “Do you know where your brother Fred is?”
“No ma’am,” I answered while washing my hands. Afterwards I headed for the kitchen where I knew supper awaited me. Our three meals were breakfast, dinner at midday, and supper at night. There on the big black wood stove was my supper. On one of the eyes, still warm, was a big pot of fresh black-eyed peas with tiny pods of boiled okra floating on top. On the apron of the stove was a bowl of creamed corn, a bowl of chopped fried okra, and a plate of sliced ruby-red tomatoes—all fresh that day from my mother’s garden. The crispy brown cornbread was sliced and still in the black skillet. I piled my plate high, ate my fill, and washed it down with a big glass of buttermilk.
Afterwards, I walked from the kitchen through the main room, by my mother and father’s bed, the fireplace, and the two big rocking chairs. My parents were on the front porch, where in the fading light, she was shelling butter beans and he was cleaning his old shotgun.
At the end of the porch was the door which led into the room—built like an afterthought onto the side of the old shack—where my brothers and I slept.
The storm came later than I expected. When the hard rain hit the old tin roof it jarred me from a deep sleep. You would have had to shout to make someone hear you over the explosive noise, but I wasn’t afraid because I had heard it many times before. After a while the rain subsided into a soft, hypnotic patter on the tin. Just before it soothed me back to sleep, I ran my hand over the rough sheet which my mother made by sewing empty flour sacks together, to find that Fred wasn’t in his accustomed place. A little later on, I felt the dampness of him as he slid into bed.
I woke up to the smell of fried chicken. I sat up in bed thinking this must be a special day if we’re having fried chicken for breakfast. Seeing the room was empty, I leapt out of bed, hoping my older brothers hadn’t eaten both the drumsticks.
On the front porch, because I knew I would be asked when I arrived in the kitchen, I stopped and washed my hands. The drinking bucket and wash basin sat on a bench at the end of the porch. I took the dipper from a nail on the wall, splashed water into the basin, and scrubbed my hands good with the big brown bar of soap. Afterwards, I threw the soapy water out into the yard and dried my hands on the thin towel hanging on another nail next to the dipper. There was no running water, and there was no indoor plumbing. We had to carry our drinking water in buckets from a well we shared with the Bedwell family. Water for bathing and washing clothes was collected in a big rain barrel at the rear of the house underneath a low spot on the roof. I knew it would be full after last night’s storm.
When I arrived in the kitchen, I was surprised to find no one there except my mother. “Where is everybody?” I asked.
“Your daddy and Ned have already gone to the woods to hunt. Fred is behind the house getting a bath. I told him to save his tub of water for you. Now, sit down and eat your breakfast,” she said, placing a plate in front of me with a fried egg and a hot biscuit. Then she slid a mason jar of her homemade blackberry jam toward me.
I glanced at my food, then stared at the big platter of fried chicken at the other end of the table. She followed my gaze and said, “You can have all the chicken you want after church. We’re having dinner-on-the-grounds right after the service.”
My heart leapt. This meant all kinds of delicious food would be stacked high on the wooden tables lined up in the shade of the big oak trees beside the church. We would probably even get out early.
While sopping up the last of the egg yoke and jam with the remains of my biscuit, I found myself wondering what Jake was having for breakfast, if anything. Jake was the first black
