Chapter 11

March 11, 1855

Tempe pokes out her bottom lip, letting it droop while staring down at the bare wood floor as if she’s lost something important but can’t remember what she’s lost.

“Like this, Mama?” she asks. She slowly raises her eyes. Her lips part innocently.

“Not quite, sugar.” Mama shakes her head so even the shells in her hair clatter with exasperation. “Let me see you walk.”

Tempe stomps across the floor with long, wide steps. She swooshes her imaginary layered skirts as her arms swing up, then down, then up in unison. It takes Mama a while to recognize the airs and when she does, she holds her hand to her chest and laughs with her mouth wide open. Mama has the most beautiful laugh in the world.

“You shouldn’t poke fun at the Missus,” I say. “She’s sickly.”

“It’s not my fault. That’s how she walks.” Tempe scrunches her face up like she’s trying to hold her laughter in her chest, but it bubbles out before she can stop it. She parades around our cooking/sleeping/visiting/sewing room. Her bare feet slap against the wood floor. She pretends to inspect and poke pots and pans, boxes and cases. “What’s this? What do you call that?”

“She’s just curious. You stop that. She don’t mean no harm,” Mama chides.

“Okay, how about this one?” Just like that, the Missus is gone. Tempe smooths her thick shift, two old dresses sewn together, and stands with her head up high. She unbinds her plaits, letting her hair fall around her ears in thick, chocolate curls. Licking her lips she raises her eyes level with Mama’s before cocking her head to the side. Before Mama can stop her, she’s sashaying across the room, long legs and hips slowly swaying with each step.

“Where’d you learn to walk that way?” Mama asks.

“From you. It’s how you walk when you think no one’s watching.”

“Don’t walk that way, people will stare.”

“I don’t walk that way, Mama, I walk like I got good sense,” I say. Mama smiles, nods without looking at me.

“So?” Tempe puckers her lips in the nasty way the hired hands taught her.

Mama stares at Tempe’s feet, slightly dusted as if they never touched the ground for long. I know she’s looking at her golden brown calves and up to her thick waist. Mama’s been fooling herself if she thought that scratchy yard frock hid Tempe’s long arms and slender fingers. Maybe she ain’t notice it till now. Eleven years old and Tempe’s filling out. And if she’s been around them hired hands long enough to pick up their ways, it’s been long enough for them to recognize she ain’t gonna be no little gal for long. Her body might be that of a woman, but it will be her eyes, wine colored in the light, or those lips, full and sculptured, that will ruin us all.

Tempe looks at the floor while Mama stares. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other then rocks back and forth while idly tugging at strings on her dress, fidgeting. At least she’s got the good sense to look shy.

“Okay, how about this?” Tempe hunches her back as if she’s carrying the Missus’s packages, weighed down with gifts for this person or that but never for anyone else really. Her body looks heavy. Her walk is slow and clumsy and a bit unsure. Mama watches her walk the length of the cabin.

“Perfect, you look just perfect,” Mama says.

“I can do it too, Mama. I can look ugly.”

“Of course you can, Sister,” Tempe says, “you don’t have to try near as hard.”

Mama grabs her bony arms and shakes her. Tempe’s little head rattles and bobs like to fall right off. “Don’t you ever say nothing like that again,” Mama hisses. “Them words sound ugly coming out of your mouth. I ain’t raisin’ nobody to be mean to nobody else just because. Nary one of y’all are ugly on the outside and I won’t let you be ugly on the inside neither.”

What if Mama kills her? My sister will be buried around back with the bunny we tried to save last winter and the frogs from before that. Will Mama find the critters when she digs the little hole to dump Tempe in? Will she split her open like James say they used to do? With Tempe gone, will I have to do her chores? “She didn’t mean it, Mama. She says stuff like that all the time and she don’t mean none of it.”

Mama pinches Tempe’s arm. Tempe whimpers.

“There’s plenty enough people to be nasty to my girls. I won’t have one of you being mean to the other.”

“Mama, Master’s all the time saying how ugly she is—”

“—Don’t you bring nothing that man says into this house.”

“Master says it’s his house—”

“Mama said don’t go repeating anything Master said.” I put my hands on my hips.

“Take your hands off your hips, you ain’t grown,” Mama says.

“Yeah, you ain’t grown. Mama, Sister’s got her fists balled up like she’s gonna hit me again.”

“Tempe, you lying! I ain’t never hit you—”

“—Have never,” Tempe says.

“See, she’s lying!”

“Spring, Tempe, why don’t both of you go out back and fetch something for supper?”

“Cuz ain’t nothing out there,” Tempe says.

“There’s greens and radishes and onions and potatoes,” I say. Mama’s garden is almost better than Walker’s.

“Ain’t no ham, no thick pork chops, no plump roast.” Tempe runs down the list from memory.

“Just pick something we do have,” Mama says in her don’t push me voice.

Tempe ain’t but two steps behind me when we run out the door. She pushes past me when we get out on the small, rickety porch, leaving me to trail behind. I run round back and start pulling beans and potatoes and sprouts. My peach crate’s almost full before I notice Tempe hasn’t put a thing in hers.

“Mama’s gonna get you if you don’t start filling that crate.”

“Why Agnes always get so mad anyway?” Tempe whispers.

Running around calling Mama by her given name. Least she’s got sense enough to lower her voice. I keep picking.

“She’s almost as bad as overseer,” Tempe continues.

“How you even know? You ain’t supposed to be out in the fields.”

“Overseer ain’t tied to the fields.”

“Where you go that he go?”

“Sometimes I see him when I’m running errands to the house or out by the barn. I see most everybody on this place.”

“Well, I’ve seen him too.”

“Know what else I seen?”

“What, Tempe?”

She twirls and dances, tiptoeing her way through the rows of Mama’s garden.

“Mama’s gonna get you,” I yell. But I know Mama won’t. Tempe can dance up and down these rows without stepping on anything she don’t want to. I put down my crate, pick hers up and start tossing in leaves and clumps.

“Meet me by the river, I’ll tell you then.”

“But Mama said—”

She’s already gone.

She’s naked as a bluebird when I catch up.

You’ll die. The warning catches in my throat. How many times has Mama said to stay away from the river? Tempe slips in. I wait for her to come up. I watch the sun shining on the river skin. Leaves float on the surface. What if she dies? What will I tell Mama? Tempe jumped right in the river and it swallowed her up, just like you said it would. I tried to help. I look at my dress. It’s my favorite. A few splashes of water won’t hurt it none. Will she float up like a fish or get tangled in the weeds? Who will cut her out? Mama? James? I bet I’d have to do it. I look for something to cut the reeds. My hands will have to do. Lord, please let her rise to the top right here on the bank. Then I won’t have to go in after her.

“Tempe!” I yell.

“Hush!” Her head breaks through the surface. “Sister, you sure are a worrying somebody.” She laughs when I jump. “I wasn’t gonna drown. I ain’t the one ’fraid of the water.” She bobs near the middle of the river.

“I ain’t either.”

“Then come in. Just a little. Just poke your little toe—”

“So what do you see?”

“Come closer and I’ll tell you.” She opens and closes her arms like a starfish. The river moves in little ripples with her. I know better but I go to the edge. She moves her mouth but I can’t make out the words. I scoot closer to the edge. She’s whispering so I have to lean over to hear.

“Up at the house they got so much food they can’t even eat it all,” she whispers. “Roasts, ham, chicken, taters, pies, fruits; and that’s just for supper. Ivy sends plates piled this high with all sorts of juicy stuff and most times plates come back with food still on ’em. And no one can touch none of it till Missus say she had her fill and what’s to be kept for when and who.”

“If they got all that food, why are we hungry?”

“Cuz we black.”

“Being black don’t have nothing to do with being hungry.”

“Master say we always want more than we need and it’s up to him to make sure we don’t get nothing we don’t need.”

“When he say all that?”

“When he was hitting Rose in the mouth,” Tempe says.

“When was that?”

“I don’t know, musta been the other day. I was waiting on Samantha to finish packing supper for the hands so she could get me the fabric to take round to the sewing shack and Rose was carrying trays stacked with plates and saucers and cups this high.” She points to the sky. “When she went back with the after-supper coffee, Master said he smelled meat on her breath. Rose said she hadn’t eaten any meat and maybe some spilled on her from cooking out back all day and Master said she was calling him a liar and Rose said she hadn’t called him any such thing and Master got to screaming that she had called him a liar twice and he hit her, pop-pop, in the mouth.” Tempe splashes water with each pop. “He told her don’t take nothing without asking and no one said nothing about it after, but I hope Samantha said something cuz Rose didn’t eat no food off no plate. I did.”

“Tempe!” I yell.

Water covers her chin. It swallows her mouth, her nose and eyes—still open—and finally her head.

“Why do you keep your eyes open?” I ask.

Laughing again, Tempe jumps out of the river and twists into her shift. Now she lies with her wet hair on my back. I’m drenched. I don’t move.

“You can’t see ’em with your eyes closed,” Tempe whispers.

“Can’t see who?”

“The dead.”

“Then how do you know they’re down there?”

“I can just tell. You know that spot where the water goes ice cold for no reason? The sun will be hot as a skillet. Water almost boiling when you get in. You wade in deep. Just go where the water takes you. It’s just you and the river pushing and pulling you where it wants you to go. You let yourself be; you just let the water do what the water’s gonna do. You know?”

“What do you see?”

“Souls,” Tempe answers.

“How do they look?”

“Mad. I’m hungry.”

“Mama will make something good—”

“I know, but let’s go up the house first.”

At first I think she’s talking about the old shack Mama lived in before, back when she was just Agnes. Even though Mama don’t like it, Tempe and me play there all the time. The busted-up roof and sides ’bout to lean in make a cave. Just me and Tempe and them bundles of shells and stuff Mama don’t think we know about. To Mama and them, it’s a shack. To me and Tempe, it is home. But Tempe ain’t talking about home. The House. I follow. I have to. Tempe runs down the trail through the woods and instead of going around the fields like we’ve been told a thousand times, she runs straight through one. It’s harvest time but everybody’s down the main field. Not a soul around for acres. The forbidden dirt feels softer. Even the air smells sweeter. We race. I would have won if I had known where we were going. If we were just running up to the house to slap the old girl like we usually did when there wasn’t anybody around to tell Mama, I’d have won. I’m about to smack right on a smooth beam when Tempe runs toward the back. She’s going to knock on the kitchen door! If she finds out we went knocking on the kitchen door begging Samantha for food, Mama will be madder than she was the time Tempe threatened to tell Walker on her if Mama hit her again. I don’t want to see nothing like that again. I run around back to catch up.

“You’ll get them in trouble if you go begging for food,” I say. I’m out of breath. I hold my side and lean against the cellar door.

“I ain’t asking them.” She darts past the side to the front.

“Tempe!” I whisper but I know she can hear me.

The back door swings open. Rose stares at me.

“What you doing hollering back here?” Her rich voice is warm and deep.

I don’t mean to but I smile.

Tempe reaches the front of the house. She skips up on to the large, white porch. By then Rose, Samantha, and me have reached the side. Tempe knocks on the door. The wind carries James’s surprised voice and his attempts to shoo Tempe off the porch. Master Walker comes out. I can tell by the way she’s standing, she wasn’t expecting him to be home. Serves her right.

“Oh no,” Samantha moans.

Instead of knocking her down like I expect, Walker stoops down to talk to her. Whatever he says, Tempe shakes her head no. He says something else. She shakes her head yes. A few minutes of headshaking and she’s inside. The door shuts behind her.

It’s almost dark before the back door opens.

Tempe ain’t said nothing since she come out the back door cradling that hunk of ham between her hands.

“What’s wrong with you?” I ask. Mama will kill me if something happened to her.

“Nothing.”

“Something happen in there?”

“Nope.”

“Somebody hurt you?”

“Nope.”

“You ever gonna tell me what happened?”

“Nope.”

She never does. Instead, she grabs my hand and we run through the woods till we get home. We let the door bounce against the frame behind us and tumble onto the floor. After pulling them from under the planks, we unwrap both bundles. Tempe rubs the stones against her face, kisses a smooth lump of hide, breathes deep. She splits the hunks of meat in two and puts one in each satchel for later before wrapping them back up.

“Why’d he give you that?” I ask.

“Did you know ain’t no babies born here ’cept us for years and years and years? Not one. Not even Agnes.”

“Mama will kill you if she hears you calling her that.”

“That’s what Master calls her.”

I give her my you know better than that look. “Besides, Mama was born right here on Walker Farm.”

“Was not.”

“Was too. Lived right here with her ma and her pa since she was born.”

Tempe’s already shaking her head. “That ain’t hardly true,” she says. “Agnes lived here with a mama and a papa. Walker gave her to them. He’s gonna give you and me babies one day too. In about a year when we older. Walker bought her when she was a baby. Bought plenty of babies too. Even bought one wasn’t a baby.”

She’s staring at me like she’s gonna be sick and throw words up all over the floor. Sweat starts beading up around my forehead then popping up under my arms. I’m holding my breath, waiting. “If he bought babies here, where they at?” I ask.

“Dead.”

“All of them?”

“’Cept Agnes. Walker says the whole place was cursed. Wouldn’t nothing hardly grow. Then Mama’s folks died and the curse was lifted. I popped out and then running behind me, you. Walker says I’m a miracle.”

“You?”

“He said you and me both. He meant me cuz I was first.”

“Then why ain’t no babies come after me?”

“Maybe you brought the curse back with you.”

Later, when Tempe tells Mama, she leaves out the part about Walker buying her. She don’t call her Agnes neither. Mama doesn’t listen anyway, not after the part about giving me and Tempe babies. I want to ask her if I’m cursed. I don’t, though. Even though I tell her I wasn’t in the house Mama scrubs us both with every sliver of homemade soap she can find. When that’s used up she uses lemon peels and tomatoes. She scrubs until my skin tingles. Then she says our insides need cleaning. We drink four jars each of “inner ointment.” The smell of lemon and onion and the thick gooey tree sap is enough to make you sick but I don’t dare drop a drip. Tempe lets a dollop fall to the ground and has to drink a whole other jar to replace it. I drink mine fast so I can’t taste it. We do our business out back downwind from the house. By the time it runs through us, we’re tired, sweaty, and empty. Our stomachs rumble when we finally lay on our thin bed of stuffed skins. Tempe shakes next to me. For months Mama makes me and Tempe drink that concoction. I drink mine every night. Tempe dumps hers in between the floorboard underneath her pallet. I watch her do it. As we get older, Mama adds a cream to rub between our legs, some herbs to put on our tongues. I do mine every morning. Tempe stands right there and watches me wiggle and squirm and pretend my insides ain’t burning up. She watches and shakes her head. She don’t wiggle or squirm except when Mama’s watching. When Mama’s there, Tempe dips her hand in the jar, rubs her fingers between her legs and then jumps and hollers like she’s on fire. Mama stands there telling her it’ll be okay like she believes it. She tells us the cream is like medicine. When Tempe says we ain’t sick, Mama says you take it before you need it. Then come the herbs. Mama dips into a satchel and measures out a pinch each of bitter herbs. We ain’t supposed to swallow them, just suck on them until it tingles. Tempe never gets it right. Because she’s the oldest, Mama puts the herbs in her hand and lets Tempe slip them on her tongue. She don’t do it, though. Soon as Mama turns to give me mine, Tempe slips hers into her pocket or scatters them on the floor. By the time Mama turns back, Tempe’s pretending her mouth is on fire. Sometimes I make her wait. I hold them on my tongue until my eyes start to water and my throat burns. The juice burns going down. It’s worth it, though. Mama smiles, relieved that her girls are safe. She gives us pressed blueberry syrup to drink after. The dosing becomes a routine, every morning before sunrise. Now that Mama stopped watching us do it, Tempe don’t bother to pretend.