4
“I think I’m gonna melt,” whined Truman in that peculiar singsong voice of his. After an hour of playing pirates and knights of the Round Table, followed by two games of marbles and three of jacks, they’d run out of things to do.
Hot and tired, he and Nelle collapsed under the shade of the scuppernong grape arbor, where it was cool and breezy. They fanned themselves with the crossword-puzzle section of the Monroe Journal, which they’d also finished that morning.
“Reality is so boring! I wish something exciting would happen for once in this town. I’ve been here over a month and it’s nothing like New Orleans.”
“Well, it may not be all exciting like New Orleans,” said Nelle. “But stuff still happens ’round here too. Why, just the other day, that black boy Edison was out in the town square drawing a crowd ’cause he could imitate anything you asked him to. He could do birds and horses, Mr. Barnett and his wooden leg, the cotton-gin machine, anything. I asked him to do the mail-carrier train, and he started shuffling his feet in the dirt, chugging and tooting like a train whistle! That’s not something you see every day.”
Truman was unimpressed. “I suppose we could go down to the drugstore and get some free candy again.” He rolled his eyes up into his head and began twitching and shaking as if he were having a fit.
“Stop it. You just about gave Mr. Yarborough a heart attack. His son’s an epileptic, you know? And I think he knows candy doesn’t stop a fit.”
Truman shrugged. “He still gave us free licorice.”
“Yeah, to get rid of us.”
Truman sat up. “What we need is some big-city excitement. Like . . . just imagine if somebody disappeared. Or there was a murder in town! Then we’d really have something to do.”
Nelle stared at him like he was nuts. “Just what the heck would we do with a murder or a kidnapping?”
“Why, solve it, of course. We could be detectives.” He snapped his fingers. “I could be Sherlock and you could be Watson! The brains and the muscle. See?” He pretended to be smoking a pipe.
“Why cain’t I be—oh, never mind. No one ever gets murdered here anyways. Why, when General Lee himself came to Monroeville, he called it the most boring place on earth!”
They both stared into the deep blue Alabama sky and counted bits of floating white cotton fluff that escaped from the cotton gin across town.
“Well, he got that right,” said Truman eventually. “I guess it is too hot for mayhem. The only place where anything is happening is probably down at the swimming hole at Hatter’s Mill. We could go swimming and at least cool off. It’s no Lake Pontchartrain, but it’ll do.”
Nelle made a face. “You don’t want to go down there.”
Truman’s eyes lit up. “Why not? Are there gators? Is it dangerous?”
Nelle wiped the sweat off her brow. She knew the boys who hung out at Hatter’s Mill. Billy Eugene and his pals would beat the snot out of a boy like Truman. The least she could do was keep him out of trouble.
“No, it’s just not . . .” She couldn’t think of a good excuse.
“What?” He tilted his head, curious. “You’re not chicken, are you? Can’t you swim?”
Nelle was offended. “No, I ain’t chicken, and yes, I can swim rings around you!” She stared him down good. He just smiled back at her.
“Fine, let’s go, then,” she said. “But on one condition.”
“What’s that?” he asked innocently.
“You have to dress more . . . normal.”
“Normal?” said Truman. He blew the long wispy strands of hair out of his eyes. “Since when is normal any fun? I mean, look at you. You’re a girl and you dress like a boy!”
Nelle tugged on her overalls. She knew it was useless to argue. Truman was only a year older than her, but he acted like he was already grown up. “Fine,” she said. “But don’t blame me if some boys throw you off the roof of the old millhouse. You’re always starting something.”
Truman grinned like an impish pixie looking for trouble. “Who, me? I can’t help it if I’m a . . . harbinger.” He waited for a reaction from Nelle, who plain refused to play his little word games. He whipped out his miniature dictionary anyway and opened it to a marked page. “It means ‘innovating pioneer’—”
“Ah don’t care what it means, Streckfus,” she said, pretending to ignore him.
Truman jutted out his lower jaw and scowled. He hated when she called him that. “Suit yourself, Na-il Har-puh!”
She stuck her tongue out; he just shrugged.
“Well, go on, then, get dressed,” she said. “I’ll meet you over there, you ol’ . . . bellwether.”
Truman giggled. Nelle was the only person he’d met who was as good as him with words.
Of course, everyone was at the pond at Hatter’s Mill that afternoon. Billy Eugene, Hutch, Doofie, and Twiggs Butts were horsing around, diving into the water and shouting things at the other kids. The girly girls, who were afraid to get their hair wet, made cute comments back at them, trying to get them to dive off the roof of the mill. Nelle kept to herself, wading through the cool waters by the shore, letting the fish tickle her legs.
Suddenly, everything went quiet. Nelle looked up and saw Edison, that gangly boy whose skin was so dark, she thought he might be a real African. He was standing at the edge of the pond in shorts that were made from an old sack of flour, dipping his toe in the water and imitating a gurgling stream.
“Just what do you think you’re doing, boy?” Billy Eugene shouted.
Edison looked around and saw everyone staring at him. “Just dippin’ my toe and talking to the stream,” he said quietly.
The boys laughed. “You know no coloreds is allowed here. You got to go over to the Negro pond.”
Edison looked confused. “The Negro pond is closed ever since y’all dammed it up.” He pointed down a ways to the drained part of the pond, which was only a bowl of dried-up mud now.
“What’s a little mud, boy?” said Billy. “It ain’t like you gonna get any darker!” He and his friends had a good laugh at that.
Nelle could see Edison’s jaw clenching. She hated when bullies picked on kids who couldn’t fight back, and a colored boy hitting a white boy? That was not allowed. She wanted to go over there herself and punch Billy Eugene in the nose, just so he’d mind his own business. Then she heard someone singing.
“I found a million-dollar baby . . . in a five-an’-ten-cent store!” The singing was followed by whistling and then Truman appeared from around the bend. With all the subtlety of a peacock, he strutted down the path with an umbrella, acting like Little Lord Fauntleroy.
“Heya, Edison!” He waved, pausing for all to admire his swimwear.
While all the boys were barefoot and wearing hand-me-down swim trunks made of old cut-off pants, Truman had shown up in a bright red Hawaiian shirt, white pool sandals, and baby-blue designer swim trunks that his mother had sent him from a trip she’d taken to Florida.
Nelle thought she was going to die of embarrassment. When Edison tried to touch Truman’s shirt, Tru playfully swatted his hand away. “Don’t touch! Just admire with your eyes like everyone else.” He winked at Edison, then whispered, “Now follow me.”
Edison smiled and followed along.
Truman was undersize for his age, but he held that big head of his high and proceeded toward Nelle with as much style as a fancy prince from Monaco—much to everyone’s wide-eyed amazement. Nelle was sure the boys would drag him into the mud with Edison, but nobody said a thing—their jaws were stuck on the ground.
“Why be normal when you can have fun?” he said as he and Edison waded up to Nelle. “That’s how we do it in New Or-leeeens.”
They made for quite a picture—the little prince, the tomboy, and the gangly black kid who imitated things. For now, it would pass for excitement in Monroeville.
Only Truman could turn a sleepy Saturday upside down.