Rolla
Jennifer Riley
Dinnertime.
With his sweetheart Viola and courtin’ on his mind, Rolla White studied his face in the clouded mirror. He was a decorated war hero, 22nd Infantry, but would that help when he went to courtin’?
He scraped his hair over his forehead. He surveyed the result, didn’t like it, made a scalpel of the comb, dragged it over his scalp, attempted a side part just so. He stepped back, looked again. “Tck.” Began again.
He tried one final time. At last. He nodded into the mirror, certain the 22nd Infantry would approve. He went to the kitchen in time to see his mother pull a pan of cornbread out of the stove and smile at him. He nodded to his father, brother, baby sister, and grandmother as he wrestled his chair back.
“Dinnertime, Rolla,” Mother said. “Gotta eat before you walk to Viola Symmington’s. I won’t have you eatin’ there.” The cast iron pan clattered on the table.
“Hoo, he and Viola will warm it up,” James said from his place across from Rolla’s seat at the oak table.
“James, leave your brother alone,” Mother said. “Help yourself to the ham, James, then pass it to Grandma. More pork chops? More sliced tomatoes? Collards, take some and pass them. Grandma, pass Rolla the butter and, Rolla, pass the butter around the table. Everbody’s drinkin’ buttermilk tonight.”
“James and I churned this morning,” said Grandma White.
Father nodded, “Good. James is becoming a man. Takin’ Rolla’s place soon.” He piled a small heap of collard greens. “Passa cider vinegar, please.”
Through the open back door, Rolla heard frogs cranking into their own full-throated courting, seeking partners. Courtship drifted from the backyard through the screen door and into the kitchen, where Rolla’s family gathered to sit for dinner.
He pulled back his chair and sat at a forty-five-degree angle, poised to bolt through the front door as soon as the meal was over. As he stroked butter onto his first piece of cornbread, in his imagination he saw the slab of oak he’d make into his own table, his and Viola’s. He caught Grandma looking at him. Grandma White nodded at him and said to his siblings, “James and Susanna White, mind your manners.”
“Passa cornbread again,” Rolla said and added, “please. Butter. Thank you. Cornbread, best in the county.” Rolla lathered another piece of cornbread with butter churned today. Underneath the table, his toes in polished shoes tapped up and down but he kept his feet still, didn’t fidget, as he tried to improve his manners. He was no longer a 22nd Infantry demolition soldier, and needed to up his manners to go courtin’. James pushed him the fried pork chop platter. Rolla tucked his dinner napkin into his collar. He caught his dad looking at him and wondered if his dad would understand improving table manners during courtship. Rolla thought again of the 22nd Infantry. Should be good enough for Viola’s father to approve me courting Viola. Sure it would be. And that wasn’t all. He had that oak slab picked out, planed, polished, and ready to be his table, his and Viola’s. He cleared his throat. “Thanks for fixin’ a good dinner, Ma.” He lifted his glass and drank buttermilk.
“Like?” James said. “You mean ‘love.’” James warbled in delight while hiding his laugh behind his napkin. “Love,” he said again in a trill of half-step notes. To distract James, Grandma pointed to his napkin then made a downward motion James dared not ignore.
“Buttermilk,” said his mother, “fresh this morning. Drink up.”
“You need buttermilk before courtin’,” James said, and smooched the air, smoothing his napkin across his lap.
“Hush,” said Rolla.
“Hush,” said Grandma and Mother.
“Take your time, Rolla,” Father said. “Too early in the evening to go courtin’ anyway.” He glanced at James and Rolla in one stroke. Rolla knew his brother wouldn’t dare snigger or smile when their father spoke. Grandma nodded and patted Rolla’s hand.
Rolla split a second piece of cornbread. Buttered it. “It’s good, Ma,” he said again. He saw her look at his father and he wondered, how had courtship been for them.
“Eat more than just cornbread, Rolla. It’s a walk to Chestnut Street.” Ma passed him collard greens. Rolla heaped collard greens over his plate and reached for the cider vinegar. He caught his mother’s eye.
“’Scuse me, didn’t mean to reach.” He thought, Can’t be nervous already, 22nd Infantry. Grandma smiled. Mother nodded once. Father didn’t look up. James puffed out his chest trying too hard not to giggle. The baby sister lowered her head and made smacking noises. Out the backdoor, frogs continued chirping, seeking courtship.
After three more bites, Rolla pushed back the chair and stood up. “Thanks, be going now.” He thought he sounded like a nervous man in his own house; stop it. He nodded to the rest of his family and silently blessed them. James looked ready to burst with a hiccup and cough to hide the giggles.
Courtship. The awkward moment in every man’s life. Had 22nd Infantry been this scary? Maybe. Rolla thought briefly about his mother and father’s courtin’ time. Then he grabbed his cap and stopped one more time in the doorway to look at his family, all sitting at the table.
Father kept his head lowered to feed scraps to the hound. Grandma fed the baby from her plate. James pulled a face. Ma got up and followed Rolla to the front door.
“You look nice, Rolla.” She smoothed down the collar of his best shirt. “Aunt Mina’s has already put in a good word for you with the Symmingtons.”
“Tck, I wish women folk would mind their business,” Rolla mock-wailed, as he kissed his mother’s cheek. “’Bye, Ma.” Secretly he was grateful. He tipped his cap to her.
“Rolla, tell the Symmingtons we’ll see them in church this Sunday. Courtship isn’t the end of the world,” Ma said.
Rolla nodded. “I’ll tell them you said hello. If they need help plowing their next field, they can let me know.”
Rolla knew the way to the Symmingtons’ house. Just last fall, he’d helped clear stumps and rocks from a new field Mr. Symmington wanted cleared, and Rolla hadn’t taken any pay for it either. That and his time in the 22nd, they ought to make him good enough for any man’s daughter.
The walk offered him a few more minutes to practice his speech, almost like a prayer now. Pray every day. He walked past the churchyard. Under his breath, “Mr. Symmington, could I pay court and come to see your daughter? Ask her out of an evening? I’m asking for your permission, sir.” Rolla had designed the words and the expression on his face. What he’d do with his hands. He was confident of his statement, as confident as three years of high school, the 22nd Infantry, Demolition Division, his handiwork skills, and working season after season on various farms could make him. His family was upstanding citizens, finest people in the town. Preacher Bob told them so every Sunday as they exited the church. Rolla took one last secret feel of his cap, his shirt collar, his shirt front, best he could manage, and headed toward the Symmington house on the next street. He saw success blooming around him in the evening air. With her father’s permission, Rolla could court sixteen-year-old Miss Viola Symmington.
Shank of the Evening, Reckonings
“One more time, don’t come near my daughter Viola. She’s too young for you. I appreciate the 22nd Infantry, but you’re a man of the world,” said the father, edging even closer to Rolla and whipping his finger in Rolla’s face. “Plus, our family is of the merchant class. What’s your family, son?”
Symmington and Rolla had excused themselves from the front parlor to the railroad tracks that ran across Center Street, out of the hearing range of everyone else. Man-to-man conversations took place at the railroad tracks. Iron will and iron horses. Power, iron rails, spikes and steam.
“My family are farmers and proud of it, sir.” Rolla looked Old Man Symmington right in both eyes. In his past, Rolla had pinned his knife through eyes meaner than those. “I’d take care of Viola, sir. Treat her with respect.” Rolla’s chin almost touched Old Man Symmington’s chin in a lover’s nudge. They could have rolled a cigarette between their chins and noses.
“Don’t come near Viola. Don’t ask me again.” Old Man Symmington spat and turned his back on Rolla. Rolla stood up two inches taller and started calculating firepower.
Almost Midnight
Boom. The dynamite Rolla White used forced apart wooden planks, iron nails and propelled them skyward. Small flames babbled like tongues and grew. Smoke roiled skyward. The Symmington General Store shelves blew up, blasted their treasures with them. Cans of Clabber Girl baking powder, pepper, salt, cloves, cinnamon, crocks of pickles, the cracker barrel, the bag and string holder, the counter, the Indian cigar statue, chewing tobacco, bolts of fabric, planking, OXO soup, George Mugridge & Sons Biscuits, J.G. Ivers & Son Steam Bakery, fishing tackle, coffee pots, the cash register, the telegraph key, all blasted outward and upward. Debris whirled skyward, telescoped outward to blacken the evening.
Rolla enjoyed the sight for a few seconds. He thought the 22nd Infantry might not approve, but his heart was black and broken. Then he sensed townspeople waking up coming outside to look, starting toward the scene, scattering in first waves of panic but then summoning the volunteer fire department.
I served in the 22nd Infantry, he thought, but I’m not good enough to court Viola Symmington. I’m not good enough for her father, on this late Day of Our Lord, June 17, 1867. He had never thought he’d be denied the pleasure of courting Viola Symmington. His heart was broken into more dirty pieces than the explosion he created.
All the contents of the Symmington General Store, all blown to smithereens in a skyward blast of anger, youth, and denial. Rolla turned his back. Who would he tell first? Words failed him again as people pushed past him to see the commotion. He kept walking, oblivious to spraying as the boom settled itself back into a harrumph over the astonished town as he walked away.
I had an itch to hitch, Rolla thought, still walking toward Preacher Bob’s house. No more. He opened the churchyard gate and then closed it. Then he thought of what had been his last act as a free man in his parents’ house: pushing open the screen door and saying good-bye to his mother.
The fire bell was clanging now. Men were stumbling over each other, vying to be first to put out the fire, yelling, turning, twisting, a human flame struggling for direction, panic before purpose in the only general store in the county.
“Nothing to put out,” Rolla said, squared his shoulders and marched up the stone path. Ma had said they’d see who on Sunday? Oh, yeah, by Sunday he’d be dead or in jail.