I find it peculiar that one person’s decision can affect another person’s life even when they don’t know each other from Adam’s cat to begin with. Take Buck Jenkins’s daddy. He came to Cold Rock looking for work and better pay in the carpet mills that sprung up all over Dalton. We had plenty of chicken processing plants, too, but Mr. Jenkins got a better opportunity at one of the mills. So when I was fifteen, Buck and his family moved here, and he turned perfectly normal girls into ones that drooled. They huddled in groups along the halls when he walked past and whispered they could live on his knee-quiver good looks and wide-shouldered body forever. Never need food again. Seemed rather silly, but they were older and popular, so I agreed with them. Mama said, “Only fools live on love, and they don’t live long.”
Course, I was crazy for Buck, too. I just never drooled over him, not at school anyway. Why bother? He wasn’t about to notice me back, but I made up for it at home. I couldn’t stop talking about him. Every other word that came out of my mouth had his name attached to it.
“Buck, Buck, Buck,” Mama said. “You sound like a chicken.”
“He’s perfect for me, Mama.”
“His kind chases everything that grows breasts,” she said.
“I hope not,” I said. “That’s a big percentage of the population.”
“He thinks he looks like Elvis,” Rebecca said.
“He does!” I said. “He even has his hair.”
“That’s the only thing he has,” Rebecca said. “That, and a high opinion of himself.”
“You should see an eye doctor,” I said. “You need your eyes examined.”
“You should see a psychologist,” she said. “You need your head examined!” she answered.
“Keep it up!” Mama said, “You ain’t, neither one of you, gonna see daylight.”
She had a hammer in her hand. She was cracking up kernels for some type of jam that called for brandy and planned on selling out of it at the fall festival that next week.
“All this racket. I can’t hear myself count. No telling how many tablespoons of brandy I put in this prune conserve.” She studied on it for a minute and then tossed in two more tablespoons.
“This better be right or they’ll all wind up drunk on their ears.”
Rebecca and I got out of there before she put us to work pitting prunes and sterilizing jars. Mama worked on her jam, and I worked on making myself look like Priscilla Presley, thinking I might get Buck’s attention. I even bought two magazines that had some real pretty pictures of her in them. I showed Mama the one I liked best and asked if I could dye my hair black like Priscilla’s. According to Rebecca, mine was mousy brunette, and that was when she was being kind. Otherwise it was baby-turd brown. Mama said, “You turn your hair that color, and I’ll turn your other end a color to match.” So it didn’t work out. The store wouldn’t give me my money back, either. I told the lady there I hadn’t read any of the articles, just looked at the pictures, and folks do that right there in her store all the time to see if they want to buy them.
“And I got a store policy once they do,” she said.
“And what is that?”
“Posted right there on the rack.” I went over and stood on my tiptoes and read the card taped to the top shelf. No loitering, no food, no drink, no refunds.
“Well, thank you very much anyways,” I said and hurried to get out of there before my cheeks turned red as Rudolph’s nose. I hated that almost as much as I hated cabbage. It felt like a lit match was being held too close to my skin. It happened a lot. Other times, my face wasn’t bad. I had black-brown eyes shaped like the moon, and thank goodness to gracious, Mama’s turned-up nose. Pa’s was the size of a hawk and near shaped like one, too. Not one of us girls got that nose. Mama said it was a miracle. Pa said she had nightmares every time she got pregnant. Mama said no wonder. “I was scared silly I’d have boy babies sprouting button noses and girl ones with beaks.”
“Praise the Lord,” Mama told us she shouted when each of us was born. “I ain’t asking for nothing else so long as I live!”
I left the drugstore thinking up other ways I might get Buck’s attention. Seeing as all the girls were after him, I only had to compete with fifty-nine others, if I didn’t count Rebecca and Clarissa, which I didn’t, since Rebecca wasn’t interested; she had just met Riley, the one she later ran off with. And I didn’t count Clarissa, because we had an honor pact that we wouldn’t go for the same boy at the same time for as long as it took us to find one.
I couldn’t come up with a way to get Buck to notice me, so I stopped trying and let the others chase after him. Not to say I stopped caring. I just watched and studied from the sidelines. You can learn a lot about a person doing that. When Buck groomed his hair, which was basically whenever he breathed, he’d do it with two quick snaps of his wrist, his lips pursed together and his chin jutting out a bit. Then he’d dangle his index fingers in his back pockets and saunter along, his knees flexed, his hips lagging behind like they were bones worthy of worship and would catch up with the rest of him once the girls took proper notice. Looked so silly. But you know, sometimes it even got to me.
Buck treated Jackson High like his own personal flower garden. That was irritating, but the girls didn’t care. They just lined up, begging to be plucked. I never lined up, but I was hopeful, and eventually he got around to me. Rebecca said he just ran out of girls.
“You’re the only one left he ain’t gone steady with. You better watch it,” she said. When he asked me if I wanted to wear his ring, I asked if he was asking for a joke.
“I’m asking for real,” he said, and I said yes quicker than you can blink. Buck paid me so much attention and gave me so many compliments Mama said to be careful which ones I believed. My head was liable to swell up and I’d look like a freak. Overnight, everything changed for me. I was somebody. Even the girls at school took notice of me, which gave me a new appreciation of myself. It’s sad to think it took a boy liking me to help me like myself, but that’s how it was, so why lie? When I looked in the mirror, a different me looked back. My skin was pale and pink and smooth. Before, I’d thought it was flat and blank and pasty. Buck said my face was almost his favorite part.
“But I got two spots further down to consider,” he joked. I smacked him in the arm for that. I was very self-conscious about my breasts. They didn’t stop growing till they were the size of cantaloupes. The only bras the stores had that fit me were ones with four hooks in the back. They looked like armor. Once, this fat kid, Luke Bertram, snapped it. I thought a slingshot had slung me into a wall, and I turned around to see who fired it. I took to wearing undershirts over them after that, so no one could see the outline of those dumb looking brassieres through my blouses.
But it was heaven having Mama’s creamy skin and dimpled smile. People at church said, “She could have spit you out whole!” True, I wasn’t anywhere near as pretty as Rebecca or some of the girls in school, but I wasn’t ugly anymore, either. I had a hard time understanding it at the time, since the year before, and the ones before that, I’d been pitiful. Mama said, “You were a little bud is all, Adie, and now you bloomed.”
Buck spent all of his growing up years in Hog Gap, which sat on the top end of the Blue Ridge Mountains of north Georgia. Cold Rock was on the south end and not near as isolated. If they’d taken the time and money to build a road through Cold Rock Mountain, Daddy said the towns wouldn’t be but thirty miles apart. But they didn’t, and you had to drive clear around the mountain to get from one to the other, about a hundred miles.
Buck’s daddy, Mr. Jenkins, took to going to the VFW dances every Saturday night. He never took Buck’s mama with him, and he met this woman Norma, who served the beer there, and eventually run off with her. Buck said she was pretty much a looker.
“Daddy never could pass up one of them.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Oh, he’s been carrying on with women ever since I was old enough to notice they’re different than men.”
That should have given me fair warning that getting mixed up with a beau like Buck, who came from a pa who didn’t put much stock in being loyal, would be a sure road to misery, but I didn’t understand the connection at the time.
“This the first one he run off with,” Buck said. “Crossed the line this time.” Most of the people in town were busy exercising their tongues, something they did real regular. You’d think they enjoyed other folk’s misery. I felt right bad for Buck’s mama. But then I hadn’t met her yet. When I did, truth be told, I wondered why his pa never left sooner. “She likes being a long-suffering woman,” Buck said. “Looong-suffering. But I ain’t gonna tell you all my pa put her through, so don’t ask.”
I nodded like I understood everything he was saying, and I certainly didn’t know much of anything concerning the matter. Didn’t even think about the fact that the sins of the father mostly plant their seeds in the hearts of the son.
“You know, whenever Pa dallied before, he usually come back the next day; if not then, at least a day or two later. Ma’d just wait it out, let him get whoever it was out of his system. She was used to it. This time he ain’t come back. It’s killing her.”
“Maybe this Norma lady’s the kind takes longer,” I said.
“Takes longer for what?”
“For her to get out of your pa’s system.”
“Maybe so,” Buck said.
But weeks went by and Buck’s pa never showed up. His ma got tired of the long part on the suffering. She told Buck they should move on back to Hog Gap. That was about the time Buck took me home to meet her. It was right after he asked me to go steady and I said yes. He gave me his ring to wear, and I had two miles of yarn wrapped around it so it wouldn’t slide off my finger. Buck picked me up and we drove out to where they lived on the edge of town. It was a tiny place, smaller than ours even, but there was only the three of them by then—Buck, his brother Austin, and his mama—so they made do. Austin was a couple years older than Buck. He near died right before they first come to Cold Rock. Talk was a man beat him in the head with a shovel, but for some reason, no one ever did anything about it.
“It’s bad,” Buck said. “Got hisself a baby’s brain. Just don’t stare at him though. Makes Ma mad.”
“Oh, I’d never do that,” I said.
“I told Ma I was bringing ya by.”
“Think she’ll like me okay?”
“Hard to tell. She ain’t never liked nobody else I brought home.” Buck had his arm around me and was driving one-handed.
“Maybe this isn’t a good time for me to meet her,” I said and sat up straight and turned toward him. “We should wait until Austin gets better.”
“Adie,” Buck said, “Austin ain’t getting better.” He glanced over at me. “Ever.”
“Oh,” I said. “I’m sorry. Still—”
“This as good a time as any.”
“Maybe we should think on this a bit,” I said. “She’s only got you, now.”
Buck pulled into a driveway riddled with potholes, where a brand new baby blue Thunderbird sat, looking right peculiar next to a run-down house.
“Too late. We’re here,” Buck said.
Verna Jenkins was standing on the cement stoop waiting on us. She was tall and large-boned like Buck, and I saw right off he had her nose. He had her eyes, too. Only Buck’s were large and brown as a Black Angus bull. Verna’s were the same color, but they were small and beady. Looked like they’d fit better on one of them pit bull dogs. I got a bad shiver just looking at her.
She shook my hand when Buck introduced us. It got lost in hers and she clamped down hard. I wanted to rub my knuckles when she finally let go, but I thought better of it. She looked like the type that might take offense.
“This is Adie,” Buck said.
Verna wiped her liver-spotted hands on her apron, which struck me as something she maybe should have done before we shook hands, seeing as now I had something sticky on mine. Then she put her hands on her hips and looked me over good with her lips pinched together tight. She didn’t say anything. So I said, “How do, Miz Jenkins. Please to meet you.” She nodded.
“I brought you a jar of jam.” I held it out to her. “It’s real good. Mama sold every one of them at the festival last year except for this one. Has some brandy in it. Hope you don’t mind. Daddy said it all gets cooked down so it won’t make you drunk or nothing.” I was so nervous I couldn’t get my mouth to shut up. Verna took hold of the jar, turned it over, and read Mama’s hand-printed label.
“Prune Conserve,” she said. “What’s it for, constipation?”
“Oh no, ma’am,” I said. “It’s for toast.” Verna tossed her head back and laughed.
“Told you she was something, Ma,” Buck said. I guess she liked me okay. She didn’t say anything to make me think otherwise, just opened the screen door and motioned me on in. “I got to feed Austin,” she said. “Have a seat.” She pointed to a chrome kitchen chair with gray plastic upholstery that had seen better years. She sat down at the table next to a full-grown man who resembled Buck. He was tied to the chair with a jump rope.
“Time to eat, Austin. Open up; I ain’t got all day,” she said and spooned in a tablespoon of puréed yellow food that looked to be squash, but could have been sweet potatoes. Austin gagged, and the glob she’d pushed in fell out on his stubbly chin. It was real sorrowful. He was wearing a giant bib made from a cotton terry towel. Verna was hand-feeding him like an infant, and the poor fella needed a shave. She scooped up the mush he’d spit out and shoved it back in.
“Eat, Austin,” she said. He swallowed hard and that lumpy glob of yellow goop disappeared. He spit it out a second time, twisted his mouth wide open, and rubbed his eyes with his fists. I watched him cry like a baby that had lost his bottle.
“Stop that now!” she said and took the corner of the huge bib tucked around his neck and wiped his mouth.
Austin pulled away and shoved the bowl of food off the edge of the table. I caught it before it hit the floor but most of it landed in my lap. I scooped it up best I could and put it back in the bowl. It was cold.
“Here.” Verna handed me a dishcloth. “Wipe yerself off. There’s soap and water in the sink bowl.” Austin was crying and banging the table with one fist and chewing on his other.
“He might would eat this better, ma’am,” I said, “if it were heat up a bit, don’t you think?”
Verna gave me a look instead of an answer, and I’m sure, not her best one. Any chance I had of endearing myself to her went to the dogs along with the puréed supper she’d tried to feed Austin. She grabbed the bowl out of my hands and plopped it on the floor. One of her feet sent it sliding over to the hounds. They liked it fine.
“How old’re you, girl?” Verna asked me.
“Seventeen,” I said. “Well, almost.”
“So, yer sixteen?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Too young for my boy. He’s near a man. What’s your daddy letting you see a grown man for? Ain’t you been brought up right?”
“Oh yes, ma’am. I’ve been brought up fine,” I said. “How old’s Buck anyway?” I already knew he was seventeen. At least that’s what he told me.
“Eighteen come July.” It was March.
“Well, he don’t act it,” I said. “My pa might not have noticed.”
“Hhmff!” she said and got herself a bottle of ginger ale from their icebox. I waited, hoping she might offer me one. Guess they were out, because she didn’t.
“Why don’t you two gals get acquainted,” Buck said. “I got me some things to take care of.”
“Tie Austin in his swing out back ’fore you go,” Verna said.
Buck guided Austin outside. He waddled like a toddler who’d just learned to walk. Buck held his hand and coaxed him along. He was so tender with him my eyes smarted.
“We’re gonna go swing, Austin,” he said. “Come on. Gonna go swing!” Austin was all smiles. Some noises come up from his throat I couldn’t make sense of. Not really words, not even baby ones, just grunts and grumbles. Gibberish. Fancy a beating doing that to a perfectly good brain.
“Come ’ere,” Verna said and motioned to me. I got up from the chair and stood still as night changing into day. Verna turned me around and studied my parts like they were pieces of fabric that might make a good quilt, if they were cut up and put together right. Buck came back in from the yard.
“He’s good for an hour at least,” he said. “Sure loves that dang swing. It ain’t even moving. Just drags his feet in the dirt and grins, like it’s getting ready to.” Buck shook his head sideways. Verna still had hold of my arm.
“I think my ma’s expecting me home about now,” I said.
“She is, or she isn’t. Which is it?” Verna asked.
“She is, ma’am,” I said.
“Then you don’t need to think it. Say it.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said.
“We just got here,” Buck said. “Yer ma didn’t say nothing about you having to come right home.”
My ears turned red. Verna let go of my arm and I sat down on the chrome chair once again.
“Here,” Verna handed me a wet rag from the sink. “Wipe that crap off the table. You hanging around, might as well make yerself useful.”
Buck took off, for where I had no idea, and left me there the rest of the day. When I got home I curled up on my bed and stuffed my face into my pillow. I didn’t want Rebecca to hear me crying and make some smart-aleck comment. Buck was the only boyfriend I’d had. No sense in her ruining it for me. Buck was having no trouble doing that on his own. I told myself things would get better. I just had to do a bit of adjusting, is all.
Buck taught me a lot. Stuff I’d been wondering about and should have asked Ma about, but didn’t. Then he got himself all stirred up one night and didn’t pause long enough for me to have a say so. Bang! I didn’t need to wonder anymore about what I’d been wondering.
Buck had a 1953 Chevy in pretty good shape that had these soft brown corduroy seats. It happened one night while we were parked out in the pasture behind his house. It was over before I could spit. Nothing much to it, really; I had more fun on the Octopus ride at the fair, even though I have never to this very day told Buck that. But he acted like he’d gone to heaven on a Harley the way he carried on. And he yelled out some God-awful things that make my cheeks red to this day just thinking on it. I wanted to tell someone about it. Rebecca seemed rightly the one, her having been married and being a mama to boot. She and Riley Jr. were still with us at the time while she worked and went to night school. I wanted to ask her if she thought I’d go to that special spot outside hell that Pa said girls go “if they do” before they were married. But every time I tried to get a conversation going, Rebecca would meander onto something else.
“I sure hope I’m not going to hell,” I told Buck.
“You going to hell, it ain’t on account of this,” he said.
“What if I get in a bad way—”
“Shoot,” Buck said. “You’re darn near still a virgin.”
“Well, Miz Avery in health class said sperm can swim right up a girl’s leg.”
“What?”
“She did. I promise you she did,” I said.
“That’s hogwash,” Buck said.
“You sure?”
“Pretty positive,” Buck said and nodded.
But Buck was wrong. Sperms could swim; at least his could. If I was near still a virgin, like he said, I was a pregnant one, and that was a fact.
Pa said he was going to put him in the ground. Mama said not until he marries her, you’re not. My folks were more upset than I’d ever seen them. Said I shamed them good.
“Can’t stay here no more,” Pa said. “You and Buck best git on back to where he come from.”
Mama said, “Probably best. Everybody will be talking about you, Adie.” Then she said it’s one thing not having any respect for myself or for them, but how could I just throw away my education?
“Rebecca quit school too!” I said.
“She waited till after she was married to do what you been up to,” Pa said. I wanted to tell him that wasn’t quite true. She’d been up to it, alright. She just never got pregnant till after they were married, is all. Instead, I told them I was sorry; I didn’t mean to shame them. I wanted another chance.
“I’ll never do it again,” I said.
“Adie, this ain’t something you can take back!” Mama said. “You’re a grown-up now.”
“But I haven’t had near enough time to learn half of what I need to be a real one!”
“Too late, now,” Mama said. “You take a drink, you gotta swallow.” Supper was over. Pa got up to head over to the Red Rooster.
“We was counting on you, Adie,” he said before he left.
I went upstairs and sat on my bed and cried, knowing my dreams would die on the windowsill with me not there to blow life into them. I wanted so badly to keep them, to give back those few minutes in the back seat of Buck’s car. In thirty seconds I was a grown-up, and I didn’t even know I was, till now. I looked in the mirror to see if it showed. The same face looked back. I started packing my things. Clarissa came in and helped fold what little I had.
“I’m gonna miss you,” she said.
“I miss you already,” I answered, and carried my bag downstairs to wait for Buck. Pa was still gone, but Mama came over and gave me a short hug. Her eyes were puffy and her nose was red.
“You do good, now, Adie,” she said. “Be a good wife and…and—” She patted my arm, took a tissue out of her apron pocket, wiped at her nose, and went into the kitchen. And that was that. I learned a lot about regrets that day.
Buck was late showing up. I left my suitcase on the front porch and went over and sat down on a small patch of grass under the magnolia tree to wait on him. Mama peeked out the window, one hand inching back the curtain. She let it fall back into place when she saw that I could see her. Buck was coming, wasn’t he? I had nowhere to go if he didn’t. I started getting more than a little bit nervous. Not able to sit still any longer, I walked to the side of the house and stood below the window I’d watched the trains out of each night. Mama took pride in her housework. The panes were spotless. They winked when the last of the sunlight hit the glass and bounced off their panels. It was eerie. I was no longer on the inside, and the windows watched me. My plans were trapped up there. They were right there on the sill where I left them. I blinked, and I shouldn’t have. They slipped over the edge and fell to the ground. They once had a strong voice. They said, “You have a bright future. You’ll make a difference. You’re going places.”
They lied. I got as far as the courthouse on Second and Main.