Daddy was snuggling with Momma on the sofa and I was pretending to read the newspaper. But really, I was listening in on the two of them. Momma run her fingers through his black hair and played with the gray around his ears.
“Oh, it never felt so good,” said Daddy.
At first when Daddy come home I didn’t even notice the gray hairs. But soon I saw that me and him were starting to show some differences. Of course, my eyes was still blue like his and we had both lost weight, what with polio hitting me and the war taking so much out of him. But my hair was still as black as Daddy’s on the day he went off to fight.
Momma smoothed the gray hairs with her thumb. “You look so distinguished,” she teased. Her happy brown eyes crinkled into pretty comma shapes when she smiled.
“I have an idea,” said Daddy. “Why don’t you and me go out on the porch where we can get some peace and quiet?” He gave a little nod in the direction of my eight-year-old twin sisters. They were sitting on the floor, dressing their paper dolls. But the dolls seemed to be fighting over the same outfit.
Daddy pulled Momma to her feet and the two of them went outside. He let the screen door close real soft. But it seemed like every time he left the room we all felt it. Just as soon as they were gone, Ida looked up and said, “Where’s Daddy?”
“Yeah,” said Ellie. “Where’d he go?” She started gathering up the paper dolls.
“You leave them be,” I said. “Momma and Daddy got lots of catching up to do.”
To be honest, I wanted to follow them too. I wanted Daddy to pull me up and take me out on the porch. But I stayed in the armchair, reading the front page of the Hickory Daily Record. It said how hard we were bombing the Japanese and how we thought they would surrender any minute now—the same thing it said every day.
Sometimes my daddy was real interested in those stories, to hear if the war was about to end. But other times when I read the paper to him, he would change the subject or get up and leave. And I hated when he moved away from me.
I couldn’t keep my mind on the newspaper, so I folded it, stuffed it under my armpit, and reached for my crutches. I locked my leg brace and hoisted myself to my feet. Once I got to the sofa, I sat on the end closest to the window. I could hear a rocking chair going out there. Just one, so I knew Momma was sitting on Daddy’s lap, her head so close to his that her shiny brown hairs was mixed in with his darker ones. And I knew he was holding on to her like he thought she might leave him.
I knew just what they’d be seeing out there too, if they wasn’t so busy looking at each other. They’d see the dark outlines of trees in the yard, the mailbox at the end of our lane, and the deep blue shape of Bakers Mountain beyond that.
Suddenly the rocking stopped. “Listen,” Daddy said.
There was silence for a minute. Then Momma said, “I don’t hear anything.”
“I do,” said Daddy. “It’s so quiet I can hear the stars sparkle.” Momma giggled, and I heard him say again, real slow, “It never felt so good.”
I closed my eyes and thought how ever since I was a little girl it made me feel safe to see how my momma and daddy loved each other. Now, after more than a year of them being apart, I figured this was as perfect as it was going to get.
Ida and Ellie’s paper dolls were getting along again. They’d finally agreed on who got to wear that red party dress.
I wished I had a good book to read. But I stared at the pictures on the wall, the ones my brother Bobby had made before he got polio and went to Hickory’s emergency hospital. Bobby was four years old when Daddy went off to the war. He used to draw Daddy pictures of wild animals with his crayons. At the bottom of every one, in my handwriting, were these words: Good night. Sleep tight. Don’t let the bedbugs bite.
I just wrote what Bobby told me.
Now he was the one sleeping tight, down there in his grave under the mimosa tree in our side yard. Or maybe not. Probably he was up in heaven making those stars sparkle. Trying to bring some comfort to Daddy.
Ever since the war, comfort was something my daddy seemed to hanker after. He had a shoulder wound that brung him home earlier than we expected. But he never talked about it, and anyway I could tell he was looking for a different kind of comfort. The kind that made you feel safe on the inside, instead of sad or worried. The kind that reminded you of how life was before some disaster snuck up and knocked you off your feet.
I felt the same way. When Daddy was driving me home from the polio hospital he offered to celebrate by going to a diner. Any other time, I would’ve begged to eat in a restaurant. But I just wanted to get home. I needed home-cooked foods, and the sight of my momma’s wood cookstove, and our table set with chipped dishes.
I noticed right off that whenever Momma asked Daddy what he was hungry for, he’d say the same things every time. If it was morning he wanted biscuits and white gravy. Evenings he’d ask for mashed potatoes and brown gravy. And corn on the cob every chance he got.
And blackberries. My daddy was so happy for the taste of them. Naturally, I wanted to be wherever he was, so the first day he took a notion to pick I followed him across the dirt road that runs by our house. But I learned real quick that when you’re on crutches, picking blackberries is more than a notion. While he tramped through the field I sat in the side ditch and picked whatever I could reach.
Daddy wouldn’t let me work for more than thirty minutes because Dr. Gaul had said to save my best energy for my therapy. I had to do exercises every day to strengthen my muscles. And go to a clinic once a week so my doctor could check my progress. Polio had made my left leg real weak, and my left arm was weak too. Some of the muscles just didn’t want to work, so I practiced using other muscles to do their jobs.
I thought about Imogene Wilfong, my friend from the polio hospital. I wished I could see her at the clinic. But she lived in Greensboro, and anyhow she was colored. She’d probably have to go to her own doctor. They had broke the rules about segregation during the polio epidemic—as long as we was in contagious—but that didn’t mean they would keep on breaking them.
I’d got just one letter from her since I come home from the hospital a few weeks earlier. And it was in my pocket. I pulled it out.
Dear Ann Fay,
I got your letter about leaving the Charlotte hospital and your daddy coming home from the war. I know you’re happy!
I’m glad to be home, but I’m bored already. It wouldn’t be so bad if I could play ball with my brothers and sisters in the backyard. But I’m tired of being the referee. I’m counting the weeks until school starts.
Have you read any good books? I’m reading Blue Willow. It’s easy but I like it. It’s about a girl. Her family loses everything valuable except one blue plate with pictures that tell a story. The plate helps her believe that someday her family will have a real home again.
We got to have our dreams, don’t we?
Your friend,
Imogene
I folded the letter up and then took it back out and read it again. I thought about what Imogene said about dreams. Once, since I come home from the hospital, I dreamed about seeing her again. But then I woke up.
In real life I dreamed the same thing. So I asked my daddy about going to see Imogene. But his answer hadn’t changed since the last time I asked him. It’s best if folks stick with their own kind.
I sat there thinking how our polio hospital was willing to break the rules and put blacks and whites side by side during an emergency. And how the minute the crisis was over they thought it was so important to put everybody back in their places. You would think they would learn a thing or two from how good we got along. Not just me and Imogene, but others in the hospital too. We could do it again if they give us a chance!
All of a sudden, right in the middle of my Imogene thoughts, I heard the call of a bobwhite. I knew right off it was Junior Bledsoe asking for me. Junior is our neighbor—he’s eighteen years old. His daddy is dead, so it’s just him and his momma now. He done his best to look after us while Daddy was gone, even though I was almost fourteen then and Daddy had told me to be the man of the house.
I couldn’t leave the room without the girls noticing because my brace clicked every time I made a move. So I nudged Ida with my crutch. “I’m going out for some fresh air,” I said. “You keep right on doing what you’re doing.”
“We’re having a party,” Ida said.
“And I’m wearing the red dress,” said Ellie. She held her doll up for me to see.
“Well, aren’t you looking pretty!” I was already on my way out of the room.
The kitchen was dark, but I worked my way around the white shape of the table, the wood cookstove, and the refrigerator.
When I got to the back porch I answered with my own bobwhite whistle, then sat on the top step and waited for Junior.