Mr. Joe stepped in, along with Daddy and the youngins, as soon as I said it. This was a completely unplanned moment. Why did it have to be so dramatic?

Ray continued. “I want you to know when I go to basic training, I’ll only be gone for ten weeks. I’m waiting until the spring to enlist and timing it around you. When I finish that up, the recruiter has already let me know I’m going to an AIT school—an Advanced Individual Training school for chaplain assistants. I’ll be in Fort Jackson, South Carolina for that. Soon enough, I’m going to get down on my knee in front of God and our families, and I’m going to ask you to be my wife. And if you say yes to me, I’ll take care of you and love you for the rest of your life.”

Daddy huffed. “She ain’t but a baby. You are moving too fast here, Ray.”

Mrs. Sunshine got up, and I scooted in closer to Ray. He squeezed my hand, and I blinked back the tears. I stared intently at the picture of Jesus taking control of the sea, so I could remove myself from the moment and get on that boat with him. Take this whirlpool in my soul and ease it, Lord. In my peripheral, I could see Daddy calculating. Knowing him, we were probably gonna flee with the youngins before the stroke of midnight. Talk about a Cinderella story about to happen to a poor sista. I wondered if I should make my Converse somehow fall off now, but the laces were too dang tight for me to try to pull it off without making a scene.

“God had a way of bringing you here to our family,” Mrs. Sunshine said. “Ray is a good man. He will take care of your baby, and we will take care of each other.”

I interrupted. “Stop while you’re ahead, Mrs. Sunshine. I know you mean well and all, but—”

Bean shouted, “Your baby will probably be ended up called Asparagus, because Daddy is gonna to whip your—”

Daddy bellowed, startling me. “Bean, hush it now.”

I cried, “He’s not asking me to marry him because I’m having a baby for him. I haven’t kissed this boy yet, and he loves me. Daddy, he’s saying all this to let me know that I have a future with him.”

We all had a chance to make it here. I knew it was our time. I felt it in the new song bursting forth right from my inner spring.

Daddy held out his arm. “We best be going now to The Home, Mrs. Sunshine.”

He emphasized those words like he thought I needed a refresher course on where I came from. He was going to go and mess this up for me, for us. After all our years on the road, we could finally be who we were without condemnation or fear, and here he was going to pull that map out anyway. Now the veil was lifted, and I recognized a good thing when it held my hand. I had to fight this one out.

Daddy’s eyes were suddenly bloodshot, as if he was trying to hold in his blood pressure. I wondered if eyeballs could actually pop out of a person’s head?

He signaled us. “The kids have an early morning. Thank you again for everything today. I’ll see you bright and early, too. I have to get used to all this growing-up stuff. Thanks again.”

Mrs. Sunshine and Mr. Joe said their goodbyes to Maize, Bell, and Bean. I could see how much Mr. Joe and Mrs. Sunshine had taken to them, and I knew somehow, we would have to make it here, regardless of Daddy’s bad attitude or closed-up sensibilities. We could make it fine—even without him, if we had to.

I pointed to the Wal-Mart bags of school supplies and the purple-lid tote. Each one of us got a bag, including Ray. We left out the back way, through the big, wooden fence, to circle back around the block to the place we called home. The way Daddy had said it to Mrs. Sunshine still rang in my ears like a clanging cymbal.

Was he going to tear us down when we were starting to build up? He could have said something like, “Let’s mosey on down to the home place, youngins,” or, “We best be getting to our house that we pay bills for.” Maybe even, “Let’s go home.” Not with a capital The in front of it.

Maize would crack under this. I felt his emptiness resonating off him like humidity. Why couldn’t Daddy sense it? If Daddy hadn’t figured it out, Maize had my back, and right about now he was about to jump over it and get to Daddy for embarrassing me like that in front of Ray and his people. The kids couldn’t contain themselves, peeking through bags, already claiming folder colors. Ray and I didn’t speak, just stole glances at each other when we could. Maize held my hand all the way back. He was on the verge of falling without a net. Maize, please hold on. Please, a little more. We’ve got this. God’s got you.

When we made it back, Daddy ordered all bags dropped in a pile in the center of the floor. He grabbed my hand in one of his hands, Ray’s arm in the other, and shut the door. I knew what this meant: another showdown on the rooftop. I could hope and pray. And God did answer them prayers—even from me.

Once we were on the rooftop, Daddy growled, “You’re talking about a future with a family that ain’t got no roots, no foundation, and no present. You stop filling up Sweet Potato’s head like that. She doesn’t deserve to be hearing that. You go running off, and the next pretty thing you see you be all in love with that, too.”

Ray stood strong. He found my hand and did not let it go. “Don’t worry about me, Mr. Jones. I will do right by your daughter. I will do right by your family.”

“Doing right by my daughter will be leaving us right alone.”

He turned to me, and I knew. I got the shuddering in my system, the blinds dropping straight down with a loud thud and a lock. “We gonna be moving on soon. You know that. You know the date.”

Ray spoke life into a hopeless situation. “It doesn’t have to be like that this time, sir.”

Daddy’s voice was grave. “We’ve got twenty weeks here, Ray. Well, we’ve got eighteen now, since we’ve already stayed on here a full two. You need to know that. You are talking about a spring planting season, and we ain’t making it to then. We’ll be out by the first frost.”

“They are good people, Daddy,” I said. “We can make it here, if you would just try. Those kids deserve more than uprooting all the time. It takes time for us to till, to cultivate. We need some patience. Maize’s drying up, Daddy. This is it for him. I’m telling you now, and you better listen.”

He frowned. “What you mean is you need some time. You need some time with this boy. Well, somehow this boy has it fancy in his head that he’s gonna take care of you. That’s my job is to take care of you, and you might not always have agreed with my decisions, but I’ve done my best.”

I bit my tongue until it was bleeding. Not once had I ever gone against Daddy. Fundamentally, he was a good man. He was fair to us kids, always there for us. He’d kept us together when he could have very easily given us over to Mr. and Mrs. Foster. But then again, he dragged us around like little sacks of potatoes and couldn’t seem to see what he had done to us, to the very core of us.

It was taking a mighty hard toll on us, especially on Maize. He was the youngest of us all, inside—even compared to Bell, who had an old, singing soul. Bean was probably falling right in step with Maize, poor kid, but Bell and me, we’d survive. Bell had that internal voice, a ringing that would save her spirit. I had the Lord all rooted up and down in me, and now that I found Ray, I knew without a doubt I’d survive. But wasn’t life more than just surviving? I felt that now. I’d had a little taste of some good food, and I knew there was more than the gruel we’d been fed. A whole bushel and a peck of opportunity was waiting for me. I could taste it right on the tip of my bleeding tongue.

This was a perfect place to become a garden. Daddy had to believe it. I had to make Daddy see. If Mrs. Sunshine said she could look into my eyes and see the peace and faith of Jesus, I could somehow make Daddy see that Newport News was the place where he’d finally claim his own home sweet home.

My eyes dried up. I squeezed Ray’s hand to let him know that I had my composure back. I was ready to do this thing.

“I believe in you, Daddy. I believe God will sort us all out. Don’t go worrying about me. We’ve been living in a mighty hurricane with the winds a-blowing us in all different directions, but I feel the hand of Jesus stretching right over our heads and calming us right down to where we can breathe. That wind won’t take my breath anymore. I don’t give it power to do so.”

Daddy usually heard me. I hoped he comprehended me properly, this time.

He exhaled deeply, and his shoulders relaxed. “Go on ahead, Ray. I’ll see you in the morning, hear?”

“Yes, sir. See you in the morning.”

He turned to me. “I’ll see you after school, Sweet Potato. I’ll be praying you have a good day.”

“We’re gonna need all the prayers we can get.”

Ray said, “We’ll start calling the Assembly for a prayer chain.”

Ray turned to Daddy and told him about the Monday men’s group and how it would be a good time for Maize and Bean, too. Bell could come with me to the restaurant on those evenings and we could care for her there, or she could join the choir practice that was always going on at the church. Ray had seen this place, and he didn’t want them kids here no longer than necessary, either.

It wasn’t just about me, after all. He truly was thinking about my little ones. I so didn’t deserve this.

Daddy nodded once. He’d be there. Daddy was raised to never turn down a church invitation. Thank God for his rest-in-peace momma for teaching him that one good thing and passing it to us youngins, because that was something we had to look forward to along our broken-up roads. We could seem to always find us a church to call our own, even if it was only for a spell. And the Assembly Revival could be more than church for us. One day at a time, I could fight for this life.

I remembered the tiny, scrolled writing on the bottom of the Soul Food menu as clearly as I could feel the touch of Ray’s fingertips circling my palms. I whispered to Ray, “‘This is the day that the Lord hath made …’”

Daddy exhaled deeply. “I know this one. ‘Let us rejoice and be glad in it.’”

Ray grinned that special way when the talk turned to the Lord. “I’ll seek the Lord, and the Lord will not fail us. Even in all of this.”

Daddy clapped Ray on the back as we made our way down the hallway, stopping him before our room. “So, you really going to be a preacher one day?”

He smiled. “I knew it from a boy of twelve that I was called by the Lord, sir. I’ve been waiting on Him to get me there.”

Daddy laughed. “To see ‘First Lady Sweet Potato’ on that billboard …” He sighed deep again. “I guess that could make a daddy proud. Just would have never thought it to be so.”

When Ray left us, and the kids were all packed up right proper, layered up and color-coordinated with their uniforms neatly folded beside the bags, I prayed aloud in thanksgiving for the giving hearts of the Assembly and Mrs. Sunshine. I took the flashlight and shone it right on Bell.

She jumped off the bunk, clapping her hands and shaking her little head. Her bare feet shuffled across the cool, tiled floor in a tap-dance frenzy. “My turn?”

Daddy settled down in his cot, and the rest of us gathered on the floor at his feet. We could get a front row with Bell, and it was a special occasion. We found joy and comfort in church. We held each other up in the times of pain and hurtful rejection that society threw at us. And we loved the sound of that girl’s voice more than any other sound on the face of God’s green earth. When Bell sang, we heard it with all the layers of a symphony in the background. The way she would start soft, then build it up—we’d be on top of a mountain somewhere, soaring. Not in The Home. Not in poverty. Just soaring. As we would hum along or softly sing her backup, we all knew that Bell would be famous one day, on a stage with bright lights. We were sure of that. One day, when it came to pass, it would be a special occasion, indeed.