I stirred awake from a drugged slumber and realized I’d been shoveled into the back seat of Doc’s motorcar. The confused memories of Saint Joseph and medical journals, samples, bolted my sore body upright. My crumpled bonnet had been placed under my head.
As I leaned my head against the window, I felt a sickness crawl into my belly and rise high in my throat, the hazy blur of trees and road rushing by, dizzying.
Moaning, I curled back down onto the seat, my breath short and fast. Soon, I escaped in sleep.
The motorcar bumped over something, growled its engine, and I awoke, raised a crooked arm over my face, the daylight harsh and hurting my tender eyes.
Instantly, I held out my hand. It was bandaged up the length of my arm.
I pressed on the dressing and felt the tenderness. Unraveling the cloth, I traced the tracks of blood on my veins, the skin bruised and swelling, the ugly strap welts, raw and deep. “Wh-what did you do?” I pulled myself slowly up and leaned over the seat, the fear tightening my voice. “What—”
Doc turned his head partway toward me. “Ah, you’re awake. Good. Don’t worry, it won’t scar,” he said quietly, and then more pert, “You’ll be fine, dear.” He snapped his attention back to the road. “Fine as one can be with chocolate-colored blood, I reckon.”
Chocolate. I peered at my arm, picked up the cloth. Brown bloodstains riddled it.
“I’m sorry the nurses were rough with you, Bluet,” he said, “but it was important—very—and we’ll learn soon about your family’s blood and how we can fix it—fix you, my dear.”
I felt the spark of anger slip behind my eyes, prompting a headache. What I wanted most was to be okay as a Blue. I never understood why other people thought my color, any color, needed fixing.
“It’ll be wonderful to fix you, won’t it?”
Fix. Again, the chilling word caught in my throat, and I suddenly wished Mama had fixed my birth with some of her bitter herbs. Then I would’ve never had to suffer this horrid curse of the blueness. Still, Doc said it would be wonderful, and I couldn’t help but wonder what my and Pa’s life would be like if we were fixed. The confused thoughts made my head pound harder. I reached up and touched my neck, looked at my arms and leg, pressing for more tender spots. A cramp took hold low in my stomach and cut even lower.
“My innards. I’m…feeling cramps,” I said, too tired to be embarrassed.
“You’re fine. We took some blood and a sample of tissue from your cervix, a few skin scrapes from your scalp and the back of your shoulder, nothing that will harm or cause you permanent pain, and nothing that a good night’s rest with laudanum won’t fix.” He rattled a bag and pulled out a pear. “Aletha packed this and some cheese here. Would you like to eat something?”
“I ain’t hungry. It hurts, everything hurts.” I doubled over. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”
“Only for a bit. I promise. Listen, Bluet, we may be able to cure you, make you white. Wouldn’t you like that?” he asked gently and pulled the motorcar onto the side of the road.
Maybe there weren’t anything a Blue should like better than becoming normal like that, but the pain and fear left me shaken and crowded out those possibilities.
“It would be safer, my dear. When you’re white, you’ll never have to worry about the likes of Fraziers, or others who might want to do you serious harm or worse because of your looks.”
The words lay cold in my cramping belly. If I didn’t let Doc have his way, there would be worse pains coming for me and Pa. Many a colored have been hanged for less looped in my brain and left a fear in the pit of my belly.
From the front seat, Doc rummaged inside his medical bag and pulled out a small bottle and a brown dropper and handed them to me. “Take one drop now and two drops of the laudanum before retiring to bed tonight.”
It seemed like I had barely touched the dropper to my tongue, tasted, when my aches began easing. I inspected my arms more closely. The pokes and scratches weren’t nothing more than a nuisance.
Curious, and then surprised that I was okay, I corked Doc’s little brown bottle with the tiny plug and tucked it into my dress pocket while something bigger took hold in me.
“I need something to heal these scrapes,” I hinted.
“Oh, yes, yes you do.” He dug deeper into his satchel. “We wouldn’t want you ill.”
“No, sir,” I agreed. “And we ain’t had much food lately, and I get weak-kneed some—”
“Here, take this pear and cheese, and I’ll bring more soon—see that you get some blocks of cheese and bread.”
Blocks of cheese and bread! I almost clapped out a cheer.
“And here’s a bottle of rubbing alcohol, dear.” He handed me the bag and a larger bottle of the clear liquid. “And you can always use honey to dress the wound after you clean it with the alcohol,” he added, reached in again and pulled out a full bottle of honey. “I want you to be comfortable, to have everything you need.”
Any Kentucky woman know’d the worth of honey, that it was good for all sorts of ailments. It was just getting your hands on some that proved difficult.
Nearly forgetting the hospital and the harshness of the day, I clutched the prized bottles to my chest and managed to smile back before tossing it all into the soft belly of my bonnet. Soon, I grew drowsy and curled back down onto the seat.