There’d been two blocks of cheese, three loaves of bread, one jar of jam, four pieces of fruit, and a dozen small squares of molasses taffy in the food carton from Doc. I’d counted it three times and each time touching it all with shaky hands. In the distance, a church bell lifted from the valley, calling up Sunday service. Sunday, and what better day than the Lord’s Day to help the children. Most would arrive to class tomorrow with empty bellies. So I stole away with Junia in the morning darkness with the damp June air on my face.
My lantern cast ribbons of light across the empty schoolyard, and I snuffed out the flame, slid off Junia, quickly untied the heavy pannier she carried. In the dimness, chickens rolled out soft clucks. Junia hawed back, shushing them.
Tiptoeing up to the porch, I went to the corner post and tied the food sack to a beam, high and out of reach from any critters.
I stepped out into the yard and inspected my work. Standing there as the sun rose over the mountains, lighting the old shadow-sleeping land in oranges and dusty yellows, felt like a prayer, like I was standing in Sunday church. And I couldn’t help bowing my head to pray to Him, giving thanks for this blessing. To think that the young’uns would have their bellies full in the morning was worth doing Doc’s tests.
“Let’s get home, ol’ girl,” I said to Junia and mounted, my heart full, near bursting.
* * *
On Wednesday, I was frightened by a loud banging on the cabin door that clattered the panes, threatening the old glass.
That night I’d been sitting, reading about Wang Lung’s youngest boy in Sons. Startled, I jumped up, flipping the chair backward. My bare feet slapped across the wood floors, and I scrambled for the shotgun.
“Bluet,” the familiar voice boomed from outside the door, “it’s me.”
I pushed the gun back under the bed, ran over, and opened the door with a pounding heart. “Doc, what are you doing out… Oh, you nearly knocked the color off my skin.” I pressed my hand to my chest, then laughed nervously.
Doc grinned and raised his medicine bag. “I aim to do just that. Let’s get inside, and quick. I have something to show you.” He plopped down his satchel on the table. “It was tricky, but I’ve learned of your illness.”
Puzzled, I quieted.
“Well, my dear, you and your kin have methemoglobinemia.”
“Met…globe, what?”
“Sit down. Let me explain it.”
I took a seat, and he picked up the fallen chair next to me, righted it, and joined me at the table.
“It’s a blood disorder, Bluet.” His eyes twinkled. “The new blood tests revealed that you’re missing the same enzyme as the Indians and Eskimos. You have what’s called methemoglobinemia,” he said again.
That there was finally a name to my peculiarity astonished me; that it could be as big as that word scared me.
Doc must’ve seen my relief and fear because he reached over and patted my hand. “You’re fine. Will be just fine. It’s a rare heredity disorder that causes the blueness. Your parents carried the same recessive gene. A very rare gene.”
“Rare gene.” Stunned, I still didn’t understand.
“The Carters all have this in their blood, from way back to your great-grandparents and beyond. You and your kin’s blood simply isn’t oxygenated. And that makes it harder to reach the body tissues. Your skin.” He lightly pinched the fat between his thumb and finger.
“Met…heme.” I struggled with the big word again.
Doc raised a finger and said it real slow. “Met-he-mo-a-glo-bi-ne-mia.”
I tasted the word on my tongue. Then braved it again and a little more correctly. “Met-he-mo-a-glo-bi-ne-mia.”
Doc nodded his approval.
I said it once more to claim it.
He reached into his bag, pulled out a stethoscope, and listened to my heart. “Very good,” Doc said. Then he took out a glass bottle and a needle. “Now, the very best part. This is a drug called methylene blue, my dear. It came to my attention that it might be the perfect antidote.”
Confused, I peered closer at the big needle.
“I’d like to give you a shot. If it works, you won’t have to go back to Lexington anymore. I can study…um, tend to you here in Troublesome.”
At that, I quickly rolled up my sleeve.
“We’ll start with a hundred milligrams.” He filled the needle. “The drug will give your blood more oxygen and reverse your color. They started using this a few years ago for an antidote to carbon monoxide and cyanide poisoning.”
Cyanide. I’d read about it in my books.
“You let me know if anything bothers you, if your ticker acts up, gets to hurting.”
Hurting. I pressed a hand over my heart and held my breath. Some medicinal herbs could right a person just fine, or stop a ticker dead.
Before I could change my mind, he shot the injection into my vein. I flexed my elbow, rubbed the tiny prick. Moments later, I watched in awe as my hands turned to a normal white.
Doc clasped his palm over mine. “A miracle,” he exclaimed, “nothing short of. Bluet, you’re as white as flour! Come see.” He pulled me over to the mirror hanging beside the pine washstand in the corner. “Astonishing,” he whispered. “How do you feel? Any discomfort?” He listened to my heart again and murmured, “Good.”
“I feel same as before, Doc.” But I turned back to the mirror and know’d I wasn’t, nor would never be. I brushed my hand slowly over my face, poked my lips that had colored a pretty pink, my cheeks a soft rose. Normal. I peered again at the stranger looking back at me, then looked at Doc, questioning.
“Modern medicine,” he exclaimed.
“I’m a stranger.” I stared at my reflection.
“A right pretty stranger at that,” Doc commented. I gazed back to the glass and inspected closer.
Pretty. Could it be? My neck looked white, like linen that matched my hands. I raised a palm and lightly braced it against the base of my neck. A tear rolled off my cheek, then another and several more, splashing onto my white hand. I was white, and that pretty white stranger was me. Me.
Doc squeezed my shoulder.
Except for his rope of veins, his hands and forearm nearly matched mine. I lifted my dress to my ankles and peered down at my feet. “They’re even white,” I said unbelievably.
“Flour white,” Doc said again, and proud.
“White.” I pinched my cheeks, smacked my lips together twice, astonished they didn’t turn blue. Then I parted my mouth to utter my surprise when, suddenly, a pain seized my scalp and my head pounded. In seconds, my belly lurched. Covering my mouth, I flew to the door, raced out into the darkness. In the middle of the yard, I bent over and emptied my stomach, once, and then again.
From behind, Doc called, “Bluet, my dear—”
I swung a hand out, motioning him away.
Doc touched my shoulder. “The nausea usually disappears. A brief thing, just a nuisance, don’t worry.”
“My head hurts,” I said.
“Let’s get you back inside and check your heart, get you some rest. It’s just temporary,” he said again and took my arm.
* * *
Temporary it was.
The flour white, that is.
By the time I woke Thursday morning, I could see the miracle drug leaving my skin, emptying itself into my piss jar. I carried the chamber pot down the ladder and tossed the blue urine outside.
Doc came by shortly after Pa got home.
My skin had nearly returned to blue. Still, I had the whiteness, and Pa could see for himself the medicine worked.
“Elijah,” Doc coaxed, “at least have a tablet if you won’t take the injection. I’ve brought enough for both of you to take for a week, and I’ll bring more. Just one a day’ll do it.” He set the pill bottle on the table.
“Take it,” I begged. “It’ll make things better—”
“Try one, Elijah,” Doc urged.
Pa said, “Look at me, man.” He held out his coal-stained hands, pointed to his dust-blackened face, then thumped his chest, smacking out a flurry of coal dust. Again, Pa hit his chest and coughed. “The only thing that I’m needing fixed is this black sickness inside of me. Have you any tonic to cure that, Doctor?”
Doc grimaced and squeezed Pa’s shoulder. Most of his patients suffered from the lung disease.
Dismayed at Pa’s refusal, I scooped a dipper into a bucket of water, took a big gulp, and swallowed a tablet, hoping he’d change his mind. “Pa, please, just one. One.”
Pa waved a hand, dismissing the offer.
Doc asked Pa questions, the names of our relatives. Absently, Pa told him. The doctor took out a pad and wrote them down, then pried some more, needling him for information on our kin.
Shortly, my heart banged and seized hold of my head, all of it churning, turning my belly. I lifted my hands to see that I’d turned back to white.
Baffled, Pa coughed violently. “White as a lily. Lily,” he barked out.
For a moment I felt like his perfect little girl. I smiled and fetched him some water.
“A white daughter.” Pa hushed the words and took a sip. Shocked, he sank down on the chair and studied me. Doc talked to him more about the tests and the medical journal piece he planned to write.
“Pa, you can go to the mine as a white man. Take one.”
But Pa weren’t listening to me or the doc, and a few minutes later, I flew out the door to relieve my stomach same as last night.
Finished, I crept back inside. Pa gawked at me, alarmed. “Daughter, are you hurt?”
Doc shook his head. “No. It’s temporary, Elijah. Like the drug.”
“Temporary? Then it’s a vanity, not a cure,” Pa snapped.
I winced.
“She should feel better directly. It’s just a little discomfort that’ll right itself, Bluet,” the doc said with sympathy in his voice.
“Prideful,” Pa grumbled. “Dangerous.”
“It’s a safe cure,” Doc insisted. “And Bluet’s strong.”
Pa scowled. “Belladonna cures ails too, and it’ll turn mean an’ slay the strongest.”
“You can quit the medicine any time, dear, if the reaction is too much,” Doc said to me.
I could only murmur “yessir,” but the thought of giving up my new color and going back to my ugly one sickened me more.
Again, I urged Pa to take one too, but he just gave me a stony stare.
Excited, Doc told Pa everything he’d discovered about the Blues, our ancestors, the rare gene, and our missing oxygen, while Pa kept a sharp eye glued to me the whole time, watching me, watching my skin.
But I barely noticed him. My eyes kept going to my hands and bare white skin, and I couldn’t stop touching myself to see if the new flesh felt any different.
I peeked into the looking glass and saw Pa’s reflection. He cut a disapproving look, and I stepped back. But in a minute, I returned to the mirror to stare at myself, delighted, spellbound by my normal, pretty white skin. Soon, I was practicing smiles and whispering at my reflection in my very best radio-newscaster voice.