Celeste's Harlem Renaissance (16 page)
After rinsing my clothes, I hung them around the room to dry and started to sweep the floor, but stopped. I wanted to be outside in the warm May sun! Taking Dede and both house keys, I locked both doors and skipped down the stairs.
“Morning, Celeste,” Mrs. Tartleton called out from behind the counter as I reached the lobby. I was glad to see her. She was nice. She was so thin I could almost see clear through her arms. Her veins crisscrossed her hands under her skin like little brown worms. One day I’d ask Miss D how much she weighed.
“Morning, ma’am.” I thought I’d test the waters. “I’m gonna take a walk, just down the street and back, to get a little sun.”
“Did Miss D say you could leave the boardinghouse?”
“No, but — but — she didn’t say I couldn’t,” I stuttered. “I mean, not exactly.”
“Listen to me, Miss Saucy Cece. You’re not fooling me. You know Miss D doesn’t want you in these streets by yourself, not even in the daytime. But at least I can sit with you on the porch.”
I smiled. “All right.” I hadn’t really figured I’d get any farther than there anyway.
We sat in the warm shade, and I played “Forsythia,” some ragtime, and, of course, some songs from
Shuffle Along.
“You can sure make that fiddle sing,” Mrs. Tartleton said. “Harlem’s the right place for you.”
“I don’t want to sound sassy, but I might like Harlem better if I could see more than water buckets and soapy rags at nighttime. I don’t talk with any girls my age —”
“Or young men, either?” Mrs. Tartleton arched an eyebrow.
“Oh, I’m not thinking about any boys,” I said, and suddenly saw Big Willie’s face. “But I imagine going to that branch library and to Mr. James Weldon Johnson’s office where the
Brownies’ Book
magazine’s published would be nice.” I explained about the
Brownies’ Book
and how much my Butterflies Club friends were depending on me to see about our poems. She promised to take me to some places when she had a day off.
“Oh, wonderful!” I thanked her over and over, and my hopes rose. Then I played some more while the morning hustle of cars and trucks and people crowded One Hundred Thirty-sixth Street.
After that I returned to Aunti’s room and cleaned, searched without success for Aunti’s boat shares, wrote in my journal, and tried to study my geography book. I hadn’t touched my schoolbooks since I’d been here. School down home was almost over, anyway. I looked at the United States map. Raleigh, North Carolina, sure looked far away from Harlem, New York. I was still staring at the map when Miss D and Gertie returned.
That evening Mrs. Tartleton came up to where I was with Miss D. She had a message from Aunti saying where she was staying. “And she said to tell you she’d be in Washington longer than expected.”
“So that means she won’t be back for Mother’s Day, just like you said, Miss D.” I tried to keep from frowning, but Miss D and Mrs. Tartleton saw my face.
“I’d be pleased to have you and Miss D as my guests at my church,” said Mrs. Tartleton, who was a widow and lived with her brother Dexter.
“Well, that’d be fine,” Miss D said, and I nodded. “Cece, I reckon your Aunti hasn’t done a thing with those clothes you bought at the Twice As Nice. Bring them over here and I can hem one for you to wear.” I broke into a smile and ran to get my skirts. I snatched up Aunti’s pale green one, too. Maybe Mother’s Day would work out for me after all.
In the middle of the night I woke up to see Miss D place a sleeping Gertie into a woman’s arms.
“It would’ve been nice to take my grandchild to church with me, for once,” Miss D was saying, sounding disappointed.
Come Sunday morning we gathered in the lobby. I wore Aunti’s green skirt that Miss D had hemmed, my white embroidered waist, and Aunti’s green, flowery silk shawl. We discovered at the last minute that an old pair of Aunti’s white fancy pumps fit me, too. They were way too small for her anyway because Aunti had a substantial foot — “country gal footses,” Miss D called them. We were able to twist my hair into a tiny bun and tie a white ribbon around it. Miss D wore a white linen dress covered with pink carnations, and her big white floppy hat. Mrs. Tartleton wore a yellow organdy dress patterned with tiny white morning glories, and a big blue hat.
“Am I presentable?” I asked, nervously patting my hair. I’d never walked in pumps before. What if I twisted my ankle and fell on my face right in front of the altar? My heart thumped rapidly and my tummy had looped itself into pretzels again.
“You look perfect,” Mrs. Tartleton replied. She reached into her purse, pulled out her rouge box, and touched my cheeks. She squinted at me, then smiled in approval. “Everybody’ll be looking at you because they’ll be wondering who this pretty young lady and this older, dignified, handsome lady are. I wish I could’ve got Dexter to come with us and see you, Ripsey.”
“Oh, how you talk, Etrulia,” Miss D said, smiling. “And look at you, Cece! Grown enough to have your cheeks painted! You look so pretty! I wish I could’ve had Gertie to take, too. Her momma came and got her last night.”
I lowered my head, smiling, cheeks burning, feeling bashful at their words. Grown enough! I looked up at myself in the lobby mirror and almost didn’t recognize myself. I looked just like Momma! Aunt Society would say I was surely going to the Devil’s Pit of Never-Ending Fire for having rouge on my cheeks, but I reckoned Momma would be pleased. I wished she could have been there, too. Or Aunti Val.
We set out for All Saints Heavenly Deliverance Church a few blocks away, looking like a bouquet of spring flowers. We strolled in, Mrs. Tartleton in the lead, me, then Miss D. I greeted everyone like Mrs. Tartleton and Miss D did, but was relieved when we sat down in the visitors’ pew. My dogs were barking!
By the time the preacher began shouting about the grace of God and motherhood, two women had caught the spirit and passed out, and a man had jumped a pew. The mother of the church offered up a Motherless Child prayer that touched me so that I had to cry. Miss D handed me her handkerchief. But at least I’d
had
a good mother, I told myself, thinking about Gertie, and that made me feel good all day long.
A couple of days later Gertie popped back up at her grandmomma’s. I’d been looking for my licorice ever since. “It’s not nice to take other people’s stuff without asking,” I told her for the tenth time. Ole thing didn’t say a mumbling word. “Gertie, you took my candy and I want it back!” Surprising myself, I made a fist.
When she saw my fist, Gertie sat up in her grandmother’s bed and screeched. That brought Miss D in from the kitchen area. “Chile, why you got to holler so early in the day? What’s wrong, Cece?”
“I keep asking her about my candy.” Before I could say anything else, Gertie jumped out of the bed and ran to the chamber pot.
Miss D folded her arms, shaking her head. “She ate your candy and drunk all that goat milk. Now she’s got the stomach flood, enty!”
I broke into giggles. Goat milk and licorice were running right through her like a flood, all right. “What a waste of good candy, my last two sticks.”
“She’d had to ate a lot more than that to make her sick. Maybe it
is
the milk. I better feed her some bread to cut the flow, and make her drink lots of water to clean her out,” said Miss D. “One thing after another.”
I grunted. I got the stomach flood once, after eating green apples. Momma and I’d been looking for lambs’-quarter plants to cook with our other spring greens. My stomach pained me so bad from those apples I could barely walk home. Momma fixed a drink from blackberry roots to cure me. I doubted Miss D had any, though.
“And I got to clean Miz Sheehan’s today.” Miss D tapped her nose with her forefinger, frowning. “Gertie’ll have to stay home with you. Miz Sheehan won’t let her sit on her chamber pot all day.”
I looked at Gertie back in bed, doubled up.
But what about my licorice, greedy thing?
I sighed. “Yes, ma’am. Miss D, if you have some chamomile tea, that might —”
“Yes, yes! Chamomile can bring peace to anybody’s innards, at least till we can get something better. I’ll put water on to boil.” Miss D patted Gertie on the cheek, set the teakettle on the stove, then started ironing an ugly Happy Home Apron dress for work. Old folks sure liked those dresses.
As soon as her grandmomma’s back was turned, Gertie crawled out of bed again, this time toward a wad of paper on the floor. I saw it, too, and beat her to it. An Ex-Lax wrapper! I raised one eyebrow at Gertie, who had scrambled back into bed and peeked at me from under the blanket. Ex-Lax looked and tasted like chocolate but its job was to loosen your bowels. So! Ex-Lax — not goat milk or licorice — had caused Gertie’s stomach flood. “You ate the wrong kind of candy this time,” I said quietly.
Gertie held out her hand. “Gimme that paper, and don’t you tell Grammaw,” she whispered. “Do, she’ll box my ears.”
“Huh!”
When Miss D was ready to leave, I waved the wrapper behind my back so only Gertie could see it. “I’m gonna do my best to take good care of Gertie,” I said. “But she’s gonna have to mind me. Else I’ll tell you, Miss D. You gonna mind me, Gertie?”
Nodding slowly, Gertie’s eyes shifted from her grandmomma’s face to mine to the waving wrapper. Miss D gave her the cup of warm tea and she drank it right down. A good sign, in more ways than one.
“All righty now, Gertie,” Miss D said with her hand on the doorknob. “You don’t mind Cece, she’ll tell me, and I’ll box your ears. You let me know, Cece.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said, smiling, and slid the wrapper into my skirt pocket.
I
’m hungry!” Gertie sat up in bed with her face so hangdog that I softened some crackers and mashed up bits of cheese in a little warm water and made a soup for her. Cheese eased stomach flood, too. She sucked it right down. “Don’t tell Grammaw I ate her candy,” she said, running her finger around the bowl to get the last drops. “She won’t let me stay here if you do. I like it here. Grammaw fixes soft food. Momma’s food hurts my mouth.”
“Don’t eat any more Ex-Lax. It’s medicine, not candy.”
“I will if I want.” She stuck out her chin.
“Your guts’ll end up in the chamber pot, looking like those tapeworms,” I said. I widened my eyes and tried to look innocent. “ ’Cause tapeworms like Ex-Lax, too.”
“No, they don’t. Do they really?” She squirmed a little. “All right. But see, I eat it at Momma’s so I can get the stomach flood. She won’t hit me when she’s mad, if I’m sick.”
“What? Hits you? Had you been bad?”
Spare the rod, spoil the child,
I thought.
“No! Well, sometimes. I eat it here ’cause Grammaw’s so nice when I’m sick. But she ain’t said nothing about tapeworms liking Ex-Lax.”
I thought fast. “That’s because she doesn’t know you eat it.”
“Oh.” Gertie lay back in bed, picking at a braid. “Can you make Miss Pinetar do the hoochie coochie?”
“Only if you promise to leave my candy alone.” She thought about that for a little bit, then nodded. “Say ‘I promise’ out loud.” She did. “All righty now. Come on, Miss Pinetar.”
When Miss D returned, I praised Gertie’s behavior. But as soon as Gertie went to sleep, I told Miss D about the Ex-Lax. “Why, that little stinker! I won’t say I heard it from you, but you can guarantee I’m going to jump salty with her if she tries it again, and get this Ex-Lax business stopped for good.”
“I told her Ex-Lax could give her tapeworms.”
“Ha! That’ll fix her, for true.” She turned somber. “Celeste. Your Aunti called me at Miss Sheehan’s house. She’s gone on to Philly and won’t get back for a few more days.”
I stamped my foot. “I’m down to my last piece of patience waitin’ for her.”
“I know, but you’re not scrubbing floors and popping water blisters, either.”
She was right about that. Yet that night I couldn’t sleep. Did going to Philly mean she’d been paid and had our rent money? Or was she having such a good time she couldn’t be bothered with me? I twisted and turned so much Miss D had to grunt loud to warn me to lie still.
The next morning Miss D had to go to work again. Gertie hopped around on one foot. “I’m not sick no more, Grammaw. Gimme a dime, so me and Cece can go to that store again and I can get me some candy.”
Miss D cocked her eyebrow at her granddaughter. “If you feel that good, then you’ll put your foot in the street with me. You leave Cece’s sweets alone. And next time your stomach gets upset, maybe I’ll give you Ex-Lax. Though tapeworms —”
“No, no, no more Ex-Lax,” Gertie said.
Smiling, Miss D reached for her comb and for Gertie, who frowned at me but didn’t say anything. I just wiggled my fingers at her.
After they left, I wrote in my journal about my successful medical treatment of Gertie, read over my schoolbooks, played Dede, combed and brushed my hair, and washed up. I checked the time. The grandfather clock’s hands had only moved about half an hour. After counting out ten nickels, tying them in my handkerchief, and tucking it into my stocking, I grabbed up my violin case, slung the strap around my shoulder, locked the doors, and took off downstairs.
I skipped up to Mrs. Tartleton’s desk, where she sat embroidering. “Hey, girl! Things stay slow here with my boarders away at their jobs so much,” she said. She peered at me through her gold-rimmed glasses. “You planning to stand on Lenox Avenue and play for pennies this morning?”
“Yes, ma’am, with a monkey in a red jacket, holding a cup, dancing on my shoulder.” I laughed. “No, I’m gonna sit on the porch. Though I’d rather go to Marley’s for some licorice.”
She lay down her needlework. “Tell the truth, I wouldn’t mind taking a stroll myself before it gets hot. Come go with me. You can get candy at Schwartz’s grocery. It’s a lot closer than Marley’s.”
“Oh, praise God, ’cause I’m dying to get out and about.”
After locking up her little cubbyhole office, she pushed her sun hat down on her head and picked up her purse. Outside in the warm May sun I wished I had brought my own raggedy straw hat from home with me, until I remembered that the thief would have stolen that, too. I breathed in the fishy rotten-vegetable car-fume smells of Harlem and twirled about in front of Mrs. Tartleton. Dede swung safely in its case against my chest. Maybe we’d see Miss Pig Foot Mary. Or Mr. James Weldon Johnson.