This Bitter Earth (15 page)

“Really?”

And so Gloria began her quest to snag the only single black businessman in Harlem.

Gloria was beautiful, no one could deny it, and she had had her pick of men. Married men, that is. The single men she met were womanizers and couldn’t seem to give her what she wanted. So for years Gloria had settled with being the other woman—their I‘ll-be-there-after-midnight chick and Did-you-receive-the-flowers-and-chocolates-I-sent-you-because-I- couldn’t-get-out-last-night girl.

She had had enough of that and wanted her own man ... with money.

She took a good look at broken, downtrodden, sick-hearted Seth Taylor and she knew that her mama was right, he was exactly what she needed.

“He drives a nice car.”

“Yeah, but he living in a room.”

“And you living in a castle?”

“Well how come he ain’t got a house?”

“ ‘Cause he ain’t got a wife.”

“Yeah, I guess. But it’s been almost two months and he ain’t said more than ‘what can I get you,’ to me.”

“Be patient, Gloria, be patient.”

And she was. Every day for three months she took her place at the far end of the counter and sipped coffee, black with two sugars, waiting for the day when he would finally come over to her and say something other than “What would you like today?”

That day came on a Tuesday.

“What would you like today?”

“Coffee, black, two sugars and uhm, toast. Please.”

“You look nice,” Seth whispered to her and blushed.

“Thank you,” Gloria responded and smiled. She knew then that she had him hook, line and sinker.

Joe didn’t think he had an ounce of anguish left in him. He thought it had drained away with each passing year. He knew he was empty when he could walk past the field where Jude’s body was found and not cry. His body still shook, trembled uncontrollably as if wrapped in a blue chill, but at least his eyes remained dry even though he wept on the inside.

Even when he lost his mother, the pain that took him over was round and dull, so much different from the sharp, biting agony that had gripped him when his daughter was killed.

Up until the winter of 1955, he had convinced himself that he was done with agony and grief and felt sure that the Lord would spare him the displeasure of looking down on the stitched-closed eyes of another one of his children.

He’d watched his wife, Pearl, come undone beneath the weight of their daughter’s death and then beheld the wondrous event of her reinvention when Sugar strolled into town.

He knew that the grief she’d carried inside of her for fifteen years had not disappeared (Sugar’s likeness to Jude would not allow that to happen), but he felt that it had rounded out like his own, had become a quiet ache instead of the wailing pain that had torn her down in the beginning. With Sugar around, Pearl was able to take in some joy and not feel guilty about doing that without Jude.

Joe should have stepped in as soon as he saw Pearl’s smiles becoming too broad and too bright. He should have sat her down and explained, when she started giving herself over to him again at night. He should have probably called both women to him and revealed his suspicions about who Sugar Lacey really was, but he was selfish and enjoyed hearing his wife greet every new day with a song and so he let it be and then Seth came home and everything fell apart all over again.

Seth stood staring at Sugar.

Sugar didn’t know whether to say hello, howdy or ‘evening. She knew she should say something; all eyes were on her now.

She raised her hand in some sort of awkward gesture of greeting but it came off wrong and so she dropped it back down to her side and rubbed her hip with the hand that still had some sense and skill.

“Joe.” She finally decided to address Joe when she could no longer stand looking at Seth and it had gotten so quiet that she could hear the thin electric charge that came off the fireflies buzzing around them.

Joe closed his eyes as the sound of Sugar’s voice washed over him. She was real.

He wanted to laugh out loud, jump up, grab her and spin her around in the air.

“You?” Seth said after the feeling came back to his tongue.

He felt anger pushing at him, pushing him right back to that night on Grove Street, banging on the door of #10, yelling Sugar’s name out over and over again.

He could feel his parents’ hands on his shoulders, pushing at his chest, restraining him from approaching that half-breed fool that hadn’t even taken the time to look at him.

He could hear Lappy calling her name, once, sharp and confidently. Then he saw her, the woman he loved, the woman he was going to take back to New York with him and start a family with, he saw her open the door and let Lappy in without even giving Seth a first look.

“You!” he shouted again after the memories fueled his anger.

Joe was up and on his feet now. Seth began to move toward Sugar, his mouth working and hands trembling. Joe stepped around him, blocking him, pleading with him to come to his senses.

Someone was saying sorry over and over again, one sorry for every day of every year they had lived since they last laid eyes on each other.

Sugar looked at Mercy, who had not spoken a word since they’d left St. Louis, and then over at the long faces on the old men.

None of their mouths were moving but yet the apologies echoed all around her until her tongue slipped between her teeth and she knew that she was the one making the apologies.

“You’re sorry? Sorry?” Seth couldn’t seem to understand that she was or that it was even the truth. “I’m sorry you’re not dead!” he said and his anger was punctuated by the long and short sounds of the car horn Gloria had begun to lay on.

“Wait a goddamn minute, Gloria!” he screamed, sending spittle everywhere.

“Son—” Joe tried to interject but Seth took a rough step forward and cut him off.

“Do you know what you did to me? Do you!” he said, raising his hand and pointing a shaky finger at her.

Sugar wanted to drop her eyes and nod her head yes. Yes, she did know what she’d done to him, but did he know what had been done to her? Did he know that she had suffered too and was still suffering?

Seth took another threatening step toward her. His chest bumped his father’s and Joe gave him a rough shove backward.

“Enough,” Joe barked.

Sugar jumped at the harsh sound of his voice. She had never, not in the few months she’d been in his company, heard him speak in such a manner.

“Enough,” he said again, calmer this time, and bringing his hands to rest on Seth’s shoulders.

Seth had never raised a hand to his father, ever. But he was in the thick of anger and fought to control the urge to knock Joe down to the ground.

“Seth?” A small voice floated out of nowhere. “Seth, what’s happening? What’s going on?”

“Go back to the car, Gloria,” Seth said without looking at her.

“You know this woman?” she asked, taking a bold step forward.

“Go back to the car,” Seth said again, his anger backing up in his throat, blocking off his air supply.

Gloria looked at her husband’s face. His dark skin was flushed and there were small beads of sweat forming above his top lip and across his forehead. She had never seen him this enraged, not even when she announced that her mother was moving in with them.

“Seth, I want to know what the hell is going on here and I want to know now.” Her words were for Seth but her eyes swung between Sugar and Mercy like a pendulum. She clutched her child to her chest and took another step closer, placing herself alongside Sugar.

“This here is family business,” Joe said, gripping his son’s shoulders. “Go on back to the car and we will all be along shortly.”

Gloria’s eyes flew wide. “I’m family,” she screeched and Sugar winced at the way her words clawed at her neck. “And
she
ain‘t,” Gloria spat, pointing a finger at Sugar.

“Yes,
she
is,” Joe said, releasing Seth’s shoulders and turning to face his daughter.

Chapter 18

Sugar was suddenly back at #10 Grove Street, the remaining days of 1955 closing in on her. She was propped up in the bed, the sound of nothingness around her, and Jude peeking at her from everywhere and nowhere. The box she cradled in her hands must have been there for days before she’d noticed it.

She remembered that the brown paper reminded her of skin and that thought stayed with her as she tore through its layers, always expecting blood, but only coming upon the blue gray of the box.

“She ain’t no family to us?” It was a statement and a question all at once and Joe could do nothing but brace himself as his son’s words bounced off his back.

“Daddy?” Seth said, his anger draining away, slowly being replaced by astonishment.

Sugar saw herself lifting the top off the box, taking a deep breath and inhaling the sweet scent of lavender.

“I—I—” Joe’s words tripped over his tongue.

There were dozens of envelopes, filled with just as many letters, and then there was the picture of her mother and Joe Taylor, the father she was never supposed to know.

“She, she—” Joe began again and then swallowed hard. “She’s your sister.”

Sugar’s shoulders dropped and she felt her head go light. Had he always known, and for how long?

The gratitude she felt toward Joe brought tears to her eyes, even though she knew she needed to do something other than cry. She needed to holler.

“She’s my what?” It was clear from the sound of Seth’s voice that he believed his father had lost his mind. “You hear what you saying, Daddy?” he said and took a concerned step toward Joe.

His right hand went up as if to check his father’s brow for fever, but then he changed his mind and stepped backward so he could get a good look at this man that seemed to be admitting to something that was sure to tear them all apart.

“I said she’s your sister,” Joe repeated himself, raising his voice so that everyone around could hear. “She’s my daughter,” Joe said, looking as proud as he did when he held his grandbaby.

What’s left after truth? Sugar knew. She’d beheld plenty of truths and the same things had always occurred: tears, broken hearts, balled fists, angry words ... death.

Seth stomped off past his wife and child, cuss words trailing behind him.

His hand snatched at the door handle of the car numerous times before his frustration overwhelmed him and he turned around and yelled.

“Do Mama know?!”

Joe took a deep breath before answering.

“I think she knew from the beginning,” Joe said to his feet, and then lifting his head and raising his voice, “I believe she know in her heart.”

Pearl knew there wouldn’t be enough time to bake a whole pie, not even time enough to boil and peel the potatoes, so she wouldn’t even think of getting the flour out of the bag to start the crust.

But she had to do something, prepare a little bit of anything that had some sweetness to it. Hands clasped together at her navel, Pearl paced the kitchen floor, thinking so hard it made her head hurt.

She should have started preparing for her early in the day, but she wasn’t sure she had dreamt right, wasn’t sure she had heard Jude clear enough to bother herself with baking a pie. But as the day progressed and the fog that swam around the dream dissipated, Pearl was able to decipher what Jude was trying to tell her.

Pearl spun ‘round and ’round in the center of her kitchen wondering what she could make, mix or mash that would substitute for what had first brought them together. There was nothing, nothing that would do and time was running short.

What would she do?

“I guess this is a good thing, we need to get to the bottom of this anyway,” Seth spat at his father from alongside his car.

“It was before I married your mother,” Joe said in his defense.

“It don’t matter when it happened. What matters is you knew all along.”

“We both knew,” Joe breathed.

“I don’t believe that. Ain’t you man enough to carry the blame on your own, why you gotta share it with Mama?”

Seth’s words were so heavy with disgust, Sugar felt the weight of them.

Joe’s chest swelled and his back straightened. “You still my son, Seth.” His voice was steel, but Seth didn’t even flinch.

“You sure ‘bout that?” Seth shot back.

Joe lost his patience quietly and soberly. There were no threats or physical fanfare, just one hard, clean punch that connected beautifully with Seth’s jaw and laid him out flat on the ground. Joe Louis would have been proud.

Seth looked up and blinked at the moon that balanced itself perfectly over Joe’s head. Were the stars laughing or was his mind playing tricks on him?

“Seth, oh my God!” Gloria screamed.

The last time Joe had laid a hand on his son in anger Seth was eight years old and had crossed the line. Now at the age of thirty-seven he had made the same mistake again.

“Why you do that, Joe, why!?” Gloria screamed at him. “Baby, you okay? Can you stand up?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Seth said as he struggled to his feet and rubbed his jaw.

“I know I’m your daddy,” was all that Joe said before turning his back on him and opening the car door. “Get in.” He was looking at Sugar and Mercy when he spoke. Seth didn’t dare object.

Sugar stepped out of the car on shaky legs. She felt her teeth begin to chatter and so she pressed her lips tightly together to keep the noise inside of her mouth. The moon was in full bloom and had positioned itself like a heavenly spotlight over the spot where #10 once stood.

“Burned down in ‘56,” Joe said before Sugar could even ask. “Don’t know how,” he added.

It didn’t matter that the wood frame and concrete foundation had perished, the ghosts were still there.
Fire can’t burn away memories,
she thought.

“C‘mon,” Joe said as he hoisted the luggage up the stairs of the front porch. He set the bags down and started fishing in his pocket for the house keys when he saw it.

“What the—” he started and then stopped.

Sugar couldn’t see what had snatched at Joe’s attention. He bent over and picked up two sweet potatoes. She could see the paper bag—colored skin of the potatoes and the massiveness of them; Joe could barely hold one in each hand.

“Who in the hell would put these here?” Joe wondered out loud.

Sugar nodded. She knew who had placed them there and why; she swallowed the thought and ignored Mercy’s probing eyes.

There would be talk later on about Sugar’s reappearance in Bigelow, the fact that she was staying in the Taylors’ home with a child that looked nothing like Sugar but was probably her child even though they’d heard that it wasn’t. Well, whores lie, they would say.

The buzz started as soon as Sugar and Mercy piled themselves into Seth’s car and would go on until the murder took place, giving them something else to talk about.

Joe quickly pushed open the front door. Sugar saw him take a deep breath before he stepped over the threshold and into the house. She would have taken one of her own but she had no breath left.

“Pearl?” Joe called cautiously. “Pearl, we’re back,” he said and motioned for the rest of them to come inside.

Gloria pushed past Mercy and Sugar and stepped on Joe’s foot in her haste. Seth hadn’t even moved from the confines of the car. He just sat there, hands gripping the steering wheel, face screwed up and eyes staring straight ahead.

Joe threw him a look and then shook his head before moving left and into the kitchen. “C‘mon,” he said and all three women followed.

The kitchen table was covered in bowls filled with food worthy of Christmas dinner.

“What the—” Joe started for the second time that evening.

The stairs creaked from out in the hallway and Sugar stiffened. Mercy blinked at her and then looked back at the table of food. She didn’t know exactly what was happening, but she did know she was hungry and wanted to eat.

“Miss Pearl cook all of this?” Gloria said, moving the baby from one hip to the other before leaning over to look into one of the pots. “Well, I thought she was sickly?”

Joe didn’t answer her; he was too busy trying to understand what had happened in the hour he’d been gone.

“Y‘all wash your hands before you eat, hear?”

And there it was, Pearl’s voice right at Sugar’s back. Everyone except Sugar swung around at the sound of it. Sugar was stone, except for her knees, which were knocking.

“P-Pearl, baby, you ... you ...” Joe wanted to say something but there were too many things knocking around in his head. Questions bumping into statements and then there was the truth he had been carrying around for ten years, sitting right smack in the middle of it all.

Pearl moved around Sugar and into the kitchen. She seemed shorter to Sugar. Her hair was all gray now and her hips were gone.

Sugar took her in quickly and then lowered her gaze.

“Miss Pearl, you do all this?” Gloria said, standing over the table, eyeing the biscuits and the sliced ham they sat next to.

“Some. But I called down to JJ and told him to bring some food by. Told him we would have quite a few mouths to feed.” Pearl smiled and Joe almost stumbled at the light that came off her face when she did.

Pearl’s eyes moved slowly over Mercy. “Child rail thin,” she said almost to herself before turning toward Gloria.

“Is this my grandbaby?” Pearl glowed.

Sugar chanced a glance at Joe, who was looking at Pearl as if it were his first time seeing her. Had they forgotten she was there? Sugar thought about snatching Mercy by the elbow and backing out of the door and onto the porch. She could make her escape before anyone even noticed.

“She sure is a cutie,” Pearl said as she took Jewel from her mother and began to gently rock her. “Don’t you think so, Sugar?”

All eyes were on Sugar and all she could do was stand there trying to be invisible.

“Well?” Pearl pushed.

Ten years tumbled down on both women. Long, restless nights and days when the tears never seemed to stop falling. They had dreamed of each other, seen each other’s faces in the faces of strangers and had spoken each other’s names to the sky, hoping the wind would carry their words to the other’s doorstep.

Sugar looked at Mercy, then Gloria. She was afraid to look at Pearl, afraid that she would come apart under her gaze.

“Pearl, uhm, I gotta tell you something—” Joe started.

“Joe, I’m asking
your
daughter a question. Don’t be rude, let her answer.”

Joe’s eyes stretched as wide as saucers.

He had never told Pearl that Sugar was his daughter. The day he found the picture of him and Bertie Mae, he had had every intention of telling her. But the moment his feet hit the porch all of his courage fell away from him and all he could do was take his wife in his arms and hold her.

He had tried again, hundreds of times over the past ten years, but never could get up the nerve to say it and so he’d finally resigned himself to keeping that secret along with one other, locked away inside of his mind, hoping that he would be able to take them with him to his grave.

Now here Pearl was speaking to Sugar as if he’d sat her down and had reeled off for her every explicit detail.

Pearl bounced the baby on her hip and stepped past Gloria before coming to stand in front of Sugar.

They were so close that the tips of their shoes kissed and Pearl could smell the musky scent three days and nights of bus exhaust and black tarred highways had left on Sugar.

Sugar looked down into those dark wells Pearl had for eyes and saw Jude swimming in the blackness.

“Well, don’t you think she’s the cutest thing?” Pearl said, holding the baby up in front of Sugar.

“Yes,” Sugar blurted out.

“Uh-huh.” The smile that covered Pearl’s face was so sweet it was wicked and Sugar thought about her grandmother Ciel and the madness that ruled her life. Ciel probably smiled the same way when she was alive.

“I’m gonna take this little one on up and take her out of these clothes. Y‘all go on and dig in, I’ll be back shortly and we’ll talk about everything.”

Pearl pressed Jewel to her bosom and the light in her face went brighter. “Yes, we’ll talk about everything and your new friend too,” Pearl said, her eyes swinging between Sugar and Mercy.

With that Pearl stepped around Sugar and began to climb the stairs.

Seth was in the hallway by then, standing around looking mean and mad at the world.

“She sure is fine, Seth,” Pearl threw over her shoulder at him.

They were all silent for a while as each of them digested what had just occurred.

“I don’t think she well at all.” Gloria shook her head as she spoke.

A dazed Joe walked into the living room and sat down heavily on the couch.

Seth followed him, but took a seat in a chair that sat close to the window. From there, he could observe Sugar, Mercy and Joe as if they were all wanted criminals.