Perennials

Perennials

Of all the cares and concerns gripping our lives that summer, nothing shook our neighborhood more than the blaze that consumed Ms. Honeywell’s home. In those endless, hot days between June and August domestic drama kept lips dancing and eyes rolling.

“She did what?”

[Pause]

“Oh, really.”

[Sucks teeth]

”I told you. That man is the devil.”

Later, I heard a rumor Mrs. Williams broke her addiction to daytime television by substituting it with the ever-developing soap operas of Halifax County. While her husband worked thirteen-hour shifts as a consultant for an engineering firm, she kept her hair in rollers, searching for any excuse to visit next door where Kerry Harding, a married woman, lay pregnant with a love child. Because Mama is only human, and summers are her time off from teaching, the gossip bug bit her good.

“Shame on him, shame on her.”

[Pause]

That’s right, Charlene. God don’t like ugly.”

[Pause]

Alright, you take care of yourself girl.”

Mama hung up the phone.

"What do you kids want for dinner?" she'd ask.

By then the sun had fallen from the sky, the faint murmur of crickets extending beyond our patio. In the time Mama spent passing judgment on lost souls, Andre and I decided to break into the kitchen pantry. We stuffed our faces with cookies and painted our tongues black with licorice before stretching out onto the living room floor, sick with sugar.

Mama came into the living room.

“What’s for dinner?” she asked,

I rolled over onto my back.

Andre sat up, his mouth and cherub cheeks stained blue and red with the firecracker popsicle he found in back of the freezer.

Just as Mama caught onto our antics, the headlights of Papa’s work car flashed over the windows.

We were off the hook but only because Mama had gotten herself tangled in one. For those three months most of our dinners were thrown together haphazardly though Papa never complained.

Summer brought a few good treats besides endless days and delicious popsicles—Andre's birthday.

Andre turned nine the way most boys turn fifteen. He developed a strong sense of entitlement. Strutting in Papa’s shadow, he considered everything Papa touched his domain—even the wicker chair on the patio in which only Papa sat.

"What you getting me for my birf-day?" he'd ask with an imposing frown upon his face.

I sucked my teeth, "Not a damn thing!" I said as I flicked my braids in his face and walked off.

Andre chased after me. He tugged at my shirt but I had only to grab his ear between my thumb and forefinger to bring him to submission. He dropped to one knee, wincing in pain. There was a solitary tear in his eye.

"You bettah watch it lil’ man. I'm still bigger than you."

I released him from my vice grip. Andre massaged his ear for awhile, until he could work up the courage to say something in retaliation.

"One day you gonna wish you was good to me," he said between his baby teeth, his chubby cheeks catching the light of mid afternoon. Andre was a very cute child who said wise and grown things that added to his cuteness. As he uttered these final words and stomped off, I couldn't help but admire his precociousness. He was right about a lot of things, particularly that Ms. Honeywell had ghosts living in her house. And if ghosts can exist within us as unresolved feelings towards people who have died then Andre was very right. Spot on.

The bike was blue with gold wheel spokes. It weighed as much as Andre did. Uncle Jeremiah came with it tied to the roof of his Land Rover. He set it down in front of us before realizing it was too big. The seat came up to Andre's collar. Uncle Jeremiah looked to Mama for counsel.

“Well, if he can't ride it, maybe Loretta can,” said Mama. “Andre let your sister try it out for a minute."

I bit my lip, trying to tame the grin wrestling with my face.

"Hell no! She’s a meany."

"Andre! That bike is too big for you. Now, you can share or—."

Andre's lower lip trembled.

“Oh, goodness,” Mama whispered to herself.

Andre crossed his arms and as if on cue I cupped my hands to my ears, my eyes still fixed on the bicycle. The frame was thicker than any I had ever seen and there were pegs extending from the wheels for me to carry my friends up and down the block.

I dreamt of the places I could go and how I could chase down the ice-cream truck no matter how far away it drove.

I peeked back at Andre. Whatever bothered him a minute ago didn't bother him now. Instead, he had a huge grin upon his face, exercising the full depth of his dimples. The receding mist in his brown eyes bestowed them the luster of pearls. His brown cheeks ran up his face and in his hands lay three one hundred dollar bills. Mama leaned down to pick up the birthday card he dropped. She shook her head disapprovingly at our common practice of shaking birthday cards to get to the money within.

"Lor, give the bike a ride. I want to see you on it."

I lifted my leg over the frame and sat on the cushy leather seat. With my bare feet I pushed off down the sidewalk. The bike moved with ease beneath me. It tore a path down the sidewalk and through the grass. I took my feet off the pedals to rest them on the front pegs. The cold metal felt tingly against the soles of my feet. I spun the bike around, riding the momentum back to our house.

"I guess it’s your birthday come early," said Uncle Jeremiah.

Mama drew Andre into the house and Uncle Jeremiah carried the bike to the shed in the backyard.

I rode that bike all summer long, sometimes with Andre standing on the back pegs. Between two wheels the borders of my world expanded. On days when the temperature crawled up the thermostat, and staying indoors became unbearable, I’d ride to a public gazebo on the affluent side of town and sleep in the shade.

---

When the pilot light went out in Ms. Honeywell’s stove and caught a spark from an electrical outlet, it split those summer months into before the fire and after.

"Are you thirsty dear?"

Those were the first words she ever spoke to me. She tipped back her gardening hat. The sun kissed her dark brown skin. A few beads of sweat glided down her forehead, which she wiped away with a leathery hand. I didn't know if the question was meant more for me or herself, but still I heard myself say in a weak and polite voice:

"Yes, ma'am."

She removed her gardening gloves, stuffed them into her pocket and began walking toward two water pitchers on a lawn table.

I wheeled my bike onto her lawn and leaned it against the giant oak casting a shadow upon her living room windows.

She pulled out a chair, "Sit here, baby."

I obliged. She shuffled into her house and came back with a glass and a cup with colorful illustrations on it.

She filled my cup with lemonade, "Ice?"

"Yes ma'am."

She poured some crushed ice into my drink before pouring a glass of water for herself. She lifted her hat from her head and placed it on the table between us. I marveled at its expansiveness and the intricacy of the weaving.

Ms. Honeywell drank a good amount of water, returned her glass to the table and let out a sigh.

For the first time I noticed the crown of silver braids falling over her shoulders and down her back. Even at twelve, I could she how I would want to look like her when I became an old woman. Her hazel eyes held bits of the sun and shone them back as if the light originated within her. And her full lips left many stories of boys kissed to the imagination. She looked on with serenity as I drank my lemonade. As I drew the cup away from my face she began to laugh. I blushed.

"My lord, if you were that thirsty why didn't you say something?"

I examined my cup, noticing its emptiness and the very little time it had been full. She poured me some more lemonade.

"Never wait for charity, my dear." She put the pitcher of lemonade back down. "The good lord says 'ask and you shall receive.'"

"Yessum," I said. The lemonade tasted sweeter the second time around without the ice.

A cool breeze swept through the neighborhood. The giant oak rustled up above and Ms. Honeywell's rose garden leaned, down below.

Ms. Honeywell slapped the table as a thought came to her. She disappeared into the shade of her home. It was a two story Georgian colonial house bought "way back when" as Mama would say.

She returned with a packet of seeds, "Give these mums to your mother for me. Tell her to use plenty of water."

"Mama would love these", I sang, feeling ever more comfortable around Ms. Honeywell.

Ms. Honeywell looked very pleased. "Yes, chrysanthemums are my favorites."

I fumbled with this new word "Chrysa..."

"Chrysan-the-mums," she said, bowing her head. She cross her hands over her stomach, the gardening gloves crushed between delicate fingers.

"What are they?"

"They're perennials. Last all year and they love the sun.”

"Thank you, Ms. Honeywell."

"Oh, you're very welcome dear." She lifted her gardening hat from the table, placed it over her silver braids, and turned away. I picked up my bike and walked it off her property, my eyes still fixed upon her while thinking to myself 'Did Ms. Honeywell ever have someone to give her flowers; to hold her close the way Papa sometimes holds Mama?’

The summer winds carried me home. The clouds raced with me to my door but kept moving along once I got inside.

I gave Mama the packet of seeds. She had rollers in her hair and by the folds between her brows I could tell dinner was an hour late.

"What's this?" she said, holding the bag limply as if it were a dead mouse.

I took a deep breath, "Chrysan-tha-mums."

"Chryssa what? Child were did you get these?"

"Ms. Honeywell--."

"Give ‘em back."

"She gave it.”

“Give ‘em back!”

“If you don't want ‘em than that's too damn bad."

I crossed my arms. Mama stood back awhile almost impressed with my sassiness.

She put the bag back in my hands and returned to the stove.

"Go on upstairs and wash your hands. And leave that bike alone for a week."

"She sassy, Curtis. I don’t know what I’m gonna do with her," I heard her say to Papa from my bedroom.

"Uh huh. And you surprised?"

-------

I kept the seeds in a shoebox along with Andre's baby photos, a letter from my counselor at the Boys and Girls Club of America, and a gold turtle hairpin I loved too much to wear.

Near the end of my week of punishment I found myself walking across Ms. Honeywell's lawn. Walking came with difficulty. I could still feel the pressure of the pedals beneath my feet and without a bike I felt heavy and awkward.

I spotted Ms. Honeywell before she spotted me. I found her kneeling over a patch of dirt breaking up the soil with her hands. The soil and her skin shared the same rich darkness. Why she didn’t use gloves this time I didn’t know. Maybe digging into the soil bare handed felt good—like a bath.

"Get that tiller for me," she said, pointing to a wooden device laying in the grass several meters away.

"Thank you," she said without looking up.

After tilling the soil she reached a hand out to me. I took it.

"Pull."

Slowly she rose to her feet, looking down at me with hazel eyes that shown even under the shade of her hat.

"Come inside and wash your hands."

As she spoke I held out the hem of my skirt to show her my idea of washing.

"My lord, you must drive your mother crazy getting dirty like that."

At that moment, I thought of the seeds Mama refused to take and decided a dirty skirt to wash from the soil of Ms. Honeywell’s garden was fair punishment.

Ms. Honeywell kept all her windows open. The house felt drafty and fresh. We walked through the foyer to the living room, which took us to the kitchen. Ms. Honeywell let the faucet run with warm water, squirted some soap into my hands, and stood back. I worked the soap into a lather so rich I got to blowing bubbles. The soap took a long time to come off.

During that time, Ms. Honeywell disappeared and came back with a tray of cupcakes.

"They’ve just about cooled down," she said to herself. Then to me "Go on, take one."

I lifted a cupcake from the pan and nearly put it into my mouth when she stopped me.

"Silly me," she intoned as she danced to the refrigerator, returning with a bag of icing and a cup of sprinkles. "I usually don’t put frosting on mine cause of my teeth but you can go ahead and ice yours if you want."

Ms. Honeywell looked much younger indoors. Her skin had the consistency of fine paper. She was so beautiful that God could have made her old with all the appropriate age spots and wrinkles so that age spots were beauty marks and wrinkles just delicate folds to be undone with careful massaging. She laid her hands upon the table and for the first time I saw her wedding ring. She must have caught the focus of my gaze because suddenly she drew her hands away as if a bug bit them. She held them just over the breast pocket of her flannel shirt.

I dropped my head and pulled a sprinkle from the frosting on my cupcake.

The silence between us felt warm. I heard a creek from upstairs and thought about what Andre said about ghosts.

"This old house," she whispered beneath the silence.

"I had children your age. They'd run from the kitchen to the hallway to the family room then upstairs and back down. It’d drive me crazy. Always hitting each other too. Couldn't keep their hands off one another. Do you give your mother trouble like that?”

I shrugged.

"I do miss the noise though. When they were young like you I thought they were making me old but its when they're gone that you really start to age."

My eyes fell upon her ring once more.

She laughed.

"You're not very good at masking your thoughts."

I blushed.

She thought a moment. "Well what can I tell a young woman like yourself that you'll understand? You like boys yet?"

I nodded my head.

"You've ever been in love?"

I wrinkled my nose and mimed a vomiting gesture.

"Don't do that," she warned. "There aint nothing nasty about it at all. Your parents love you and it’s just the same. All love is the same.”

She took off her wedding ring and set it on the table before me. I couldn’t take my eyes from it. It looked even more impressive sitting there on the tablecloth, catching a ray of light from the kitchen window.

“The man who gave me that ring loved me."

As I examined the ring, she examined me.

"And he loved everyone of my children as if they was his."

She took another cupcake, iced it and slid it toward me on a napkin.

"Thanx."

"Does your Mama talk to you about boys?"

I shook my head.

"I never had any girls so I don't know when it’s right to start. Boys seem to figure it out for themselves alright. But girls, we need the coachin."

She put the wedding ring back on and uncrossed her legs.

"No one ever put it to me quite right so I'll tell it to you the best I know it."

I sat up in my seat.

"Love is a very warm thing. Like the sun, its warm and you need it to be healthy and grow. Your Mama and Papa love you and someday you'll meet a boy and he'll love you." She let out a sigh, struggling with some quiet frustration. Then her tone changed and the words she uttered from then on existed separately of anything she had ever said to me before.

"Never love any man or any relationship more than you love yourself. If you love yourself completely then that will keep you whole forever even when that man is gone."

"Yes, ma'am."

She grew quiet and contemplative. I felt a strong affection for her. My eyes sailed off of her prominent cheekbones. No one could ever convince me Ms. Honeywell was anything less than stunningly beautiful. She held all of her beauty and strength in that face and somehow it radiated down to the rest of her body; to her delicate hands which brought a garden of chrysanthemums to fruition and those same hands which poured lemonade and made delicious cupcakes.

If the gossipmongers could see in her what I saw on that cool afternoon in August they would have never said the things they did. They would have never called her a "homewrecker" or accused her of loving a man to death.

After the fire came and went, taking everything but the shell of a woman with it, I felt it my duty to help in some way.

“Mama, I would like to sell my bike.”

"What for? That was a gift. It’s only a few months old."

"I don't want…need it anymore."

"Don't be silly. You're brother can ride it when he’s big enough. We don't sell things in this family we pass them down."

"He can't have it, Mama. Cause its my bike and I want to sell right now."

Mama put her hands on her hips, "Don't you sass me, girl. There's enough goings on in this town for me to be catching a case with you."

I backed down, but a week later Mama had been cleaning my bedroom and found the packet of seeds with all of my most treasured possessions.

We sold the bike for a good price, but mama made me open a fund with it because Ms. Honeywell had homeowner’s insurance and grown children up north who would keep her young all year round.