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But those days were over. Now Momma was always fretting over me. I didn't know what to do about that. After all, with him gone I had a mess of things troubling me too. And school was right there at the top of the list.

I wanted to go home and tell Momma I was accepted into the United States Army. That I'd be fighting for the freedom of the whole world. I couldn't do that. Not yet, anyway.

But one thing I could do was find a job. Now seemed as good a time as any to quit school. “I'm not even showing this note to my mother,” I told Dudley. “Pop wanted me to drop out of school. I'm finally gonna do it.”

Now all I had to do was convince Momma.

March 1942

Momma was at her ironing board by the kitchen table, sprinkling my blue plaid shirt with water from a Cheerwine bottle. She didn't even look up when I let the back door shut behind me.

“I'm home.”

She spread the shirt over the ironing board and pressed the hot iron onto it. Steam rose around her like a cloud of anger. “Miss Pauline was here. You skipped school? What's gotten into you, Junior?”

I shrugged. I didn't exactly know how to explain. It wasn't like I was trying to be bad. Maybe Momma didn't deserve what I was putting her through, but I didn't ask for the hand I was dealt, either. And I had had enough. “I can't do it,” I said.

“Exactly what can't you do?”

“High school. It's useless. Why does my longhand have to look like the Palmer method? And that nonsense Miss Hinkle talks about, poetry and grammar and figures of speech—what does any of that have to do with getting
along in the world? Do you even know what a participle is, Momma? Much less a dangling one.”

“Axel Bledsoe, Junior!” Momma set her iron down hard. “Don't you dare take that tone with me.”

I took that to mean she didn't have any idea what I was talking about. But she wasn't going to admit it, either. “See?” I said. “You're doing just fine in life without knowing certain things. And Pop could tear a car to pieces and throw it all in a heap. He wouldn't know a participle if it was on top of the pile. But he could put it all back together.”

Momma almost smiled.

“The reason I played hooky was, I tried to enlist.”

Well, that set her back. “Junior!” Worry covered over her face like wrinkles on that shirt.

“I wanted to do you proud, Momma. Get some honor for the Bledsoe name. Lord knows we could use it. I could fight for freedom with the best of them.”

She stood, stiff as starched laundry, with the iron pressing into my best shirt, not even noticing the scorched smell it was making.

“Momma! The shirt.” I grabbed at the iron, but it was too late. The blue plaid had a brown triangle pressed into it. When Momma saw that, she let out a shriek. “For crying out loud!” She took off across the kitchen with her face in her hands, ran into her bedroom, and slammed the door.

I stared at that scorched shirt. She'd just made it for
me a few weeks ago. And I knew we didn't have money to buy more material.

“Now look what you done.” That was Granddaddy, standing not three feet away, nosing into my business. “Better unplug that thing before you burn the house down.”

I reached up to where the cord of the iron connected to the light socket and pulled the plug. And I set the hot iron over on the cook stove, where it couldn't do any damage. There was a pot of potatoes and peas with bits of ham stewing there. “You might want to dish up your own supper,” I told Granddaddy. “I'm going to tend to the animals.”

I went to the barn and milked Eleanor. “I should quit—right, Eleanor?” I didn't know why I was asking her. I just couldn't see me going back. As far as I could tell, the only good thing about school would be sitting behind Janie. I knew she didn't like me. Maybe she liked me a little more than she liked Dudley, but that wasn't saying much. And besides, by now she'd probably heard about the two of us playing hooky. She wouldn't be impressed with the likes of me.

When I was finished tending the animals, I strained the milk and took it inside. Momma had supper dished up and we sat down to eat but she wasn't starting any conversations.

“I'm sorry, Momma,” I said. “I'll pay for the shirt. I'm
not going back to school. With the war on, this country needs workers. I'll take a job at Brookford Mills, making cloth for uniforms. It'll be my bit for the war. And I can buy war bonds and pay the bills. Maybe we can even get ahead.”

Momma squinted. “Axel hated that place. And you're just like him. You'd hate it too.”

“Maybe. Or maybe I'll like bringing home some money. Doing something more in this world than he did.” I shouldn't have said that. I wasn't trying to put him down or hurt her feelings or anything. It was just a fact. I tried to soften it then. “Maybe I just want to be where he was,” I said. “See the machines he fixed. Heck, I'd even sweep the floors.”

“Junior, I want you to go to school.”

“I know you do, Momma. But I can't.”

“Yes, you can. And you will.” Momma shook her fork and little bits of broth came flying at me. I saw her lip quivering like a leaf in the wind. I took a bite of biscuit and she kept on preaching. “If you keep this attitude, Axel Bledsoe, Junior, you're likely to turn out just like your father.”

“I know,” I said. “Acorn don't fall far from the tree. Least that's what I hear.”

I was trying to sound tough—like I didn't care if she compared me to Pop. But much as she loved him, I knew she didn't mean it as a compliment. Sure, I could do some
of the things people admired about him. Fixing cars and helping perfect strangers. But lately I was real good at hurting her the way he could, too.

I finished my supper and then went to work cleaning her treadle sewing machine, which needed oiling. Maybe she'd see that if I didn't have homework to do I could actually help out more around the house.

Later, when I crawled into bed, Granddaddy wandered around the room. I watched his stockinged feet go past my head and thought about the things I'd heard from Aunt Lucille and Aunt Lillian.

“What's it like?” I asked. “At the mill. What kind of jobs do they have?”

Granddaddy's feet stopped in their tracks over by the bureau. “What business is it of yours?”

“I need a job,” I said. “I'm not going back to school.”

“Well, if you ain't Axel made over again.”

“Yes, sir,” I said. “I'm a big disappointment. What kind of jobs they got?”

“Sweeping floors.”

“What else?”

“Operating machines. Packing. Shipping.” Granddaddy walked past my head again, his feet sending up little clouds of dust. “I reckon you could sweep up. Like your daddy did.”

“I thought he fixed machines. I could do that.”

“Boy, you ain't laid eyes on one of them machines
and already you're wanting to fix 'em? Your daddy learnt that a little at a time.”

Granddaddy reached for the string hanging down from the light in the ceiling and the room went dark. The bedsprings creaked when he climbed into bed. “You can't live here and work there. You gotta live in Brookford, where they can own you. Rent from them. Buy food on credit at the company store. Be in debt the rest of your life.”

That was something I hadn't thought of. “Does everybody at the mill live in Brookford? I'm a hard worker. They should be proud to have the likes of me there.”

“If you're so good, how come you ain't sticking it out at school?”

“That's different,” I said. “School is a bunch of hot air, if you ask me.”

Granddaddy laughed. “I'll tell you what,” he said. “How about in the morning you wake up and listen to the radio and I'll go to school for you. I have a feeling me and that pretty schoolteacher will get along just fine. I could clean her blackboards and if I'm lucky she'll keep me after school and teach me to talk right. I could sing to her, even.”

Then Granddaddy started singing.
“Let me call you sweetheart. I'm in love with you. Let me hear you whisper that you love me too.”
And when he did, he sounded a
lot like Pop always did when he came in at night. His deep voice alone could make you forget all the headaches and worries he'd just put you through.

Granddaddy sang to the end of the song, then rolled over and thumped his pillow. It wasn't two minutes later that I heard him snoring.

“Sweet dreams,” I muttered.

March 1942

“Okay,” I mumbled when Momma called me in the morning. I almost crawled out of bed. But then I remembered. I wasn't going. I turned over and tried to go back to sleep, but in no time she came knocking again. This time I didn't answer.

“Junior! You're going to be late.”

I pulled the pillow over my head. But that didn't stop me from hearing her open the door and walk into the room. “Hammer,” she said. “It's time to kick this boy out of your room.”

His
room? That made me good and sore. Momma turned his radio all the way up and marched back into the kitchen, flapping her dishcloth at my head on her way out.

Between me being mad and the sound of the radio blaring, I knew I wasn't going back to sleep. So I crawled out of my bed and turned the radio off. Granddaddy had a few words to say about that, but I ignored him and got dressed.

A plate of cold grits and eggs was waiting for me at the kitchen table. I ate and Momma fidgeted around by the stove, keeping her back to me the whole time like a wide wall of anger.

“After I milk Eleanor I'm going to clean up and go looking for a job,” I told her.

Momma pushed the cupboard door shut extra hard.

I intended to apply for work at the mill, and the sooner the better, so after my chores I climbed on Grover and headed for Brookford.

Grover was tickled to be on the road again and wanted to trot. Evidently he approved of me quitting school. It felt good to be out on the highway with the March wind nipping at my ears and the bright sun trying to warm them up. Right before Whitener's store I saw a gray car at the side of the road—a 1937 Chevrolet. A woman about Momma's age stood there staring at it, hugging herself and looking like she didn't know whether to kick that car or bust into tears.

I tugged on the reins and Grover pulled to the right. “Whoa.” I waved to the lady and hopped down. “Got a problem?”

She stopped hugging herself and started talking with her hands going every which way. “The car just stopped.” Her voice sounded like she was on the edge of tears. “I have to get it to Jerm Foster, somehow.”

“Ma'am, your car sure is a beauty. I betcha I can fix it.”

The woman frowned. More than likely she didn't believe me.

“I tell you what,” I said. “I'm going right by Jerm's place on my way to Brookford Mills. If I can't fix you up, I'll stop in and send Jerm out to help. Unless you want to ride my mule with me.”

She looked at Grover and wrinkled her nose.

I laughed. “Let me take a look. But first, are you sure you aren't out of gas?”

Now the lady looked downright disgusted with my mechanic skills. “Sometimes that happens,” I told her. “My pop was a mechanic. You'd be surprised how many people think they have car trouble when all they need is gas.”

I lifted the hood and first thing I did was pull the dipstick. I ran it between my thumb and forefinger to clean the stick. I didn't have a rag on me, so I wiped my fingers on the dry grass at the side of the road. Then I put the stick back into the engine and pulled it out again. “You've got oil,” I said. “That's good. Never let it get too low or you'll have big problems on your hands.” For some reason, when I said that, I heard Pop's voice, sounding all sure of himself. I sure hoped she could see that I knew what I was talking about.

I poked around the engine, and it didn't take long to find that a spark plug had come loose. “Aha! Here's the problem, ma'am. Once I put this spark plug back in you'll be hitting on all six cylinders.” I tightened it as best
I could with only my fingers. “You might want to have Jerm take a spark plug socket to that,” I told her. “Want me to start the engine for you?”

“No, no. I can do that.”

I figured getting behind the wheel was too good to be true. But anyway, she started the car and it cranked right up, purring like a tomcat. The lady sat there shaking her head and smiling like I was a miracle dropped out of heaven.

I closed the hood, and by the time I walked back by her window, she had her hand stuck out to give me a shake. When she saw grease on my fingers she changed her mind, but she did stick a folded dollar bill between my fingers. “For your trouble,” she said.

“No, ma'am. I can't take this. I didn't do anything, really. And besides, I enjoyed it. Honest, I did.”

“Of course you can take it. Do you have any idea how much trouble you just saved me?”

I didn't, but I thought about Pop and how he would help people for free even though we had bills to pay. I sure needed to show Momma I could pull my weight around the house. So I took it. That dollar bill seemed like a sign that I would succeed. It proved that I could earn money and respect too.

Now I had a hankering to stop by Jerm Foster's garage. The man who was working on a car in there was skinny and had deep-set blue eyes just the way I remembered him. And he recognized me too. He smiled
right off when he saw me. “I could pick you out of a crowd for Axel Bledsoe's boy,” he said. Jerm started to offer me his hand but I guess he thought twice about it, because of the black grease on his fingers.

I stuck my hand out and it had grease, too. “I just fixed a loose spark plug. A lady wanted to pay you to do it, but then I came along.”

He laughed and shook his finger at me. “I reckon you got it honest. Axel was always taking jobs out from under my nose. I wish I could say I taught him everything he knew. I did teach him a lot, but that boy had himself a knack.”