Child of the Mountains (7 page)

I stretched out in the backseat the best I could with keeping my feet on the floor. I sure didn’t want to get Uncle William’s car seat dirty.

Uncle William didn’t seem to like hearing all the talk about Myrtle Beach, but I sure did. I ain’t never been to the beach. I wondered what sand felt like when you walked on it in bare feet. Was it scratchy or smooth? Aunt Ethel Mae said the oceans had waves that made a sound that could put you to sleep. I heard the noise the creek makes lots of times when it ripples over rocks.
Does the ocean sound like that?
I wondered. And how did the ocean sand stick together to make a sand castle? I imagined BJ and me running in that water and building castles in that sand. Tears started to burn my eyes, so I tried to imagine Aunt Ethel Mae running in the water in her bathing suit and bathing cap. Pretty soon I had to hold back giggles instead of tears.

When Aunt Ethel Mae stopped talking about the beach and commenced to gossiping about some women at church, I quit listening. Instead, I started thinking about all of them trips we made in Uncle William’s car, taking BJ to the hospital in Ohio. BJ was three years old and I was seven when Doc Smythson comed up to the cabin all excited one day. Doc said he found out about a children’s hospital that might be able to help BJ. They would treat BJ for free on account of them wanting to study about kids with cystic fibrosis.

We was all happy. Uncle William even said he would take us up there in his car.

It was a long, long drive. We felt all tired and hot and sticky by the time we got to that hospital. Mama sat in the front seat with Uncle William. Gran sat between BJ and me in the back. I felt mighty glad that Aunt Ethel Mae stayed home. We would have been scrunched, and she would have wore our ears out, for sure and certain.

To make the time pass faster, Mama had me and BJ find the alphabet on license plates and figure out who had the most cows on their side. Then we sang for a spell until Uncle William told us to shut our traps so he could pay attention to all them cars on the road.

BJ put his head down on Gran’s lap and fell asleep. Gran poured some water from a jar on a clean rag and wiped the sweat offen BJ’s face.

I felt too hot to take a nap. We went round and round and round them curvy roads until my stomach started going round and round and round, too. All of a sudden,
my breakfast of biscuits and gravy and buttermilk sloshed in my lap and on the car floor.

Uncle William said a bad word as he pulled to the side of the road.

“P.U.!” BJ sat up and leaned his head out of the window. He closed his nose with two fingers and gagged like he might throw up, too. “What did you have to go and do that for, Lyddie?” he asked.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” I said as tears poured down my cheeks.

“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” Gran said as she put her arm around me. “It ain’t your fault you got a weak stomach. You know what they say. There ain’t no use crying over spilt biscuits, gravy, and buttermilk!” She winked at me, and I felt a little better.

Mama laughed, but Uncle William just rolled his eyes. Gran and Mama done the best they could to clean me and the car up with the jar water and rags. Then Gran gived me a piece of hard ginger candy to suck on to settle my stomach.

We stopped at the next gas station to get soap and water from the restroom to finish cleaning up. Gran said the restroom smelled worse than me and the car. I told her I thought it smelled worse than any outhouse I ever used. We learned real fast that we best do our business at home and try to hold it until we got to the hospital. Most times, Uncle William would pull offen the road, and we would find us a tree to hide behind.

We felt all grouchy and plumb tuckered out when we
got to the hospital. A doctor took BJ to check him out real good. Gran waited in the lobby for the doctor to finish up with BJ. Mama had to sign some papers, and me and Uncle William went with her. Mama commenced to read the papers, and she started up asking questions.

The lady behind the desk let out this real long sigh, but she didn’t even look up at Mama. She had some other papers she was busy writing on and shuffling around. “You are not going to understand these papers anyway,” she said. “If you want your boy to get the help he needs, just sign them.”

Uncle William’s face got mater red and his teeth clenched tight like he had lockjaw. “Now see here, lady …,” he said, looking at her with burning eyes like he wanted to melt her into a puddle. She looked up at him like she dared him to finish what he planned to say.

Mama put her hand on my uncle’s arm. “William, we need this hospital to help BJ,” she said real soft.

Uncle William snorted, got up out of his chair, and shoved it back under the table so hard I was afeared it might break. “I’ll wait outside with Mom,” he said as he stomped out of the room.

“Where do I sign?” Mama asked the woman.

Later, Mama said that she made the biggest mistake of her whole entire life when she signed them papers.

T
UESDAY
, D
ECEMBER 1, 1953

I figured out one thing I can do to keep myself busy. I’m going to start making Aunt Ethel Mae and Uncle William Christmas presents. I ain’t got no idea what to make for Mama, stuck in prison as she is. I wonder iffen they even let people celebrate Christmas in jail. Maybe that’s part of how they punish them, not letting them get any gifts from family. Iffen them guards in Ohio say it’s okay, I hope Uncle William will tell Aunt Ethel Mae to let me send Mama something. I’m afeared Aunt Ethel Mae will commence to crying iffen I ask.

I’m going to embroider Aunt Ethel Mae’s initials on her hankies. Maybe I’ll add some purple flowers on account of that being her favorite color and all.

One time Uncle William pointed out some big, fuzzy pink dice hanging from a car mirror in the hospital parking lot. He said he sure enough would like to get hisself a pair of them for his car. My jaw about dropped to the ground! I never, ever would of thought he would want hisself a pair of pink dice. But iffen that’s what he wants, I figure I can sew him up some.

I’ll need six squares for each one of them. I ain’t got no fuzzy pink material, but I saw some white muslin in Aunt Ethel Mae’s scrap box. I wish Gran or Mama was here to help me mix up some dye. It’s been a few years since Gran learned me how to do it. Aunt Ethel Mae growed up too citified to know stuff like this. I hope I recollect how much salt or vinegar to add and how long to soak the material. I think I’m supposed to add salt for berries and vinegar for plants. Or was it the other way around? I’ll figure it out, I guess. I sure am glad they’s a lot of muslin in them scraps!

Mama and Gran and BJ and me always had fun making gifts for Christmas. We’d whisper to each other about what we was a-making for everbody else. That way we could trade ideas and help each other. But we all kept our lips clamped shut when the gift getter tried to worm it out of us.

BJ was the most ornery about trying to get us to tell them secrets. One time he started up coughing real hard. Mama had went to a ladies’ meeting at church to help plan the Christmas party. Gran took herself a little nap in her bedroom.

“BJ, are you okay?” I asked him.

“I’m a-feeling real poorly,” he said as he stretched out on the couch.

“Do you want some water? Should I wake up Gran?”

“There is something you can do that might help me feel better.” He hacked again.

“What’s that?”

“Maybe iffen you told me what Mama and Gran was a-making me for Christmas, I’d be able to think about that instead of about feeling so awful.” He looked at me with big, sorrowful, puppy-dog eyes.

“Well, the other night, Gran did tell me what she made you,” I said.

Hack, hack
.

“I know Gran wants it to be a secret,” I went on.

Hack, hack, hack
.

“I guess it wouldn’t hurt to tell you, seeing as it’s just a few more days till Christmas.”

Then I saw it. This little, teeny, tiny grin started creeping up the corner of BJ’s mouth like a mouse a-climbing up a wall. His eyes didn’t look sick no more. They lit up like they was a-giggling!

I put my hands on my hips and stared a grown-up stare at him. “Benjamin James Hawkins!” I told him. “You almost tricked me!”

He busted out laughing. And he didn’t hack. Not even once!

*   *   *

I liked to whittle Christmas presents for BJ. Mama learned me how when I was five. “Your gramps learned me when I was just a little thing, maybe even younger than you,” she said. “You must never whittle toward you. Always whittle away from your body.”

She showed me how to hold the knife with my thumb on top and fingers curved around the handle. “I like to use cedar because it has such a sweet, comforting smell,” she went on. “But the most important thing is to find a piece of wood that speaks to you. Listen to what it tells you it wants to be.”

The first thing I whittled was a whimmy diddle. All I had to do was whittle a few notches in a stick. Mama helped me cut a propeller out of a piece of cardboard. The only hard part was to stick a straight pin through the middle of the propeller and into the end of the stick. When I finished, BJ could rub another stick across the notches real fast to make the propeller go around. That was the first Christmas gift I made for BJ out of wood. I felt right proud of that whimmy diddle.

When BJ was four, I decided to whittle him a train for Christmas. Him and me walked to the railroad tracks along the Kanawha River a lot. BJ loved to pretend he was all growed up and riding the train, going on a adventure. He’d make up stories about being a famous doctor, traveling all over America to save sick kids. He took them cures he invented. I was always his faithful companion.

One time, we found a pop bottle on the way. We
stopped at the store to return it and got three cents back. We each bought a stick of licorice for a penny apiece. I told BJ he could have the extra penny. He didn’t want to spend it, though. When we got to the tracks, it was almost time for a train to go by. He put the penny on the track. The train came by and squashed it flat. BJ picked it up and held it to the sky. “This is a magic penny,” he said. “I’ll always keep it with me. When I hold it tight in my hand, it will take me on a train trip, anywhere I want to go.”

He did keep that penny with him all the time—in his pocket or under his pillow. Mama said she thought he used his magic penny a lot when he stayed in the hospital.

That’s why I knowed BJ would love to have his very own train. Mama thought that sounded like a real hard project, but I just knowed I could do it. Mama said she would make the train whistle.

I commenced to working on the train in August so’s I would have plenty of time. I had to whittle on it when BJ stayed at the hospital. That way he wouldn’t know about it.

I figured I would make a engine, a car for coal, a passenger car for clothespin people, and a caboose. Mama and Gran gived me good ideas. Uncle William helped, too. Him and me sawed some blocks of wood for the cars. We cut wheels from an old broomstick somebody throwed out in the trash. He let me use some of his wood glue, too.

It took all of us thinking real hard about how to connect them train cars. Gran had the best idea. She said I
could use cup hooks. Uncle William bought me some at the hardware store. He paid for them, but I told him I would do some chores for him the next time I went to his house. We had ourselves a deal. On one end of the cars, I screwed in a cup hook that I closed up with a pair of pliers. On the other end, I screwed in a cup hook left open. That way, BJ could put the train together and take it apart any old way.

My very favorite was the caboose. We used beets to make a deep red dye for it. Mama said I could use her black liquid shoe polish for the engine. Grapes made blue dye for the passenger car, and spinach made a good green color for the coal car. Mama thought that train would be the best Christmas present BJ ever did have.

We went to pick up BJ at the hospital on December 23, singing Christmas carols almost the whole trip up there. I kept smiling the entire time, thinking about BJ getting his train on Christmas day. This secret would be hard to keep. Gran and I sat in the waiting area while Mama went up the elevator to get BJ. I kept watching people getting offen the elevator, hoping BJ would come out of them doors.

Finally, I saw him. Mama carried a newspaper and the pillowcase full of his stuff. Nurse Chapel pushed BJ in a wheelchair. BJ’s grin covered up his whole entire face, almost. He had a big box on his lap.

“Lyddie! Lyddie!” he shouted. “Come see what I got!”

“Shhh!” Nurse Chapel leaned over and scolded him. “We use quiet voices in a hospital, young man.”

“You might, but I don’t,” BJ said. He didn’t even look at her.

I runned over. When I saw the box, it had a picture of a train on it with a big, fancy locomotive.

“Look, Lyddie, look! It runs on electricity!” BJ pulled off the top, and I saw a locomotive, just like the one on the box. There was passenger cars, boxcars, and a caboose. It had lots of track and even a railroad crossing sign. I never ever saw a toy that looked so much like the real thing.