Family (2 page)

I remember that special day cause I had worked in the house side my mama washing three tub loads of clothes, big loads, too! Then we both been sent out to the fields to help there too. It was plumb dark when we staggered in, leaning on each other, too tired to eat, almost too tired to sleep had we coulda at that time. I was cryin a little, don’t know zackly why cause wasn’t nothin really hurtin me, I was just tired … just tired. Tired. Maybe it was cause “tomorrow … tomorrow” was goin to be just the same thing all over again. A new name for the same day, over and over again. That was what made me feel like cryin. I don’t know. I do know we put ourselves down on that cornshuck bed and lay there breathin hard. We had to get up tho, cause we had a few more things to do with feeding the rest of the slaves from the field, foldin those washed clothes, then cleanin up after the slave supper.

It was THAT day the Master of the Land said my mama was goin to go for to be his son’s night-mate too, smilin down at her like he was doin her some special kinda good favor.

Now … that man’s son was young. And the Master had many slaves on his land. He knew my mama was old in her body, even as young as she was sposed to be in years. He had to know my mama was tired. Everybody knows bout work! And bein tired! Ain’t that why people try to get somebody else to do their work? People will give you the money they love and hate to part with just to keep from doin their own WORK! Ain’t that true? Even now … today … in your day? See … he could have picked somebody else! She done already carried and had nine of his babies what he got good feelin from and good money for!

Why didn’t he? I done found out you can’t see into nobody’s mind no matter what comes out their mouths nor what their actions are. But I know for my own self when somebody don’t give a damn bout you and treat you like you ain’t
nothin. Now I didn’t wish nobody else, no other woman, no bad luck, to have to use their body when they don’t want to, but, that was my mama … and I wisht he had picked somebody else. Later on, I know he wisht he had too! At twelve years old, I was beginnin to understand life, feeling it.

That day she came in from her last jobs and helped me finish mine, washing tin plates for the next morning. Then she took me into that ole dark, broke-down chicken house in the black of the night and held me to her close, close. She squeezed me so tight it hurt my bones cause I was already sore from work, but I loved bein in my mama’s arms, so I never said a word. Uh, uh.

She cried … and I cried again. I didn’t know just what exactly we was cryin bout that time, but there was so many things to cry about it didn’t matter.

She rubbed my face, my back and arms. Held me away from her, looked at me and cried harder. I did too, cause who likes to see their mama cry? Lord! Not me.

We finally slowed down cryin. She wiped her eyes, then my eyes, with the tail of her worn-out dress of that ole shitty-color sackcloth. Then she leaned over and drew some lines on the ground. Justa sniffling all the time. I know now there was twelve lines. She say, “That’s how old you are, Clora.” Her name was Fammy, my name was Clora. I sniffed and said, “Yes mama, mam.”

She say, “They gonna count you a woman soon, for sure.” I almost smiled cause I thought that might be good but she only cried more, with no sound now. I said, “Yes mam. Don’t cry like that, mama.” She say, “Lord, I can’t help you none, child.” I held her tight, said, “Yes you do, mama.” She heaved a big sigh, said, “No. I can’t help you none, baby. Mama can’t even help herself.” I held on to her tight.

She looked down at me, rubbed my tears from my eyes, wiped my running nose, said, “No matter whatsomever happens, you remember I loves you. I loves you very hard. You my child.” She was squeezin my shoulder and it hurt, but I still didn’t do nothin but look up at her. She said, “You
always gonna remember that?” I nodded through my tears and I still didn’t know exactly why we was cryin this time. But I did not care. Somehow this little piece of time we was havin together was worth anything to me. It was OUR TIME and hadn’t nobody appointed it to us. It was just ours and we took it cause we had a mind of our own, even if we did have to hide to use em!

Then we heard those dam-awful footsteps! We knew it was somebody white cause they was walkin in shoes. All the slaves was barefoot, you know that. My mama let loose of me and jumped up knockin her head on some wood cross the door. She never hollered to show her pain, just ran out the chicken house leavin me behind. Some reason I never even got to think of made me just sit in there and cry like my heart was goin to break. I was feelin so low, so sad … I couldn’t help myself from all those tears. I finally got up and dried my eyes, brushed the dirt and dried chicken dodo off my piece a’ clothes and wound my way to our shack in the blackest night I ever been in. See? Life made that night black, not the sky or the sun bein gone. My mama feelin bad and bein hurt, hittin
her head, and all that cryin made that night so dark. Sometime, when life be hittin you with a sledgehammer, it don’t stop til it done drove you all the way down, far as you can go down … to the bottom.

I WAS SO TIRED
, so worn out, inside my body and head and outside where my muscles was, I just fell into the bed with them cornshucks just rustling under me. I didn’t even wash up or take off my clothes like my mama made me to do. I just wanted to sleep. I was tryin to keep my eyes open til mama came in so I could hold her, make her warm and me too. But I was too tired.

Sleep had drug me so far down til I could feel I was bein shaked but it seemed like it was another
world somewhere. I knew it couldn’t be, just couldn’t be, mornin already. But the shakin kept up and somebody, Miz Elliz, was callin my name. “Clora, Clora child! Wake up! Wake up!” Miz Elliz was the old woman who watched out for the babies while their mamas was in the fields. I pulled with all my might to open my eyes, to move. Then she said, “Clora child, your mama done killed herself! You wake up and come on over to my shack where them other children be. They won’t see you there so fast while they mad. She done killed the Master too! Come on now! Child, come on! Heist yourself up and move!” I was wide awake in a second. Cryin again. And scared! I grabbed Miz Elliz’s skirts and stumbled after her to her shack and tumbled in with the other slave babies under the raggedy covers. Miz Elliz cautioned with a fierce whisper. “Hush! You be quiet now! Don’t … you gonna get me in trouble too! Hush!” Then in another moment in a little softer whisper she said, “I know you hurt and you sad … cause your mama gone. But if you want to live … hush now … hush.”

I lay in the dark listening to the sounds of the
other children sleepin, thinkin … if I want to live. But, I don’t want to live. My mama was gone. I didn’t have nobody now. Maybe Miz Elliz, but she belonged to everybody the Master told her to keep care of. Then my mind landed on the Master. The Master. The Master wasn’t no Master no more. He only was gonna have six feet of land now and he couldn’t command nobody to come to where that would be. But that didn’t make me feel no better bout my mama. She was gone forever. I even rather have the Master back if I could get Mama back. I wanted to cry, I wanted to scream, I wanted to die. But all I could do is lay there and be still … and hush. I found out later when the slaves wasn’t scared to whisper bout it that mama had gone to the son like she was ordered to do, but on her way from whatever place that was set up for them to meet, the Master had caught her to ask her about it and his son. They was in the farmyard and she just picked up a pitchfork and stabbed him with it. Then she went somewhere near where they kill the hogs, got her a knife, went back and finished him to death while he screamed for help. No help came cause them
slaves wasn’t gonna move! They might be blamed for whatever was happening! Then she stabbed herself … she was bent double over the fence, bled to death, standin up.

When everything was long over, a month or two, and I could be seen around more in the open again, when the Young Master of the Land needed somebody, he took me. I was still those twelve lines old. I had gone out to that chicken house and got a rock for every line my mama had marked out so I would know my age now that the only other one who would know was gone. So I know I was twelve when he took me. He sneaked so his mama wouldn’t know. But when I caught a baby, she knew. She called, only me, that “twelve-year-old slut.” She didn’t call him nothin but “son.” She didn’t hate me like she had my mama, tho. Cause, I guess, this was her son, not her husband. I blive she was glad that Ole Master was dead and gone. Yes … I was a woman at twelve, and sure was one at thirteen years old when I had my first baby for the Master of the Land.

Even havin him, I still didn’t have nobody. You all know that! My mind opened up and I understood
my mama. I
was
my mama, now. That’s slavery … they all alike … ain’t nothin. I went back to that dark, broken-down chicken house many a day and just sit and think and cry.

My first baby was a very light baby, almost white. Look like a fresh peach. Rosy cream. It was a girl. Lord how I cried for this girl-child right after I got through being glad I had my baby. Thought I had somebody of my own to love and be with. I was a fool! I had forgot that child did not belong to me! And when I thought of her future I pained in my heart. I would hold the little sweet body in my arms, fondle her arms, fingers and hands. Her tiny little ears, her soft little tummy. She would press tiny little rose-petal soft lips to my full breast and kick her strong little legs and feet against my body. I would look at her through tears and love cause I knew SOMEBODY had already decided what her life was to be. How far she could go in life … in anything … for as long as she drew breath on this earth. THEY had done decided she would never go to school, never learn to read and count, never be married in the right way in front of the Lord and
man, never be in love cause she don’t know how long fore they be sellin her man-love, never have a new store-bought dress was nice, a new pretty doll … just never nothin she wanted.

I looked up to God to talk to him, say something, ask everything … but I couldn’t find words strong enough to say what I felt. I knew He knew anyway … there was many a thousand of me all around this land and I knew they had talked to Him like I wanted to. I didn’t look up at Him long tho, cause if these white folks think you prayin you can catch the worstest beatin in your life. See … they want Him all to themself too. They want it all! Well, they sure got it! I knew most of em I seen and heard of didn’t blive in Him right noway, cause of all the devilish things they would do under them laws they made up for themself. They just used God on us slaves. But I blived if God was Love like I heard read out the Bible, He never made us for to be slaves and suffer like this. And I never did blive they had all God to themselves. I knew He wasn’t scared of bein whipped or killed by them if He didn’t obey. So I prayed to Him right on, but I did it quiet, inside
my head. See … some peoples put they heads in big pots when they prayed, so the sound wouldn’t carry out when they spoke out loud. I knew He could hear me no matter which way I prayed, so I did it my way.

Anyway … I knew no matter what life had in store for either me or my baby I would love her always. So … that’s what I named her … Always. I mumbled it round the big house so they thought I said somethin like “Alice” or somethin. I don’t care what they wrote down. My baby’s name was Always. Some folks laughed at that name round the slave shacks. But, I didn’t care. It was somethin didn’t nobody have but me and my baby … was that name. Til I realized one day, people use that word all the time. But, still, I knew what I meant, and they didn’t have that!

NOW … TIME PASSED
by slow and fast all at the same time. Ole Endless Time passed. And when the Young Master of the Land came at me again and again, I found out I wasn’t as strong as my mama. I hated him! Ohhhh, I hated him. I never felt love with him or bout him. And the men I coulda loved freely, knew I was hisn so they stayed way from me. And so … well, I just hated him. Not only for ownin my body, but for blockin my mind, lettin my heart dry and shrivel up cause it
didn’t have nothin to do but hate him. And I know he didn’t really like me. Sho couldn’t love me! He just shove me out when he be through usin me. Didn’t never pay no mind to his children by me, cept his son, just counted them as property, to keep for work or sell. My son he paid mind to cause he looked just like him and he was white. He had my son whipped, so hard, so hard, I like to die watchin my son bleed from that whip. See … he wanted him to have stripes crost his back and be known to be a slave … so he wouldn’t run off tryin to be free. My son finally did run off. He was hounded to it. He was only fourteen years old. I couldn’t help him and his daddy was killin him. The Young Master had finally married up with a sweet-faced, laughing little lady who mighta tried to be nicer to the slaves if he hadda done right. Some people have evil mean streaks in their souls no matter what happens in their lives. Other people, a few, have kind souls til some other people mess with them so much they can’t take much more of nothin and then they get that mean evil streak in them to fight back with. It’s a few others we ain’t got time to talk bout now. The
Young Mistress told the Young Master, “We will always love only each other. NO slaves to bed with like some other no-account low whites.” He agreed cause she was new and his and he loved her. But time kept passing like it does and pretty soon he was at me or somebody again. That Young Mistress took to hating us, and him, and soon after that, life got hard up there in that house and out there in them fields even. She was everywhere where she thought he might be when he wasn’t with her. The Old Mistress just laughed to herself as she ate them big chunks of pecan fudgies, cause it was her son, not her husband, and didn’t we blong to him? Couldn’t he do whatever he wanted with us? Sides, she told her, white women was not ladies if they thought too much of “that.” They should be glad if their husbands “relieved” themselves out in the garbage-bin.