Cynthia Bond: Ruby

“Shephard’s Mortuary lay folk out nice, Mama.”

“Shamed Mother Mercy last year with them red lips and rubbed-on fair skin.”

“Mama …”

“Woman look like a peppermint stick, Lord know. You yet one of Junie’s pallbearers?”

Ephram nodded yes. Celia opened the kitchen door to empty the dustpan, just as a strong wind blew a mouthful of salt into her face. She spit it from her lips, wiped it from her eyes and quickly swept what was left out of the back door.

Celia turned to face Ephram, “You know Baby Girl Samuels back in town.”

Ephram took a bite of eggs.

Celia wiped the table with a damp rag. “Supra Rankin say Baby arrive from New Orleans three days ago, painted up like a circus clown, wrigglin’ like a mackerel all over town.”

Ephram lifted his cup and plate as she cleaned. “Mama—”

“I didn’t say it. Supra Rankin did.” Celia looked hard at Ephram, “Which is why I asked you to get my jars from Glister, since the Samuels are just past that way.”

“Mama! I ain’t taking that cake to Baby Girl Samuels! I ain’t thought nothing about her in fifteen years.” Ephram stood up. “I got to go.”

“Finish your breakfast.”

Ephram reluctantly sat.

Celia poured the steam back in his coffee. He ate the last of his meal as Andy Williams’s rendition of “Battle Hymn of the Republic” syruped its way through the kitchen. Celia circled back to the sink, emptied water from soaking green beans, sat beside Ephram and began snapping the tips off the beans. With practiced grace she chucked the remaining pod into a pail with a hollow TING!

Without looking at Ephram she said, “Run into Miss Philomena yesterday at P & K. She asked after you.”

Ephram ate quietly as the music curled under him.… truth is marching on …

Celia continued, “That Miss P always be so generous. Helping all manner of folk and such.”

The song infused itself into the air.

I have seen Him in the watch fires …

Ephram breathed it in.

The beans echoed. TING.

Celia continued, “Way she give ’way that Wonder Bread to them folks flooded out in Neches.”

Ephram nodded.… of a hundred circling camps …

TING.

“And her old jerky and pickles to them no count Peels.”

TING. TING.

… builded Him an altar …

“And don’t she help out that Ruby Bell quite a bit?”

… in the evening dews and damps …

TING.

“Now that Bell gal one sad case, ain’t she?”

I can read his righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps …

TING.

“You knowed her as chirrun, didn’t you? Pretty thang she was too, with them long good braids.”

Glory glory Hallelujah!

TING.

“Look like”

Glory

“she was gonna”

Glory

“come to something,”

Hallelujah!

“being raised by that White lady after Papa Bell died.”

TING.

“Going off”

Glory

“to New York”

Glory

“City like she done.”

Hallelujah!

“Even going”

His

“to that White”

truth

“folks’ school up there.”

Is marching on .

TING. TING. TING.

The song faded into the wallpaper, but Celia sang on.

“It’s more than a sin how far she fall. Hair nappy with mud, raiment’s torn and trampled. Now I hear she take to doing her pee-pee in the streets! Beggin’ for scraps with crazy scratched acrost her pate. And they say what happens at night with menfolk in old Mister Bell’s house would set his bones to spinnin’.”

Ephram felt little dots of sweat along his temples. “Ma—”

“But I don’t blame them none. You know how men do. Nasty ring its bell and they come running like it’s suppertime in hell. Devil got him a firm foothold in Liberty. I know. I seen firsthand what conjure can do. Folk cut down, men shriveled up like prunes. Leave a body empty of they spirit so they just a hollow thing ’til they lay down dead. Boy, I sat acrost the hearth from Satan, close as you is. Seen him stirring his big kettle a’ souls over a lake of fire. I’m on a first name basis with the Devil, so I know how his mind be working, always looking out for another sinner to season his brew. So when Glister say her boy Charlie seen you eyeballin’ that Bell gal ever day. Sniffin’ after her, I say to her, No Sir. I raise my boy better than to eat at no Jezebel’s table and I know he ain’t bringing dessert.”

“Ceal—”

“I ain’t got flippers.”

“Mama—”

“What?”

Ephram noticed his wrist trembling. Just barely, but there it was. He set his cup down.

“Mama — it’s just cake.”

“Bait more like it.”

“She just—”

“Tell me you ain’t lie your own mama into making ho-cake?”

Ephram breathed in a huge gulp of air, as the sleeping pain in his fingers yawned to waking. Far away Andy began singing “Amazing Grace.”

“Your bones botherin’ you today baby?”

“No.” The pain stretched itself into his knuckles, wrists and arms.

Celia took his hand. “Ephram, you always been simple. When you was a boy you’d come back with half a pail a’ milk instead of whole. Couldn’t never figure out how to stop that cow from kickin’ it out from under you. But that’s all right. God love simple, but so do the Devil. Cuz simple ain’t got the kind of mind to withstand temptation.”

Ephram’s bones began to shoot through with fire, the very marrow sizzled under his skin. It was the bad day pain, the worst he’d felt in years. He began to perspire. His legs began to shake as a dot of sweat dropped onto the kitchen table. Ephram stood.

“You need your bad day cane?”

He didn’t look at her when he said, “I’m not going out today Mama.” Ephram walked to the doorway as Celia took a cloth and wiped away the drop of sweat. He walked past the narrow hallway as she stood and plopped her green beans into a waiting pot on the stove. He crept into his bedroom, slipped off his polished shoes, took off his jacket and hat, then lay back flat upon the iron bed.

Celia called in from the kitchen, “You want a slice of cake, baby?”

“Not now Mama.”

“Well, I’ll cut you a piece. Leave it out for when you get up.”

EPHRAM PRAYED against the pain. It came anyway, sizzling like a pit fire. Rising, burning, sucking. Ephram gritted his teeth against it. Sweat poured into the curve of his ear, onto the pillowcase. It began receding. Ephram took in a breath. He felt the bedsprings coiled beneath him. The ceiling low and bumpy from when Celia hired the Pastor’s son to scrap stucco gray over the wood.

It started again, clanging like a fire alarm, wrenching his stomach. Ephram balled his fists so hard, all ten crescent moons disappeared to white. It passed. He gasped for air.

The spells were getting worse. Lately, he’d felt like his bones were God’s kindling. That God must be awfully cold to set so many fires. As Ephram waited for the pain, he saw Ruby as she used to be, the first time he’d seen her. The sweet little girl with long braids. The kind of pretty it hurt to look at, like candy on a sore tooth.

Ephram gasped in. He could tell this wave would be big. The hurt rose up, and the world crashed down. Ephram’s last thought before passing out was of sorrow, that Ruby would never taste Celia’s angel cake.

His body grew limp upon the chenille spread, his bones grinding even in slumber. The Saturday sun ruffling his curtains, sending fingers of light across the floor. Outside something cawed from atop a tree. Something shiny and black. It flew from its perch and made lazy eights over Jennings land, then it drifted down from the sky into a patch of yard just outside Ephram’s room. Scratching and strutting until a broom-toting woman yelled at it from inside the house. At that the crow tilted her head, spread her wings and caught the wind. Then she cawed.