Cynthia Bond: Ruby

The piney woods were full of sound. Trees cracking and falling to their death; the knell of axes echoing into green; the mewl of baby hawks waiting for Mama’s catch. Bull frogs and barn owls. The call of crows and the purring of doves. The screams of a Black man. The slowing of a heart. All captured, hushed and held under the colossal fur of pine and oak, magnolia, hickory and sweet gum. Needles and capillary branches interlaced to make an enormous net, so that whatever rose, never broke through to sky. The woods held stories too, and emotions and objects: a tear of sleeve, bits of hair, long-buried bones, lost buttons. But mostly, the piney woods hoarded sound.

Like the sharp squeak of a wheel from a child’s wagon turning round and round. A rusted Radio Flyer, being pulled by a little brown boy, rattling with a lunch pail of chicken and dumplings, biscuits with fig preserves stuffed inside, collard greens and a special dessert wrapped in a red and white napkin.

The boy named Ephram pulled the wagon with great anticipation. He guessed what dessert his big sister had put in his pail. She’d made one just like it for his eleventh birthday four months ago. The white lay angel cake. His mouth watered so that he stopped under the big trees and opened the cloth. He was right. He nibbled one corner and covered it. He paused for a second, opened it again, then crammed the slice into his mouth. It was like eating sweet air. When he was done he shook the napkin over his face to catch any crumbs, brushed off and walked until he smelled the water.

There were two suns at Marion Lake, the one high above and the one floating on the surface. The water was a blue mirror, surrounded by a hundred trees and a million frogs. Ephram took off his shoes and cooled his toes first thing. He loved Marion Lake, especially on Sunday morning when nobody else was there. He used to go on Saturdays before his mama had gone, but only after he’d finished his chores. She was very firm about that.

Ephram watched the water swirl and skim not too far from shore. He knew the fish would be biting. He baited a bent nail with a bit of fatback from Celia’s slop jar. Then hoisted his branch pole between two rocks and sat down to eat his dinner. Ephram knew he might sit there for hours and never catch a fish. Sometimes, he’d feel one tussle with the line, he’d pull it above water and see those invisible teeth still grabbing ahold of the bait. Scales flashing silver, tail twisting … single glass eye staring straight ahead until they realized the spot they were in and let go. Flop! Splosh! Down into the sky water until it was out of sight. His real mother had called it “feeding,” not fishing. He guessed that was true. Otha Beatrice Jennings always took notice of the little things. Maybe that’s why she’d been such a good lace-maker. Ephram wondered if they let her make lace up where she was now. He sure hoped so.

The chicken and dumplings were good. Not as good as Mama’s, but Celia was a good cook, even though she was too bossy about it. She was bossy about everything since their father, the Reverend, had been asked to step down by the Elders. He would mumble at bedtime, to no one in particular, “That was a mighty unchristian thing for a pack of Christians to do.”

To make matters worse, the acting preacher was Elder Rankin’s cousin and a part-time janitor at the Piggly Wiggly in Newton, who had only recently heard the call. The Reverend renamed it “the Piggly Service,” then bade Celia and Ephram to never cross its threshold. “We’ll have church in our own house, fifty-two Sundays a year whether I’m here or no.” Celia had kept the faith, making Ephram memorize huge sections of Leviticus and Revelation and recite them perfectly each Sabbath. When the Reverend was in town, Sunday mornings before breakfast and after chores, Ephram and Celia would kneel and he would preach while eggs turned to yellow glue and pancakes shriveled and died. Long. And sometimes, he would pour two fingers of rye, and slip a sip between Ephesians 1 and 2, until he dozed off. That had happened that very morning in fact. Celia had scraped their breakfast into the bin, made the Reverend some coffee, then fixed Ephram’s dinner and told him to go play.

He had just finished eating and was sitting with his pole when he spotted them — Maggie Wilkins and the quiet little girl beside her. They were across the lake. The girl tiptoed and leaned in, her nose almost touching Margaret’s cheek. She was caramel brown with her hair up and fancy, grown-up eyes in a heart-shaped face. She held shining black shoes with white stockings balled into the toes. She wore a pink dress and looked about eight or nine. Margaret was dressed like a farmer. She was one of those grasshopper children, with legs almost as thin as their arms and twice as long. There were six tall rough girls in the Wilkins family including Margaret. All lanky and black brown with a constant sheen of ash on their knees, elbows and shins. Every one of them known for being bad, but Margaret had the worst reputation. The Wilkins were the Bells’ no count relations and they lived just on the edge of Liberty.

Ephram had heard of Margaret — Maggie’s right hook getting her kicked out of school long before he’d seen her fight. None of the Wilkins girls stayed in school for long. Most left after half-killing some student or teacher.

After each of the girls spilled a good amount of blood, they stayed home and helped their mother, Beulah Wilkins, farm her twenty-seven acres of cane and cotton. Beulah Wilkins was bigger than all her children put together, a mountain of a woman who made the earth shake just a bit when she walked. Beulah had been his mama’s good friend and Ephram had heard his mama saying that staying out of school might be fine for Samella and the other girls, but not so fine for Maggie, since she was the smartest of them all.

Still, he’d never met Margaret face to face. He remembered just last month he’d seen her fight Chauncy Rankin’s younger brother Rooster — so named for the rust color of his hair, and the way he liked to crow. He was built like all the Rankins. Big. Maggie was ten, Rooster was fourteen and he’d picked a fight with her because, he said, he wanted to “see if she could really fight.” He’d made her take off her boots because they were pointed at the end. She’d beaten him in bare feet. Beaten him bloody. Ephram had seen this horrible thing she had done to Rooster. Seen his pride water down to a puddle, and he couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for him. Maggie beating Rooster was all anyone had talked about for weeks. So when Ephram saw Margaret on the other side of the lake, he had no desire to cross paths.

Just as he thought of retreating into the brush, he saw the quiet girl pointing in his direction. Maggie turned fiercely and cut her eyes at him.

“What you staring at?” she called across the lake.

“I’m not staring.”

“What you doing then?”

“Fishin’.”

“Well you best not be staring at nobody if you know what’s good for you.”

Ephram nodded. “I’m just fishin’.”

“Well see that’s all you do.”

Ephram watched the other girl whisper into Margaret’s ear. The two began to approach, walking along the water’s edge. As they got closer Margaret asked, “You catch anything?”

“Naw.”

“How long you been here?”

“Awhile.”

“You ain’t fishin’, you feedin’.”

Ephram paused and looked at Margaret. Although he was a year older, Margaret towered above him.

“Gimme that pole.”

Ephram handed it over before she asked twice.

“You Celia Jennings’s brother, huh?”

Ephram nodded.

“You got a name?”

“Ephram.”