Jeffery Allen - Rails Under My Back

Sam ain’t never have any kids? Lucifer asked.

Sam never claimed any, Beulah said. Cept one by this girl when they was stationed over in the Philippines. One. A Filipino. The only one he claimed. But who knows all the places his blood done run.

SHEILA DRIFTED AWAKE in sunlight. The rising sky lifted like a blanket. Faint sounds rose in spirals up the stairwell. Hatch? She reached for Lucifer. Discovered a warm hollow where his body had lain. He sleeps very still, legs straight, hands crossed on his chest, an ancient mummy. Strange. He never rose before her. While he slept, she would make breakfast and prepare his lunch. Work-bound, he carries his lunchbox solemnly, like a miniature coffin. Ah, so that was him downstairs in the kitchen. He was preparing to bring her breakfast in bed. Not if she surprised him first.

She found him in the kitchen, shaved and fully dressed, drinking his coffee in five scorching swallows. Black. He likes it black. With four lumps of sugar. Ah, he would go early to work. Make up for missed time. Set right to right. He caught her eyes as he lowered his cup, and his fingers suddenly became unable to compass both cup and sight; the cup banged against the table.

Sheila.

Clumsy. She smiled at him in the remembered fashion. Touched the yellow bird at her throat, floating in its element. Swept into an empty chair at the table. Ran her bare toes up the thick hard logs of his thighs.

Sorry.

How are you this morning?

Fine.

Why you up so early?

His head rocked unsteadily on his neck. I gotta go.

What?

I gotta meet Gracie.

Why?

His look rose and settled on her, then flew away.

Don’t you remember? The phone call last night.

She watched him.

Remember, she called last night? You know, John. His eyes floated everywhere in his face. Away from her.

John again?

She had a feeling about John.

Two days in a row.

Well, she called. He rose from the table. What am I sposed to do? She called. Said John’s gone. He crossed the room and stretched her insides.

SUNRISE FOUND LUCIFER taking the long train ride to Liberty Island, his heart ringing and echoing against the warm bed he’d left. Coffee lay in a hot ball on his stomach. And Sheila lay somewhere even deeper.

He blinked behind sunglasses, looking through tinted glass, looking through the train’s speeding window. Bright streaming skyscrapers rose above his twin lenses as the train left Central, shaking and shivering like a dope fiend, and passed over metal scaffolding to the island. The horizon licked the bright slapping waters of Tar Lake. Licked sun from his glasses. Sun-day. A day that reminded him of Sundays reminded him of Porsha reminded him of Pappa Simmons cause it was hot and bright and Sunday when he and Sheila carried the newborn to Inez’s house, first showing her to the old man, spending the last of his years on the screened patio watching the grass and soaking in the quiet, and they made the trip every Sunday after that, Porsha making the journey by herself when she was old enough to learn the El, coming to hear the old man’s aged words— wrinkles slacken the face, loosen the tongue —words that memory and possibly the fear of death had forced out of him, and it was on a Sunday when Death took him, snatching him from under Porsha’s frog-witnessing eyes. She never grew out of her ugly.

Beneath his dark shades, an old feeling of stolen sleep. Each day, he rose early, the sun scratching his back. Gracie had robbed him of needed sleep. Healing in long sleep. Perhaps she had robbed him of even more. Sheila’s mouth formed into a taut line and tightened about him. For the second day in a row, he had crossed her. In the kitchen this morning, his eyebrows had raked in her startling form. He had shaded his eyes so that he might see only a little of her face at a time, first the chin, then the lips, then the nose, then — skip the accusing eyes — then her forehead. Yes, she was angry that John had drawn him away for a second day. If she knew all that he had thought and felt as night softened to dawn, she would understand why he was on his way to meet Gracie this morning. Once she knows — I must tell her, I will — she will understand.

He reached Twin Lakes station, walked to the Davis Street exit, and ran down five flights of El platform stairs — cool wind blowing past his ears — hoping the speed would wake him. Liberty Island. Cobblestoned alleys gave hollow force to the sound of his footsteps. Tall yellow fire hydrants. You only see those in museums. Tree-lined streets. Gardens smearing the air with scent and color. Groomed lawns and neat squarish brick houses. Liberty Island.

The hot ground came up through his shoes. He pressed Gracie’s doorbell. Removed his glasses. Fixed a smile on his face. Over the years, he had learned to hide his disgust for her.

She opened the door. Lucifer.

Shadows spilled out the house.

Gracie.

Sunlight filtered the shadows. The stairs curved upward just beyond her. Black. Black as a worn ass. She had lost some flesh. Always been a toothpick. A skinny chicken bone. Caught in John’s throat, his chest. Two scroll legs meant for stomping prayers in church.

You and John gripped your dicks like fire hoses. Pissed high as the hellfire ceiling. Pissed down Reverend Tower’s hot sermons. Fat women with Bible-weighted pocketbooks chased yall out.

You, Lucifer. You know better. Being the oldest.

Zip up your pants.

Do something constructive. Fix Miss Beulah a plate and take it over to her place. And take them nieces something.

You fixed Miss Beulah a plate (fried chicken, buttered dinner rolls, candied yam, and greens) — them nieces can fix they own — and ran to keep it warm.

My, my, Lucifer. Ain’t you sharp in your suit?

Thank you, Miss Beulah.

Miss Beulah smelled good, like rusty tubs of rain.

Where that mannish John?

Playin with Dallas.

Dallas. There’s another one for the devil. Miss Beulah tasted her chicken. You ain’t bring my nieces a plate?

I forgot.

Well, help them there with that ice cream.

You did. You turned the cooler’s handle while Gracie and Sheila added ice, salt, or milk. Ice cream done, Sheila sat you down at the table and white-stirred some into your bowl.

Gracie watched him, the curve of the staircase behind her. There are curves in this house.

They embraced as though through glass.

PORSHA WOKE with Deathrow imprinted all over her. Her nipples raised tepee-like. Deathrow had worked them, painting with his fingers. Morning entered, cool and clear, through the open window. Sunlight edged under the closed blinds and formed a yellow square of concern on her bedding. She shed her sheets — onion skins, layer upon layer; one skin for sleeping, another for loving, another for eye-burning tears — and opened the blinds to the full blast of day. What night had blurred began to take definition again. The humming warmth of the Prophet 1 Faith Stimulator patent pending still roared through her body. Rise. Rise. Rise. Rise and shine. She never slept this late. How dare he?

She showered. Perfumed her body. Massaged her private places with a healthy sprinkling of powder. Slipped on a red loose-fitting dress, black-belted at the waist. Slipped into fishnet stockings and high-heeled satin shoes that accented the curve of her calves. She rouged her cheeks and drew another face for herself. Haloed her mouth with lipstick red and apple-shiny. Now the final touches. Four gold apple earrings Deathrow had bought for her. A necklace of real pearls she had bought for herself.