Curse of the sampan witch follow me back from Nam six months ago. It’s March now. Dogwoods budding pink. All morning I been in the shed. Raw sores stinging me like a pin cushion. Run to the kitchen, dip my whole face in the bucket till cool water dribble to my belly. But cool don’t soothe nothing. Soothe me . . . that what Momma Pearl promised to do.
Porch chimes ring, tiny bells Momma stitched to calico sash. She peep out the window.
“It’s a white girl haven’t seen before.”
Momma shush and wave me under the porch. Say sores on my face “bad for business.”
Since I been home from Vietnam, two, three womens ring the chimes every day except Sunday when Momma go to Aunt Reverend Mattie’s tabernacle. Come to buy Momma Ruth Pearl’s Herbs for Lady Problems. Negro maids come cause boss men on Promised Land Road ride them. Poor white ones from Stringer Road come. Even upper white ladies from Promised Land park nice cars outside Momma Ruth Pearl’s gate.
“Go. Please, Amory,” she say. “Selling herbs only way I can feed these children I’ve taken in. Can’t let you scare my customers away.”
I think about the sampan witch struck a curse on me in Nam. “Tất cả những sai lầm của tôi quay ngược lại. Không bao giờ tha thứ.” Saigon dope girl tell me what it mean. “For all your wrongs backward. All your wrongs forward. Never forgiven.”
Next day, flesh holes opened in my face.
Chimes jingle jangle again. The girl in a hurry. Momma’s eyes on me sharp as a whipping switch. “Go on.”
I don’t move.
She step out on the porch. Floor boards whine.
I follow right behind her. And look dead at that girl. She prettied up now. Teeth nice. Hair perfumed like Daisy’s Department Store next door to the army recruitment office. But her green eyes look right through me, like I’m not there. Like she don’t remember we did it in the back seat of her nice blue car in January cold. Now she want to buy herbs. That mean she got something growing inside her. Something I put there? And she want tea and poultices to make it not be. Is her belly round under that coat?
Momma turn, see me. Her lips strict, “Get back.”
I want to stay. See can I find out her name. Instead, I go under the porch like Momma say.
Under the porch it dark, cool, safe for secrets. Dirt smell sweet as brown sugar boiling. Fat black ants tickle my arms. Eight years ago, I ran here after Cousin Sara drowned in the river. One time, I peeped under here, saw Momma vomiting her supper. After she told Papa “Ruth Pearl ain’t bearing you no more children.” And I knew I wasn’t getting no brother or sister. She didn’t want no more like me. No more that people call “slow.” No more to explain again and again: Stove. Do not touch. Hot means hurt means cry.
Up on the porch, the girl tell Momma she near three months on. “I’ll pay extra, ma’am.” All the womens that come here, none ever call Momma “ma’am.” But she treat my momma good. Give her kindness. Like she give me when I got back from Nam. Everybody was mad at me. At first, she was, too.
September, I was just off the bus. Government sent me home early. “DD Form 214: Private Amory Pearl USMC. Nov. 30, 1967-Sept. 30, 1968. Days served 303 of 365 tour. Discharged Honorable. Acute Micro Bacterium Ulcerous Infection. (Combat Disabled Only). She come at me in a big crowd. Angry. Her teeth, gums red as hot Jolly Rancher candy. She stab a sign: OUT of VIETNAM. Hair stringy as a mutt. Fingernails polished pink. “Baby killer,” she shout, leading the pack. Then she see the sores. Smell puss. Her growling go silent. She back away. My mind make a rhyme so they angry can’t hurt me inside. Eighteen, Am go to Nam. Am come home a man.
Fall air was apple crisp. Pine mist kissed my face. Didn’t care about these sores. But downtown, people scorn me like a leper in Aunt Reverend Mattie’s bible. China Lady in shiny grease spot dress show me out her Imperial Golden Palace restaurant. “You nice color soldier, but you face sore bad news for customers.” Clerk at Daisy’s accuse me of stealing. “I know you Nam boys got to feed your heroin habit.” Hitched a ride. Old truck driver spit tobacco in a snuff cup. Told him I was in Nam. “Nigger baby killer. Open that door. I got out. Deserve what you got—bird shit pit face.” Tail lights. Am is a man.
Four months pass, I saw her again. She wasn’t mad no more. At Kroger, I’m looking for a job. Sweeper, bagger, anything. Three white boys jump me in the parking lot. “What’s that shit on your face?” My rhyme help me fight back. Nam is Am. Am is a man. My brogan kick tall one in his thing. He grab it howling. Then two duke, pin me. My ear stick to icy ground. Tall light a cigarette, take a long drag like he a movie star. “This is a red hot poker.” He sniggle. Aim embers and burn a halo in my chin. My skin sizzle. I scream and smoke and sleet blur everything. Then a blue car chase them down. They scatter like Nam cave beetles in light. Slipping, sliding, boots disappear into woods. The car circle back. Brakes slam. Door fly open. Nice pink fingers on handle. White lady. “Get in.” She spin the car behind the store where trucks unload. Hit the brakes. Inside, heat unlock my frozen fingers. She reach backseat grocery bags, pull out a little tub. Butter. Green Tambourine white boy tune on the radio. My head spinning. I can’t look at her. Stare at snow specks whistling the windshield. “It’s OK. It’s OK. You’re safe in here.” She touch butter to the burn. Melting like Momma’s hands soothing salve on my skinned boy knees. Fingertips soft between sores. Except for medic man, nobody touch close to my sores, my curse. This girl, she ain’t afraid. “Let’s just be still for a minute.” Then, she press into me, breath calm, warm. Pull her scarf over us. And she gives to me tenderness, like she have so much tenderness pent up inside that need to come out, else she’ll die. Engine running, windows frosting, our breath white puffs. We weeping, moaning, joy rising over us like them waves on the South China Sea. Then quiet. And I see that she the girl from the crowd, the one that come at me. Now she holding me. Telling me she sorry with no words. Easy as butter melting my heart forgive her. Same way I want to be forgived. Like I want this curse and sores to go away. She drop me off at Crisscross Bridge. Never tell me her name. Never see her again till she come here today to buy Momma Ruth Pearl’s Herbs for Lady Problems.
Up on the porch, she thanking Momma. A crack of light in the floor board show her driving away in that blue car. Same one we did it in. I crawl out on my way back to the shed to work on a motor.
Momma look at me. “I don’t want to know” is only thing she say.
My mind tell me don’t say nothing, just find out where she live. Make her keep what I put inside her. But one more month, it won’t be.
One more wrong. One more sore. Never forgiven.
Next morning breakfast, Leddy, Ruby, Willa, Momma Pearl, me, we squeezed in this kitchen. No bigger than three beat-up outhouses hammered together. Leddy fiddling a toy soldier he keep balled in his fist. Momma’s softest finger wipe away grits sprinkling his greasy chin. None of them come from inside Momma. After Aunt Mattie’s only child drowned eight years ago, her and Momma start taking in children. Mixed ones that white womens on Promised Land born and didn’t want. Willa came seven years old. Eyes mismatched as marbles, blue one minute, gray the next. Fair with Brillo Pad hair. Now she got titties. Leddy came two years old, eyes simmering like a warm cup of tea. Howl, spit up too much. He ten. Little Ruby came newborn. Now her hair windy, pink as a strawberry moon.
Mr. Watson at the fish stand had everybody whispering, “Ruth Pearl and her sister Mattie Nill turning Crisscross Town into Halfbreed Town.” But Momma don’t worry none what other people think. After Uncle Reverend Nill left Crisscross and never come back, Aunt Mattie stood on milk crates and ordained herself Reverend Mattie. She prayed for the children and Momma Pearl fed them. Best I could, I cared for them. Then they all growed up to be smarter than me. Now Momma love them more equal than she love me.
This morning, Momma Pearl making a big news speech. At table head, over plenty scrambled eggs, she stand straight as a platoon captain, smiling. Cracked, old brown teeth are gone. Money from the lady herbs bought new teeth too wide for her mouth. She buy pointy glasses got sparks like a lighted grenade. Miss Hattie press her hair in tight curls. Momma rattle pork rind from her throat. “I’ve purchased us a acre from Mr. Bessmore,” she say in her proper white people way. “Snapped open my purse, counted out one hundred and sixty-six dollars.” Price went up this very morning to two hundred, he tell her. She time-table in her head. Purse snap open again. Count thirty-four dollars. “He so surprised, his chicken fingers spilled black coffee. Starched white shirt muddied.” Momma cluck and clap.
Still standing, she sip coffee. Never again will Ruth Pearl or her babies be somebody’s maid. Cooking, cleaning up after whites can eat up a colored woman’s life. Now she got a business. When she dead and gone, Leddy’ll supervise fields. Not go to war. Ruby’ll keep the books. Willa’ll run the business. “You’ll never be anybody’s maid. Long as I’m breathing.” Momma tighten her lips like a recruit in rifle training. “You won’t end up like Cousin Sara.” I think about Aunt Reverand Mattie’s only child. Ruby clap happy, drink down a whole cup of milk and belch. “Never going to be nobody’s maid. Thank you, ma’am.” Everybody laugh. Not Willa. She look sad at hotcake syrup and bacon grease on her plate. It’s Easter week. No school. But they can’t go out to play in flowers blooming like manna in Aunt Reverend Mattie’s bible. All day, they got to stay in and work Momma’s production table. Willa stitch poultice sacks. Leddy and Ruby stuff herbs in them. Herb dust darken daylight till bright day gone. They ain’t got no choice.
It’s cause of me, my wrong, they caught up in Momma Pearl’s business. Cause of me she had to start selling herbs. I never sent no money home to Crisscross Town help her feed the children.
Instead, drank up my pay outside the Temple of Eternally Tranquil Light.
Saigon come back in my mind. Me and Mellow, my only platoon friend. We go to see the boy priest in his brown áo tràng robe. He praying. His eyes steady, palms pressed together, he bow but stumble into Viet Cong AK fire like a shattering mirror. His temple burns, bits of clay bursts to orange stars. In the street, children cry for his prayers, for him to come back from the dead. We empty our pockets. Throw all our dong till they crying cease. Then we drink up the rest, Rượu cần and snake wine. Till we throw up sour, piss, pay to smear our seed on them Saigon dope girls. But I can’t. Scared I’ll snap they tiny hips in two. So me and Mellow drink and cry for the boy priest. His words soft as a hiccup. “Giống như hoa sen, vận may và sắc đẹp chỉ có thể mọc. …Kinh Pháp Hoa dạy địa ngục là cõi vĩnh hằng ánh sáng thanh tịnh.” Then he tell us what it mean in his fish-gut, cut-up English: “Like lotus blossom, fortune, beauty only can bloom in filth, stinking swamp of our life. …Lotus Sutra teach hell is the Land of Eternally Tranquil Light.” Every payday—one hundred and fifty U.S.— me and Mellow throw the children dongs. To buy them rice, buy them life. Till our pockets empty. Nothing left to send home to Momma. Nothing left to feed Willa, Leddy, and Little Ruby hungry in Crisscross.
All my wrongs forward.
At the table, Momma Pearl sit back down. Pat the corners of her mouth in a dignity way. Eyes on me. “I’m expanding my business. We going to have dishes, beds, drawers—nice things like we live on Promised Land.”
Willa mismatched eyes still on her plate. She picking the nappy hair at the back of neck. Say she don’t know if Momma Ruth Pearl’s Herbs for Lady Problems is good or bad by the bible. I don’t know either. But it’s on me that girl bought tea and poultices from Momma to make what I put inside her not be.
One more wrong forward on me. One more sore.
Willa’s blue eye on me. “When that ofay-girl come here yesterday, I peep the window curtain. Seent how you looked at her.”
“None of your business,” I say. “Time for you to get to sewing them poultices sacks for Momma?”
Next day, almost light, I’m ready to get out the gate. It’s two miles to the bridge. See can I find her. Make her let what’s inside her be. Like Saigon girls cooking go hấp in rau ram. Penny royal mint in Momma’s skin hit my nose before I see her. Shawl on her shoulders, she on the top porch step, big yellow bowl in her lap. Hands crispening dried herbs. Flakes flicker, tickle my sores.
“Where you headed so early, Amory?”
“Walking. Hoping spring dew drop on these sores.”
She know even my slow mind can tell a good lie. I pick at the blister splitting my lip so she can see I’m hurting. Tincture she made a month ago ain’t helped none. For a minute, she sad. Then her heart get back to business. She got a plan for her new land. New seeds that’ll grow penny royal, thicker, faster. Need me to plant and pick three crops. In and out the ground by fall. Six months. That’s enough time for what I put in that girl to come to be. Time enough for me to give my momma her own grandchild, a second chance on me.
She point at the bottom step. Galloping to get to day, sun flash on a shovel and hoe. “They’re brand new. Quality, Daisy’s Department Store,” she say. “Every day, I need you out early. In after dark. And stay out that shed, wasting time on a motor. Planting will build this business.”
Pick herb flakes off a sore. Can’t tell her it’s a curse on me. She would only laugh. Boy, war make your mind slower than it already was. Still, I ask. “When you gon find the right herb to heal me like you promised, Momma.” I pick up the hoe. “These sores hurting me bad, Momma.”
First time since I been back, her eyes tender on me. On the pops of pink flesh, the ring O burned in my chin. Please Momma take your hands out that crispening bowl. Please hold my face like I’m a little boy again. And me and Cousin Sara at Daisy’s and it’s Christmas time and we on Santa Claus’ knee. She way older than me. Grinning, her bad gray tooth poked out. My face shining fatback like gold wrapping paper on gifts under the tree.
Momma look at the crispening bowl gripped tween her knees. She shame. Been too busy brewing tea, mixing herbs, making smells. Filling up mason jars, bowls, poultice sacks, getting her hair pressed. No time for a tincture, salve for me, Amory that come from inside her.
I lift the shovel, light as tin. Cheap.
“Don’t worry.” Her voice sifts soft as flour and promise again. “I’m going to mix herbs make you brand new with fresh bright skin.”
“Waiting on you, Momma.”
She searching her apron pocket. “That white girl come here yesterday—feel like I know her from somewhere.” Find a small sack of seeds and toss to me. “Keep your mind on planting them seeds. White girls trouble. Can’t help they selfs.”
April. Sun up. Fatigues on, march to the field. Like Sadie M-16, shovel on my shoulder. Bust angry dirt clumps hard as cement waiting on rain. Hoe handle splinter my fingers till three crops planted. Cohosh, penny royal, cohosh. Soon tiny leaves pop. See clear through them to heaven. My mind tell me heaven is green as a rice paddy. Two months since that girl come here. By now, Momma’s tea washed away what was inside her. It’s gone. Like it never was. No grandchild.
More wrong on me. More sores. So raw, carrion crows caw, circling my head.
Momma promise she working up a new tincture. But late at night so quiet I can hear worms moving, she steady at her crispening bowl.
“How you coming making my medicine, Momma?” She don’t look up at me in the doorway. “White trash girl on Stringer Road, found her this morning in the outhouse behind old Bells Mill. Chicken wire. Poked her insides till she bled out like a hog in dirt.” Tears stuck in Momma’s throat. “My herbs could’ve saved her. But crackers didn’t want her to come to me. Hate us niggas so hard, they hurt they ownselfs. Already had four children. Who going to care for them now?” Her fist squeeze, crush herbs like she ringing a chicken neck.
“Mr. Watson at the fish stand, behind my back, Miss Hattie, too, got every mouth in Crisscross Town saying, ‘Ruth Pearl kill babies.’ ‘Ruth Pearl hands unclean.’
I suck in air till my chest ready to bust. All my wrongs.
Momma go on. “This war, it leave womens lonely. They dance, drink, lay with strangers. Rich white ones forget to take they pills. Then come to me. White bossman do what he want to Negro maids. They come to me. They all come unto Momma Ruth Pearl’s dirty hands. And you know what?” Her new teeth shine pride. “Them white womens from the big church on Promised Land, they thanks me. Christmas Eve, a crate of oranges appear in the porch snow dust. Dead of February, heat oil truck fill up the yard tank, drive away. Even my sister, your Aunt Reverend Mattie, say my medicine make evil do good.”
Momma promise me medicine. Momma owe me equal love. But for now, only thing I got to sooth these sores is standing in the middle of the field, head to the sky and hard cool rain.
The May sun steam like Nam.
Leddy run to the field to give me a piece of mackerel, water jug. “Mr. Watson at the fish stand say they killing childrens over there in that war he was in.” He twirl the soldier toy. “Mr. Watson say war make you sin when you don’t even want to.”
Stead of drinking water, I pours it on my face and hoe five more rows. Rest. Song in air.
From behind the shed, Ruby spring up like a lily. “Uncle Am, I picked these for you.” Her small fingers press cool mint leaves to my face.
Was that you singing back there?
“Uh-huh. I singing for you to get well. Aunt Reverend Mattie say God gon hear me.”
These children that didn’t come from inside Momma look out for me. They make Mellow come in my mind. Mellow only one in my platoon looked out for me. I messed up, didn’t look out for Mellow.
Me and him processed in at Parris Island. Ishamel Wilson aka Mellow cause he smoke reefer and cuss. “Fuck a regulation haircut.” Recruitment man line us in the yard, say we special. Project 100,000, big Government opportunity for Negroes. War get us ready for equal jobs back home. But outside the window of they office with a fan blowing cool air, Me and Mellow hear them snigger, call us “President LBJ’s morons—United States Moron Corps.” In our tent, lava light twirling red, orange, blue. Mellow pick his fro. “Think we low IQ niggas to use when they run out of white boys to fight they war.” Only give us eight weeks training instead of twelve. I still can’t trust Sadie M-16. She jerk, twitch, least move I make. But Mellow ain’t no moron. Mellow teach me.
Lunar New Year. All of Nam dance they yellow Con Rong snake dragons. Red lanterns swinging. Then boom. VC boobytraps. Every which way. Boom. Orange blue fire. Somewhere east of Saigon, I’m lost in tall swamp grass. Blades slice palm, bubbles of flesh pop out. Tiger skeeters pinching. Can’t find Mellow. Heat like a clothes iron dizzy my head, send me in circles. Get there too late. Andrews Alabama in cabbage shit water up to his shoulders. Stone still. Turning more blue than white. He the platoon tunnel rat. Burrow underground in the VC Cu Chi tunnels. Squirreling over bones, dried turds, spiders in his crack. Crawl back up stinking, holding a sack of dummy grenades. Flick open a fist full of teeth. But in that swamp, Andrews Alabama see live booby traps don’t know what to do. Mellow stuck in the middle. Across the swamp, razor eyes. Small mens or school boys? Sadie-16 jerk. Bodies drop. Whenever the sergeant told us to blast “gooks,” Mellow always hated it. “They brown as we is,” he say. “Killing them feel like I’m killing my own self.” But—"Mỹ giết bạn. America keel your Martin Lutha King”—Ho Chi Minh’s VCs don’t care nothing about Mellow. School boy AKs rise out the swamp. Tat-tat-tatter Mellow camouflage shirt to pieces. Andrews Alabama cry all night long, till I tell him Mellow ain’t dead. Tell him Mellow back home in his Harlem that he told us about. And it’s Sunday morning. He roaring his motorcycle down St. Nicholas Avenue, wind in his fro—no more regulation cut—and his girl Ida on the back, her arms around him buckling love. Let those school boys kill Mellow? Or kill them? I messed up bad on Mellow.
All my wrongs.
My mind come back from Saigon and Ruby skipping back to the shed. Sun high, purple martins thrip. Here come Willa, stomping through the fields like she in charge. Her little titties about to pop her blouse buttons. She give me a poultice sack ice packed.
“This here cool them nasty sores,” she say, gray eye narrow at the sun. “Ain’t you tired of digging, Uncle Am?
I stay quiet.
“I seent how you looked at that girl. How you wants to go find her. Uncle Am, you could leave here. Learn to fix that motor. Get you a real job.” Willa sass, hands on narrow hips. “I be sixteen soon. Tired of sewing. I’ll leave with you. Go over the bridge, find a maid job on Promised Land, grow pink lilies in they big garden, instead of these ugly baby-killing weeds. Get paid so Miss Hattie can press my hair.”
Willa don’t know nothing about the world she say she want. Same world sent Cousin Sara to her grave in Crisscross River. If Willa leave here, I have to go with her. Protect her, look out for her. “It’s a Bessmore in every house.” I tells her. She roll them mismatched eyes, one gray as silver in the sunlight. “What happened to Sara ain’t gon happen to me. I’m strong, Uncle Am. I’m gon leave. Come on go with me.”
Willa make me want to leave. Make me think I can get me a paycheck job. A new life of my own. My mind ask me what if that girl threw Momma Pearl’s tea and poultices in the river. What if she rubbing her belly right now, feeling joy growing inside her? Tranquil light in her? Baby alive inside her right now.
One less wrong. One less sore. Maybe whole curse be gone.
“Alright, Willa. We gon do it,” I say like a soldier. “We gon leave here.”
“Go on then, hurry up finish learning that motor.” Willa thrash through the field, worn shoe smashing penny royal leaves as she go.
At the production table today. Willa head down sewing. Foot on the pedal. I’m stuffing poultice sacks. Sores pussing so bad, I can’t tend the field or work on the motor. Minute Momma go check on neckbones boiling, Leddy sneak outside to play. Come running back in. It’s a white man in the yard want to see Momma Pearl. Say his name Bessmore, say he sold her the acre.
Momma run put her teeth in. She don’t have to tell me. I jump up from the table to go under to the porch hole. Momma stop me, grab my arm muscle and we walks out on the porch. Her arm in mine. Like she want me to bear witness. Like I’m in Aunt Reverend Mattie’s bible. Sewing machine stop humming. Willa at the window curtain. She a witness too. Ruby and Leddy playing in Momma’s flowers.
Bessmore standing at the bottom step. He don’t want to come no closer to us. Momma thinking he here to jip her. Take back the land she just bought. Lie that price went up. And she need to pay more. She grip me steady like I’m Sadie-M16. He take off his nice hat with a feather. And Momma don’t see the tall man with hard shoulders that can do whatever he want to in Crisscross Town like he did to Cousin Sara. Today, his bald head bowed, humble like Momma ain’t never seen him before. He can’t bring hisself to look up at her. She grip me harder like it’ll make him look up and see me. Like these sores on my face her weapon. And he’ll see how war didn’t give me no equal. Make him have mercy on her. Not take back what belong to her now. Destroy her business. Her hope.
The knot in his thick neck jump like a fresh-killed chicken gizzard. Momma wary. Maybe he going to sic police on her for selling lady-problem herbs. The gizzard leap again. Momma’s teeth click in and out of place.
Sores sting sweat salt. I stand still.
He open his lips trembling, wet, weak for words. Say he need to buy some herbs. His little girl got a lady problem. She five months along. He done had to tuck her away. His nice shoe kicking herb flakes in the dirt.
All Momma see is Sara body dragged from Crisscross River, belly swollen with calf. River weeds tangling her gray tooth. Eyes white. And her mother, Aunt Mattie feet so fast down the river bank, mud sucking bare heels, trying to outrun grief. Momma can’t catch her sister.
And Momma hear Wolford Washington tell everybody at tabernacle that it wasn’t him put that baby inside Sara. Was her boss man Bessmore. So Wolford wasn’t going to marry her. Mr. Watson saying a ugly girl like Sara with a bad tooth won’t get no more chances.
And I feel the river in spring rush cold over me. At the minute Sara change her mind. Her arms swing out like wings. Even if she a disgrace. She want to live. Want her baby to breathe. I kick harder. Harder. Swim like Papa taught me. Sara like a big sister to me. Sara looked out for me. All my might reach for her. Stronger, the river suck her down. Sunday-school blouse like a big white flower blooming over her swollen belly. Ashamed of me, Crisscross River rage downstream, dodging sunlight through pines.
I run home to the hole under this porch I’m standing on. Wail, my hand covering my mouth. All these years, I never tell a soul. Never tell Aunt Reverend Mattie I was there when the river took her only child, born to her late.
The sampan witch chop-up words come back to me.
“Tất cả những sai lầm của tôi quay ngược lại. Không bao giờ tha thứ. All your wrongs backward. Never forgiven.”
Momma bony, crispening fingers dig deeper into my arm. Strong and weak at the same time. Bessmore finally look up at us on the porch. Now we got some power over him we didn’t know we had. Momma tell him if his daughter five months along, herbs hurt her. Too late for herbs.
He turn red as bread mold in wet July. Offer to give back thirty dollars off land she just bought.
Momma shake her head. Ain’t no price he can pay. He turn again into the Bessmore that did his business on Sara. Hawk. Spit at me. Say war give me what I deserve. Then stomp to the gate. Chicken leg arms in short sleeves.
Little Ruby run, tug his pants leg. Hand him a bunch of lilies, lavender. She look up at him tall as a lob lolly pine. Her eyes amber, hair pink gold, a field ready for harvest. He look down at her and can’t help but see beauty—nigga mixed with white cake-batter beauty. So much beauty he scared. He throw the flowers in Ruby face. Her mouth turn down and she run to Momma’s apron, a bouquet of tears on her chin.
“Get off my property,” Momma holler. “This my land now.”
He out the gate, yelling, “I’ll find a way to stop this thing, Come hell or high water.”
My heart thumping my head. My mind tell me he talking about her, that girl that give me mercy. Talking about what I put inside her. It mean she didn’t drink the tea she bought. It’s alive. I know it. It’s coming to be. Lest Bessmore kill it. I break away from Momma and run. Can’t let him hurt her. But he in his chariot angels polished, his gold Buick wheels spin road dust in my sores. And he gone. I’mma find her, before he make his own grandchild not be. Make Momma Pearl’s grandchild not be. Am is a man.
Momma still outside wiping Ruby tears. In the kitchen sink, I wash dirt specks from sores. Willa back at the sewing wheel.
“We got to go now,” I tell her.
“Then finish up learning that motor so we can get on up out of here,” she say. “You can do it, Uncle Am.”
“I’mma learn soon as I can and I’mma leave.” Am is a man.
Willa raggedy shoe press the pedal and the sewing machine hum.
Done everything I can to fix the motor. August. Willa tired of waiting on me. Motor still setting here on the shed dirt. Dumb. In the shade, Papa’s broken tools piled in the corner, do-nothing ghosts. Then sput-sput-rat-tat-tat! Smoke shoot up. The engine rattle to life.
“You did it, Uncle Am.” Leddy skipping round me and the motor. “You fixed it.”
Sweating, surprised at my ownself.
“Come on, Uncle Am. Give me some dap skin like in Nam.” We snap fingers, knock elbows, slap five, jump like jelly beans.
“Boy, stop carrying on, get back in the house and work,” Momma yell at him. At the shed door, her shadow sets down the crispening bowl. Got to come see for herself.. She stand there, hands on hips. The motor clatter to the rafters. Can’t drown out the miracle spreading across her face. Every tooth in my head grin at her.
“I can fix a motor now,” I shout it. “Whites on Promised Land gon hire me. Pay me like I’m equal. I got to leave now, Momma. Go cross the bridge. See can I find—”
“All right, then,” she say, words like her soul trembling inside. Like Aunt Reverend Mattie’s God just answered the prayer Momma been praying all my life. “You’ve proved yourself. You can be a man. That’s what I want for you. Go on, cross the bridge, son.”
She reach for me and say it again. “Son.” Engine steam huffs, stings my sores, pushing us together.
“Momma.” I whisper. “I need you to make me new medicine. Can’t go or do nothing, till these sores heal. Won’t nobody hire me.” She holding me now and I tell her. “Nam witch struck a curse on me, Momma. Sore open every wrong I do. That girl drink our tea, curse keep on, on and on. I find her. Stop her, you get a grandchild. A second chance on me. Amory brand new—I don’t know. War stay in my mind. Sadie M-16 mess up my mind.”
Her bony fingers hold my chin. I’m her little boy again. Her eyes see these sores for the first time. “Son, if it’s a hex, I’ll break it. A tea, a salve—your Momma Ruth Pearl will find a way to heal you.” Engine still rumbling low. I wait for her to tell me I ought go to the tabernacle, pray.” Instead, she pick up her crispening bowl and her shadow stretch long in the sun.
Fresh holes bust open. Flesh too raw to touch. In the room off the kitchen where I sleeps with the children. On my cot, rock my head, trying not to moan. Puss seep buttermilk bitter to my tongue. Sores heat a fever sucking me so weak I wet myself. Salt tears burn my eyes. Leddy don’t fiddle his toy soldier. Don’t ask about “that war you was in.” He pin my arms to my side. Clamp my hands in his small fists. I can’t scratch, pick flesh holes. Lightbulb swinging, Willa hold my head still. Whisper a prayer over each sore. Then, finger by finger, Ruby pat on Momma Pearl’s new salve—calendula, mint, rosemary, arnica. Momma stick her head in the door. She shame. None of her seeds, roots, herbs, leaves, powders, recipes can break this curse. She leave. Can’t stand the sores stink.
Trembling, legs kicking. I cry out. And the children keep laying hands on me. Finally, Willa pull the lightbulb string. In the dark, she see her dream of us leaving walk out the door and crawl under the porch to the dirt hole. “No more don’t cry, Uncle Am,” she say. “Aunt Reverend Mattie got the whole tabernacle praying on you.” Little Ruby sing, “What a friend we have in Jesus. All our sins and grief to bear.” Her finger tips salve my cheeks, cracked lips, till I fall asleep and see the sun. Blasting white light. Village outside Saigon come in my mind. Tender fingers touching newborn sprigs. Old Bà in her rice paddy. Bent, soaking wet, so happy, singing sweet as syrup on hotcakes. “Hai Hoa. Hai Hoa.” Straighten pointed coolie hat, tie green ribbon under chin, wipe her brow, smile up at Ông Troi, King of her sky. Brutal sun His gift to her. Her apron pocket sagging, low as an udder. A grenade? She a VC boobytrap? My finger spring Sadie-M16. Air cracks. Her song stop. Hat straw flies. Her head zig-zag open. My tongue taste Papa’s rusted tools, fresh blood. Can’t move. Screaming pink cranes soar blanched sky. She fall over. Green water splash pink, red, like the Lava light Mellow bought on R&R in Hong Kong. I want to cradle her head. Give her life back to her. Three children run out a stilt hut, crying. “Bà. Bà. Grandma. Grandma.” Tallest boy eyes drill hate. “Bây giờ chúng …? Who look out for us now?” Bà’s body, tender fingers still, sinking, spinning in the sun. They gather around. Put palms together, begin to sing. Angel throats yearning. Higher, till they sorrow rise to wailing up up over the sky. My trigger finger sweat, slippery on Sadie M-16. Which way is good? Which way is God? Help them live? Help them die? Help them go to Aunt Reverend Mattie’s heaven? Help them see eternally tranquil light? I let Sadie-16 do what she want. And run stumbling sick in tall grasses, slicing, whipping me. Then I see her. The witch, face cloaked standing top her rotted sampan. She carry me and cargo. Bloody catfish mouths cut to thin white bones. On shore, her people bowing, chanting over me. All my wrongs. Faraway, Bà’s children sing. Palms pressed in pure prayer over Bà. High above insects trilling, rising over the filthy, rank swamp, soft voices join Ruby singing balm. “Have we trials, temptations? Is trouble anywhere? ... Take it to the Lord in prayer.” Together, they sing me forgiven.
I wakes up to a new sun shining yellow blue red through morning rain. Thunder rolling away. The children ain’t here. The children that love me equal—where they gone? Come back. Amory Pearl need to look after the children. Children is my forgiveness. I sit up straight on the cot. Call they names. Willa, Leddy, Ruby. I got to find them. Throw off sheet. Undershirt, britches, no shoes. Run outside to the yard. Pebbles grind my bare soles, scrubbing my feet. Rain soft, cleaning sores. Oak tree branches arc over me like praying hands. Ruby, Leddy, Willa, Momma—they all there, gathered at the gate. Angel trumpet vine blooms candlelight. Here come Aunt Reverend Mattie stick-leaning, drenched, bringing joy. Through the gate, she step holy, lifting her long skirt like she got prayers in her pockets.
“Why you come from the tabernacle in this rain, Aunt Mattie?” Willa shelter her with poultice cloth and reach out her hand. Aunt Mattie grab hold, the other palm of praying hands.
Aunt Mattie chase her breath. It’s old, rank tobacco, and new, fresh sassafras. Leddy put a cool dip to her lips. “Children, Exodus tell us, ‘In all the travels, whenever the cloud lifted above the tabernacle, Israelites set out.’” She drink a sip. “A tabernacle don’t stay in one place. Tabernacle go where my heart go. And I go here.” We ease her to a stump under the mimosa tree pink whiskers shining raindrops. My eyes meet Willa. We ain’t leaving.
“Aunt Mattie, I was there that day when the river took Cousin Sara.” I’m able to tell it at last. “Years gone by, I never told you. Ain’t no excuse for myself.” But Aunt Reverend Mattie don’t even look at me. Her eyes on the basket looping her arm.
“Last night in the storm, white girl come to me,” she say. “Blue car. Left this child. Told me give him to you to look out for him.”
Wind whip maple leaves to a crown. Already I got him in my arms. Kiss his smooth newborn skin, gold, red as a plum picked deep in summer. I know he mine. My son. And I know I’m forgiven. All my wrongs backward. All my wrongs forward. Sampan witch curse is broken—or a blessing now. Ruby at her side, Momma know too. “My grandson. Mercy. Amory brand new.”
“That white girl didn’t say her name. Still, I recognize Bessmore in her eyes,” Aunt Reverend Mattie say. “My Sara was his maid. Back then, I couldn’t see he was shaming Sara till it was too late. Took a long while, but I forgived myself. You ought to, Amory.” Tranquil light in her eyes, she reach for my child. “Woowee, listen to that cry. Mighty enough to open sky to day. And look at them legs wriggling, eager to walk this world. He gon be strong.” I hold on tight. “And he gon be smart,” I say. Never let him go. “Just like me.” And we laugh and love on each other at the tabernacle door.
Contributor Notes
Charlise Lyles is an alumna of the Kweli Art of the Short Story Workshop. Amory Pearl: Baby Killer is her fiction debut. As the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War approached, Ms. Lyles visited the country. She is writing a collection of short stories centered on the mysterious birth of a child in a small segregated town in the American South during the war.
Ms. Lyles is the author of the memoir Do I Dare Disturb the Universe? From the Projects to Prep School (2008 Gray & Co; 1994 Faber&Faber Ltd.).
Her 25-year career in print journalism included reporting for Landmark Newspapers and Cox Enterprises. As co-founding editor, Ms. Lyles led Catalyst Cleveland, a non-profit education policy journal, to two Association of Women in Communications Clarion Awards for Best Small Publication.
She is a recipient of an Alicia Patterson Fellowship for journalists; a Virginia Center for the Creative Arts Fellowship; and a Kimbilio Fellowship, formerly of Southern Methodist University.
Ms. Lyles is a graduate of Smith College, and works as a proposal manager in health information and supply chain technology. She lives in Texas with her husband and garden.
* Medical experts warn against use of herbs to induce abortion due to serious health risks, including potential organ failure and death. There is no scientific evidence supporting their safety or effectiveness as abortifacients.
**As interpreted by Soka Buddhist teachings, the Land of Tranquil Light is not a separate physical or celestial place, but a state of enlightenment to be realized amid one’s daily struggles.
