Grace
In the midst of mourners, I stand looking in the empty coffin as echoes of the dry dead voices recite. You ugly girl, you will never amount to anything. Why can’t you be more like Bernice? I turn and stare out the window; the rain blows in with the funeral procession. Guests are all arriving, taking their place in the pews of Wimberly White’s Funeral Home. A voice reverberates through the high ceiling “Mr. Jack Campbell is being laid to rest.” Ironically, my father is a black man being laid to rest at White’s Funeral Home. Think about it: a black man at White’s Funeral Home; I just think it’s funny. Bernice and I are sitting in the front row pew with Mother and Mama Grace. Only if I could hide in the back of the church, from the onlookers gawking and whispering. In a small town, everyone gossips like chickens pecking and scratching for grain. I have spent a lifetime being pecked. I wonder did everyone know.
I could smell the musty odor from the red paisley carpet. It must have been there since 1809 when the funeral home was initially St. Mathews Baptist Church. The rain beading on the stained glass windows made all the saints look like they were crying for my father. I turned as look at my mother; she wasn’t. An alcove lay in the center of the church, with a cross and vermillion red banners on each side. Each banner has a bible verse, John 3:16 and 1 Corinthians 1:18. Obviously, this was a Baptist Church before it was renovated into a funeral home with its choir loft and the baptismal right of the pulpit. It still has the wooden pews, some of them with sections that were darkened by the many coats of varnish covering the scorch and bloodstains where ten black families were shot and locked in the church while set on fire. Church burnings in the south were deeply driven by racism, and this event overwhelmingly aroused our community.
Our town managed to rise above its history of slavery and racism. The families were gathered in St. Mathew’s Baptist Church, killed, and set on fire. Mother and Father kept us hidden in the basement when our town was in a civil uproar. Bernice and I were only 13 at the time. The Wimberly and White family restored St. Matthews and changed it to Wimberly Whites Funeral Home, hoping for reconciliation out of decades of destruction. While listening to the choir singing Amazing Grace this morning, much more is being put to rest here than just my father.
I put on my Foster Grants to hide my puffy eyes; I have what most people call an “ugly cry.” Not the type of hysterical face while searching to catch my breath. But the kind of ugly where all the blood drained from my face. Revealing every receipt of gratitude from my father’s drunken gifts of rage, married with tears finding every scar to deposit its place of honor. Bernice, my twin sister, took hold of my hand with a look of why? Why am I so broken-hearted? Why did I come here? Why did I leave her behind…. Why? So many why’s I couldn’t answer to myself, let alone to Bernice. Mother sat next to Bernice with her cold and distant look of disappointment. She clung to her Bible and a hanky with the embroidered initials MC. I often wondered what kept Mother here and why she never fled. Why did she stay home to take care of me, Bernice, and Mama Grace after Paps’ passing? Mother is such a talented artist. She restored paintings at the Boston Museum of Art before marrying my father and moving to Macon County, GA.
“Pst… Bernice?” I elbowed her while looking behind us.
“Shhh… What Grace?” Trying to sit in a refined posture while rubbing her arm where I jabbed her.
Bernice was always annoyed with me, for I never fell into line with all the southern social graces. I think Mother got it wrong when she named me Grace Louise and Bernice, Bernice Suzanne; we must have been mixed up as children at some point.
“Look at Aunt Ella Jean?” I said with a smirk, changing from the stoic face as she carried with the weight of a lifetime of secrets all morning. Bernice covered her mouth to muffle her laugh. We looked at each other and rolled our eyes. Cousin Patsy and her husband Jimmie Tate brought their baby to the funeral. Aunt Ella Jean hollered as they sat down, “Don’t be bringing that crying child up in here. It’s rude. Lawd have mercy….” Mother turned, “Shhh….”
Aunt Ella Jean sat right behind us, in a classic black suit, I think a Channel, pearl necklace, and her charm bracelet that clattered every time she waved at someone she knew from her church, New Hope Baptist. But all these hats, OMStars, the pews were filled with oversized hats moving about like ants in an ant farm. I suppose, no matter what decade it is, one could consider it a prerequisite to belong to the First Baptist Church and wear large Sunday hats. I’m not sure if this is part of our culture, but when I attend one of those milky white non-denominational churches, NO HATS!! I can say this is one of the many beautiful colloquialisms of our culture. You know what they say, “the bigger the hat, the closer to God.”
Everyone was wearing black. Except for Bernice and me, we stood out like two peaches in a bushel of pecans. I was wearing a pink dress with tiny dandelions that looked like they were being blown off by the wind and ballerina flats. My coarse black hair was pulled up and off my neck, I looked in my little compact, and my blue eyes were still puffy and red. I wiped my face and any semblance of eye makeup left under my eyes from crying. Bernice is wearing a pale green dress with a wide pattern-leather black belt. She took after mother. Everyone in the family said Bernice looked just like her. Bernice’s hair was straight, and brushed her face with the breeze every time the door opened; her skin was fair like Mother’s.
The Pastor stepped up onto the platform with the cross and banners behind him, flowers to his right. He began with, “Mr. Campbell was a thoughtful husband, a father who cherished his daughters, and a best friend to his neighbors. Not to mention how he loved his football and bourbon; everyone laughed.
I look around. There are flowers from the church, father’s work buddies from his union local 354, and the Elks club where he would spend most of his time drinking and shooting the shit. The flower arrangements covered one side of the wall where the 1 Corth. banner hung. Sunflowers in large baskets, three huge flowers draped on easels, baskets of plants, and an arrangement with two pool sticks crossing each in a ceremonial triangle, like the Father – Son and the Holy Spirt. I could smell the fragrant flowers lingering above the dank carpet, like the magnolia breeze over the humid bay.
Leo and Tim, my father’s best friends and retired union buddies, all sat left of the room. They were sitting with their wives, large women, the type that worked on the assembly line until they got married, then stayed home, raising a dozen kids and watching the neighbors’ kids. The only current events they read were the gossip magazines at Stella’s beauty shop around the corner.
My father was a tall, slender man. His hair and skin tone were as rich as Croatian soil, and he had dark eyes that often reflected the emptiness within? He was wearing a blue suit at the viewing, I would guess from the 1970s, with a wide tie and tiny white dots on it. No shoes, though. Why wouldn’t the funeral home put his shoes on? Did they think he would escape and torment small children and widows? I thought, no one thinks it’s strange the coffin is empty. Maybe he is out tormenting small children. It would be just like him…
“Bernice?” I whispered.
“Now what?”
“Why is the coffin empty? Where’s Father?”
“Grace… Mother wanted Father to be cremated, but Mama Grace would not allow it.” Bernice replied.
“So why are we looking at an empty coffin?”
“Mother thinks Mama Grace had someone take Father and Mama Grace thinks Mother stashed him to have him cremated later.”
“So, are you saying Father is missing?”
Mama Grace glared at us, “shhh….. Have some respect for your father’s memory.”
Mother responded, “Respect? Where was your respect when you took him thus, not allowing us to finalize his remains to give him a proper service?”
“Miranda Darlin, I don’t know where my son’s body went. I had nothing to do with him missing.” Mama Grace said.
I looked at both of them, “shh…. people can hear you. Bernice will take care of this after everything is done.”
Bernice quickly turned, “ME??? Why me?”
“Because you are the oldest.”
“Seriously, by 45 seconds.”
The Pastor stared down at us while our voices raised with the choir singing. After the choir finished with Nearer My God to Thee, Pastor asked if anyone would like to come up and say anything. I didn’t dare go up, for I would have decades of bruises and scars to unleash on our friends and family who were sincerely lost by my father’s passing. I don’t understand why no one questioned the black eyes, broken opened lips, and trips to the hospital with cracked ribs. I’m still slightly blind in my left eye from being walloped that he bruised my cornea.
As children, Bernice and I feared our father. Bernice and I knew our father’s joy was replaced only by the bitter taste of anger. He found every self-destructive measure to kill the pain he endured with an existence consisting of too much liquor and too many cigarettes. Father would frequently come home from a hard day at work with the stench of his two-pack-a-day habit. Combined with the heavy aroma of English Leather and alcohol since he had already spent hours in the bar or the Elks club. I would hear him walk through the door and holler, “Grace, bring me a Bourbon and water.” I was the best 10-year-old bartender in town. At this time, Bernice would hide in our room under her beds. We had better have our homework done, dinner dishes clean, bathed, and in our pj’s so that maybe we would go to bed without enduring his wrath.
I handed him his drink and smiled. In a sigh of relief, tonight is quiet. Father sat in his leather recliner, glowing cigarette half-burned in the ashtray, drink in hand, watching The Dating Game. He delighted in this barbaric TV show; men chose one of the beautiful young girls for an all-expense paid date.
“We could take a trip to Europe.” Mother said.
“Europe? Why would we go there?”
“If you remember, I have a master’s in art history and restored paintings at the Boston Museum. It could be a second honeymoon and romantic knocking around Paris and Rome.”
“Well, isn’t that just hunkey-dorey for you?” Father began to get agitated. “You are always trying to remind me how important you are with your college degrees. Am I not giving you a good life? Don’t the girls go to the best private school in Macon County? What more do you want from me? All I ask is some peace and quiet when I come home from work. The next time you start with me, I’ll knock you so hard in the head you will be lying on the ground, then I will have to tell God you died and come a get your pathetic soul.”
It was easy for Father to dismiss Mother. Unfortunately, she had lost her youthful dew of when they met. Having Bernice and I, two miscarriages and enduring Father’s drunkenness had withered the sparkling gleam from her eyes, replaced only by disappointment. I overheard my father yelling at her as I sadly watched him turn away. Her smile faded into tears. She was beautiful, soft with a distinct smell of ivory soap, strawberry blond hair, and eyes as green as her Irish heritage. She was broken, and I don’t mean just her heart of what used to be. She had a permanent limp when father took out his wrath on me with the belt because the washer broke. There was water everywhere, running out of the kitchen onto the deep blue shag carpet in the living room. I fell to the ground. He kept kicking me in the ribs and stomach. Mother tried to block the kicks, then he broke her leg. This was one of the many trips to the ER after my father’s drunken rages. We would come up with some ridiculous excuse. I could see the doubt in the doctor’s and nurse’s eyes; however, there was nothing they could do unless we pressed for their help. After all that we had gone to bed, Father could hear us chattering and yelled from down the hall, “Shut up, I don’t want to hear another peep from you” Bernice and I would then laugh and go, “peep – peep – peep.”
The next morning, we ate our breakfast among the reeking dirty ashtrays on the kitchen table, his drink half-full watered down from the melted ice. I could tell Bernice was sick. I held her hand and said, “It’s okay.” I sat with bruises on my ribs and welts on the back of my legs. Thank God it was Saturday. We could wear pants today. Mother limped out of the bedroom; I could see the giant purple bruise on her leg. I asked if she was going back to see the doctor. Mother assured me she would be alright, but her leg never healed properly as she walked with a limp. These were the many deposits my father left on us during his drunken rage.
“Go clean your room, get cleaned up and dressed. Your father will take you to lunch today when he gets back from playing golf.” Mother said.
We were excited that afternoon. Father took Bernice and me to the Roadrunner Cafe. After the high school football games, it was the local hang-out and had the best burgers and shakes. More importantly to my father, around the corner in the same shopping strip was Harvey’s bar, where my father spent a lot of his time.
We had just got our food when he asked one of the waitresses if he could leave us in the cafe while we finished our burgers and fries. The chubby waitress wearing a yellow uniform and white apron matched the color of her Tweetie Bird tattoo, with a name tag that said, Pauline. She said in her gravelly voice, “No, I can’t let you leave your kids here. What are you thinking?”
Father flew into a rage. He started grabbing up our food demanding to-go boxes. Pauline came from behind the counter with the boxes and gave Father the check. She looked at us and asked if we wanted her to call our mother. We just put the food in the boxes and told her, “No, it was okay. Our father will take us home.” I knew what was coming next. My stomach was turned into knots, and my face flushed. I was afraid that my father was going to smack me. While he was at the register paying the bill, he yelled at us to grab our shakes. We left and headed back to the car. He sat us in the back seat of our metallic brown Studebaker. It was another scorching day in August. Mama Grace would say, “it was hotter than a cat on a hot tin roof.”
“You two wait here. I will be back in a few minutes.” Father walked across the parking lot over to Harvey’s. He went through the heavy red leather door with metal studs hammered around it, looking like diamond-shaped pillows and a small round window. When the door opened, the aroma of alcohol and bleach filled the air. The bleach odor was from the night before, while men who couldn’t hold their liquor vomited in the bathroom. It was dark, with sawdust on the floor to soak up any remaining vomit. The jukebox in the corner was playing Conway Twitty, Hello Darlin.
Tim and Leo were sitting at the bar, “Hey…. you finally made it.” Tim said.
“I couldn’t leave the girls. Miranda made me take the girls to lunch. I tried to let them eat while I run in for a quick drink, but some low-class cracker waitress wouldn’t let them stay.”
Leo looked at Jack as if he had lost his mind, “You can’t leave the girls unattended. They are only 10….”
“Well, I didn’t, so don’t be given me your high and mighty attitude, Leo. They are safe in the car; I’m just coming in for one drink anyway. They are fine. They’re finishing their burgers.”
“Miranda will kill you leaving those girls in the car. It is hotter than blazes.” Leo said.
“What Miranda doesn’t know won’t kill her.”
The bartender asked, “The usual Jack, bourbon, and water on the rocks?”
A couple of women were in the booth against the wall. Stella, who owned the beauty salon, came by the men. “How’s Miranda, Jack? Did you leave her home again alone with the girls again?”
“Shut your mouth, Stella,” Jack replied. “Go mind your own business.”
“I’m sure Miranda would like to get a phone call letting her know where you are.”
“There’s the payphone right there! Call her.” Jack said with a smug look, knowing Stella wouldn’t do it.
Bernice and I were still sitting in the car, trying to keep ourselves entertained, playing tic tac toe with our fries. Counting how many white men would drive up and go into Harvey’s and honk the horn every time a stupid boy would ride by on his bike weaving through the parked cars. One hour then two hours, three hours passed by, we were getting bored and late. I looked at my watch, a gold wristwatch with a thin band of two black cords, which was one of the best birthday gifts my father ever gave me. At least one of the fanciest presents I ever received.
“It’s 4 o’clock,” I said to Bernice.
Bernice was getting tired and had to go to the bathroom. She always had to go to the bathroom. We always made fun of Bernice that she had a bladder the size of a pecan. A woman came out of the bar. She wore a crazy rainbow-colored fur jacket, green hooped acrylic earrings, and fuchsia pink lipstick melted onto her teeth. Her face pushed right through the open window. She asked, “Where are your parents?” Bernice pointed at Harvey’s, “Our father is in there, but he’s going to be right back.”
The fur lady asked, “Where’s your Mama, honey?”
I replied casually, “Oh, she’s at home,” as if waiting for father in the car while he sat inside drinking in the middle of the afternoon was an everyday occurrence.
The fur lady rolled back into the bar and said to Stella we were still sitting in the car, and Jack had been at the bar for over 3 hours. Stella got the nerve up and walked to the payphone and called Miranda. After she hung up, both Stella and the fur lady came out and stood by their car watching us.
Mother did not drive, so before we knew it, we saw her walking straight for our car, and without a word, she grabbed us, and we walked back home. The strip mall was about 2 miles from our house. We walked down Citrus Ave. crossing over the freeway bridge was so long, and we were tired. I kept complaining I was tired and afraid one of our friends from school would drive by and see us walking just to be interrogated with questions when we went back to school on Monday. I didn’t need to start the new school year with this embarrassment hanging over my head. It was already hard enough at school.
I looked more like father, and Bernice looked more like Mother. The difference in our appearance matter more to our grandmother than to us. However, I never admitted that it mattered to me more in school. The teasing from the other girls and Bernice left me out even when I attempted to have lunch with her and her friends. Although Bernice and I were sisters, people were often mistaken and didn’t believe we were twins. One of the girls said, “Bernice, I don’t know how you can live in the same house with her.”
It became unbearable when we transitioned to high school. As teenagers, we started to look so different from each other. It was quite apparent Bernice leaned fairer and was accepted in the elitist social groups. Bernice was popular and was invited to parties hosted by the Governor’s daughters. I was left behind since I was the ugly sister. The boys were mean and called me names that I couldn’t repeat without crying. The girls would pick a fight where I would go home with my hair pulled, disheveled, and food stains on my uniform. What left me with the unforgivable hurt was when Bernice was sitting with her friends. I walked by them. The girls called me spaz, loser, you must have been a mistake, telling me to go home, and I didn’t belong in their school. All the while, Bernice just sat there quietly, ashamed and not sticking up for me. She ignored all the comments about me and joined in by laughing as if I wasn’t her sister. I tried to stay out of everyone’s way from that moment on and kept to myself. It was the only way I could find the quiet within the chaos. I thought we had risen above juvenile racism.
We attended Bulloch Academy with all the social expectations of becoming young ladies of the south. The Academy claimed to be progressive, yet I suppose the parents of the students were the underbelly of racial division across Macon County. We were enrolled in art and dance classes. We each played a musical instrument, and of course, Bernice played the piano. But I loved the smooth, rich bello of the saxophone. Bernice was a cheerleader, and I loved history.
Mama Grace said I love history because I was rooted in our rich culture. She would tell me the stories of her family when they moved up north during the Harlem Renaissance. Would go and listen to jazz players breaking barriers like Louis Armstrong and Bessie Smith. Mama Grace still has paintings hanging in her bedroom from Jacob Lawrence and books from Langston Hughes, and she would read them to me every time I would go and visit her and Pap on their Peach farm. Paps passed away about three years ago when Mama Grace came to live with us. Going to Mama Grace and Paps was my “Saving Grace.” Visiting them freed me from the turmoil that I endured during my childhood.
We loved visiting Mama Grace and Paps peach farm just outside Macon County, Ga. While they sat under the Hickory trees, Bernice and I would catch fireflies. Mama Grace brought out canning jars and poked holes into the lids for us, but Paps said, “When you catch the fireflies and put them in jars, they die.” My heart broke hearing that, so I immediately let mine go. However, Bernice would keep right on catching them and putting them into her jar. Although it was magical seeing Bernice’s jars filled with fireflies, if we caught enough of them, they were like miners’ lights shining in the depth of the South Carolina mines. It still made me sad watching them dim out like the light in me every time father smacked my face. I sat with Paps and would love to watch them poetically dance below the trees, stars moving about like Shakespeare’s Midsummer’s Night Dream. I would pretend they were fairies. Mama Grace would say that fireflies were the fairy scouts. They would make sure it was safe to come out before the fairies were allowed to emerge to unleash their crusade for mischief. I loved listening to her stories of fairies and mythical creatures. Mixed in with our African culture and the history of generations of slavery, all while helping her sew quilting squares by hand. My Great Grandma Ruby and Granddaddy would come over to help Mama Grace and Paps with the harvest. Mama Grace and Grandma Ruby would be rocking in the rocking chairs on the porch, quilting and singing hymnals.
Great Grandma Ruby’s quilts were tapestries of storytelling of how our family came here as slaves, the many white folks who fought for their freedom by way of the underground railroad. Grandaddy bought a small piece of land for Paps and Aunt Ella Jean to have their own. Paps kept buying surrounding farms as they fell on hard times during the depression. Paps and Mama Grace now have the largest Peach Orchard south of Macon County. Paps and Granddaddy would be out with the workers helping with the harvest. I loved harvest season, the smell of fresh peaches baking in the hot sun sitting in the pickup truck before bringing them to the silo over on the north side of the barn. These were always magical moments for Bernice and me to get away from Father.
Mama Grace would often take us for a couple of weeks at a time. I’m not sure if she knew what was going on in our house, but it always seemed an unspoken secret everyone never talked about. Unlike Homer, folks in Macon County would never bring it up to Mama Grace, where they would gossip just to validate their pitiful existence.
Mama Grace and Paps would take us to the First Baptist Church on Sundays. I went to church and sang in the choir since I was knee-high to a grasshopper. Paps loved it when I was up singing gospel hymns. Sometimes he would sneak out after I sang to go help the crew during harvest time. Mama Grace would get annoyed, but Paps said, “God understands. Farming doesn’t wait for no one.” After church, we would meet up at Mama Grace and Paps for Sunday dinner. The fried chicken was always on the menu. Mama Grace made the best-fried chicken in Macon County. Grits, collard greens, cornbread, Aunt Ella Jean’s homemade jam, pean, and peach pie. Uncle Bud would be in the back after dinner cranking the ice cream machine for homemade vanilla ice cream to go with Aunt Ella Jean’s fresh peach pie. I loved Sundays at Mama Grace and Paps. We would pray, and Father seemed to be much calmer and would never drink in front of Paps.
It was those Sundays with Mama Grace and Paps, going to church, where I would understand the Lord’s mercy on us. Mama Grace would explain the demons that haunt people, and it is by the Lord’s mercy to forgive us as we should forgive each other. I knew in my heart that Mama Grace was talking about father. It was hard when I felt alone, and there were times when I felt God had forgotten me.
Mama Grace said, “God never forgets. The Bible says that God was with David. God was with Job, Jacob, Lot, Moses, Noah, and Jesus throughout the Bible. God is with us when we are with God.”
“I feel God when I’m here with you and Paps.”
“Then by faith, you will walk strong, and forgiveness will only bring you closer.”
I hugged Mama Grace; she always knew where to connect and open my heart to the truth.
My attention bolted back to the Pastor, hearing all the words of how Jack was a wonderful father, good provider, and committed husband. Yet, no one witnessed what I suffered in a prison of silence. Mother taught me how to hide behind the southern graces, smiles, and phrases: “It’s snowing down south (by letting a lady know that her slip is falling below her skirt), put on your big girl panties and deal with it. Or my favorite, I can go from Sweet Southern Lady to Crazy Country in about three seconds, and That’s nice! (A polite way of saying F… Y…)”
The rain stopped by the end of the service. Everyone was getting up, walking around, and talking amongst themselves. At the same time, Mother and Mama Grace excused themselves to the small room in the back saved for grieving widows who cannot face anyone. They started up with their arguing again. Mother, wanted to know where Father’s body was stashed, and Mama Grace denied that she had anything to do with the disappearance of her son’s body. Their voices carried into the main sanctuary.
“Miranda, you couldn’t wait or have the heart to leave my Jack intact and bury him. But out of revenge, you had to go and incinerate him?” Mama Grace said.
“Look, old woman, being cremated was what Jack wanted.” Mother replied
Aunt Ella Jean comes storming in with her two cents of where father’s body could be. “How do you lose a dead body? He was just here at the viewing three days ago. Did anyone check with the funeral home’s Director?”
I’m trying to keep everyone quiet, and Bernice then charges in. “You are all embarrassing me. Everyone can hear you screaming at each other like a bunch of banshees.”
“OMStars Bernice, can you just let your guard down once and not worry so much about how other people perceive you? It is getting exhausting to keep up with your rules of priority, aren’t you exhausted?”
Bernice walked out of the room in a peacock huff. Aunt Ella Jean sat down crying, Mama Grace shaking her head, and Mother still with that stoic expression on her face. The rest of the family are all leaving, heading out to Aunt Ella Jean and Uncle Bud’s, what used to be Mama Grace and Paps Peach farm.
Aunt Ella Jean and Uncle Bud came in and kept the farming going after Paps died. Mama Grace moved in with us just shortly after her father got sick with liver cancer. I, too, came home from New Orleans. I spent much of my time helping Mother and Mama Grace with Father. Then it got to the point where hospice came in and helped him journey through the final stages of his cancer. On a Saturday afternoon, I stood by his bed just watching him breathing, his chest rising and falling. He was sedated and wasn’t even aware of my presence.
The screaming started up again. Mother and Mama Grace arguing about old events of father’s carelessness and Mama Grace constantly bailing him out. Bernice shows up with the Director of the funeral home. Both looked pale and solemn, carrying an urn.
Mama Grace looked at Bernice with a screech, “What is that? Miranda, is this your doing?”
“I have no idea.” Mother replied.
The Director sat the urn down in the middle of the table and said, “Let me explain.” We all sat down with our arms crossed over our chests, waiting for his best-stated excuse.
“Mr. Campbell was initially scheduled for cremation; however, at the wake Mrs. Campbell…
“Which Mrs. Campbell?” Aunt Ella Jean asked, interrupting him.
“Mrs. Campbell, Mr. Campbell’s mother. She stated that arrangements have been changed, and the family no longer wanted his body to be cremated….”
“How dare you interfere, Grace. It has always been your interference during our marriage. I was never good enough for your son. Some northern white girl taking your precious boy away from the family’s legacy and accusing me that I was only after the family’s wealth. How cliché.”
Then Mother started rambling off in French which no one understood except for Bernice and me. “Il est remarquable que vous pensiez que j’épouserais Jack pour son argent ou votre argent. J’avais ma propre vie et ma propre carrière et il m’a promis une vie avec amour et tolérance parce que sa famille comprend être un étranger.” It is remarkable that you would think I would marry Jack for his money or your money. I had my own life and career and he promised me a life with love and tolerance because his family understands what it meant to be an outsider.
“Mother… Mother … En Anglais s’il te plait,” Bernice calmly said while looking into her face.
“Okay, Jack has been cremated. There is nothing we can do about it now.” Mama Grace said calmly. “I’m sorry, Miranda. I never meant to make you feel unwelcome or not part of our family. I know you and the girls endured so much of Jack’s demons. We both agree that he was a lovely man before he started drinking.”
“It’s fine, Grace. Thank you for acknowledging the turmoil the girls and I endured.”
“I believe his drinking started when Jack never heard from his best friend again. His best friend’s parents had the neighboring farm in high school and college. When her parents were killed in a tragic auto accident, she lost her parents and their pecan farm. Bernie just disappeared. Until he ran into her a couple of years after you two married. He tried to help her, but she refused, then Bernie kept moving about and ended up homeless about ten years ago. She stuck around the stripe mall where the Roadrunner café was located.”
“Wait, you mean the crazy fur lady? Was he in love with her?” Bernice asked.
“He was not in love with Bernie. They had been best friends since they were small children, though. You were named after Bernie, Bernice Lincoln Dupree. Yes, Bernie was the homeless woman you call the crazy fur lady.” Mama Grace replied.
I almost lost my cookies. I had never laughed so hard in my life. My sister, miss Queen of Southern Social graces, bourgeoise of sophistication, popular, head cheerleader, Prom Queen, was named after the local homeless woman. I fell to my knees, and tears streaming down my face. “OMStars!!! I have heard it all. I remember seeing father give her money every time we would see her in front of the café.”
Bernice looked like she was about to faint. Mama Grace immediately replied, “Bernie was not homeless when you and Bernice were born.”
“But it’s still so funny. I have had a lifetime of not measuring up to the perfect Bernice…. And now…” I just kept laughing. It was contagious because Mother and Aunt Ella Jean started to laugh.
“It’s not funny. This cannot leave this room….”
The Director interrupted, “Well, here’s the problem… Bernie passed last week. She, too, was scheduled to be cremated. Her service is scheduled for tomorrow. Somehow, the paperwork got mixed up, and that’s how Mr. Campbell was cremated. But that’s not the only bad news.”
“Bad news… isn’t this enough?” Asked Mama Grace.
The Director took a deep breath, “I think you should sit down.”
As the Director continued, everyone found a chair or deposited themselves into the pink oversize pillowed sofa. “Since the paperwork somehow got mixed up, the bodies were put in the wrong section where they are kept for processing. Bernie’s body was in Mr. Campbell’s box, and Mr. Campbell was located in Bernie’s. One of my staff processed Mr. Campbell, who thought it was Bernie. However, another staff member discovered Bernie’s body in Mr. Campbell’s box and saw that she was scheduled for processing, so they processed Bernie too. Here’s the icing on the cake, neither one’s ashes were retrieved, and unfortunately….”
“Are you telling me that my son’s ashes are mixed with Bernie’s ashes?” Mama Grace is now screaming and has lost her mind.
“Yes, Mam. There is no way of separating them.”
Mother just smiled. Bernice and I looked at each other shaking our heads and laughing. I thought it served him right to spend the rest of eternity kissing Bernie’s back end.
“So, what do we do now?” Mother asked.
“That’s up to you all, but we can’t release his ashes until the state releases Bernie’s to a family member.”
I put my arms around Mama Grace and said, “I guess this is what you meant when you kept telling me about forgiveness. We have to forgive the funeral home for this. There is nothing we can do right now.”
Bernice agreed, which is probably the first time we ever agreed on anything. I smiled at her and gave her a long hug where she broke loose first. I see Bernice through different eyes now, more humbled. Her voice was against our father’s anger when I didn’t have one. Bernice did stick up for me against the bullies at school. It was just in her way of speaking with authority with the softness of a southern woman. We all left for Aunt Ella Jean and Uncle Bud’s. Father was left behind and will take care of him next week. Sitting on the back porch, rocking in Great Grandma Ruby’s rocking chair. Where I made sense of my father, who favored liquor and cigarettes, staying out at the bar and taking his drunken frustration out on me. I smiled at Bernice and realized it was forgiveness. He wasn’t all that we saw on the surface. He did have a kind spirit, a man that lived for God but battled his demons. Our family found Jack Campbell, my father, and he was loved through God’s grace.
JL Valentine 