Evie rolls on one side, afraid to close her eyes because every time she does, she remembers the red silky inside of Olivia’s neck and the black blood that she lay in. Daniel tried to cover her eyes before she saw but he was too slow. Evie always thought blood was red. Now she wonders why babies are blue and cows bleed black blood. She should have asked Uncle Ray. He is more of a cowboy than Daddy. Uncle Ray would know about blue babies and black blood, but he didn’t want to talk much on the ride home. He didn’t even ask about Aunt Eve’s dress even though it stuck out from under the bottom of Evie’s coat. She saw him looking at the blue ruffles. Mostly, Uncle Ray looked like he hadn’t slept a single night in his whole life.
“Girl ought to wear trousers when it’s so cold” is the only thing he said.
Thinking that next time she sees Uncle Ray she’ll ask him about black blood, Evie rolls over and looks at the drawer where she hid the picture of Aunt Eve and Uncle Ray. Mama made her return the rest of Aunt Eve’s things to Grandma Reesa and she has to write an apology letter on Mama’s best stationery so they can send it through the mail. Mama doesn’t know Evie kept the picture.
Across the kitchen, Mama’s bed creaks. Sometimes, when the house is dark, Evie hears it. Mama always says they are making up the bed with clean sheets. Tucking in hospital corners, straightening the quilt, fluffing the pillows. Soon enough, Mama is done tucking her sheets and the house is quiet again. Maybe Evie can sleep without closing her eyes. Cows do that sometimes, or is it horses? Another question for Uncle Ray. But Evie isn’t a cow or a horse. She tries closing her eyes. First one, then the other. Everything is black for a moment and then she hears a knock. Maybe Mama is making the bed again. Evie opens her eyes and sits up. She hears another quiet knock. Tapping on glass. Tap, tap, tap. Someone is at the back door.
Daniel wants to bang on his wall. He wants to punch a hole all the way through to Elaine’s room and into her fat mouth. She and Aunt Ruth are still whispering about the wedding. All night long, probably all through dinner, and even now when they should be sleeping. Elaine doesn’t care one damn bit that Olivia died. She doesn’t care that Evie wore Aunt Eve’s dress to school or that everyone calls Evie a nigger lover. She doesn’t even care that Evie almost got swiped like Julianne Robison. All she cares about is studying and finishing high school so she can have the wedding that she spends all night, every night, planning with Aunt Ruth. Daniel sits up, lunges toward the wall he shares with Elaine, pulls back his fist, ready to punch a hole all the way into her room, when he hears a knock. The last time Mama checked on him, he pretended he was asleep so she left his door ajar. Unwrapping his fist and dropping his hand to his side, Daniel walks to his open door and listens. Yes, someone is knocking.
Ruth keeps talking, thinking that Elaine won’t notice the quiet creaks coming from Celia and Arthur’s end of the house. She gathers the fabric at Elaine’s waist with the fingers that stick out of her sling and weaves a straight pen into the satin sash. “That should do it,” she says as Elaine muffles a laugh. “Now, be still.” Ruth ignores the giggle. With so much to be sad about that day, the laughter is sweet. “I can’t keep taking this in. You need to eat better. You’ll waste away to nothing by the wedding if you’re not careful.” She folds over another patch of loose fabric farther down Elaine’s hip and this time when she smiles at the quiet creaks, it’s because they make her feel that maybe things will be fine again. In these quiet moments, the house binds together.
“Will that do?” Ruth says, patting Elaine’s hip and looking past her into the mirror on the back of the door.
Elaine so resembles Celia, though her features are dark like Arthur’s. Still, she has her mother’s long, soft waves, and even late at night, her eyes and cheeks shine the same way Celia’s did when she smiled at Arthur through a cascading white veil.
“Perfect,” Elaine says. “Just perfect.”
The creaking stops and the house is quiet.
“Let me help you,” Ruth says as Elaine wiggles out of her wedding dress.
“I need to use the restroom first,” Elaine says, stepping off her stool and reaching for the doorknob as she hops from side to side.
She must have been holding it, waiting for the creaking to stop. They both begin with a smile before breaking into giggles.
“I can’t wait anymore.” Trying to muffle her laughter, Elaine opens the door a crack. “Did you hear that?” she says, turning toward Ruth.
“Sounds like someone is on the porch.”
“Who would come so late?” Elaine says, and stepping out of her dress, she slips on a robe.
Ruth waves Elaine aside. With one hand pressed to her full, round belly, she says, “I’ll have a look.”
Celia opens her eyes. She rolls her head toward the dark window. No moonlight. No sparkling Battenburg lace curtains. Next to her, Arthur’s eyes are closed. Covering her bare chest with one arm, Celia sits up and feels for the quilt. She finds it at the end of the bed and tugs but it is tangled in Arthur’s feet. She tugs again, causing his eyes to open, and she hears it. A knock at the back door. She drops the quilt.
“Arthur,” Celia whispers, poking his shoulder. Yes, she hears a knock. Louder now. “Arthur, did you hear that?”
Arthur rolls on his back to see Celia leaning over him, barechested. He lets out a quiet moan and reaches for both breasts.
She pushes his hands away. “Shhhh,” she says. “Listen. I think someone’s at the back door. Do you hear it?”
Reaching with one hand for the spot between Celia’s legs, Arthur mumbles something about the wind. Celia slides off the end of the bed, yanks the quilt from under Arthur’s feet, causing him to startle, and after wrapping it around herself and securing it by tucking in one end, she stands and looks straight into the eyes of a black silhouette standing in the window.
“Arthur,” she says through clenched teeth.
Backing away from the window, she trips over the quilt and, as she stumbles, each step yanks down the blanket until she is naked again. The black silhouette still stands in the window.
“Arthur, someone is there,” Celia says, squatting behind the bed and gathering up the quilt.
Arthur sits up, swings his legs around so that he is staring directly into the window. He is close enough to touch the glass. It’s black. Empty.
“No one there, Celia,” he says.
“Well, I saw someone. And I heard knocking.”
Arthur exhales, loudly enough that Celia can hear, stands, pulls on the jeans draped over the end of the bed and walks past her, giving a playful tug on her quilt. She slaps his hand and gathers the cover under her chin with two fists.
“It’s probably Jonathon. That kid might as well put his name on the mailbox.”
As Arthur opens the bedroom door and steps into the kitchen, Celia whispers, “Jonathon wouldn’t peek in our window.”
“Suppose not,” he says. “I’ll give a look.”
Evie pulls her robe closed and presses her face to the glass in the back door that leads onto the porch. With each breath, a frosty patch balloons on the window. Soon, she can’t see outside. Rolling her head to the left, she presses her ear against the cold, wet glass. Quiet. She looks again and, seeing nothing and hearing nothing, she takes a step back, pulls the sleeve of her flannel nightgown down over her hand like a mitten and rubs a circle in the icy patch of glass.
“Evie,” Daddy says.