Can me and my kids stay here tonight?
Oh lord, what happened this time?
Luther slapped me. He’s being mean to me again.
I told you the last time I wasn’t going to do this again. Didn’t I.
Yes.
I don’t know why you two even stay together.
He’s my husband, Betty said.
That doesn’t mean you have to stay with him. Does it.
I don’t know.
Well I do. I got to get up in the morning and go to work. I can’t be running you all over town.
But he’s being mean. I don’t want to stay with him tonight. Betty looked back toward the car. Rose had turned the engine off.
Then suddenly the rain started. It came down slanted brightly under the yardlight next to the garage and glinting and splashing under the yellow porch light. Betty began to get wet.
Oh, all right, the aunt said. But you know you’ll just go back to him. You always do. But you listen to me now, it’s just for tonight. This ain’t going to be anything permanent.
We won’t make no trouble, Betty said.
You already have.
Betty looked away and put her hand up over her face, shielding her face from the rain.
Well, tell them to come in, the aunt said. I’m not standing out here all night.
Betty waved toward the car for the children to come.
I think you better go on, Rose told them. I think it’ll be all right.
Joy Rae took the bag from the front seat and she and her brother got out and hurried through the rain up onto the porch, then followed their mother inside. The aunt looked again at the car. She flipped her cigarette out into the wet gravel and shut the door behind her.
THE WIND WAS BLOWING THE RAIN SIDEWAYS IN GUSTS when Rose pulled into the driveway at her house, and when she stopped she got a sudden fright. Luther was leaning against the garage door. She turned off the ignition and the headlights and got out, watching all the time to see what he might do. She walked around to the side door and he followed a few steps behind. Rose, he said, can I ask you something?
What do you want to ask?
Could you borrow me a quarter?
I think so. Why?
I want to call Betty and say I didn’t mean her no kind of hurt. I want to tell her to come back home.
You could call from here.
No, I better go downtown. I been rained on already.
She took a quarter from her purse and handed it to him, and he thanked her and told her how he’d pay her back, then walked off toward Main Street. She watched as he passed under the streetlamp at the corner, a great dark figure splashing through the shining puddles in the wet night; his black hair was plastered over his head and he went on in the rain, bound for a public phone booth on a corner.
9
ON A SATURDAY AFTER BREAKFAST, AFTER HE HAD DONE up the dishes, he came outside and without specific intention or any direction in mind started up the street in the bright cool morning and passed the vacant lot and the houses where the old widows lived in individual silence and isolation. Dena and Emma were out in front of their mother’s house, and they had a new bicycle that they’d bought with the money their father in Alaska had sent. Dena knew how to ride already but Emma was only learning. Dena was on the bicycle now, riding on the sidewalk, and she stopped in front of DJ and stepped down, straddling the bike. Her little sister ran up beside them. You want to ride? she asked him.
No.
Why not? Don’t you know how?
No.
You could learn, Dena said. Look at me, I’m already riding.
I don’t know anything about it.
Haven’t you ever tried before?
I don’t have a bike, he said.
Why don’t you? Emma said.
I never bought one.
Don’t you have any money?
Be quiet, Emma.
But he said —
Never mind, Dena said. You want to ride this one?
It’s a girl’s bike. I ought to learn on a boy’s bike.
You want to or not? She got off and held the handlebar out to him and he looked at her and took hold of the rubber grip and stepped over the low crossbar. When he tried pushing the bike forward the pedal came around and hit him in the back of the leg.
How do you? he said.
Get this one pedal to come up. Now step down on it.
The bike went forward and wavered and stopped.
Do it again.
He went ahead a little farther.
Get your other foot up at the same time on the other pedal.
He went forward once more and wobbled and put both feet down.
You have to keep pedaling. You don’t stop.
He pedaled down the block on the sidewalk and the two girls trotted beside until he veered off into a bush and tipped over. He got up and pulled the bike upright. How do you stop it?
Dena put her foot up. Like that, she said.
Don’t you have hand brakes?
No. Just the pedals.
He started again and rode down the driveway into the street and rode along pedaling steadily as they ran beside him. The bike stammered and wobbled and he almost hit them once. They screamed in delight, their faces pink as flowers, and he pedaled away. Dena called: Try and stop, try and stop. He stood up on the pedals and braked suddenly, then put his feet down to catch himself. They ran up beside him.
It’s easy, Dena said. Isn’t it?
I know.
He rode up and back in the street and turned and rode toward them and lifted one hand from the handlebar to wave and put his hand back quickly and rode past and came back once more, but he was too fast this time and drove the bike into the two sisters in the middle of the street and hit the older girl hard and they crashed over, sprawling out in the pavement, the bike over them. He had torn the skin from his elbow and knee and the girl was hurt in the hip and chest. She was crying a little, holding her hip. He felt sick to his stomach. Blood trickled down his arm and the knee of his pants was ripped. He got up feeling sick and lifted the bike off her, then took her hand and helped her to her feet. I’m sorry, he said. Are you all right? I’m sorry.
She looked at him and crossed her arms over her chest where she felt bruised. Why didn’t you put the brakes on? Didn’t you remember that?
No.
You can’t forget that.
I better go home, he said. He was inspecting his elbow. I need to wash this off.
Mama will fix it for you. Come in the house.
You’re dripping on your shoes, Emma said.
He looked down. I know, he said. There were bloody spots on the toes and laces.
Let Mama fix it for you, Dena said.
They walked the bicycle out of the street onto the grass and let it flop down. Before they got up to the house Mary Wells came out and stood in the front door. She had seen them from the window coming toward the house and for some reason her eyes were red. She took them into the house.
Inside, he cupped his hand under his elbow so he wouldn’t drip on the carpet and she led him back to the bathroom. The two girls followed and watched while he held his arm over the sink and their mother rinsed his arm, the blood thinning and dripping into the basin while she washed tenderly, touching the cut place with the tips of her fingers, brushing the grit away. When his elbow was clear, the blood seeped out like little red berries. She told him to hold a washcloth to it, then had him put his foot up on the toilet seat and she lifted his pants and his knee was bleeding too. The blood had run into his sock. She cleaned off his knee with another washcloth. The two girls peered over her shoulder, their faces serious and absorbed, wondering. And while their mother was tending him, her eyes suddenly filled with tears and the tears ran down her cheeks onto her chin. DJ and the two girls looked at her in astonishment, and they felt a kind of fear at seeing a grown-up cry.