Fred’s Alley was the world to me, even now. Quite a few people helped with my upbringing. That dusty dirt road in South Carolina had everything and everybody I would ever need, friends, family and fun. The first house belonged to Miss Galena White. The very pretty widowed mother of two sons and two daughters had frequent visits from a married man, so they whispered. The sons moved to Maryland. She had a lot of chickens that lay a lot of eggs. My time at her house taught me the importance of using cold cream on your face. Sometimes they wanted to buy a chicken. She would either ring its neck or chop its head off. The headless chicken would hop around; even fly for a few minutes before reaching its permanent end. Then it would be dunked into a big pot of boiling hot water. That made it easier to pluck the feathers off. During Easter time she sold lots of eggs.
My family owned the second house on Fred’s Alley. My mother left me with my grandmomma and my granddaddy so they could raise me. I was a few months old when she left. I called them momma and daddy. I knew she was my mother only because they told me and her name was on my birth certificate. As far as I was concerned, momma’s and daddy’s name should have been on the birth certificate. My youngest aunt ended up helping daddy take care of me when momma left. There was a better job waiting for her in a place called Long Island, New York. She worked there so that we could have a better life.
The house was surrounded by pecan trees. We had a garden with peas, beans, corn, tomatoes, cucumbers, sweet and white potatoes, chickens and pigs. Before the garden was planted, I had to use a hoe to make rows, plant seeds and cover them up. I had to pick the vegetables and help preserve the vegetables. I had to feed the chickens and take the eggs out of their nests. I had to shuck corn to put in the pig’s slop. I had to feed the pigs their slop.
Next door to us were Edward and Mary James. Their three oldest children moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to find good jobs and the three youngest were still in school. Their youngest daughter was my best friend even though she was a few years older than me. Mr. James, her father, was a preacher. They used to take me to revivals when sweaty preachers from out of town pitched their tents for about a week. Next door to them were Harley and Lina Brown. They were momma’s and daddy’s best friends. Everybody called her Little Momma because she stood about three feet tall. Besides momma, she was one of the best cooks in town. She earned money cooking for other people and she was a seamstress. He worked at the cold storage where they slaughtered and butchered pigs and cows. Their house always smelled like lemon pound cake. She stood on a crate when she cooked. They had two sons. One was nasty and loved to touch little girls in places he shouldn’t. His nasty habits made him ugly. The other was nice and good looking and got stabbed during a fight. Little Momma knew about this preacher that always preached about the miraculous healing power in his prayer cloths. She wrote asking him to send her one. He said he would be more than happy to if she sent him some money. Her faith was not deterred. I just couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t pray for her for free. I was taught at a very early age children should be seen and not heard. I asked no questions.
Next door to them sat the abandoned Joffrey house with tons of weeds surrounding it. Next door to that was the railroad house that belonged to F.D. Joffrey. When the door was opened you could see straight through it. The word in the alley was his wife ran off with another man leaving him to raise their daughter and two sons. One day he sent his three children to live with his sister who lived further down in the alley. He used to come to visit us sometime. He never washed. He smelled bad. He never changed his clothes, but momma never stopped him from coming to our house or sitting at our dining room table to eat with us. She said if you were going to mistreat somebody, don’t invite them into your house. He taught me how to play checkers so good that I could beat most of the old men.
The four houses that led down into the loop of the alley belonged to the Joffreys. Around the corner were the Geralds. They didn’t come out much and their shades were never up. They didn’t socialize with people often. Next door to them were Luida and her mean husband, Hammond Davis. He resembled the bulldog with the smooshed-in face that he treated like a son. He spent a lot of time parked outside Galena White’s house when his wife went to work in New York too. While she was working she took classes to become a florist. When she came back home, she became the first black florist in town. Some days she let me come to the shop to let me work with her. Around the corner from them was another Gerald family with about 15 children. Next door to them was the Mullins family, and next door to them was the other Mullins brother with his wife and children. Next door to them was the aunt of the man whose name was on my birth certificate. Her house was filled with her husband and their 14 children. That family loved me because I was family. We spent a lot of time together. She taught me how to do hair. I could use a curling iron like a real beautician. Then Fred’s Alley came to a dead end.
Right after he got in from working at the wood mill, daddy would give me my favorite cookies or corn cheese puffs or candy. But the one thing he most looked forward to after work was over on Fridays, was making a trip across Highway 76 to Momma Aileen’s to have shots of stump hole liquor. He’d be sober enough to make his way back across highway without getting hit by a car or one of those long distance trucks. Then he would sit by the pot belly wood burning stove smoking a non- filter Winston cigarette and holding his mason jar half filled with the remainder of his liquor. Every now and then he made repetitive sounds as though he was trying to spit out the tiny bits of tobacco the cigarette left behind every time he took a puff. He would sit there drinking until he fell asleep. He would go to bed after falling off the chair or bumping that head that he had blistered ever-so-often on the stove. But Saturday mornings before sunrise, he and his best friend, Mr. Brown, would go down to the river to catch some fish. They would come back with croakers, perch and spots. As soon as he got back with the catch of the day, he’d have me come out to the back yard to help him scale and gut the fish. We would have fish and grits for breakfast. Sometimes he would have my aunt make him the eggs found inside the fish. Every Sunday morning he would put on his one and only favorite suit and drive to Front Street to listen to the sermon from a pew in the back of the church.
A couple of years after momma left, she returned from Long Island. She no longer worked for rich Jewish people. Anytime anyone said that, the only words I understood were worked for rich people, thinking Jewish meant some sort of white people in New York. I was happy momma was home. She was my protector. She would let me nestle under her when I was scared to go to sleep after seeing that scary face of the wicked witch of the west on the “Wizard of Oz” or when somebody died and the body would be in a casket at the family’s house in the living room or after hearing scary stories. Getting older didn’t stop my fear.
She went back to cooking and cleaning for rich white people at home. Some of them were doctors, business owners and lawyers. On days when the bosses weren’t home, I was allowed to go with her. I’d get an up-close view inside those big beautiful houses they called mansions. Everything inside looked like nothing I had ever seen. Bathrooms were colorful and fancy. I had to sneak to use them. The floors in the kitchens and the bathrooms were tiled. Some of the other rooms had carpet and the others had shiny wood planks. Everything was shiny and beautiful. I wasn’t allowed to touch anything except the chair I was sitting on. It wasn’t my responsibility to help clean anything. It wasn’t supposed to be my dream to clean up behind lazy white people. That would be a nightmare. It fell upon me while I was there to read, write some of what I read and learn something from it. When I finished that, momma would tell me stories that always had some sort of lesson in the end. She would teach me about people. She explained how important it was to respect everybody. She explained how kindness could take me a mighty long way. She explained to me why she worked her fingers to the bone even though she was tired. She explained why she smiled when she didn’t feel like it. She explained to me why she smiled at people even when she knew they cared nothing about her. She taught me why it was important to have your own, even if you got married and be with him forever, you still needed your own. Never touch stuff that didn’t belong to me and to stay out of grown folks business and to never repeat stuff I heard grown folks talking about. Bottom line; stay in a child’s place.
My best friend graduated from high school and moved to Philadelphia to work and go to college. I missed her. My youngest aunt moved to New York to do the same thing. I became friends with Dianna McFadden. She and her brother Ervin came to live with their aunt and uncle because their parents had passed away. Ervin was 17 years old, tall and good looking. He dropped out of school. He used to stop at our gate to talk to me and momma would make me come in the house. I was told more than once to stay away from him.
I’d take a short cut through the soybean field to get to choir practice. They never painted that barn with that rusted tin top almost at the edge of the field. I wondered why. The tall yellow poplar trees lined up at the edge of the field made it look real pretty like a picture. That yellow in the trees made up for all the color that was gone from the barn. That whatever wood they used to it build looked old and gray. As it started to pour down rain, I saw Ervin making his way across the field towards me. I didn’t tell him I was going that way. He said a lot of nice things to me and made me laugh. I let him know if I was seen with him, I’d get in trouble. He kissed me in the mouth. I’d never done that before. He said the only way he would leave was if I promised to meet him the next day. As I sloshed my way through the field to get to practice, I wanted to turn back and kiss him some more. The more I saw him, the more he grew on me. We started sneaking to see each other almost every day.
It was July 3rd. Mr. F.D. came with his rifle to meet daddy and Mr. James. I followed the three of them to the pig pen. The pig was shot right between the eyes. They hung it up to clean out its innards. After that was done, the pig was washed and cleaned and thrown on the barbecue pit. Some of the skin was fried to make cracklin. The fat from the cracklin was used to make soap. The pig was cooked all night long. The next day a lot of people would come over for the barbecue. That gave me the chance to run off to see Ervin. There was a lot of touching and feeling and kissing. I had never done anything like that with a boy. It felt good.
It was Ervin’s birthday. We decided to meet in the unpainted barn in the soy bean field where nobody could see us. I was ashamed of the way I felt when he looked at me. His eyes told me that he meant what he said. His words were sweet like a melody he wrote just for me. He kissed me on both of my sweaty hands. He looked at every inch of my face as he touched it. And then, it happened. I started tingling everywhere. Especially in that place called Possible. It was called that because momma said it was possible for that place to take your life up or down in a matter of seconds. She said the only thing that was supposed to come between me and Possible was a wash cloth. I had to leave. We promised to meet on Wednesday.
I couldn’t get him out of my mind. On Wednesday, as I approached the barn, I could see him. I could see his smile. He was holding a flower in his hand. When we got in the barn there was a croaker sack made out of burlap on the ground. He asked me to sit down there with him. One short kiss, then two long ones. I almost passed out. The next thing I knew, he came between me and Possible. I got home real late and momma wasn’t happy.
Weeks passed before I saw him again. When I did, we stayed out until everybody in his house was asleep and we snuck in. I ended up falling asleep and stayed all night. The next morning I was afraid to go home. I didn’t know what was going to happen when I got there. When I walked in the door, momma didn’t say a word. I went in the bathroom to wash up. Within the next few minutes, my uncle was there. Momma bought a suitcase into the living room. She told me I was going to live with my mother in New York. My who? I didn’t know her. I didn’t want to go. Momma looked like she was tired of worrying about me. I couldn’t stop crying, but that didn’t change her mind.
I arrived at Port Authority bus terminal. My mother had to work and her common-law husband met me at the station. His name was Mr. Benjamin, a soft-spoken man. He was the father of my youngest brother. The twins, Anthony and Antonia had a different father. I didn’t really know those people. I cried everyday. I called down South to beg momma to let me come back home. A week later she showed up in the Bronx. I was so happy I didn’t know what to do. She sent me and my sister to the store to get her some flour so she could make us some homemade biscuits with dinner. By the time we got back, she was in the bathroom and told us to call the ambulance. She was sick. There was blood. They took her to Harlem Hospital where my mother worked. As soon as I could visit her, I did so as often as I could.
The weather on this August day was nice and hot. It was my 16th birthday. I decided to walk across the 138th Street Bridge to visit momma in the hospital. I got there around 5 o’clock. I let her know that I wanted to return to the South with her. She knew it. I promised this time I would listen. I stayed with her as late as they would let me. When I was leaving, she reached in her pocket-book and gave me all the money she had in there. She told me she didn’t want me walking home and to get me something for my birthday. I was happy because I knew I was going back to my real home.
The next morning, because I left the window open, so many flies were swarming around my ears and my eyes, they woke me up. I finally got up. Shortly after, the telephone rung. The person on the other end of the phone asked to speak with my mother. I told her my mother wasn’t home. She identified herself and asked me my name and age. I told her. She told me that momma died. I dropped the phone and screamed so loud that my brothers and sister ran into the kitchen where I was. I couldn’t believe it. It couldn’t be true. The only love I had couldn’t be gone. I no longer had a protector. She looked so healthy and happy the day before. She didn’t look sick. I lost the chance to tell her how sorry I was for breaking her heart.