"Is There Some Kind of Problem?"

“Is there some kind of problem?” Leo moved smoothly down the porch steps and toward the car.

“I’m sorry.”  Sukie whispered hastily.

The red fingernails lifted away from the car door sill.  “I didn’t mean to pry,” began the woman, turning to Leo.  “But I heard their commotion as I was walking by, and....” Here, Leslie emitted a watery groan from the base of her throat.

Edna Smalls turned to shout through the screen door, “Juanita! Get out here, now.  You have had more than enough time to get yourself together.”  She followed Leo down the steps and across the lawn.  “Meredith, have you met my brother-in-law, Leo Tompkins?  And those are my nieces in the car.”  Leo gave a stiff nod and Meredith smiled.  “Hello, Leo.  I’m one of the neighbors.  I live just down the street....” Meredith gestured as Juanita and Barry came out of the house and murmured their greetings, “Hi, Mrs. Berger.”

Edna opened the car door and pushed the front seat forward.  She looked from one niece to the next, taking in their chocolatey eyes filled with tears, the musty scent of childish sweat blended with vinyl; and the way their cardigan sweaters drooped from their shoulders.

“You know better than that.” she said in a voice that was for their ears only.  Then she stepped back and opened her arms, inviting the girls to crawl out and wrap their arms around her.  By now, the sky’s blue was deepening into a private dusk.

Mrs. Berger cleared her throat.  “Well, I guess I’ll get on home.  Talk to you, later, Edna?”

“Alright Meredith.  Take care.”

“Nice to meet you Leo.”

“Likewise.”

“Bye, girls, and no more fighting each other, okay?” Mrs. Berger pointed a red fingernail at Leslie and Sukie, and, still smiling, walked away.  

Rolling her eyes heavenward, Juanita plopped herself into the front passenger seat of the Plymouth. The stack of 45 records hung around her thumb; the parcel of poundcake slices rested in her lap.  A few feet away, Barry and Leo’s hands were locked in a soul handshake and the uncle said something to make the nephew grin and nod with vigor.  Edna held each of her hands soft against the base of Leslie’s and Sukie’s necks.  “Now, I know you all are going to be good girls for Juanita,  aren’t you?”

“Yes, Aunt Edna.”

“And Juanita, don’t let them stay up past their bedtime.”

Juanita gave her mother a doleful look as her little cousins scrambled back into the car.  Just before Leo collapsed his body down into the driver’s seat, Juanita whispered over her shoulder:  “Mrs. Berger is nosy.”

“Yeah,”  chimed Leslie.  “Just like Mrs. Payne!”

"Big Sister, Little Sister"

In the car Leslie and Sukie sat first patient, and expectant with the hope that at any moment the front door of their Aunt Melvina’s house would open and their father and cousin Juanita would come out.  

“It’s quiet.”

“Yeah.”

“Ssshh.”

“Umhm....ssshh.”  Sitting very still, they managed not to slide their legs over the vinyl seats.  They were conscious of their breaths, and, in their ears, could hear the beating of their own hearts.  Outside the sun was going down and fat brown squirrels darted from hiding place to grass, from grass to tree, from tree to tree limb, and then froze.  In a watchful stillness.  A single breeze swept so confidently down the corridor of the street that it collected and dispersed several smells all at once: the smell of something frying in a kitchen, and the smell of fresh-cut grass; the smell of burning leaves and the smell of autumn’s turning coat-of-many-colors.

“It’s a MONster!”

“Ssshh.”

Sukie reached for her sister’s hand and Leslie scooted closer as protector, coward, and dramatic actress all rolled into one.  She turned to stare into Sukie’s face until her eyes began to water.

“They forgot all about us.”

“No, they didn’t.”  Sukie poked out her lips and blew a puff of air.

“Unhunh.  The monster BLEW inside the house and HUFFED and PUFFED and blew Daddy down, down, down, and DOWN! to the ground!”

Sukie gave Leslie a look of distaste.  She had heard the story of “The Three Little Pigs” enough times to know it had been the wolf that huffed and puffed and blew down the house.  She snatched her hand out of Leslie’s grip and moved her body a couple of inches to the left.  Sensing the game change, Leslie moved a few inches closer to Sukie.  

Sukie retreated and Leslie advanced until the two of them were nearly bunched-up together in the corner of the car behind the driver’s seat.  Sukie tried to push Leslie away.  

“Stop sitting by me!”

Leslie, grinning devilishly, tried to put her arm around Sukie.

“I can always sit by you if I want. Because:  I’m the big sister and you’re the ll-iitt-lll sister. Come here, baby, come here.”

“Stop it! I’m telling on you!”

With their braids jabbing the air like horns, they fell into tugging and pinching each others limbs, tumbling and pawing and baring their teeth like cubs in the wild.

“I’m sure your mother wouldn’t want to see you fighting this way.” An immaculate voice-over  came through the car window.  Startled eyes found a woman whose hairstyle made her look like she belonged on “The Dick Van Dyke Show.”  Sukie---who had been at a disadvantage---used the moment to deliver a well-aimed shot against her sister’s ear.  Intimidated by the strange woman’s ethereal scolding, and humiliated by Sukie’s cheap shot, Leslie brought a hand to her face and worked to squeeze out a cry.  It took a few moments but she was finally able to get a nice wail going.  Covering her eyes, she peeked at Sukie, who had retreated fully to the other corner of the backseat and was sitting with her hands tucked beneath her legs.  She was suspicious of Leslie’s tears and didn’t like the way the woman placed her bloody-red fingernails near the door locks just as the wailing brought Leo and Edna out of the front of the house.

"A Letter From Auntie Mip"

Melvina Tompkins was checking herself out in the mirror.  She was wearing a navy blue shirt-ways dress with a tie belt, and caramel colored shoes with a T-strap and chunky heels.  Her soft, short natural was round like a halo.  Puckering and dabbing her lips with a frosted pink lipstick, she decided that she looked good.  Melvina peeked at her watch and hoped that Leo would be arriving soon with the girls and Juanita.  She went to front door to unlock it while glancing up and down the street.  It was rare for her to be ready to leave on time and so she gave herself a little go’n Girl! finger snap before electing to tidy-up a few things.
In the kitchen her eye fell on the partially-open junk drawer where, earlier, she had stuffed a stack of mail, which had included a letter with their street address, yet addressed to Melvina Smalls---which was her maiden name, after all.  It had been with a sense of query and amusement that Melvina had opened and begun reading the letter, which she quickly realized was not meant for her eyes, but for those of her sister-in-law, Edna.  Wincing mentally and physically, and listening for the sound of a car pulling up, Melvina unfolded the letter and read it over again.

                                                                                                                                     October 21, 1968
Hello, My Dear One,


I hope that you have time to read a letter from your husband's mother’s cousin Myrtle.  Bernard knows me as Auntie Mip.  It has been just over one year that my mother---God Rest Her Soul---left this world and, I have not been doing so good since. 


The whitepeople here in Alabama are this way, some have turned out to be God’s good people even while so many are still just as mean as the devil.  We are learning who is who because of all the marching and the sitting in and the preaching.  You see peoples true self, now.  Our feelings are right up front now.  Before, we all kept hid by keeping each race to their self, but now some of us colored people have a hard time to call ourself Black because that was not never beautiful, before.  Some of us do not know how to be brave but some just couldn’t wait! And, that makes me feel good and afraid, also.


I want to visit your mother-in-law who is my cousin and lives in California she said to come on out, but, I have never made a long trip across the country like that before.  She told me that Bernard has left his little family (you all) to be a big Freedom Man.  This is not something that I can understand.  She said that maybe I should visit you all as I am lonesome since Mother died and I would like to visit you all and my other relations in Detroit.  I heard about what happened to you all up there last year.  It seems that the whole world is just going to the dogs.  I will be visiting you all soon.  Because a family I know by the name of Evans will be driving there and I have been invited along if I may.  Do you know any people by the name of Evans up there from Selma? 


May the Good Lord Bless You Dearly,
I am going to see you soon,
Auntie Mip (Myrtle) Harrison

Melvina remembered Auntie Mip from her childhood.  Of their mother’s closest sister-women-friends, Melvina and her brother, Bernard, had liked Auntie Mip the least, and suspected that she wasn’t truly a blood relative.  Her marital status had always seemed vague and she didn’t have any children of her own; yet, she was always around.  Auntie Mip had been one of those adults who seemed to be unmoved by children, no matter how sweet, cute, or smart they were.  She was always on the look-out for children to be up to something.
Biting down on her well-coated bottom lip, Melvina could have kicked herself for opening that mail.  She considered re-sealing it with a bit of Elmer’s glue, and pressing it between two heavy books until she and Leo returned from the Parents Meeting at Leslie's school.