She couldn’t have told herself why she wouldn’t say his name. Maybe she still thought this was all her fault for sneaking out and for every little bad thing God had tallied over the course of her life. She hadn’t asked for what happened, but if there was one thing she’d taken from the nights she’d spent in the pews of Beulah Springs Holiness Church, it was that the Lord worked in mysterious ways. Regardless, the deacons might pressure her to marry him. After all, it was she who had opened her window that night and run down the hill to his waiting car. They might do an okay job of pressuring him too. And then she’d be married to a son of a bitch who made her sick to her stomach, a man who’d already shown her he was stronger than she was. She wouldn’t let it happen again.
Things would be simpler if she kept the focus on this baby. Maybe that was as far as her young mind could stretch, as much as it could handle. As far as she was concerned at that moment, the father didn’t exist, nor did that night. She was simply a girl, or had been, and now there was a baby, immaculate as could be.
Uncle Thorpe poured olive oil into his hands, put them over each of their heads, and prayed over them. Justine didn’t mind for once that her hair would be oily. She let her mind settle into Uncle Thorpe’s words. She figured she needed all the help she could get. When he finished, Uncle Thorpe wiped his eyes and hugged them.
“Maybe you two should spend the evening sorting things out at home. I’ll bring Mama home. You can take John Joseph’s car.”
Justine was gathering Lula’s purse when Lula hugged it back into her belly.
“We won’t go,” she said.
“Won’t go where?” Uncle Thorpe asked.
“We won’t go home. The Lord’s house is home, where we need to be.”
“I thought you would want to sort things out, Sister Lu.”
“Justine is having a baby. It is sorted.” She stood and picked up her Bible from his desk. “I won’t have us thrown out of here like trash by Brother Eldon.”
“He’s worried about factions in the church, Sister. You know how he gets.”
“I know how he talked to my daughter like trash, and I won’t have it. From anyone.” She turned to Justine. “It’s going to be alright, Justine. You’re right about that. God holds us in his hands even when we feel the farthest from him. We can do whatever we have to do. If you want to go back to the service, let’s go. Only God can make our way. If you want to go home, I think that will be fine. God will be with us where we are.”
“Let’s just go, Mama. I don’t want to cause any more mess.”
“Your decision.”
When they walked into the hallway, Granny was sitting in a chair she’d pulled up from one of the classrooms. Lula leaned down and yelled into her ear.
“We’re leaving, Mama. You can stay if you want.”
Granny shook her head, and Justine helped her stand. Uncle Thorpe walked the three of them to the door and said, “I’ll go get John Joseph’s keys.”
“I think he left them in his car,” Justine said, maybe a little too quickly.
Uncle Thorpe studied her for a moment, then squeezed her shoulder and said, “I’ll be praying for you.”
When the three of them got to the other side of the church, John Joseph was still leaning by the window. Now he was listening to the traveling preacher’s sermon. Justine was glad to see he didn’t have a cigarette because she didn’t want to get into a-whole-nother thing with Lula.
“Where’s the party?” John Joseph grinned. Lula tried to scowl, but even she couldn’t pull it off. Granny shook her head. He had always been her favorite, Justine knew. It was okay. He was Justine’s favorite too.
“Can you please take us home, young man?” Lula asked. She smoothed her hair, and Justine noticed that her fingers shook ever so slightly as she tucked a handkerchief into her bag.
“At your service,” John Joseph said. He opened the primer-colored door and pushed the front seat forward so Lula and Justine could squeeze into the back. Then he helped Granny down into the frayed passenger seat.
Uncle Thorpe walked out the back door as John Joseph was backing out. He raised his hand, trying to get John Joseph to stop, but he hit the gas around the corner out of the gravel parking lot. When he did, the car skidded sideways, and Justine slid into the middle of the seat, pressed against Lula.
“John Joseph!” Lula shouted, and Justine laughed. Granny held tightly to the roof outside the rolled-down window and muttered something in Cherokee that Justine couldn’t understand. Lula’s shouting only goaded John Joseph. He pressed the car faster up the big hill into town. The wind whipped in the windows, and Justine forgot for a minute what would happen when they got home and the real questions and shouting and crying began. She couldn’t know how in a few months she’d be flooded with a crippling love for another human being that would wound her for the rest of her days, how her insides would be wiped clean, burdened, and saved by a kid who’d come kicking into this world with Justine’s own blue eyes, a full head of black hair, and lips Justine would swear looked just like a rosebud. For now, that little car filled with three—almost four—generations flew. And when they dropped over the top of the hill, Justine threw her hands up, her mouth agape in wonder.
PART II
The Care and Feeding of Goldfish
My mom, Justine, brags on how I set my own alarm and have since kindergarten. She was usually working the night shift, so I got up, dressed, and brushed my own teeth. Then I’d sneak into her and Kenny’s room and sit on the edge of the bed where she’d brush through the rats in my hair and pull it back in barrettes. I knew not to wake up Kenny. He didn’t exactly work, not like she did, but he was on a night shift of some kind.
If I whined about her pulling my hair, Mom shushed me with a brush upside the head or a good hard yank. Sometimes she’d rub the spot and kiss it real quick. I knew she was just tired and worried about Kenny getting mad, but on weekends when we had time to just be, she’d want to say sorry. It was usually when we were watching cartoons and eating cereal, two things she never got to do when she was a kid because they were too religious for TV and too poor for cereal. She might say something like: “Mama used to jerk me bald when I was little. It’s a wonder I had any hair left to pigtail.” Then she’d get lost in stories about being raised so strict and the switches and belts Lula took to her. My mom told those old stories like she talks about a lot of stuff, like it’s a little bit of a favorite joke she loves to tell and a little bit of a sorry memory she wishes she could forget.
She’d say, “Lord and Mama forgive me,” if she went on too long. Then she’d close her eyes real tight and whisper, “Bless her, Jesus.”
They found a tumor in Lula’s brain when I was just a baby. The doctors call the terrible spells she gets grand mal seizures, but Lula doesn’t believe in doctors. She believes in God. I think Lula breaks my mom’s heart in more ways than she could ever count.
“I love you more than anything, my Teeny Reney Bean,” Mom would say after she fixed my hair, and then she’d pull me into her arms and squeeze. Just when it felt like she wasn’t ever going to let me go, she’d kiss me and point me toward the door. Then she’d stretch her never-ending arms and fingers to the ceiling, take a sip of water from a glass on the dresser, and fan her long, black hair over her pillow.