3

Last night Mama say, “Tomorrow we going to town.”

“It ain’t hurting me no more,” I say. “I can eat anything on it.”

“Tomorrow we going to town,” she say.

And after she finished eating, she got up and went to bed. She always go to bed early now. ’Fore Daddy went in the Army, she used to stay up late. All of us sitting out on the gallery or round the fire. But now, look like soon ’s she finish eating she go to bed.

This morning when I woke up, her and Auntie was standing ’fore the fireplace. She say: “Enough to get there and get back. Dollar and a half to have it pulled. Twenty-five for me to go, twenty-five for him. Twenty-five for me to come back, twenty-five for him. Fifty cents left. Guess I get little piece of salt meat with that.”

“Sure can use it,” Auntie say. “White beans and no salt meat ain’t white beans.”

“I do the best I can,” Mama say.

They was quiet after that, and I made ’tend I was still asleep.

“James, hit the floor,” Auntie say.

I still made ’tend I was asleep. I didn’t want them to know I was listening.

“All right,” Auntie say, shaking me by the shoulder. “Come on. Today’s the day.”

I pushed the cover down to get out, and Ty grabbed it and pulled it back.

“You, too, Ty,” Auntie say.

“I ain’t getting no teef pulled,” Ty say.

“Don’t mean it ain’t time to get up,” Auntie say. “Hit it, Ty.”

Ty got up grumbling.

“James, you hurry up and get in your clothes and eat your food,” Auntie say. “What time y’all coming back?” she say to Mama.

“That ’leven o’clock bus,” Mama say. “Got to get back in that field this evening.”

“Get a move on you, James,” Auntie say.

I went in the kitchen and washed my face, then I ate my breakfast. I was having bread and syrup. The bread was warm and hard and tasted good. And I tried to make it last a long time.

Ty came back there grumbling and mad at me.

“Got to get up,” he say. “I ain’t having no teefes pulled. What I got to be getting up for?”

Ty poured some syrup in his pan and got a piece of bread. He didn’t wash his hands, neither his face, and I could see that white stuff in his eyes.

“You the one getting your teef pulled,” he say. “What I got to get up for. I bet if I was getting a teef pulled, you wouldn’t be getting up. Shucks; syrup again. I’m getting tired of this old syrup. Syrup, syrup, syrup. I’m go’n take with the sugar diabetes. I want me some bacon sometime.”

“Go out in the field and work and you can have your bacon,” Auntie say. She stood in the middle door looking at Ty. “You better be glad you got syrup. Some people ain’t got that—hard’s time is.”

“Shucks,” Ty say. “How can I be strong.”

“I don’t know too much ’bout your strength,” Auntie say; “but I know where you go’n be hot at, you keep that grumbling up. James, get a move on you; your mama waiting.”

I ate my last piece of bread and went in the front room. Mama was standing ’fore the fireplace warming her hands. I put on my coat and my cap, and we left the house.