“What about me?”
“Why don’t you apply for my job?”
I glance around the foyer to make sure she’s not talking to someone else. “Are you listening to yourself, Mama Carla? Me, a black woman, housemother of a lily-white sorority house? You have lost your mind.” I don’t want to tell her that I’d thought about it when I woke up in her bed a few weeks ago. After the way Miss Lilith acted, I put a heavy pipe in front of that dream.
“I most certainly have not. You did a great job when you filled in for me. Besides, you’ve been working here far longer than I have, and you’re smart as a whip. You have a year of college under your belt and you’re going back to get your degree. Of course you should apply for the job.”
“Unh-uh. It would never happen.”
“Just give it some thought. You’d have health insurance. A lovely, paid-for apartment. A nice salary, plus a paid vacation all summer. And you could study at night. In fact, you could take online courses. That’s become common among working professionals.”
The more she talks the better it sounds. Until Miss Lilith’s hateful mug pops into my mind. “Even if I were to consider it, what do you think Mrs. Lilith Whitmore would have to say? After the powder room incident?” I had told her all about it the day after she got back from Ocean Springs.
“Pooh. I filled her in on Kadeesha’s ways. She knows it wasn’t your fault.”
“Maybe, but that’s not the only issue. I heard the talk when I filled in. You know she, and a few others for that matter, were not happy.”
“I’ll admit Lilith Whitmore has high standards for Alpha Delt. But, she’llhave to agree you are every bit as qualified as I am. No one knows more about the inner workings of this House than you do; I’m a novice by comparison. I, for one, would love to see you get the job, and I’m sure the girls would, too.”
“I do know every inch of this place. And I should after working here all these years.”
“Give it some thought.”
I let her words marinate a few extra moments. “I might just do that.”
THIRTY-TWO
MISS PEARL
Even though I promised Mama Carla I wouldn’t mention it to anybody, I run straight into the kitchen to tell Fee. I have to tell somebody before these nerves of mine jump out of every pore on my body. She’ll keep it to herself. I know that. Whenever Aunt Fee gets top secret information she locks it up like she’s storing it in a vault.
She’s up to her elbows in flour. It’s down the front of her bosom, on her white apron, and in her hair, too. I see chicken, eggs, butter, and milk right next to where she’s working. Helen’s pulling chicken off the bone and Latonya is a few feet away, chopping onion, parsley, and celery. I know what’s on tonight’s menu. Chicken and dumplings.
“Aunt Fee,” I call from the side of the stove. “May I talk to you a minute?”
“Lemme get my hands out of this mess, and I’ll be with you in a minute, baby.”
“I’m in no big hurry,” I tell her. “Take your time.”
“Looks like you in a hurry to me,” says Kadeesha, who is standing in front of the dishwashing station with her hands in a sink full of dishwater. The front part of her hair is poking out of her hairnet. “You came running in here like you had a big story to tell. Like you know something nobody else know.”
That fool woman tries to pick a fight with anyone who will let her. I want to give her a piece of my mind, but instead I angrily—but calmly—say, “I run because I need the exercise, Kadeesha.” Then I just stare at her.
“Kadeesha,”Auntie hollers, “you finished washin’ my utensils yet? I am two minutes away from needin’ everything Helen and Latonya are choppin’. That means I need my utensils. You don’t need to be concernin’ yourself with whether Pearl run or she walk. You need to keep your own mind on your own business. You hear me?”
Kadeesha shuts up then. But I see her eyeing me, narrow slits following me around the room. Somebody needs to tell her there is nothing pretty about her face with that ol’ ugly scowl spread clear across the front.
“And cover your whole head. I ain’t gone tell you that again.”
“I’ll be in the pantry helping Mr. Marvelle when you’re ready,” I say to her, sliding over to where he’s working. Then the two of us finish emptying the morning’s delivery onto the pantry shelves.
Ten minutes later Aunt Fee walks by, and motions for me to follow her out the back door.
“Look at her,” Mr. Marvelle says after she walks past. “You see where her hand is, don’t you?”
Stepping out from the pantry, I catch a glimpse of her holding her stomach the instant before she opens the back door. I turn back to him with worry written all over my face.
After rubbing the nape of his neck, he looks me straight in the eye. “I see her doing it all the time.”
