Brightleaf Read online

  As we walk to the buffet, I say, “I see you know Deacon Coons and his wife.”

  Terry says, “Tip and Belinda? Great running into them. Really nice people.”

  At the buffet, Belinda comes up, squeezes my arm, and whispers, “I didn’t know that you and Terry were seeing eachother! He’s such a great gynecologist, don’t you think? Great catch!”

  I about drop my plate.

  For the remainder of the evening, Terry is seriously engrossed in the story of Dot Henrico’s Bell’s palsy. He wants to know who all her doctors are, the procedures, the prognosis, etc. I thought Terry would be at a loss here, but he’s right at home. Great catch? I wasn’t fishing. He just kind of jumped into my net.

  17

  A Cultural Day

  July 4, 1990

  Dear Diary,

  I woke up today thinking, Fourth of July! The middle of summer! No work! I snuggled under the covers, hoping to go back to sleep until noon. But right away old Mazie knocked on my door and told me I was coming with her to the soup kitchen. I was super scared. Not sure why, but maybe I thought I’d see a bunch of scary beggars with no teeth, talking to themselves. I don’t know. There were some scary beggars with no teeth but also a few tired-looking moms with little kids. There were a couple of men with brushed hair, shaved faces and had their shirts tucked in. One guy looked a little bit like my daddy. It wasn’t him, of course. First of all, my daddy’s face never gets that tan, and he’s a lawyer in Savannah. Plus, he would not hang out at the soup kitchen in Brightleaf but go directly to Grandmother’s house. So today I helped serve food. Harriet, the lady in charge, said that a restaurant dropped off a bunch of sausages and rice, so she made dirty rice and opened up a gigantic can of peaches to serve on the side. Suddenly, I was starving for peaches and dirty rice. All of a sudden it seemed like the best meal in the world. Harriet said it was because I couldn’t have any. It wasn’t for me. We want what we can’t have. Then Harriet talked about getting creative with the food donations, which seemed fun. Like art class. She told me one time all they had were mushrooms and kidney beans. Every day for a week Harriet made mushroom soup, kidney bean and mushroom curry, and mushroom caps stuffed with kidney bean paste. All the homeless vegetarians must have been thrilled. I told her that I would like to help cook sometime.

  Baptists aren’t totally retarded…X

  18

  Lonnie Jr. the Healer

  Mavis

  I’m thinkin that I might-could get Manchild some help from Marcelle’s healer-man. Manchild needs all the help he can get nowadays…even if he gets put in a trance to brush his teeth more regular. All I know is that since I done shooed him off and Eleanor done got sick of him tryin to romance her, he’s been actin like a stinker. He’s already gone to jail for muggin a pregnant girl. Then he got picked up by the police for hangin around the schoolyard and followin youngsters with his hands wagglin down his britches. His eyes done gone from beady to mean. So if there’s anybody out there passin out miracles, Manchild needs to break in line and get him one.

  Mary Beth

  Lonnie Jr. the Healer is a lot shorter than I thought he’d be. For some reason, when Marcelle said she met the healer, I imagined him with a long beard and staff, kind of like Swami Ken meets Billy Graham, but instead he’s more like Yoda meets Liberace. Lonnie Jr.’s got a head of thick, black hair sculpted stiff with gel and bulgy, blue eyes. He’s also got a teeny goatee, and his side burns are trimmed into right angles. He looks pretty hypnotist-like. Why not fit the part? He’s wearing an electric blue silk shirt and a heavy gold chain around his neck with a fat medallion hanging from it. I bet that’s what he swings to make people obey. I won’t look at it. He’s not putting any spells on me.

  I’m hiding Floyd, too. I once read in Woman’s World that hypnotized pets are demanding. Always wanting to shake a paw, and prancing around on hind legs.

  Lonnie Jr. walks directly to me. I fight the temptation to snatch a glimpse at the gold coin moored around his neck. I feel it shining in the corner of my eye and sense its magical pull. I could be imagining the magical pull.

  “Hello,” he says softly. “May I?”

  Before I get the chance to say, No, he reaches out his arms, grabs my face, and cradles my chin and cheeks in both of his hands. This is a new experience, and I kind of like it, except for the fact that he is probably trying to hypnotize me.

  I don’t know if I should close my eyes or keep them open, so I close them in a duel effort to resist the medallion and avoid eye contact. His hands are warm, and I feel my jaw and shoulders relax.

  “You have a lot of tension. I noticed the moment I saw you,” says Lonnie Jr.

  I want to say something, but my face is so relaxed I can’t speak. My cheeks feel rubberized, like Novocain dead.

  The numbness flows through my nervous system, and at the same time it feels like a whole flood of clean water is rushing through me. Only it’s warm water. But more like sunshine, and…

  “He did that to me, too,” says Marcelle. “Lonnie Jr., this is Mary Beth. My sister.”

  “Mary Beth,” says Lonnie Jr., now taking both of my hands in his, “It’s a pleasure.”

  I gulp. I was seriously having an experience. I was seeing the Light. I was about to break on through to the other side. Marcelle steps back a few feet, so Lonnie Jr. and everyone can get a good look at her in her tarty dress.

  “Lonnie Jr.,” says Marcelle, practically gushing, “I’m smoke-free, thanks to you and your healing ways. Look at me!” She runs her hands down her sides. “I jog without coughing, and my road rage is under control. It’s been two months since I ran a bicyclist off the road. Can you help these people, Lonnie Jr.? Especially my sister, Mary Beth? I know you can give her the power she needs to shed those unwanted pounds. They might start calling you the Hypno-Slimmer!”

  I look down at my body. One more workout with Richard Simmons each week wouldn’t hurt.

  “Mary Beth is beautiful the way she is,” says Terry. “Although if he is a hypno-slimmer I might be interested in his services down the road.” He smiles, patting his flat stomach. “But we also hoped Lonnie Jr. could help a friend of Mavis’s. A very disturbed young man.”

  Marcelle puts a smile on and says, “Of course!” But I sense her freedom from road rage being challenged.

  Winslow slides over to Marcelle to comfort her. He puts his hand on her waist and says in a low voice, “I need help…but I doubt the hypnotist has a cure for what ails me.” Marcelle looks uncomfortable with Winslow’s hand on her.

  Manchild finally shows up. He scuffles in wearing brown corduroys worn through at the knees and on his backside, so it’s whitish in those places. He’s got on an old tuxedo shirt with yellow stains. I welcome him, but he ignores me, which is good. Nobody needs scary people paying attention to them. Mavis was right: Manchild looks meaner than before. Eleanor rushes over to him and tries to hug him.

  Lickety-split he grabs her wrist and says, “Don’t you touch me, you strang bean of a woman.”

  Eleanor had a plan to get Manchild honest work by helping him become a gardener. She bought him a leaf blower, a weed whacker and a pair of loppers. It was a wonder anyone hired him since he looks so seamy, but some people will give anyone a chance. And I love that. Unfortunately, Manchild tore up the yard of each and every customer. He didn’t have an eye for sculpting shrubs. When one man refused to pay him for destroying his shrubbery, Manchild chased him with the weed whacker until an officer showed up. Then Eleanor had a revelation that Manchild needed to release his creative side, so she bought him a camera. He did not pass Go with the camera but took it directly to the pawnshop. Now he’s telling Eleanor he wants to become a professional golfer. He says that when he was in jail he watched the Player’s Championship on TV, and it was very inspirational. He’s positive he would look great in a pink golf shirt and green pants and would love the chanc
e to smack a ball for easy cash.

  Eleanor seems unruffled, despite the fact that Manchild could easily snap her hand off. “Manchild, if you’d allow yourself to get a little help, I might buy those golf clubs for you,” she says.

  “What I got to do?” asks Manchild, squinting at everyone.

  Mavis says, “Manchild, baby, I know you ain’t much on religion, but here’s somebody calls hisself a hypnotist for Jesus. Just hope you’ll let him say a little prayer over you.”

  “As long as he don’t try to cast out no devils. I already had that. And I get me a golf cart, too.” He looks at Eleanor.

  For Pete’s sake. They need to let Manchild go. He’s plainly a mental case and would benefit from a little shock therapy or something. And when I think he may own the keys to a golf cart soon…

  I look around the room at my friends. They’re still and solemn and look genuinely expectant. Even both of Doyle’s eyes are at peace for a moment. I am struck by how much these people care about Manchild. How many people would go out of their way to help an angry deviant? Create a plan to lure him into a trap where he could get help? Even though the “help” part remains to be seen.

  “Here, you want me to hold your hand, baby?” asks Mavis.

  Manchild shrugs and sort of makes a little motion towards Mavis.

  “That’s right,” whispers Mavis. “It’ll be all right.” She squeezes his hand.

  “Okay,” says Lonnie Jr., standing in front of them like he’s about to marry them. “Focus on the coin around my neck.”

  I knew it.

  “Now, Manchild, I’m going to place my hands on your face and speak some words into you. Are you okay with that?”

  Manchild nods, but he looks at Lonnie Jr. the Healer like he’d rather eat him.

  “Keep your eyes on the coin,” says Lonnie Jr., oblivious to Manchild’s cannibalistic stare.

  Terry looks back at me and smiles. I do half a smile.

  Lonnie Jr. says, “In the beginning God made you good, Manchild. Now, I’m taking you back. Back before you ever did any wrong…I see you as a baby. Yes. You are a baby lying on a dirty blanket with an empty bottle in your hand. You’ve been wearing the same diaper for days. You don’t know you’re neglected. You don’t know your mother is either drunk or passed out all day. You don’t know your father has abandoned you. You don’t understand the abuses of life yet. You are hungry, and you have a painful diaper rash, but you still trust. You trust everything is going to be okay. You are good and know nothing but goodness and love. Be there right now with me. In that hidden place you once knew. The place where goodness and trust and love abide. And now, feel the love. Feel the love flowing from my hands.”

  I don’t know what to think right now. This Lonnie Jr., he is saying the things I always suspected about people. The things about babies being good and trusting but being served up a plate of rottenness they accept, believing for the best. Not realizing they are being poisoned for the rest of their lives. A spiritual salmonella, taking root in their hopeful hearts.

  Manchild’s shoulders slacken. His head tilts towards Mavis until it’s resting against hers. The hand he’s clutching Mavis with loosens. I cannot see his face from where I’m sitting, but I’d bet you all the gold medallions in Atlantic City he’s drooling.

  Lonnie Jr. claps his hands hard in front of Manchild’s face. Manchild jumps before falling backwards. His head hits the floor with a thud. He doesn’t move.

  “My god,” says Terry, jumping out of his chair. He kneels beside Manchild and asks him some questions. Manchild doesn’t speak. Terry checks his pulse. He lifts Manchild’s eyelid and tells Winslow to call an ambulance.

  Lonnie Jr. appears to be unconcerned and nonchalant about the ambulance being called. This angers me. I march over to him, figuring I could maybe strangle him with his necklace, and then notice that Mavis is in some sort of trance. If I weren’t so troubled by this development, I’d rush upstairs for my camera. She’s motionless but with a queer look in her eyes, like she’s on one of those space shows and a paralyzer gun zapped her good. I’m pretty sure she’d want a picture of herself.

  “What’s wrong with Mavis?” I ask Lonnie Jr.

  “There must have been some power overflow.” He looks pleased with himself.

  “Bring her back, this instant.” I feel like Samantha from Bewitched, yelling at Endora to turn Darren back from a donkey to a person again.

  He claps, and Mavis yawns.

  “Mavis, are you okay?”

  “Sure, babe. Good to go. Where’s Manchild?”

  It’s dark. I stumble in from the port-o-let, haul myself up the steps, and climb into bed. I slide between cool sheets and pull the covers up to my chin. Manchild is safe in a hospital and Mavis free from her trance. A streetlamp shines through the blinds, making stripes on the ceiling. I stare at those glowing lines, finding it hard to sleep after the evening’s excitement. My cheeks are tingling. I can still feel Lonnie Jr.’s hands on them, warm and dry. The heat goes down inside of me, through my face, down into my neck and stomach and legs, melting me to sleep. I’m riding in a car with Lonnie Jr., his medallion shining in the sun. He tells me to fasten my seatbelt, so we can escape. Escape from what? The Lexus. I turn around in my seat, and there’s Terry Dorrie, driving like a madman behind us. He wants to catch us.

  19

  After Effects

  Mavis

  An inneresting thing did happen in the car when me and Winslow followed the ambulance carrying Manchild. He done pulled out his pack of Basics and tossed one my way. Normally, I ain’t one to turn down nothin free. But when I picked up that cigarette, I had no more desire to smoke it than an old tampon.

  I says, “Winslow babe, it kinda seems like I been hit by the trance of quittin. And I ain’t sayin I’m particularly happy about it, neither. I hate gettin hit with shit I ain’t asked for.”

  Winslow kept his eyes on the road, shrugged his shoulders, and held out his hand for the Basic. He stuffed it back in his shirt pocket.

  “Let me know if you change your mind,” he says.

  Mary Beth

  The hypnotist is not anyone I’d go out with, even if he did become a famous hypno-slimmer. I’m ashamed I let myself be charmed by the medallion and his hands on my face. I must be a desperate soul to dream about someone who looks like a magical mobster.

  I like being single. I don’t ever think about being in touch with my sexual side, like Redbook always talks about. Still, I’ve never felt the way I did when Lonnie Jr. put his hands on me.

  I’m sitting at breakfast when Marcelle walks in the house, fresh from the port-o-let, wearing a jogging bra and athletic shorts. She says she’s checking out.

  “I can’t stay here one more day,” she says. “I must bathe, unlike the rest of you. Plus, my time here has been somewhat profitable. I did what I came to do.”

  “You might as well just go on ahead and say, It is finished,” I tell Marcelle, referencing Jesus Christ, himself. Marcelle thinks she’s real smart coming in here and fixing everything. If you consider Manchild getting a concussion and Mavis being forced to quit smoking against her will as fixing everything. I’m tidying up the living room in case any down-and-outers wander in today for a relaxing rerun of 90210. Going without a shower for a day or two doesn’t bother me.

  “It is finished—except for that little bit of weight you’ve got to work on,” says Marcelle, poking my side and smiling. Then she heads upstairs to pack.

  I’ve been persecuted by a couple of Presbyterians my whole life long.

  “I always thought you and your cigarettes would be buried together,” I tell Mavis.

  “Yep. I kinda had the same idea. I’d be all laid out, wearin my favorite t-shirt, with rouge on my cheeks, and maybe some fake tanner. My hair would be feathered on one side, with a banana clip holding back the other side. Then I
’d have me a cigarette wedged between my lips in a thoughtful way, not lit of course, just for show. I’d be a sight to behold! It’d be the last time anybody sees me in the flesh. And the men, when the men sees me all laid out that way, they’ll hold their hearts.”

  “There’s something seriously wrong with that,” I say.

  “My cousin Livira looked that good. You shoulda been there to hear some of the things folks said. There ain’t nothin wrong with puttin your best foot forward. Even if your best foot is a dead foot.”

  The doorbell rings, and Mavis answers it.

  “Flowers!” yells Mavis from the foyer. “Somebody done sent you some flowers, girl!” She walks into the kitchen carrying a long pink box filled with Stargazers. “Mmm, they smell like PER-fume. I done told you. You need to give Doc more attention. He’s hot for you, baby. Looka here, the card says, Dear Beautiful Mary Beth, Something about you touched something in me last night. You swing? 912-555-6809.”

  “You think Terry sent that? Swing? I’m a little big for playgrounds. What about that phone number? That is not Terry’s.”

  Mavis has the phone in her hand. She’s shaking her head while she dials. “Generally speakin, swang don’t mean the playground, darlin.”

  When someone on the other end answers, she says, “Hey baby! I got them flowers! They’re so purdy. Hm? No, this is Mavis. Who’s this? You didn’t sign your name. Who? You think I’ve got the wrong what? I’d be glad to come on over this minute. Oh really? Well okay, tough luck, baby, but I really love them lilies. Bye, now.”

  “Well?” I ask when she hangs up.

  “I give you one guess, and it ain’t Doc.”

  I feel myself blushing. I don’t want to say, but I know.

  “It was the scalawag who dropped the hammer on my smokes.”

  Mavis, Eleanor and I are in the kitchen washing the last of the serving spoons after a regular boarding house breakfast of scrambled eggs, biscuits, and fruit.