"HARRY & IVORY" – Chapter 7

"Harry & Ivory"

A love story you have not heard before.

   Chapter Seven

    "Ivory"

    Harry awoke at first light, with the crowing of the roosters. It took him a moment to figure out where he was, a feeling he usually enjoyed. But station-identification came when he started to raise up and Annie flopped an arm across his chest in her sleep. It was Christmas morning and he was back home again. He remembered now that he had gotten drunk while they were all opening their presents under the tree, after he had arrived just before dark. No hangover.... "Thank you, Jesus," he whispered, mimicking Sunday's usual comment for everything.
    It took him a minute to light the gas flame under the coffee pot and to poke up the fire in the wood-stove. Annie mumbled to him after he jumped back under the covers.
    "Well, that's a surprise. Anyway, I put the coffee pot on the wood-stove in the winter."
    Harry reached over and felt for her. Annie seemed so soft! And thinner than he remembered her to be.
    "Mmmmmmmmmm...." Annie said.
    mushy....
    It was still dark in the trailer but the early light was growing quickly, quietly. Their big bed was in the middle of the living-room – the children each had a room to themselves down the hall. The living-room had the big windows, the wood-stove, the VCR and TV, the open kitchen within sight and reach. Harry slid out of bed and went outside to piss off the back porch, (he hated the tiny bathroom full of kid towels and tooth-brushes and make-up kits perched on every available surface) and brought back two coffees. As Annie sat up for her cup, the covers slid down her breasts.
    So white! They glow in the dark!
Desire for her pounded up, surprising Harry. Annie put down her cup for a second and Harry rolled her over on top of him, brushing his face against her dangling tits.
    Later, they sipped their luke-warm coffee sitting up in bed, watching the first, red glow of the sun glimmer through the pines and hickories.
    "I'm glad you were so horny, Harry. If you weren't, well.... Is that why you brought me coffee in bed?"
    Harry leaned over and kissed her cheek. He set his empty cup down (there was a small table on each side, Annie's full of Cosmopolitans and Elles (which Harry liked to check out), and Harry's stacked with Hustlers and Club Internationals (which Annie, Perry, and Janey liked to check out – Annie somewhat apprehensively). Leaning back against the pillows, he watched the chickens working their way through the pine straw, scratching at the ground and pecking. So beautiful, home was. So peaceful, too, with the brats still asleep or whatever.
    Harry wondered about the urge he had just had for his wife of so many years. Sunday had given him a blowjob just the afternoon before. Before he dropped her off at her parents' house in Tallahassee.
    "I've got something for you, Mister Harry. Something for you to remember me by so you don't come home all mean and horny and take it out on your nice family on Christmas Eve." They were in the rest-area near Lake City on I-75, parked on the end, Harry behind the wheel, raising up so she could jerk his jeans down far enough. Looking through the dusty windshield, he saw nothing while she tugged and swallowed, and after she had finished him off good she laid her head down in his naked lap and he could feel her warm and sweet breath against the inside of his thighs.
    Thank you, Jesus!
    When it seemed to be time to move on, Sunday zipped up her lacy-white blouse and Harry struggled with his jeans. Harry took her hands and kissed them, and held her face and kissed her warm, beautiful, mouth. Her mouth was wonderful and he couldn't turn her loose, and the loving of her mouth made him horny again, so soon! Not in all the time he had been married had this happened to him so soon. "Sunday...."
    She worked her hand down and smiled at him. "Okay, Baby. Just for you."
    Harry couldn't believe it. What a sweet woman! (It took her a little longer this time but she never flagged). This time, however, when he lay in trembling bliss with her head in his lap, she suddenly sat up and became all business. "Zip up, Harry! See? I told you – The Lord always provides. Just like He did when He awarded me my Thunderbird. Oh, I wish my family could see me driving up in it today!"
    "Soon as The Lord provides a title, insurance, a tag..."
    "Oh, He will! I have kin working for the state all over Tallahassee!"
    "It's been raining a lot while you were away," Annie said.
    "Huh?"
    "The front finally came through – yesterday afternoon. It's going to be a little colder, but sunny. Today's going to be beautiful! It's going to be a nice day, Harry!"
    "Yeah, Annie. Yeah, it's going to be a nice day."

* * *

    "I'm glad you're back, Dad," Janey said. They were eating breakfast. Pancakes, with blueberries Annie had frozen the spring before.
    "Thanks, Janey. I'm glad to be back."
    "Glad you're back, Pop," Perry said through a mouthful.
    "Thanks, Perry"
    "Glad you're back, husband."
    "Thanks, wife. What is this, anyway?"
    "You came home with presents and money," Perry said. "Can we go to Panama City tomorrow? To the gun shop?"
    "And see a movie?" Annie said.
    "Sure. Good idea."
    "Perry?" Janey said. "Another gun?"
    "You'll probably need to save your money for the VD clinic!"
    "The clinic's free, dummy!"
    Annie got up and went to the cupboard for a hit of Jack Daniel's.
    "Janey'll fuck anything, Dad," Perry explained.
    "Except Pumkin," Janey said. "That's Perry's department!"
    "Janey!" Perry yelled, half out of his chair and spraying blueberries.
    "Pumkin?"
    "Dad, that's the German Shepherd we found for Pounder. She wasn't here yesterday when you came. Just a stray but she's nice. Anyway, Perry..."
    "It's not true, Dad!" Perry's ears were burning red.
    "I saw it!"
    "Saw what?" Annie said.
    Harry slammed his fist down onto the table.
    silence....
    "Tell us about the new bathroom," Janey said finally.
    "Tell us about the rabbits, George," Perry said, imitating Janey's voice.
    "Oh, Dad, are we getting rabbits? Cool!"
    Harry looked up at the ceiling and Perry shook his head. The two reached across the table and slapped fives.
    "I want to talk about the new bathroom, too," Annie said. "When are they going to start on it?"
    "They?" Harry said. "I'm going to build it myself. As soon as I finish with the back porch deck."
    "Oh, Harry, you're never home!"
    Perry was at the stove for more, still gulping down his last forkful. "Dad, you haven't even started the new deck!"
    "We've got the money for the materials. If you guys help we can get it done in no time." Harry looked at their unenthusiastic faces. "Remember how much fun we had putting the new roof over the barn?"
    "Yeah, that was fun," Perry said. "Sort of. When you weren't in a shitty mood. Some days you..."
    "Shut up, Perry," Janey said. "The winches were fun. Getting that old Lincoln up there!"
    "Getting drunk and stoned with your father," Annie said.
    "You get drunk and stoned with our father."
    "I don't," Perry said.
    "The Lincoln isn't old – its only got a couple thousand miles on it."
    "Harry, the barn was supposed to be our storeroom."
    "Daddy, please stay home for a while this time," Janey said.
    "Yeah, Pop! You can help us finish the go-cart track we started!"
    "I'll help with the bathroom, Dad! Is it really going to have windows all the way around?"
    "Three sides – floor to ceiling!"
    "And a sunken tub?" Annie said.
    "And a shelf for Perry's girlie magazines?"
    "You read them, Janey!"
    "Just to look once. Dad, that Hustler you left in the bathroom last time you were here, well, Perry has it wore out so thin the pages feel like toilet paper now."
    "Fugly!"
    "That's what he calls me now, Dad. "It means pregnant and ugly put together."
    "Fucked and ugly – same thing!"
    "That's another thing, Harry," Annie said. "I want Janey on the pill."
    "Oh, Mom! If I ever have sex, I insist he double glove."
    "If?" Perry said. "If ever?! That's a laugh! Anyway, he, whoever that is, he'll say 'Nope' and you'll say, 'Okay!' Flop!"
    "Your mouth and Pounder's ass. Dad? Remember the Clearsons? Connie and her family?"
    "Frizz Family Clearson," Perry said.
    Annie said, "Harry, Listen. Janey's over there all the time now. She even eats dinner there half the time. Do you think she calls me first to tell me she won't be home after school? Or not to have a plate ready for her? And it seems odd to me that Mister Clearson is so happy to drive her back here, no matter what time."
    "Maybe Janey is Connie's only white friend," Harry said.
    "I am, Dad."
    "Dad? The other night Janey was home? Hard to believe, but, anyway, they had this pregnancy test kit commercial on TV and the very next day Janey hitched a ride to DeFuniak Springs and bought one!"
    "Oh?" Annie said.
    They all looked at Janey, who was coming back from the stove with a second helping.
    "Eating for two?" Perry said. "Well?"
    "It came out negative."
    Harry looked out the windows. The place looked so bleak with the trees just skeletons now, and the ground littered with leaves. He saw that the tarp over their boat had blown part-way back, and wondered how long it had been that way.
    "Connie's father and Johnny Small are too old," Perry said. "Now if Connie had a brother, a young buck in good shape, he'd pump Janey a fuck that'd stick! And the test would've come out positive!"
    Harry and Annie looked at each other.
    "It's worse when you're gone."
    "Janey? Does Connie have a brother over there that you're seeing? Or anybody?"
    "No. She has older brothers. Two, I think. But they don't live there. But Ivory's still home!"
    "Oh, Janey," Annie said.
    Ivory....
    Harry looked at Annie and felt her hurt. He wished that he could love her the way he knew she deserved. He got up from the table and rinsed his plate in the sink. Annie went off down the hall.
    He sat back down at the table. "Tell me about Ivory," Harry said quietly. Perry snorted and got up to leave.
    "Clear your plate, little asshole!" Janey said. They watched Perry saunter away toward his room.
    "I told Ivory about you. No, no, don't be mad. Nothing bad. I wanted you to have something, you know, around here. Besides us! Ha ha! Somebody you wouldn't want to leave uncovered for a minute!"
    "Oh, Janey...."
    "So, anyway, I told you that Ivory never talks, right? But she talks to me sometimes, if everything is just right, and, well, we were all sitting outside in back one day and it was fixing to rain? So Mister Clearson and Connie started bringing in the cushions and stuff from the lawn chairs, you know, and I was left sitting out there with Ivory because she reached over and held my hand and said to wait. Oh, Dad, her hand feels so weird, so neat! Anyway, she said to wait because right before the rain comes is the best time. You probably think this is dumb – you think I'm dumb, but, well...." Janey suddenly laughed and looked her father in the eye. "Except now you'll know how smart I am!" Janey laughed again and Harry smiled and had to laugh with her.
    "Yeah...." Harry felt tears welling up. It was that one-too-many acid trips years back reminding him who he really was.
    Remember me, Harry? I'm you!
    "Yeah, Janey!"
    "Well, anyway.... Where was I?"
    "It's about to rain...."
    "Right. Okay. See, I really like Ivory, even if she's older than me, because I can just be with her, just walk with her or sit somewhere, and we don't have to keep on talking about everything. Like we can sit there for an hour and not say a word and still you're not alone, you're with a friend, only you can just watch stuff, and listen to the wind or whatever, and just be with your friend without having to talk! You know what I mean? Wait! Wait! I know you know what I mean! Okay. So – because of this, no, I mean, when this happens, with Ivory, it's like – I think of you automatically. Automatically!"
    "Oh, Janey.... That's beautiful!"
    "Yeah!" Janey laughed again. "So, anyway, on this day I'm telling you about, I started telling Ivory stuff about you. I don't know, it seemed like everything came out so fast. But I also had this feeling I had to do it! It's hard to explain. Anyway, when I was through – it never did rain, either – when I was through Ivory got up all of a sudden and walked toward the house real fast, like she was pissed at me."
    Janey was getting excited and Harry held a finger to his lips.
    She lowered her voice and leaned forward across the table. "Well, I shouldn't say she walked fast because she has this sort of glide thing, like she sort of flows along, well, she goes up on the porch and just when she gets to the door of their house – Annie calls their house a shack – well, Ivory turned around and looked at me – and all of a sudden she smiles! And I knew! And then she went inside."
    Harry was watching his daughter. So many thoughts were coming. And how did Janey know?
    "What did you tell her about me?"
    "Oh, Dad...."
    "Well, like what?"
    Janey made a face.
    "Was it good?"
    "I told her the truth. About – what I see. What I know."
    Harry thought about that. She's like me.... Janey came from me.
    "I don't believe in good or bad," Janey said.
    "You're a little young to be coming to that conclusion, aren't you?"
    "How old were you?"
    "Ha! You're beautiful, Janey. But about this good or bad business..."
    "You're beautiful, too, Dad."
    Ivory.... Harry could almost see her.
    "I love you, Janey." Harry reached for her hand. "I didn't know."
    "I know."
    There was a long silence while Harry held, and felt of, his daughter's cool hand across the table.
    "I told her that she was your dream."
    Their hands tensed.
    Harry did not say anything.
    "I was right!" Janey looked at him with her happy but hard, teen-age eyes. "I was right," she repeated, smiling again. "Your dream!"
    Perry came wandering back to the table and plunked down. "I heard every word."
    "You didn't hear shit. Clear your stuff! Your turn to do dishes, too."
    "And it takes only about twenty minutes to drive," Janey continued.
    "He goes to Miami for the money, Janey! There's no good jobs around here!"
    "Dad, Perry admitted himself he was worried about you finding a girlfriend down there and never coming back."
    "That was Annie said that!"
    "Jeez, kids, not so loud. Annie said that?"
    "Well, Dad, remember last year when Mom went down to visit you for a couple days and you would both call us every night to see if we were okay?"
    "When we were abandoned? At home alone?" Perry laughed. "They put parents in jail for that!"
    "Perry, let me finish!"
    "Wait! Let me tell! Remember, Dad? The broken ends of kinky black hair Mom found on the pillow cases when she got there?"
    "She told you kids about that?"
    "She told Janey. They didn't know I was listening."
    "Dad," Janey laughed. "That was dumb."
    Harry nodded.
    "See, Dad – Annie, well, I mean, Mom, she's so good at stuff like canning and cooking and growing a garden, and she's good with the bees and trades our honey for stuff, and she still looks good for her age, I guess, you know what I mean? Like all these country heifers around here eat candy bars and Little Debbie snack cakes all day long and lay around watching soap operas and, well, they're all a bunch of ugly, barf-hogs! And Annie's getting offers all the time from men around here, and if..."
    "She is?"
    "Yes! And if you don't do something about it, at least stay here or find a job here, one day she's going to say fuck it and walk off this place. With somebody else!"
    "Yeah, well...."
    "Janey, the big expert!"
    "She might just be right, Perry."
    "Right? Then how come Janey picked such a shit-ass boyfriend? You should see him! Sheeeit!"
    "Boyfriend?"
    "Yes, Dad, and he's an okay person."
    "Okay person? He's the scum of the school! His name's Boy! Boy Justice! Dumbest name I ever heard!"
    "Boy is his real name?"
    "Yes, and he's not scum."
    "Pop, before you came home, he came up here in his dumb Pinto station wagon, all stoned and hair all matted and no shoes on, and he comes here and shows Janey how to kill cats. Annie's kittens!"
    "Those cute little kittens?" Harry was having trouble concentrating on this.
    "Yes, Pop. I told Mom about it."
    "It's not true, Dad."
    "Not true? Picking up a kitten and throwing it up against the trailer to kill it just for fun?"
    "Dad, it's not like that. You know how you can, like, toss a kitten toward a pine tree and they stick to the tree with their claws, like Velcro, and then they climb down? Well, that's what we were doing."
    "Pop, he took one of Annie's kittens and whomped it right up against the trailer!"
    "He was throwing it at the tree and he missed, dummy!"
    "And I had to kill it to put it out of its misery!"
    "Perry stomped on the kitty's head, Dad. It was awful!"
    "Janey, the kitty was lying there with blood on its mouth, and it was twitching and flopping around – I had to kill it – it was suffering! And what were you doing? And Boy? Laughing! That's what!"
    Harry sucked in a deep breath.
    "Okay, so believe her!" Perry got up from the table and tramped outside.
    "Anyway, Dad, about Ivory...."
    "Jeez. You kids."
    "About Ivory, well, I found out some things about her. Some of it from Connie and a little bit from her father. The mother doesn't say much. She's sick a lot and she's always in her bed and not doing anything. She's like crippled. But Ivory, well, she seems to know a lot of stuff but doesn't admit it or something. When she was a little girl she ate some berries or some poisonous stuff and had this high fever for a long time, and after that she was different. At first they didn't think it was brain damage because she did okay in school and everything. And her father told me one day that she was pretty when she was small, too, and all her teachers liked her, even though all the teachers were white. This was when they used to bus the colored kids over to Walton county. But the white kids in Walton treated her real bad. They used to push Ivory in the mud and stuff to see if her brothers were going to do anything about it – I guess because she always came to school in clean, pretty dresses and stuff her mother would sew for her before her mother got sick. Anyway, when Ivory finally graduated they had all the pictures of each kid in the senior class in the newspaper, only the newspaper printed the pictures so dark that Ivory's face was pitch black and all you could see was her teeth and her eyes. They do that on purpose to all the black kids here, Dad! She still has the clipping but when she showed it to me she started crying."
    "Oh, Janey...." Harry could see it, see her, so clearly. "How old is she now?"
    "Uh, she has a birthday coming up. I don't know if she's twenty-two or going on twenty-two. Well anyway, after high school, before Connie started at ours, Ivory wasn't allowed to go to the movies in DeFuniak, or dances and stuff, because of what happened to her brain or whatever – like, Mrs. Clearson knew that Ivory couldn't say no to anybody, or say no to a boy, for instance – not back then, anyway. Like her mother'd send her down the road to Rice's store for milk or whatever and Ivory'd come back without any money and without any milk, you know. So one day, right after graduation, Ivory went for a walk down the highway to the creek – she had a favorite spot there – and she didn't come back for over a week. Her father called the sheriff and everything – I think her mother was already sick at that time – and they finally found her wandering around Highway-90, real close to here, all beat up and dirty, and trying to hitchhike home in the wrong direction. The deputies told her father that when they saw her they asked if she was Ivory Clearson and she started to talk her head off about these niggers who tied her up in a motel somewhere, but when they got her to the hospital she wouldn't say a word. She wouldn't talk to anybody.
    Harry was looking out the window. The sunlight was streaming down through the pines and the bare hickories, and he could see Annie hanging out some of his jeans – part of the huge bag of laundry he had brought home to be washed.
    "She didn't get pregnant, though, and she got a test for AIDS later. Negative. So.... Are you listening, Dad?"
    Harry nodded, and tried to smile.
    "She's real pretty, Dad. And so cool! And tall! A lot taller than me! And she has this gun in her purse – it's loaded, too, she showed me. Her purse weighs a ton! And she has the prettiest clothes! Her mother used to make all her clothes but now her aunt does. She's weird, too, the aunt, but I only saw her twice – she doesn't live there. She has real long, gray hair, in braids like an Indian, two long braids with colored yarn and stuff wove in, like, well, picture an old, black, Indian hippie! That's her! As for Ivory's mother, well, she smiles at me and stuff, but, she's so bad off she just lies there. She has her own corner. Sometimes Connie and her father have to turn her on her other side, and she has this tube coming out of her and this plastic bag hanging under the bed. Sometimes the county nurse comes and gets a sample of her pee out of the bag. It's Ivory's job to empty it every day – I think its the only chore Ivory does – I helped her once. And the aunt, well, I don't know where she lives, but once when I saw her she was washing Ivory's hair, and Ivory just sat there for the longest time while the aunt made all these little braids, with beads in them, you know. That's why I like to go over there, because they all seem to love each other so much, and they take care of each other like it's so natural! Not like our family."
    Harry had to swallow. "Ivory – never goes to – town at all any more?" Harry's voice broke in mid-sentence.
    "I don't think so. When they have to go somewhere they leave Ivory at home alone, even when they load her mother up in the truck. I always ask her if she wants to see our place, you know, come along when her father drives me back? But she just looks away and doesn't answer. Sometimes when I come over I have to sit outside for a real long time by myself after Connie starts on her chores, if she doesn't want me to help her, and then Ivory'll come out and sit next to me. Connie said that when her brothers used to live at home she didn't have chores either."
    "Ivory never has to help?"
    "Never! They never make her do anything! And I always see her father or Connie kissing her when she comes up, usually a peck on the cheek, you know, but I've seen them hug her sometimes like they haven't seen her for a week! But she doesn't kiss back, or smile or show that she likes it. But I know that she does."
    Harry tried to sound unconcerned. "So what am I supposed to do about all this?"
    "Ha! Come on, Dad! I know – I just know – that you would love her!"
    "Uh -huh."
    "Her parents aren't going to last forever. She needs a boyfriend and you need a girlfriend. One that's nice, and young, and pretty, and in your favorite – never mind. Nobody's going to marry somebody like Ivory, so.... And I know you could never be mean to her – you have these funny ideas about women. You're such a softie! Ha ha!"
    "Softie?"
    "Yeah. You are! It's dumb, too!"
    Harry smiled through his fingers, his chin resting in his hand as he leaned toward her, marveling at a daughter he didn't really know. "Softie, huh?"
    "Yeah."
    "Annie agree with that?"
    "Annie's a slave type. She loves her role. If you guys split up, she'd have to go back to work instead of – nesting."
    Harry laughed. "Nesting.... Janey, when I was your age, I didn't know about shit like this."
    "Well, I still don't understand stuff, like, for instance..."
    "Go on."
    Janey lowered her voice. "Is it, well, when you – wait! When a white man is hot for black women, is it like when a person has this thing about feet, or certain kinds of shoes, or pierced ears and nipples, you know, a...."
    "Fetish."
    "Fetish! Yeah. Is it like that?"
    "I don't know...."
    "Is it, like, real strong?"
    Harry looked away from her and nodded his head. "It's a curse. Like in your blood." Harry met her eyes again. "How did you find out?"
    Janey's smile broadened and she threw her head back and started laughing so hard Harry had to shush her up.
    "That obvious, huh?"
    "Oh, Dad!" Janey's hand over her mouth as her mother came in and stopped half-way through the back door. The three of them looked at each other silently for a moment and Annie stepped back out, letting the screen door slam with the storm door open and letting in the cold air. Harry got up to close it.
    "Anyway, Janey said quietly, "it's Christmas vacation and I have a present for the Clearsons, and there's no way for me to get there until school starts again – I'm not going to ask Mom to drive me – so, I need you to take me there. Soon. Like today. And then you can meet Ivory."
    Harry shook his head. "I'd be afraid to. You don't know if we would like each other. And I wouldn't know what to say."
    "That's the neat part, Dad. "You won't have to say anything. Remember that time when you were tucking us in, when we first moved here, and you were telling us about this hawk you saw in a tree, and you were looking up at it and it was looking right back at you – in the eye? And you felt like it was an alien looking right into your brain and I said, 'A hawk is an alien!'"
    "Yeah!"
    "Try looking in Ivory's eyes."
    "Yeah?
    "Trust me."

     <end chapter-7>

Humanism with attitude! Rev: 22 March 2005