"HARRY & IVORY" – Chapter 12

"Harry & Ivory"

A love story you have not heard before.

   Chapter Twelve

    "Picnic"

    A chill ran up Harry's spine when he opened the mailbox at the bottom of the stairs and spotted the powder-blue envelope. It was nearly square, with a hint of perfume, and when he flipped it over his wish came true. Ivory Clearson's name and address were written in the upper-left corner.
    "Ivory!"
    He opened the envelope carefully with his bear knife, hoping the edge was sharp enough to do a neat job. Jeanie, the freckle-faced fourteen-year-old from across the street, was riding out of her yard on her bicycle and she waved as she whizzed by. Harry looked up and watched her whip the bike around the corner, legs pumping and flashing gold in the winter sun. Happy. Alive.
    "Be careful, Straight-Edge," Harry yelled, too late for her to hear.

Dear Harry,

    Hello, I suppose you are wondering why I am writing to you. My father wishes for me to settle my mind, but I can't. It seems that the dummy in the family. This morning I'm just terribly upset and wondering what's happening to me. Nothing I try to do turns out right. Please come and get me.

       Ivory Clearson

    Harry stood there in the cool, clean, winter sun and read the letter over and over, feeling his heart beating, his mind racing over the meaning of the words. And the penmanship – just a little uneven and yet so charming and bold. So much stress! The words all spelled correctly, but the grammatical flaws....
    He had not expected such a desperate cry for help. On powder-blue paper with the scent she wore the day he met her. His dream before he knew she was real. Ivory.
    Slowly, he re-folded the letter and slipped it back into the envelope. He pictured her folding it quickly, sealing the envelope immediately – without proofreading what she had written. The decision had been made and if she looked at what she just wrote she would chicken out, as perhaps she had done before. He pictured her waiting for a safe time to run it out to their mailbox. Her fears after the mailman stopped and there was no going back. Her fears now. The letter on its unerring journey. The poison taken.
    Harry held the letter to his heart and pulled in a deep breath. He lifted the envelope to his face and smelled of it again. Still standing outside at his mailbox, the rest of the world had ceased to exist. It was a strange but familiar feeling, and for a moment he couldn't place it. It was the feeling he used to have just after dropping acid, the tiny pills swallowed, the journey committed. No going back now! He had taken the choice of Casteneda's sorcerer – he had chosen "the path with heart".
    As Ivory had done.
    Up the stairs. Harry had rushed home that day to shower and change during his lunch hour (after slipping in an oil spill at the boat-yard). Would he be able to go back to work now? Sunday's shampoo and lotion bottles glared at him in the bathroom. Harry did an about-face and went to the kitchen for a beer. After calling the job ("I got my period, Bo!"), he fished a crumpled joint out of his soiled jeans and went out on the balcony. After lowering himself down carefully into the rocking chair – he didn't want to get it dirty – he pulled out the gallon jug of clear, moonshine whiskey Ivory's father had given him, and nailed down a good slug of it. "Oh, this is some smooth shit, John!" he said aloud. John was Mr. Clearson's name. Harry thought about him, and how he might react to his daughter taking up with a white man. With any kind of man. With Harry Schaffner whom he thought he could trust. Feet up on the railing now, the jug beside him, a cold Corona in his hand and a lung-full of reefer invading his bloodstream, Harry waited.
    It did not take long.
    WHAT ABOUT SUNDAY?
    Thy will be done, Harry answered.
    SHE TOLD YOU SHE LOVES YOU.
    Sunday was Your idea. I was looking for a hooker that day, remember?

    silence....

    WHAT ABOUT ANNIE?
    I'm choosing the path with heart, remember? I'll take care of Annie, too – with Your help!

    silence....

    You could have made me normal, Harry added. He partook of another swallow of beer and another toke on the joint. Personal responsibility works both ways, you know!
    He reached over and lifted the heavy jug, pulled the cork, and nailed another hit of shine. The jug clunked against the deck when he set it back down. The rocking chair creaked. The neighborhood was eerie and quiet – people at work and kids at school.
    Thank You for this good life, Lord. And thank You for this good reefer, this beautiful whiskey, this mellow beer....
    I HAD HER PUT ON A PINK DRESS FOR YOU, TOO, REMEMBER THAT?
    Harry shivered. I remember. Thank You for the pink dress. Yeah, but all that fetish stuff is Your doings, too! You owed me that one!
    I GAVE YOU FREE WILL!
    Bullshit. Free will is a Factory-made accessory. The Factory's responsible for any failures. I know my law!

    silence....

    I got You that time, didn't I!
    IVORY COULD CHANGE HER MIND ABOUT COMING. OR SHE COULD GET SICK. MAYBE EVEN DIE. YOU DON'T BELIEVE? SHIT HAPPENS, YOU KNOW....
    "Stop! Stop!" Harry jumped out of the chair. He hung onto the railing and waited for his head to clear. Then he went to the end of the balcony and looked out over the stairs, over the neighborhood. Jeanie's bicycle was back, leaning up against her duplex, her gate padlocked. Harry wondered why she wasn't in school. She seemed so smart and sharp for fourteen. So pretty, too.

* * *

    After a fitful night, Harry got up early and dropped his reply to Ivory directly at the post office. He took his bicycle, a good, antique, Raleigh 3-speed, and pumped over to the PO and to work as fast as he could – it was time to get back into shape. That afternoon, back home, he padlocked the bike to a Christmas palm out in front where it would be ready to go at all times, where he would see it and remember to take it instead of Love Jones. (And where Jeanie could see it). He had already taken an oily rag the evening before and shined it up, and aired up the tires until they were rock hard. That's what he needed to be right now – rock hard. Stay tough. Get his shit together. Go for what life has to offer. Go for it!
    He raced up the stairs and whipped off his clothes. He wanted to shower off before the sweat dried, but Sunday's things, in the bathroom especially, were bothering him. He zoomed to the kitchen where he kept some empty boxes under the sink, then combed every room for her stuff. Every shelf and drawer and corner. It turned out she had been squirreling away more things than he expected. Underwear. Sandals. Disposeable razors. Combs and brushes. Brassieres. A Gideon bible. A bottle of ten-milligram Valium – the heavy-duty blue ones....
    She stole a bible?
    I'll keep some of the Valium....
    I'll write her a note. I'll say: I kept some of the Valium to help me get over this crisis.
    I'll say: On one of those nights you refused to come over, this new lady walked in through my open door and into my life. I didn't intend this to happen but it did.
    After closing up the box, Harry wrote Sunday's name across the top, and placed the box near the door where he wouldn't forget it. He stomped back to the bathroom, still naked, and checked himself out in the full-length mirror. Turning to the side, he pulled on his buttocks, and forced his eyes to focus. Wrinkles. He decided right then to cut down on drinking as soon as he got rid of Sunday. Outside on the balcony, the morning air tightening his bare skin, he pulled out the moonshine jug under the rocking chair and nailed down a good swallow. But Sunday clung to his thoughts, reminding him that she had said she loved him. And never mentioned that his ass was beginning to sag.
    Another swallow. "This sure is fine whiskey," Harry said aloud. "John."
    I'll take good care of Ivory, John.
    Back in the bathroom, Harry winced with pain when he urinated. He had noticed a little pain earlier, and the night before, but this time it was serious. Maybe he got soap up his dick in the shower, yeah, that must be it. Sure!
    Shit – I didn't take my shower yet....
    Sunday!
    Back to the kitchen for some vitamin-C. Harry downed three, five-hundred milligram tabs with a bottle of Corona.
    It had to be Sunday. All those nights when she says she can't come over....
    Thank you, Jesus!
    I'M MAKING IT EASY FOR YOU TO SAY GOODBYE.
    Harry shuddered. By giving me a dose? Can't You just make her go away? The same way she came?
    I AM THE LORD AND THAT IS NOT MY WAY. ONLY THROUGH MUCH TRIAL AND TRIBULATION, REMEMBER? YOU KNOW THE BOOK....
    Picking up the pink towel Sunday had used during her last night over, Harry dropped it into a clean garbage bag. He stripped the bed of pillow cases and sheets and reminded himself to set the washer at the laundromat to HOT.

* * *

    Harry did not make it to the health clinic until the next morning. The pain during urination had ceased but Harry decided to get checked anyway. He was downtown early enough to score Love Jones an easy parking spot under a shady banyan tree, right across from the Public Health Department. The sign on the VD clinic door said open at eight-thirty. He had thought eight. So he waited at the door, suddenly feeling exposed with all the county employees and citizens scurrying past the clinic to other parts of the complex. And the longer he waited, the more naked he felt. He could almost hear their thoughts. Look at that man. Must have a real dose! Can't wait for the doors to open!
    Ten minutes later a black man joined him. A Haitian. Haitians were the blackest people on earth, Harry thought. Blue-black. There was a new Haitian at work and he and Harry were becoming friends. But on his first day on the job, Furman Burd had come over and warned the Haitian, who had a French name nobody could pronounce or spell, to look out for the skin-divers' supply company three blocks down the street on the Miami River. The company was on the lookout, Furman said, for shiny black people – that at night they would "skin them to make wet-suits for divers. No eye-holes to cut out or nothin' when they use real skins." The Haitian at the clinic saw Harry grinning and he moved away a little, and scratched at his crotch.
    Crabs....
    A pretty, dark hooker walked up and sat down on the edge of the concrete planter next to the VD clinic sign. Looking at the sign for a moment, she got up suddenly and brushed off the seat of her tight jeans.
    "You never know," Harry said.
    She flashed him a smirk and looked the other way. Golden brown. A tiny purse big enough to hold a voter's registration card, which would bond her out for a dollar on a misdemeanor charge.
    Another black girl, young, and so tiny! A fox. Then a young, redneck couple, tattered jeans, the man wearing a railroad cap and a huge mustache; the woman white and chubby with a rashy-looking complexion and stringy, long blond hair.
    "This where you get the tests for a marriage license?" the guy asked Harry, ignoring the blacks.
    "I thought they did away with that requirement," Harry said.
    The man turned to his fiancee. "Honey, you better not sit down."
    Harry nodded. One of the hookers spit. Another working girl walked up and a line was beginning to form. Harry allowed a couple of the girls to get ahead of him.
    They look so sad....
    Jeez, this is a good place to pick up chicks!
    Oh! Dumb....
    But....
    When the doors opened, Harry drew card #4. He scrutinized the yellow, plastic chair in the front row before sitting down, his nose stinging with the sharp smell of bleach. The rows behind him were filling up with young women and Harry wished he had picked a seat in the back so he could check them all out.
    A few minutes later: "Number four!"
    Harry went to the window. Surprise! A chubby, old-white-grandmother type was sitting there, hunched over her desk and glaring up at him with her ballpoint poised.
    "My girlfriend is coming to visit me and I want to make sure I..."
    "Name!"
    "Harold Schaffner."
    "Address and telephone!"
    Harry spelled out the details.
    "Purpose of visit!"
    "I want to get checked for VD."
    "Symptoms!"
    "Uhhh – painful pee."
    He watched the nice, old grandma nudge up her bifocals and check off gonorrhea on his card. "I want to get checked for AIDS, too, and syph, and crabs."
    "Anything else?"
    "Well, I've been having this craving for pickles and ice-cream lately."
    "Take this card and sit down until your number is called again."
    The first hooker was already leaving with a bottle of yellow and blue capsules in her hand. "Pickles and ice-cream? Ha ha!"
    Harry blew her a kiss and looked back over the audience. The Haitian was doing the windows with a bucket of sudsy water and a squeegee, stopping from time-to-time to dig at his crotch. All of the girls were looking down at their feet.
    "Number four!"
    A large, round, happy black woman led Harry down the hall to the first treatment room. Plunking him down onto a stool, she slapped a tourniquet around his arm and held his wrist firmly against her huge, warm tit while his blood spurted bright and alive into her syringe.
    "Your girlfren' know you're pregnant? She love you? She know you cheat? She white?"
    "She's blacker than you...."
    "I knew it! Take this card an' go back out there an' wait."
    "Thanks. You're beautiful."
    "I know. Now git!"
    "Number four!"
    An old, Cuban doctor in a worn, gray, pin-stripe suit bagging at the knees stood in the hallway waiting for Harry to respond. Harry followed him down the corridor. They passed an examination room with the door half open. One of the hookers was up on the table, her legs spread wide, a skinny, ancient Cuban lady peering in with green rubber gloves....
    "Classy place," Harry said.
    "Back in Havana, I was physician to the Ventura family. We had a big house, three maids..."
    "Sure," Harry said.
    "...big swimming pool. Now this shit!"
    "It's a cruel world."
    The doctor sat down wearily. "Pants down."
    "No underwear...."
    "I don't care." The doctor sighed. He held a large magnifying glass over Harry's equipment. "Crabs," he said.
    "Where?" Harry looked. He didn't see anything.
    The doctor took a cotton-tipped swab, about half the size of a Q-tip but with a longer stick, and handed it to Harry. "Put this in your penis and push it around."
    Harry winced, but complied. His penis looked so small, suddenly, and so guilty.
    "Farther." The doctor looked up at the ceiling. "Okay – put it in here." He handed Harry a plastic container. "Stop at the window on the way out and hand in your papers." He handed Harry a bottle of the yellow and blue capsules and an additional form. "And take this to the drugstore and get this shampoo and kill those crabs."
    At the window, the grandmother type checked the forms and the bottle of pills, and told him if his tests turned out negative he could stop taking the pills. "And no sex for seven days!"
    "Seven? Rome was built on seven hills. Do you think that has anything to do with..."
    "Number twelve!" the lady shouted. "I know how many hills Rome has," she said in a lower voice. "They're called the Palatine hills. Now git. Your crabs are jumping off of you and getting on my counter.

* * *

    Harry was already awake when the motel clerk called to tell him it was five AM. He checked himself before the big mirror in the bathroom. Old. Ass only sagging if you concentrated on it.... No beer fat.... Still muscular looking....
    ....glad the tests turned out negative!
    Got money in my pocket....
    Wonder why they haven't mentioned hauling more dope for them lately....
    Sure hope I get to drive one of the new trucks soon!
    Harry pictured what that would be like. Sitting up high and hauling-ass down the interstates, gearing up and down the Appalachian Mountains, country girls standing on their front porches wistfully watching his truck fade into the distance.... He pictured Ivory sitting up there with him, tall and pretty.
    Ivory....
    What if she didn't get my letter? What if her parents got a hold of it?
    What if she's not out there like I told her to? Do I drive in?
    Shit – she's old enough! Twenty-two.... Or going on twenty-two....
    She must've spent the last five years dreaming....
    I hope she understood the letter – where to be.

...if I talk to your parents first, there will be an argument. I will have to prove to them that I will take good care of you. I'll pick you up out on the road near your mailbox. When you see the morning sun just clearing the treetops across the road, I'll be there.

    Did I have to be a fucking poet? Couldn't I have given her a time?
    Harry saw her running out to the road every morning, trying to figure out what time the sun would top the trees there. He didn't know himself.
    Spring was still a long way off, even for Florida, and Harry shivered when he went out into the dark, morning air. His family was only a half-hour away, and the tractor-trailer rig he had hidden Love Jones behind had already left. He should have gone home last night. But then he would be sleeping with Annie, dear Annie, and for two weeks he had been dreaming of Ivory sliding into bed with him. Perry would want him to stay, too, and Janey.
    "A boy needs his father!" Danny told him one time, and Harry had to brush away a tear after he said it.
    Harry had breakfast at the truckstop down the road, and after brushing his teeth in the men's room he hung around there with his coffee until the sky brightened. Figuring he was a hair ahead of schedule, he stopped at the park in Ponce de Leon and gave the windows a final wipe. A last pee and a look up at the sun, and he was off down Highway-81, heart beating with fear and anticipation. After the turn-off onto the Valley Road, the black-top brightened just as he rounded the last curve before Ivory's farm. And there she was! Standing alone down there beside their mailbox, tall and pretty and gleaming in the morning light.
    Oh, God, I love You! Lord! She is so beautiful!
    Oh, God, I love you!
    A long, multi-colored, patch-work skirt, a mint-green sweater, and a matching head-rag – so tall with those clogs! Harry pulled up to her and jumped out. He took her hands in his and looked into her eyes, afraid to hug her. Her eyes were steady, and cold.
    "You are so precious and beautiful!"
    She did not respond, and Harry let go of her. Ivory immediately snatched up the knapsack at her feet and tossed it into the back of the truck. It landed with a loud thunk and Harry shoved it forward into the corner, surprised at how heavy it was.
    "Is this all you're taking?"
    Ivory nodded, and hopped into the pickup before Harry could get the door for her. In a minute, they were flying down a dirt-road shortcut back to Highway-81, with nothing up ahead but freedom. A thunder of dry, red dust billowed out behind them. Ivory looked back at the growing dust-cloud plume and smiled for the first time.
    As soon as they were out on the smooth blacktop, Harry took his eyes off the road to look at her. Ivory, so erect, looking straight ahead. So far, his attempts at small talk had failed.
    "Don't be nervous because I'm stealing looks at you all the time," Harry said finally. "I have to. You are so fine. You are my dream!"
    Ivory just sat there, tall and proper, her hands folded in her lap. The mint-green bandanna was small and tightly wrapped. Gold, hoop earrings. Harry admired her long, graceful neck. Her elegant bearing. Her profile was so – so African!
    "Did you bring your gun along?"
    "I lef' it at home."
    Harry saw her fingers work against each other for a moment – her hands still folded in her lap.
    "That's okay. I always have a couple guns with me. Automatics. I'll show you how to use them one day. I'll give you one as soon as we get to Miami."
    silence....
    "I used to pray for a lady like you. A black angel. Tall and graceful and beautiful, with a voice like velvet." His glance caught her looking at him and her eyes snapped back to the road ahead. "A lady with heart.... So many guys lie to chicks – to ladies. The guy tries to figure out what the lady would like to hear.... So I want you to know that what I'm telling you is coming from my heart."
    "Mmmm - hmmmm."
    "Have you ever been on a trip like this before?"
    "Noooo.... Well, not like this. But I had a dream about a white man once – when I was little. An' I had the same dream before. These men were bothering my father an' this big white man with hair like yourn come up in his truck an' when he see what was happenin' he jump out wif' this big pipe in his han' an' he run everybody off. An' he took me to the store an' when we come back his truck was full of stuff – ohhhh! But when I woke up, it took me awhile an' then I realize none of it ever happen. But I know where that dream come from."
    Harry looked at her again. She seemed so sad.
    "I tol' my brother 'bout my dream one time an' he get angry wif' me. He didn' have to tell me where that dream come from."
    Harry remembered her map. "Which way would you like to go?"
    Ivory did not answer.
    "You showed me your map, so I figure you have a dream way to go."
    "Well – I don' want to impose."
    "Try me."
    "Well, you could go down the wes' coas' or the eas' coas'. The wes' coas' go through Fort Meyers.    My brother – he live in Fort Meyers."
    "The brother that didn't like your dream?"
    "We don' need to stop. I don' want to stop – to see him. But on the map it look so good."
    Janey said she hardly ever talks! She trusts me!
    Harry slowed down and pulled off onto the grassy shoulder. He spread out his own map of Florida between them. "From here we can take, uhhh...."
    "Highway-98," she said.
    "You're pretty inside your head, too, Ivory."
    Love Jones bounced off a rock Harry didn't see in time when he pulled back onto the highway, and he had to make a quick correction with the wheel. He glanced at Ivory to see if she was upset but there was a smile on her face.
    "You had breakfast yet?"
    "Yes. My Daddy, he figure out what time to stan' by the mailbox. An' he made me a big breakfas'. An my Daddy an' Mama they pray for me – Mama don' want me goin' an' my Daddy, oh, he was mad at firs'. He made me show him the letter. He say he disappointed in you. But he saw me packin'. I was packin' that very firs' day the letter come, but I know I had more than a week, an' every day my Daddy he be remindin' me about my pas' mistakes an' how I ain' smart enough to take care of no man – 'specially no married man. An' Janey come over one day and they got to arguin' for the longest time. Then 'bout day-before-yesterday he change his min'. An' he say if he can' stop me, I should promise to write every week. So I promise him. An' he made Janey write down bofe your telephone numbers. He say if he don' hear from me he gonna call your wife firs'."
    Harry took his right hand off the wheel and picked up Ivory's hand and kissed it. "I'm going to take good care of you, Ivory." The feel of her gentle hand in his gave him a rush, and he couldn't turn it loose. Their hands rested together in the middle of the seat. "I love you already, Ivory."
    "Mmmm - hmmmm." Ivory slid out of her clogs and wiggled her toes in the thick carpeting. Her toenails were painted a fresh, bright red.
    "You like this truck?"
    "Mmmm - hmmmm. It's nice."
    "Don't be afraid."
    "Oh – I'm not afraid. But...."
    "You look so sad."
    "Oh, I'm always sad. I'm a sad person. Lady Sad, that's me."
    "You don't have to be. You're not happy now?"
    "Well...."
    "Well, what?"
    "Well – a married man – you know. My Daddy, he say you have your own family – your own family already...."
    "Yeah.... Ivory. Oh, Ivory.... I wish I could... Ivory, I can't even explain my own life to myself! I bet you know that feeling, huh!?"
    silence....
    "I want you to be my star, Ivory. My shining star."
    "Mmmm - hmmmm."
    They turned onto Highway-20 at Bruce. Harry wanted to stop at the cafe, to have a coffee there. It was such a pleasant, old-timey place. Annie liked it, too. Table cloths and linen napkins and a real grandmother in the kitchen and three specials on the menu, take-it-or-leave-it.
    But Harry had never seen a colored person there.
    "When we get to Panama City, let me know if you want to stop and eat. Or we can stop in Port St. Joe, or Apalachicola...."
    "I know Apalachicola. This man, he work for the paper factory in Port Joe now – he took care of me one time. I have his phone number – he say he worry 'bout me – I should call him. We could stop at a pay-phone.... But it's okay."
    Harry's heart pounded up.
    "If we see a pay-phone, no, well – maybe he don' live there no more."
    "No! Bullshit, Ivory! That pisses me off! That makes me jealous as hell!"
    "We don' need to call...."
    Pain was burning holes in Harry's stomach. All of his assumptions about Ivory flashed through his mind. Her sheltered life, the kidnapping, her dreams. "How'd you meet him? What color was he?"
    "Oh, he was born in Jamaica. They talk kind of funny."
    "How'd he meet you?"
    "Oh, my Daddy took us to Apalachicola one time an' we took this tour, an' the driver put this paper in my han' an' later I looked at it an' it had his name an' address on it. An' one day, after I graduate from high-school – it was bad for me then – I wrote a letter an' he come an' get me."
    Harry swallowed hard. He was a ball of pain. "Ivory. I can't stand to think about you in bed with another man. I can't stand it!" Pictures of a muscular, shiny-black Jamaican buck jamming his meat into his sweet Ivory's innocent body drove through Harry's brain. The pictures played across the windshield, across the faces of the cold-eyed black workers loading railroad ties at a crossing he had to slow down for, Love Jones bam bam bam bamming across, one of the workers suddenly whistling.
    Ivory rolled up the window on her side until they passed the crew, then rolled it back down again.
    "Oh, Ivory, I'm so fucking jealous!"
    "He was okay.... He was nice to me."
    "Shit! I'm sure he was!"
    Harry reached for her hand but she snatched it away.
    They drove through Port St. Joe without a word. Then Apalachicola. Harry was able to look at her again – so tall and beautiful.
    "Let me know when you get hungry or want to stop for anything. I'm going to pull over for a minute and get a beer out of the back. You want one?"
    No answer. They passed several small, country restaurants. Fishing wharves. Harry was glad that Ivory didn't ask to stop in this part of the world – he wasn't sure how the rednecks would behave. If someone would insult her, or him, he would have to fight. The law would arrive and it would be all over.
    Open country again. Miles and miles of forests, and dairy farms, and little towns without a single traffic light.
    She's sorry she came....
    "I'm getting hungry," Harry said finally, still thirsty for a Corona. And it was the first day in a long time he hadn't smoked any reefer. Well, the reefer could wait – at least until he figured out what to do about Ivory.
    "I have to go to the baf'room," Ivory said suddenly.
    Harry looked at her and her eyes looked back into his, soft this time. Worried.
    "Well, we can stop in Perry and eat, and score a bathroom that way...." God. Perry, the redneck pulpwood capitol! "But that's a good ways off. Can you go in the bushes if I stop in a good place?"
    "Mmmm - hmmmm. If you stan' nex' to me."
    If you stand next to me!
    Dear God, I love her so much already!
    Harry slowed the pickup down to around forty and began looking for a good spot. He had to pee himself.
    Once, at the boat-yard, Jimmy's wife stopped by at lunchtime only Jimmy was nowhere to be found. She was thirtyish and light-colored and short and over-weight. When she and Harry were hunting for her husband they began talking. They discussed all sorts of things: opportunities in Russia, politics, reefer, and the Bible. Her language was flawless, and she beat Harry down in all the subjects except religion. "I never lose a discussion on the Bible," Harry had said. "That's my home territory!" At that point, Jimmy's wife told Harry she needed a bathroom. The only dedicated ladies' room at the boat-yard was in the back of the main office but she was reluctant to walk through there. "I'll go with you!" Harry said, and he held her hand all the way past the office bitches to the restroom. This waddling duck of a fat, brainy, black woman. Since that day Harry would frequently remind himself, mostly in vain, never to prejudge intelligence from physical appearance.
    Harry pulled Love Jones off the road near a stand of palmettoes. Ivory's mint-green bandanna and sweater poked out above the vegetation like a new, spring flower while she tinkled, Harry standing beside her, his back to her, facing the road, steeling up for the huge eighteen-wheeler approaching – WHOOSH SUCK RUMBLE.... The ground trembling – a large, tan RV approaching, a middle-aged woman hunched over the wheel, wearing glasses, her husband pouring out a cup of coffee from a thermos – HUMMMMM SUCK RUMBLE – Bicycles hanging from a rack on the back. A zephyr of hot exhaust....
    Harry waited for the traffic to disappear before handing Ivory the Kleenex box he was holding. Mint-green bikini panties. He looked away while she wiped, and his love for her grew.
    "Okay." She rose out of the palmettoes with a hint of a smile. Eyes downcast.
    They picked their way hand-in hand back to the road. After working at the straps of her knapsack, Ivory pulled out her crumpled purse and a heavy, brown-paper bag. She handed the bag to Harry and laid the purse on the seat of the pickup.
    "There be bad people in Perry – my Daddy, he tol' me. Anyway, he fix this lunch if you wan' it."
    Harry peeked into the bag, then looked up and down the highway. There was a shady oak on the other side of the road. Handing the bag back to Ivory, he fished out two Coronas from his cooler. "Come on!" He sprinted across the road, relishing the burst of adrenalin. Ivory was still looking both ways. He watched her walk across, so calmly, the clogs clicking against the asphalt.
    There was litter everywhere on this side, and some wooden crates to sit on. An unofficial picnic spot. Harry plunked down but Ivory remained standing. He could not take his eyes off of her. A Taylor County police cruiser whizzed by heading toward Perry. A touch of the brake lights but it continued on.
    Thank you, Jesus!
    Harry leaned forward and dusted off the old orange crate next to him. Ivory picked her way closer but still did not sit. She held her lunch-bag in two hands, against her chest.
    "Ivory, if you only knew! Smile so I can see your golds. Ha! That was a real smile! Janey told me you had a gold cap with a star cut out in the middle – its beautiful! Look!" Harry pulled on his gold necklace and hauled out the lead-crystal star which he usually wore under his shirt. "This is my five-pointed star!"
    Ivory smiled again. "Daddy, he say white folks don' like gold teeth on a black person."
    "Well I'm not like everybody." Harry hefted the paper bag she was handing him again. "Heavy!" He pulled out the sandwiches. At the bottom was a can of Pepsi and a can of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer. Still cold. He glanced back at Ivory, who was looking down at her feet now.
    "PBR!" Harry said. "How did you know?"
    "Janey tol' me, but I see she was wrong."
    "Oh, no, I used to drink this all the time. I've only been drinking Corona recently. Does Janey know I came to get you?"
     Janey – I haven't been good enough to her....
    "Oh, no.... Maybe Connie tell her."
    Harry was inspecting the sandwiches. Ham, lettuce, and slices of chicken. Harry firmly told Ivory to sit down. She smoothed out her long skirt and sat down properly, back erect, knees together and pointing slightly toward him. He handed her one of the sandwiches and a napkin, pried the cap off a Corona with the gut-hook of his bear knife, and handed her the icy-wet bottle. He popped the tab of the PBR and took sip, and set the can on the ground between them. Ivory took a sip from her Corona and set her bottle down beside Harry's beer. He watched her turn her sandwich around and around in her lap.
    "Eat."
    Ivory continued to inspect the sandwich. Harry reached for another swallow of beer and then started on his own sandwich. Immediately, Ivory took a bite out of hers. "Oh, pretty lady," Harry said. He could not look anywhere else but at this strange and exquisite creature while she ate, and before he knew it his own sandwich was gone. He did not remember eating it. There was only Ivory, the movements of her arms and hands so graceful and her face a poem.
    After finishing off his can of PBR, Harry stood up and pulled off his sweatshirt. The T-shirt underneath was black, and on the front was a large, color picture of a front porch with two dogs jumping off and heading out into the woods. Two smaller dogs remained on the porch. Underneath the scene were the words:

If you can't run with the big dogs
Stay on the porch!

    Ivory smiled as she studied the shirt.
    "It's my favorite. I got it at a truckstop."
    "Daddy, he have a hat wif' the same picture. He don' hardly wear a hat, but when he do it be that one."
    "Yeah?" Another omen.... Harry moved his crate so he could face her. "I don't like to wear a hat, either. Whenever I see a man without one I figure there's a good chance he's a brother of mine, you know, I mean, somebody I could relate to. Like."
    "I un'erstan'." Ivory had finished her sandwich and her beer was nearly gone.
    Harry was happy to note her alcohol consumption. "You're not getting warm? It's going to get hot today – plus we're heading south. What are you wearing under that sweater?"
    Ivory began to turn the Corona around and around, and tried to peer into the narrow opening with one eye. "Nothing," she said quietly.
    "Oh." Harry's mind jammed for a moment. "This'd be a good place to change if you want to. We can watch the highway both ways for cars...."
    Without a word, Ivory was up and heading for the pickup. Harry had to move quickly to catch up to her before she crossed the road. And he stood beside her while she reached over the side and opened her knapsack. At the very top, a tiny, pink bra, a matching head-rag, and a pink and blue Miami Vice muscle shirt. Ivory turned and looked Harry in the eye, but her face was sad.
    "My navel show wif' this shirt. That be okay?"
    "Oh! Perfect! Beautiful!"
    "It have a knot stick out, you know...."
    "Oh, Ivory, I love that kind!"
    He helped her strap down the top of her knapsack and they crossed the road together. After he sat back down, he pried off the cap of the other Corona. The beer went down easily while Ivory changed behind him. He wished the whiskey were handy – not so well hidden in the truck. He needed to take the edge off. Off reality. The reality that what had been a dream for so long was standing right behind him in a devil-black body and a little pink bra.
    When Ivory stepped out in front of him, she surprised him by posing. Smiling but somehow still sad, she first faced him with her hands on her hips, chin up, then with a dramatic swirl of her patchwork, 60's style skirt she turned sideways, shoulders back, the short T-shirt hanging off her points, the knot of her navel just above the tiny waistband of her skirt.
    Harry swallowed. He wanted to clasp his hands around her little waist. Take her down right then and there. "Damn, Ivory! You should be a model!"
    She turned completely around, the sadness gone from her smile. Turning her head this way and that, Ivory dropped her eyelids, feigning shyness. Then, winking, she managed to pull out the mint-green bandanna, which she had replaced with the pink, from between her fingers. Drawing the material across her face like a veil, she kissed it with a purse of her lips and tossed it toward him.
    Harry reached out and caught it in mid-flutter, pretending to find the spot which had touched her lips and kissing it. He looked up at her and patted his knee. "Come here. Sit on my lap."
    Ivory's smile disappeared. "No."
    "Baby...."
    "No."
    Ivory sat back down on her own crate, pouting. She finished the last of her beer and peered into the bottle again. "This beer make me feel funny."
    "Good funny?"
    "Well – yes...."
    "Stay right here!" Harry raced across the road and returned with two more Coronas. He hoped that Ivory would accept hers and she did. He pocketed the caps he had pried off. "I don't litter."
    "Oh, there's so much here."
    "Yeah, but I won't add to it."
    Ivory stared at her beer for a time, then lifted it to her lips. A single swallow. She turned and gave him a look.
    "What?" Harry laughed. "I'm not the devil. Drink up. We have a long way to go and it'll make you feel comfortable. After this one we'll lay off for a while, okay?"
    Ivory smiled and took another sip.
    "Who made the cookies?" Harry pulled a Ziploc bag of chocolate chip cookies out of the lunch sack.
    "My sister, Connie. She know."
    "Then Janey knows."
    "Nooo...."
    "Your father's going to hate me for this, too. That's the only thing I feel bad about."
    "Noooo.... Not if you bring me back okay."
    "Oh, Baby, there's no way I could ever hurt you. We're going to have a good time, a happy life."
    "Mmmm - hmmmm."
    "For sure, Ivory."
    "Mmmm - hmmmm."
    Harry saw that her tummy didn't bunch over her waistband as she sat – she was as lean and hard as a little poor-girl. But so sad looking, sipping on her beer. Looking down at her feet and wiggling the toes poking out of her platform clogs.
    Once in a while a truck or a car would roar by. A honk or two....
    "We need to hit the road," Harry said finally, "if we want to get to Miami before too late."
    On the other side of the highway, Ivory turned and looked back at their picnic spot. Harry moved close and hugged her from behind, his arms encircling her waist. He kissed the nappy back of her neck. He wanted to slide his hands up under her short muscle-shirt but he didn't.
    "You're so beautiful, Ivory. And so quiet. So peaceful."
    "Mmmm - hmmmm."
    He allowed the palm of his right hand to dust across the knot of her navel, her tight stomach. The erotic urge that pumped up into his loins was so immediate and powerful he had to turn her loose and step back. The blood hammering up in his jeans was visible – he knew it – and he dashed back across the road to retrieve the unopened Pepsi they had forgotten. He concentrated on that Pepsi, the color of the plastic bottle, ten ounce, the dirt that might be stuck to it – brush it off. Go down, asshole pecker! Go down!
    Back on the road, Harry munched on a cookie with the Pepsi for a chaser. Ivory staring straight ahead again. Silent. Harry set the cookie bag in her lap. He wondered what had triggered the uninhibited modeling exhibition back at the picnic place, so unexpected and so fleeting.
    "The chocolate's not good for my skin," she said.
    "Oh?" Shut up. What do you know about her skin? "Well, I'm going to fuck up my skin – these cookies are good!" Harry had both hands on the wheel. This part of the road was always rough, and tended to throw the pickup off track. "You can hand them to me while I drive. Beauty and the beast."
    Harry turned and caught her smile. And instead of handing them to him one-by-one, she brought each cookie to his mouth, and waited with the next until he finished chewing. After the last one, he kissed her hand.
    "I love you."
    "Mmmm - hmmmm."

     <end chapter-12>

Humanism with attitude! Rev: 27 March 2005