A Day to Pick Your Own Cotton - Michael R. Phillips [47]
“I got you, Mayme!” she cried.
“Yes, and now I’m gonna get you!” I said, turning and chasing after her.
She howled in a frenzy of terror and fun and ran away from me. Katie was running to one of the water pumps to fill up her bucket again, and within another minute, an allout water war had begun.
At first Emma just stood watching, too bewildered at the sight to enter in. Sometimes I wondered if her brain just went a little slower than other folks’. But finally, after laughing at the rest of us, it seemed to dawn on her that she could join us in the fun herself. But I think she was still a little intimidated at the thought of being too free with white folks, so when she finally started splashing water about, it was always toward me. Before long she was running and laughing and shrieking too.
All four of us were running around back and forth between the clotheslines, the barn, and the house. Within ten minutes we were soaked to the skin from head to foot. But after all the work and the heat of the day, it felt as good as swimming in a creek.
Pretty soon we were laughing too hard to keep running and were just taking turns pouring buckets of water on each other. Aleta and Emma were laughing as hard as me and Katie.
Right in the middle of it, as we were standing there dripping and starting to think about going back to finish hanging up the last few things, Aleta interrupted our laughter.
“There’s somebody coming,” she said.
NEW WINDOWS
25
ALETA’S WORDS QUIETED US ALL IN A BIG HURRY! We looked where Aleta was pointing to see a wagon coming from the road into the yard. It was too late to do anything about it. The man rode up in front of us as we stood there soaking wet, watching him approach.
He looked down at us with a curious expression. All of our dresses were dripping water down onto the ground. I can’t imagine what he must have thought to see two white girls and two black girls in such a mess. He stared at me a second, then turned back toward Katie.
“Your mama home, Kathleen?”
“Uh, no … no, she isn’t,” answered Katie, wiping at her hair, which was dripping down all over her face.
“I heard you had some broken windows you wanted me to fix.”
“Oh yes—that’s right. I’ll show you.”
He got down off the wagon and Katie led him toward the house, her feet squishing in her boots, still trying to wipe her hair back out of her face as she went.
“You girls look a mess,” the man said.
“Yes, sir. We were doing the wash and started throwing water at each other.”
“I can see that,” said the man.
“Who’s the tall colored girl? Ain’t seen her before. She’s got an uppity look in her face.”
“She, uh … works for us now,” said Katie. “She used to be a slave.”
“Yeah, well I reckon a lot of things is changing now for everybody. I didn’t recollect you having a younger sister, Kathleen.”
“Uh … no, sir,” said Katie and kept walking.
Aleta and Emma and I gradually started moving back in the direction of the rinse tub, but I was trying to listen to Katie and the window man at the same time.
“There are the windows, Mr. Krebs,” said Katie, pointing to the four broken ones. “My mama’s not going to be home till later. Can you fix them and she pay you later?”
“Yeah. Just take me about an hour. I’ll cut the glass and get ’em glazed. I’ll send her a bill.”
“Thank you, Mr. Krebs,” said Katie. “Well, I guess I should see about the washing.”
Katie walked back to where we were standing watching.
“He’s going to fix the windows,” she said, as if it was nothing out of the ordinary.
We continued with the last of the wash, not saying much now, both Katie and me glancing kinda nervously toward the house every now and then.
“Emma,” said Katie after a minute, “you’d better go back in and change your clothes and tend to William so he doesn’t start crying.”
“Yes, Miz Katie.”
“She can’t go in like that,” I said. “Miss Katie, why don’t you take her around and through the front door so he won’t see her. Aleta and me will finish up here. We can do that, can’t we, Aleta?”
“Yes,” said Aleta.
Katie and