Color Purple, The - Alice Walker [73]
You mean he knowed he was the one damage you all along? he ast.
-I say, Yeah.
Mr.??? shake his head.
After all the evil he done I know you wonder why I don't hate him. I don't hate him for two reasons. One, he love Shug. And two, Shug use to love him. Plus, look like he trying to make something out of himself. I don't mean just that he work and he clean up after himself and he appreciate some of the things God was playful enough to make. I mean when you talk to him now he really listen, and one time, out of nowhere in the conversation us was having, he said Celie, I'm satisfied this the first time I ever lived on Earth as a natural man. It feel like a new experience.
Sofia and Harpo always try to set me up with some man. They know I love Shug but they think womens love just by accident, anybody handy likely to do. Everytime I go to Harpo's some little policy salesman git all up in my face. Mr.??? have to come to the rescue. He tell the man, This lady my wife. The man vanish out the door.
Us sit, have a cold drink. Talk about our days together with Shug. Talk about the time she come home sick. The little crooked song she use to sing. All our fine evenings down at Harpo's.
You was even sewing good way back then, he say. I remember the nice little dresses Shug always wear.
Yeah, I say. Shug could wear a dress.
Remember the night Sofia knock Mary Agnes' toofs out? he ast.
Who could forgit it? I say.
Us don't say nothing bout Sofia's troubles. Us still can't laugh at that. Plus, Sofia still have trouble with that family. Well, trouble with Miss Eleanor Jane.
You just don't know, say Sofia, what that girl done put me through. You know how she use to bother me all the time when she had problems at home? Well finally she start bothering me when anything good happen. Soon as she snag that man she married she come running to me. Oh, Sofia, she say, you just have to meet Stanley Earl. And before I can say anything, Stanley Earl is in the middle of my front room.
How you, Sofia, he say, grinning and sticking out his hand. Miss Eleanor Jane done told me so much about you.
I wonder if she told him they made me sleep up under their house, say Sofia. But I don't ask. I try to be polite, act pleasant.
Henrietta turn the radio up loud in the back room. I have to almost holler to make myself understood. They stand round looking at the children's pictures on the wall and saying how good my boys look in they army uniforms.
Where they fighting? Stanley Earl want to know, 268 They in the service right here in Georgia, I say. But pretty soon they be bound for overseas.
He ast me do I know which part they be station in? France, Germany or the Pacific.
I don't know where none of that is so I say, Naw. He say he want to fight but got to stay home and run his daddy's cotton gin.
Army got to wear clothes, he say, if they fighting in Europe. Too bad they not fighting hi Africa. He laugh. Miss Eleanor Jane smile. Henrietta turn the dial as high as it can go. Got on some real sorry whitefolks music sound tike I don't know what. Stanley Earl snap his fingers and try to tap one of his good size foots. He got a long head go straight up and hair cut so short it look fuzzy. His eyes real bright blue and never hardly blink. Good God, I think.
Sofia raise me, practically, say Miss Eleanor Jane. Don't know what we would have done without her.
Well, say Stanley Earl, everybody round here raise by colored. That's how come we turn out so well. He wink at me, say, Well Sugar Pie, to Miss Eleanor Jane, time for us to mosey along.
She leap up tike somebody stuck her with a pin. How Henrietta doing? she ast. Then she whisper, I brought her something with yams so well hid she won't never suspect. She run out to the car and come back with a tuna casserole.
Well, say Sofia, one thing you have to say for Miss Eleanor Jane, her dishes almost always fool Henrietta. And that mean a lots to me, Of course I never tell Henrietta where they come from: If I did, out the window they would go. Else she'd vomit, tike it made her sick.
But finally, the end come