The Color Purple - Alice Walker [25]
Yeah, she mad. But what good being mad gon do? She not evil, she know Sofia life hard to bear right now.
How she git long with the children? ast Mr. ____.
They love her, say Harpo. She let ’em do anything they want.
Oh-oh, I say.
Besides, he say, Odessa and Sofia other sisters always on hand to take up the slack. They bring up children like military.
Squeak sing,
They calls me yellow
like yellow be my name
They calls me yellow
like yellow be my name
But if yellow is a name
Why ain’t black the same
Well, if I say Hey black girl
Lord, she try to ruin my game
DEAR GOD,
Sofia say to me today, I just can’t understand it.
What that? I ast.
Why we ain’t already kill them off.
Three years after she beat she out of the wash house, got her color and her weight back, look like her old self, just all time think bout killing somebody.
Too many to kill off, I say. Us outnumbered from the start. I speck we knock over one or two, though, here and there, through the years, I say.
We sit on a piece of old crate out near the edge of Miss Millie’s yard. Rusty nails stick out long the bottom and when us move they creak gainst the wood.
Sofia job to watch the children play ball. The little boy throw the ball to the little girl, she try to catch it with her eyes shut. It roll up under Sofia foot.
Throw me the ball, say the little boy, with his hands on his hip. Throw me the ball.
Sofia mutter to herself, half to me. I’m here to watch, not to throw, she say. She don’t make a move toward the ball.
Don’t you hear me talking to you, he shout. He maybe six years old, brown hair, ice blue eyes. He come steaming up to where us sit, haul off and kick Sofia leg. She swing her foot to one side and he scream.
What the trouble? I ast.
Done stab his foot with a rusty nail, Sofia say.
Sure enough, blood come leaking through his shoe.
His little sister come watch him cry. He turn redder and redder. Call his mama.
Miss Millie come running. She scared of Sofia. Everytime she talk to her it like she expect the worst. She don’t stand close to her either. When she git a few yards from where us sit, she motion for Billy to come there.
My foot, he say to her.
Sofia do it? she ast.
Little girl pipe up. Billy do it his own self, she say. Trying to kick Sofia leg. The little girl dote on Sofia, always stick up for her. Sofia never notice, she as deef to the little girl as she is to her brother.
Miss Millie cut her eyes at her, put one arm round Billy shoulder and they limp into the back of the house. Little girl follow, wave bye-bye to us.
She seem like a right sweet little thing, I say to Sofia.
Who is? She frown.
The little girl, I say. What they call her, Eleanor Jane?
Yeah, say Sofia, with a real puzzle look on her face, I wonder why she was ever born.
Well, I say, us don’t have to wonder that bout darkies.
She giggle. Miss Celie, she say, you just as crazy as you can be.
This the first giggle I heard in three years.
DEAR GOD,
Sofia would make a dog laugh, talking about those people she work for. They have the nerve to try to make us think slavery fell through because of us, say Sofia. Like us didn’t have sense enough to handle it. All the time breaking hoe handles and letting the mules loose in the wheat. But how anything they build can last a day is a wonder to me. They backward, she say. Clumsy, and unlucky.
Mayor____bought Miz Millie a new car, cause she said if colored could have cars then one for her was past due. So he bought her a car, only he refuse to show her how to drive it. Every day he come home from town he look at her, look out the window at her car, say, How you enjoying ’er Miz Millie. She fly off the sofa in a huff, slam the door going in the bathroom.
She ain’t got no friends.
So one day she say to me, car been sitting out in the yard two months, Sofia, do you know how to drive? I guess she remembered first seeing me up gainst Buster Broadnax car.
Yes ma’am, I say. I’m slaving away cleaning that big post they got down at the bottom of the stair.