Drowning Every Day Every Minute
by Darlin
One morning Ororo Iqadi T'Challa got up, bathed, dressed, fixed her beautiful white hair, made breakfast for her little daughter, sent her off to school with a wave then cleaned her house and made sure the rag rug in the hall was swept thoroughly then she walked to the closet in her bedroom and retrieved her husband's old Colt revolver, took it into the living room where she sat down on the clean carpet and shot herself in the head.
Many years later her daughter still remembered that when she'd found her mother she'd never seen her look more peaceful. And yet it was the most gruesome sight she'd ever seen. She later realized her mother hadn't meant for her to find her. But she'd come home earlier than usual, angry with the friend she usually stayed with after school.
Her screams brought a neighbor, limping, out of breath and terrified. All the years afterward she wondered why he hadn't come at the sound of the gun shot. He could have saved her from nightmares ever after. The memory of her mother laying on the freshly vacuumed rug, congealed blood pooled beneath her head, the look of nonchalance, the stiffened body, it never went away, the sight, the questions.
Hadn't her mother been happy? She had her! Wasn't a daughter and a husband enough? They'd migrated from Africa and had been successful enough for that time of racial strife in the south and they hadn't been starving! Their house was small but always clean and welcoming and full of good smells. Her mother loved flowers. Flowers were in window boxes spring and summer into fall. Mason jars full of flowers were everywhere in the house and during winter the jars were filled with holly and ivy. She sang when she got up. She sang when she cooked. She sang when her daughter came home. She sang with a sweet, simple voice, not particularly great but not so awful that you wished she would hush up. She'd sung every day until that last week.
This revelation only came in time. No one ever thought about it because only her husband and her daughter and perhaps the unborn child in her belly knew singing had become a joy to her in recent years. She would sing Spirituals and more modern tunes like rock and roll songs you would never expect your mother to even know, songs you weren't supposed to know but you heard late at night across the way at the bootlegger's when he had a party because you lived in such a small town that the bootlegger lived just across the creek from you.
Many years later the daughter wondered if her mother had felt as if she were drowning every day, every minute. She wondered about this a lot because she felt as if she were drowning every day, every minute. When things got too hard, when her heart was broken, when she felt her spirit dying, she would always think about death – her death – killing herself as her mother had. She imagined it would be welcomed, exquisite bliss. No more worries, no more anything. Dark nothingness, true blackness. Darker than her father with his rich mahogany skin that she loved, darker than the earth her mother had toiled in, a darkness that would be all encompassing.
But she didn't kill herself. She woke every morning, bathed, dressed, fixed her hair, made breakfast for her father and herself, went off to school, sometimes turning and waving at the empty threshold because she sometimes forgot her mother was no longer there to wave back. She took care of the house – it was never a home again – she made dinner, did homework, cleaned and made sure there was never another area rug in the hall or anywhere in the house. Blood was too easily contained by a rug, the rug too easily removed so the one who wanted to kill themselves could leave no trace of their cruel act. They'd rolled her mother up in that carpet and taken her away, away from her daughter, her husband and her little home saturated with flowers, away into darkness and mystery.
Many years later at her father's wake she heard someone mention her mother – Remember . . . ? But then they'd all turned and stared at her, no one saying anything more. She wanted to scream, to rage – Remember her please! Tell me what you remember! All she remembered was the stiff, ageless face, pretty but silent, peaceful – free. She'd gotten up amidst the silence, gone into the kitchen for some country ham and a coke, trying to hear the whispers that followed her departure. But it was their neighbor, the old man with a limp, the neighbor who'd come at her scream, and he finally gave her a clue.
"It wasn't that she didn't love you," he told her when everyone was piling into their cars.
"What?" she asked., startled at his intrusion of her privacy that everyone else so religiously observed.
"Your mother loved you very much baby girl. And the baby too, she wanted it."
She looked at this old man and wondered what he knew about her mother. He was an old friend of her family. He'd been in a shooting accident but she never recalled how it happened, didn't really care. Now she looked at this old man and felt as if she wanted to smack him. If he was going to tell her that her mother had had an affair with him she would take his cane and beat him with it – kill him!
"I don't want to talk about her, Mr. Luke," she said.
"I just thought you should know."
"I would have thought you might have wanted to tell me that when I was on the floor in front of her dead body or when I was crying at the funeral!" she shouted.
"I . . . I couldn't. I didn't know that then," he admitted.
"Then how do you know it now?"
He shrugged. "You always have that solemn look on your face just the way she used to look till she took up singing and I see her smile in your smile and I saw how well you took care of your daddy and how you take care of the house putting flowers all around just like she used to."
"That hardly means she loved me."
"She taught you all that and gave all that to you because of love baby girl. You don't have her white hair and blue eyes but you look a whole lot like her. Your mama had a big love for life. She loved big and loved everything and everyone! Lord, how I remember how she loved her flowers! She loved you and your daddy hard baby girl. She loved you all so much she just didn't want to hurt you."
"You don't think killing herself hurt me and my father?"
"I think she must've thought it would be a lesser kind of hurt, child."
She hated being called child when she was a grown woman, had always hated being called child even when she was a child! Hush up child, go away child, a child don't need to hear this, you're just a child, a child, a child! She had stopped being a child the day her mother shot herself in the head and let her find her there in the entryway of their little farce of a peaceful, love filled home.
"It was wrong what she did," he murmured as if he were thinking out loud. "It's hard to forgive. You don't forget that kind of death and that kind of pain. Your mother was a beautiful woman with a big heart. I don't know why she did what she did but I do know she loved you."
She had thought that she would never forgive this man for his words but now she folded herself into him and they clung to each other for a brief, clumsy moment and then she pulled away, nodding.
It was Luke's funeral service some years later that gave her more information. She actually wept a little as she stared down at his lifeless body, remembering that he alone had tried to give her some comfort. She wished she'd asked more questions and hadn't been so bitter with him. Liking flowers, having the same looks, and dying on a carpet to keep the house clean couldn't be proof that her mother loved her.
The way everyone stared at her, whispering and then the silence when she approached, it was just too much. She regretted coming back to the little town and knew she wouldn't stay for the wake even knowing there would be delicious fried chicken and country ham and potato salad and yellow cake with caramel frosting. So when the pastor spoke his words over the grave and they all broke up to go she was the first to head for her car. But out of the corner of her eye she saw a man standing at a grave not far from there, standing very near her mother's grave, and something about the lonely figure made her stop. Others noticed him too.
"What's he doing here?" someone hissed.
"Maybe he wants to pay his respects after us black folks leave," suggested someone else.
"Hah, it was him who done shot Luke, ruined his leg!"
She hadn't known that. She really shouldn't even care. But she realized that old Mr. Luke, now in welcomed darkness, had probably known more than he'd revealed.
"When did that happen?" she asked.
"Huh? Oh, child, everyone know he was shot the week 'fore your mama died! Always limped after that. Guess you was too young to remember all that though."
Someone tried to shush the talkative woman who immediately covered her mouth as she realized what she'd done. But Ororo's daughter's mind was elsewhere. Two shootings within a week of each other? She'd never pieced it together before, never even noticed when her neighbor had started limping.
"He got into it with that ol' white man over yonder," someone muttered with unbridled anger in his voice.
"A fight?" she asked.
"They was wrasseling!" the talkative woman offered eagerly as if she simply couldn't hold back the gossip after all the years of silence in the girl's presence.
"Mmm hmm," an elderly man chimed in. "They done fell into the creek out by your place and the gun went off, least ways that's how ol' man Logan tells it."
"Logan?"
"Mmm hmm, that white man over yonder. He ain't spend no time in jail either!" the man declared.
"Did y'all think he would?"
"Hell no!"
"I've never seen him before," she said.
"He used to be with the police department but he moved up north after the trail after he nearly killed Luke."
"Did he know my mother?"
"He knew everyone like we all know everyone, child. It don't matter now no how," someone said, not willing to offer more than that.
"What is he doing here?" she whispered. "What does he know?"
"They say . . ."
But someone tsked loudly as if trying to restore the protective silence they had silently but unanimously settled upon long ago, keeping talk about Ororo's death away from her daughter. And the talkative gossiper reluctantly acquiesced to the silent code and closed her mouth and sucked her teeth. Everyone stared at her, some shaking their heads and then as if in some silent agreement they all headed to their cars without saying anything else.
She didn't. She stayed. She waited. This man knew something. She debated with herself. Did she want to know what he knew? Were her mother and the old handicapped man lovers like some of the gossip she'd actually heard second hand from friends over the years? Mr. Luke had been the first one to reach her and her dead mother. He'd wept over them even as he'd taken charge, shooing her out of the house, keeping the body hidden in the carpet, directing everyone as they crowded in. Had he loved her mother? Had her father known? Had they been secret lovers, maybe quarreled and he shot her in a jealous rage then pretended to discover the body only when she'd screamed? You couldn't help who you loved. She remembered her mother saying that sometimes.
When the others were gone she began to walk. The white man was short, almost shorter than she was she noticed as she approached him. Her mother had been tall, she would have towered a head above this man and that thought suddenly lifted her spirits. But he had a unique look, thick mutton chop whiskers, black, wild hair that stood up on either side of his head in points. Her mother had enjoyed interesting looking people, perhaps because her own look of white hair and blue eyes was so unique. Logan had dark eyes and his face was troubled – sad? His hands were in tight fists as he stood looking down at a grave – at her mother's grave!
He looked up when she stopped beside him but he didn't speak although it looked as if he wanted to. They both stood there for a long time just looking at the green grass, the fresh white roses lying on the grave, her mother's favorite, and the marble tombstone. 'Always' was inscribed above her mother's name. There was no last name, no birth date, no death date. She remembered how people had thought it strange that her father had put no marker over the grave and then when one suddenly appeared years later she'd never asked him about it. It had seemed strange because her father was full of hate and anger and they never spoke of her mother. To mention her mother meant a beating so she'd quickly learned to keep quiet. Now as she gazed at the marble tombstone it seemed to her that there was some secret message to be discerned in the single word. Always. Her father had never forgiven her mother for what she'd done. Always he would hate her. Was that the message? But that made no sense. Always. Love always. Had Mr. Luke had the tombstone put there?
After a while she felt him turn to her, felt his gaze on her, but she couldn't look at him nor could she speak. Did he have answers for her? Did she really want to know what happened, what this police officer had done? Would she have even worse nightmares for the rest of her life if she knew the truth?
She heard him sigh then felt a hand on her shoulder and still she ignored him. She was shaking when she felt the absence of his heavy hand and knew he would go. He'd offered comfort. Why? Soon she heard his footsteps on the gravel road, heard a car door shut and then there was a long silence as if he were debating, much as she was. She hoped to hear the car door slam again as he got out of the car and shut the door, she hoped to hear the crunch of his footsteps over the gravel as he joined her again but this time with words of explanation, words that would save her from drowning every day, every minute no matter how many times she surfaced from the nightmare filled abyss, words that would release her from a life of grief and fear and loss. But instead she heard the engine start. She looked up; saw him still watching her as he sat in his truck and then she was running. She ran as far away from him as she could, through the cemetery, dodging graves and up to the fence where she fell onto the ground and sobbed in deep, pain filled gasps.
When people die you always want to remember them but after the years pass and fade so often do the memories. If you're young like she'd been sometimes you forget what they looked like and have to run upstairs to your room and grab their framed photograph off a dresser and stare until you've reabsorbed their reflection. But after a few decades pass and you only recall the likeness in the photograph you don't want to admit it but you know you've forgotten what they really looked like, who they really were even. But she'd never forgotten. She would always see her mother's happy face when she sang; she would always remember her mother's peaceful face when it was all over.
But what was all over? She had more questions than before. Had a white man fought with their neighbor, over her mother? And if not that then over what? Had her father called the officer on the neighbor when he'd found out? Was that why he hated so fiercely, never visiting the grave, never allowing her to speak of her mother? And why had her mother stopped singing a week before she took her life; did that mean she'd found out she was pregnant and had desperately begun plotting her death? Had their neighbor known she was pregnant with his child? Or was he a partner in her crime in some other way? Had he tried to stop the policeman from finding her body or from doing something else?
She didn't remember a policeman at the time but of course one had to be there. And why had this ex police officer come on the day of his victim's funeral but was instead there at her mother's grave? And suddenly she thought she knew. It wasn't the neighbor who had killed her mother. It was the officer who had killed her. He who had taken her and placed her on the carpet, he who had put the gun to the side of her head and pulled the trigger, released the bullet into her brain. Their neighbor had heard, come running and had been shot in turn. But that made no sense for he had found them only when she'd come home and he'd been shot before that.
Surely her mother hadn't been seeing the policeman? If she had, then had she loved him? Had he shot her because she didn't love him? Didn't want him? Refused him? Yet there had been no sign of a struggle. Had she found out she was pregnant and couldn't bear bringing an illegitimate, biracial child into the world? She would have been found out with the birth of a half white half black child. Had her mother truly killed herself then?
It was too much to take in. She was too afraid to ask anyone what had happened, had always been afraid to face the truth. And now all her conjectures were making her sick to her stomach. She was drowning in a sea of doubt and anguish.
Maybe her mother had loved this white man, had been found out by the neighbor, and knew it would ruin her child's life and her husband's life if Mr. Luke had made it known. Had she then made preparations to give up her lover to protect her family? Had she cared for her father that much? Her poor, clueless father. Had he known or was it the not knowing that had caused him to withdraw from his daughter and friends and life until he'd withered and died too young, full of hate and mistrust?
And had her mother loved her so much that somehow she thought committing suicide would save her little girl from shame and make life easier for her? Had she even considered that the guilt and shame and all the unanswered questions would hinder her little girl who would – should have been helpless without her but never was helpless after that horrible day?
A hand touched her shoulder and she jumped. She saw the white man and stopped herself from crying out for as she looked into his dark eyes she suddenly knew. Without a word she just knew. Truth washed over her like some insatiable thing, greedy and painful, but finding satisfaction too. This man had brought the roses her mother loved because he loved her mother and her mother had loved him.
"I'm sorry," he said as she came to a sitting position in the grass.
"You loved her," she replied flatly for no one chose whom they loved.
"Always," he whispered.
"Did you – did you kill her?" she asked bluntly though she no longer thought he had.
"No I didn't kill her but I would've died for her if it meant she would still be alive." His statement was not adamant or angry but calm and certain.
She felt he would have said more had she pressed him but there was only a long silence as he knelt before her and they looked at each other. How did they even begin to broach this subject she wondered? And she knew he must be wondering too. She wanted to say something, ask something, but she couldn't think beyond the man in front of her. He wasn't as handsome as her father but he was handsome in a rough way, his face tanned, weathered, tired as if worn out from years of grief much like her father before he'd succumbed to death too soon.
It should have been difficult looking at this man but she found it peaceful looking into his eyes. She could see how her mother could love him. She sensed he was strong and decent, a man who would protect his woman from the gates of hell if he could. But when his brows arched suddenly and his face turned hopeful, even desperate, she drew away from his touch, closed her eyes and prayed that he wouldn't ask her to forgive him. She had never been able to forgive her mother; she could hardly forgive this stranger who had wrecked her life.
"I shouldn't have said anything. I shouldn't have come here," he said.
"Why did you then?"
"Luke and I were friends once. I wanted to pay my respects but, well, I thought things had changed only I forgot how small and backwards this town is. I'm not welcomed here. It was my fault he was lame. If I hadn't . . . Well, you see, he knew about us, your mother and me. He was really angry. He and your father were pretty close. He just wouldn't stop coming. I tried to talk to him, calm him down – your mother didn't want me to hurt him and like I said we were friends before that, but he just kept coming. Then there wasn't anywhere to go. He tackled me and we fell down the bank and into the creek in your yard . . ."
She looked at him now; saw him looking off as if he were seeing that day crystal clear before him.
"He tried to get my gun, we fought over it and it went off. It wasn't supposed to happen. I just, I just loved her. I couldn't stop loving her. How do you stop loving someone? I just couldn't."
"You can't choose who you love."
His attention turned back to her and he looked at her as if some déjà vu had washed over him and then he nodded slowly. He'd heard Ororo's voice in her daughter's voice and it pained him but heartened him too.
"She was a beautiful woman, I mean here, where it counts not just her looks," he said and touched his hand to his chest. "Though she was one hell of a looker – she was beautiful all around."
"Did my father know? About you . . . ?"
"No. I don't think anyone really knew except for Luke and, well, he never wanted to hurt your father so he wasn't telling anyone. Mostly I think everyone figured Ororo killed herself over Luke as dumb as that was or they thought because things weren't great between her and your father, and I guess they weren't with me in the picture, but she was always trying to make him happy. That was the thing I hated about her." He shook his head, memories jogged of the woman he loved and had brought down to a level so low she'd felt the only solution out of the mess he'd caused was suicide.
"She never wanted to hurt him. After she – well, I just let them think what they wanted. I know I shouldn't have but it wouldn't have done anyone any good if I'd told the truth. Ororo didn't want anyone to ever find out about us."
"My father never spoke to Mr. Luke again."
"Your father hardly spoke to anyone again. I'm sorry about that too. We never meant to hurt anyone. We tried not to see each other an' mostly we succeeded. And then after years of just seeing her in town going to the store or seeing her at the Christmas tree lighting and little things like that, her working in her flower garden in the front of her house when I drove by, well, I just couldn't take it anymore. I just wasn't strong enough to stay away forever."
Her mind was filled with the images he'd presented, her mother looking up seeing the police car, maybe hoping it was him, maybe dreading it was him, her heart leaping within her chest either way, wishing, regretting. Maybe he'd sidle up close to her as she stood with her hands on her little girls shoulders as they watched the Christmas tree being lit in the little town square. Maybe he'd brush his hand against hers or just breathe in her floral scent and that would be enough for a time. She could see him driving up their gravel driveway when he knew her mother was alone, her little girl at school and her husband at work, the nearest neighbor half a mile away. Maybe her mother would go inside their little house and lock both doors though they never locked them otherwise. Or maybe she'd give in if he called to her sorrowfully and desperate. How did you resist love that big?
Her thoughts turned back to the present as the wind blew strong around them and the delicate leaves on the old willows and the tall grass along the fence waved fluidly as the sky grew dark as clouds overtook the sun. It would rain they both thought.
"Do you reckon someone can love too much?" he asked.
"Yes." Yes, she did. Now. She saw what had happened. It was startling clear. Her mother had loved a man she shouldn't have even spoken too in that era. Her mother had loved too much. She couldn't bear to hurt her husband and couldn't go on living with her guilt and yes, with her love.
"But it was a cruel thing to do, just mean and selfish," she said.
He nodded. Even though he still missed Ororo, every day he was still angry over what she'd done and then there was his guilt. It never went away. Would it ever?
"How did you and her . . . how did you meet?"
He chuckled now and she saw that faraway look come over him again.
"We used to play together as kids, Luke too. I had a crush on her, we were kinda secret boyfriend and girlfriend when we were about ten to twelve but then we got older and it just wasn't what you did back then. People would've talked. She was afraid, said she couldn't run off with me 'cause she wouldn't be able to go to school. She really wanted to be a teacher so she went off to college and I took up the law. When she came back she was married to – to your father." Logan paused and she saw conflicted emotions flash over his face.
"I knew she was getting married, you know how everyone talks in this town, but I was too stupid and too angry to go get her out of college. I should've. Maybe she would've gone away with me but knowing her I knew she wouldn't let herself do that. I would've just embarrassed her. But, well he was good to her – your father was."
She watched him and believed him. Perhaps they were fated, this man Logan and her mother Ororo. Ill fated, star crossed lovers. And like stars going nova anyone who got in their way was decimated just like their neighbor, her little brother or sister who was never born, her father, and now herself. You couldn't escape your fate.
"I asked her to go away with me again after she was pregnant with you an' then when you were born but she wouldn't leave you – you were so small then. I told her I'd love you too, all I wanted was to keep her safe but she wouldn't get a divorce. It just seemed like . . ." His words died as he remembered.
"She – we – it was just . . . it was never the right time for us. She'd give in then break it off over an' over then she found out about the baby and she couldn't handle it. I tried to tell her we could make it work if we just left, the three of us, but . . . it just, it was just too much for her. I never guessed she'd do that. If I'd even thought she'd kill herself and the baby I would've taken her away whether she liked it or not.
"I thought she must've hated me so much to do that but after a while I knew she just loved too much. Sometimes you just want to rip the love right out of you so you don't feel anymore. She did that I guess. But she was a good woman; she was kind and sweet and thoughtful, just good. She never would've killed herself if it hadn't been for me not being man enough to let her go."
"Thoughtful," she mimicked his observation, thinking of her mother's thoughtfulness in cleaning the area rug where she'd chosen to end her life so there would be no mess to clean up.
"She loved you," he said.
"I can't even imagine that."
"She did. She always told me how much you meant to her. I never would've even thought about going away with her if we didn't take you too and you were a cute little thing, laughing all the time. She said you were mischievous but boy did she love you. I kinda think having you was the only thing that kept her sane."
"Really?"
"Yeah. She didn't wanna hurt you. I guess it's hard to see how that could be true but it took me a long time to see it. She didn't want to hurt anyone an' she ended up hurting everyone. But it was my fault, I know it. Ya got every right ta hate me."
"I don't. I – no one ever told me anything. I picked up pieces here and there. I guess they didn't know at all though. Well, I guess now I know and now I know what I have to do."
You couldn't help who you loved – her mother's saying – and probably because of this man she guessed. Now Ororo's daughter took her purse from off her arm where it had fallen in her race to escape the truth and she opened it and pulled out her father's old colt revolver, the same gun that her mother had used. In a moment she would pull the trigger.
And for the first time since her mother's death she knew peace. She smiled slightly with this realization even as she dodged the man's outstretched hands and managed to blast herself in the face. It didn't matter what happened here or what had happened at her little house so many years ago. She knew she had finally escaped the whispers, the looks, the not knowing. She knew nothing in this world mattered, that they were all drowning every day, every minute, they just didn't know it like she did, like her mother had, and maybe like her father and her mother's lover knew.
Sprawled awkwardly there on the lawn of the old cemetery, she saw then that this had always been her fate. And she welcomed it and embraced the darkness as it began to rain.
~Finis~
A/N - Please, if anyone reads this and thinks of suicide as a solution please, please know that it simply isn't! You matter! It may seem as if oblivion is the answer but there is so much in this world yet to see and do and there is a God! There is Heaven and there's hell too! Jesus loves you if you feel no one else does! And if you feel you need help hopefully some of the info below may be of use:
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
1 (800) 273-8255
Hours: 24 hours, 7 days a week
Languages: English, Spanish
Grace Help Line 24 Hour Christian service
1-800-982-8032