A Demise
Grandpa and I will leave in two days. I pine to go, but a speck inside me is unsettled about One-Thumb’s warning.
When I get to Nellie Finch’s place to fetch the newspaper, Jess Willoughby sits on her porch, drinking cider and eating vinegar candy. He jumps up when he sees me, but for once his smart-tongued mouth stays closed.
Nellie offers me a glass of cider.
“I don’t have time,” I say.
“I don’t reckon the Kents has heard your woeful news,” she says to Jess. She turns to me. “Thaddeus Willoughby done passed on ta Glory yesterday.” She bows her head and lays her hand across her plentiful bosom for a scant second before adding, “Died right at the supper table, eatin’ catfish stew.”
Jess looks down at his dirty bare feet and says nothing.
“I’ll git yer newspaper,” Nellie says, stepping inside.
“My condolences,” I tell Jess to fill the quiet caused by Nellie’s absence.
He nods and runs his big toe along a porch plank.
“Died just yesterday, did he?”
“Yup.”
Silence drops on that porch like a pot lid, and my own breathing sounds loud in my ears. My mind struggles for a proper word to utter, but Jess speaks first.
“You and your grandpap ain’t still goin’ ta that battleground, is ya?”
“Leaving Monday.”
He shakes his head. “Ought not. Ain’t wise ta dis-heed a dyin’ man’s warning. Sometimes they knows things.”
“He wasn’t dying when he gave the warning. I’m not scared.” It was just a tinyfib. “And we’re going.”
He digs into his grubby pants pocket and pulls out a tiny piece of green. “You Kents is a mulish bunch. Take this here four-leaf clover with ya. Cain’t hurt.”
I put my hands behind my back.
Nellie puffs through the door waving our folded newspaper.
Before I can reach for the paper, Jess snatches it. Quick as an eyeblink, he tucks that leaf between the paper’s folds and hands it to me. He pulls foot down the trail to his house before I get a word out.
“Tell your granny I’ll bring them pies by tomorrey,” Nellie calls to the empty space where there’s no longer a trace of Jess.
“They’s fixin’ ta hold a buryin’ on Monday,” she tells me.
“Grandpa and I leave at first light come Monday,” I say. Surely Nellie knows a Kent would never turn out for a Willoughby, no matter the occasion. Though Grandpa might dance a jig when I tell him.
I head home, and as soon as I’m out of Nellie’s sight, I open the paper and shake that dirty leaf to the path. I grind it under my heel for good measure, wishing Jess could see me do it. I want him to know I’m not fixing to tote it anywhere.
On my way home, I recall Mama’s words about heeding messages from dead folks. But she didn’t mean this. Not One-Thumb Willoughby. I didn’t want to listen to him when he was alive.
