Jeopardy

“C’mon Hon, show’s about to start.” Milton knew his wife hated missing a second of Jeopardy, she enjoyed the opening spiels, she rooted for the contestant she related to the best. Given the choice between a local from Pensacola or a black woman from Alaska, she’d choose the black woman every time.

Milton’s own cousin had been on the game show eight years past and did Velma root for him? No. She cheered for the elderly black woman in the floral mu mu.

He had said, “Really Vel? Have you ever seen a parade float win?”

Velma had scowled and growled. “Really Milt? You gonna dis my sista like that? Your cousin ain’t nothin but a broke ass loser just like his cousin.”

Milton had ignored the jab, lest she get violent. The game had a way of riling her up.

Now, eight years later…

Velma bustled into the living room, her geometric patterned caftan flowing behind her like a witch’s cloak…or a mu mu. Her dark hair was intrically braided, piled on her head, and steaked with grey. It seemed every night he looked over at his wife in the over-stuffed rocker on the other side of the end table next to him, her hair practically greyed before his imaginative eyes. She put his supper down on his tv table and another on hers.

“Daaa de da-da da de da, DA de da da, DA de da da da da DA.”

Milton was relieved she’d made it in time. “That was close Milt.” She said it with menace, as if it would have been his fault dinner was late.

He sighed.

“What was that?”

“Nothing Hon.”

“Shh. Alec’s talking.”

The middle-aged black woman ended up coming in second. A young snappily dressed man with a man-bun was the winner by a mile.

“He was good. May go on to the championships,” said Milton.

“Oh, shut up! You goin’ all light in the tootsies now? Might as well…ain’t got it up fer a decade.”

Milton chose not to fuel her fire. He got up and went to the kitchen, grabbed a beer from the fridge, and went out to the back porch where it was peaceful and calm and dark, the warm muggy air enveloped him like welcoming arms, the crickets and tree frogs chirruped, their sweet high voices punctuated by the deep croaky belches of the swamp toads. The warm air smelled of rotting shore plants and cottonwood and diesel.

Gradually, the familiar breeze whispering through the mangroves made his clenched fists relax, he pictured the sage-colored beards of Spanish moss wafting like moth wings in lace. He truly loved the swamp. Even the gentle soft splooshing of the gators calmed his soul. Velma was getting worse. He supposed it was his fault for acting the mute, all it had done over the years was fuel her inner rage, the anguish and fear in her had warped her into the creature she was now. Twenty years earlier, he had listened to her unburden the heavy weight of her despair, and gradually her deep depression had morphed into bitter anger. He pitied her, the horrors she’d endured as a child, and he pitied her now for it seemed they’d never really left her at all but instead festered deep in her subconscious.

Forty years earlier…

“Velma Jean Mayweather! You git yer ass in here this instant!” Her uncle calling her in from the garden where she’d been picking beans for the supper she was to cook.

“Coming Unk-Bo!”

“You lollygaggin’ agin’. I swear ya got beans fer brains. Good fer nothin’…”

Never mind that she did all the housework and cooking and garden tending, she thought, ever since Auntie-Daisy fell ill. And then there was all the ‘comforting’ she gave her uncle every night when Daisy’s rattling, watery breaths grew deep and steady.

“Beans again? Cain’t you grow anything else? Tomahtas is good…”

Velma sighed. “Tomatoes ripen in August Unky, lessen you want green ones.”

“You getting uppity wi me?”

“No Unk---” ‘Whomp!’ The empty bottle struck the back of her head. Right in the same spot he’d whacked her with his old bible the day before. That one had knocked her out for an hour or so.

She remained quiet the rest of the evening, serving her uncle his supper quickly, lest he start up again about the beans. If the man crawled out of the bottle long enough to hold down a job, maybe they’d have some meat someday that wasn’t possum or coon or squirrel. She kept the thoughts to herself, lest she add to the fat red welts on her backside. And she thought of her parents again. This had been their home together and up until she’d turned ten, she’d been a happy child. Bitter tears blurred her vision as she went back out to the garden to finish the weeding.

She felt close to her mother there, imagined her hands plowing the same dark soft earth her mother’s had. Inevitably, the anger came again, not in a sneaky little trickle but a full force clap of thunder. They’d left her. With him. The note said they’d be off traveling for a spell while still young enough to appreciate the fine things in life. Wasn’t she fine? Wasn’t she worth coming home to? The zucchini patch in the far corner was dead. Brown curled up leaves, shriveled tendrils, and what vegetables were left on the vines were mottled with ugly brown spots and mushing away into the dirt. She used to like zucchini just fine until for a month that’s all she’d had to eat, God forbid it all go to waste. She pulled out all the plants, rotten roots and all and tossed it into her compost pile.

She crept back into the house to her room, peaking into the tv room cautiously. He was passed out. Good. Stay that way and leave me alone tonight. She peeked in on her aunt, the covers were pulled up to her ears and she was lying on her side. Better that way for her tired lungs, she didn’t sound so horrible.

The next morning her uncle’s catfish rod was gone from its place by the back door. The day was starting off well. She made porridge with a little sugar and cinnamon like her aunt liked it and brought a bowl to the bedroom. The old woman was still lying on her side and sleeping so peacefully that Velma put the bowl down on the nightstand quietly and tip-toed back out. An hour into her chores, she checked on her aunt again, she’d need help getting up to the bathroom.

She was as still as she’d been before. A sudden pounding in her temples announced alarm. She went to her Aunt Daisy and gently pulled the blanket down, exposing her face. It was ashy grey, and the eyes were wide open and protruding horribly! She gasped and stepped back, confused and panicky and drenching in sweat. Her feet tangled in the sheet pooled on the floor, pulling it down. The contrast of the too pale skin with the violent bruises around her neck was the stuff of nightmares.

“Mew.”

‘Hm. Fox? Coypu? Cat? Ain’t seen no cats out here…”

“Mee-ew”

‘Sure sounds like a cat.’

Cats didn’t survive out here so close to the swamp. They were low on the food chain.

Milton got up and turned on the porch light. The fifteen-foot halo of warm yellow light illuminated nothing out of the ordinary. Fireflies lilted in the soft breeze like wandering stars, the nearby chirruping halted, and then picked up after the little creatures grew accustomed to the light.

Then…from under a patch of flowering milkweed, two spots glowed luminescent yellow- eyes. “Mew.”

“Kitty? Come on now…” Milton, knees popping, got low to the ground and crept towards the bush. The eyes went dark, but he didn’t hear any fleeing noises- no rustles, no dead leaves rustling. He froze like a hunched over oak and held his breath. Then came the rustling of dry leaves…it was gone.

The next morning Milton put out a small bowl of cream, next to the porch, across from the milkweed patch.

“Whatchoo doing out there? Is that our cream? Can’t get us a nice steak fo suppa but can leave cream out for the beasties. I swear my husband is losin his mind!”

Milt remained silent. The contestant headed for the Tournament of Champions was on again tonight and he hoped a black woman would kick his ass. Velma was sweet when she got her way.

That evening at 7’oclock, Velma had supper on the fiberglass topped tv tables with the brass tube legs. She’d even brought sweet teas and watched the end of the nightly news. Milton was tense as the game show’s theme music played. There was the super smart gay man, he didn’t doubt his wife’s perception. No black women on tonight. The contestant Velma chose this evening was a swarthy Indian man about her age of fifty-five.

He was very good.

But the man-bun guy was smarter.

“They rig this shit! Did you see that?! They must change the questions…there’s no way…” Velma was off on a tangent.

He stayed silent. Damn. She needed a winner soon or he would be fearing for his life. His tongue was tied by non-confrontism. But he couldn’t hold back the damn forever, the storm was coming, he could only take so much.

After the show he went back outside with a can of Coors. He’d turned the porch light on and was happily surprised to see the little dish of cream empty. Any critter could have lapped it up, but he was certain it had been the cat.

“Mew.”

Milton perked up but forced himself to be calm and slow moving. The cheery yellow light caught the eyes of the cat under the milkweeds.

“C’mon puss puss. Kitty-kitty-kitty.” Milton’s naturally soft deep voice was hypnotic. The cat came out.

It was pure black and quite small. ‘Just a kitten,’ thought Milton. ‘Awe.’

He had re-filled the bowl and from his pocket pulled out a chunk of fried catfish that had been on his plate.

“Mew.” The small kitty came closer. Milton could have reached out and grabbed the cat but that would have been too scary for the poor thing.

He cooed, “you poor thing, you must be lost. I’ll help you…come here, come here…” He continued the cooing in his soft deep voice, a voice that could calm rattlesnakes…

His mind flashbacked to 1922…

The gangly black boy of twelve ran off into the corn field with the dead puppy in his arms. He’d been late to make his Pop’s dinner. He’d been making a bed for the puppy and a collar and leash from rope. His father had thrown his boot at it, a boot heavy with coal miners ash, heavy enough to bash in the pups skull. He cried as he dug the grave- silent tears, alternating with vows of never following his dad’s footprints.

The kittenish cat crept out from the shadows and crouched on her belly. Milton held out the fish for a few seconds and then let it go. The cat came forward, sniffed a few seconds, then scarfed it down barely chewing. Milton still sat on his haunches like a statue, giving the cat time.

“Milton you dammed fool! Quit givin that cat all our food!”

At the harsh cawing of his wife’s voice the little spooked cat took off like a blur through the milkweeds.

“Ah Velma. Ya scared it off, probly for good…”

“Good! What the heck’s a cat doin out here anyways? Ain’t natural. Be gator poop shortly I reckon.”

Milton sighed. There was something about that cat though. He didn’t think it could be killed so easily. As he watched the tall weeds he caught two spots glimmering- ‘cat’s eyes! Reflectin light.’

When the screen door slammed shut behind him the spots disappeared.

Milton rolled backward and sat on his butt. He recalled the rest of his wife’s childhood story…

…the next day in the garden, little Velma tossed the old zucchini vines into the compost bin and finished the weeding while contemplating what to plant in the empty patch now. Not beans. Tomatoes. She had some seeds dried out from the last tomatoes they’d had. The old plants had withered and died. She’d not understood why, they’d been healthy and green and promising a fresh crop the next season. Then she’d gotten up after midnight one night to use the outhouse. She’d nearly run into her uncle in the dark. That woulda been the end of her. Her eyes adjusted and she spied him swaying there at the edge of the garden, trying to balance while relieving himself…into the tomato patch.

Milton had found that part of the story somewhat funny but wisely kept that to himself, chewing the insides of his cheeks to keep from grinning.

Young Velma had figured that if she planted the seeds farther into the garden where the zucchini had been, they wouldn’t get peed on. With the seeds in her apron pocket, trowel in one hand, and garden fork in the other, she knelt on the earth by the back of the yard and began digging a trench. She stopped when she spied a spot of blue under the butternut leaf to her right. She raked at it and pulled it up. It was blue fabric- pale blue denim. She used the trowel to dig deeper. The faint smell of rot puffed out of the hole, and she shuddered; she’d smelled plenty of dead things before…but none that wore a blue…dress? She saw the pattern on it was small pink roses. Her mother’s. She had stood, not wanting to see more. She knew what the truth was.

When the Sherriff left with her belligerent uncle in handcuffs, she’d gone with a nice young woman to a home full of orphans like her. Her backyard was filled with men digging up all her plants. It was no longer a backyard but a cemetery.

Milton understood why his wife was the way she was. But after years of coping, she was unravelling now and all he could do was stand by her side and love her, as hard as she was making that possible.

He sighed deeply. Then smiled as the little black kitty came to him. As if the cat had been reading his reveries, it nudged its head under his chin and purred cat language that said, ‘hold on, be strong, there’s a lot of goodness in the world.’ The cat allowed him to pick it up. He cradled it in his thick arms and stroked its silky fur, his big, gnarled hand covering its entire body.

That evening, Velma prepared their supper plates of fried chicken and mashed tators with gravy, a special dinner to mark the beginning of The Tournament of Champions. Velma came in and placed the plates on the tv tables and froze when she saw the bowl of milk next to her husband’s chair. Her mouth opened but Milton cut off her words, “Show’s starting. Sit down.”

The beginning theme music played, and Velma must have decided the show was more important. She’d deal with the cat later. It silently crept up to the bowl and lapped up the milk in between bites of chicken that Milton was discreetly offering it. The cat was gone when the show was over. Milton looked over at Velma who was staring open-mouthed at him.

He said, “what?”

“You answered at least half the questions…correctly.”

“Just got lucky.” He got up and went outside before she could spoil the mood. Her eyes followed him out, her jaw hung ajar. “Yer catchin flies darlin.” The jaw snapped shut.

The next night, she glared at the cat beside Milton’s chair but said nothing. It was Saturday, Jeopardy would be a re-run. They decided to watch an old Bing Crosby comedy. Velma giggled throughout the film and didn’t seem to notice the cat had laid down at her feet.

Milton named the cat Stephanie. Velma continued calling her Gator Poop. On a Sunday night a week later, Stephanie Gator Poop jumped up into Velma’s lap. Milton stood, ready to catch Steph, should his wife fling it into the air. Velma gasped. Then she placed a hand on the cat and smiled as she began to purr. Milton sat back down, smiling himself, but not daring to ruin the mood.

The next evening was Monday and though just a ‘regular’ Jeopardy night, Velma made the special dinner again. She placed the bowl of milk between the two chairs and then a small plate of chicken cut up into little pieces…with gravy. After the evening news was over and the trays cleared, the cat again jumped into Velma’s lap.

After the intro-babble commenced, Alec began the first answer, “a line of elephants.”

Velma said, “what is a parade?”

“St.Mary’s Bells dame.”

“Who is Ingrid Bergman?”

“T I on the table.”

“What is titanium?”

Velma was clapping her hands and smiling. Steph gazed at Milton and was smiling too. Velma could answer no wrong, she was on a roll. That night, Velma joined Milton out on the porch. As the cat went off to do its cat business, Velma said, “that…Stephanie is one smart cat.”