Planting a Friendship

After working all night in the mansion’s nursing home Kitty was too tired to take a bath and too wound up to sleep. From the kitchen she grabbed a cup of coffee and went to the back porch that overlooked downtown Des Moines.  She kicked off her nursing shoes and plopped on a wicker chair. Her soiled nursing uniform, once starched and ironed to perfection was now wrinkled and damp from perspiration.   As she unhooked her nylons from her garter belt she wondered how much longer she could work without hiring a fulltime employee. 

           Resting her weary feet on a threadbare foot cushion she leaned back and lit a Camel cigarette. She inhaled deeply, relishing the taste of nicotine that relaxed her weary body and cleared her mind of dirty diapers and wet bed sheets. In the sunshine a spider plant and an asparagus fern dangled from the ceiling. She hung them on the south side just for that reason. As she sipped on the coffee she watched in amazement as a horse drawn wagon came through the alley spewing dust. When it parked in her driveway she stood bare foot beside the screen door. It was a young Negro couple with a bushy plant placed between them. They appeared to be their mid to late twenties, and their wagon was stacked high with various household commodities. She went outside to have a closer look and headed straight to the lime green John Deer wagon with red painted wheels. 

           As Kitty approached the strangers sitting on a yellow seat she stopped beside their tricolored work horse with white and black spots.   She was at least fifteen hands high, and by the looks of her lower extremities her powerful legs and strong thighs could plow through a rocky field and easily pull a wagon full of heavy grain. “What’s her name?” Kitty asked.

           “Lady”, the guy said, wearing a straw hat stained with sweat. “Her name is Lady.”

           Kitty patted her neck, thinking she was a fine looking draft horse with a leather girth and tug around her well-formed belly.

           The guy watched her with interest. “I see you got a love for horses. I got her from a poor farmer with four kids. They didn’t want to give her up, but the parents needed the money to feed their children.”

           Kitty understood the hardships of the Great Depression and walked around the wagon overflowing with a variety of household items. “What’s for sale?” 

           “Almost everything but my fiddle.”

           She peeked through a hole in the back of the wagon. There was a ten-gallon milk can, a wooden barrel, some fresh vegetables and cage of baby chicks. “How much is the rocker?” Kitty asked.

           The stocky man stepped down from the top mounting-step and jumped to the ground on the muddy soles of his scuffed boots laced with tattered shoestrings. His shirt tail was tucked neatly inside his frayed leather belt buckled around the waistline of his patched work pants. Smiling he held out his large hand with short fat fingers. “I’m Joshua but you can call me Jonah. Everyone does.”

           He tightly gripped her hand with his callused one that felt like sandpaper. “My wife has baked pies under the seat.”

           Kitty went to the front of the wagon and smiled up at her.  She wore a large straw hat and a dress made from a flowered gunny sack. “Is that plant for sale?” Kitty asked.

           Pearl shook her head and grinned, showing the gap between her two front teeth.   “Got plans to use it for practical purposes, but I guess I could think about it for a bit.”

           “What kind of pies do you have?” Kitty asked, her mouth watering at the thought of eating pie.

           “Fruit pies, mam. She handed over one oozing with blueberries that had bubbled up through the holes in the crust, generously sprinkled with sugar. “For you it’s thirty-five cents.”

           Kitty looked at Jonah. “Can you set the rocker on the ground? I’d like to have a better look at it.”

           “The price is five dollars.”

           Kitty looked it over. The oak wood had a light varnish that brought out the natural grain, and on the headboard was the carved head of a horse. “Would you take three?” She asked, worried about her tight budget.

           He scratched his well-trimmed beard. “Can’t take less than four.”

           “How about three and a half?”

           “I’ll settle for three seventy-five.”

           “Will you carry it inside for me? I want to give it to someone.”    

           In the parlor her mother’s grandfather clock bonged six times. 

           “Wow!” Pearl said, looking up at the chandelier hanging from the second floor ceiling. “I ain’t never seen a living room with no ceiling.”

           Kitty’s mother came limping in on stocking feet with her cane. Her wrinkled dress was stained with urine and her white hair was a tangled mess. “What the hell’s all the racket about? If that damn chair is for me I don’t want it. I’m not an invalid, and I have my own furniture.” 

           “Mumsie, this is Jonah and Pearl. We’re taking the rocker up to Ralph.”

           “Oh, that old coot! He needs a coffin more than he needs a chair!”

            “That’s enough!” Kitty scolded, embarrassed by her mother’s drastic mood swings that could be a sign of her mental decline.

           Pearl held out her hand to Julia and she shook it.

           “Julia, it’s nice to meet you,” Pearl smiled, wanting to make a connection with someone that reminded her of how frisky her grandfather was before died in his sleep. “Kitty bought one of my berry pies and it’s in the kitchen if you’d like a piece.”

           Julia’s face lit up. She liked Pearl already, even if her skin was a different color.  “Is it homemade? Kitty couldn’t bake a pie if I rolled out the dough for her.”

           “Now, Mumsie, I may not be the best cook, but I’m trying with your help. You should see that lavender plant that Pearl found today. I wanted to buy it, but she wants to keep it.”

           Pearl spoke. “It’s not an inside plant. It’s an herb plant used for making bars of soap or adding it to a batch of homemade soup. It will do much better planted outside in the sunshine.”

           “Well, Kitty never was good at gardening or cooking,” Julia said, “but I wouldn’t trade her in. When I get too old to wipe my own ass she’ll have to do it,” she said, cackling all the way to the kitchen. 

           “Never mind, Mumsie,” Kitty said, leading them up the winding staircase to the second floor.  “She loves to get my goat.”

           In Ralph’s private room he was reading a newspaper in bed. Wearing reading glasses he looked over the top edge of the paper curled down at one corner. “You got that rocker for me?” He said, giving them a toothless smile. Put it in front of the window overlooking the hillside.” 

           As Jonah set the rocker in its place Kitty helped Ralph to his feet. While she walked him slowly across the room a light breeze blew in the sweet scent of lilacs that erased the smell of old age and unquestionably brought joy to an elderly man with no hope of ever leaving.      

           Back downstairs Kitty offered the couple a glass of lemon-aide and they all sat down at the kitchen table. 

           Kitty spoke first. “Are you from these parts? Do you have children?”

           “No, mam,” Jonah said. “Pearl miscarried so we ain’t got no babies.”

           She could almost feel the loss in their dark soulful eyes.

           Jonah hung his head. “We got a camp down yonder along the Des Moines River.”

           Kitty contemplated hiring them, but she had her reservations, not because of their skin color, but for financial reasons.   “I can’t afford to pay you wages but I could feed you and give you room and board above the carriage house if you’re willing to work for me. There’s no running water in the one-bedroom apartment, but it does have some tattered furniture and an old wood stove that will heat the place. It’s a filthy mess so you’ll have to clean it. Outside you’ll find chopped wood and an old well with a water pump.   There’s also an outhouse hidden between pine bushes in the far corner of the backyard.  You’ll also find an old wash tub in the shed beside the well.    

           They both looked at Kitty with wide, unbelieving eyes, as if she were reading a fairytale to youngsters.  

           “I need a handyman and someone to cook and clean. I’m very particular. Everything has to be spotless and in order.  If you’re staying I want the laundry done today. All my uniforms need washed and there’s a pile of dirty sheets and diapers on the basement floor that I shoved down the laundry shoot.

           Kitty turned her attention to Jonah. “After you put the horse and wagon in the carriage house you’ll find a bag of oats stashed inside the stall. I found it after I moved in. Now don’t think I’m going to feed the horse once the grain is gone. That will be your responsibility. It seems to me that if you keep selling commodities out of your wagon that you should be able to provide for the extras.”

           He nodded with understanding. “Where can I put the hen and her baby chicks?”

           Fresh eggs and chicken stew took her back to her childhood on the farm. “There’s some chicken wire in the carriage house.   If I remember right there’s even a little chicken feed in a bag somewhere.”            

           “What can I do with the ten gallon milk can? It’s half full and will spoil by morning.”

           “You can fill my water pitchers with the milk and set them in the fridge.”

           “We have eggs too,” Pearl said.

           Kitty’s mind went to memories of her mother’s custard pie and for a moment she was back to her childhood gathering eggs in the hen house. “Tomorrow morning you can scrabble up some eggs for breakfast.”

           “I’m an early riser,” Pearl said. “What time do the residents eat?”

           “Breakfast at seven, lunch at noon, and supper at five. As you know foods are rationed during this Great Depression, so be frugal with commodities.”

           “Won’t waste no food. Those apple trees in your yard will be perfect for making desserts.”

           They talked for a while longer. Each had something interesting to say about the other, and Kitty told them about her bootlegging days during the roaring twenties. 

           “Jonah occasionally has a lil moonshine,” Pearl confessed, afraid that Kitty might frown on Jonah’s love of homebrew.          

           Kitty smiled, grateful for Pearl’s honesty. “Well, on occasion I like a little nip of Templeton Rye, but I never drink on the job,” she told them, looking directly at Jonah. “So I expect the same from you.” 

            Jonah grinned, relieved that Kitty wasn’t a teetotaler, or a closet drinker.

           “Just don’t take up bootlegging in town. You’ll get yourself arrested.”

           “No mam, ain’t never gonna jeopardize my freedom over no illegal doings, but I want you to know Pearl sometimes smokes a corncob pipe,” Jonah admitted, fearing that Kitty might judge Pearl for her hillbilly ways. “She learned that bad habit from her grandmother.”   

           Herself being a heavy smoker and an occasional drinker, Kitty respected their honesty and told them so. “The only thing I ask is that you don’t drink while you’re working, or smoke in the mansion.”

           They both agreed and before the sun went down everything was unloaded from their wagon and put away in the carriage house. The fridge was overflowing with pitchers of milk and the horse was bedded down. Before she did her rounds Kitty was overwhelmed with excitement. Now that she had hired help she could devote more time to nursing and even sneak in some needed shuteye. 

           When she looked in on Mumsie she was snoring in bed with an open book lying across her chest.  Kitty picked it up and read the cover. It was “The Story of My Life” by Helen Heller. As she skimmed through the pages and glanced at pictures she felt grateful that she was in good health with no underlying conditions. Smiling, she laid the book face-down on Mumsie’s bedside table. Before Kitty shut off the lamp she studied her mother’s weathered face road-mapped in deep wrinkles caused by a lifetime of working in the fields. Now those farming days were gone, and she was forced to live the life of a city slicker.      

           Upstairs in Ralph’s room Kitty found him asleep in his rocker and helped him get ready for bed. In the next room Francina was snoring loudly in bed, but when Kitty changed her diaper she woke up confused. “Where am I?” She asked.

           “You’re in a nursing home.”

           “Bullshit! I need to go home. I got cows to milk and pigs to feed.”

           “Not tonight. They’ve already been milked and fed,” Kitty said, playing into Francina’s nightly hallucinations caused by her long term memory loss. “You can milk and feed them in the morning.”

           “I always have a nightcap before retiring. If you’ll fetch me a bottle of moonshine hidden behind the barn I’ll give you some.”

           “Francina, we’re not at your farm. We’re in town.”

           She threw off the covers and sat on the side of her bed. “Where’s my husband? He needs me at home. I have to feed him supper and prepare his bath. He’ll raise hell if I don’t.”

           “He’s working,” Kitty said, not wanting to upset her more by telling her that he died on their farm years ago.”

           “Working late? Bullshit! He’s probably bedding down some farmer’s wife in our barn. I caught him once. Can you imagine that?  He was riding her like a bull. No telling who he’s got under the hay this time. He always did have a roving eye and a stiff wiener.”

           “Francina, you shouldn’t talk like that. He passed away some time ago.”

           “He died? It’s just as well. He was a mean old fart. I can’t tell you how many times he beat me, but boy was it fun making up! Got several kids to prove it and too many grandchildren to count.”

           As Kitty gently placed Francina’s ankles on a pillow to relieve the swelling caused by her weak heart, Kitty felt great sorrow that Francina was suffering from a memory loss that had no cure.   

           Back downstairs Kitty used the bathroom and got ready for bed. She hadn’t slept in over twenty-four hours and she couldn’t wait to hit the sack. Just as she was turning out the kitchen light there was a knock at the door. It was Pearl standing under the porch light. She was holding a small Boston fern and puffing on her corncob pipe. “Jonah found it growing wild along the alleyway. I thought it would make a nice house plant. It needs a cool location and indirect sunlight. Keep it well watered and don’t let it dry out.”   

           “I’ll buy it for a quarter,” Kitty said, throwing out a bid and opening the door to let her in.   “It will look great in the parlor between the grand piano and the grandfather clock.”

           “A fifty-cent piece sounds better,” Pearl replied, going into the mansion, thinking she’d use the money on a bag of tobacco. 

           “I’ll give you thirty cents for the plant and a nickel for the coffee tin you planted it in,” Kitty replied, looking forward to having a friend with similar interests. “Come on in and I’ll fix you a drink. I was just getting ready for a smoke and a nightcap,” she lied, forgetting about going to bed.