High Heels and Running Boards

Estelle had smugly started her story innocently enough to draw Rosa lee in slowly and she quickly accelerated like a machine gun rapidly spitting out the details that in one split second formed the eye of hurricane Rosa lee. Estelle paused to take a drink of her ice water and she eyed Rosa Lee with the look of someone who had accomplished something…contentment maybe. 

Jack had always thought Estelle looked like his ole busy hen, she had sharp pointed features and she would turn her head to the side as talked in her high pitched voice. He looked at his dusty siblings crouching underneath the porch eating blackberries covered in sugar that he had managed to grab from the kitchen table.  

Estelle once again begins repeating the story of “wild careless carrying on” in the middle of the day right in the middle of town no less. Shameless women, “hussies” loose wild women without any true worthwhile purpose in life other than to cause trouble. 

Rosa lee had heard enough. She was enraged but she would not give Estelle the satisfaction of knowing that she was jealous of Elmer.  She stood to her feet and smoothed her hands over her stomach as she steered Estelle off the porch. She smiled at Estelle and calmly invited her back to have fresh blackberry cobbler on Sunday pointing proudly to the five gallon bucket of blackberries that she had picked early that morning with her children.  She said that she was going to start canning jelly and she stepped inside the cool house waving goodbye to Estelle.

Estelle smiled smugly to Rosalee and said you are going to have another baby I see.  I don't know how you manage to feed the ones you have now Rosalee, as she stepped off the front porch into the bright afternoon sun.  She turned and headed down to her car quickly before she was confronted with the gang of wild children she knew was hiding somewhere just out of sight.  Rosa never left them alone or let them stray out of her sight.  Estelle could not look them in the eye now or anytime for that matter they seemed to look right into her soul. 

Alf and Jack felt the first chilling winds of hurricane Rosa Lee whirling under the porch. Jack watched Estelle going down the lane and he thought to himself that she even walks like his ole hen…pitching forward hands clasp over her stomach…head bobbing back and forth. 

At that moment Jack wished that his mother had punched her in her pointed little beak as he watched his mother bite her lower lip.  He felt her shame, her humiliation and he knew she would never admit to being pregnant to Estelle.  

He felt He knew all too well what was on the horizon.  It was going to be another night of screaming and shouting, hopefully that would be the extent of it since she was pregnant.  He had seen things escalate, he had been on the receiving end of the anger that only two people who could conjure when passion and jealousy meet full speed.  Rosa Lee sat on her bed and stared in the mirror looking at her reflection…a storm was brewing. Her eyes were intensely blue and her wavy black hair was pulled back into a bun. She let it down and brushed it out, it was so long and she knew how much Elmer liked it when she wore it down. She freshened up her clothes by spraying lemon water on her skirt and in her hair. She turned sideways and smoothed her stomach once again…gently patting the growing little baby. 

She went into the kitchen and started the fire in the cook stove; she needed to get supper started.  Singing a song she pulled together a delicious meal and filled the table with plates and bowls ready to fill from the stove when Elmer arrived from town.  She stuck her head out the door and hollered out to her boys to fill the watering trough and wash off.  She needed to hug her boys and she knew she needed to feed the youngest.  Rosalee had been nursing a baby or pregnant since she and Elmer got married in the field that afternoon.  She loved him deeply.  So deeply that she could not stand the idea of him cavorting around in town!  She knew by the way Estelle looked at him that she too was in love with her Elmer.  

 Elmer was the "go to man", he pulled teeth when it was necessary and no money to pay a dentist,  the local barber when no one had money to pay the real one in town, mortician to clean and dress the dead when money was not available to pay and he often built the very coffin they would be buried in the grave he would help dig, he help build homes, barns,  and he was one of few mechanics that could work on the automobiles,  but he supported his growing family by sharecropping.  He was quiet and kept to himself, his genius and passion was only matched by his temper.  His temper was a bomb of violence and rage that spilled over into his marriage and his ability to parent his family.  He was not a man of reason and he expected his family to do as he said and when they did not they were punished.  He would send them to the barn and he would beating them with a leather strap.  This was dangerous and he lost all control.  RosaLee knew this all to well but she loved him.  

The wind was swirling little dust funnels in the lane much like the whirling in her brain. She was furious! She was furious that Estelle took such delight in repeating the story to her, furious most of all at Elmer and she would get to the bottom of this…soon! The children were playing in the yard as she stood motionless in front of the door watching as the car rolled down the lane in a cloud of dust. She silently counted under her breath to steady herself and to maintain her composure until the car stopped. She stepped onto the porch and slammed the screen door as Elmer strolled up to the front of the house. She stood tall and proud as the hurricane was in full gale force winds…Jack grabbed Alf, Fred, and Lloyd and they ran under the porch. They knew what was going to happen and they knew to stay out of the way. Elmer continued to walk to the house without even acknowledging the slamming door.

“Elmer tell me about your day in Shingletown yesterday” Rosa Lee demanded in a tone that was meant to draw a tired man into an argument.  Elmer stopped dead in his tracks and said "what  are you talking about now woman?"  "It is a very simple thing Elmer; tell me about your day in Shingletown riding around in your new car (a 1930 Chrysler with running boards)" Rosa said with sarcasm dripping onto the ground.Elmer replied sheepishly "I don't know what you are talking about…what's for supper?"  Rosa Lee was not backing down she began to walk to the car she turned and said "just how many girls were riding on the running board through town?" 

Once again Elmer replied this time loudly "I don’t know what you are talking about Rosa Lee" and he spit on the ground. 

She walked over to the car and was prepared to climb on the running board and reenact the shameful ride when something caught her eye in the running board. Stuck in the crack was a heel from a high heeled shoe…the eye of the hurricane came ashore and the rage was unleashed. She came undone. She began to scream and ran to Elmer shaking the evidence in his face. “I am going to Shingletown and I am going to match this heel to the hussy with a broken shoe and I will beat her ass!”  She screamed and began to swing wildly smacking him in the face. Elmer was not the kind of man to take that from anyone including his pregnant wife and without a second thought he backhanded Rosa Lee knocking her on her ass in the dusty road.  He stepped over her and continued on to the front porch.  Sitting down and picking up the glass of water that Rosalee had waiting on him everyday.  

Tears blinded her vision as she sat there staring at the shiny black patent leather heel; so it was true.  Estelle was telling the truth.  She looked down at the dusty hard packed dirt and traced her name in the dust.  She looked over her shoulder at the man she loved, the father of her children, the man that she had held in her arms that very morning before he climbed out of bed.  He was sitting there on the porch looking straight ahead into the horizon, she turned to follow his gaze, he was looking at his dog running from the barn. She knew this conversation was closed it was over...maybe for him but she would have her say. 
  

Jack and his brothers quietly left their hiding place under the porch and went inside to wash up for supper. She heard the screen door shutting quietly behind her husband as she picked her self up and once again smoothed her dress over her belly tucking the broken heel in her pocket.