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"I hope he writes back and tells me his side of it."
"He won’t," Jimmy insisted. "And even if he does, it'll be all lies."
"Jimmy, you can't go on hating him like this. He's still your real father, even if he's not mine."
"I don't want to ever think of him as my father. He's dead with my mother," he declared, his eyes burning with such fury, it brought an ache to my heart. I couldn't keep the tears trapped under my eyelids; they burned so.
"No sense in crying about it, Dawn. There's nothing we can do to change things. I'm going down to Georgia and maybe live with Momma's side of the family, if they'll have me. I don't mind working hard, as long as it's for my own family."
"I wish I was going with you, Jimmy. I still feel those people are more my family than these people, even though I never met them."
"Well, you can't. If you came with me, we'd be hunted down for sure."
"I know." My tears kept coming. Now that Jimmy was here, I couldn't help myself.
"I'm sorry you're not happier, Dawn," he said and slowly brought his arm up and around my shoulders. "Whenever I lay awake thinking about how terrible all this was, I would cheer myself a bit by thinking you were safe and comfortable in a new and richer life. I thought you deserved it and maybe it was good it all happened. I didn't mind what happened to me as long as it meant you would have better things and be with better people"
"Oh, Jimmy, I could never be happier if you were unhappy, and just thinking about poor little Fern in a strange place—"
"She's little enough to forget and start new," he said, his eyes dark with a wisdom beyond his years, a wisdom forced upon him by hard times. He was older in mind and body. Hard, cruel times had dragged him out of childhood.
He sat inches from me, his arm still around my shoulders, his face so close I could feel his breath on my cheeks. It made me dizzy, confused. I was trapped on a runaway merry-go-round of emotions. Jimmy, whom I had thought to be my brother, was now just a boy who cared for me, and Philip, a boy who had cared for me, was now my brother. Their kisses, their smiles, and the way they touched and held me had to have different meaning.
Just a little while ago I would have felt strange and guilty about the feelings that passed through me when Jimmy touched me. Now, when the tingle traveled up and down my spine and made me shudder pleasantly, I didn't know what to do, what to say. He cupped my face between his palms and tenderly kissed away my tears. I felt so warm all over. Before this I would have forced that warmth to stop its journey to my heart. Now it rushed over the highways along my skin and curled up comfortably inside my breast.
His face remained close to mine, his serious eyes so delving, worried, and intense. A lump came in my throat as I wondered where the boy was I used to know. Where was that brother, and who was this young man staring so long into my eyes? Greater than any pain or ache or hurt I had ever felt before or since was the pain caused me by the suffering I saw in his tortured eyes.
We heard Philip's footsteps on the cement stairway, and Jimmy pulled his arm off my shoulders and continued to take off his sneakers and socks.
"Hi," Philip said, coming in. "Sorry the food's not hot, but I wanted to rush in and out of the kitchen b
efore someone caught me and wondered what I was doing."
"Food's food. I don't care whether it's hot or cold at this point," Jimmy said, taking the covered dish from Philip. "Thanks."
"I brought you some of my clothes—should fit—and this towel and blanket."
"Get the wet clothes off and dry yourself before you eat, Jimmy," I advised. He went into the bathroom and slipped out of his pants and underwear, wiped himself down, and returned in Philip's clothes. The shirt was a little big and the pants too long, but he rolled up the cuffs. Philip and I stood by and watched him gobble the food, scooping one mouthful into his mouth before he had swallowed the one he already had.
"Sorry, but I'm starving," he said. "I didn't have any money to stop to eat."
"That's all right. Look, I'm going to have to get back to the hotel. Grandmother saw me go in before and probably will be keeping an eye out for me to be sure I'm mixing with the others."
"In the morning I'll put aside some food as I serve breakfast, and later, as soon as I can get loose, I'll bring it down to you, Jimmy."
"Thanks."
"Well," Philip said, standing and looking at us. "See you later. Have a good night."
We watched him go.
"I don't understand," Jimmy said almost as soon as Philip disappeared up the cement stairway. "Why was he worried about his grandmother seeing him in the hotel?"
I told him what Clara Sue had told Grandmother Cutler and what she had forbidden. Jimmy lay back in the bed, his hands behind his head, listening. His eyes grew small and the tight smile around his lips became a serious and intense look.
"Of course, I was worried about all that, too," he said. "I was wondering what it was going to be like for you. You were starting to get stuck on him in school." I was going to tell him how it was harder for Philip to adjust, how he still wished I could be his girlfriend, but I thought it might make Jimmy upset and cause more problems. "It hasn't been easy," I simply said. Jimmy nodded.
"Here you have to work at thinking about him as your brother, and here I was your brother and you got to work at forgetting I was," he said.
