When she begins to cry, I tell her about what I saw at the creek, but I don’t tell about Gandee, so maybe my pinky swear wasn’t broken. Coco’s mad at me. I can tell. She stares at me hard.
Mama tells me what a good girl I am, then she calls the sheriff’s office, though my granny begs her not to. No telling what the law would do to a colored man, once they get hold of him, but Mama doesn’t care. She calls anyway, but the sheriff says she needs to call back the next day. He couldn’t do anything until Lydia’s been missing for twenty-four hours.
Uncle Root starts calling Black folks in town, asking them about my sister. He tells them she’s very light-skinned with long hair in two braids to her waist. She’s tall, too, but she hasn’t yet filled out, so she looks her age, which is fifteen going on sixteen. And have they seen her with Tony Crawford?
I’m not hungry at breakfast, and neither is Coco. We sit on the front steps of the porch and that’s how we see Lydia in the passenger side of Tony’s truck. Lydia opens the door, but Tony must have said something, because she stops before she kisses him on the mouth. That’s what Mama sees when she comes out of the house, before Tony drives away. She yells down from the porch to Lydia. She tells her she better not move. My big sister stands, shaking, and Mama runs out to the field, through the peach trees. She comes back with a switch, and Lydia starts screaming.
The screen door slams, and my granny walks onto the porch.
“Wait a minute now, Belle. Let the child explain.”
“What explanation? That nigger kissed her!”
The screen door slams again. This time, it’s Uncle Root.
“Maybelle Lee. Don’t do this, beloved. Please don’t. This isn’t like you.”
But Mama starts stripping the leaves off the switch, and my big sister is screaming even louder.
“Cry all you want! Go ahead! But you’re going to get this whipping. And let me tell you why. You’re getting whipped because you scared the shit out of me. I was wondering where you were and whether you were alive or dead! My fifteen-year-old child . . .” Mama shakes the branch in my sister’s direction. Tears leak from her eyes, but she doesn’t wipe them away. “。 . . and your granny didn’t even want me to call the police! Said if I did, Tony Crawford might end up killed, because that’s the way they do Black men in this town. But when I called the sheriff anyway, he told me fast girls run away all the time. That’s what he called you! A fast girl! He didn’t even care about you, because you were somebody’s Black daughter. So I started to pray. That’s all I could do, Lydia. Pray that nigger wouldn’t kill my child. That she would come back home.”
I’m standing in front of the porch and crying, and Coco’s on the step behind me. She hugs me around the shoulders. Mama drops the peach branch and falls to the ground. She starts to holler like at church. To wave her hands like when the Spirit comes around, only Mama doesn’t sound happy. She doesn’t sound blessed by God, and Uncle Root runs down the steps and pulls her into his arms. He tells her not to cry. Please don’t cry, beloved, but Lydia doesn’t move from her place in the yard. And my sister’s still screaming.
At church on Sunday, I sit between Coco and my granny. On the other side, there’s Uncle Norman. Nobody else from our family is there. Nobody’s been talking much since my sister came home. I feel bad this morning, so I wore a dress that Lydia made for me. I twirled in my dress to make her smile, but she didn’t say anything and I hope she’s not mad at me for tattling.
Before the sermon, Mr. J.W. leads us in a song. He’s the head deacon, and he gives one line and then we give it back. But Mr. J.W. has a very bad voice, and even though I’m sad about my sister, I want to laugh. I cover my mouth, because I don’t want to get in trouble.
Elder Beasley stands up from his chair. He goes to the lectern and flips through his Bible.
“The text that I take this morning comes from Genesis, chapter four, verses one through thirteen. Y’all got that?”
I have my own Bible. It’s white leatherette. My granny gave it to me for my birthday, and I find the pages because I read really well. I’m proud of myself and I put my Bible on my lap and pretend I’m a grown lady. I wave at the air with the cardboard fan that has the picture of the blond Jesus and the lambs.
Elder Beasley reads to us about the story of Cain and Abel. How Adam knew his wife and then she conceived, and when Cain and Abel grew up, Cain killed his brother.