Rachel Caine - Minute Maids

VIP免费
2024-12-22 1 0 138.9KB 34 页 5.9玖币
侵权投诉
MINUTE MAIDS
anoriginal short story by RachelCaine
After she'd looked at the blood a while,Olida was able to think of it as a stain.A big old ugly stain from
floor to ceiling, throwing red legs over the tub,puddling around the pot. She pulled the last stiff towel
down from the rod. The bathmat made a sticky sucking sound as she peeled it loose from the floor; the
blood underneath looked black and flowed slow, like syrup.Olida wrapped the mat in the towel and
tossed the whole mess to Rita-Mae. The girl made a face and held it at arm's length.
"Shit, don't throw it at me! Think they'regonna want this stuff?" Rita-Mae asked, and pushed her limp
blond hair back with a sweaty hand. She'd been scrubbing at the stain in the hallway, the one that came
down the hall to the bathroom in sloppy footprints. "I mean, wegonna wash it or what?"
"Rita, did you leave your brain in a jar thismornin '? Just throw it out,"Olida said, and wiped at her face
with the back of her forearm. Lord, she was tired. Dried blood stuck to her gloves in brown flakes.
"They'll bebuyin ' new towels."
"Think you're so smart. Howd'you know?" Rita-Mae shot back.Olida didn't even look at her.
Rita-Mae's mouth didn't bother her any more.
"'Cause I would," she said, "and so would you if theywas your towels. Get me that pail of hot water, and
you put enough Pine-Sol in there that I can smell it this time."
Rita-Mae gave her a dirty glare and walked away swinging her butt like the trailer-park trash she was.
Olida sighed and heaved herself off of her knees. At fifty-five, getting up wasn't as easy as it used to be.
She caught a look at herself in the stained mirror as she turned -- a wide-hipped black woman, dressed
in a white woman's castoffs bought for three dollars at the thrift shop. Good smooth skin, too much gray
in her hair. She wondered how much Misty Lee Jackson over at the Le Chic Salon would charge her to
dye that it out.Too young to be gray , she thought.I still look good.
She knew she was lying to herself. She looked like any old sorry-assed nigger, sentenced to clean up
other people's shit for the rest of her life.
But shit was better than this, Lord, better than seeing what was left after folks done unto each other.
Sometimes she felt bad about it, in a quiet way. She sighed and remembered what her momma had
always said, bent over scrubbing up drunks' vomit at Joe'sLateNite Place.
"Rich folks get depressed," she said aloud. "Poor folks get back to work."
She reached up to unfasten the Care Bears shower curtain. The plastic rings let go with pops, and the
curtain sagged like a carcass into the tub. Blood flaked away and made piles of red grit like old rust.
Well, no sense in staring at it. She turned the hot water on and left it to soak.
The blood wiped right off the glossy wall across from the toilet, gone like a bad dream. She used an old
toothbrush to clean it out of the cracks in the tile and looked at the floor with a flashlight to make sure
she'd got it all. When she was satisfied, she stood up to stretch a minute and lifted her arms over her
head. Her back felt like it was put together with rubber bands, wrapped twice.
Fifty-five.Sweet Lord Jesus, what a trial it was to get old.Olida sighed and got down on her knees again
to sponge off the tile behind the toilet. Some of the blood was solid enough to peel off in a layer, like
those Fruit Rollups her grandkids liked to eat. Old Jell-O, thatwas what it was. Old spilled raspberry
Jell-O.
She flushed the Jell-O down the toilet and got down on her knees again to sponge off the thick syrupy
film that was left. Rita-Mae had brought her Pine-Sol bucket while her back was turned, and every time
she dunked the sponge in it the water turned darker.
She finished that and reached way back to clean off the streaks that had to be hiding where she couldn't
see them.
Something hard touched her fingers. She let out a yelp and banged her head on the pot scooting away;
her heart felt heavy and thick in her chest, hammering to get out. She took in deep, deep breaths until her
chest stopped aching, then crawled under the toilet and reached in and grabbed what she'd found.
It was a little Care Bear, with a big happy rainbow on its chest. One ear had been chewed off, and the
other showed child-sizedtoothmarks .
There were dried bloodstains all over it.Olida took the sponge and scrubbed it, scrubbed it again until
her fingers cramped up, then plunged it into the soapy water in the bucket and scrubbed it some more.
When it was as clean as she could make it, she set it reverently back up on the shelf where the other
Care Bears waited.
The tub was full of hot red water.Olida pulled the plug and rinsed the shower curtain until she saw no
more blood, anywhere.
When she cleaned the mirror, there was no sign that anything had happened at all.Just an empty,
clean-smelling bathroom waiting for a child.
The Care Bears smiled at her from the shelf.
Rita-Mae had finished her job and was polishing the wood hallway floor with oil, face dark pink and
sweaty. She glared.Olida nodded to her and went on into the kitchen, whereZenobia was packing up
their supplies into the carrying cases. The cases had faded stickers on them that said MINUTE MAIDS,
but they hadn'tnone of them worked for Minute Maids in twelve years.Olida reminded herself for about
the one hundredth time to take those stickers off, and forgot about it as soon as she dropped her rubber
gloves into the trash sack piled in the corner.
"Wedone?"Zenobia asked.Olida nodded and flapped her damp hands to cool them off. "Rita-Mae done
a good job on the hall, did you see?"
"I saw. You want your money now or atCharley's ?"
"Better now, I got to pick upMando at school. He got football practice and all. I see you later, okay?"
"Okay, honey. Here."Olida rubbed her hands on her faded work pants and dugten twentydollar bills out
of her pocket. She handed them toZenobia ; the Mexican woman's round face puckered in a frown.
"You give me too much,Lida . How much they pay you?"
"Don't matter, you know that.You done a good job. You tellMando to win on Saturday, hear?"Olida
said, andZenobia frowned at her for another minute, then shrugged and nodded. She waddled out the
door to her ancient Woody station wagon with two of the carrying cases, andOlida waved to her as she
backed out of the driveway and ontoTattingerStreet. The wagon drove away, flapping peeling fake wood
like streamers.
That left Rita-Mae.Olida paid her off -- Rita-Mae wasn't as happy asZenobia , but then she never was
-- and helped her carry her share of supplies out to the orange Pinto. It sputtered and roared and
belched black smoke as the girl gunned it and drove away.
Olidastood on the porch and felt the sun breathe on her skin while she ticked off the list in her mind.
Check the doors and windows. Take out the trash. Lock the door and drop the key over atMiz
Grainger's house. She went back inside, blinked back sunspots, and turned right to walk down the hall.
A little girl stood at the end of it, by the bathroom. She was wearing a long yellow nightgown with green
ribbon on it.Olida stopped and braced herself against the wall. Her head pounded. A numb feeling bled
up and down her left arm, and her eyes filled up with tears. She couldn't get her breath, and she felt tired,
so tired she couldn't even feel too scared.
She just wished it wouldn't keep happening.
The little girl was white, with blonde hair. She just stood there, watching, waiting.Olida slid down the
scrubbed wall to the oiled wood floor, and knew she was sitting right where nice Mrs. Gilbert had died.
The little white girl held something out that caught the setting sunlight. It was a small plastic Care-Bear.
She smiled and nodded toOlida .
"Sweet Jesus, make it stop,"Olida whispered, so softly she couldn't even hear it herself over the
pounding of her heart. Tears broke free to slide like oil down her cold skin. She tried to turn her face
away, but she couldn't. The little girl turned and walked back in the bathroom.
It's empty,Olida told herself.I cleaned it.Nothing there to see.
She lay there half-propped on the wall for a long while before she felt the numbness in her arm go away.
Standing up made her feel light-headed and sick, and scared. Her legs felt weak.
The front door was behind her. She walked down the hall, the way the stains had walked. She walked
to the bathroom and looked inside.
Little Isobel Gilbert stood in the middle of a pool of blood. Blood everywhere, on the shower curtain, on
the Care Bears,puddled around the pot. Isobel clutched her favorite plastic toy close and cried without
making a sound. The whole house was like that, waiting.
Olidafelt so tired. The numbness hadn't gone away in her arm like she'd thought; it drilled deep into her
bones like termites, cleaned out all her strength and left her empty.Too old , she thought.I'm so old. I
don't want to see these things no more.
Isobel looked up at her, and the tears sliding down her cheeks were blood.
Olidawent down on one knee. Something wet soaked into her work pants. Seen at close range Isobel
wasn't so solid, more like a flickering TV picture, grainy and glowing.
The little girl held out her arms.
Olidaclosed her eyes and embraced her. Just for a minute, she felt her, cold and bloody, and then warm
and firm like a child should be. And then it was gone, a whisper against her skin and through her body.
Olida collapsed back against the cabinets and lay there while her heart fluttered in her chest like a caged
bird, and settled down to pound again. It sounded quieter now.Weaker.
Her fingers slid over the floor.Clean, smooth linoleum. Nothing wet.
Olidaraised her head and looked at the clean bathroom. She prayed for a while, flat on her back, and
waited for her strength to come back to help her home.
Dinner was done, and even thoughOlida knew she shouldn't let the plates sit there she was too tired to
clean up. She went in the living room and turned on the evening news. Her husband Lark stayed in the
kitchen, rustling his paper; he pretended to be too deaf to hear the doorbell when it rang.Olida hauled
herself out of her threadbare recliner and switched off the TV before she opened the door.
The face on the other side turned out to be a sickly yellow-white.Nervous. It wasMiz Cochran from the
CalvaryTemple, and she tried to smile and didn't do a very good job of it.
"Olida, I'm so sorry to bother you, but your husband said it would be all right to come on by. We -- I
mean the members of the Calvary Temple -- we took up a collection for Deacon Graham, and we'd like
you to -- to -- clean his house for him while he's in the hospital.As a Christian favor."
MizCochran found it hard to lookOlida in the eye, like she might catch something off the stare. Her eyes
kept moving away, down to the cracked concrete porch or off to the hollyhocks blooming in thegarden,
or over next door to whereFredoric sat on his steps and grinning at the show.Olida stepped aside to let
Miz Cochran come in, but the woman just stood there like a mule, shaking her head.Olida came out and
let the screen door slam shut behind her.
"Why, sure,Miz Cochran, that would be just fine," she said, and tried to remember what the pastor said
about turning the other cheek. "Deacon George, he's a real nice man.Real nice. He fixed my sink when
Lark was down with his back problems, and I'd consider it just fair to do something for him in his bad
times. How is he?"
"He's fine. The doctors say they plan to let him go by Saturday. We just didn't want him to come home
to the --"Miz Cochran flapped her hands, helpless.
"Mess,"Olida supplied. "I reckon we can clean all that up. He used a shotgun to kill that burglar, didn't
he?"
"I think so,"Miz Cochran said weakly. "Lord, I don't really know."
Didn't want to, neither,Olida figured. She shrugged and let it go. She haggled another few minutes,
poking atMiz Cochran's squeamishness when she thought it could get her to a better price, and in the end
agreed on a perfectly good five hundred dollars. It would getZenobia through another week of running
her army of kids around, and get Rita-Mae's husband another few good drunks, and getOlida ahead a
little on Lark's medical bills.
MizCochran couldn't leave fast enough.Olida leaned on the door frame and watched her flowered dress
shimmy away. She hadn't dared come by herself; somebody white waited in the car for her.Olida's
neighborsFredoric and Shalimar waved at the car until the white folks drove away, hellions just because
they didn't have anything better to do.Olida grinned and went back into her house.
MizCochran hadn't made such a good deal.Olida figured she would have done the job for two hundred,
and paid Rita-Mae andZenobia out of her own pocket. Deacon Graham had been good to her and Lark
these past years; one of her prize possessions was the bronzed praying hands he'd made for her. He was
known for them, at least in the county shows and fairs. Her pair looked like middle-aged hands, gnarled
with hard work. Hands like her own.
She went into the kitchen and sat down across from Lark with the phone. He kept his nose in the paper
and pretended not to notice her. Rita-Mae's number rang five times, and when it finally got picked up it
clattered as somebody dropped it. There were children screaming in the background, one baby,one just
a baby at heart. The TV was on loud enough forOlida to pick up the end of the weather report she'd
missed.Rain tomorrow.Thunderstorms.
"'Lo?" somebody yelled on the other end.
"Rita-Mae?"
"Rita-Mae's in the can.Call back later." The boy was about twelve years old, too much attitude and too
little sense.Olida decided he could have taken after either his mother or his father. In the background, a
woman's voice yelled at him to put the phone down and asked who it was.
"It's that nigger lady you work for!" the boy yelled back.Olida's back straightened,then relaxed. It didn't
dono good to worry about it, not with Rita-Mae's kids.
The boy yelled again, this time in pain as somebody smacked him. The phone picked up with another
clatter.
"Olida?"Rita-Mae asked. She was short of breath. "Sorry. If he had a brain, he'd take it out and play
with it. Curtis, get in there and watch some TV! Don't bother me no more!"
Olidawaited until the fight on the other end died down to just the baby's squalling in the background.
"You want a job tomorrow?"Olida asked.
"How much?"
"Hundred fifty.It'll be quick, in and out. Not like today."
"Huh," Rita-Mae grunted. "Where is it?"
"Deacon Graham's house.You 'member, he shot that burglar?"
"Yeah, I heard that. Expect he keeps a clean place, him being a church man and all. What time you want
me?"
"Oh, ten.That'll giveZenobia time to get the kids settled."Olida cleared her throat. "You won't haveno
trouble getting Richard to keep yours?"
"Richard don't go nowhere until the bars open, you know that. Won't beno trouble. He needs the
money."
"We meet there, ten sharp, okay?"
"Okay." Rita-Mae hung up without a goodbye.Olida pushed her glasses back up on her nose and dialed
Zenobia's number.
"Ten is fine. God bless you," wasZenobia's answer. She didn't ask questions. She never did.Olida hung
up smiling, which was the reason she always calledZenobia last, and looked across the kitchen table at
Lark, who was working on the sports page with a deep frown. He didn't read sogood , even after long
years of trying.
"Don't like you going to the Deacon's house," Lark said suddenly as she got up to take their dinner
plates in to the kitchen. She stopped and looked at him, surprised, and got another frown and a rattle
from the paper. He cleared his throat.
"How come?" sheasked. He turned the page.
"Just don't. Just don't like him."
Lark,Olida had long since resigned herself, was never going to take to any church or any church folk
He'd threatened to throw ReverendBarnaby down the front steps one night when the Reverend came
calling about the annual revival collection, and the Reverend was as black as a Georgia midnight.
"Lark, I promised, and Iain'tgoin ' to go back on my word.Ain'tnothing wrong with the Deacon."
Lark grumbled under his breath. She carried the dishes to the sink and clattered them until he got up and
hobbled out into the living room. Lark wasn't moving so good these days. Back troubles had put him out
of work on the loading docks, and now he had trouble sleeping, and the money she made cleaning didn't
go far enough to cover his medical bills. She turned the water on hot enough to steam her eyeglasses and
scrubbed at the dishes until her mind felt clean.
She ran herself a hot bath and put some rose colored bath crystals in it, the ones Lark had given her last
Christmas; the smell was like a hot summer garden, and reminded her of trimming rose bushes in her
momma's back yard, back when black folks sat in separate sections and had to use toilets white folks
wouldn't have let their dogs pee in. The roses had been blood-red and velvet-smooth, the thorns as sharp
as knives. She'd asked momma to plant some yellow ones, the kind that didn't have such sharp thorns,
but momma had grinned and told her that the ones that were the hardest to get close to were always the
best.
There were blood spots on her work pants.Olida picked at them a minute, then rinsed them in the sink
and put the pants in the laundry basket. The bath was hot and steamy, and when she settled into it she felt
light, feather-light. Like a little girl.
Olidawas half-afraid she'd see the ghost again, but there was only the smell of roses, and rain.
She dozed off and woke up with enough of a jerk to spill water out of the tub. She'd been in the water
too long. Her skin looked loose and wrinkled. She felt like she'd gone to sleep in the bath a young firm
woman and woke up a bloated, sick, old sack.Wasn't right. She'd mislaid ten or twenty years,
somewhere, without even taking notice of them.
When she got out of the tub again she felt heavy and old and mortally tired. Her robe was getting too
small for her, and her stomach pouted out through it like it had when she was carryingLaVelle . She
belted it tight and went back out in the living room.
Lark was asleep, feet up on his threadbare footstool. The TV blared out wailing sirens and screams. She
turned it down and went to her own chair, where she picked up her Bible and began to read her Sunday
School assignment.
Deacon George had always taught the adult class. She wondered who'd teach it this week.
She looked at the flickering blue TV again, over the top of her glasses, and turned up her reading light a
little to concentrate on the Lord's words.
The keys to Deacon George's house had come from his sister, Charity GrahamWarriner , who lived out
inGreenfieldand never visited town unless she had to. Charity had married money and society, and didn't
like to be reminded she came from poor folk just like most everybody else in the county. Folks said she
and George had never got along, butOlida had never heard anybody say why.Money, maybe. Charity
had a lot of money and Lord, didn't it make people crazy.
The Deacon sure had a whole lot of keys. Most everybody had a key lock in the doorknob, and that
was considered sufficient by everybody in town except banks. Deacon George hadthree locks, one in
the doorknob and two deadbolts.
"Hey, check that out. What's he got to lock up like that, you think?" Rita-Mae asked.
"None of your business,"Olida snapped. Rita-Mae made a funny little O with her mouth. It showed off
teeth that would have been better covered up.
"Yougonna let her talk to me like that?" the white girl askedZenobia .Zenobia shrugged cheerfully. She
was checking her watch, probably figuring out when she had to pick up her kids again.Zenobia never
cared about other people's peculiarities.
Rita-Mae's eyes, on the other hand, lit up. She kept staring at the keys.
"Had to be something to make that guy break in here, don't you think so,Olida ?Something good.
Maybe he's got money hidden away in there." Rita-Mae sounded convinced, but then she was the kind
of silly woman who got convinced by those newspapers in the checkout line, and by men who said they
still loved her after they gave her black eyes.
Olidaignored her.
She got the first lock open and studied the other two keys. She guessed right the first time, and slid the
second lock back. The other deadbolt was harder to turn, and she felt the strain in her wrist before it
finally clicked back. The door swung open without even a creak, and the other two women looked at
Olida . A whiff of something evil-smelling blew out at them with the warm air from inside.
摘要：

MINUTEMAIDSanoriginal shortstorybyRachelCaine Aftershe'dlookedatthebloodawhile,Olidawasabletothinkofitasastain.Abigolduglystainfromfloortoceiling,throwingredlegsoverthetub,puddlingaroundthepot.Shepulledthelaststifftoweldownfromtherod.Thebathmatmadeastickysuckingsoundasshepeeleditloosefromthefloor;th...

展开>> 收起<<
Rachel Caine - Minute Maids.pdf

共34页,预览7页

还剩页未读， 继续阅读

声明：本站为文档C2C交易模式，即用户上传的文档直接被用户下载，本站只是中间服务平台，本站所有文档下载所得的收益归上传人(含作者)所有。玖贝云文库仅提供信息存储空间，仅对用户上传内容的表现方式做保护处理，对上载内容本身不做任何修改或编辑。若文档所含内容侵犯了您的版权或隐私，请立即通知玖贝云文库，我们立即给予删除！

相关推荐

更多
立即下载
分类：外语学习 价格：5.9玖币 属性：34 页 大小：138.9KB 格式：PDF 时间：2024-12-22

开通VIP享超值会员特权

  • 多端同步记录
  • 高速下载文档
  • 免费文档工具
  • 分享文档赚钱
  • 每日登录抽奖
  • 优质衍生服务

作者详情

相关内容

更多

热门标签

人际关系 配电装置 动力学连接体 力的合成 高考理综 全宋诗作者索引 公务员考试
/ 34
评分 收藏
分享
立即下载 VIP免费下载
客服
关注