Read Swan Place for Free Online

was nice to see her in a mood to talk, for a change.
    “Why, we were scared to death, honey. Because neither one of us had ever touched a piano, and we didn’t even have a piano in our house, but our mama had decided we would learn how to play anyway. And when Mama spent good money on something, she expected the very best. So we knew we had to do very, very well. I was around nine and your mama was only six years old. And I remember how we held hands as we walked all the way to the very end of Stone Street and then followed a dirt road on for nearly a quarter of a mile, and it nothing more than two hard clay ruts between fields of tall, dry grass where crickets chirped and little creatures we couldn’t even see scurried away and made such a fearsome noise in the weeds. We had to walk all that way before we came to Miss Eunice’s house—a big, old place with peeling paint standing way back from the road. Funny thing was, there wasn’t a tree on the place, and that day—that hot July day—we could smell the tar from the roof. Miss Eunice must have been watching from the window, because we saw the curtains move a little and then she came and opened the door, just as we got to the front steps. And what a sight she was! Such a stout lady and her wearing a white dress with hundreds and hundreds of bright lavender bows printed on the fabric.” Here, Aunt Bett paused, looked at me, and smiled. “Honey, she had a bosom like nothing I ever saw in my life! Just like two big old rattlesnake watermelons, and those shiny little buttons on her dress just straining, what with trying to keep it all inside!”
    Aunt Bett laughed out loud. “And her hair was salt-and-pepper gray and standing up a little in the back, from where her head had been resting against the back of a chair. And her eyes tiny and just as shiny as the buttons on her dress. Like I said, your mama and I were both scared to death, but we knew if we went back home without having our lessons, we’d get a switching. So we went inside to where it was dark and cool, and when our eyes got used to the dimness, the first thing we noticed was that the entire ceiling of the hallway was gone. We could make out some jagged edges left of what had been the floor of the second floor above it. I’ll never forget that, how that ceiling just went up and up and into some kind of a deep and hot darkness, way up there under the roof, where there was no light. When Miss Eunice saw us staring up, she said, ‘Oh, don’t you pay no mind to that. Whole floor from upstairs fell one summer a long time ago, and after I got that mess all cleared away, I found it made the whole place a lot cooler just to leave it like that. Hot air rises, you see.’”
    I had goose bumps on my arms, from imagining how that house must have looked. And Aunt Bett’s eyes were moving around the perfectly normal ceiling of her own kitchen, all those years later, but she was really seeing Miss Eunice’s house. I waited for her to go back and finish her story, but she just sat there.
    “Did you and Mama learn how to play the piano?” I asked, hoping to get her going again. She glanced at me as if she had forgotten I was there.
    “Oh, we learned some little songs. Not much, but enough to satisfy your grandmama. But your mama never did like to play the piano. In fact, come to think of it, there wasn’t much she ever enjoyed,” Aunt Bett admitted, drawing her eyebrows together. Then she made a little huffing sound and smiled. “Except for going dancing with Roy-Ellis,” she added, nodding her head.
    “Was that really bad, Aunt Bett?” I asked her, wishing with all my heart she could have seen Mama holding hands with Jesus.
    “Well, it wasn’t good, that’s for sure,” Aunt Bett said. “But God is merciful, and I believe He will have mercy on your mama—mainly because of how well she bore all that sickness and pain, I expect.”
    “I’m sure He will,” I added. “I’m truly sure He will.”