He said good-bye to his mother, sitting at the table, smoking another cigarette. She told him to have fun and he said that he would. Out in the living room, his father, half lit now, looked him over. Stewart wore black Levi peg-legs, thick-soled loafers called “bombers,” and a bright orange button-down shirt under black leather. His hair was thick with Brylcreem and it rode high and stiff on his head.
“Where’d you get that shirt?” said Albert.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“You look like a nigger.”
Buzz Stewart left the house.
DOWN IN THE basement of the Vaughns’ split-level, Alethea folded the family’s clothing, warm from the dryer, on an ironing board set under a naked bulb. She timed her day so that she could have this relatively light chore after lunch, when she tended to grow tired. All that food sitting in your stomach, especially that bland, tasteless food Olga Vaughn made, just made you want to lie down and close your eyes.
It was quiet down here, pleasant and cool. All the toys sitting around the basement, things Ricky didn’t use anymore and probably never had used much, gathering dust. In Alethea’s opinion, they had spoiled that boy, not an uncommon thing to do with an only child. When really all any child needed was love, food, shelter, and a good example of how grown men and women should conduct their lives.
Olga had become barren after the birth of Ricky, Alethea guessed, which was a shame for the boy. A child needed a sibling to play with and also to confide in when things got tough. Frank Vaughn was not the kind of man who could find a way to be both a father and a friend to his son. For Frank, it took too much effort and thought. He should have spent more time with Ricky, though, even if it was not in his nature, as the child had become something of a mama’s boy. Boys like that grew up to be lovers and layabouts, the kind of men who leaned on their women far too much. But Ricky was smart and kind. Most likely, despite what he hadn’t gotten in his home, he would find his way.
Alethea stopped for a moment to stretch her hurting back. The pain could have been a mind thing, thinking too much on the fact that she’d turned forty a couple of years ago. But she was getting out of bed slower most mornings, no question about it. Wasn’t her imagination or the date on her birth certificate giving her those pains. You worked this kind of labor six days a week all these years, what did you expect? She wasn’t going to think on it all that much, because none of that worrying ever did anyone any kind of good.
The Lord would show her the way.
She could see a doctor about her back, she supposed, but money was tight, like it had always been. Another ten, twelve dollars a week would help, and she felt certain she could get it, spread out among the six households she worked on her regular schedule. Wasn’t one of those families could argue that she didn’t deserve a two-dollar raise. But seventy-two would put her over the salary of her husband, who was making sixty-five a week on his job, and that would be a problem right there. You never wanted to be making more money than your husband. A situation like that, it could kill the lion in your man.
Alethea folded a pair of Olga Vaughn’s white panties.
“Oh, Lord,” said Alethea, chuckling at the thought of Olga, trying to make conversation at lunch.
Lunch should have been Alethea’s time of rest, but truly, at the Vaughns’ it was the most challenging portion of her day. Olga insisted she eat with the family when all Alethea wanted was one half hour of peace. She accepted it, the way you had to accept most anything your boss asked of you, but it was a chore, more work, like being forced to take a role in a play. When Olga was talking to you, she was so aware that she was talking to you: Look at me, world, I’m talking to a “Negro.” The whole lunch thing was her way of telling herself, and her friends, most likely, that she was pure of heart, better than those people “down South.” But she wasn’t any better. Matter of fact, she was worse, ’cause with a race hater from anywhere, least you knew where you stood. If Olga was so pure, then why was she separating Alethea’s dishes in the sink?
Don’t want to get any of that colored on you, do you, girl?
“Forget it,” she said aloud, not liking her resentment, knowing it to be a trait that went against her Christian teachings. To herself she said a small prayer of forgiveness.
She began to fold Frank Vaughn’s underwear, extra-large-size boxers. Big man, Frank. She wondered… never mind. Wasn’t a sin to think about it. It was just natural curiosity about a physical thing, is all it was. She knew, though, that he studied her in that way. She felt his eyes on her all the time. But she never did think of him like that, not even for a moment. In any kind of world he was not her type.
Frank Vaughn would be upstairs in their bedroom now, taking his afternoon nap, like he always did before going off to work. Probably he went off to sleep quickly, like uncomplicated people tended to do. That was Frank Vaughn in a word: uncomplicated. If you asked, she’d bet he would tell you the same. Unlike his wife, this was a person who knew who he was. Not good, exactly, but clear. He must have done bad things on his job, had to have done bad things, she supposed, ’cause that’s the kind of job it was. In the end he was just a man. All man, if you had to say it short.
Anyway, this family here was no business of hers. She would always be polite to them, but she was uninterested in being their friend. This was something Olga and most “good” white folks would never understand. The thing of it was, she had her own friends, took pleasure in her own world. Her own family, too. A good man and a good provider who she loved fierce, and two strong, fine-hearted sons.
AFTER FRANK VAUGHN woke from his nap, he showered and shaved in his master bathroom. He left both the door to his bedroom and the bathroom door closed, as it blocked out the rock-and-roll music coming from Ricky’s room.
Vaughn could blame himself for that, as he had bought most of Ricky’s records. Occasionally he paid retail down at the Music Box on 10th and at the Jay Perri Record Shop, next to the Highland Theater on Pennsylvania Avenue in Southeast. But most of the time he got them hot from this colored fence he knew down near 14th and U. This fence owed him a favor for something Vaughn didn’t do to his kid brother, so often these records came free.
The records made Ricky happy, and that made Vaughn feel good. Still, Vaughn couldn’t stand the sound of the shit. Sinatra, Perry Como, and them, they were real singers, and some of the broads like Peggy Lee, June Christy, and, God, Julie London were pretty good, too. Elvis? He sang like a hopped-up spade, and the way he wiggled his hips was just, well, it was suspicious. These days, at least you didn’t hear him every time you turned on the radio. Presley was in Germany now, wearing a uniform. Kids had short memories, so maybe he would just fade away. In Vaughn’s opinion, that was good.
Vaughn found his can of shaving cream between Olga’s private things, a box of Modess and a bottle of Lysol douche. He lathered his face and used a straight razor to shave himself. He had large features, jowly cheeks, and a squarish head. His teeth were crooked and widely spaced. His eyes were blue and lazy. He liked to think of himself as a less pretty Mitchum. Some of the younger guys at work called him Hound Dog. He figured it had something to with his determination on the job and something to do with his looks. And there was that goddamn Elvis song. The name didn’t bother him, though. Long as they respected him, he didn’t mind.
He dressed in a white shirt, black tie, and gray Robert Hall suit. He opened the drawer of the nightstand beside his bed and extracted his.38. He checked the load, then slipped the service revolver into the clip-on holster he wore on his belt.