6
Our raggedy caravan kept to the coast as we moved slowly through the flatlands of the South. Carl and Ep detoured to take us kids to Richmond and there we saw a stuffed seal that had come down to swim around Richmond in the 1800s. There was a stuffed Indian too, but he made me sick. Leroy, Ted, and I liked the Civil War uniforms best. The Confederate ones were the prettiest because they had gold braid all down on the cuffs of the sleeves. Leroy confessed if he didn't become a famous actor, he'd become a soldier so he could wear gold braid on his sleeves. I said that was okay but then he couldn't wear lipstick and he'd have to follow orders.
The journey dragged on and we nearly went crazy cooped up in the car. Carrie invented a license plate game that helped. First one to get one hundred points wins. The plates of the state you were going through counted one point. Every state in the South aside from that state was two points. Northern states were five points and Midwestern ones were ten. Western states were twenty points and California plates were thirty. I knew we'd never see California plates because only movie stars lived out there, and why'd they want to be driving around these washed-out lands?
Once in Athens, Georgia, we pulled over to eat and go to the bathroom. Leroy, Ted, and I popped out of the car and zoomed into the dinky restaurant that smelled of years of grease. I sped past the door the boys used and into the next one. Carrie seized my arm as I was coming out.
'You got no sense, girl. You do that again and I'm gonna whale you good, you hear me? That's the colored room and you stay out.' I wasn't about to argue with her in front of strangers, but when we got back in the car I asked Carl what all that meant. Carrie turned to him, 'See, she won't listen to me. You make her listen.'
'Down South things are a little different than up in York. Here the whites and the coloreds don't mix and you're not to mess with those people, although you are to be mannerly should you ever have to talk to one. Your mother was trying to save you from getting in trouble someday.'
'Daddy, that's no different than up home in York. They just don't put "Colored" over the bathroom doors, that's all.'
'You little smartmouth, you shut your trap,' Carrie warned.
'No, I ain't shutting my mouth. It's no different except for the signs. I ain't gonna sit here and pretend it's different when it ain't.' Leroy tugged my sleeve fearing a fight. I gave him a jab. 'Daddy, why should I shut up?'
'You got a point there, kid, but around here people get more riled up about coloreds than they do in the North. Other than that, you're right. I can't see it's no different neither.' Carrie said we were both teched and looked glumly out the window.
'Since I don't know who my real folks are maybe they're colored. Maybe it's all right for me to go in those bathrooms.'
'My God!' Carrie exploded, 'if you ain't enough trouble now you want to go be a nigger.'
Carl laughed and the sun caught on his gold tooth and reflected back on the window. 'It'd show, Molly. Who knows what you are, you're a mongrel, that's all.'
'She's darker than the rest of us, Uncle Carl.' Leroy piped up.
'She's got brown eyes, none of us got brown eyes.'
'Lots of people have brown eyes and are olive complected; Italians and Spaniards are like that.'
'Hey Molly, maybe you're a spic,' Leroy offered.
'I don't care what the hell I am. And I ain't staying away from people because they look different.'
Carrie whirled around in a full fury and spat. 'If I ever see you mixing with the wrong kind, I'm gonna wring your neck, brat. You try it and see how far you get.'
