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The concoction looked like what I had once vomited on that Winston-smoking coach’s shoes. My grandfather started to cry some more but quickly fought back the tears. He surveyed the yard with his brimming eyes. “Look at all this space we got back here,” he said, burping up some clabber. “Don’t this look like a nice place for a pony?” I shrugged. Somewhere out there in the pastures surrounding us was a flock of throaty birds that must have taken a wrong turn out of Alabama, for they were now sounding as deeply flummoxed as I was feeling. “Listen to them damn crows,” said my grandfather. “I hate crows. They remind me of all these civil-righters crawling all over the state—black and complaining and always making the most of a bad situation. But I guess that’s what we gotta do, too, hon. Make the best of a bad situation. I know you miss yo’ mama and daddy something awful. God knows, I do. I know you probably don’t know what to make of your old Pop and Mom,” he said, using the names that Kim and Karole and I called him and our grandmother. “But I promise you sitting right here on this day under this tree—I want you to remember this the rest of your life—that nobody will ever love you more than Mom and me. We ain’t got much but love to give you. Butyou can rest assured, hon, that we’re gonna give you that.” His old eyes filled with tears again, his sorrow magnified behind his thick-lensed glasses. I looked up and saw the long gray hairs in his nostrils clot with snot. He pulled out a handkerchief from his back pocket and haphazardly wiped his big nose. He looked a lot like LBJ. “Oh, Lord,” he said and pointed toward the house. I heard the clunk of Vena Mae’s jewelry in the distance and turned to see her leading my grandmother toward us. “Better batten down the hatches,” my grandfather whispered. “Here comes Veeny. And Jake don’t look too happy neither,” he said, using the nickname my grandmother was called by those closest to her. I put my rabbit’s foot back in my pocket and formed my highfalutin mask with my fingers. “You might have the right idea there, Arlene,” my grandfather said, chuckling and making sure that there was nothing left in either the goblet or his nose. He put his handkerchief back in his pocket.
    â€œLyle, you should be tending to Joycie. I had to find her asthma spray before her grief plumb near smothered her. Here!” Vena Mae said, handing off my grandmother, who sat gingerly on the ground on the other side of me, careful not to snag her funeral dress on any of the tree’s exposed roots. My grandfather took off his suit jacket and handed it across my masked face to her so she could wrap it around her thin shoulders in the November chill.
    â€œI better not ruin my dress sitting here like this. It’s the first time I’ve ever worn it. Took me near ‘bout one whole hour to find this
McCall
’s pattern up at the Thomas Great M last month,” my grandmother said, referring to the department store on Main Street in Forest. “Nan had taken her final turn toward the worst and I knew I’d be needing a dress like this soon enough. Thought I should be planning ahead for this day. Practical to a fault—that’s me. How I kept all my seams straight with me crying at my sewing machine like I done, I’ll never know.”
    Vena Mae stood over the three of us and frowned at the sight. She rearranged her bracelets. “Y’all seen Doots anywhere? It’s about time we started driving back. I told him not to sneak off,” she complained, mentioning her husband who so seldom spoke after years of marriage to her that one could be forgiven for thinking the woman had purposefully wedded a mute. He owned Moore’s Hardware up in Philadelphia and would sit in his proprietor’s chair in the front of the store and keep