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boys died.
    Anyway, we called her Big Aunt Sally because Ma had a baby sister named Sally, who the family had planned to call Little Aunt Sally, but she died. Ma said that her sister Sally was sleeping with Grandma and Grandpa when one of them rolled over and suffocated her to death in the middle of the night. They don’t know who rolled over on her. They just know she was dead the next morning.
    Big Aunt Sally was real nice. I helped her, June Bug, and Willie pack pecans for a week until Ma made me come home. I am so glad I was not there when them boys died that I do not know what to do.
    Big Aunt Sally been telling us all our lives not to go back of the field to the pond. Well, June Bug and Willie was hardheaded and went back there anyway. They had been back theretwice before the day death came. Both times I told Big Aunt Sally and she took a switch to they behinds. That did not do any good. Big Aunt Sally was sweeping the front porch when Willie and June Bug came running around the house talking about they going for a walk.
    â€œYou both can walk all you want to, but you best not go near that pond.”
    â€œWe won’t, Big Aunt Sally.”
    Willie’s ma, Essie, was out Christmas shopping at the thrift store over in Jackson when all of this happen. I don’t know why them boys did not listen, because they dead for not listening.
    The day my cousin and Willie died there was another boy at the pond that we call Hog Daddy. We call him Hog Daddy because he eat like a hog and he looks just like his daddy. He eats all the time just like Toe Worm. From house to house, he go telling lies to grown folks. He tells them that he hungry because he ain’t ate nothing. They feed him, then he go to another house and tell another grown-up the same lie until his belly is full. Hog Daddy had stopped by Big Aunt Sally’s forblackberry dumplings the day the boys died. He claims he could not skate because he had a belly full from eating Big Aunt Sallys blackberry dumplings. He lying! Who goes to a pond in December unless they going to ice-skate?
    The sun had been shining all day and that ice was mighty thin. Hog Daddy said that Willie got on the ice first and skated all the way to the middle. Hog Daddy said before he could say “no,” Willie fell through the ice, yelling at the top of his lungs. June Bug yelled and skated out there too. Skated out there to save Willie. Down he went! Them boys couldn’t even swim. Hog Daddy ain’t no kin to them, but he almost died trying to save their lives. He said he pulled them out one by one. Willie was dead and Hog Daddy knew it, but June Bug was still breathing, so Hog Daddy laid Willie by the side of the pond and carried June Bug all the way back to Big Aunt Sally’s house on his back. It was too late, June Bug died right there on Big Aunt Sally’s living-room floor. Then Big Aunt Sally had to walk all the way out of the Low Meadows to tell Aunt Rosie that her boy was dead. HogDaddy had to walk to town to get Joe Gordon, because Big Aunt Sally did not have a telephone.
    Aunt Rosie was at church decorating for the Christmas party Ma said she hollered for five hours. Grandpa said he could hear her on Rehobeth Road. That’s five miles from the church where Aunt Rosie was doing her hollering.
    Thats the truth.
    Two caskets, not one.
    Two families, not one.
    Two hearses, not one.
    I can’t think about it another minute. I want to think about finding Uncle Buddy. When I do, we are going to talk about the living, not the dead.

6
Harlem, Lord, Harlem
    I wonder how big Harlem is. For sure it is bigger than Rehobeth Road. For sure it is bigger than Rich Square. I hope it ain’t too hard to find my uncle.
    Before Grandpa died, I overheard him tell Grandma that Uncle Buddy is right here in Harlem. Well, I didn’t overhear him tell her nothing. I was ease dropping. Yes, I know it’s rude, but that’s the only way to get my information from