The Medium And The Message

a short story

Selma looked down in the bitter cup of dregs and saw again how the milk had curdled in the coffee. "Now ain't that fine?" she spoke to herself out loud and answered; "Nasty." But she had slowly sipped the vile stuff down to these last grainy drops. It wasn't even yesterday's pot of coffee neither, but the day before's. She had to drag out to the Foodarama now for sure, with the coffee gone and the milk sour. She couldn't hide in here in this dark house forever.

Raymond looked in around the open kitchen door, so tall he was, with little Melody beside him. "Mamma," Raymond said, "we're going to school now."

Hardly glancing up, she said; "That's good, honey. You're a good boy. I'm proud of you. You take your little sister on to school, okay? You take good care of her."

Raymond kind of cleared his throat and hesitated, and then said; "Looks like there's ripe tomatoes."

Now she was sure the boy was testing her. Could she drag out back today to scratch a little in the garden? She looked him in the eyes and answered; "Okay, we'll have some of them for supper. Okay? I promise. I'll get some cucumber too, and milk. I'll fix pork chops maybe. How 'bout some mustard greens?"

"Mamma," Melody spoke in her sweet voice, "are you alright?"

That drew the woman's eyes to the sweet girl's worried face and the mother answered very earnestly; "Don't you worry, honey; Momma's going to be alright. It's just some bad times going on. It's just the blues. Everything will be alright again real soon." She really had to get herself together now. And, she suddenly wondered, to her shame, what had the little chickens had for breakfast?

The girl ran the few steps in to Selma's open arms, arms that opened wide instinctively to hold the girl, but Selma had to hold her damn cigarette away from the child and that cooled the warmth she loved to feel from the little one. She held the burning cigarette away behind her back as she leaned down in the hard kitchen chair for the embrace. She had to let go of the child to pet the long and shining hair.

"You fixed your hair real nice." the mother said.

"Raymond brushed it." Melody answered, full of pride to have her brother's care.

"Momma;" Raymond spoke up, leaning on the door frame, unwilling to leave with a question in his mouth that he really had to ask; "you want me turn the sign around?"

The sign? What was he getting on about? Oh yes, he meant the "Closed" sign that hung on a string inside the front door glass. Could she open shop today at last? What if Missis Johnson came around? That old lady could be a first-class pain sometimes. Could she handle something such as that? Sometimes the work was hard.

Suddenly, with new resolve, the woman stood, turned to shove the burning cigarette into the coffee cup where it hissed as though in anger, and she said; "Sweetheart, I'm gonna turn that sign myself."

But as she herded her two dear chicks out through the darkened little house, out down the creaking hallway's floor, straightening up her open robe, she realized the frowzy house dress underneath was hardly fit to greet the public in. Out the children went on down the front steps, hand in hand, to the sidewalk with many backward looks so that she smiled and waved as reassuring as she could. She left the piece of cardboard hanging "Closed" for now, until she dressed, but anyway she pulled the dusty black cloth down that she had hung around the glass in mourning.

How long ago had she hung that black cloth there? She opened up the door again and looked out on the day and found with some surprise that it was getting on to fall. The tree across the street was turning red.

Her grass was cut but weeds had grown up tall around the posts of the front yard sign. That really looked a mess. July the seventeenth, her mother had passed on. And six years back, her husband too. Buttoning the robe, shuffling in the cloth house shoes, she went out to inspect the big tall sign and saw its faded paint, some of the letters even peeling. But Raymond could take care of that in half an hour on Saturday and he'd be glad to help.

That long-gone rainy day when Jim and her brother Billy had put it up, that came to mind. There was a dark rainy picture of them leaning proudly against the new sign right here, splashed with mud, in their rain coats holding the shovels, somewhere in her photo book. Jim had built signs for a living too, slaved and saved to buy his wife this little house, until a different rainy day had blown him off of one downtown. And now Billy gone off too.

Standing steady on its stout legs, up above her head, dominating the tiny yard, the sign board read: "Madame Selma – Spiritual Advisor".

Feeling still the new resolve, Selma washed and all and got into her nicest daytime dress, the rose-red one, and put on good shoes and the beaded necklace and ear rings and finally the big amber finger ring that her mother's palsied hand had pressed into her palm as a final parting gift. Thus fitted out, she turned the cardboard sign at last and stepped back out again to get the paper where it lay beside the front porch steps. She sat down in the easy chair in the corner of the tiny parlor by the hall, a few steps from the door. She rose again to pull the parlor's dusty drapes back from the dusty windows. She sat again and found the baseball section of the paper. She saw there was a pack of cigarettes and book of paper matches and an ashtray there on the little table.

She thought she'd better call some of her clients on the phone and say that she was working now again, so they could spread the word around. She craned around to check the ticking hallway clock and thought it was too early yet for that. Well, if anybody happened by, although nobody would, for another hour or so, then she'd take care of that. She'd make some calls at half past eight.

She struggled with herself about the damn cigarettes. Her throat was sore from them and her mouth was tasting awful lately. And yet, she wanted one to calm her nerves. She hadn't worked since way back in July. Would it all come back now? She took one from the crumpled pack and reluctantly put it between her lips. She took the paper matches up. She pulled one of the flimsy matches loose and struck the light.

The little orange and purple flame burst into human shape before her eyes.

"Momma!" Selma cried in shock, staring at the flickering form and face. The cigarette fell unlit to her lap.

"Hey there!" her mother's voice spoke quite distinctly in her head.

"What you doing in there, Momma?" She held the amazing match up close to stare.

"What you think I'm doing? I'm talking to you."

"How come you ain't come back before?" That was all that Selma thought to say in that startling moment, staring in the translucent glowing face that bloomed out of the tiny stick of burning paper. She had struggled hard for two weeks and more to call the lost beloved soul after it passed beyond the veil, and she had never got no answer.

But then the tiny flame puffed out into a tiny coil of smoke that also vanished.

The voice in her head then faded fast away, fading toward some distant place, but she distinctly heard the old woman's exasperated tone in the faint words; "You light a candle, girl."

The silence of the room then seemed to echo round her. In a panic then to get it back, Selma rose and dashed about the house. Candle? What kind of candle? She went from cabinet to cabinet, opening doors and drawers. Here were the Jesus candles, Mary candles, Saint Sebastian candles, skeleton candles, naked man and woman candles, naked man and woman kissing candles, green money candles, golden lucky hands, bleeding hearts, black cats. There were those in tall glasses with shiny colored paper round, and those with molded shapes. Each kind was hidden round the house in some particular kind of place to fit its nature. She opened every box to look inside and ask if these were right.

Reluctantly at last, she went back to her bedroom, lay down on the floor to reach beneath the bed. She sorted round and found the small box in which were hidden things she'd struggled over in July. Reluctantly opening the lid, she knew this wasn't right. Here was the most elaborate bleeding heart that she had ever done, the tall glass jar coated thick inside with smoke, with nothing but a spoon's worth of wax remaining in the bottom by the time she'd given up, the glass all twined about with plaited black and purple ribbons that held within their toils as well a rose of purple silk. This too was wrong, but looking at it set her straight.

Selma walked straight to the kitchen then, looked inside a jumbled drawer to get the paper box of ordinary plain simple household candles that were there for when a fuse got blown or storms blew down the wires so that the lights went out. Looking at one of these short stubby objects in her hand, she almost saw her mother's stubby shape, almost saw there shaped in that wax her mother in a patched and faded dress. Now, that was right.

She went and closed the parlor drapes. She stood the simple candle on a simple saucer on the brocaded table cloth on the round table at the center of the darkened room, pulled up her favorite working chair, straightened up the wick and finally lit it. There in the steady flame, her mother reappeared and frowned.

"Girl!" her mother said. "What took so long? I been waiting and waiting."

"You been waiting! Momma, I conjured you and conjured you when you passed and didn't hear a squeak! Where are you? Are you alright?"

The old woman's voice was coming perfectly clear, exactly that real feeling where you can't be sure if it is in your ears or someplace else. Now her mother spoke with the perfect sound of real surprise; "Huh? You conjured me? How long's it been?"

"Two months and two days. That's long enough, I swear."

"It ain't been that long, has it? Seems like yesterday."

"Momma, where are you? Are you alright?"

"I'se fine dear, just fine." Momma smiled a little smile to reassure her daughter. "We're all just sitting around here like some kind of park, just shooting the breeze. Nice place, trees and flowers and birds and bees and all, real quiet and peaceful. Don't you worry none; your momma's doing fine. Seems like yesterday, though, I swear. I had no idea it's been so long. Hey, that old bursitis in my knees is gone. I feel just fine. But listen here, Billy's got in trouble, ain't he?"

Selma's brother. "You heared about that? Momma, it's awful. Billy killed a man."

"That's what I heared. Where has he gone to?"

"Momma, it was awful but it's not his fault. It's not his fault. He smashed this fella's car up, see, by accident, and then the fella got mad and jumped him. Jumped him with a bat, for God's sake, and Billy was just barely out of bed then, and with his arm in a cast too. Momma, it's not his fault; the fella would have broke his head."

"Stuck the fella with a knife?" the old lady asked.

"That's right." But now Selma was worried that some kind of turmoil of divine judgment might be going on about her brother. She had to ask; "Momma, how did you hear about it?"

Momma shook her head and clucked her tongue. "Girl, that dead fella's here of course. He just showed up. He told me."

"Oh." Well, Selma realized it had been a silly question but the answer was a relief.

"Look here," Momma repeated, "where has Billy gone?"

"San Francisco. He's moved in with Aunt Louise."

"Louise? My sister Louise? No! That woman hates me."

"Not anymore, she don't. She was crying and carrying on at your funeral like a water faucet. She was weeping and wailing about everything. She told me you took a boyfriend of hers one time, and said you owed her money, and all of that, but she forgives you now."

"Oh. Well, okay. That's nice. But you look here. You send my Billy boy a telegram right now. Today."

"Momma, nobody sends telegrams anymore. We've got telephones now, remember?"

"Telephones? Oh yeah. Okay, you call my Billy boy on the telephone today. You tell him to stay there. Understand? You tell him, stay put where he is and he'll be alright. Understand?"

"I understand, Momma. He can't come home?"

"That fella's friends are gonna be looking for him. They'll be watching for him for a long time. They'll catch him if he comes home. You tell him."

"Yes Momma, I'll call him right today and I'll tell him."

"You make him promise. You make him stay put."

"I'll try to make him promise, but he don't listen to me much."

"You tell him I said so."

"I'll say it."

"You tell him I wagged my finger at him . . ." and Momma wagged her finger at Selma ". . . and I told him myself that if he don't stay put, I'm gonna be mad as all tarnation."

"I'll tell him that. I'll make him promise."

"You might be wondering why I'm worried."

"Huh?"

Actually, it had not occurred to Selma to wonder that. Of course the old lady would be worried that some fellas were looking out to kill her boy, of course. But now Selma stopped and thought. Why would that bother a dead person so much? Then the answer came.

Selma said; "Somebody with a name that starts with M. Right? M. Mabel. Marjorie. Morning Glory. Matahari. M. Martha. Martha. Martha Somebody. Right? There's some woman there. Billy's gonna get married in San Francisco and have some kids. Right? What is it; two kids? Three? Three kids, right? No, the last one's twins so its four kids. Right?"

"Selma, you tell him that he's got to leave off gambling. Martha don't like no gambling."

"I'll tell him."

"But she don't mind drinking if he don't drink too much and don't get in no more fights. You can tell him that."

"Okay."

"Is there ships around there? You tell him that Martha's daddy's got a job doing something with the ship docks someplace around there. Maybe he can find her that way."

"I'll tell him. I'll tell him that you said so. That'll keep him busy."

"Well, okay. Girl, I'm proud of you. I feel better now. You do your momma proud."

There was a space of silence then between them. For that first moment of the quiet, Selma felt how glad she was to look into her mother's tender eyes again, but suddenly then she felt the contact slipping from her grasp, felt the woman beyond the mystic looking glass of flame just starting to turn away.

"Selma, honey. I think maybe now I'll get up and take a walk. You know, it's so pretty here, maybe I'm going to just get up and take a walk around and see what's what."

"Momma?"

"Yes?"

Selma hesitated now. She wanted badly to ask something now, but what? Exactly what? She finally simply spoke: "How come they do all that? I mean the men. How come they do all of that evil stuff?"

Momma frowned and sadly shook her head. She answered; "It's just in the blood, honey child. They can't help it. They's got to be proud in their own way, see. Your Jimmy now, he's a real proud man and he's a good one too. He would have done that kind of stuff that Billy done, before he got a wife and kids. And then he would have killed somebody too if he had to do it for you all someways. It's just all in the human blood. There ain't nothing you and me, nor God, nor nobody can do about it. That's just how they got to be. And if they weren't so proud that way, they wouldn't bother messing with kids. It's just the way they care."

"Momma, I miss Jimmy something bad."

"I know you do, sweetheart. And I don't know why he had to go away. But you'll meet up with him again. You will. Love is stronger than everything else. It is. You'll meet him again and you'll be happy. But you got stuff to do there nowadays, see?"

"I got stuff to do here?"

"Girl, you got the work to do. Missis Johnson needs you."

"Missis Johnson! That mean old biddy hen? Why's she got to come around? I don't owe that woman nothing!"

"Honey child, don't you see by now? That old woman's like a child to you. She is. She's just like a child beside you. Somebody's got to help her through and you've got the gift to help."

Now suddenly, being told, Selma saw the truth in it. She had a gift, and if you've got a gift you've got to help out where you can.

"Selma, honey."

"Yes Momma?"

"The door bell's gonna ring."

"I ain't got no door bell."

Suddenly then, the brass knocker outside was pounding on the door. Selma liked to jumped a foot.

"Who's that?"

"Baby, you know who that is."

Selma sat there waiting, looking toward the hall and back. The knocking stopped.

But then the knocking took up once again.

Momma spoke; "Now, you go let her in. And then you do your stuff. Now go ahead."

"But Momma! Are you going to leave?"

"I'll hang around a little while, for you. You can tell her I'm here too, if you want to." Momma laughed. "What's she gonna think of that?"

"But Momma!"

"Honey, you just call me when you want to talk. I'll always listen. And I'll try to come back when I can. Okay?"

The rapping at the front door didn't stop this time, but kept on quite insistently.

So finally Selma stood and pushed her chair back from the table. She had to stretch herself. She looked and saw her mother was still there in the flame. She heard a whisper; "Now go on; do your stuff." And so she very gently lifted the candle and its saucer from the center table, set it very carefully out of the way up on the cupboard as she went out into the hall with many backward looks. She reached the door.

"Selma!" Missis Johnson said, spying through the frosted glass, her voice muffled so she cried out loud. "Selma! Can I come in?"

Selma opened up the door, although she couldn't help but stand there in the way at first.

"Selma, honey! I am so glad! I was just walking by and saw you've turned this here sign around. Can I come in?"

"Missis Johnson, my momma's here."

The woman shook her head emphatically and spoke up to correct her. "Your momma? No, your momma's . . ." But then astonishment grew in her look, slowly overtaking disapproving disbelief. And then the woman reached to remove the spectacles from her face, as though she might hear better that way. But then she shook her head again. "You don't mean? You don't mean?"

"Yeah. But Momma says that you should come on in. What can I do for you today?"

Missis Johnson very warily peered in around the door.