The Help, Page 29

  The door opens and a Negro man stands there looking at me, his white clerical col ar gleaming. I hear Aibileen say, “It’s okay, Reverend.”

  He hesitates, but then moves back for me to come in.

  I step inside and see at least twenty people packed in the tiny living room and hal way. I cannot see the floor. Aibileen’s brought out the

  kitchen chairs, but most people stand. I spot Minny in the corner, stil in her uniform. I recognize Lou Anne Templeton’s maid, Louvenia, next to her,

  but everyone else is a stranger.

  “Hey, Miss Skeeter,” whispers Aibileen. She’s stil in her white uniform and white orthopedic shoes.

  “Should I…” I point behind me. “I’l come back later,” I whisper.

  Aibileen shakes her head. “Something awful happen to Yule May.”

  “I know,” I say. The room is quiet except for a few coughs. A chair creaks. Hymn books are stacked on the smal wooden table.

  “I just find out today,” Aibileen says. “She arrested on Monday, in the pen on Tuesday. They say the whole trial took fifteen minutes.”

  “She sent me a letter,” I say. “She told me about her sons. Pascagoula gave it to me.”

  “She tel you she only short seventy-five dol ars for that tuition? She ask Miss Hil y for a loan, you know. Say she’d pay her back some ever

  week, but Miss Hil y say no. That a true Christian don’t give charity to those who is wel and able. Say it’s kinder to let them learn to work things out theyselves.”

  God, I can just imagine Hil y giving that goddamn speech. I can hardly look Aibileen in the face.

  “The churches got together though. They gone send both them boys to col ege.”

  The room is dead quiet, except for Aibileen and my whispering. “Do you think there’s anything I can do? Any way I can help? Money or…”

  “No. Church already set up a plan to pay the lawyer. To keep him on for when she come up for parole.” Aibileen lets her head hang. I’m sure

  it’s out of grief for Yule May, but I suspect she also knows the book is over. “They gone be seniors by the time she get out. Court give her four years and a five hundred dol ar fine.”

  “I’m so sorry, Aibileen,” I say. I glance around at the people in the room, their heads bowed as if looking at me might burn them. I look down.

  “She evil, that woman!” Minny barks from the other side of the sofa and I flinch, hoping she doesn’t mean me.

  “Hil y Holbrook been sent up here from the devil to ruirn as many lives as she can!” Minny wipes her nose across her sleeve.

  “Minny, it’s alright,” the reverend says. “We’l find something we can do for her.” I look at the drawn faces, wondering what that thing could

  possibly be.

  The room goes unbearably quiet again. The air is hot and smel s like burned coffee. I feel a profound singularity, here, in a place where I’ve

  almost grown comfortable. I feel the heat of dislike and guilt.

  The bald reverend wipes his eyes with a handkerchief. “Thank you, Aibileen, for having us in your home for prayer.” People begin to stir,

  tel ing each other good night with solemn nods. Handbags are picked up, hats are put on heads. The reverend opens the door, letting in the damp

  outside air. A woman with curly gray hair and a black coat fol ows close behind him, but then stops in front of me where I’m standing with my satchel.

  Her raincoat fal s open a little to reveal a white uniform.

  “Miss Skeeter,” she says, without a smile, “I’m on help you with the stories.”

  I turn and look at Aibileen. Her eyebrows go up, her mouth opens. I turn back to the woman but she is already walking out the door.

  “I’m on help you, Miss Skeeter.” This is another woman, tal and lean, with the same quiet look as the first.

  “Um, thank…you,” I say.

  “I am too, Miss Skeeter. I’m on help you.” A woman in a red coat walks by quickly, doesn’t even meet my eyes.

  After the next one, I start counting. Five. Six. Seven. I nod back at them, can say nothing but thank you. Thank you. Yes, thank you, to each

  one. My relief is bitter, that it took Yule May’s internment to bring us to this.

  Eight. Nine. Ten. Eleven. No one is smiling when they tel me they want to help. The room clears out, except for Minny. She stands in the far

  corner, arms clamped across her chest. When everyone is gone, she looks up and meets my gaze for hardly a second then jerks her eyes to the

  brown curtains, pinned tight across the window. But I see it, the flicker on her mouth, a hint of softness beneath her anger. Minny has made this

  happen.

  WITH EVERYONE TRAVELING, our group hasn’t played bridge in a month. On Wednesday, we meet at Lou Anne Templeton’s house, greet with hand-patting

  and good-to-see-yous.

  “Lou Anne, you poor thing, in those long sleeves in this heat. Is it the eczema again?” Elizabeth asks because Lou Anne’s wearing a gray

  wool dress in the heat of summer.

  Lou Anne looks at her lap, clearly embarrassed. “Yes, it’s getting worse.”

  But I cannot stand to touch Hil y when she reaches out to me. When I back away from her hug, she acts like she doesn’t notice. But during

  the game, she keeps looking at me with narrowed eyes.

  “What are you going to do?” Elizabeth asks Hil y. “You’re welcome to bring the children over any time, but…wel …” Before bridge club, Hil y

  dropped Heather and Wil iam at Elizabeth’s for Aibileen to look after while we play bridge. But I already know the message in Elizabeth’s sour

  smile: she worships Hil y, but Elizabeth does not care to share her help with anybody.

  “I knew it. I knew that girl was a thief the day she started.” As Hil y tel s us the story of Yule May, she makes a big circle with her finger to

  indicate a huge stone, the unimaginable worth of the “ruby.”

  “I caught her taking the milk after it expired and that’s how it starts, you know, first it’s washing powder, then they work their way up to towels

  and coats. Before you know it, they’re taking the heirlooms, hocking them for liquor pints. God knows what else she took.”

  I fight the urge to snap each of her flapping fingers in half, but I hold my tongue. Let her think everything is fine. It is safer for everyone.

  After the game, I rush home to prepare for Aibileen’s that night, relieved there’s not a soul in the house. I quickly flip through Pascagoula’s

  messages for me—Patsy my tennis partner, Celia Foote, whom I hardly know. Why would Johnny Foote’s wife be cal ing me? Minny’s made me

  swear I’l never cal her back, and I don’t have the time to wonder. I have to get ready for the interviews.

  I SIT AT AIBILEEN’S KITCHEN table at six o’clock that night. We’ve arranged for me to come over nearly every night until we’re finished. Every two days, a different colored woman wil knock on Aibileen’s back door and sit at the table with me, tel me her stories. Eleven maids have agreed to talk to us,

  not counting Aibileen and Minny. That puts us at thirteen and Missus Stein asked for a dozen, so I think we’re lucky. Aibileen stands in the back of

  the kitchen, listening. The first maid’s name is Alice. I don’t ask for last names.

  I explain to Alice that the project is a col ection of true stories about maids and their experiences waiting on white families. I hand her an

  envelope with forty dol ars from what I’ve saved from the Miss Myrna column, my al owance, money Mother has forced into my hands for beauty

  parlor appointments I never went to.

  “There’s a good chance it may never be published,” I tel each individual y, “and even if it is, there wil be very little money from it.” I look down

  the first time I say this, ashamed, I don’t know why. Being white, I feel it’s my duty to help them.

 
; “Aibileen been clear on that,” several say. “That ain’t why I’m doing this.”

  I repeat back to them what they’ve already decided among themselves. That they need to keep their identities secret from anyone outside

  the group. Their names wil be changed on paper; so wil the name of the town and the families they’ve worked for. I wish I could slip in, as the last

  question, “By the way, did you know Constantine Bates?” but I’m pretty sure Aibileen would tel me it’s a bad idea. They’re scared enough as it is.

  “Now, Eula, she gone be like prying a dead clam open.” Aibileen preps me before each interview. She’s as afraid as I am that I’l scare them

  off before it even starts. “Don’t get frustrated if she don’t say much.”

  Eula, the dead clam, starts talking before she’s even sat in the chair, before I can explain anything, not stopping until ten o’clock that night.

  “When I asked for a raise they gave it to me. When I needed a house, they bought me one. Doctor Tucker came over to my house himself

  and picked a bul et out my husband’s arm because he was afraid Henry’d catch something at the colored hospital. I have worked for Doctor Tucker

  and Miss Sissy for forty-four years. They been so good to me. I wash her hair ever Friday. I never seen that woman wash her own hair.” She stops

  for the first time al night, looks lonesome and worried. “If I die before her, I don’t know what Miss Sissy gone do about getting her hair washed.”

  I try not to smile too eagerly. I don’t want to look suspicious. Alice, Fanny Amos, and Winnie are shy, need coaxing, keep their eyes down to

  their laps. Flora Lou and Cleontine let the doors fly open and the words tumble out while I type as fast as I can, asking them every five minutes to

  please, please, slow down. Many of the stories are sad, bitter. I expected this. But there are a surprising number of good stories too. And al of

  them, at some point, look back at Aibileen as if to ask, Are you sure? Can I really tell a white woman this?

  “Aibileen? What’s gone happen if…this thing get printed and people find out who we are?” shy Winnie asks. “What you think they do to us?”

  Our eyes form a triangle in the kitchen, one looking at the other. I take a deep breath, ready to assure her of how careful we’re being.

  “My husband cousin…they took her tongue out. A while back it was. For talking to some Washington people about the Klan. You think they

  gone take our tongues? For talking to you?”

  I don’t know what to say. Tongues…God, this hadn’t exactly crossed my mind. Only jail and perhaps fake charges or fines. “I…we’re being

  extremely careful,” I say but it comes out thin and unconvincing. I look at Aibileen, but she is looking worried too.

  “We won’t know til the time comes, Winnie,” Aibileen says softly. “Won’t be like what you see on the news, though. A white lady do things

  different than a white man.”

  I look at Aibileen. She’s never shared with me the specifics of what she thinks would happen. I want to change the subject. It won’t do us any

  good to discuss it.

  “Naw.” Winnie shakes her head. “I reckon not. Fact, a white lady might do worse.”

  “WHERE ARE YOU GOING?” Mother cal s from the relaxing room. I have my satchel and the truck keys. I keep heading for the door.

  “To the movies,” I cal .

  “You went to the movies last night. Come here, Eugenia.”

  I backtrack, stand in the doorway. Mother’s ulcers have been acting up. At supper she’s been eating nothing but chicken broth, and I feel

  bad for her. Daddy went to bed an hour ago, but I can’t stay here with her. “I’m sorry, Mother, I’m late. Do you want me to bring you anything?”

  “What movie and with whom? You’ve been out almost every night this week.”

  “Just…some girls. I’l be home by ten. Are you alright?”

  “I’m fine,” she sighs. “Go on, then.”

  I head to the car, feeling guilty because I’m leaving Mother alone when she’s not feeling wel . Thank God Stuart’s in Texas because I doubt I

  could lie to him so easily. When he came over three nights ago, we sat out on the porch swing listening to the crickets. I was so tired from working

  late the night before, I could barely keep my eyes open, but I didn’t want him to leave. I lay with my head in his lap. I reached up and rubbed my hand against the bristles on his face.

  “When’re you going to let me read something you’ve written?” he asked.

  “You can read the Miss Myrna column. I did a great piece on mildew last week.”

  He smiled, shook his head. “No, I mean I want to read what you’re thinking. I’m pretty sure it’s not about housekeeping.”

  I wondered then, if he knew I was hiding something from him. It scared me that he might find out about the stories, and thril ed me that he

  was even interested.

  “When you’re ready. I won’t push you,” he said.

  “Maybe sometime I’l let you,” I said, feeling my eyes close.

  “Go to sleep, baby,” he said, stroking my hair back from my face. “Let me just sit here with you for a while.”

  With Stuart out of town for the next six days, I can concentrate solely on the interviews. I head to Aibileen’s every night as nervous as the first

  time. The women are tal , short, black like asphalt or caramel brown. If your skin is too white, I’m told, you’l never get hired. The blacker the better.

  The talk turns mundane at times, with complaints of low pay, hard hours, bratty children. But then there are stories of white babies dying in arms.

  That soft, empty look in their stil blue eyes.

  “Olivia she was cal ed. Just a tiny baby, with her tiny hand holding on to my finger, breathing so hard,” Fanny Amos says, our fourth interview.

  “Her mama wasn’t even home, gone to the store for mentholatum. It was just me and the daddy. He wouldn’t let me put her down, told me to hold her

  til the doctor get there. Baby grew cold in my arms.”

  There is undisguised hate for white women, there is inexplicable love. Faye Bel e, palsied and gray-skinned, cannot remember her own age.

  Her stories unfold like soft linen. She remembers hiding in a steamer trunk with a little white girl while Yankee soldiers stomped through the house.

  Twenty years ago, she held that same white girl, by then an old woman, in her arms while she died. Each proclaimed their love as best friends.

  Swore that death could not change this. That color meant nothing. The white woman’s grandson stil pays Faye Bel e’s rent. When she’s feeling

  strong, Faye Bel e sometimes goes over and cleans up his kitchen.

  Louvenia is my fifth interview. She is Lou Anne Templeton’s maid and I recognize her from serving me at bridge club. Louvenia tel s me how

  her grandson, Robert, was blinded earlier this year by a white man, because he used a white bathroom. I recal reading about it in the paper as

  Louvenia nods, waits for me to catch up on my typewriter. There is no anger in her voice at al . I learn that Lou Anne, whom I find dul and vapid and

  have never paid much mind to, gave Louvenia two weeks off with pay so she could help her grandson. She brought casseroles to Louvenia’s house

  seven times during those weeks. She rushed Louvenia to the colored hospital when the first cal came about Robert and waited there six hours with

  her, until the operation was over. Lou Anne has never mentioned this to any of us. And I understand completely why she wouldn’t.

  Angry stories come out, of white men who’ve tried to touch them. Winnie said she was forced over and over. Cleontine said she fought until

  his face bled and he never tried again. But the dichotomy of love and disdain living side-by-side is what surprises me. Most are invited to attend the

&nbs
p; white children’s weddings, but only if they’re in their uniforms. These things I know already, yet hearing them from colored mouths, it is as if I am

  hearing them for the first time.

  WE CANNOT TALK for several minutes after Gretchen’s left.

  “Let’s just move on,” Aibileen says. “We don’t got to…count that one.”

  Gretchen is Yule May’s first cousin. She attended the prayer meeting for Yule May that Aibileen hosted weeks ago, but she belongs to a

  different church.

  “I don’t understand why she agreed if…” I want to go home. The ten-dons in my neck have locked tight. My fingers are trembling from typing

  and from listening to Gretchen’s words.

  “I’m sorry, I had no idea she gone do that.”

  “It’s not your fault,” I say. I want to ask her how much of what Gretchen said is true. But I can’t. I can’t look Aibileen in the face.

  I’d explained the “rules” to Gretchen, just like with the others. Gretchen had leaned back in her chair. I thought she was thinking about a story

  to tel . But she said, “Look at you. Another white lady trying to make a dol ar off of colored people.”

  I glanced back at Aibileen, not sure how to respond to this. Was I not clear on the money part? Aibileen tilted her head like she wasn’t sure

  she’d heard correctly.

  “You think anybody’s ever going to read this thing?” Gretchen laughed. She was trim in her uniform dress. She wore lipstick, the same color

  pink me and my friends wore. She was young. She spoke evenly and with care, like a white person. I don’t know why, but that made it worse.

  “Al the colored women you’ve interviewed, they’ve been real nice, haven’t they?”

  “Yes,” I’d said. “Very nice.”

  Gretchen looked me straight in the eye. “They hate you. You know that, right? Every little thing about you. But you’re so dumb, you think

  you’re doing them a favor.”

  “You don’t have to do this,” I said. “You volunteered—”

  “You know the nicest thing a white woman’s ever done for me? Given me the heel on her bread. The colored women coming in here, they’re

  just playing a big trick on you. They’l never tel you the truth, lady.”

  “You don’t have any idea what the other women have told me,” I said. I was surprised by how dense my anger felt, and how easily it sprang

  up.

  “Say it, lady, say the word you think every time one of us comes in the door. Nigger. ”

  Aibileen stood up from her stool. “That’s enough, Gretchen. You go on home.”

  “And you know what, Aibileen? You are just as dumb as she is,” Gretchen said.

  I was shocked when Aibileen pointed to the door and hissed, “You get out a my house. ”

  Gretchen left, but through the screen door, she slapped me with a look so angry it gave me chil s.

  TWO NIGHTS LATER, I sit across from Cal ie. She has curly hair, mostly gray. She is sixty-seven years old and stil in her uniform. She is wide and heavy and