Peaches And The Missus

Peaches’ tolerance was tested as her compassion bled, and her rites of passage were blocked. She was a forty-year-old college graduate with a master’s in psychology and lived with an old, bitter white woman as her maid. Even under the umbrella of growing technology and President Lyndon B. Johnson, with all her education, she was just another modern-day slave.

She wondered what he would have thought of her situation if King was alive. As a college student at Tugaloo, she had left campus without her parent’s permission and traveled to Montgomery to march with Dr. Martin Luther King. He had once been her hero, but she discovered that he hadn’t saved her long after he died. She was still prey to the Master’s whim, no matter how much education she had. Her situation drove her mad, and she found herself talking out loud to no one in particular.

“I can hear you whispering to each other,” She screamed while ironing old Missus sheets. “Some of you were asking, and others are begging to see if I have had enough. You are all animals!”

Everybody needed a laugh, and the old Missus testing her patience became her private joke. Behind the glass walls, they thought they could hide behind racial lines, but their invisible thoughts did not escape Peaches. She found out that the old Missus and her great-grandmother were half-sisters.

“I see you!” Peaches said to no one in particular. “You made a huge mistake putting me behind and giving me a clear view of you. Even when you farted in my face, I stayed right there just like my mother and her mother before me!”

Peaches’ parents had been field niggers, and the seventies didn’t bring them any relief. Her mother entered the Master’s house because old Missus got sick, and the Master required servicing. Soon, there were little mixed babies all over the place. They could hardly tell her from the other little white children, except she was not allowed to think for herself.

It had been decades since they were slaves and colored folks were allowed to work, but few could use the expensive education their parents had paid for. Most couldn’t get credit cards over the 200-dollar limit. Poor colored folks lived on minimum wages and little mercy. They had been freed physically but were still enslaved mentally and economically.

Peaches’ mother and her mother’s mother worked for the old Missus before her. That’s how Peaches managed to go to college. It was a favor owed to her great-grandmother by the old Missus` grandmother. It was a family thing.

Peaches went to school beside young Missus, who had married Old Missus` son. Peaches earned a master’s degree in psychology but could only get a job as a maid or slinging beef. This did not seem fair to her, but that’s how colored folks paid off endless debts they had never accrued in Mississippi.

This family Peaches had inherited was mean to each other. They hated everyone, and there was no exception to this rule. Old Missus especially hated her daughter-in-law.

Day in and day out, Old Missus would bark instructions to the young Missus. She ordered her around like a kept woman. Old Missus enjoyed treating young Missus worse than she treated colored folks. She had told others she hated her daughter-in-law above anyone, even the niggers. She also accused her of being the town whore.

“Nothing more than poor white trash,” Old Missus said. “Not good enough for my boy.”

Many days, Peaches found young Missus hiding in one of the spare rooms, crying her eyes out. Her husband hated her because she couldn’t give him a son. She could not even get pregnant. They had taken her to a lot of doctors, but they could not help her to have a child. The only children the young Master had were the ones Peaches gave birth to, and it had not been by her choice.

The young Missus didn’t hate Peaches for giving her husband children; this was the way of the South. But she hated her husband for sleeping with Peaches in their bed. She plotted day and night to make them both pay for hurting her. Peaches remembered the day young Missus called her aside and told her she needed some sleeping herbs. Old Missus couldn’t sleep, and young Missus wanted to still her tongue for a while.

“Peaches,” she had said. “I so desire an evening with my husband. I need to speak to Wayne about putting his mama in a nursing home.”

Peaches smiled, knowing this would never happen, but she felt sorry for the young Missus. After all, she thought they had gone to the same school, and Peaches didn’t care for old Missus.

Peaches had gotten beaten badly when young Missus gave the old Missus too much of the herbs. Luckily, the old bat didn’t die because they would have hung Peaches. When things quieted down, Peaches wanted to get revenge on the young Missus for getting her into trouble, so she told the young Master what had happened, and he told the old Missus.

The next time the young Missus called Peaches aside, Peaches was one step ahead of her. Old Missus was informed, and a special cup of tea was prepared for young Missus. Peaches` anger at young Missus’ pointing finger could not be appeased any other way.

The following day, there was a hustling going on at the Old Missus’ house. The sheriff was there before Peaches woke up. Young Missus was very upset because she had to go to jail for killing her poor husband, who had insisted on drinking the tea which she had sworn she had prepared for herself. Old Missus was the only eyewitness to the crime who testified against her. Her word was law in Bolivar County, Mississippi.

Old Missus nearly died from laughing when the judge gave young Missus twenty-five years to life. She forced Peaches` to get rid of her two children after her son’s funeral. She didn’t care for her colored grandchildren and wanted them out of the house. They had finished high school, and Peaches didn’t see how she could send them to college. Unbeknownst to Peaches, her young Master had provided for the boys’ college education, but the old Missus pretended she was their benefactor. They moved to Washington, D. C., and both attended Howard University. On the other hand, Peaches was forced to stay with old Missus to pay off yet another debt.

Now, all Peaches does is wait for Old Missus to die so that her debt will be paid in full. Funny thing, Old Missus seemed to be getting better after everyone left the house. Every first Sunday of the month, rain or shine, Peaches would take her to the jailhouse to visit young Missus. These visits seemed to give the old woman a lot of energy.

Last week, the warden called. He said that young Missus had killed herself and asked the old Missus what should be done. Old Missus told them to throw her in a ditch for all she cared. Then, she said a funny thing to Peaches.

“Gal, I have lived a long time and know what day it is. I will pay my debt to your grandmammy, and when I am gone, you are free. But don’t bother bringing me any of your herbal tea because I’ll die when I damn well please!”

Peaches smiled at the wonder of Old Missus. You see, she had not been the one that had prepared the tea for young Missus that fateful night. She was just the one who delivered it.

Peaches said under her breath, “You killed your son, old woman. Tricks are not always played on kids. Sometimes, they are played on old bitches too!”

? ljm 01/01/2007