Golden Charms

Leah R Cutter

Copyright 2011 by Leah R Cutter

This version published by Knotted Road Press

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Golden Charms

Grandma Loretta was the only one with her own bedroom in the cramped house on Dauphine. When Jolene was five and she asked why, Grandma Loretta just laughed and said, "Darling, I ain't alone in there. There's ghosts stacked up to the rafters."

After that, whenever Jolene walked by the open door to Grandma Loretta's room, her feet stuck to the scarred wooden floor and she tarried, peeking in, trying to see some ghosts for herself. All she ever saw was Grandma Loretta's clean room. A thin bed lay along one wall, covered in a quilt made up of old flannel work-shirts and baby blankets, the stitching not neat but zigzagging. In the far corner, next to the window overlooking the backyard, an old wooden rocking chair held vigil. Shelves covered in knickknacks and a big tallboy dresser took up the rest of the space.

But no ghosts.

Jolene's sisters, Evelyn and Roberta, couldn't see ghosts either, but because they were older, they'd heard the stories. They kept Jolene up half the night telling her about the wicked banker who drown his lover then hung himself just down the block, who was always asking Grandma Loretta for forgiveness. Or the jockey who got caught throwing races and had been gunned down next door and wanted to run his last race over and over again.

They didn't want to see ghosts. Said they was too scared. They were happy they didn't have the gift, that they weren't born with a veil.

It took all of Jolene's courage and most of a week to step across the threshold of Grandma Loretta's room to ask. It wasn't that she wasn't welcome. She just wasn't sure she wanted to know the answer. Grandma Loretta would tell her the truth. "Do I have the gift? Will I see ghosts sometime?"

Grandma Loretta beckoned Jolene to come further into the room. She stood the girl before her and gripped her face between bony hands, turning it this way and that in the late afternoon sunshine filtering through the windows. "Hmph," Grandma Loretta said after a bit. "I might be seeing something in you. Tell me what you see," she said, indicating the rest of her room.

Jolene bit her lip and looked around, feeling awkward and a little scared. She didn't see anything. Nothing stood out in the room: it had a wood floor black and painted and scraped like all the others; it felt cozy and warm like the tiny kitchen where they all got under each other's feet and ate together; it was welcoming like the front porch where Mama and Papa sat in the evenings, talking to the neighbors. When Jolene turned to tell Grandma Loretta, she noticed a golden charm hanging around her neck.

Without asking, Jolene crawled into Grandma Loretta's lap, kneeling up on the hard wood of the chair. Grandma's white shirt felt slick under her palms. She tried to pick up the tiny golden key but it kept slipping through her fingers, so she just patted her grandma's neck, where the collar was open. "This. This is something." Grandma's skin was worn soft with age, and the scent of her lily of the valley perfume rose up around Jolene.

"Oh darling," Grandma Loretta said, wrapping her arms around Jolene and rocking them both back and forth. "My darling dear." The straw-stuffed cushion made a crinkling noise as they shifted back and forth, the only sound in the heavy afternoon air.

Jolene didn't know what she'd said, but she knew it was important.

She also knew she'd made Grandma sad.

"Do I have the gift?" Jolene finally asked again.

"That you do. But ya'll are gonna have to deal with the living, not the dead."

* * *

Reverend Stevens was the next person Jolene met who wore a charm. He was a tall black man, gaunt and old, with rivers of wrinkles next to his eyes, his hair cropped short and all gray. He'd moved to New Orleans to be with his grandkids.

Jolene saw the reverend's charm when he stood outside greeting everyone coming in: it was shaped like a tiny keyboard. They learned during the service that Mr. John, their old choir director, was leaving, and Reverend Stevens was taking over. He played a beautiful introduction to the first hymn on the church's organ: thrilling and solemn at the same time, music Jolene felt in her soul.

Reverend Stevens stood beside Reverend Jefferson outside shaking hands and saying good-bye as people streamed out. More than one person told Reverend Stevens how wonderful his music was. Jolene waited while Grandma Loretta told him how happy she was that he'd come to the church, and then asked the question burning inside her. "Why are you a reverend? Why not just play music?"

Grandma Loretta tutted at her, but the reverend took Jolene's small hand in both of his. "God called me first," he said solemnly. "I'm happy doing both."

"I don't know what's gotten into you, child, asking the reverend that kind of question," Grandma Loretta told Jolene, taking her hand and turning her aside as the reverends greeted the next person.

"He has a charm," Jolene explained. "A tiny keyboard."

Grandma Loretta was quiet for the first two blocks during their walk home. Then she called Jolene to her. They walked slowly behind the rest of the family, so they could talk privately.

"Your gift must be to see the fate of the living," Grandma Loretta told her. "But you shouldn't tell the person what you see."

Jolene nodded, trying to swallow over the lump she felt in her throat. "I'll try," she said. She couldn't promise, though. The words had seemed to burst out of her. "So what does your key mean?" she asked.

"What did I just say about asking a person about their fate?" Grandma Loretta told her angrily.

"Please?" Jolene asked. She was really curious.

"Never you mind," Grandma Loretta hushed her. "That's my business with the ghosts."

* * *

Jolene had just turned fifteen when she met Buddy, Roberta's new boyfriend. He was as wide as the door to the house: if they had one of the shutters closed he had to turn sideways to get in. A gold cap covered one of his front teeth and he wore a big gold necklace with a medallion that had his name scrolled across it. He had his hair done in tiny braids, front to back, all tied off.

He also wore a golden charm, like Grandma Loretta's and Reverend Stevens' and others. Only it was in the shape of a flute.

Roberta and Buddy sat on the stoop one evening while both Mama and Papa were working late, talking with neighbors and hoping to catch a cool breeze, when Buddy mentioned playing in a second-line.

Jolene interrupted to ask, "Ya'll play the flute, don't you?"

Buddy stared at Jolene like she'd grown crawfish tails in her new weave. Even with his dark coloring Jolene could tell he'd grown a little pale. "I ain't never played the flute!" Buddy shouted at her.

Jolene stood up and started backing away, one step at a time, off the front porch and into the house. Buddy followed after her, still yelling. "That ain't a man's piece. That's for women and kids. I play a drum. I keep the heart of the line."

"Young man," Grandma Loretta said, thumping her cane as she rose slowly from where she'd been resting on the couch. "What do you think you're doing?"

Buddy went from spitting mad to contrite in seconds. "Sorry, ma'am," he said, visibly shrinking. "It's just Jolene here was accusing me of playing the flute."

"I just asked—"

Grandma Loretta glared at Jolene like she was the one in trouble. And she was, now, for talking back.

Jolene knew she was right, though. Buddy sometimes played the flute, in secret. She could see it, a ghostly image, bent over, beside him. However, it wasn't manly enough as far as he was concerned, and it shamed him something awful.

"I'm sorry," Jolene said. "I'll never ask again."

"That's good," Buddy said, his words soft, his stare hard and mean.

"Now ya'll kiss and make up," Grandma Loretta directed. She raised her cane and indicated they should get closer.

When Buddy kissed Jolene's cheek she saw even more. He had talent with the flute. He needed to fly free above the others, lead the band as they marched. The drum made his feet sink into the ground, so he trudged through the earth, always loosing time. His captain was about to kick him off.

Buddy was never going to follow his heart, though.

Once Buddy left, Grandma Loretta warned Jolene about her gift again. "You can't just speak out. You gotta dance up to it."

"Ain't it better to know?"

"Not everyone will thank you for it," Grandma Loretta said kindly. As Jolene made her way back to the kitchen to fetch Grandma some iced tea, she heard her mutter, "Rather deal with the dead any day."

* * *

After Buddy, Jolene ran away from anyone she saw who had a charm. She didn't want her gift, didn't want to know anyone's path. It wasn't as if the few people she told had wanted to know.

Jolene still spent time in the mirror looking at her reflection in all kinds of light, trying to catch a glimpse of her own golden charm, but she never did see any. She was always both sad and relieved at her failure.

One fall day when the heat wasn't too bad and the wind from the Mississippi blew steady and strong, keeping things cool, Jolene called in sick to Jimmy's bar and restaurant then caught a series of busses all the way to the French Quarter, more than a few miles from their house in the Bywater.

Fortunetellers traditionally set up tables in Jackson Square, on the side closest to the big, fancy church. Jolene walked past palm readers, tarot readers, even a crystal fairy reader. None of them were anything special. She didn't know how she knew: she just did. None of them had a gift, not like hers. Plus, there was only one other black person there—ripping people off by giving false hope seemed to be mainly for white people.

Jolene hadn't come to the Quarter with anyone: she hadn't told anyone what she was doing. She knew Grandma Loretta wouldn't have approved. Her sisters didn't understand why she couldn't tell them their fortune, or anything about their fate: it seemed to only be certain people who had a true path. Everyone else just rambled along doing the best they could.