Page 17 of The Deadly Candies

Sandra touched Gladys as her eyes teared.

“I’m learning a lot about Mama,” Sandra said.

Ms. Gladys handed her a key. “Here you go. It opens all doors.”

Sandra tried it, and it worked. She stepped into the storage room, her eyes immediately drawn upward. There it was—the trapdoor to the attic. All those years running in and out of this room, and she’d never noticed it. The questions swirled in Sandra’s mind, her thirst for knowledge growing.

Ms. Gladys gave her a rundown of the supplies and deliveries, then ushered her out to the cozy coffee and tea area where regulars read the newspaper. Finally, they toured the kitchens, where a staff of six—mostly young people in need of work—kept the ovens humming. Sandra promised to honor her mother’s legacy, her heart swelling with pride and determination.

* * *

An hour later,Ms. Gladys declared her legs were burning. “Time to listen to my body and go home,” she said, leaning heavily on her cane. Daphne agreed to take her, but Sandra wanted to stay behind. She needed to meet the staff, explore her mother’s office, and get a feel for how the business ran.

“Come back at seven when the bakery closes,” Sandra told Daphne, hugging Ms. Gladys tightly before seeing them to the door. The bell above the entrance jingled as they left, and Sandra returned to the café.

For the next few hours, she worked alongside three staff members behind the counter, slipping back into the rhythm of the bakery like she’d never left. The familiar clatter of trays, the espresso machine’s hum, and customers’ warm laughter made it feel like home. She knew most of the workers—some had been there since she was a child—and being among them was like reuniting with family.

The bell chimed again, pulling Sandra from her thoughts. She was counting change for a customer, her fingers moving quickly over the bills and coins. When the customer walked away, she tucked the cash into the register and looked up.

A man stood in front of her, his presence commanding the space between them.

Sandra’s eyes lifted to his face, and her breath caught. It washim—the man from the funeral. His dark sunglasses were gone now, revealing sharp, piercing eyes that seemed to see straight through her. He wore a crisp white shirt rolled up at the sleeves, the faintest hint of cologne cutting through the sweet scent of pastries.

“Hi, Sandra. Remember me?” he asked, his voice low and smooth, like honey over gravel.

And suddenly, she did. The memory hit her like a flashbulb—bright, startling, and impossible to ignore.

8

Butts, Mississippi – February 1949

“Time to rise!”

Kathy peeled her eyes open. Big Mama’s face hovered in the doorway, her smile warm as grits on a cold morning. The feather bed beneath Kathy felt like heaven—soft, forgiving, a far cry from the bus she had slept on when she travelled in. If she’d known sleep could cradle her like this, she’d have traded her late-night scribbling for it sooner.

“Git up, chile. We gotta feed the boys ’fore the rooster hollers,” Big Mama said, her voice honey-thick with Mississippi rules. The door clicked shut, leaving Kathy alone with the pitch-black window. No streetlamps here, no clatter of garbage trucks—just the deep, breathing dark of the Delta. Back home, her mama would’ve yanked the covers off by now, scolding herlazy boneswhile bacon sizzled. Here, the quiet pressed down like a quilt.

She dragged herself up, her body still humming from yesterday’s laughter—Ely’s jokes, the cousins’ stories, the way the kerosene light had danced on Big Mama’s face. But as she shuffled down the hall, the ache for Carmelo hit her like a fist.Where was he?The questions gnawed:Did he know she’d been shipped south? Did he care?She bit her lip hard, trapping the tears.

Downstairs, voices tangled in the kitchen. Kathy froze on the creaky step.

“Start her in the fields this week. Show her how we survive,” Big Mama was saying. “Come sunup, take her to town to get the right clothes. I seen them fancy dresses her mama sewed her up in Harlem. Girl can’t be a princess picking peas or cotton. Jensen’s expect her Wednesday.”

“Yes’m,” Ely mumbled.

“You got a problem with my plan for her, boy?”

“N-no’m. Just… Kathy’s smart.I ah, just thought, she went to a really fancy school up in Harlem. We need a teacher. Maybe instead of her sharecropping, she could get the school up and going again for the kids?—”

Big Mama’s laugh cut sharp. “Ain’t noschoolin’in lean times. Land don’t care ’bout no book smarts. She works like the rest.”

Kathy’s heart dropped to her feet.Sharecropping?Her hands—soft from penning letters and flipping library pages—weren’t meant for cotton thorns and calluses. She nearly bolted back upstairs, her mind racing:Jump out the window. Hitch to the train tracks. Find Carmelo’s Queens home, slip into his window, bed, and let his promises about visas and steamships to Sicily then Africa, drown out this nightmare.

“Kathy!” Big Mama’s holler snapped her back into her dreadful reality. “Git in here ’fore the biscuits burn!”

She stumbled into the kitchen, eyes burning to suppress tears. Ely stood at the sink, coffee cup in hand, his gaze darting to her like he knew her torment. Big Mama had earned her name right. She was over six foot tall, and very shapely. Her wide hips swayed with every move she made in her flour-dusted apron. She rolled dough with hands that’d buried five husbands whose backs were broken over the hard living.

“Apron on,” Big Mama ordered. “These men ain’t gonna feed themselves.”

---