Page 80 of Under the Tulip Tree
“Mm-hmm. That’s just how I remember her.” She lifted the picture up to the morning light streaming in from the window. “This must’ve been taken after I was sold.”
My stomach knotted. Now was the time to offer a long-overdue apology for the sins of my family, yet what could I say?
I stood. “I don’t know if you can—”
Her sorrowful eyes met mine, and a sob brought an end to my inadequate speech. Before I knew it, a flood of tears, remorse, and pain came forth, and I was powerless to stop them from consuming me. I stood there and cried as I’d never cried before. Wailing for six-year-old Frankie. For her mammy. For myself.
I sobbed louder when I felt her frail arms go around me, tugging me into a fierce embrace in the same way Grandma Lorena had the previous evening. We wept together there in her tiny living room, a former slave and the white offspring of her worst enemy. I don’t know how long we remained there, but even after the heart-wrenching sobs ceased, we stood, arms around each other.
When her grip on me loosened and she pulled back, red-rimmed eyes met mine. “Tears wash the windows of the heart.”
I sniffled and nodded.
She settled back in her chair and pulled a handkerchieffrom the front of her dress. I had need of my own handkerchief tucked in my purse, but I couldn’t move. I had to know. I had to know what she thought of me.
“You have every right to hate me and my family.”
She blew her nose again, wiping it this way, then that. When she looked up, I recognized the expression in her eyes. I’d seen it the previous day, when she told of forgiving Burton Hall.
“Hatred is a powerful thing. It can turn a person into something they ain’t. It don’t matter what color your skin is.” She picked up the photograph of Sadie, her eyes narrowed. “I hated that woman. I hated her with every bone in my body. For years I let that hatred feed my soul. Every white person I met felt it. Even after Mr. Waters bought me and gave me a comfortable life, I hated. I ’spect my life might not have been so hard had I let go of the hate. Sam and Miz Illa talked about God and his love, and I learned to read the Bible myself, but that hatred never really left me. I hid it, I suppose.”
She looked at the picture again, and I noticed she held it in her gnarled hand. “It wasn’t until I saw Burton in that hospital, his arm cut off and looking so pitiful, that forgiveness finally took hold inside me. Them Federals was planning to take him away to prison for who knows how long, and there weren’t nothin’ he nor his mama coulda done about it. It was as though I finally saw him as he was—a man who had no control over his situation, just as I’d been the day Miz Sadie beat me.” She shook her head. “He looked as helpless as anewborn baby that last time I saw him. I’ve often wondered what happened to him.”
“Grandma could only remember that he served in the army.”
Her eyes on the photograph, she said, “When I forgave him—when I actually said the words—all that hatred slipped away. Even the hatred I’d carried so long for Miz Sadie. It was gone. I remember that feeling like it was yesterday. Like I dropped something heavy that had weighed me down for too long. Seeing her face now, all these long years later, don’t bring it back up.”
She laid the picture in her lap and met my gaze. “God healed the scars inside me, Rena. I could never hate you nor your family.”
I fell to my knees at her feet. “They don’t deserve your forgiveness. Sadie probably never admitted what she’d done was wrong.”
“Maybe not, but that’s between her and her Maker. I won’t let hatred steal away the peace I have in my heart. You can’t let it steal yours either.”
I clasped her crippled hand in both of mine. “I’m sorry, Frankie,” I whispered, tears falling down my cheeks. “I’m sorry for what a member of my own family did to you. I’m ashamed to know they’re responsible for this.”
A look of peace settled over her features as she held up her hand. “God will heal these ol’ fingers someday.”
“How can you believe that? He hasn’t done it yet.”
“Chile, you remember the day you come to my door the first time?”
I nodded.
“What did I tell you?”
I thought back to that day. I’d been so nervous. Frankie had come to the door and said something I still didn’t understand. “You said the Lord wouldn’t let you go home until you talked to me.”
She smiled. “Nothin’ surprises the Lord. He’s got a plan and a purpose for everything. We just have to wait on him.”
I stared at her. “You believe God brought me here... on purpose?”
She chuckled. “It sure couldn’t be a coincidence, now could it?”
I knew she was right. “But why?”
Her gnarled fingers grasped mine. “For this. If I’d told my story to anyone else, that’s all it would’ve been to them. A story. Butyoucame to my door, and lookee what the Lord done.”
I still wasn’t sure I understood, but I was grateful she didn’t hate me or my family.
