The Mighty Miss Malone: Chapters 8–21

Every Friday after school the hooligans get even with each other and meet to fight.

“First you will apologize for hurting my brother, then you’re going to apologize for talking about my father, who did actually eat some bugs but did it for a very selfless and noble reason, then for calling Mrs. Needham a cow, then for mispronouncing my name on purpose, then for that horrible poem, which wasn’t anything close to being a limerick.”

But most of all I loved knowing that when something was happening to someone, I could do more than wring my hands, I could strike back!

Besides, it was just a lucky punch, I’ll bet you anything the next time I see him he’s going to pulverize me.

Mrs. Ashton said, “Oh, those two! They’re just giddy with excitement about the fight!”

“Pedro Two-Toes Torres is pitching. Grand Rapids has some southpaw named Lewis.”

“Think about a strange dog, Deza. They let you know if they’re friendly or not, right?”
“Yes.”
“Unless they’re rabid they give you signals that if you get any closer you’ll end up hurt. Their ears will go back, their fur will stand up, they’ll show their teeth.”

“There are perch in the river too.”
“True, but Steel Lung knows a spot where they’re practically jumping into the boat.”

“Deza, you know I can’t tell you that. We’ll have to endure.”

Jimmie came in and slumped down beside me.

He was too small to be my father. He was bony and scraggly-looking.
His hair was snarled and he had a stubbly beard.

“But I have noticed my Dar Dawt, the Gorgeous, Gregarious, Glamorous Deza, hasn’t found fit to form the flimsiest conversation concerning the coming fisticuffs.”

“So, Dar Dawt, why aren’t you on the bandwagon about Joe Louis?”

“Good, we’re agreed. I hope we can also agree that people tend to leave a trail as to where they’ve been and from that trail you can tell where they’re going, right?”

“Very good, Dar Dawt, I was waiting for you to do that, which is why I prefaced this by telling you that, over time, you know whom you can have faith in, right?”

“And it’s a fact, Deza, Jimmie, sometimes getting educated on a subject has a lot in common with being manipulated. The main difference is that you know to trust who’s guiding you.”

“Steel Lung used to say it was the only place where a black man could hit a white man and not get lynched for it.”

I agree, it’s silly to put so much importance on one fight, but you have to keep in mind that this fight is the one chance we have to show the Nazis, and some of our white brethren here in America as well, that we are people too.

It’s ironic, but Joe will show we’re human by savagely beating the stuffing out of someone.

What if this depression goes on for so long that you can’t find work even in Flint?

So you tell me, you tell me how can I come home empty-handed knowing that that sassy, smart, beautiful, charming little girl...my Mighty Miss Malone...is slowly rotting away on the inside and we can’t afford to have her teeth looked after, we can’t even get them pulled?

When we sat to eat Mother said, “Jimmie, Deza, I’ve been thinking, we haven’t heard anything from your father and to be quite frank, I’m starting to get a little worried.”

I grabbed Mother’s arm and we tussled back and forth over the letter.

Charles has been ordered to take an unheard-of twenty-five-percent cut in his salary. He’s a man of integrity and refuses to accept this.

Speaking of which, how are Ernest and your young ones? Please forgive me for waiting so long into this correspondence to inquire after their well-being.

Has this horrible depression devastated your family as much as it has devastated ours?

She missed an entire year for some cause or other. She is a competent worker so I relented and rehired her.

She missed an entire year for some cause or other. She is a competent worker so I relented and rehired her.

Don’t answer this missive, I shall write from Burton-on-Trent which is geologically located in England where we will be the guests of Lady Chigwell for a very long time.

“No, dear, we rent this place furnished. Pretty much all of this belongs to the landlord.”

I sat down, took the stub of a black crayon and wrote, My dearest sister Clarice…

I could see where my dear Clarice got her kind and loving nature, her mother was close to blubbering too.

You’ve been good tenants, this is just as hard on me as it is on you. But I got kids that like eating too, and I got three families who’re gonna pay me four times as much to live here as you do.

Go hire a lawyer or call the police, but until I hear something from a shyster or a cop, you’re out of here.

At three-thirty Mother trudged up the sidewalk, looking like she’d walked a hundred miles.

Mother was so mortifried that I thought she was going to swoon.

The bed had fancy blankets and fancy pillows and the lampshades were pink and frilly and everything matched, even the curtains!

Sitting on the desk was a bunch of exquisite different-color little bottles with gold tops and rubber bulbs held to their sides by a little skinny piece of hose, looking like gigantic diamonds or rubies!

“You must be kin to Marvin or that sad excuse for a woman.”

“Get right into the shantytown. You’ll need somewhere to rest at least one night.”