Chapter 3: Ceremonies

Jonah spent some days after Pearl told him that she had picked out the ring thinking of what else a married couple would need. He didn’t want to take two trips to the store. They would need a second chair, a second plate, a knife and fork. He made a mental list. He could read and write, but he still had the memory he had developed before he could read.

Then, Tuesday morning, he hitched Droop to the cart and drove to the store. Another customer was already there, a woman who wasn’t in his class in night school. He went into the other building where the large items were. There were more kinds of chairs than he had expected, and he chose a straight-backed one that looked solid. When he carried it out, the woman was still talking to Juliet.

“Pardon me, ma’am. You aren’t going to buy hardware?”

“No.”

He set the chair down in the hardware section and went back to look at the wardrobes. There were only two kinds of them, and he selected the sturdier style. He carried one out and set it beside the chair. When he came back with another just like it, Juliet was looking at the prices on the tags.

“You buying these?” she asked.

“And this.” He took it out to the mule cart. He took the other two pieces to the cart in two trips. When he went back, he got a plate, knife, fork, and spoon. “Look,” he said when he put them on the counter, “you’re a girl.”

“Last time I looked.”

“A girl gets married; she moves into a new house. What is it she wants to find there?”

“A bed,” she said.

“I have a feather bed, a big one.” That had been his one luxury, and he was happy about it now.

“You are getting low on your deposit.” she said. “This late in the year, the General is happy to give credit to anyone who has used a deposit this far.” She didn’t ask a question, but Jonah heard the question she wasn’t asking.

“I can bring more cash around the next time I sell hams,” he said. He could do it sooner, but he didn’t want to tell anyone he hid money on his grant.

“How many pillows?” she asked. He fetched another.

“Is that all?” he asked.

“It’s never all. We always have more for you at the store. Pearl would really want a bathtub.”

“I have my own branch.” Neighbors who didn’t have a branch running through their grant were always welcome to dip out a pail or two. Getting all the way in might be considered intrusion. Then, too, a gal taking a bath couldn’t object to the grant-holder coming by.

“You asked what I thought,” Juliet said. “Then, too, in cold weather, you can heat the water.” He thought about it, and then got a galvanized tub and took it out to the cart.

When the ring was added to the total, it ran the deposit very low. He had once expected that deposit to last through picking. Well, he could pay more cash in.

Wednesday had been a rainy morning, and Jonah was in his cabin rendering lard. A single man, he owned more pots than most large families. Some of them were simmering on the Franklin stove; others were cooling on the table until it was time to remove the solid lard.

Suddenly, Pearl called from the door.

“It’s hot in here,” she said. “What are you doing?”

“I’m rendering lard.” He handed her the piece of sacking to wipe some of the rain off. “There is more fat in a pig than I put in smoked meats, and fat spoils too fast. Lard doesn’t.”

“You are really going to marry me?”

“Sunday,” he said. “I think that everything is arranged.” Actually, he hoped that her parents had made the arrangements. Weddings had seemed simple when he was only in the congregation.

“And you’ll bust me?”

Jonah couldn’t see what this visit was about. “Pearl, what do you want from me?” he asked.

“It doesn’t sound a happy way to start a marriage ... Would you bust me today?”

“If you want.” He went over to her and began removing the wet dress. She opened the buttons. He returned from hanging it on the hook on the chimney to kiss her. The thought of fucking sweet Pearl, even with the way she was treating it, had him hard.

“You don’t have to do that,” she said. “Just bust me.”

“It’s going to hurt. It can hurt worse.” He used the sacking to dry off her upper body. His mind was churning. At first, he planned to lead her to the bed. Then, he decided that he wasn’t going to hurt her in bed. There were other ways of fucking, and he could wait for those until she no longer thought of pain when he did it. Her first time in bed was going to be pleasure.

Jonah knelt down and eased her drawers down her legs. He wiped off her legs and her lovely ass. Then, he led her over to the table. He took four pots off one end and set them on the floor against the wall. He scooped out two fingers worth of warm lard from one of the pots.

“Bend over and hold onto the other edge of the table,” he said. When she did, he went around the table a bit. He bent over and kissed the back of her neck.

“What?” she asked.

“This will ease it.” He stroked the lard into her slit. As he straightened and circled back around her, he quickly wiped the rest of the lard onto his cock.

Pearl felt the lard fill her. Then she felt him behind her and pressing in. He bent over her and whispered into her ear, “Grit your teeth.” She did and closed her eyes. She felt him straighten and the pressure into her ease. He had his hands on her hipbones.

Then, he was pressing into her, painfully. The pressure and pain grew until she felt some part of her tear. She screeched through her clenched teeth. Her eyes popped open. The pain eased, and she felt Jonah slide deeply into her.

“Don’t straighten up, yet,” Jonah said from behind her. “Tell me when it doesn’t hurt as much.”

It was already hurting less, and as the hurt went. it left behind a feeling that he was filling her where she had never been filled before. She also felt awkward bent over the table. When that felt worse than the pain, she said, “It’s less now.”

The hurt returned a little as he drew out. Then he was pushing into her again while pulling her back by her hips. Soon, both motions speeded up. When he pushed into her hard, one last time, there was a pulsing deep inside her. He grunted and fell across her back. There was one more twinge as he pulled out, and then he was beside her on the table.

When she straightened up, so did he. Jonah took her in his arms and kissed her forehead.

“I’m sorry I hurt you,” he said. She was a lot sorrier, but it was nice of him to say so. Busting a girl was supposed to feel special to a man. It probably did to Jonah, but he said he was sorry about her hurt. Something was running down her leg. It didn’t look like blood. There was a tinge of pink, but it was all mixed up with lard and him. Jonah knelt down again and wiped it off with a wet cloth and then dried her off again.

Jonah looked at the clock. That wasn’t how he ran his life, but there were two of them, now, and Pearl was between the mills and the school. Those ran by clock time.

“School is starting in twelve minutes. Have you eaten dinner?” he asked.

“I left school. I’m going to be a married woman. Mama will have dinner for me. What I really would like is a dip in your branch.”

“Have you ever used a bathtub?” he asked. He pulled it out and splashed what was left of the water in the drinking pail into it.

“No. You use it inside the cabin?”

“I figure ... We need more water.” He dressed and picked up both pails; then, he headed for the branch. By the time he got back with the water, he was a little recovered. Coming in the door and seeing her firm, young teats stirred him some again. The two pails didn’t fill the tub very deep, but Pearl stepped in before the water stopped sloshing around.

“Give me a hand,” she said. He put down both pails, braced, and held out his hand to her. She got her other foot into the tub and used his arm for balance as she lowered herself. She shivered when her ass hit the water. “Cold!”

He put the pails where they belonged and fetched a larger piece of sacking while she splashed. Then, he helped her up and out of the tub. She dried herself and dressed.

He got one kiss before she left. “Sunday,” he said.

“Sunday.”

He caught up on the tasks of making lard. The next day, he decided to stay home from night school. What Pearl would tell her parents about the last afternoon, he couldn’t guess; even if they didn’t suspect, he did not want to talk with them before Sunday.

After supper Saturday, he looked at the tub and decided no. He wore only trousers to the branch. He carried soap there and gave himself a good scrubbing.

Sunday morning, he heated a pot of water to shave the parts of his face that weren’t covered by the beard. He trimmed the beard, as well. After breakfast, he harnessed Droop to the wagon, and headed for the Burton place.

Abe, who had been wary of him on his first visit, was now excited to see him. He got the idea that they were – or at least he was – going to ride the wagon to church. Jonah looked at the bench. It wouldn’t hold four, and he was damned if his bride was going to go to their wedding in the bed of a wagon like a load of cotton.

Titus guessed what he was thinking. “I can ride in the wagon bed with the littles,” he said.

When Pearl, her mother, and Nattie came out, he kissed Pearl for a long time. Then he helped her into the wagon. He helped Maisie in beside her. When he climbed in on the other side, Pearl’s hip was pressed against his. She told him the route to take.

The church was a large frame building – one room with a large platform at one end. When the service started, the platform held two fiddlers and a group of singers as well as the preacher. He was a Negro who talked with a Yankee accent, and they called him “Brother Davis.”

“If you have to go,” Brother Davis said at the end of the service, “you can go. We’re going to have a wedding, though. You all know Pearl Burton. Well, you won’t anymore. She’s going to be Pearl Douglass. Why don’t you two come up here while we get arranged?”

Almost no-one took his offer to leave. Jonah did see two mothers open their dresses and put their babies to suck. Apparently, that wasn’t thought to be proper during church itself. There had been a lot of getting up and sitting down.

“You did bring the ring?” Pearl asked as they walked toward the platform. He nodded and touched the coat where the ring was.

‘Up here” didn’t mean actually on the platform. The service sounded familiar, although he hadn’t paid much attention to others’ weddings. Towards the end, Brother Davis took the ring from him and said what seemed an awfully long prayer over it. Then he gave it back, and Jonah put it on Pearl’s finger.

“You may kiss your bride,” Brother Davis said. Jonah took him at his word, but Pearl didn’t seem interested.

“We go out first,” she whispered as soon as he lifted his lips from hers. They weren’t far out the door, though, when she stopped and turned. As the congregation spilled out the door, many women and girls ran up to kiss Pearl. She introduced them to him. To one woman, who was with child, she said, “He’s a good man, Melly.”

Tie and Maisie were being congratulated by another generation in another cluster on the other side of the door. The littles were running around. Groups left, and they were soon nearly the last. Brother Davis came out the door and turned to lock it. Jonah walked over to hand him two dollar bills.

‘Why thank you, Brother.”

Tie and his family were heading towards the mule cart. By the time Jonah got there, everybody else was in place. He got the reins from the rail, climbed in, and started them toward the Burton grant.

“Only tell me if I turn wrong,” he said.

“I don’t think it’s a compliment to a bride, Pearl,” Maisie said when the cart rolled up to the Burton cabin, “that her husband remembers all those turns all through the wedding.”

The truth was that the wedding hadn’t been that important to him. The important part of the marriage would happen this afternoon.

“But she had told me how to go,” he said. “I remember everything that Pearl tells me.”

Pearl and Nattie went into the cabin with their mother to get the dinner ready. Tie helped him unhitch Droop from the wagon and take him into the stable. They tied him up beside Tie’s mule. The beasts didn’t bother one another.

As he had expected, the meal was built around the small ham. After he’d said that the cooking was tasty and Tie said that the ham was tasty, they didn’t have much to talk about. Maisie said that he had missed class.

“I had things to rake care of,” he said. “Probably Pearl is going to decide tomorrow that I didn’t take care of enough things.”

“Why is that?” Orrie asked.

“Women are particular about their cabins. I look after the grant, but as long as the roof keeps the rain out, I’m satisfied with the cabin.”

“‘Women’? Pearl is a girl.”

“Your sister was a girl. Pearl is married, now. We say married women.” He would leave it to Tie, probably not for years, to explain what part of marriage made a girl a woman.

Pearl mentioned that he had been in the war, and that took Orrie’s attention. He had to be careful of what he said, but Maisie and Tie didn’t mind his talking about killing at the table.

When they had stopped eating, Pearl got up and went over to a corner. She brought back a cake. Tie cut it, they passed down their plates, and he put one piece on each plate. The cake tasted good, and he said so. It was about time to take his bride home, though.

Maisie smiled indulgently at him, but she didn’t seem to notice that her daughter was as eager as he was.

“I’ll get the mule hitched to the cart,” he said. “Pearl, there’s room for what you want to bring. I’ll let you say your good-byes.”

Jonah hitched Droop up to the wagon and drove it to the front door. Tie came out with a bundle. “Pearl’s clothes she’s not wearing,” he said.

“Why don’t you put it in the back of the wagon.”

Tie did. “You take care of my girl, hear?”