Mama always said to keep her head down and keep focused on the end result: a high school diploma. But now Louise wasn’t so sure. What would come next? What was the point of enduring all of these daily humiliations? She dropped her chin to her chest and inspected the toes of her scuffed brown shoes. Small, careful repair seams were visible on her gray knee socks upon close inspection. Her family needed more money and if she stopped going to school, she could do something to help.
Her parents had been insistent that she stay in school, saying they didn’t want Louise to take a job away from someone who really needed it, but Louise was getting impatient. A loose sheet of paper covered in quadratic equations lay on the ground by her toe and she kicked it away.
AFTER WASHING AND drying the dinner dishes that evening, Louise and Emily settled in at the kitchen table to work on their homework. Mama sat alongside them, mending in hand. When Louise looked at the long line of computations to be calculated, she took a deep breath. “I’m not going to school anymore.”
Mama continued slipping her needle in and out of the skirt she was hemming, but Emily’s pencil stopped moving across her composition book as she stole a look at her sister. “What do you mean?” she asked.
Louise’s heart hitched in her chest as she forced herself to look at Mama. “I’m failing chemistry and possibly a couple of other classes, all because of my teachers. They don’t want me to graduate.”
Without lifting her gaze from her needle, Mama said, “Since when does what they want dictate what you want?”
“It’s just starting to feel like I’m wasting time in school. Ever since I set that new national record in the broad jump in December, Coach Quain says my Olympic prospects are looking better and better. I could end up going to Los Angeles to compete. Why do I need to know how to solve equations or analyze Shakespeare?” She spoke quickly, pointing at her battered copy of Hamlet. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”
Papa had come back inside now, the sweet smell of his pipe trailing behind him. He leaned against the door, his face lost in the shadows. “You think your mama has wanted to clean other people’s houses for the last twenty years?” His voice sounded tired but firm. “You think I want to tend to other people’s lawns, weed their flowerbeds? You’ve been going to school all this time so you can do better than us.”
Louise shuddered and licked her lips, steeling herself for what she needed to say. “The best thing I can do for myself is compete in the Olympics.”
Sorrow flashed across Mama’s face and she sighed. “But what makes you so sure you’ll qualify?”
“I can do it. I know I can.”
Papa shook his head. “That’s an awful big bet. Stick with school. Get that diploma and you can go on to become a teacher, a nurse. You’re almost done. Why quit now?”
Exasperation ballooned inside Louise’s chest. There were no options for a black girl like her in nearby colleges, and she had no desire to leave her family and move away to attend a farther one. “I’ve been thinking about this a lot, and I’m not going to be able to go to college. We simply can’t afford it.”
At that, her parents quieted and shame filled Louise. “I can make it to Los Angeles,” she whispered. “I’ll make you all proud of me.”
Mama rubbed her eyes in exhaustion. “We’ve been proud of you. Being a good daughter and sister is enough.”
“Well, it’s not enough for me.” Louise pushed her chair back and headed for her bedroom, leaving a silent kitchen in her wake.
THE NEXT MORNING Louise rose and dressed in a clean navy-blue skirt and matching knee socks, a cream-colored midi blouse, and a light gray wool cardigan that her grandmother had knitted for her. While her brother and sisters scrambled around the house, washing themselves, dressing, and eating, she made a pot of oatmeal and doled out bowls of it for each of them. After Mama and Papa left for work, she called goodbye to her siblings, cleaned the breakfast dishes, straightened the kitchen, and then made her way over to Dr. Conway’s house late enough that the household would be up and running, but early enough so that she could catch Mrs. Conway before she left the house on any errands or social calls. When she reached their house she paused, checking to see if Papa was anywhere nearby, but there was no sign of him so she circled around to the kitchen door at the back of the house and knocked.
Miss June, the housekeeper, opened the door. “Why aren’t you at school?”
“I need a job.”
Miss June harrumphed. “Your parents know about this?”
“Mama’s job could go away any day now. I need to line something up.”
“Louise Stokes, you’ve always been a stubborn girl. Why, I remember you in Sunday school when you drew that picture of the nativity scene. You remember what I’m talking about?” Miss June chuckled. “You drew that little round man in the corner of your nativity scene picture and when Miss Hayes asked you who it was, you said, ‘Round John Virgin, ma’am.’ She tried to correct you and sang you the correct lyrics of ‘Silent Night,’ but you refused to budge. Not until the reverend came down and showed you the lines in the hymnbook and explained to you what ‘Round yon virgin mother and child’ meant did you back down.” She laughed and shook her head, repeating, “Round John Virgin.”
Louise gave a grudging nod. “I still think it’s strange that everyone cared so much about what was in my nativity scene.”
Miss June’s chest stopped heaving with silent laughter and she became serious. “Miss Hayes wanted to make sure you understood that scene. She didn’t want you going about your life with such a mistake and embarrassing yourself in school. She knew every opportunity to teach a colored student the correct way to say something was important for when you would be out in the real world someday. She didn’t want you to look ignorant when you went off to school with white students.”
“But I was just a little kid.”
Miss June shook her head. “Still stubborn as always, I see. Well, c’mon, let me take you in to see Mrs. Conway, but don’t you go telling either of your parents that I had anything to do with this scheme of yours.”
They found Mrs. Conway perched at her walnut desk, several letters fanned in front of her. If she thought it odd that Louise wasn’t at school, her kind face gave away nothing. “Why, Louise, what a treat to see you this morning. What can I do for you?”
After Louise explained that she was looking for work, Mrs. Conway tapped her perfectly rounded fingernails on her address book for a moment as she thought. “You could try Mrs. Clark, over on Fairview Avenue. I believe she mentioned needing a girl when I saw her at a Women’s Club meeting last Tuesday. Her young daughters will keep you busy. Tell her I sent you.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
“If Mrs. Clark has found a new situation, try Mrs. Mason over on Stone Street.”
“Yes, ma’am. Thank you.” As Miss June led Louise through the kitchen to the back door, the older woman said, “Mrs. Clark could be good, but don’t even think about Mrs. Mason. She’s mean and her husband’s even worse. If Mrs. Clark don’t work out, come back here, I got more suggestions, though the pay won’t be so good. It’s tough out there.”