Cutler 01 - Dawn

she was finished with her lesson, and all the time the students were goggling me. I didn't know where to shift my eyes. It was so embarrassing," I said, but I knew Patty couldn't understand just how hard it really was to enter a new school and confront new faces so often. She had lived in Richmond all her life. I couldn't even begin to imagine what that was like: to live in the same house and have your own room for as long as you could remember, to have relatives nearby to hold you and love you, to know your neighbors forever and ever and be so close to them, they were like family. I hugged my arms around myself and wished with all my heart that one day I might live like that. But I knew it could never happen. I'd always be a stranger.
    Now Jimmy and I looked at each other and turned to Paddy, expecting him to tell us to start packing. But instead of looking sour, he suddenly smiled.
    "Where's your ma?" he asked.
    "She's not back from work yet, Daddy," I said.
    "Well, today's the last day she's gonna work in other people's houses," he said. He looked around the apartment and nodded. "The last time," he repeated. I glanced quickly at Jimmy, who looked just as astonished as I was.
    "Why?"
    "What's happening?" Jimmy inquired.
    "I got a new and much, much better job today," Daddy said.
    "We're going to stay here, Daddy?" I asked.
    "Yep and that ain't the best yet. You two are gonna go to one of the finest schools in the South, and it ain't gonna cost us nothing," he announced.
    "Cost us?" Jimmy said, his face twisted with confusion. "Why should it cost us to go to school, Daddy? It's never cost us before, has it?"
    "No, son, but that's because you and your sister been going to public schools, but now you're going to a private school."
    "A private school!" I gasped. I wasn't sure, but I thought that meant very wealthy kids whose families had important names and whose fathers owned big estates with mansions and armies of servants and whose mothers were society women who had their pictures taken at charity balls. My heart began to pound. I was excited, but also quite frightened of the idea. When I looked at Jimmy, I saw his eyes had shadowed and grown deep and dark.
    "Us? Go to a fancy private school in Richmond?" he asked.
    "That's it, son. You're getting in tuition free."
    "Well, why is that, Daddy?" I asked.
    "I'm going to be a maintenance supervisor there and free tuition for my children comes with the job," he said proudly.
    "What's the name of this school?" I asked, my heart still fluttering.
    "Emerson Peabody," he replied.
    "Emerson Peabody?" Jimmy twisted his mouth up as if he had bitten into a sour apple. "What kind of a name is that for a school? I ain't going to no school named Emerson Peabody," Jimmy said, shaking his head and backing up toward the couch. "One thing I don't need is to be around a bunch of rich, spoiled kids," he added and flopped down again and folded his arms across his chest.
    "Now, you just hold on here, Jimmy boy. You'll go where I tell you to go to school. This here's an opportunity, something very expensive for free, too."
    "I don't care," Jimmy said defiantly, his eyes shooting sparks.
    "Oh, you don't? Well, you will." Daddy's own eyes shot sparks, and I could see he was maintaining his temper. "Whether you Like it or not, you're both gonna get the best education around, and all for free," Daddy repeated.
    Just then we heard the outside door opening and Momma start coming down the hallway. From the sound of her slow, ponderous footsteps, I knew she was exhausted. A sensation of cold fear seized my heart when I heard her pause and break out in one of her fits of coughing. I ran to the doorway and looked at her leaning against the wall.
    "Momma?" I cried.
    "I'm all right. I'm all right," Momma said, holding her hand up toward me. "I just lost my breath a moment," she explained.
    "You sure you're all right, Sally Jean?" Daddy asked her, his face a face of solid worry.
    "I'm all right; I'm all right. There wasn't much to do. Mrs. Anderson had a bunch of her elderly friends over is all. They didn't make no mess to speak of. So," she said, seeing the way we were standing and looking at her. "What are you all standing around here and looking like that for?"
    "I got news, Sally Jean," Daddy said and smiled. Momma's eyes began to brighten.
    "What sort of news?"
    "A new job," he said and told her all of it. She sat down on a kitchen chair to catch her breath again, this time from the