The Presence by T. Davis Bunn Page A

that. Good for those times, anyways. Worked in a grocery store. All these fine black folks’d come in. Lawyers, doctors—mostly wives but some gentlemen too—in all their fancy white-man’s clothes. Wouldn’t never touch nothin’. They’d walk down the aisles, point out what they wanted, or jes’ stand there at the counter and name it, brand and all.
    â€œOld man Thompson—that’s the fella what owned the store—he’d have this big ol’ wad of bills in his pocket and the change on the counter in a cigar box. I’d stick all the groceries in a wicker basket and carry ’em home for ’em, walkin’ behind them fancy folks. Got ‘bout a dollar a day in tips. Big money for a poor boy back then.”
    The man kneaded the steering wheel with stubby work-worn hands. “Sounds like nothing now, don’t it. Lemme tell you how hard it was. Two years ‘fore I started with the ice company—lessee, I was twelve then. Biggest thing in my life was when my brother got home; he was six years older’n me. He’d count his pennies from begging or piece-work or haulin’ coal, whatever. Wasn’t no such thing as a steady job. Didn’t have no daddy. We needed forty-five cents for him, me and momma to go down and eat our fill of soup. Kitchen down the street sold big bowls of soup with a hunk of bread for fifteen cents. When I was twelve, there was so many people out there waiting for soup some days, we stopped traffic. Had to have a policeman there to hold the crowd back. Lotsa people waiting for the kitchen to open meant a lotta work that day. Yessir. After that and the ice work that grocery job was easy street.”
    â€œMister, something about the way you say that scares the dickens outta me.”
    The man chuckled. “Reckon it could scare a sensible fella. If’n it came once, sure as the sun’s gonna rise tomorrow, it could come again. Problem with this world is there ain’t too many sensible people ‘round…. Hey, look over here,” he said, returning to his tour-guide role. “That’s the J. Edgar Hoover Building. Used to be a store there called S. Kann’s. That and Lansburgh were the two big department stores back then. And right there, between ninth and tenth on Pennsylvania Avenue, was what they called Market Place. Worked there for a while too. They’d bring the fruits and vegetables in there by horse, set up these little stalls, and sell there all day.”
    TJ inspected the front of several high-rise buildings for a sign of the past, but found none. “You were working two jobs?”
    â€œTwo, sometimes three. Momma got sick ‘bout then, and doctors gotta be paid.”
    How long, oh, Lord? TJ shook his head, feeling admiration for the quiet strength of this man. The matter-of-fact way he spoke of hardship made TJ feel smaller than the less fortunate of his people. His people. How seldom he thought of them in that way. He had lived a truly sheltered life, shielded from the horrors that this man and so many others had suffered. He was thankful he had never had to face such trials, but knew that because of it, he lacked something. Something only found through the pain of such a life. A fountain of strength drawn from depths he had never fathomed within himself.
    â€œMy house didn’t have no electricity,” the driver went on. “No furnace neither. Had a coal-fire stove in every room. Had a waist-high ice box; you stick your block of ice in there, and your perishables on the ice. Summertimes you wrap newspaper ‘round the ice, keep it from melting so fast.
    â€œDidn’t have no hot water, no bathroom,” the man continued. “Cold water faucet, one for the whole house was all there was. Took a bucket of water out with us when we went to the shed, washed it down good. Hot water we cooked up over the stove. Didn’t have much. Knew we were poor. But we