Synopsis: “Inside the Shadows” is a novel about a black girl (Mookie) and a white girl (Susie) who grow up amidst the turmoil of the alleys in Washington, D C and their lifelong love for each other. It spans the generations of their families before them, bringing a breadth of history never entered into before. Their paths take them from their less than humble beginnings to the peaceful southeastern Virginia countryside, to barren Appalachia, to Paris, to drug-infected New York and finally back to the Capitol Hill area where they first met.

     Mookie saved her money from her baby-sitting jobs and work from the general store helping out old Mr. Moody. MaMary always gave her more than enough spending change to take care of her personal needs every month and whatever she had left over always went into her very own bank account. She learned how to budget and she did so almost to the penny. MaMary had sat the reluctant child down and she went over all the expenses of the house and farm so Mookie could see how MaMary’s monthly check covered everything, and also how Granpa’s Social Security check figured in.

     MaMary never asked the teenager what she did with her money. The child told her that she was saving it for an education. “I would like to be a nurse or a teacher,” she lied to her grandmother. She knew within her heart that she wanted to be a writer but she knew her grandmother would frown on that. MaMary smiled and patted her hand. “Nice girl”, she said.

     Mookie was not thinking about an education, that was the farthest from her mind. All she could think of was getting to New York and finding Hammerhead.

     All during this time the old woman’s health was declining. She was short of breath, she took longer naps during the day and slept late in the morning. Her visits to Dr. McIlwaine became more and more frequent. Her color was poor and she appeared to stumble quite a lot, sometimes her speech was slurred and off times Mookie would catch her staring off into space and then she would have crying spells.

     MaMary never discussed her health with her granddaughter but the doctor did. He called her in one day along with her grandmother’s sister, Mandy, and said, “Her heart is very weak and the diabetes has taken its toll over the years. Her circulation is very poor and I must take off her big toe soon or she will develop gangrene. Get things in order because she will not be around long.”

     When they had gotten home and had seen that MaMary was asleep Mandy said to Mookie, “That bastard was cold, wasn’t he? Could put it a little softer, I think. Well, girl, you’ll just have to pull a extra load around here. Keep your damn head outta them books and keep busy, you hear me?”

     Mookie just glared at the ugly old black woman and didn’t answer.

     MaMary lived on for another three years, Mookie was now nineteen and she felt that her grandmother would live on forever. She had only told Walter, the hired hand around the farm, of her plans to go to New York to find her brother’s murderer. Walter loved Mookie and Mookie was crazy about him, too—he was really the only one she could trust, but she couldn’t let anything stop her from what she wanted to do.

     He pleaded with her not to go. “She’s a sick old woman and she needs you here. You will break her heart if you go, and you won’t have any good luck if you do go and leave her.”

     “I haven’t had any good luck anyway. I’m going, and nothing you can do to stop me.”

     On the very day that Mookie boarded the bus from Gloucester to Baltimore, MaMary was rushed to the hospital to amputate not her toe, but her right leg. It was the beginning of the end for her.

     Susie handed Mookie the letter from Walter.

     Dear Mary Ellen, come home, please. Your Grammaw is dying. She’s calling for you. Ma, Aunt Lucy, Miss Mandy and I are doing all we can do. Little Petey is helping out,too. Give up this crazy notion about finding Hammerhead. I love you and I am afraid something terrible will happen to you. I want you to give us a chance, too.

     She gave the letter to Susie to read and sat down in the middle of Susie’s floor where they’d been drinking beer and eating sandwiches. “I love him, too, Susie, but there’s no time to wait. I must find Hammerhead.”

     “Mookie, where are you going to look? Living in that crappy place where we lived in DC did not prepare us for this jungle. The streets here will eat you up! I don’t want to lose you, honey. You could get seriously hurt or killed.”

     “He just got out of jail, I’ve been reading the newspapers. You know a no-good son-of-a bitch always goes back to his old haunts or his mama when he gets out of jail.” They both laugh. Mookie then adds, “They’re the only ones who will really accept ‘em.

     “Is his Mama still living?”

     Mookie shrugged her shoulders, “Your guess is as good as mine. Those old black mamas from the alleys live on forever.” They doubled over with laughter, drinking their beer.

     Mookie’s face became serious again. “I’ve applied for an apprentice’s job to a street worker and I’ve also joined a reading group to teach these people who don’t have a place to live and the addicts how to read. That will put and keep me in the streets.”

     Susie looked at Mookie dead in the eye, knowing that she was about to trespass into forbidden territory between them.

     “I could ask Crutch for help.”

     Mookie held up her hand to Susie’s face. “I don’t want his help.”

     “Listen, sweetie, he has connections—“

     Mookie’s voice became strident, “I don’t want his help!”

     “Dammit, you just don’t like him!”

     “The feeling’s mutual, I’m sure, and I wonder why it is I don’t like him?”

     “He’s sorry, Mookie, he’s doing better, I know he loves me.”

     Mookie looked at her dear friend’s face. She had such a lovely, lovely face. The lip which had been split at the top in the middle that had so disfigured her when she was a child had been transformed into a gorgeous pouting form that lighted up her whole countenance, her jawbone (which he had broken a few times) had been restored, her teeth so beautifully capped. Plastic surgery and advanced cosmetic dentistry in its miraculous state.

     Mookie jumped up, spilling beer all over Susie’s white carpet.

     “Listen, I’ve heard all this bullshit before! ‘He’s sorry, he’s doing better, he loves me.’ You’re crazy to stay with him, crazy! What the hell does that mean? That he’s just beating your face into a pulp once or twice a year instead of once or twice a month?”

     Suddenly, Susie, catching Mookie off guard grabbed her around her legs and threw her to the floor, straddled her and began beating her in the face. Mookie, shocked first, then spurred on by their childhood brawls, responded in kind by punching Susie back, first to the head and then kneeing her in her groin. Then she found enough arm’s length to slap her across her mouth. Susie winced when she tasted blood, “You black ass country bitch, do something to that nappy hair—“

     “You white-ass high class whore—“ 

     When Mookie saw the blood, she screamed and took Susie into her arms. “I’m sorry, honey, I’m so sorry. 

     Forgive me—“

     Then they started crying and laughing and cradling each other and wiping each other’s tears. 

     “Let him help you.” She whispered to her friend.

     “Ok, Ok,” she answered softly.

     Susie went to get them some more beer and they laid out in the middle of the floor after they had taken off everything except their drawers and drank until they got drunk. Pretty soon they were humming alley songs to each other just like they used to do as children. 

     Time came when they could no longer hum and their words tumbled over one another and they fell asleep in each other’s arms, snoring. 

© 2002 Elizabeth Allen Stokes All Rights reserved