Mama Told Me Not To Come

Mama was a Bible-fearing Christian. I knew she was because she’d been telling me so darn near every day for as long as I could remember.

She was a regular churchgoer, my mama was. Not just on Sundays, either: for a long time she had made it a habit to go to private Bible study sessions on weeknights with Pastor Reeves, the young assistant to Pastor Johnson, a venerable, gray-haired minister who had presided over our church since before I was born. Mama kept her appointments for those sessions nearly every Tuesday and Thursday until Pastor Reeves moved away to start his own church three counties to the West of ours. I was never too keen about religion, myself, but it seemed to do Mama a heap of good. She had a skip in her step and a glow on her cheeks every time she came back from those afternoon sessions with Pastor Reeves.

Mama was never exactly the most talkative person. Papa wasn’t either. But after Pastor Reeves left, it felt like Mama was quieter than before. She was grimmer in the face, too, and more prone to get snappy and peeved at little things, like when I didn’t clean my fingernails carefully enough at the end of the day when I came in from the fields for supper.

I was a grown man by then, 19 years old, but still living on the family farm. I cannot honestly say that I had the most observant eye for the moods of women, but even with my limited skill, I could see something was bothering Mama. One day I asked her about it.

“Mama, is something wrong?” Mama was in the kitchen, shucking corn, and I’d just come in from slopping the hogs. I wiped my feet on the mat inside the door.

Mama didn’t answer right away. She looked at me with a look I couldn’t read.

“Why do you ask, Jubal?”

“Just seems like you’ve been out of sorts for a while,” I said.

“No,” she said. “I’m fine. Don’t you worry.”

I knew enough about Mama to know that was that, and I wasn’t going to get another word from her on that subject. I went to the bathroom to clean up for dinner. I heard the door slam and knew that Papa was back from the feed store.

Dinner was delicious, as usual, but quiet. Mama was an able cook, and as far as I was concerned, she couldn’t go wrong serving fried chicken with biscuits and buttered corn on the cob, which is what we ate. As usual, nobody said much. I noticed Mama looking at Papa a lot, like she wanted him to say something, but he didn’t have much to say other than complimenting Mama once on her fried chicken and boasting about the good price he got at the feed store.

When the meal was done, I offered to clean up the dishes. Mama thanked me as Papa retreated to the living room. I heard the TV turned on. Papa only ever watched one show – reruns of Walker Texas Ranger. He must have been the biggest fan of Chuck Norris on the planet. Papa liked to turn the sound way up, so the noise of the show reverberated throughout the house. After a few minutes, I heard Mama’s voice rise over the din. It sounded like she was complaining about something to Papa, but I couldn’t tell what she was saying, and I knew better than to eavesdrop. When the last dish was washed, I left the kitchen and climbed the stairs to my room and closed the door. I picked up a dog-eared copy of a horror novel I was in the middle of. I guess you could say I was a big reader, for a farmer’s son, and horror books were my favorite.

The next morning, a Saturday, I got up, early as usual, just before dawn, and I showered and dressed and went downstairs for breakfast. Mama was in the kitchen, but not Papa.

“Papa’s gone hunting with the boys,” Mama explained. “He’ll be gone all day. He said to tell you to feed the animals, but when you’re done you can take the rest of the day off.”

It was a welcome thing to hear, because I thought I’d be tilling the fields after tending to the animals. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with myself.

Breakfast was a quiet affair of eggs and bacon and pancakes. I didn’t say much, and neither did Mama. But I had the feeling she wanted to say something. She fidgeted in her chair throughout breakfast, like she was trying to make up her mind about something but wasn’t sure what to do or say about it.

I noticed she was dressed more nicely than usual, too. She wore a tight-fitting print dress that hugged her curves and showed off more of her legs than usual. Mama was a pretty woman. She had me when she was only 19–my age–so that made her only 38. The life of a farmer’s wife had left some lines on her face, but Mama still looked youthful and pretty. It seemed like she’d taken extra care brushing her hair that morning, because it fell in soft shiny waves around her shoulders. I didn’t have much of an eye for such things, but even I could tell she was wearing more makeup than usual.

After breakfast, I offered to clean up again.

“No, Jubal, I’ll do it. You get to the animals. Get done quick and come back. There’s something I want to talk about.”

“What is it, Mama?”

“We’ll talk later. First, tend to the animals.”

I wasn’t one to argue with Mama.

We didn’t have a big farm, or a big barn, so it didn’t take too long to feed the chickens, hogs, cows, and horses and to do some cleanup. Two hours later, chores done, I was back in the house, coming through the back door into the kitchen again. Mama was there.

“Wash up, Jubal,” she said. “When you’re done, come to my room. I want to talk to you.”

I was puzzled by the strangeness of Mama’s request. My parents’ bedroom was like their sanctuary. It was off-limits to me, most of the time.

But I did as she said, and 20 minutes later, freshly scrubbed and cleaned, and hair still damp, I knocked on Mama’s closed bedroom door.

“Come in,” she said.

I did, and I saw Mama sitting on the edge of the bed. The pretty dress was hiked up past her knee, and I couldn’t remember Mama ever showing so much leg in a dress. A button was undone at the top of the dress. I couldn’t remember Mama ever being careless enough to leave her dress in such a state. A shadowy hint of cleavage showed at the neckline of the dress.

Mama patted the side of the bed. I sat down next to her.

I waited for her to say something. It took her a few moments, like she was trying to figure out what to say.

“Jubal, do you have a girlfriend?” she asked at last.

I was surprised. Mama and Papa seldom talked with me about such things. All three of us were private about personal matters.

“No, Mama,” I said, candidly. “You remember I dated Mary Anne Miller a few times last spring, but nothing since then.”

“That’s what I thought,” she said. She patted me on the knee.

“It’s too bad,” she said. “A fine young man like you. It’s only natural that you would want to enjoy the company of young women, although, as you are aware, we must always abide by the strictures of the Bible, which limits the explorations of the flesh outside the sanctity of matrimony.”

“I’m aware of it, Mama.” I knew what the Bible said, but Bible or no, Mary Anne and I had spent time in her parents’ barn loft enjoying the explorations of the flesh together. I was no virgin, and Mary Anne had a reputation throughout the county. But I wasn’t going to say any of that to Mama.

“Did your father ever have… the talk with you?” Mama asked, her voice rising in pitch uncomfortably.

“The talk?”

“About, you know. The birds and the bees. Bulls and cows. Men and women.”

What was she getting at? I shrugged.

“Sex, Jubal. Did he ever talk to you about sex?”

Papa never said much of anything to me about anything, except the farm. I couldn’t recall ever having a “talk” with him about anything related to sex.

“No, Mama.”

“Pity,” she said. “Fathers are supposed to talk to their sons about such things, as mothers are supposed to talk to their daughters. But I never had a daughter. Your father shirked his duty, which was not right.”

She patted me on the knee.

“Your father, I am sad to say, has shirked that, and other duties.”

She got a faraway look in her eye and was quiet. I wasn’t sure what to say.

“What do you mean, Mama?”

Mama looked me in the eye and brushed her hand across my cheek.

“You’re a grown man now, Jubal, so I feel like I can share some things with you as one adult to another. Do you mind if I do that?”

“I guess not.” I shrugged, uncertainly. I didn’t know what Mama was trying to say and I did not know how to respond.

“Your father is a good man,” Mama continued. “He is honest, he is God-fearing, and he works hard and is a good provider for our family.” She paused before continuing.

“OK,” I said.

“But in some ways,” Mama said, “Papa has not fulfilled his duties. Jubal, are you familiar with the first book of Corinthians, chapter 7?”

“I’ve read the Bible, Mama, but I can’t say as I specifically recall that part of it.”

“It says,” she said, “in verses 3 and 4, that ‘the husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband.’ So you see, Jubal, that while outside the bond of matrimony, sexual relations between a man and woman are a sin, within that bond, they are a duty. Does that make sense to you?”

“I guess so,” I replied, but in truth I was utterly confused about what Mama was trying to tell me. She had never spoken so frankly to me about such things.

“I hope you do not mind my being so candid and intimate with you, Jubal,” she said. “But since you are a young man, and your father’s son, it is important for you to hear this.”

Mama continued, as though she was reciting a long-rehearsed speech.

“A husband has duties to his wife, and a wife to her husband. I never shirked my duties to Papa. I gave him everything that the Good Lord commanded me to give him. If you know what I mean.” She clutched and twirled a tress of her hair. “Your father, however, did not see fit to do his duty with the same diligence.”

She turned to me.

“Does this make you uncomfortable, Jubal?”

“Um….” It was all I could say.

Mama patted my knee again.

“I understand it is difficult to discuss such things, especially with your parents.”

Mama sighed and said nothing for another minute. The silence was oppressive. Tightness gripped my chest.