Free All Men Fear Me by Donis Casey Page B

sister’s farm, Rob was struck with a peculiar longing for the warmth of a family. He shook himself. This kind of thinking was dangerous.
    Martha McCoy, the eldest of the many siblings, hugged him as affectionately as if it had been ten days since she had seen him, instead of ten years. She looked so much like a young Alafair that Robin was overcome by a brief, startled feeling that time had become disjoined, and he had been transported back to his own youth.
    A tall, attractive blond had draped herself across an armchair and was struggling to contain a rambunctious dark-eyed girl who was desperate to slide off her lap.
    â€œHowdy, Alice,” Robin greeted. “My, aren’t you a picture? And this must be Linda striving to join the fun.”
    Tucker daughter number three, Alice Kelley, gave an ironic laugh. “She loves her cousins. I’m sorry Walter isn’t here, but he has a standing engagement on Saturday afternoon.”
    Rob noticed the sour look that passed over Alafair’s face when Alice mentioned her husband’s “standing engagement,” and envisioned a card game. “Too bad Martha’s husband Streeter couldn’t come, either, Robin,” she said.“He’s on the draft board, and they’re getting ready for the lottery on Friday. You’ll like him.”
    Rob smiled, but said nothing. If Martha’s husband was complicit with the draft, Rob figured there were probably too many philosophical differences between them for much of friendship to develop.
    â€œAre Mary and Kurt coming, Ma?” Alice asked.
    â€œThey came up and met Uncle Robin last night, honey. We’ll all be at church tomorrow, though. Robin, you can meet Streeter and Walter, then.”
    ***
    Rob sat down at the table, to the right of Shaw, the place of honor for a guest. Alafair bustled around for a good ten minutes after everyone was seated, plating dishes and bringing them to the table, pouring drinks, getting the children situated.
    Since the U.S. Food Administration had declared that on Saturdays the patriotic housewife should serve one meal wheatless, and one meal meatless, Alafair had decided to go all out for this special dinner and the family could to make do with a bowl of rice for supper tonight. She set a big, bubbling pot of black-eyed peas and fatback in the center of the table, surrounded by bowls of fried okra, sliced tomatoes and onions, sweet potatoes in their jackets, boiled corn on the cob, a dish of wilted lettuce and radishes, and a plate piled high with hot water cornbread, golden little fritters made of cornmeal batter fried in bacon grease.
    Alafair smiled when Rob’s mouth dropped open at the sight of the chicken-fried steaks piled high on a serving plate.
    He looked up at her. “Is that what I think it is?”
    â€œIt is, honey. Just the way you used to like it.”
    â€œYou remembered!”
    Alafair tried not to grin, but since she was feeling inordinately proud of herself, it was hard.
    Rob was so used to hotels and boarding houses that he had forgotten how family dinners worked. By the time Alafair placed the final dish in the middle of the table, he was hungry enough to bite someone’s hand off. When Alafair finally, finally, sat down and Rob moved to pick up a spoon, Shaw folded his hands on the table and said, “Fronie, would you say the blessing tonight?”
    Oh, Lord, Rob thought, and not with the proper spirit. He looked down at the tablecloth in case any of his kinfolks happened to glance his way and wonder at his lack of piety.
    â€œOh, Lord,” Sophronia began, which caused Rob to smile in spite of himself. “Bless this food to the nourishment of our bodies. In Jesus’ name, amen.”
    Rob waited until the chorus of amens had abated before he reached for the sweet potatoes.
    The chicken fried steak nearly brought him to tears. The slabs of round steak had been tenderized to a fare-thee-well, dredged in