I’M AT THE KITCHEN sink waiting for Miss Celia to come home. The rag I’ve been pulling on is in shreds. That crazy woman woke up this morning, squoze into the tightest pink sweater she has, which is saying something, and hollered, “I’m going to Elizabeth Leefolt’s. Right now, while I got the nerve, Minny.” Then she drove off in her Bel Aire convertible with her skirt hanging out the door.

I was just jittery until the phone rang. Aibileen was hiccupping she was so upset. Not only did Miss Celia tell the ladies that Minny Jackson is working for her, she informed them that Miss Leefolt was the one who “recommended” me. And that was all the story Aibileen heard. It’ll take those cackling hens about five minutes to figure this out.

So now, I have to wait. Wait to find out if, Number One, my best friend in the entire world gets fired for getting me a job. And Number Two, if Miss Hilly told Miss Celia those lies that I’m a thief. And Number Two and a half, if Miss Hilly told Miss Celia how I got back at her for telling those lies that I’m a thief. I’m not sorry for the Terrible Awful Thing I done to her. But now that Miss Hilly put her own maid in jail to rot, I wonder what that lady’s going to do to me.

It’s not until ten after four, an hour past my time to leave, that I see Miss Celia’s car pull in. She jiggles up the walk like she’s got something to say. I hitch up my hose.

“Minny, it’s so late!” she yells.

“What happened with Miss Leefolt?” I’m not even trying to be coy. I want to know.

“Go, please! Johnny’s coming home any minute.” She’s pushing me to the washroom where I keep my things.

“We’ll talk tomorrow,” she says, but for once, I don’t want to go home, I want to hear what Miss Hilly said about me. Hearing your maid’s a thief is like hearing your kid’s teacher’s a twiddler. You don’t give them the benefit of the doubt, you just get the hell rid of em.

But Miss Celia won’t tell me anything. She’s shooing me out so she can keep up her charade, so twisted it’s like kudzu. Mister Johnny knows about me. Miss Celia knows Mister Johnny knows about me. But Mister Johnny doesn’t know that Miss Celia knows he knows. And because of that ridiculousness, I have to leave at four-oh-ten and worry about Miss Hilly for the entire night.

THE NEXT MORNING BEFORE WORK, Aibileen calls my house.

“I call poor Fanny early this morning cause I know you been stewing about it all night.” Poor Fanny’s Miss Hilly’s new maid. Ought to call her Fool Fanny for working there. “She heard Miss Leefolt and Miss Hilly done decided you made the whole recommendation thing up so Miss Celia would give you the job.”

Whew. I let out a long breath. “Glad you ain’t gone get in trouble,” I say. Still, now Miss Hilly calling me a liar and a thief.

“Don’t you worry bout me,” Aibileen says. “You just keep Miss Hilly from talking to your boss lady.”

When I get to work, Miss Celia’s rushing out to go buy a dress for the Benefit next month. She says she wants to be the first person in the store. It’s not like the old days when she was pregnant. Now she can’t wait to get out the door.

I stomp out to the backyard and wipe down the lawn chairs. The birds all twitter up in a huff when they see me coming, making the camellia bush rattle. Last spring Miss Celia was always nagging at me to take those flowers home. But I know camellias. You bring a bunch inside, thinking how it’s so fresh it looks like it’s moving and as soon as you go down for a sniff, you see you’ve brought an army full of spider mites in the house.

I hear a stick break, then another, behind the bushes. I prickle inside, hold still. We’re out in the middle of nowhere and nobody would hear us call for miles. I listen, but I don’t hear anything else. I tell myself it’s just the old dregs of waiting for Mister Johnny. Or maybe I’m paranoid because I worked with Miss Skeeter last night on the book. I’m always jittery after talking to her.

Finally, I go back to cleaning pool chairs, picking up Miss Celia’s movie magazines and tissues the slob leaves out here. The phone rings inside. I’m not supposed to answer the phone what with Miss Celia trying to keep up the big fat lie with Mister Johnny. But she’s not here and it might be Aibileen with more news. I go inside, lock the door behind me.

“Miss Celia residence.” Lord, I hope it’s not Miss Celia calling.

“This is Hilly Holbrook speaking. Who is this?”

My blood whooshes down from my hair to my feet. I’m an empty, bloodless shell for about five seconds.

I lower my voice, make it deep like a stranger. “This Doreena. Miss Celia’s help.” Doreena? Why I use my sister’s name!

“Doreena. I thought Minny Jackson was Miss Foote’s maid.”

“She . . . quit.”

“Is that right? Let me speak to Missus Foote.”

“She . . . out a town. Down at the coast. For a—a—” My mind’s pedaling a thousand miles an hour trying to come up with details.

“Well, when is she coming back?”

“Looong time.”

“Well, when she gets back, you tell her I called. Hilly Holbrook, Emerson three sixty-eight forty?”

“Yes ma’am. I tell her.” In about a hundred years.

I hold on to the counter edge, wait for my heart to stop hammering. It’s not that Miss Hilly can’t find me. I mean, she could just look up Minny Jackson on Tick Road in the phone book and get my address. And it’s not like I couldn’t tell Miss Celia what happened, tell her I’m not a thief. Maybe she’d believe me after all. But it’s the Terrible Awful that ruins it all.

Four hours later, Miss Celia walks in with five big boxes stacked on top of each other. I help her tote them back to her bedroom and then I stand very still outside her door to hear if she’ll call up the society ladies like she does every day. Sure enough, I hear her pick up the phone. But she just hangs it back up again. The fool’s listening for the dial tone again, in case someone tries to call.

EVEN THOUGH IT’S THE third week of October, the summer beats on with the rhythm of a clothes dryer. The grass in Miss Celia’s yard is still a full-blown green. The orange dahlias are still smiling drunk up at the sun. And every night, the damn mosquitoes come out for their blood hunt, my sweat pads went up three cents a box, and my electric fan is broke dead on my kitchen floor.

On this October morning, three days after Miss Hilly called, I walk into work half an hour early. I’ve got Sugar seeing the kids to school. The coffee grinds go in the fancy percolator, the water goes in the pot. I lean my bottom against the counter. Quiet. It’s what I’ve been waiting for all night long.

The Frigidaire picks up a hum where it left off. I put my hand on it to feel its vibration.

“You’re awful early, Minny.”

I open the refrigerator and bury my head inside. “Morning,” I say from the crisper. All I can think is, Not yet.

I fiddle with some artichokes, the cold spines prickling my hand. Bent over like this, my head pounds even harder. “I’m on fix you and Mister Johnny a roast and I’m on . . . fix some . . .” But the words go all high-pitched on me.

“Minny, what happened?” Miss Celia has made her way around the refrigerator door without me even realizing it. My face bunches up. The cut on my eyebrow breaks open again, the hot blood stinging like a razor. Usually my bruises don’t show.

“Honey, set down. Did you take a spill?” She props her hand on the hip of her pink nightgown. “Did you trip on the fan cord again?”

“I’m fine,” I say, trying to turn so she can’t see me. But Miss Celia’s moving with me, bug-eyeing the cut like she’s never seen anything so awful. I had a white lady tell me once that blood looks redder on a colored person. I take a wad of cotton from my pocket, hold it to my face.

“It’s nothing,” I say. “I banged it in the bathtub.”

“Minny, that thing’s bleeding. I think you need you some stitches. Let me get Doctor Neal over here.” She grabs the phone from the wall, then bangs it back. “Oh, he’s up at the hunting camp with Johnny. I’ll call Doctor Steele, then.”

“Miss Celia, I don’t need no doctor.”

“You need medical attention, Minny,” she says, picking the phone back up.

Do I really have to say it? I grit my teeth to get it out. “Them doctors ain’t gone work on no colored person, Miss Celia.”

She hangs the phone up again.

I turn and face the sink. I keep thinking, This ain’t nobody’s business, just do your work, but I haven’t had a minute’s sleep. Leroy screamed at me all night, threw the sugar bowl upside my head, threw my clothes out on the porch. I mean, when he’s drinking the Thunderbird, it’s one thing, but . . . oh. The shame is so heavy I think it might pull me to the floor. Leroy, he wasn’t on the Thunderbird this time. This time he beat me stone-cold sober.

“Go on out a here, Miss Celia, let me get some work done,” I say because I just need some time alone. At first, I thought Leroy had found out about my working with Miss Skeeter. It was the only reason I could come up with while he was beating me with his hand. But he didn’t say a thing about it. He was just beating me for the pure pleasure of it.

“Minny?” Miss Celia says, eyeing the cut again. “Are you sure you did that in the bathtub?”

I run the water just to get some noise in the room. “I told you I did and I did. Alright?”

She gives me a suspicious look and points her finger at me. “Alright, but I’m fixing you a cup of coffee and I want you to just take the day off, okay?” Miss Celia goes to the coffee percolator, pours two cups, but then stops. Looks at me kind of surprised.

“I don’t know how you take your coffee, Minny.”

I roll my eyes. “Same as you.”

She drops two sugars into both mugs. She gives me my coffee and then she just stands, staring out the back window with her jaw set tight. I start washing last night’s dishes, wishing she’d just leave me be.

“You know,” she says kind of low, “You can talk to me about anything, Minny.”

I keep washing, feel my nose start to flare.

“I’ve seen some things, back when I lived in Sugar Ditch. In fact . . .”

I look up, about to give it to her for getting in my business, but Miss Celia says in a funny voice, “We’ve got to call the police, Minny.”

I put my coffee cup down so hard it splashes. “Now look a here, I don’t want no police getting involved—”

She points out the back window. “There’s a man, Minny! Out there!”

I turn to where’s she’s looking. A man—a naked man—is out by the azaleas. I blink to see if it’s real. He’s tall, mealy-looking and white. He’s standing with his back to us, about fifteen feet away. His brown tangled hair is long like a hobo. Even from the back I can tell he’s touching himself.

“Who is he?” Miss Celia whispers. “What’s he doing here?”

The man turns to face front, almost like he heard us. Both our jaws drop. He’s holding it out like he’s offering us a po’boy sandwich.

“Oh . . . God,” Miss Celia says.

His eyes search the window. They land right on mine, staring a dark line across the lawn. I shiver. It’s like he knows me, Minny Jackson. He’s staring with his lip curled like I deserved every bad day I’ve ever lived, every night I haven’t slept, every blow Leroy’s ever given. Deserved it and more.

And his fist starts punching his palm with a slow rhythm. Punch. Punch. Punch. Like he knows exactly what he’s going to do with me. I feel the throb in my eye start again.

“We’ve got to call the police!” whispers Miss Celia. Her wide eyes dart to the phone on the other side of the kitchen, but she doesn’t move an inch.

“It’ll take em forty-five minutes just to find the house,” I say. “He could break the door down by then!”

I run to the back door, flip the lock on. I dart to the front door and lock it, ducking down when I pass the back window. I stand up on my tiptoes, peek through the little square window on the back door. Miss Celia peeks around the side of the big window.

The naked man’s walking real slow up toward the house. He comes up the back steps. He tries the doorknob and I watch it jiggle, feeling my heart whapping against my ribs. I hear Miss Celia on the phone, saying, “Police? We’re getting intruded! There’s a man! A naked man trying to get in the—”

I jump back from the little square window just in time for the rock to smash through, feel the sprinkle of shards hit my face. Through the big window, I see the man backing up, like he’s trying to see where to break in next. Lord, I’m praying, I don’t want to do this, don’t make me have to do this . . .

Again, he stares at us through the window. And I know we can’t just sit here like a duck dinner, waiting for him to get in. All he has to do is break a floor-to-ceiling window and step on in.

Lord, I know what I have to do. I have to go out there. I have to get him first.

“You stand back, Miss Celia,” I say and my voice is shaking. I go get Mister Johnny’s hunting knife, still in the sheath, from the bear. But the blade’s so short, he’ll have to be awful close for me to cut him, so I get the broom too. I look out and he’s in the middle of the yard, looking up at the house. Figuring things out.

I open the back door and slip out. Across the yard, the man smiles at me, showing a mouth with about two teeth. He stops punching and goes back to stroking himself, smoothly, evenly now.

“Lock the door,” I hiss behind me. “Keep it locked.” I hear the click.

I tuck the knife in the belt of my uniform, make sure it’s tight. And I grip the broom with both hands.

“You get on out a here, you fool!” I yell. But the man doesn’t move. I take a few steps closer. And then so does he and I hear myself praying, Lord protect me from this naked white man . . .

“I got me a knife!” I holler. I take some more steps and he does too. When I get seven or eight feet from him, I’m panting. We both stare.

“Why, you’re a fat nigger,” he calls in a strange, high voice and gives himself a long stroke.

I take a deep breath. And then I rush forward and swing with the broom. Whoosh! I’ve missed him by inches and he dances away. I lunge again and the man runs toward the house. He heads straight for the back door, where Miss Celia’s face is in the window.

“Nigger can’t catch me! Nigger too fat to run!”

He makes it to the steps and I panic that he’s going to try and bust down the door, but then he flips around and runs along the sideyard, holding that gigantic flopping po’boy in his hand.

“You get out a here!” I scream after him, feeling a sharp pain, knowing my cut’s ripping wider.

I rush him hard from the bushes to the pool, heaving and panting. He slows at the edge of the water and I get close and land a good swing on his rear, thwak! The stick snaps and the brush-end flies off.

“Didn’t hurt!” He jiggles his hand between his legs, hitching up his knees. “Have a little pecker pie, nigger? Come on, get you some pecker pie!”

I dive around him back to the middle of the yard, but the man is too tall and too fast and I’m getting slower. My swings are flying wild and soon I’m hardly even jogging. I stop, lean over, breathing hard, the short broken-off broom in my hand. I look down and the knife—it is gone.

As soon as I look back up, whaaam! I stagger. The ringing comes harsh and loud, making me totter. I cover my ear but the ringing gets louder. He’s punched me on the same side as the cut.

He comes closer and I close my eyes, knowing what’s about to happen to me, knowing I’ve got to move away but I can’t. Where is the knife? Does he have the knife? The ringing’s like a nightmare.

“You get out a here before I kill you,” I hear, like it’s in a tin can. My hearing’s half gone and I open my eyes. There’s Miss Celia in her pink satin nightgown. She’s got a fire poker in her hand, heavy, sharp.

“White lady want a taste a pecker pie, too?” He flops his penis around at her and she steps closer to the man, slow, like a cat. I take a deep breath while the man jumps left, then right, laughing and chomping his toothless gums. But Miss Celia just stands still.

After a few seconds he frowns, looks disappointed that Miss Celia isn’t doing anything. She’s not swinging or frowning or hollering. He looks over at me. “What about you? Nigger too tired to—”

Crack!

The man’s jaw goes sideways and blood bursts out of his mouth. He wobbles around, turns, and Miss Celia whacks the other side of his face too. Like she just wanted to even him up.

The man stumbles forward, looking nowhere in particular. Then he falls face flat.

“Lordy, you . . . you got him . . .” I say, but in the back of my head, there’s this voice asking me, real calm, like we’re just having tea out here, Is this really happening? Is a white woman really beating up a white man to save me? Or did he shake my brain pan loose and I’m over there dead on the ground...

I try to focus my eyes. Miss Celia, she’s got a snarl on her lips. She raises her rod and ka-wham! across the back of his knees.

This ain’t happening, I decide. This is just too damn strange.

Ka-wham! She hits him across his shoulders, making a ugh sound every time.

“I—I said you got him now, Miss Celia,” I say. But evidently, Miss Celia doesn’t think so. Even with my ears ringing, it sounds like chicken bones cracking. I stand up straighter, make myself focus my eyes before this turns into a homicide. “He down, he down, Miss Celia,” I say. “Fact, he”—I struggle to catch the poker—“he might be dead.”

I finally catch it and she lets go and the poker flies into the yard. Miss Celia steps back from him, spits in the grass. Blood’s spattered across her pink satin nightgown. The fabric’s stuck to her legs.

“He ain’t dead,” Miss Celia says.

“He close,” I say.

“Did he hit you hard, Minny?” she asks, but she’s staring down at him. “Did he hurt you bad?”

I can feel blood running down my temple but I know it’s from the sugar bowl cut that’s split open again. “Not as bad as you hurt him,” I say.

The man groans and we both jump back. I grab the poker and the broom handle from the grass. I don’t give her either one.

He rolls halfway over. His face is bloody on both sides, his eyes are swelling shut. His jaw’s been knocked off its hinge and somehow he still brings himself to his feet. And then he starts to walk away, a pathetic wobbly thing. He doesn’t even look back at us. We just stand there and watch him hobble through the prickly boxwood bushes and disappear in the trees.

“He ain’t gone get far,” I say, and I keep my grip on that poker. “You whooped him pretty good.”

“You think?” she says.

I give her a look. “Like Joe Louis with a tire iron.”

She brushes a clump of blond hair out of her face, looks at me like it kills her that I got hit. Suddenly I realize I ought to thank her, but truly, I’ve got no words to draw from. This is a brand-new invention we’ve come up with.

All I can say is, “You looked mighty . . . sure a yourself.”

“I used to be a good fighter.” She looks out along the boxwoods, wipes off her sweat with her palm. “If you’d known me ten years ago . . .”

She’s got no goo on her face, her hair’s not sprayed, her nightgown’s like an old prairie dress. She takes a deep breath through............