Britsy

From the age of eleven, Elizabeth and her sister Alice, called Britsy and five years older, were mothered by their kind sister Ida.

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

From the age of eleven, Elizabeth and her sister Alice, called Britsy and five years older, were mothered by their kind sister Ida.

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

To the end of her mind, Britsy loved the climax—Your big old head just sank like a rockl!

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

And though Elizabeth mainly loved and thanked her foster parents, there still were times when a harsh bafflement surged up in her and dimmed her affections—a harshness that, if anything, was stronger in Britsy and Louise, the eldest sister.

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

To the end of her mind, Britsy loved the climax—Your big old head just sank like a rockl!

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

And though Elizabeth mainly loved and thanked her foster parents, there still were times when a harsh bafflement surged up in her and dimmed her affections—a harshness that, if anything, was stronger in Britsy and Louise, the eldest sister.

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

Since wine and liquor were off-limits in our house, I’d found a pair of the plump ceramic flasks in which Old Spice lotion was then sold and another pair of circular green prune-juice bottles from my aunt Britsy.

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

Britsy and Herman she’d married a Rodwell cousin might drive up from Warren ton for two hours of talk; or we’d listen to the radio, with Ida and me sitting far back since Marvin would need the volume on high.

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

It was Ida, with her husband Marvin Drake and their sons, who returned to Macón at her own mother’s death to keep house for her father Jack and her motherless young sisters, Elizabeth and Britsy.

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988

There were tales of how they blundered into one another with tubs of cold water and assorted collapsible rubber goods to wrest young me, one more time live, from another death; of how many new dresses and shoes were ruined in the drastic baths and enemas not to mention the tale of that afternoon when they’d gone to Richmond for Ida’s operation and left me with Aunt Britsy, who couldn’t swim a stroke.

CLEAR PICTURES REYNOLDS PRICE 1988