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Mae
By Kate Cilke
There was a girl named Sarah. She loved her parents. She had a
dog and a cat. Her life was the perfect life of anybody until
something very, very, amazing happened.
The cause of her death was obvious. More than ten people saw it.
One person was it. He said he was sorry, and that he meant it
with the bottom of his heart, but her parents didn't know if they
would ever forgive him. They knew how sorry he was, but how can
you forgive the man who is the cause of your most beloved child,
your only child, the child that you were going to see grow up
to die. They were going to send her to the most fancy, nice college
that they could. She would be the first person in their family
to graduate. The only person in their family to graduate.
It was 1909. Mae knew that she had the right stuff to get into
college, but she would never get into one because she was black.
Everyone knew that blacks don't go to college, except if you had
an I.Q. of 1000, and you lived in Massachusetts or a college far
north that would allow blacks to go to school there. Besides,
there were only three blacks that have gone to college up north,
and they were all male. She would never go to college. It was
a fact. She was black, from Georgia, and she was female. The only
factors that would keep her from getting a true education.
Education wasn't the only thing that she had to worry about, though.
Females couldn't get a good job, either. The only jobs that women
could get were being a seamstress or working as a maid for a rich
household. The first job Mae knew she would stay as far away as
she possibly could. Seamstresses didn't get paid hardly a cent
for long hours and no vacations in a hot room crowded with other
black women that feel worse than you do. They either are seriously
ill, and can't get a break without getting fired, or is a single
mother that has to feed three children, herself, and pay off bills.
That was the worst route to take. When you're a maid, you will
get paid better, do something that changes from day to day, and
if the hirers have kids, you might even get to read to them or
watch over them, which is always fun. Besides, if the hirers go
on vacations they usually give you time off when they're gone,
or they will take you with them, which is better than a sewing
room any day.
Mae considered herself lucky though. She had two very nice friends
that were already in the workforce, one in each job. They told
her everything. Misty was always complaining about her job, whereas
Josie always came back from her time at her job happy and anxiously
waiting for the next day to arrive.
When Mae went out looking for a job as a maid, she thought that
her trek through the finical world would be the most difficult
thing that she would ever encounter. She hit the nail in the head.
She also thought that finding a job would be the hardest part
of dealing with the finical world, as it had been with her friends.
She couldn't of hit her thumb harder.
As she walked up to the first house that had the slightest appearance
of the need of a maid and rang the doorbell. A young lady answered
the door.
"Hello, my name is Mae. I came around to see if a maid wouldn't
be a great help to the household. May I speak to whom is in charge?"
Mae asked cautiously. She had worn her best dress, in hopes that
she would make a good impression.
"Why hello," a beautiful woman said, "I heard that
you came by to see if I needed a maid?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Oh, good lord, I knew that you heard my prayers." The
woman said to the sky. Turning back to Mae, she said, "Dear,
I am in much need of your services. Come inside and we'll talk
about me hiring you."
As Mae stepped inside she almost tripped. This was a most beautiful,
grand, worldly place if she ever saw one. There were tapestries
from all over the world, globes, a library, and beautiful lamps
that seemed to glow without even being lit. Mae felt so out of
place she almost told the beautiful woman that her services would
be of such poor quality compared to the wonders of the house that
it would be embarrassing. Such a grand house should receive the
same treatment. She kept her courage up though. She had to make
it through the marvelous house without staring at the marvels
it held to much.
When they went into the dining hall, everything changed. There
was food on the walls, a few broken plates lied upon cracked ceramic
tile, and a table that was missing a leg, and a leg that was missing
three inches.
Mae looked at it in awe, and the lady must have noticed, because
she said,
"It is a sty, isn't it? When my husband left to go to a better
place, this was the only place that I could control my sorrow.
I would throw pots and pans, destroying everything that I could.
I locked myself in here for years, only going out for food once
in a great long while."
"He died?" Mae asked with uncertainty, for she didn't
like to intrude on other peoples private business.
"Yes," said the lady, wiping a tear from her eye. "But
I found another man that I love, and we're happy. He doesn't want
to clean this place up, though. He believes that it its my sacred
place, and nothing should interfere with it." She paused,
then she said, "now lets talk about your wages. You're going
to stay fifteen hours Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and
Friday. I'll let you have weekends and holidays off. As for wages,
does a dollar an hour sound good?"
"Yes, ma'am." And that was all that Mae could say.
Mae's mind was a bustle as she walked home. A dollar an hour?
Fifteen hours every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and
Friday? That was less hours, and more pay than Josie got, and
Josie had worked at her mansion for three years, with raises every
Christmas.
