This Bed Of Rose's - TEC

One large black woman, wearing a white dress mostly covered by a large apron, worked at the stove and counter, cooking eggs and sausage, dispensing coffee, and punctuating her conversations with the other women with a wave of a large wooden spatula. She put a large cookie sheet with steaming hot biscuits on the table and the women scrambled to grab one.

Rose told one of the women to move down on the bench and then directed Kenny to sit beside her. Immediately the black woman plopped a heavy plate and silverware in front of him, gave him a huge grin and turned back to the stove. A mug of coffee and a glass of orange juice were put in front of him by different women without so much as a by your leave.

The cook brought big bowls of scrambled eggs to the table and returned shortly with platters of sausage. The women hastily grabbed a place around the table and the dishes quickly passed, everyone taking generous helpings. When the first bowl came to Kenny, he took a spoonful and passed it to Rose, sitting on his right at the end of the table. She took the bowl and plopped another heaping spoonful on his plate before helping herself.

Once everyone had quieted down a bit to eat, Rose got their attention and introduced Kenny as her new handyman. She told him that he was free to help the women with problems in their rooms if they asked but he was not to partake of their wares. Kenny was a little uncertain of her meaning but figured she would explain.

After breakfast, the two of them went back to Rose's rooms, where she dressed in a beautiful dress and jacket, not-too-high heels, what he thought was an outrageous hat, and a lacy umbrella.

Holding his arm, she took him out the front to a waiting taxi and directed the driver to take them to a part of the downtown area where there were a variety of stores. Kenny noticed that Rose held her head high everywhere they went, insisting that he hold his arm so that her hand was politely tucked in the crook of his elbow.

They went from store to store, first concentrating on clothes. She had him outfitted in a dark blue suit, white shirt and tie, even including a package of handkerchiefs for the breast pocket. Then they shopped for jeans, buying three pair, and everyday shirts, of which she finally selected five. She bought him socks – two packages of three – and jockey underwear – also two packages of three. She bought him a new set of sneakers for everyday use and a pair of shiny black wingtips to go with the suit. Rose topped it all off with a baseball cap for working and a black fedora for dress-up. At each place, Rose arranged to have the purchases delivered to the house later that day.

When they were finished, Kenny was surprised to spot a pharmacy clock showing the time as 3:14 in the afternoon. He didn't realize how much time had passed while he listened to Rose laughing and handing him more things to try on. He did notice that many of the people they passed, both on the streets and in the stores, quite noticeably turned up their noses or turned away when they spotted Rose and him. Even some of the store clerks were barely civilized when they dealt with her. Kenny couldn't understand how they could be so rude to such a lovely woman; that didn't seem to be happening to other customers.

Rose guided Kenny into a lunch counter where she ordered a petite sandwich and he ordered a hamburger, fries, and a big chocolate shake. She noticed the way he stumbled over the reading of the menu and knew then than his education was sorely lacking. She laughed at the way he shoveled in the food, as if he hadn't eaten for a month and someone might steal it if he didn't hurry.

In the taxi on the way back to the old house, Kenny asked why so many people had been so impolite to her. She explained that her line of work was not popular among the townspeople, particularly the ladies, even though the men didn't mind patronizing her place under cover of darkness. When Kenny seemed puzzled, she had to explain that she ran a brothel where men came to purchase the favors of the women ... such as he had freely partaken from her that morning.

Slowly the light dawned in Kenny's eyes. Even though she was very much a lady to him, she was just as much an outcast to the town as he was!

With the daylight waning upon their return, Rose gave him a quick tour of the house, inside and out. She showed him where she kept a set of tools, not extensive but sufficient for most repairs, in the large garage at the rear of the property. She had been hoping for some time to hire someone to repaint the exterior of the house, which was in desperate need of fresh paint. She had several five gallon cans of white paint and a few gallon cans of dark green for the trim sitting in the garage, along with tools needed. She asked if he would mind starting that job the next morning, so it could be finished before the weather turned even colder.

After a dinner with Rose and Sarah, the cook, and three of the other women, Rose took Kenny back to her apartment, where she sat him at a desk. Pulling a book by Mark Twain from the shelves of books, she asked him to read and use the dictionary to look up anything he didn't understand or know how to pronounce.

Each time the bell rang, Rose went into the foyer to take care of business, sending the client to one of the upstairs rooms. Then she came back and sat with Kenny, letting him read to her, helping him understand what he was reading, referring him to the dictionary when necessary. Before he knew it, several hours had passed and Kenny realized that he had become enthused about reading the book. He liked the sense of accomplishment when he learned a new word and its meaning.

In the early morning hours, Rose had Kenny put the book aside and follow her to the bedroom. Once again they lay in each other's arms as Rose gently taught Kenny the art of making love. They were both sated when they fell asleep, arms and leg tightly entwined.

After a big breakfast the following morning, Kenny began work on painting the house. It was slow work, moving the heavy ladder a few feet at a time along the side of the house so that he could reach the tops of the gables. The thirsty wood soaked up the paint like a parched animal drinks water. Carrying the bucket of paint up and down the ladder so many times used muscles he didn't know he had and at the end of the first day, he was disappointed with his small amount of progress.

Thus was his schedule set for weeks. He started with a big breakfast among the chattering women, painted for hours until there was not enough light to see, cleaned up for dinner with Rose and a few of the women, and read until the early morning hours. Then he and Rose retired to her big soft bed, where she continued to teach him the art of making love.

Days turned into weeks, which became a month, then two. The entire house had been covered in a single coat of white paint and Kenny went back to apply the dark green on the trim. Finally he began a second coat of white, which went faster since the first coat had primed the wood. As Kenny carefully applied the last of the white paint next to a green corner molding, Rose applauded and gleefully hugged Kenny, ignoring the danger of getting painted by his brush.

Kenny moved to the oversized garage but, since it was a single story edifice, he completed the repainting of it in under a week. He found yard waste bags and raked leaves until the lawn, both front and back, was clean again. With direction from Rose, he winterized the rose bushes that flocked throughout the lawn. Kenny wondered if Rose got her name from the flowering bushes or if she planted the bushes because of her name. He regretted having to cut back the limbs because it meant that there would be no more of the sweet smelling blooms for that season.

One cold Sunday, Rose surprised Kenny by requesting that he dress in his suit. When she was dressed in a lovely flowing dress and a fur jacket, she took him out to the garage and opened one of the doors. There sat a late model Cadillac sedan in a navy blue. He had never been in this side of the garage and didn't know that Rose owned a car.

Kenny was even more amazed when she handed him the keys and had him slide into the driver's seat. She proceeded to give him instruction on how to drive in very succinct and soft tones. She told him that he was going to learn how to drive, obtain his license, and become her driver. Although she could drive if necessary, she did not like to drive in city traffic. Thus she would rather put her life in Kenny's hands. When he realized what she had just said, he almost popped the buttons from his dress shirt. A few months later, Kenny passed his driver's license test and became Rose's official driver every sunny Sunday.

Thus the days passed in idyllic fashion for Kenny. Rose had become his savior, his idol, his goddess, his everything. He loved to accompany her as she shopped downtown, holding onto his arm as if he were somebody. It took all the self-restraint he could muster sometimes to smile and nod at merchants or passersby who obviously snubbed Rose but she always reminded him that those people did not matter to her. She knew what was in her heart and that was what mattered. Rose even told Kenny that she loved him, although for the life of him, he couldn't figure out why she would.

In the spring, Kenny planted flowers around the rose beds on all sides of the brothel. He kept the lawn neat and trimmed better than a golf course. He worked all over the inside of the house, teaching himself to do minor plumbing, carpentry and electrical repairs. Occasionally, with Rose's pre-approval, Kenny accepted sexual favors from the ladies of the house in return for some special work they asked him to do. Although Kenny liked being with each of the women of the house, he always felt that he was betraying Rose when he was with one of them. Besides she provided for each of his needs almost every night, not the least of which was a tight, long-lasting hug next to her warm, naked body.

During his second year with Rose, she intensified his education, pushing him to read deeper novels and think through the author's meaning. She enlisted the aide of some of the more knowledgeable ladies of the house to teach him mathematics. One of the women even taught him a modicum of French. Rose brought home history and civics text books from a downtown bookstore and prodded him to read and learn.

The forays downtown to buy clothing for Kenny were repeated periodically, until Kenny's clothes occupied a third of Rose's big walk-in closet. She forced him to destroy his work clothes every so often rather than let him wear paint-stained work pants or shirts. With the delicious and plentiful meals that Sarah served, Kenny added a few pounds to his formerly skinny frame, and he filled out his new clothes nicely.

In his third season after Rose had taken him in, Rose convinced Kenny to take the test for a government equivalency diploma, just in case he needed it in the future. He took it and passed with flying colors, thanks to her tutelage.

It was also in that third season that Kenny began to sense that all was not roses in Rose's world. It started with a hacking cough that winter. Each month, when by special arrangement, a local doctor came to the house to check each of the women, Rose had the doctor also examine her. He prescribed some medication that Kenny got filled at a pharmacy and carefully watched to ensure that she took each dosage on time.

As the weeks passed though, Kenny became concerned. The cough just seemed to get worse instead of better. Rose tried to remain her cheerful self but he noticed that she sometimes seemed to be in pain. She had less of an appetite than before and began to lose weight. When he'd ask her about it, she always smiled and shook her head as if it were nothing.

Kenny became distraught. The one person that meant something to him was obviously sick. She was not getting better. Early in his fourth year with Rose, she began to have problems getting out of bed each day. The coughing came more often and was more prolonged. Sarah prepared soup especially for Rose each day, in hopes that she would regain some of her strength. Kenny insisted on feeding it to her. And yet her strength continued to dwindle.

Kenny's love for Rose took different channels. Unable to leave her bed, he lay beside her and wrapped her in his arms, gently rocking her and crooning soft tunes in her ear. She clung to him with her waning strength and let tears roll down her cheeks.

And then one cold windy fall evening, Rose breathed her last breath. And it was Kenny who held her and let the tears roll down his cheeks.

There were just eighteen people at Rose's funereal, held on the windy slopes of a bare cemetery: the preacher Kenny hired to conduct the service, two grave diggers with heads bowed, the thirteen girls of the house, Sarah the cook, and Kenny. Even in death, the townspeople forsook Rose as a scarlet woman.

Four days later at the reading of Rose's will, not everyone was surprised that Rose had bequeathed her house to Kenny; in fact, he seemed to be the only one. His initial reaction was that he didn't care, now that Rose was gone. She had been the only love of his life. However the attorney handed him a letter Rose had written in her last days.

In a shaky scrawl, it said:

My dear precious Kenny,

I know that you are going to go through some hard times. I know that you will feel abandoned, just like when your own mother left you. I want you to know that I loved you, Kenny, as if you were my own flesh and blood – maybe more so. You represented everything I never had in this life, and for a short time, you gave it to me.

I do not want you to despair. Although life is hard and people are not fair, I want you to hold your head up high, know that you were loved and gave love, and you made me happy. Now I want you to go on with your life. Use the house, if you will; the girls can use your support and need some way to keep making a living for themselves. Please don't turn them out on the streets. If you need help running the house, ask Sarah for help. She knows everything about the business.

I can never thank you enough for coming into my life, baby. Now, cheer up, be happy, go on with life, and make the most of your opportunities.

With all my love forever,
Rose

Kenny read the letter through a second time – well, almost. He couldn't quite see the words well enough through his tears to read the last few words again. But they were already committed to memory.

It was funny. He could have sworn that there were fourteen Roses around him by the time he folded the letter and put it into his jacket pocket. Sarah and the thirteen women crowded around him quietly, touching his arm, his shoulder, patting him soothingly, whispering words of encouragement. Yes, he thought, there was a little bit of Rose in each of them.

The end