"Stuart's been sitting on the porch for almost two hours now. He's waiting on you."

Stuart? It doesn't make sense. "But Mama . . . she's . . ."

"Oh, Mama's fine. In fact, she's brightened up a little. Come on home, Skeeter, and tend to Stuart now."

THE DRIVE HOME has never felt so long. Ten minutes later, I pull in front of the house and see Stuart sitting on the top porch step. Daddy's in a rocking chair. They both stand when I turn off the car.

"Hey, Daddy," I say. I don't look at Stuart. "Where's Mama?"

"She's asleep, I just checked on her." Daddy yawns. I haven't seen him up past seven o'clock in ten years, when the spring cotton froze.

"'Night, you two. Turn the lights out when you're done." Daddy goes inside and Stuart and I are left alone. The night is so black, so quiet, I can't see stars or a moon or even a dog in the yard.

"What are you doing here?" I say and my voice, it sounds small.

"I came to talk to you."

I sit on the front step and put my head down on my arms. "Just say it fast and then go on. I was getting better. I heard this song and almost felt better ten minutes ago."

He moves closer to me, but not so close that we are touching. I wish we were touching.

"I came to tell you something. I came to say that I saw her."

I lift my head up. The first word in my head is selfish. selfish. You selfish son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h, coming here to talk about Patricia. You selfish son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h, coming here to talk about Patricia.

"I went out there, to San Francisco. Two weeks ago. I got in my truck and drove for four days and knocked on the door of the apartment house her mama gave me the address to."

I cover my face. All I can see is Stuart pushing her hair back like he used to with me. "I don't want to know this."

"I told her I thought that was the ugliest thing you could do to a person. Lie that way. She looked so different. Had on this prairie-looking dress and a peace sign and her hair was long and she didn't have any lipstick on. And she laughed when she saw me. And then she called me a wh.o.r.e." He rubs his eyes hard with his knuckles. "She, the one who took her clothes off for that guy--said I was a wh.o.r.e to my daddy, a wh.o.r.e to Mississippi."

"Why are you telling me this?" My fists are clenched. I taste metal. I've bitten down on my tongue.

"I drove out there because of you. After we broke up, I knew I had to get her out of my head. And I did it, Skeeter. I drove two thousand miles there and back and I'm here to tell you. It's dead. It's gone."

"Well, good, Stuart," I say. "Good for you."

He moves closer and leans down so I will look at him. And I feel sick, literally nauseated by the smell of bourbon on his breath. And yet I still want to fold myself up and put my entire body in his arms. I am loving him and hating him at the same time.

"Go home," I say, hardly believing myself. "There's no place left inside me for you."

"I don't believe that."

"You're too late, Stuart."

"Can I come by on Sat.u.r.day? To talk some more?"

I shrug, my eyes full of tears. I won't let him throw me away again. It's already happened too many times, with him, with my friends. I'd be stupid to let it happen again.

"I don't really care what you do."

I WAKE UP AT FIVE A.M. and start working on the stories. With only seventeen days until our deadline, I work through the day and night with a speed and efficiency I didn't know I possessed. I finish Louvenia's story in half the time it took me to write the others and, with an intense burning headache, I turn off the light as the first rays of sun peek through the window. If Aibileen will give me Constantine's story by early next week, I just might be able to pull this off.

And then I realize I do not have seventeen more days. How dumb dumb of me. I have ten days, because I haven't accounted for the time it will take to mail it to New York. of me. I have ten days, because I haven't accounted for the time it will take to mail it to New York.

I'd cry, if only I had the time to do it.

A few hours later, I wake up and go back to work. At five in the afternoon, I hear a car pull up and see Stuart climb out of his truck. I tear myself away from the typewriter and go out on the front porch.

"h.e.l.lo," I say, standing in the doorway.

"Hey, Skeeter." He nods at me, shyly I think, compared to his way two nights ago. "Afternoon, Mister Phelan."

"Hey there, son." Daddy gets up from his rocking chair. "I'll let you kids talk out here."

"Don't get up, Daddy. I'm sorry, but I'm busy today, Stuart. You're welcome to sit out here with Daddy as long as you like."

I go back in the house, pa.s.s Mother at the kitchen table drinking warm milk.

"Was that Stuart I saw out there?"

I go in the dining room. I stand back from the windows, where I know Stuart can't see me. I watch until he drives away. And then I just keep watching.

THAT NIGHT, as usual, I go to Aibileen's. I tell her about the deadline of only ten days, and she looks like she might cry. Then I hand her Louvenia's chapter to read, the one I've written at lightning speed. Minny is at the kitchen table with us, drinking a c.o.ke, looking out the window. I hadn't known she'd be here tonight and wish she'd leave us to work.

Aibileen puts it down, nods. "I think this chapter is right good. Read just as well as the slow-wrote ones."

I sigh, leaning back in my chair, thinking of what else needs to be done. "We need to decide on the t.i.tle," I say and rub my temples. "I've been working on a few. I think we should call it Colored Domestics and the Southern Families for Which They Work. Colored Domestics and the Southern Families for Which They Work."

"Say what?" Minny says, looking at me for the first time.

"That's the best way to describe it, don't you think?" I say.

"If you got a corn cob up you b.u.t.t."

"This isn't fiction, Minny. It's sociology. It has to sound exact."

"But that don't mean it have to sound boring," Minny says.

"Aibileen," I sigh, hoping we can resolve this tonight. "What do you think?"

Aibileen shrugs and I can see already, she's putting on her peace-making smile. It seems she has to smooth things over every time Minny and I are in the same room. "That's a good t.i.tle. A course you gone get tired a typing all that on top a ever page," she says. I'd told her this is how it has to be done.

"Well, we could shorten it a little . . ." I say and pull out my pencil.

Aibileen scratches her nose, says, "What you think about just calling it . . . Help Help?"

"Help," Minny repeats, like she's never heard of the word.

"Help," I say.

Aibileen shrugs, looks down shyly, like she's a little embarra.s.sed. "I ain't trying to take over your idea, I just... I like to keep things simple, you know?"

"I guess Help Help sound alright to me," Minny says and crosses her arms. sound alright to me," Minny says and crosses her arms.

"I like . . . Help Help," I say, because I really do. I add, "I think we'll still have to put the description underneath, so the category's clear, but I think that's a good t.i.tle."

"Good is right," Minny says. "Cause if this thing gets printed, Lord knows we gone need some."

On SUNDAY AFTERNOON, with eight days left, I come downstairs, dizzy and blinking from staring at pica type all day. I was almost glad when I heard Stuart's car pull up the drive. I rub my eyes. Maybe I'll sit with him awhile, clear my head, then go back and work through the night.

Stuart climbs out of his mud-splattered truck. He's still in his Sunday tie and I try to ignore how handsome he looks. I stretch my arms. It's ridiculously warm out, considering Christmas is in two and a half weeks. Mother's sitting on the porch in a rocking chair, swathed in blankets.

"h.e.l.lo, Missus Phelan. How are you feeling today?" Stuart asks.

Mother gives him a regal nod. "Fair. Thank you for asking." I'm surprised by the coolness in her voice. She turns back to her newsletter and I can't help but smile. Mother knows he's been stopping by but she hasn't mentioned it but once. I have to wonder when it will come.

"Hey," he says to me quietly and we sit on the bottom porch step. Silently, we watch our old cat Sherman sneak around a tree, his tail swaying, going after some creature we can't see.

Stuart puts his hand on my shoulder. "I can't stay today. I'm heading to Dallas right now for an oil meeting and I'll be gone three days," he says. "I just came by to tell you."

"Alright." I shrug, like it makes no difference.

"Alright then," he says and gets back in his truck.

When he has disappeared, Mother clears her throat. I don't turn around and look at her in the rocking chair. I don't want her to see the disappointment in my face that he's gone.

"Go ahead, Mother," I finally mutter. "Say what you want to say."

"Don't you let him cheapen you."

I look back at her, eye her suspiciously, even though she is so frail under the wool blanket. Sorry is the fool who ever underestimates my mother.

"If Stuart doesn't know how intelligent and kind I raised you to be, he can march straight on back to State Street." She narrows her eyes out at the winter land. "Frankly, I don't care much for Stuart. He doesn't know how lucky he was to have you."

I let Mother's words sit like a tiny, sweet candy on my tongue. Forcing myself up from the step, I head for the front door. There is so much work to be done and not nearly enough time.

"Thank you, Mother." I kiss her softly on the cheek and go inside.

I'M EXHAUSTED and IRRITABLE. For forty-eight hours I've done nothing but type. I am stupid with facts about other people's lives. My eyes sting from the smell of typing ink. My fingers are striped with paper cuts. Who knew paper and ink could be so vicious.

With just six days left, I go over to Aibileen's. She's taken a weekday off from work, despite Elizabeth's annoyance. I can tell she knows what we need to discuss before I even say it. She leaves me in the kitchen and comes back with a letter in her hand.

"Fore I give this to you . . . I think I ought to tell you some things. So you can really understand."

I nod. I am tense in my chair. I want to tear the envelope open and get this over with.

Aibileen straightens her notebook that's sitting on the kitchen table. I watch as she aligns her two yellow pencils. "Remember, I told you Constantine had a daughter. Well, Lulabelle was her name. Law, she come out pale as snow. Grew hair the color a hay. Not curly like yours. Straight it was."

"She was that white?" I ask. I've wondered this ever since Aibileen told me about Constantine's child, way back in Elizabeth's kitchen. I think about how surprised Constantine must've been to hold a white baby and know it was hers.

She nods. "When Lulabelle was four years old, Constantine . . ." Aibileen shifts in her chair. "She take her to a . . . orphanage. Up in Chicago."

"An orphanage? You mean . . . she gave her baby away?" As much as Constantine loved me, I can only imagine how much she must've loved her own child.

Aibileen looks me straight in the eye. I see something there I rarely see--frustration, antipathy. "A lot a colored womens got to give they children up, Miss Skeeter. Send they kids off cause they have to tend to a white family."

I look down, wondering if Constantine couldn't take care of her child because she had to take care of us.

"But most send em off to family. A orphanage is... different altogether."

"Why didn't she send the baby to her sister's? Or another relative?"

"Her sister...she just couldn't handle it. Being Negro with white skin . . . in Mississippi, it's like you don't belong to n.o.body. But it wasn't just hard on the girl. It was hard on Constantine. She . . . folks would look at her. White folks would stop her, ask her all suspicious what she doing toting round a white child. Policeman used to stop her on State Street, told her she need to get her uniform on. Even colored folks . . . they treat her different, distrustful, like she done something wrong. It was hard for her to find somebody to watch Lulabelle while she at work. Constantine got to where she didn't want to bring Lula . . . out much."

"Was she already working for my mother then?"

"She'd been with your mama a few years. That's where she met the father, Connor. He worked on your farm, lived back there in Hotstack." Aibileen shakes her head. "We was all surprised Constantine would go and... get herself in the family way. Some folks at church wasn't so kind about it, especially when the baby come out white. Even though the father was black as me."

"I'm sure Mother wasn't too pleased, either." Mother, I'm sure, knew all about it. She's always kept tabs on all the colored help and their situations-- where they live, if they're married, how many children they have. It's more of a control thing than a real interest. She wants to know who's walking around her property.

"Was it a colored orphanage or a white one?" Because I am thinking, I am hoping, maybe Constantine just wanted a better life for her child. Maybe she thought she'd be adopted by a white family and not feel so different.

"Colored. White ones wouldn't take her, I heard. I guess they knew... maybe they seen that kind a thing before.

"When Constantine went to the train station with Lulabelle to take her up there, I heard white folks was staring on the platform, wanting to know why a little white girl was going in the colored car. And when Constantine left her at the place up in Chicago . . . four is . . . pretty old to get given up. Lulabelle was screaming. That's what Constantine told somebody at our church. Said Lula was screaming and thrashing, trying to get her mama to come back to her. But Constantine, even with that sound in her ears . . . she left her there."

As I listen, it starts to hit me, what Aibileen is telling me. If I hadn't had the mother I have, I might not have thought it. "She gave her up because she was . . . ashamed? Because her daughter was white?"

Aibileen opens her mouth to disagree, but then she closes it, looks down. "A few years later, Constantine wrote the orphanage, told em she made a mistake, she wanted her girl back. But Lula been adopted already. She was gone. Constantine always said giving her child away was the worst mistake she'd ever made in her life." Aibileen leans back in her chair. "And she said if she ever got Lulabelle back, she'd never let her go."

I sit quietly, my heart aching for Constantine. I am starting to dread what this has to do with my mother.

"Bout two years ago, Constantine get a letter from Lulabelle. I reckon she was twenty-five by then, and it said her adoptive parents give her the address. They start writing to each other and Lulabelle say she want a come down and stay with her awhile. Constantine, Law, she so nervous she couldn't walk straight. Too nervous to eat, wouldn't even take no water. Kept throwing it up. I had her on my prayer list."

Two years ago. I was up at school then. Why didn't Constantine tell me in her letters what was going on?

"She took all her savings and bought new clothes for Lulabelle, hair things, had the church bee sew her a new quilt for the bed Lula gone sleep in. She told us at prayer meeting, What if she hate me? She's gone ask me why I give her away and if I tell her the truth . . . she'll hate me for what I done." What if she hate me? She's gone ask me why I give her away and if I tell her the truth . . . she'll hate me for what I done."

Aibileen looks up from her cup of tea, smiles a little. "She tell us, I can't wait for Skeeter to meet her, when she get back home from school. I forgot about that. I didn't know who Skeeter was, back then."

I remember my last letter from Constantine, that she had a surprise for me. I realize now, she'd wanted to introduce me to her daughter. I swallow back tears coming up in my throat. "What happened when Lulabelle came down to see her?"

Aibileen slides the envelope across the table. "I reckon you ought a read that part at home."

AT HOME, I GO UPSTAIRS. Without even stopping to sit down, I open Aibileen's letter. It is on notebook paper, covering the front and back, written in cursive pencil.

Afterward, I stare at the eight pages I've already written about walking to Hotstack with Constantine, the puzzles we worked on together, her pressing her thumb in my hand. I take a deep breath and put my hands on the typewriter keys. I can't waste any more time. I have to finish her story.