A Taste for More

by Phyllis R. Dixon

Genres: African American Women's Fiction; Friendship; Women's Fiction

Synopsis

From rural Mississippi in the Jim Crow era through the transformative 1970s, this sweeping novel tells the tale of a mother’s sacrifice, relentless ambition, and against-all-odds success. But the one dream she can’t stop chasing may cost her everything . . .

Money is security. Always. Margo Dupree has lived by that rule since childhood, when her father’s death plunged her and her mother into poverty. Marriage brought only disillusionment and struggle. But it also gave Margo the determination to migrate north in search of a better life for herself and her young daughter, Lana.

The north, however, isn’t the panacea she expected, and Margo finds herself contending with the all-too-familiar obstacles of racism and prejudice, not to mention the new stresses of urban living. But things change once she realizes that what was once her greatest shame is now her greatest asset—the skills she learned from her mother’s job as a cook. Using her tasty recipes, personality, and relentless hustle, Margo begins to build a successful restaurant chain. Yet despite her ever-more desperate efforts, she can't earn her heart’s deepest desire: Lana’s forgiveness for her early absence.

As Lana becomes a beautiful young woman with an increasingly mercenary temperament, Margo wonders if she knows her daughter at all—and if she can save her from the bitter and frighteningly dangerous mistakes that may shatter both of their worlds . . .

Release date: June 25, 2024

Publisher: Kensington Books

Print pages: 320

Sample

Mama told me not to come here. But it was 1961 and I’d already had enough of Mississippi. Historians might say I was part of the Great Migration of Negroes who left the South fleeing racist violence, segregation, and poverty. Migration sounds natural and peaceful, but it doesn’t reflect the appropriate level of desperation and persecution. Great escape is more like it.

I grew up just outside Price, Mississippi. I was the youngest of five, the first born in a hospital, and first to graduate high school. Segregation and discrimination were prevalent, but I stayed on our side of the tracks, oblivious, in the warm cocoon my parents provided.

The first crack in that cocoon occurred when I was fourteen. My beloved daddy died. He was a World War I veteran who had met Mama at a church social. They married, bought land, raised cotton and children. I was much younger than my siblings and was basically raised as an only child. My siblings tell stories of picking cotton, World War II ration books, and riding to town in Granddaddy’s wagon. I never had to pick cotton or leave school during planting or harvest time.

When I turned thirteen, we moved into a four-bedroom house Daddy was building, with indoor plumbing, electricity, and a wraparound porch. Mama complained the new citified stove didn’t bake as well as her old woodstove. But I didn’t miss toting firewood every day. I loved peering in the oven window to watch her biscuits and cakes rise. And, not having to go outside to the bathroom seemed life-changing. I remember getting a spanking for flushing and re-flushing the toilet. Unfortunately, Daddy didn’t get to finish the house. Ten months after we moved in, he died in a car accident. Mama couldn’t finish the house and didn’t have money to pay farmworkers. My brothers lived in Memphis and offered to help. But Mama knew they weren’t interested in farming and didn’t want to return to Price. She reluctantly sold the farm, but after paying off the contract on the house, there wasn’t much left. They say those white men cheated her out of the property, but there wasn’t anything she could do about it. Even though she had never worked outside our home, she got a job as a domestic and we moved to a two-bedroom, shotgun house, closer to the railroad tracks in Price. At the time, I didn’t realize how much Mama was struggling. I liked living closer to town and she brought home food we never had at home, like stuffed bell peppers, crepes, and store-bought bread.

My daddy was what some folks derisively called “blue-black.” To him, this wasn’t an insult. He said that meant our blood was pure and not spoiled by a white master. Daddy was black and proud before James Brown proclaimed it. He adoringly called me his Hershey’s kiss, but in 1950s Mississippi, no one else complimented my mahogany brown skin, except Jesse, my first boyfriend. I was overjoyed that this popular boy with golden brown, cornbread-colored skin was interested in flat-chested, chocolate me.

Jesse Neal and I were high school sweethearts and my career goal was to be Mrs. Neal, have babies, and live happily ever after. He was a year ahead of me and we did everything together. He was on the track team and I was his biggest cheerleader. After he graduated, he started working at the paper mill, but within weeks, he was drafted. I was devastated, mostly because he wouldn’t be home for my senior prom. But Mama was relieved. She didn’t dislike Jesse, but she had plans for my life. “You got a letter from the colored college in Memphis, and with your grades, they’ll offer you a scholarship. You can stay with one of your brothers. Nothing to do around here but have babies and keep house.” I didn’t say anything, but that was exactly what I wanted to do.

Mama gave me a beautiful, leather-inscribed Bible for graduation and a pair of white gloves. But the present I adored most was a sterling silver-plated engagement ring from Jesse. He surprised me and came home on leave for my graduation. We got married the next day, then had a two-day honeymoon in Jackson. He returned to Fort Benning and I stayed with Mama. I got a job at the dry cleaners, but only worked two months before I had to quit. I was pregnant and had begun to miss a lot of days at work because the cleaning chemicals made me nauseous. I had morning sickness the entire pregnancy and none of Mama’s remedies worked.

Jesse scheduled leave to coincide with my due date, but I delivered six weeks early. Ultrasounds weren’t routine back then, and I didn’t know I was carrying twins until I delivered two babies. Lana slid out first, announcing her arrival with a demanding wail. My baby boy was breech and his delivery was more difficult. His umbilical cord was knotted, reducing oxygen flow and blood. He was much smaller than Lana and needed to be in an incubator.

Having a Negro hospital was a big deal for Price County, but it wasn’t equipped for complications with premature newborns, and my doctor wasn’t allowed to practice at Price County Memorial, the white hospital. This was déjà vu for Mama, since my daddy died because Memorial, the hospital nearest the accident site, didn’t accept Negro patients.

This time, Mama wasn’t taking “no” for an answer. After several frantic phone calls from my doctor, our pastor, and Miss Miller, the white lady Mama worked for, Memorial agreed to make an exception and care for my baby, but they wouldn’t send an ambulance to pick him up. After thirty hours of life, my baby boy died.

Mama took care of the burial, me and Lana, because for weeks I couldn’t function. Seeing other baby boys made me cry and I did something I had never done before—I began to tell my mother “no.” I refused to go to church because my son was buried in the cemetery behind the church. I didn’t emerge from my funk until Lana was almost four months old. Mama was outside hanging diapers on the line, and I was inside with Lana. She woke from a quick nap, crying, and I went to pick her up. She was dry and full, so I bounced her, walked her, and patted her. When Mama entered the room, Lana stretched out her arms and quieted as soon as Mama took her. Lana’s rejection stung, but I could only blame myself. It was time to embrace my role as mother to my healthy, butterscotch-colored angel.

Mama kept telling me about families looking for help, hinting I should find a job. I told her, “I didn’t graduate from high school just to work in some white woman’s kitchen.”

“You think you’re too good to do what I do, what my mother and grandmother did?” she asked. “Your daddy took good care of us. But when he died, I had to take care of you, so I did what I know. Thanks to God, and me working in a white woman’s kitchen, you never went without.”

“I know, Mama, but isn’t each generation supposed to do better than the one before? I believe I can do better than the lane white folks want me to stay in. I feel stagnant and I want something different.”

“Different isn’t always better.”

“Yes, ma’am.” I said yes, ma’am, but the only kitchen I planned to work in was my own. I saved the money Jesse sent and helped Mama make and sell her cakes, pies, and biscuits, while counting the days until my husband returned.

When he was discharged, I was ready to resume our path to happily ever after. I found a house, paid rent three months in advance, and Jesse was rehired at the paper mill. Things should’ve been on track, but Price didn’t hold the same appeal. The fun-loving boyfriend who left for basic training wasn’t the same man who returned from Okinawa. He had changed, or maybe I had. The Price that I had grown up in had felt safe and carefree. But I was outgrowing my youthful blinders. I clearly remember the first time I mentioned leaving.

“Jesse, is that you?” I said when I heard steps on the porch.

“Yeah. You got another man coming over here?”

“Of course not,” I answered. “l didn’t expect you home this early. Did they cut your hours again?”

“Yep. Cut ’em to zero,” Jesse said as he grabbed a beer from the icebox.

“Not again. Did they say how long the layoff would be?”

“How does forever sound? They’re closing and moving production to Mexico.”

“Can they do that?” I asked.

“These white folks can do whatever they want.”

“I read in the paper that A and P is hiring stockers. If you hurry, you can get there before their offices close.”

“Damn. I haven’t even been out of work an hour. Is it okay with you if I go tomorrow?”

“Everybody else who got laid off will be going over there. If you wait, you might miss—”

“I said I’ll go tomorrow,” Jesse said. “What’s in these bags?”

“I went to McRae’s and bought Lana new shoes, after I delivered peach pies to the American Legion.”

“These bags look like more than a pair of shoes. Didn’t you just buy shoes? She’s barely two, how many does she need?”

“Lana’s growing so fast. It’s important for her posture for her to wear proper fitting shoes.”

“Your sister brought you boxes of baby clothes and shoes. None of those fit?” Jesse asked as he opened another beer bottle.

“Hand-me-down clothes are okay, but not shoes. Her bones are still forming and used shoes can damage her feet. One three-dollar pair of shoes won’t break us. I did two wedding cakes last week and used that money.”

“Rub it in that I don’t make enough money.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?”

“I’m not arguing with you. Maybe if you weren’t inhaling so many beers, you could make some extra money.”

I may as well have been talking to the floor. Jesse grabbed his keys, another beer, and left. The next day, I applied for the A&P stocker job.

“This is a man’s job,” the manager told me.

“If I can do the job, what difference does it make?”

“You know this is a night job?”

“Yes, sir. That’s why it’s perfect. With a night job, I won’t need a babysitter.”

“I’ll hire you, but I’m not going to make any special allowances,” he said. Mama didn’t like it. She said all that lifting would keep me from having more babies. But it didn’t seem any more strenuous than lifting baskets of wet laundry or bringing in firewood. I was the first female stocker in Price County, but there were daily reminders that others didn’t think I belonged.

The stockers entered through the back door. I thought that was because it was closest to the stockrooms. One day I worked past the end of my shift and exited through the store. Judging by the customers’ facial expressions, you would’ve thought I was Adolf Hitler. My manager rushed to my side as I crossed the parking lot and with his finger pointed in my face, said, “If you want to keep working here, don’t ever use that door again. You know the colored door is in the back.” He was standing so close spit was sprinkling my chin. Then in a lower voice he said, “I like you. I hope you aren’t turning into a troublemaker.”

I was just trying to hurry home. I had the car and Jesse needed it to get to work. I apologized and rushed home, more concerned about the trouble that would be waiting for me if I didn’t get the car back, than some stupid whites-only rule.

Another day, I filled in when the bakery was shorthanded. A customer saw me frosting a cake and told the manager, “I don’t want that nigger handling my food.” These were the daily slights that stung like paper cuts. But one benefit of working at the A&P was I could get bruised produce, dented cans, surplus bread, and the Green Stamps customers tossed aside. Their goods were fresher and more varied than the items sold in the A&P on our side of the tracks. Our pantry and Mama’s chest freezer were full. Jesse claimed he only liked fresh vegetables and wasn’t eating canned food. But by the time I doctored up those cans with onions, peppers, smoked meats, and celery, he didn’t know the difference.

However, even with the extra groceries, Jesse still complained. “I don’t like you working this late,” he said one night, after I had put Lana to bed.

“I thought this was convenient so when you return to work, we won’t have to make any adjustments. It’s not like there are tons of jobs around here. And did you call the landlord about the roof?” I asked, as I emptied one of three buckets in the kitchen catching water from the leaking roof.

“He said he’ll send someone over. I reminded him about the porch step too. We pay him good money. Maybe we should consider moving,” Jesse said.

“Yes. Maybe we should consider moving, not just from this shack, but out of town. Aunt Lizzie said they’re begging for workers in Milwaukee, and she’s sure Uncle Max can get you on with him at Modern Metals. They’re hiring colored welders now and paying good money.”

“It’s too cold up there. When I was stationed in Camp Drum in New York, I froze my behind off. They can have it.”

“But there’s much more opportunity. Nobody has a problem finding a job.”

Mama’s sister, Aunt Lizzie and her husband Max, had moved to Milwaukee two years ago, leaving Mama as the only member of her immediate family still in Mississippi. Their daughter Vanessa was my favorite cousin and she’d been despondent about the move right before her senior year. We wrote letters and I kept her up to date on the happenings at Pettus High. But it didn’t take her long to get acclimated to her new home and shortly after they moved, she got pregnant. She didn’t graduate, but she still found a job making more than she would have in Price. She said there weren’t any white and colored signs. Negroes could try on clothes in the store and didn’t ride in the back of the bus unless we wanted to.

“Northern white folks aren’t any different than these crackers around here. At least here, you know where you stand,” Jesse said. “You make more money up there, but everything costs more, and you’re no better off. Three and four families are crammed into houses meant for one. And remember, everybody had a job during slavery too. We’re staying here.”

“There are boycotts, new civil rights laws, and everyone is excited about what President Kennedy has promised to do for Negroes, but it seems like times are getting harder instead of easier,” I said. “They just found that man in Yazoo County, castrated and mutilated, tossed on the roadside, and they pulled Mack Parker’s body from the Pearl River after he was arrested and jailed on some bogus charge. Those cases didn’t get publicity like Emmett Till, but things aren’t any better.”

“I won’t be run off. My family’s blood and sweat is in this county and I have a right to stay here as much as any white man. I wasn’t crazy about Eisenhower, but he did sign the Civil Rights Act. Somebody’s got to stay and make them live up to it.”

“You may be willing to sacrifice your daughter’s future on the possibility things will improve, but I’m not. I thought we were a team. Don’t I get a say?” I demanded.

“A team has one captain, and I say, we’re staying here,” Jesse replied while leaning back in the chair with his hands behind his head. “You’ve never been north of Memphis. You’re gullible and naive and wouldn’t last a week with those slick jokers.”

I hadn’t abandoned the idea of moving, but Mother Nature made the decision for me. That fall, I got pregnant. I could barely keep food down and I stayed tired. But I thought a baby would motivate Jesse to do better, especially if it was a boy. However, six weeks later, I miscarried. I was relieved, and that was when I realized I wanted out of the marriage. When I went to pick up Lana from Mama’s, I told her my concerns.

“You’re tired?” she asked with a chuckle. “You ain’t seen tired yet. Wait until—”

“That’s my point, Mama. Is this as good as it gets? I’m stocking at the store at night and baking all day, but we’re always short of money. Jesse had a good job at the lumberyard, but got into it with his boss and got fired. He knows you can’t talk to these white folks any kind of way.”

“Don’t he babysit most nights?” Mama asked.

“It’s not babysitting if it’s your own child. And he was off work yesterday. Why did he even bring Lana over here?”

“Don’t be too hard on him. Colored men have it hard.”

“And colored women don’t?”

“That’s the way it is, honey.”

“Jesse didn’t stay at the house last night. I got off work early and he wasn’t home. This isn’t the first time either.”

“Men got their ways is all I can tell you. Unless he beating on you or drinking too much, Jesse ain’t no worse than the rest of them.”

“Daddy always took care of us, and he didn’t mistreat you.”

“These young fellas ain’t like they was in your daddy’s day,” she said, shaking her head. “Try being more understanding and supportive.”

“And who’s supporting me?”

“Pray and lean on God, baby. He’s all the support you need.”

“I know Jesse is as miserable as I am. I’ve suggested we move and get a fresh start. Aunt Lizzie says lots of places are hiring up there. He won’t even consider it.”

“If your husband doesn’t want to go, that’s the end of it.”

“Why should I struggle because he doesn’t want to try something different? I’m moving, and I need you to keep Lana until I get situated and come get her.”

“I thought you said Jesse don’t want to go.”

“I’m going, with or without him.”

“It’s a cold, fast life up there, and I’m not talking about the weather. Lizzie and Max work fifteen jobs just to survive. Your daddy instilled an independent streak in you, but the reality is, it’s not easy for a woman on her own.”

“It can’t be harder than it is right now.”

“You probably just need a change for a little while. Go visit your sisters in Detroit. Lizzie wasn’t in Wisconsin three months before Vanessa got pregnant. She can’t watch her own daughter, how is she going to keep up with you?”

“Nobody needs to watch me, and I want more than a little change. Aunt Lizzie said I can stay with her and Uncle Max until I get settled. But if things are like she says they are, it shouldn’t take me long to get a job and my own place.”

“You’re still grieving the loss of your baby. Don’t make no quick decisions.”

This wasn’t a quick decision. I’d been considering leaving for months. This wasn’t the first time Jesse stayed out all night. When I got in from work, I could tell he’d just gotten in too. But other than him disrupting Lana’s routine, I didn’t care anymore. My pregnancy scare crystallized what I was afraid to admit. Another kid would’ve chained me to him and Price, and I was trying to break free.

For the next three months, I worked extra hours at the store. I aggressively sought bakery orders, and my house constantly smelled like vanilla, cinnamon, or nutmeg. But when a tornado came through town, the A&P closed. We had a few trees fall, but most damage was across the tracks. My white coworkers received unemployment checks, but when I went to apply, I was told I didn’t qualify. With the rebuilding, Jesse found construction work, but I never knew when or if he was going to give me money. With my job on hold and my baking customers also rebuilding, I decided this was the time to leave. Otherwise, I was going to deplete my savings.

I’d written to Aunt Lizzie and told her when I was arriving. Vanessa’s letters said she couldn’t wait, and talked about the fun we were going to have. But I wasn’t going there for fun. In the days leading up to my getaway, I took my things and Lana’s little by little to Mama’s house. Each time she tried to talk me out of moving, but eventually gave up and said, “It’s a mistake, but every tub got to sit on its own bottom.”

On the first Friday in January, Mama drove me to the Greenwood train station while Jesse was at work. Sitting in the colored section, we heard the announcement that the train was arriving. “It’s not too late to change your mind,” she said as the train approached.

“Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing,” I assured her.

“And you got your money pinned in your brassiere?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said with a smile.

We held hands while Mama prayed, then we moved toward the train. Mama hugged me and placed two rolled-up twenties in my hand. The blaring train horn and squeaky brakes startled Lana and she hugged my legs and began crying. I kissed the top of her head, then tightened the belt on my new coat, and turned my head so she wouldn’t see my eyes watering.

“You take care of yourself,” Mama said, as she picked Lana up.

“I will. And I’ll be back for Lana in a couple months, September at the latest.” Little did I know those months would turn into years.

After riding for six hours, our third stop was Cairo, Illinois. Most of my fellow passengers were grabbing their suitcases. I assumed they were getting off, until someone told me we could now leave the Jim Crow car. I switched cars along with everyone else. I’d never been on a train and didn’t know our car was inferior, until I entered the other one. Walking those twenty steps was like stepping into another world. The seats were upholstered and there was heat. There were luggage racks, and the bathrooms were larger and didn’t smell bad. I reclined my seat, stretched out my legs and slept until dawn, when the train pulled into Chicago’s Union Station.

I’d never been north of Memphis, and I was amazed by the tall buildings. The next amazing thing—when I switched to the Milwaukee train—was that black and white passengers stood in the same line and the white porter took my suitcase and helped me onto the train. I couldn’t wait to write Mama and tell her about it.

The sun was up and I could see the snow-covered ground. Outside the city, the landscape looked like the fields back home when it was time to pick cotton. We finally pulled into the Milwaukee stati. . .