For One More Day

Chick prepares to accompany his mother to a second appointment. The doorbell rings. Chick opens the door, and sees a bright light shining in his face and hears the voice of the policeman he heard earlier over the phone. He looks away, and when he looks back, he sees that instead it is Thelma, his family’s African-American housekeeper from his childhood. Thelma is “lean and narrow-shouldered, with a broad smile and a quick temper” (83). He remembers how she gave him his nickname, Chick, even though his father wanted him to be called Chuck: “‘Boy, the way you holler, you’re like a rooster. Chuckadoodle-doo!’ And my sister, who was then a preschooler, said ‘Chickadoodle-doo! Chickadoodle-doo!’ and, I don’t know, somehow, the ‘Chick’ part stuck” (84).

Thelma drives them to her house in her car. She lies down on the bed and his mother begins to take out her tools. Chick finds it strange that after so many years of Thelma working for his parents, his mother now works for her.

The narrative flashes back to Chick’s college baseball career. After his father witnesses a string of successful games, they meet by the team’s bus.