A Gathering of Old Men by Ernest J. Gaines

I heard Candy out in the front yard calling Gram Mon. Me and Toddy and Minnie was sitting at the table eating, and Gram Mon was at the stove looking in the pot to see if she had enough food left in there for supper. I could hear Candy out in the yard, going: “Oh, Aunt Glo; oh, Aunt Glo; oh, Aunt Glo.” I jumped up from my chair to go see what she wanted, but Gram Mon told me to sit back down there and finish my food, ’cause my name wasn’t Glo, or Aunt. She looked at me long enough for it to set in; then she started toward the front door where Candy was still going: “Oh, Aunt Glo; oh, Aunt Glo; oh, Aunt Glo.”

Old Toddy with his snagged-teef self looked at me and grinned, ’cause he thought Gram Mon had hurt my feeling when she told me to sit back down. I checked one of my fist, but he knowed I couldn’t hit him, ’cause he had already caught me and Minnie playing mama and papa in the weeds, and he told me I had a year when I couldn’t do him nothing no matter what he did me, and if I did he was go’n tell Gram Mon what he caught us doing. He told me he could grin at me all he wanted to, and he could hit me, and kick me, and pinch me (in church, or home, he didn’t care), and he could steal my cake if he wanted to, or my candy if I had any, and he could lose all his marbles to me, and I better not take them back, and I better not gig his spinning top when we played gigging, ’cause if I did he was go’n tell Gram Mon what he saw me and Minnie trying to do in the weeds. He said it was go’n be like that a whole year, if I liked it or not. It started just ’fore Candy started calling Gram Mon, ’cause we had just come in to eat dinner when I heard her calling out there in the yard.