Camilla's Roses

Rose Charlottesville, unable to claim Georgia or Florida, but settling in both places; its name in place, but state allegiance caught up in red tape and government paperwork until the latter part of the eighteenth century when the town was divided into Charlottesville(on Georgia land) and Charlotte Bay(on the Florida side).But the people that called the town home had known the place for so long just as Charlottesville that they found it hard to refer to it as anything else. The return addresses found on letters that were sent to family and friends that relocated to different parts of the country stated: who and what street, road or route and then just, Charlottesville, USA.A quaint town, filled with people who lived in harmony; tiny wooden houses, barns well-stocked with grain; preserves in the cellar, animals fat and content.Abundant in everything anyone could ever want.Charlottesville was dense with vegetation brought over during slavery times. Java plum and carob trees dotted the countryside, jungle berry bushes climbed trestles and wood fences and there was an abundance of strawberry guava trees at the mouth of town.All of those exotic plants, trees, and shrubs were commonplace in Charlottesville, found in any backyard or the wide yawn of land that wouldn't be developed until the mid- 1950s.It was as unique a place as it was common; boasting nine- month-long summers and residents that had only heard of snow.Hope was everywhere in that small place few had heard of; resting in the dawn of each new day, in the blue jays? song and seen in the young eyes of the laughing children that played tag around the massive barks of the African tulip trees.Almost perfect.It was the rosebush that caused the envy and thievery.Where it came from, no one knew for sure. Algiers or Morocco, depending on who was telling the story.One of a kind and thriving on Hurston land is what caused the problems. Horticulturists came from all over the country to see this rosebush that did not grow in any other part of the country and all of the attention elevated its owners up to a kind of celebrity status. It had been stolen a number of times, dug up in the thick of night and hauled away by some jealous neighbor, but always returned, wilted and half-dead. ?Heathens,? Abbey said as she steadied the bush in place as Joseph shoveled dirt back into the hole and patted it into place. Back in its own soil, in its front-yard home again, the rosebush flourished and so did Abbey, coming up pregnant each time the rosebush was stolen and returned; she gave birth to ten children; eight girls and two boys, christening every one of the girls with the middle name Rose. And they in turn did the same and the same holds true for every girl child after that and so on and so on. Years later the tradition still holds firm and continues in that place that claims two states, with no zip code and one rosebush, but it also flourishes in a borough named after a little-known English royal that is bordered by the sea, where remnants of a world's fair still stands; it still thrives in a place called Queens. ThePresent Camilla Rose Tuesday was their day.Camilla picked out a matching thong and demi-cup bra. Purple-and-black mesh that showed most everything. She sat down at her dressing table and admired herself in the mirror as she squirted on some perfume, plucked at a few stray eyebrow hairs that had burrowed through since her last waxing. The car pulled into the driveway and then the front door opened. There were greetings exchanged between employer and employee and then the heavy sigh her husband Bryant always took before he began to climb their sweeping staircase. When he walked into the bedroom she was seated on the mahogany four-poster king-sizedMcFadden, Bernice L. is the author of 'Camilla's Roses', published 2004 under ISBN 9780525947967 and ISBN 0525947965.