savannah's street

Savannah Jackson's leg lay angled on the floor like some dismembered doll part. She looked at the leg and cursed. Savannah stabbed at it with the hook of her cane, sliding as close as she could on the edge of her bed. If she fell again they'd put her in the home. She knew that. "Mothafucka," she hissed. Savannah was ninety-two, raised in the sharecropper south. She came north in the forties and made a minor name for herself as a waitress in the local jazz clubs. Nobody messed with Red. Everyone knew about the razor she kept, the one she was not afraid to use. Her now gray hair was braided tight to her scalp. Her clear blue eyes were like opals. She was stunning in her younger years.
Peter Magonagall, Professor, steamed milk for his latte. Peter rode the gentrified tide into this neighborhood. He met Savannah once in the hallway, kindly offered his assistance any time she might need it, and then closed his door when she said nothing in reply.
It killed her to do so, but she held the cane like a bat and whacked the wall. Soon Professor Magonagall was standing on the threshold of her bedroom looking in on the odd site of this old woman with her cane raised like a staff, and a leg, complete with sneakered foot, laying just out of her reach.
"I needs my leg," she said.
"That?" Magonagal pointed.
"Now ain't that a bitch. Smart Professor muthafucka' don't know what a leg look like."
Embarrassed, Magonagall's eyes darted nervously about, and stopped when he noticed a half-smoked joint in an ashtray next to the bed.
"Shit," she said, "What, now you gonna lecture the old lady?"
"No, No..."
"Just get me my damned leg."
Magonagall bent and handed her the leg, surprised by its weight.
"Thank you," Savannah said dryly.
And then, because she couldn't help herself, she added. "You wants some?"