Help for the Haunted(20)

They were stopping to kiss.





[page]Chapter 6

Thunder, Lightning, Rain



Ocala, Florida—of all places, that turned out to be the first we visited with our parents. They were scheduled to give a lecture at the city’s conference center. The event was going to draw their biggest crowd to date—more than three hundred tickets sold, my father informed us, reading from a fax that came as we were stuffing our suitcases. Even though the auditorium only held two hundred, the coordinators were setting up a spillover room where people could watch on a monitor. My father was thrilled, though my mother never cared one way or another about those sorts of details. She was too busy making sure Rose and I packed our toothbrushes and plenty of underwear.

Kansas. California. Texas. Pretty much any location they’d traveled to interested me more. Still, I was grateful for the chance to see something outside of Maryland for a change. Mostly, I couldn’t wait to splash around the hotel pool, even if that meant having to sit next to Rose on the fifteen-hour drive south. Ever since that night with Dot, my sister had developed an obsession that made her even less fun to be with. She’d been carting that bible around from the moment she pulled it from my parents’ nightstand. Flipping pages. Underlining passages. Scouring the text in search of ludicrous scripture that she recited to my parents as evidence that the book was “nothing more than an outdated fable.” So while other families we passed on I-95 might have been playing I Spy or Twenty Questions, the Masons kept busy listening to Rose.

“ ‘And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night,’ ” she read from Genesis before pointing out, “First of all, the moon is not a light; it only reflects light from the sun. And why, if God made the moon to ‘rule the night,’ does it spend half its time moving through the daytime sky?”

Sometimes my parents ignored her—the best tactic as far as I was concerned, since it led to her quietly staring out the window, a faraway look on her face. Other times, my mother or father offered an explanation, which almost always led to an argument. Every once in a while, they’d try some version of: “It’s nice to see you taking an interest and using your intellect, Rose. Perhaps all your questions will lead to a newfound faith.”

“I seriously doubt that,” she’d tell them. And soon, she’d be back at it. “Oh, here’s a winner: Genesis 1:29: ‘And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in which has the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.’ ”

From the front seat, our mother asked, “What’s so wrong with that?”

“Well, let’s see. Since a huge majority of plants and trees are poisonous, God’s advice is a tad reckless, don’t you think? I mean, would you tell Sylvie to wander out into the woods and eat whatever plants she found?”

“Of course not.”

“Well, lucky for Sylvie, otherwise she’d be dead. I guess you’re smarter than God who is apparently a moron.”

“Enough!” my father said, growing angry whenever she took things too far.

After that, my mother killed a few miles humming what sounded like a lullaby, one I’d never heard before. The tune climbed higher and higher until I think even she grew tired of it, and then she said, “Why don’t you read us some of your paper, Sylvie?”

I kept quiet, anticipating a groan from Rose. But my sister just pressed a cheek to the window, and her lack of protest led me to take out my paper along with the envelope announcing that I had won first prize for fifth grade, along with two hundred dollars.

“The Washington, D.C., riots that took place in early April of 1968, following the assassination of civil rights movement leader Martin Luther King Jr., affected at least 110 U.S. cities,” I read after clearing my throat. “Chicago and Baltimore were among the most impacted. The availability of jobs in the federal government attracted many to Washington in the 1960s, and middle-class African American neighborhoods prospered.”

“That’s a very good point you raise,” my father told me.

“It is, Sylvie,” my mother said. “Good job.”

Rose let out a humph.

“What?” I asked her.

“Nothing.”

Okay then, I thought, and I started reading again, “Despite the end of mandated segregation, the neighborhoods of Shaw, the H Street Northeast corridor, and—”

“It’s just funny that the people in the front seats agree with you,” Rose said, “since the Bible is racist and they are such big believers in everything the book says.”

“The Bible is not racist,” my mother told her.

My sister cracked hers open and began flipping pages. “Exhibit A: ‘If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property.’ If that’s not enough, here’s another gem: ‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property.’ Should I find more?”