The Last House on the Street(59)

We talk about Rainie then, always a safe topic. I tell him how disappointed she was about the ugly lake and how she loved the old tree house. We have a second glass of wine and when I walk him to the door and step out on the front porch, he turns to me. The porch light glitters in his thick white hair, but his blue eyes look tired.

“Don’t let Rainie play in those woods, Kayla,” he says, his voice serious. “Not till she’s older. All right? Maybe not even then.”

“Daddy?” I wrinkle my nose at him. “What—”

“Just humor me,” he says, leaning over to kiss my cheek. “I love you, honey. Good night.”

I watch him walk to his car, and although the night is warm, almost hot, I rub my arms as though I’m chilled. I feel a wave of sadness wash over me. I wish Jackson had heeded my father’s letter, no matter how silly or misguided his reasons for writing it. I wish he’d told me about it.

I wish we had found us a different place to build our home.





Chapter 27



ELLIE


1965

I woke up in darkness not knowing where I was. My head felt as though it had been cracked open. I heard myself groan, and someone leaned over me. Brushed a hand over my forehead. Made me wince.

“Oh, thank God! She’s waking up, guys!”

“Where are we?” I asked. “Are we moving?”

“We’re looking for the hospital. You fell. Do you remember falling?”

“I tripped.” My body jerked at the memory of flying through the air. I was beginning to make sense of where I was. What was around me. My head rested on Jocelyn’s lap. We were in the back seat of Paul’s car. “Am I bleeding?” I asked.

“No, but you were knocked out.”

I shut my eyes. All I wanted to do was go to sleep.

“Don’t sleep!” she said, pinching my shoulder through my blouse.

“Ouch. Stop it.” I knew there was no energy at all in my voice. I wasn’t even sure Jocelyn heard me. When I shut my eyes again, I saw the giant cross on fire. “I hated the…” I hunted for the right word. Couldn’t find it.

“The rally?” she prompted.

“Yes. I hated it.”

“We all hated it,” Paul said from somewhere to my right. I turned my head and could just make out his profile in the darkness. He was driving, focused on the road.

“I see the hospital,” the other boy said. I couldn’t remember his name. But I saw lights from the hospital through the window above my head. Round Hill Hospital, where I’d had my tonsils out and my hand stitched up after I cut it carving a boat out of balsa wood. I closed my eyes. The hospital would take care of me. I could sleep.



* * *



The next thing I knew, Jocelyn was squeezing my shoulder, telling me to wake up. “Open your eyes,” she said. “Don’t sleep.”

Everything was the same. The same jut of her chin above me. The same dark car ceiling. The same stop-and-go motion that was making me nauseous.

“Why are we leaving?” I asked. “Did they … fix me already?”

“No, honey,” Jocelyn said, and I thought, “Honey”? Why is she calling me honey? Why did she bite off the words like she was angry? “Once they found out you’re one of ‘those SCOPE kids’ they said you have to go to the Negro hospital. ‘The colored hospital,’ they called it.”

“I don’t know where that is,” I muttered. That seemed so wrong. “I’m from Round Hill. I had my hand taken out there.”

“Your hand taken out?” Jocelyn asked, then she spoke across me to the boys. “She’s delirious or something,” she said.

“I’m driving as fast as I can,” Paul said.

“It’s in Carlisle,” the other boy said, loudly, so I could hear him. Chip. His name was Chip.

Carlisle? Carlisle was a million miles away. I shut my eyes. I wouldn’t let Jocelyn wake me up again.



* * *



At the hospital, they kept me awake when all I wanted to do was sleep. They shined lights in my eyes and put ice on my head and gave me pills to lessen the pain. A nurse sat next to me, smiling and talking. I tried to tune her out and sleep, but gave up after a while. I got my words mixed up when I spoke to her. I wanted to tell her about SCOPE but couldn’t remember the name of it. She knew, though. She said her auntie had been one of the protesters in front of the courthouse. She was proud of her.

I had no way of reaching my SCOPE team, but I assumed they knew where I was, since Paul, Jocelyn, and Chip had brought me here. “Just you don’t worry ’bout it,” the nurse said. So I didn’t.



* * *



Sunday was a blur, but when I woke up Monday morning, I felt almost fine. I sat up in the narrow hospital bed and ate eggs and grits and talked to my roommate, who was there for a broken leg. “You white, ain’t ya,” she said. “Why you here?”

“Yes, ma’am, I am,” I said, and I explained about the white hospital turning me away. The more my head cleared, the angrier I got about that.

The nurse told me someone from SCOPE would pick me up that afternoon. She said she was “truly honored” to have me as her patient and thanked me for the work we were doing. I was suddenly glad the white hospital had turned me away then. Nobody there would be thanking me.