The Prophets(111)

They could have been sisters if Missy Ruth didn’t believe the same deception that men did. Oh, but the deceit was so alluring, sweet on the tongue like cane. There weren’t many who could spit it out.

Nothing compelled Maggie to shout to her or signal that the flames would soon reach her, giving her the chance to flee. Where would she go? Out in the woods like she always did, probably. Or into town. Or find some place of worship to give shelter. There were traps everywhere, sure, but, too, there was no shortage of people who would spring them and endanger themselves to spare a toubab woman grief.

Maggie just stared at her, remembering the dress. Then she held up the torch and for whatever reason, a tear streamed down her face. Maggie decided not to question where it came from or why it came, but was certain that it, alone, was enough.

She wasn’t standing on a hill, but that’s what it seemed like. It was as if the smoke were, instead, clouds, and the ashes—some of the flakes could have very well been her own child’s, mixed in with how far Empty was about to fall thanks to her, yes her, it should be known and remembered, but it won’t be—the ashes could have been the starry heavens because they, too, were remnants of dead things.

No one would remember her name, but she had become a larger spirit now: head bigger, hips wider, and whatever the hurt. All of the ones who had come before her simply pumping through her heart and they had found a place to be in the caverns of her throat. There, she recalled her voice.

With both her hands in the air, she cast her last spell:

“Look! We lined up in a row, stretched damn near across the whole place.” The people, crying some of them, looked over toward Maggie and scurried nearer. “Make a circle. We need a circle because both ends need to be closed up. A snake. A snake eating its own damn tail. Don’t that just beat all? What matter do it make if you are seen? You are here!”

She took a moment to look at each of them. “All you done seen. All you done touched. And you let something as small as a ocean part you? Ain’t you shamed?”

As the knowing rose upon their faces, Maggie smiled. Finally: “A wisdom!”

Only one question: What to do when the cavalry arrives? Only one thing to do:

With every drop of blood:

Rebel!





Isaiah

Be a stone. Please be a stone.

That was what some rocks said to some feathers, to the dandelion-wishes that floated about minding their own business before coming down slowly to land in some meadow and, after a time, take root. They wanted soft things to harden, for their own good, for their own good. But that left no consideration for the traveler who had to walk barefoot over the terrain, left them no comfortable place to step. And Isaiah wanted to be that for Samuel.

But comfort for travelers wasn’t the point. Because wonderful for them that they had some place to rest their feet, weary as they might be, but what about all the soft things beneath them?

Yes, I know. But I can’t be what I can’t be.

Open fields, then, where the blues were heartbreak and the black-eyed Susans were high in their conceit. Isaiah laid down both sword and shield way before he even got to the river. Whatever was ahead would be the hell toubab feared, unless it also came with a promise: the tip of Samuel’s trembling tongue at the edge of Isaiah’s impatient nipple. That was the thing to make the head roll back and the face worship sky. That was the thing to unfurl itself, a delicate bloom holding on to dew like joy. That was the thing to cause the many waters to rush toward calm and therefore to harbor. Yes. That was the thing.

And all the while he babbled in their covered intimacies, making Samuel ask him why he liked to talk so much; where was the quiet and could they have it for themselves, if just for a time? “Sleep is quiet enough,” Isaiah had told him. “When we awake, I wanna make sure you hear me. Inside you, I want you to hear me.” Samuel looked away. He understood it, but he couldn’t hold it. Elusive, like trying to catch a wish when a stone was easier to grasp.

But Isaiah couldn’t be a stone, especially not now, unless he wanted to sink to the bottom deep.

I be your stone for you.

How would Samuel get across the river with that weight on him? He, too, had nearly succumbed. No one would ever know how close he came to betraying everything, even himself in exchange for a tender name.

“Why they hate us?”

“The answer plum right in front you, ’Zay. Because Amos told them to. And Massa told Amos to.”

They could deal with stares and whispers. But the cleaving? That was what pushed Isaiah into the night waters, where who knows what was liable to have at him. No, he couldn’t be a sinking stone, for he needed, now, to float. Nameless because Isaiah wasn’t the name given to him by those he truly belonged to. Thus he walked about wearing an insult like castoffs. He answered to disrespect every time he was called, whether the caller adored him or not. Yes indeed, nearly a stone.

He took all of that, every single piece of that, and carried it on his back when he shot into the dark river water not knowing what abyss could be below. They had said that his people were afraid of water and couldn’t swim. He had heard the stories of the elders who leaped into the sea rather than make it to these bitter shores and how easy they went down. He thought maybe it was true then, that his people were made of stones, and the minute he thought he could make it across, he would sink to the bottom and drown.