Out of Darkness

by Ashley Hope Pérez

  Wash’s face tightened. “Henry made Beto throw a stone through our window. There’s something wrong with that man.”

  Naomi understood then. Poor Beto.

  “I’ll carry him if he doesn’t wake up. We have to hurry,” Wash said.

  “And your parents?” she asked.

  “I’ll make them see,” he said.

  WASH Wash stood at the edge of the Masons’ backyard on the opposite end of the street from the burned house. Beto and Naomi hesitated a few steps behind.

  “What?” Wash said.

  “Maybe you should talk to them first,” Naomi said.

  Wash studied them for a second and then shook his head. “We go in together.” He reached for Naomi’s hand, and the three of them walked to the back door of the house.

  The relief on his parents’ faces turned almost instantly to confusion. Wash didn’t wait for them to ask. “Ma, Pa. We have some extra passengers.”

  “Who are they?” Jim asked, bristling. “Isn’t that the boy who—”

  “This is Naomi and her brother Beto. He didn’t want to throw that stone. His father made him.”

  Beto took a small step forward. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Fuller.” His eyelashes were wet and clumped from crying, and now the tears started again.

  “Oh, honey, that’s all right.” In a flash, Rhoda was out of her chair, kneeling by Beto and thumbing away his tears. “I know you didn’t want to,” she murmured. “I saw your daddy make you.”

  “He’s not my daddy anymore,” Beto said in a whisper. “I don’t want him.”

  “You know this boy?” Jim said to Rhoda, his voice accusing. “Did you know about ... about this?” He jabbed a finger in Naomi’s direction.

  Rhoda pulled back from Beto, but she kept her hands on his shoulders. “I know the boy. About her ... I had no more idea than you. But it’s done.”

  Jim glowered. “What are you talking about, woman?” His eyes flicked down to Naomi’s stomach. “Is there something I’m missing here?”

  “I guess you’ve forgotten what it’s like,” Rhoda said.

  “She’s white,” his father spluttered.

  “No,” Naomi said. “Mexican.”

  “That doesn’t fix a thing. What about this boy? I saw his daddy, and he was white and mad. White daddies don’t like their daughters running off with black boys.”

  “He’s not my father.”

  Jim rolled his eyes. “Everybody’s keen on denying that man—”

  “No, truly. My mother remarried. My father died.”

  “She’s my girl,” Wash said. He couldn’t help smiling; it felt so good to say it, even if it set his father off.

  “All of this is beside the point!” Jim shouted. He lowered his voice to an angry whisper. “You can never, never give them another cause to hunt you, James. What you two want—it’s impossible. In this world, at least. Tell them, Rhoda.”

  Wash’s mother didn’t answer him. “We can work this out on the road,” she said. “They need to get away from here, too.”

  “Naomi has people in San Antonio,” Wash said.

  “You think putting on a sombrero would be enough to make us blend in?” Jim’s voice dripped with sarcasm. He lowered himself back into the kitchen chair. “This is a mess, this is all a mess.”

  “Let’s go, Jim,” Rhoda said.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  Wash was leading the way to Mr. Mason’s old Chevy when Beto began to cry.

  “Now what?” Jim said.

  “Edgar,” Beto whispered. He grabbed Naomi’s arm. “Edgar.”

  “It’s his cat,” Wash explained.

  “Beto,” Naomi knelt beside him. “We can’t go back for Edgar. There’s no time, mi amor.”

  “She’s a living thing,” Beto said. “I can’t leave her.”

  “She’ll be all right,” Wash said.

  “He’ll kill her, I know it. He’s said as much before.” Beto ran to Jim and tugged on his sleeve, pleading eyes turned up.

  Naomi bit her lip and looked at Rhoda. “He’s lost so much.”

  “There’s money, too,” Naomi offered. “Nearly fourteen dollars.”

  Rhoda laid a hand on Jim’s arm. He shook her off. “We have to be practical,” he said. “Think about what matters.”

  “If we take the path through the woods,” Wash said, “we can get the money and the cat and be out where 37 crosses the county road by the time y’all drive by there,” Wash said.

  “You’re in no shape to run,” Naomi said. “I know the way. I’ll go.”

  “Naomi—” Wash started. His skin prickled at the thought of her going too near Henry.

  “He’s madder at Beto,” she said. “If anybody should go, it should be me. And anyhow, by now we can pretty much count on him being passed out drunk.”

  Wash’s father swallowed hard, then threw his hands up. “Get the money. Twenty minutes. We’ll be waiting just off the road past the Spender oil lease.”

  HENRY Henry sat in his empty house, hunched over the table and a tumbler of whiskey. He tossed the glass back. The night had not gone like he’d expected, not with Tom’s meddling, and now he wanted comfort from the drink, from his home. But he could see only what was missing.

  Henry went to his bedroom to refill his glass. He’d hidden his new bottle out of habit. At the nightstand, his hands wandered to the Bible. He had tried to read it so many times. Always the words lay dead on the page, refusing to come into his heart the way Pastor Tom had promised they would. But then the preacher had said a lot of things, most of which had proven untrue.

  Still, there ought to be some answers in that book. For once, there ought to be something for him. Henry lit a cigarette and smoked it. He studied the fake leather binding and gold lettering. Finally, he flipped the Bible open and laid a finger down at random. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and leaned closer to see what it said.

  Above the grimed crescent of his fingernail was the verse, “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.”

  He slammed the Bible shut and knocked it off the nightstand. It skidded across the floor and thudded against the dresser.

  Henry was done waiting on the Lord. He was done sitting by while he was robbed of what was rightfully his and those responsible went unpunished. He was done with disobedience from his son, done with the wanderings and false boundaries of the girl who was his by rights. He was done trying to rise above himself. He stubbed the cigarette out on the nightstand and went back into the kitchen with his whiskey.

  WASH “We have it all worked out—” Wash began. He started to explain to his father about the train tickets, the first step of his plan.

  Beside him, Peggy was muttering frightened pleas. “Let’s go now, let’s go now.”

  Wash gave her an elbow to the side. She whimpered and then quieted.

  Jim turned in his seat to face Wash. “It can’t be. Face it, son. We can take the girl and her brother back to their family in San Antonio, but that’s the end of it.”

  “At least hear his plan,” Rhoda said.

  “There’s no north that’s north enough for a mixed couple,” Jim said, his voice gritty with exasperation. “You know that.”

  “The girl could pass for black,” Rhoda insisted.

  Jim shook his head. “Think, Rhoda. There’s the boy, too.”

  Wash felt Beto stiffen. He slid his arm around Beto and whispered in his ear, “It’s going to be fine, buddy, don’t worry about them.” He turned his voice toward his parents. “Beto’s coming with us. And we’re going south.”

  “Oh, sure,” his father gave a bitter laugh. “Try Alabama. No, how about Florida? I hear just last year they cut off a man’s parts, fed ’em to him, then killed him for being with a white woman he’d never even met. How’s that sound to you, Wash?”

  “Pa—” Wash’s voice cracked. He pushed down the memory of Cal’s story about Blue and sucked in a deep breath. “Did you ever read about some folks trying to start a black
colony in Mexico? In a place called Baja California?”

  “It didn’t work, son,” his father interrupted. “The Mexican government denied their immigration papers and reversed their land grant. It was just another dream that went nowhere.”

  “I’m not saying we would go there,” Wash said, rushing to explain. “But Mexico. We could slip in, no papers. Lay low. I’ve got a plan to get there, too. I’ll sign on as a porter. And I’m learning Spanish.”

  His parents began arguing then, but Wash stopped listening. The idea of Mexico took hold of him again. Warmth. Everyone shades of brown. No Jim Crow shadowing them. He reached for Beto’s hand and squeezed it. For the moment, it still seemed possible that there was some place with room for the three of them.

  NAOMI Naomi walked as lightly as she could across the muddy yard of Henry’s house. His truck was parked at a wild angle on the gravel patch, but all the lights were off. Naomi peered under the truck in case Edgar had crawled under it, as she sometimes did, for the warmth of the engine. She wasn’t there. Naomi crept around to the front porch of the house where the window into their bedroom was. She eased up the front steps, avoiding the squeaky middle one, and crouched on the porch, listening. Nothing. The house remained dark and still.

  Naomi slid the bedroom window open and dropped from the windowsill onto the bed she had shared with Cari. She waited for a long moment without moving. There was no reaction. She exhaled. Henry was asleep, then. Or better: passed out.

  She stepped down from the bed and pulled the guitar case and bag out from under it. She placed them on the bed and turned, praying Beto’s cat would be there, curled up on his pillow. It was so dark, she couldn’t tell. She tiptoed across the room and held out a hand. Warm fur rubbed against her.

  Naomi took Edgar into her arms and walked gingerly across the floor.

  She climbed back onto the bed by the open window. She reminded herself to breathe. She set the cat down and lifted the guitar case and sack out the window and onto the front porch. Then she scooped Edgar back out and slid over the windowsill. She didn’t bother to close it, just grabbed their things and hurried down the steps.

  On the way back, though, she didn’t think to skip the middle step. When it creaked, she ran. Every step in the dark night brought her closer to Wash.

  HENRY Henry jolted awake. He steadied himself with a hand on the kitchen table and listened. He heard a sound at the front of the house, and for a moment his spirits lifted. He wasn’t alone after all. Someone was back. Naomi. Beto. Both of them. But then silence swallowed the sound. He went down the hall to the living room and pulled the curtains back from the side window. The night was dark as pitch, but there was one streetlamp at the intersection of the road to town and the first road that led into the Humble camp.

  He was about to drop the curtain when he saw her come into the circle of light. Naomi. She was carrying a bag and the guitar case. She was running. No, he realized, she was leaving. Leaving him.

  Knowledge turned into anger, and anger turned into action. Henry ran for his shotgun, and while he was in the bedroom, he pulled the revolver out of his drawer and shoved it in his hunting bag. Then he set out to track down what was his.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  Naomi was far down the road when Henry came out of the house, but he could hear her footfalls. He ran after her, keeping to the softer dirt on the side of the road. He thought about calling out to her, but if she was meeting someone, he didn’t want to alert him. The element of surprise was on his side. Just when he’d narrowed the gap between them, Naomi darted off the road and into a clearing. Through the dark trees, Henry saw taillights and heard the sound of a trunk slamming closed. He pulled the revolver from his bag as he ran.

  Naomi was climbing into the backseat of an old Chevrolet, but Henry got there before she closed the door. He elbowed it back open and grabbed her by the sleeve.

  “Get out,” he said.

  She gave a small cry but didn’t move. He leaned in farther to get a better grip. The air smelled of iodine and hair oil and filth. Blackness. Some kind of knowledge lurched inside him even before his eyes adjusted to the dark interior. He tightened his hold and dragged her out of the car.

  “Let her go!”

  Henry knew the voice.

  There was movement in the car, and then he was face to face with the nigger boy who should have been swinging from a tree.

  “Shut up!” Henry spat at him and shoved him aside. “Listen up, in the car, kill the engine and then get your hands where I can see ’em.” Henry trained the revolver on Wash and glanced back inside the Chevrolet. Now he could see that the rest of the nigger family was there, black hands lifted into blackness. And Beto. It was too much betrayal to take in at once.

  He motioned Beto out of the car. “You don’t run from your father, not ever. Did you think I wouldn’t find you?” He saw that the boy was holding his cat. “I’m going to strangle that damn cat.”

  Beto stared up at him, eyes brimming. He didn’t move.

  “Please, Henry, leave him alone,” Naomi whispered as she pulled against him and tried to put herself in front of Beto. Her yellow dress looked white in the moonless night.

  “Hold still,” he growled. “Stay put.”

  When she didn’t listen, he wrenched her to the side hard, knocking her against the side of the car. He kept the gun pointed at Wash.

  Henry glared at him. “I’ve had enough of you meddling in my affairs,” he said. He dug his fingers deep into the soft flesh of her arm. He liked the feel of her trembling under his hand. “This is my family.”

  “We’re not your family,” Naomi whispered.

  “Like hell you’re not!” He pointed the gun briefly at Beto. “Who’s your father, Robbie?”

  “I don’t have a father,” the boy said.

  “Damn it, Robbie!” Henry let go of Naomi and dragged Beto out of the car and slapped him hard. Naomi cried out, and when Henry turned to give her a dose, he saw that she had grabbed the nigger boy’s hand. She released it, but he knew what he’d seen.

  And then he recognized the shirt on the boy. Pale blue. The shirt he’d thought she was making for him. Now he understood the depths of her deceit. Like a goddamn fool, he’d listened to the preacher and let her into his house. He’d tried to win her over, and she had made him think she wanted to make things right.

  “You nigger-loving cunt,” he said.

  Naomi stared at her hands.

  Henry wavered for an instant. Her hands looked so much like Estella’s. She looked so much like Estella. Then he looked up and saw the whites of the black boy’s eyes, and purpose took hold of him again. He twisted his hand around her braid until her head was tipped back and she was close to him.

  “Get over there,” Henry said to Wash, pointing out a spot with his gun. “Stand right there where I can see you.” He motioned for the driver to roll down the window. “Listen carefully, Mr. Blackie. You and Mrs. Blackie and Girl Blackie are going to drive away. And you keep driving until you’re about ready to run out of gas. And when you stop to get gas, you say your yessirs and smile big, and then you go on your way. And you don’t say nothing about these three, you hear?” He jerked his head at Naomi and Wash and Beto.

  Henry could see the fear in the man’s eyes. The wife just stared ahead. In the back, the girl was sobbing. Snot streamed out of her nose.

  “I can’t do that, Mr. Smith,” Jim said.

  “You can and you will.”

  “Pa?” Wash said. “You all go on. We’ll be all right.”

  After a long moment, the engine started. “You know where to meet us. Don’t be a fool, son.”

  “Bye, bye,” Henry said, waving with the pistol. “Let’s go, kids.”

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  Henry had them walk single file in front of him. Beto in the front, then Wash, then Naomi. As they moved slowly down the path the wrongness of it all swelled inside Henry. All the disaster, all the pain the colored boy had caused already, and now the
thought of him sniffing around Naomi. And worse.

  “A nigger, Naomi?” He didn’t bother keeping his voice down. “You take up with this nigger all the while you was being cold to me? Me loving you and you acting like that was nothing?”

  “Stop it, Henry,” she said. She held her chin up.

  “This looks all right,” Henry said when they came to a small clearing deeper in the woods. He dropped his hunting pack to the ground but kept his shotgun slung across his back. “Now, nigger, you walk real slow over to that big oak. That’s right, walk on over.”

  Naomi and Beto followed after Wash.

  “Did I say for you two to move? I did not. Come here, son,” Henry nodded at Beto. “Come stand by your pa.”

  Beto shook his head.

  “Do what he says, Beto,” Wash whispered.

  “You, shut up!” Henry glared at Wash as Beto shuffled over, eyes down. Henry grabbed the boy’s arm. “Listen to me, Robbie. You think you can make a fool of me and nothin’ will happen? And you,” he said to Naomi. “You.”

  Wash took a step toward them, but Henry cocked the revolver and aimed it at his head.

  “Don’t think you’re the only one I’ll shoot,” Henry warned Wash. “Now listen, you dumb buck, move back with your hands up until you’re up against the tree.”

  Wash raised his hands and took a step back, then another.

  “Back against the tree. Now, arms by your side,” Henry said. He glanced over at Naomi and Beto. “Y’all make a single move other than what I tell you, and I shoot him right between the eyes.”

  Wash stood stiffly against the tree. He lifted his palms up slightly. “Sir, please. It doesn’t need to be like this. There’s nothing we can’t work out.”

  “Shut up,” Henry said. “Robbie, I want you to reach into my pack and find the rope. There’s a good length of it in there.”

  Beto shook his head no, but when Henry walked to the tree and shoved the gun under Wash’s chin, Beto put his head down and ran to get the rope. He brought it to where Henry stood with Wash.