The Past Is Never

by Tiffany Quay Tyson

  I told her I’d started my own book of stories, a new notebook with my memories from our childhood and the story of the trip to Florida. My memory was like a series of interconnected caves, each one containing something new and surprising. The more I wrote, the more I knew.

  “Memory is like that,” she said.

  I asked her if she thought Fern would make a good mother.

  “The best,” Granny Clem said. “I have no doubt.”

  She gave you a stuffed rag doll that smelled of lemons. She said the doll contained a magic heart to keep you safe and happy. She folded the three of us in her arms before we drove away: me, you, your mother.

  I now understand why Granny Clem kept so many things from me. She hadn’t wanted to admit we weren’t related by blood, but I knew it didn’t matter. We were family, all of us. For good or for evil, we were bound together.

  I saw a curtain move as we drove past Chester’s trailer and I saw Chester’s face in the grimy window. He put a hand to the glass and I lifted my own hand to wave goodbye, but we didn’t slow down for a visit.

  We drove past Mama and Daddy’s old house before we left town. Your mama wanted to see where your daddy was raised. But I refused to drive her past the spot where Pansy disappeared, past the old quarry. No good has ever come from that plot of land. No good ever came from its water or from its rocks or from the woods surrounding it. It’s a place for ghosts and spirits, a place where the past lives on forever, but it’s not a place for you.

  I tell you all this because I don’t want our secrets to drown you.

  Your daddy will be released from prison right about the time you start school. You won’t know him. Going to visit him once a month won’t be anything compared to having him home every day. I suspect you’ll be mad at him for missing so much. Try to forgive him. He’ll do his best to take good care of you.

  You’ll have a nice life if you want one. You’ll travel. You’ll read books. You’ll meet people who speak different languages. You’ll eat exotic food. You’ll have your babies in hospitals where doctors and nurses hover to stamp out infection. You’ll believe in God. You’ll believe in science. You’ll believe in the Devil and monsters and fairy tales. You’ll believe in flying saucers and government conspiracies and extra-sensory perception. You’ll visit fortune-tellers and preachers and professors. You’ll take up baking. You’ll write poetry. You’ll sing in a band. You’ll search for truth and reason when the world makes no sense, when bombs blow up buildings, when tyrants are elected, when friends hang themselves, when babies die because no one bothered to feed them. You’ll carry with you the curse of the quarry and the secrets of the swamps and the rivers and the ocean.

  I’ll teach you how to kayak. You’ll welcome the ache of your shoulders after a long day with the paddle. You’ll never be lost on the water, because the water is part of you. But someday you might row a far piece and find yourself on the edge of the world, where alligators and crocodiles live, where manatees swim, where sharks circle, where dolphins play, and where dead men walk among the mangroves.

  Don’t be afraid.

  You were born from cotton slaves and plantation owners, from preachers and kitchen help, from healers and murderers, from liars and truth-tellers, from criminals and lawmakers, from bigots and from the oppressed, from monsters and saints. You were born from water and from earth and from blood.

  And someday you may feel them watching you; those creatures crouched beyond the trees, hiding in the water, lurking on the horizon, those creatures that live beneath shifting sands, above the dark clouds, or beyond the stars. But I tell you they aren’t beasts or ghosts or aliens come to read your dreams. Those eyes you feel watching you are the eyes of your family.

  They mean you no harm.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  My tales about southwest Florida are pure fiction, but I was inspired by true stories and I’m grateful to the people who let me ask too many questions. These include Lynn McMillan of the Smallwood Store, and Justin and Alli of Shurr Adventures. Thanks especially to Alli for guiding me through the mangrove tunnels and for teaching me to use my “monkey arms.” I’m enormously grateful to Captain Kent of Allure Adventures for the tour of the Ten Thousand Islands and for sharing his memories about life in the Everglades in the 1980s. In addition, I read stories from reporters including Mike Clary and Peter B. Gallagher and I watched Billy Corben’s entertaining documentary Square Grouper: The Godfathers of Ganja. Thanks to them and to all the journalists doing the hard work of recording the truth every day.

  To Sandra Bond for her unwavering support and for getting this manuscript into the hands of Chelsey Emmelhainz, who immediately found a dozen ways to make it better. To Beth Canova for thoughtful notes, endless patience, and steady guidance. To Caitlin Thomas and Stella Connell for spreading the word. To Jordon Koluch, Erin Seaward-Hiatt, Sarah Vostock, and everyone at Skyhorse for bringing this book, and many others, to life.

  As ever, I am grateful to Lighthouse Writers Workshop, my literary home. Shout out to the members of Salon Denver for listening. Thanks to the Amtrak Residency Program for the adventure on the rails.

  Much love to my family, especially my mother. Finally, to my husband, who paddles alongside me in the vast ocean, in frigid mountain lakes, in warm Gulf waters, and in life— come high winds or low tide, I want you on my team.