The Castle Cross the Magnet Carter

by Kia Corthron

  After Sunday school this week I went over to his house just for an hour. I knew the rest of the week I’d be too busy, between regular homework and the final crucial preparations for the debate. But Henry Lee had mentioned Sally would be taking Tuesday off for some funeral and had traded with her regular Sunday off, and that Roger always liked to spend Sundays with his mother, so I calculated Roger’s presence should add up to an extra nickel. All the debate excitement had not caused me to forsake my Sopwith ambition.

  I knocked on the kitchen door. When no one answered I walked in. No Sally, no Roger. Down to the basement.

  I stopped still in my tracks. There was Roger playing trains with Henry Lee. And not in Roger’s usual half-aloof way. Really playing, though never exactly looking at his playmate.

  “It’s the tragedy of the century,” Henry Lee said.

  “A tornado,” said Roger, “is approaching this sleepy town. They hear tell of it wreaking destruction in the next state, but these unsuspecting villagers don’t worry. This settlement is in a valley surrounded by mountains, Whoever heard of a tornado jumping a mountain? They laugh and pray for all the prairie dwellers in the twister’s path and go to bed. Except for the night owls, students up studying, those people driving around in their cars—”

  “Tonguin,” Henry Lee inserted, demonstrating with rapid gymnastics of his own tongue.

  “The last chance for these naïve citizens to take their families on a pleasant leisurely evening drive-around before the rations outlaw sightseeing.”

  “Hookers! Streetwalkers!”

  “Others are alone in their cars, just speculating about life. Looking for the Milky Way. Or thinking one day they’ll build a rocket to the moon, they’ll walk on the moon which is cold and soft and peaceful.”

  “But back to the tragedy.”

  “It would appear nothing could interfere with this idyllic night. But lo, danger lurks in the distance. Even the train thinks it’s safe, it’d pull over usually, hold off until the minor storm passed—”

  “Wait a minute.”

  Roger looked up.

  “What’re you talkin about? the train. The tornado is not knockin over the train. The train’s expensive, she’d kill me. The tornado can mess with the cars and the people but nothin touches the Southern Railway.”

  “After I graduate I’m hopping the trains.”

  “Me too!” Henry Lee seemed delighted to find this element of kindred spirit in Roger. Neither of them had yet looked in my direction but I knew damn well they were aware I was standing there.

  “I’m gonna be on the bum, out to San Francisco. I’ll dip my feet in the bay. I’ll drive the city bus.”

  “They won’t let a colored drive the bus.”

  “They’ll let me. Then on up to Seattle. And cross over: Vancouver.”

  “They let colored in Canada?”

  “Yes!” As if it were the most moronic question ever, but Henry Lee seemed to take no offense.

  “I’ma hop the trains too. Maybe we can hop em together. I can go to Canada. Bonn jore.”

  “West Canada! They don’t speak French in the West!”

  “Roger.” His mother calling from the top of the steps.

  “Ma’am?”

  “Think it’s about time you started your homework.”

  Roger sighed, and for the first time his eyes rested directly on me. I held several books in my hand, ready for rental. I had lugged them to Sunday school and back just for this moment. He stood and gloomily ascended the stairs, passing right by me without comment. The door above closed behind him.

  “Jesus!” Henry Lee slammed a fire truck down, still not looking at me. “He don’t like to always be the student. The minute he havin any fun: Roger!” I was wholly undecided whether at the moment I hated Roger or Henry Lee more.

  “You got the cards?” I suddenly wanted to whip Henry Lee’s ass in twenty-one. We had both grown a bit tired of the trains as of late, though he sure seemed to have been having a jolly ole time with Roger. We sat on the floor. We never played for money. Henry Lee had suggested it many times. I told him my mother wouldn’t let me, gambling she considered a sin. For truth, I was just suspicious Henry Lee would cheat.

  “You goin to college?” he suddenly asked. I nodded though it seemed doubtful.

  “Not me. I’m hoppin the trains.”

  “Hit me.” By this point, he must have glimpsed the bandage on my head from the deer attack, but far be it from him to have acknowledged it.

  “Unless I could go to college with Roger.” His face brightened. “Yeah, I could go to a colored school. How hard could it be to graduate from there? And they couldn’t cry cuz their son didn’t get the damn degree. Wouldn’t they love it! Now that’d be worth it, look on their faces. Their only child: proud graduate a Sambo U!”

  “The U.S. has various protectorates,” affirms Nick Fiore, “and any one of these could apply for statehood. But there is one major liability that distinguishes Hawaii, a domain bringing together multiple cultures owing to the immigrant plantation workers. Nearly forty percent of Hawaii’s inhabitants are of Japanese descent. Forty percent! It could be argued that Pearl Harbor was such an easy target because the Japanese most likely had spies that had traveled there, legally, many times.”

  I think of how our flat maps, U.S. to the left and Japan to the right, make it seem like we are the world apart, when all you have to do is fold it and see Japan practically kisses Hawaii. I think about when I came downstairs this morning in my suit, passing my father hidden behind his newspaper, the headline:

  JAPANESE CONTAINMENT

  PRESIDENT SIGNS EXECUTIVE ORDER 9066

  My mother chatted away in the kitchen, oiling my hair. Pa could have traded with somebody to get off today, but apparently he chose not to. For all I know he might have already had the day off and traded to make sure he was on. Then I heard the front door open and close, him gone to the mill for the day.

  “Where’s B.J. gonna be?”

  “Takin him over to Aunt Pearlie’s. She’s makin her apple crumb pie he likes, he won’t even need to know anything went on.” She pats my hair. “Okay, you’re done. Lemme fix you a plate.”

  “I don’t think I can eat.”

  “You better eat. Your pa give up both his bacon strips so you could have four.” I stared at her. She smiled. “He said you’ll be the one needin the energy today.”

  “My full name,” our opponent continues, “is Nicostrato Giovanni Fiore. A mouthful.” The audience laughs, and he smiles. “My parents came here from Naples, the land of our current enemy. But as you can see, I have fully assimilated. My brother Ludo volunteered for the army, flew overseas two days ago. We are not certain where he is right now. He could very well wind up killing a distant cousin. This war is a catastrophe, but not one of our making. It is the brainchild of a few mad despots-in-arms, namely Hitler, Hirohito, and Mussolini. But my brother, my parents, my entire family. We are Americans. We have happily dived into the Melting Pot.

  “I’m not so sure this melting process has progressed so well with our Japanese immigrants isolated on islands so far out in the Pacific, not much closer to San Diego than to Tokyo.” Apropos of nothing other than that the opposing team has the floor, Henry Lee crosses his eyes and twirls his tongue, which old physical science Mrs. Thatcherall spies, and in the interest of good sportsmanship she flicks Henry Lee twice sharply in the temple.

  On Sunday when I came up from Henry Lee’s basement and into the kitchen, Roger was poring over his own books. I relished the look of disappointment on his face when he’d see that I’m leaving already, that he blew his chance to look over my texts. I shut the basement door behind me, and he looked up. Gazed at me before he spoke.

  “Did anyone ever ask the first Hawaiians if they wanted to be Americans?” I stared. I hadn’t ever mentioned anything about the debate
to him. Did Henry Lee? “The ones the Americans originally stole the islands from?”

  When it’s time for my rebuttal, I stand on the podium. I had worked through lunch, too nervous to eat the tuna sandwich my mother packed. I’m guessing no one else is prepared to argue with the news that just hit the papers today. I take a moment to look out at the audience. My mother and sister smile wide at me, and I am suddenly overcome with a terrible regret that my brother is not sitting there with them. This just might be the finest moment of my life and, because of my own stubbornness, he missed it. He would’ve been quiet if Ma had told him to. He would have been so happy to see me up here. Why do I always have to be such a creep?

  “My opponent has made mention of the melting pot theory, assimilation into the culture of the United States. He has hypothesized that while his family, of Italian background, has evolved into full-blooded Americans, that this same conversion is not possible for, or is of no interest to, the Hawaiian Japanese. Mr. Fiore’s family is part of Prayer Ridge, Alabama, a town of few newcomers, most families here for generations. I wonder if Mr. Fiore’s family would have melted so quickly if they were living in New York City, where there are other options, Little Italy right around the corner.

  “But we are talking about the Japanese. Yesterday President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066. The legalese is nearly incomprehensible, but the newspaper editors have spelled it out: Americans of Japanese descent are to be sent to internment camps. Japanese families who have been here for generations will not be exempt. Families of people now serving America in the armed forces will not be exempt. With regard to my opponent’s concern that the Japanese have not properly assimilated into the larger American society, it would appear their forced segregation from the rest of America would be a monumental deterrent to such a process.

  “Although President Roosevelt’s order lacks specificity with regard to these ‘military areas,’ the newspapers have interpreted it well. To be sure, there recently have been internments of residents of German ancestry, of Italian ancestry, but these detainees made up a minuscule percentage of their ethnic population, and were mostly noncitizens. This belated decree affecting the Japanese is much more far-reaching. Whole neighborhoods will vanish, the camps filled with mothers, old men, children. So it would seem those who melt into the pot most seamlessly do not appear to be those who think American, but rather who look American. Like the Founding Fathers, none of whom, to my knowledge, were Japanese, or African, or Cherokee.

  “So we as a democratic nation, vastly different from Hitler’s regime, we demand that eligible Hawaiians serve in the war, and simultaneously may force over a third of the Hawaiian population into confinement. And all Hawaii has asked of us is statehood. That in addition to the undertaking of all the attendant responsibilities of being American, many of which have already been thrust upon them, they might also enjoy the privileges of being one of these United States, to vote and to be represented. Don’t we owe them that much?”

  I feel ecstatic in my surprise attack, stunned by my own impeccable articulation. The audience stares, gaping, and for a brief insane moment I wonder if I’ll get a standing ovation. Then, as some of the mouths close and the stares transform into glares, I am hurled into the terrible reality that I’ve just lost Prayer Ridge the debate.

  When it’s all over, there’s some kid from the yearbook to take our picture. Mr. Hickory behind with his hands on Lucille’s right shoulder and my left. Why didn’t the idiot snap the shot before the debate, when we were all nervous smiles? Of course Megan and Nick and the St. Mary’s gang are laughing, beaming. Mr. Westerly appears, and I look to him for some small comfort, but he seems almost to scowl at me, then congratulates Lucille on a good job. Mr. Hickory is shaking hands with St. Mary’s and waves Lucille and me over to do the same. Nick and Megan are kind, trying to be ungloating winners. One of their nun teachers, an old woman, gives me dirty looks. A young nun smiles brightly at me. Mr. Hickory is giving Lucille some encouraging conciliatory words. He turns to me but before he can say anything, the principal calls him over, and he indicates for me to wait until he returns. Where’s my mother?

  “That was great!” It’s some kid, maybe a couple of years older. Dark hair, tall, wiry. “I didn’t understand half of what yaw said, but you sure sounded smart!” He offers his hand. “I’m Francis Veter. I used to go here, graduated sixt grade few years ago.” We shake. “I saw your picture in the paper and I came. I must say I am thoroughly impressed!” Everybody in the St. Mary’s circle is praying now. Gratitude. Wonder if they’d be praying if God had lost it for them.

  Lucille’s parents are comforting her. She wipes her eyes, trying to do everything not to burst into tears but it’s coming. She hasn’t even looked at me since my rebuttal. Her mother is also heavy, her father tall and comparably slim. The way she is with him, I’m sure Henry Lee made up that whole thing about the two of them.

  “Hey Randall.” I turn around. Francis Veter is still standing there. “I saw you. Before.” He winks, like some secret between us. I have no idea what he’s talking about.

  I look over at Mr. Westerly who seems to be ranting to Mr. Hickory. They steal glances at me. When Mr. Westerly notices I am looking back, he turns away. I head fast for the exit.

  The air out on the football field is chilly but I barely notice, bawling on the sidelines thirty minutes straight. In the distance some boys running cross-country. Monday I could have been some kind of school hero but instead I’ll once again be the dunce. None of them gave a damn about the debate but they’ll use it, just another excuse to get me, act like they hate me, like they’re so disappointed about the blamed competition but for truth they’ll love it, all the more reason to pull my chair out from under me, to flick at my ears when the teacher’s back’s turned flick my ears till they’re blood red, my face blood red and I’ll pretend it doesn’t bother me I’ll shoot myself, I should just shoot myself, my father hasn’t hunted in ages but still gotta be bullets in that shotgun I could go into Pa’s work shed and get that shotgun and blow my brains out blam and I am soothed by the image, my brains and blood splattered all over the walls. There’s one of my eyes, there a piece of my nose. I’m peering close to figure out if that pink spot is from my tongue or my lip when I see Mr. Hickory walking toward me with the young nun.

  “Randall! I thought I told you to wait for me.” But he’s all smiles.

  “I liked your speeches today, Randall,” the young nun says, also glowing.

  “Randall, this is Sister Gabriel. Math teacher.”

  “And I really, really liked your rebuttal.” She holds out her hand, and we shake. “Excellent work.”

  “It sure was.”

  “If I were the judge, I guess I would have had to vote against my own school.” With that, Sister Gabriel leaves.

  “That was some rebuttal, Mr. Evans.”

  I look at him. I don’t know what to say. I’m afraid anything I say might turn on the sobs again.

  “Listen. People don’t wanna hear what you said. I didn’t wanna hear what you said. But if the panel voted fair, who made the stronger case and not just who said the safe things, you young man would have easily given St. Mary’s their first loss of the season.” He touches my arm, giving it a warm squeeze. “I sure hope you’re considering law school.”

  Nobody’s home except my father grousing about no supper on the stove. “Probably took him out for ice cream to make up for leavin him all day,” he mutters. He’s likely right. Aunt Pearlie’s got nine kids most still living at home, plenty enough to keep B.J. busy, and yet he still would have felt abandoned by us. Pa doesn’t bother to ask how the debate went.

  I go up and change out of my good clothes. Before running off to tend to B.J. they could have at least left a note for me: Good job. A few days ago she asked me how to say I love you in the sign language. She was enchanted when I showed her, immediately running off to show him. A
fter a while I went to stand at the living room doorway, observing them. They were doing it back and forth, mother and firstborn son, him mimicking her, but he was confused: What is love? She tried to show him, holding her heart, showing her heart beating. Finally she held him and kissed him many times, silly and affectionate. He was thrilled and at last seemed to comprehend. Eventually she turned to sign I love you to me. An afterthought.

  I hear them all coming in downstairs, B.J.’s voice, Ma and Benja laughing and talking, ignoring my father’s grouchiness. I wash my face several times, trying to erase all evidence of my blubbering, of the day. When I’m through I stare in the mirror. Sure hope you’re considering law school. I heard this episode of Perry Mason on the radio a few weeks ago. Once again he proved the case, shocking everyone in the courtroom into a collective gasp.

  I come down to the living room and there they all are, Ma, Benja, B.J. Grinning at me. B.J. holds it. The trophy from Gephart’s. I know Mr. Westerly wasn’t planning on purchasing it until after the debate, and depending upon its outcome, so my family must have gone on and ordered it ahead of time, making it ready regardless.

  Randall Evans

  Best Speech

  Prayer Ridge Debate Competition

  Feb. 20, 1942

  8

  B.J. sits on the ground with our cousin Deb Ellen, him teaching her. He wanted to show her the sign words, and she always liked playing with him. She turned thirteen Wednesday, but they waited till today, Saturday, 14th of March, to celebrate her birthday in the park. Bright spring sun, and over on the colored side I see some girls skipping two ropes at once. The frankfurters and potato salad done, now Ma helps Aunt Pearlie set up the picnic table for the cake and ice cream.