G-157

by K. M. Malloy

  “Yeah, I’m really excited. Congrats on Gary making it to J.P.’s.”

  Melissa’s face began to glow, her speech speeding up as she chattered on about the event. “Gary just looks so cute in his uniform. He got a new lime green helmet and jersey with his equality credits last week. About time too since he looked ridiculous in that orange get up on a bright green bike. And don’t forget,” she said, elbowing Aire’s side. “Troy is going to be there, too.”

  “I didn’t forget that,” she smiled.

  “So?” Melissa asked, her brown eyes glittering.

  “So, what?”

  “What are you going to do about it?”

  “About what?” Aire asked. They reached the end of Buffalo Trail and took a left onto Washington. Melissa rolled her eyes.

  “You know exactly what I’m talking about,” she said.

  “Nope, no idea.” Aire turned her head away to look at anything but Melissa. “Aren’t you so glad it’s not raining today? I sure am. Yesterday sucked.”

  “Don’t change the subject,” Melissa said, giving her a playful shove. “Are you going to ask him for his practice jersey or not?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because that is way too scary.”

  “What the heazy, Aire?” Melissa shouted. “You’re not afraid to go to the worst part of the States by yourself but you’re afraid to ask a boy if you can wear his practice jersey?”

  “Yep,” Aire nodded. “Asking Troy if I can wear his jersey is way scarier.”

  They’d reached the corner of Washington and Bourbon, the business district alive once again. The community service crew was scattered about the buildings sweeping sidewalks, pulling weeds, and emptying garbage pails into the passing trash wagon. A CLOSED sign was posted on the door of the General Delivery. Inside she could see Mayor Jenkins pointing to mail bins and flipping through ledger books. Mike Hadley’s head bobbed up and down, a too wide grin on his face as Jenkins explained the inner workings of the office. Mrs. Jacobs gets recruited and Mike gets his job, Aire thought. Oh the glorious justice of John’s Town.

  “Well,” Melissa said. “You better hurry up and ask him before someone else does. I heard Lucy Mobley has a crush on him.”

  “No,” Aire said, her eyes flashing with anger.

  “Yep,” Melissa nodded. “So you better ask him today. Actually, you better do it tomorrow when you can wear a hat. Your mom did a real number on your bangs.”

  “Thanks,” she said, scowling as she tried to hide the ridiculous bangs under the rest of her hair.

  “Well, it really doesn’t matter,” Melissa shrugged when they reached the school. “You’re not going to ask him anyway, so you can blare those bangs around all you want.”

  Aire’s scowl deepened. They reached their lockers and began taking out their books: history, chemistry, algebra. Aire weighted down her back pack with her first three hours worth of text, groaning as she slung the heavy bag over her shoulder. Melissa winked at her when the bell to first period rang.

  “Do it,” Melissa said, and waved as they parted ways to their first hours.

  Aire greeted her history teacher and took her seat. She had just flipped to their new chapter on Africa when a familiar voice called to her from behind. She’d heard that voice nearly every day since kindergarten. It had been higher then, the face that went with it more rounded and smooth. That voice had belonged to a second-grader when she first heard its magical tone. The school believed that the best way to learn something was to teach it, and the second-graders had come into her kindergarten class to teach them to read as they enhanced their own new literary skills. The quiet boy with the deep green eyes had chosen her to teach. He gave her the gift of reading over the course of a few afternoons, and within a year she had skipped ahead two grades because of what he taught her. Now as she turned to look at those unchanged deep green eyes she’d looked into so many times, the thought of asking to wear their owner’s practice jersey scared her even more than the thought of living out the rest of her life in John’s Town.

  “Hey, Aire,” he said as he took his seat behind her.

  “Hi, Troy,” she replied, and tried to cover her hand over her bangs without being obvious.

  “Did you finish your report on the lost tribes of New Guinea?”

  “Yeah, I don’t think I like them though,” she said.

  “Why not?”

  “Because,” she said. “They’re all walking around half naked thinking red heads are witches and eating people they don’t like. Yeah it would be cool to live in the jungle, but not with those crazy people.”

  Troy let out a deep laugh that turned the skin of her arms into hot gooseflesh. “I totally agree. That is a scary thought. Anyway,” he continued. “Are you coming to The Moto? I made it to Junior Pro this year.”

  “Of course I’m going to go,” she said, her mouth suddenly going dry as her stomach flopped and twisted into knots.

  “Good,” he smiled. “I need a fan club.”

  She felt the color drain from her face as a wave of nausea tackled her. This is it, she told herself, just do it already. The room began fade away, and all that existed in that space was Troy. Her palms grew slick with sweat as she leaned in closer to him and lowered her voice. She could feel her pulse pounding in her neck as she forced the words out of her sticky mouth. “Then you should let me wear your practice jersey.”

  The boy smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he nodded his head.

  “Of course I will,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to ask you for a while now if you’d like to. I’ll give it to you next Wednesday so you’ll have it in time for the kick off dinner.”

  “Okay,” she smiled. “Sounds great.”

  “Cool.”

  The relief made her feel like flopping out of her seat and collapsing onto the floor. See, she told herself as she took a deep breath to calm her nerves, that wasn’t so bad. She felt more like throwing up now than she had before she’d asked him.

  “Okay, break it up, break it up,” their teacher, Mrs. Finch, said as she flurried down the aisle. “I know everyone is excited about The Moto next weekend, but we still have work to do. Let’s get going with the morning pledge so we can start our new chapter on Africans.”

  The class stood up to face the flag with the gold star in the middle hanging in the corner of the room. Putting their hands over their hearts, they began their daily recitation of the pledge. Aire’s lips were the only unmoving pair in the class.

  I pledge allegiance, to the flag, of the United Community of Johnson

  And to the vigilance, by which it stands

  One people, under Johnson, in pure obedience, with peace and harmony for all

  The clanging of metal on metal bounced through the room as butts were planted in chairs and knees were tucked under desks. The tearing of paper, flipping of pages, and sharpening of pencils followed. Mrs. Finch clicked on the projector and waited until she could hear only the clock ticking on the wall before beginning the lesson.

  “Alright everyone, you should have your books open to chapter nine on Africans: Ancient Peoples of the Plains. Africans primarily congregated on the plains of the Serengeti, also known as the Savanna. As you know, the African plains are a harsh and desolate environment. Temperatures can reach to well over a hundred and twenty degrees, and the average rainfall is less than thirty inches a year. Resources are scarce, and survival is granted only to those who use all of their resources to their full potential. If you turn to page 197, you’ll see a picture of an extinct African in front of his dung hut.”

  Snickers and quiet shocks of disbelief filled the classroom with the high school amusement of living in a dung hut. Mrs. Finch shot a reprimanding look at those snickering to silence the room before continuing.

  “Yes, that’s right, dung hut. Lumber is scarce on the plains, and the Africans found that using dung from water buffalo to build their lodgings worked better than any other mater
ial available. It provides a concealed environment that’s safe from predators, and provides excellent insulation against the sweltering heat of the Savanna. Do you see the African in the picture sweating? No, you don’t, thanks to his cool dung hut.”

  More snicker erupted as Aire leaned in closer to look at the photograph. The whiteness of the African’s eyes made a sharp contrast against his deep ebony skin. A few emaciated cattle roamed around the dry brown grass in the background. The sky was a lighter blue than it was in John’s Town, and it was gorgeous in its sweeping expanse.

  “The Africans had been a hearty and savage people,” Mrs. Finch continued. “No one is quite sure what happened, but they all vanished just over a millennium ago.”

  Aire frowned and looked closer at the picture. It wasn’t a drawing, it was a photograph. How could someone have taken a picture, she thought, if these people disappeared over a thousand years ago?

  “Some believe a long lasting drought caused their extinction. This would have caused crops to fail, cattle to die, and death from dehydration. Others believe-“

  “Mrs. Finch,” Aire said, her hand shooting into the air.

  Mrs. Finch’s grey eyes frowned from behind square glasses. “Yes, Aire?”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “When did you say the Africans went extinct?”

  “Aire, you need to pay attention in class.”

  “Yes, ma’am. It’s just that I thought you said they went extinct over a thousand years ago?”

  Mrs. Finch cleared her throat, her frown growing increasingly agitated. “That is exactly what I said. Why are you questioning me?”

  “It’s just that…” Aire paused. She pursed her lips together, glancing from the picture, to Mrs. Finch, and back to the picture. Don’t say anything, she told herself, you’ll just get sent to the principal’s office again if you say something.

  “It’s just that what, Aire?” Mrs. Finch snapped. “Please, ask the question that was so important you had to rudely interrupt the lesson to ask it.”

  The room was quiet and tense as twenty pairs of eyes stared at her. She clenched her jaw, her lips turning into thin white lines as she wiped her sweating palms on her jeans. Shut up, shut up, shut up, she told herself over and over again in her mind.

  “It’s nothing,” she mumbled, lowering her head as she sank in her seat. “I just wanted to make sure I heard you correctly. Sorry.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “Now as I was saying…”

  Aire heard no more of the lecture. Her thoughts were on the African, her eyes transfixed with his dark face as she wondered why the school was teaching her a lie.

  Chapter Three

  John’s Town

  In the beginning…

  In the beginning John’s Town was not an all Caucasian population like it is today. In the beginning, whites only made up half the population, the rest being a mix of black, Hispanic, Asian, Indian, and the likes. The Tillman twins changed all that.

  The Tillman twins, Richie and Ronny, were no more than five when they and their mother came to John’s Town. There were behavioral problems with all of the non-Caucasian people at the time, but the Tillman’s were the worst.

  It began when they entered grade school, though really their mother kept their bad behavior hidden from everyone else well before that. They were sent home on the first day of school for grabbing a stray cat on the playground and whipping it like a helicopter blade over their heads by the tail. On the second day, they beat an older boy with a cafeteria tray for taking the last cookie in the snack cart. They were asked to not show up for their third day, or any day after that.

  Lucita Tillman did her best to home school the boys when she was not at work in the cherry orchards. Each morning she got the boys up, washed, dressed, and fed before barricading them into the empty laundry room before she left for work. Both boys had their hands and feet bound behind their backs with a jug of water with a crazy straw sticking out of the top between the two of them. Lucita didn’t like having to tie up the boys, but if she didn’t they would escape. Who knew what they would do if they got out. Each night she came home and untied them. They had dinner and did their studies and had time to play before they were once again tied up in their beds for the night. This went on until that terrible day when the Tillman twins were fourteen.

  On that terrible day, Richie had taken a pearing knife from the kitchen drawer when his mother wasn’t looking and tucked it into the bottom of his shoe. He said nothing to his twin as their mother went through her usual routine of bounding and barricading them in the laundry room. She kissed them both goodbye and shut the door behind her. Richie waited until he heard her close the front door before setting to work.

  He wiggled off his shoe and inched his way around in a half circle until his fingertips found the knife handle. Then he began to move his fingers back and forth, the blade slowly gnawing away at the rope.

  “What are you doing?” Ronny asked. His back was towards his twin as he lay on the floor facing the wall. “Are you playing with yourself?”

  “No. I’m getting us out of here.”

  “What?”

  “I’m getting us out of here.”

  Ronny wormed his way around on the floor to look at his brother. He smiled when he saw the ropes slide from Richie’s hands.

  ***

  Lucita Tillman came from a long line of slaves born and raised on a southern plantation. The whites who owned her great-grandparents, and great-great-grandparents, and great-great-great-grandparents, had been wealthy cotton farmers who bred their slaves to be big, powerful work animals to raise more cotton than any other plantation in the south. Though she was a third generation free Tillman, Lucita’s workhorse breeding was alive and well in her, and she towered over most men in John’s Town. There was even talk of switching her over to the lumber yard because of her brute strength, but the switch was never made.

  Lucita had known for some time that there was something wrong with her boys after she brought them to John’s Town. She remembered almost nothing about her life before she became a resident in the United Community, but every once in a while, usually at night when she was in that strange netherworld between sleep and wakefulness, she remembered their smiling faces, their laughter, their gentle play.

  But something had happened after they came. She wasn’t consciously aware of it, but the feeling of it was always with her, weighing down on her like the heavy fruit baskets she carried every day in the summer. She loved her boys no less, but knew in her mother’s heart that there was something very wrong with them. And for the last few weeks, she knew there was something wrong with her as well.

  It crept up on her slowly, like a scorpion stalking its prey, hiding in the shadows until the victim was close enough so that it could lash out with its stinger and inject it with its poison. She could feel it lurking there in the back of her mind, festering, slowly releasing its toxins into her. And on that terrible day, the poison finally consumed her.

  She had a half full basket of cherries when it hit. The force of it was so overwhelming she shuddered and dropped the basket, sending hundreds of red cherries tumbling into the grass. Walt Hadley was working the same grove that day and rushed to Lucita, who began stumbling like a newly blinded woman around the grove. He dropped his own basket and ran through the trees, grabbing hold of her elbow just before she toppled over.

  “Easy there, pretty lady,” Walt said softly, doing his best to hide the effort it took to support the gigantic woman. “Little dizzy there?”

  “Yes.” Lucita’s eyes were void of thought, her lids unblinking.

  “Must be the heat. It’s warmer than normal this year. Let me walk you home so we can put you to bed.”

  “No.”

  “It would be no trouble at all. You don’t look so good. Come on, let me get you home so you can put your feet up and cool off.”

  She looked right at him, through him, almost. He stepped back a little when he saw the look in her eyes, t
hat hollow look.

  “No.”

  “Alright, Lucita, you win. I won’t walk you home, but I think you should go all the same. I’ll tell Boss you’re under the weather.”

  She said nothing as she turned to walk away from him, her footsteps jerky and mechanical. Walt felt a tight feeling in his chest he could never remember feeling before as he watched Lucita walk stiffly across the orchard. He couldn’t put a name on that feeling then, not even on all the days that followed after. It wasn’t until he was on the bathroom floor clutching at his chest and regretting that he’d never throw a ball with his new grandson Michael that he knew what the feeling was; it was the feeling of doom.

  Chapter Four

  Saturday March 13, 2010

  Population: 406

  Aire and Troy had been assigned as partners for a report on Africans. Melissa and Sarah Hadley had a research project for their biology class on gazelles. Thinking they’d be able to find information for their projects faster if they worked as a team, the four agreed to work together that Saturday in the public library. Melissa and Aire found the other two in the corner table at the northeast corner of the library, a few meager steps from the geography section. Troy grinned at her as she approached, and pulled out the chair next to him, motioning for her to sit. Aire felt a flush beginning to rise in her cheeks and smiled at him. Her leg burned and tingled as it brushed his when she sat down. For a moment she imagined what it would be like if his hand ran over her thighs, what it would be like if-

  “Hey all,” Melissa said as she took a seat across from Aire. “Are we ready and raring to go,” she laughed, and pulled her thick blond hair into a ponytail.

  “Oh yeah,” Troy said. “Reports are my idea of a great time.”