Welcome to Braggsville (13 page)

L
ATER
, D
ARON
AWOKE TO
C
HARLIE'S FACE
only inches from his own, his friend's breath heavy on his chin. Charlie was hyperventilating, his eyes hovering in the dark like some kind of magic trick. Daron led him outside in silence, knowing, hoping, that he would back out, too. Daron hadn't yet told his friends that his father expressly forbade him to go.

In the backyard with the door safely shut, Charlie asked, Are you sure about this? I don't remember ever being this frightened before. I can't do it. I can't. I can't pretend . . . not this. I can't pretend this. His forehead gleamed and his hands shook worse than his voice.

Was Quint right about Charlie? No. Daron recalled the sensation that had swept over him at Six Flags, the feeling that everyone was watching him, waiting for him to fuck up so they could swoop in. He'd felt under so much pressure that he'd wanted to scream, Stop staring at me. He should never have asked Charlie. Charlie shouldn't dress as a slave and pretend to be lynched any more than Daron should dress as a Grand Dragon and pretend to burn a cross. Charlie had nothing to fear from Braggsville, but they shouldn't have asked him anyway.

Charlie and Daron were still sitting in the backyard at five thirty, the appointed hour, when they heard Candice being quiet in the kitchen, which was clean as a chemistry lab. The canisters, spices, and condiments all put away. Everything out was labeled. There was no way they could return it to that condition before they left, so he suggested Waffle House, Right up the road a spell.

They packed into the Bronco.

W
AFFLE
H
OUSE
,
A
S
OUTHERN ICON
, the black lettering on a yellow background a beacon of gastronomical joy to the road-weary traveler, the Chapel of Carbohydrates where the high priest dispensed waffles to salve the soul, to satisfy every spiritual desire, even with chocolate chips. Then there were the hash browns, which could be ordered as a double portion, scattered, covered, smothered, and spiced. In Yankee-ese that meant with onion, cheese, chili, and jalapeños. Not quite home cooking, but a welcome treat because each location was locally owned and operated, and so felt like part of the family. The Braggsville kids traveled distances to circle BK or McD's on Friday nights, but when munchies took over the wheel, it was here they came. In this Awful Waffle, as it was affectionately known, Daron had broken up, made up, and broken up again with Rheanne. In high school, Daron often stopped here for midnight meals on his way home from parties as far as fifty miles away. It was fifteen miles from home, twice the width of San Fran, a short jaunt to Daron.

That country mile shit is true, complained Louis as they sat in a
Goodfellas
seat, as he called corner booths. Up the road my peach ass.

Peach ass?

Like that? I'm adding it to my routine. If you're Asian but act black, you're a peach. It's like the opposite of a Twinkie. The peach pit is reddish brown, though. So if you look Asian generally, but you're Indian specifically, does that make you double Asian? Or maybe if you look Asian, but you're Indian like, How, on the inside? That's Asian-Indian, which we already have. All right, all right. Wait, wait, wait. He waggled his finger. Malcolm X was reddish-ish. So, peach means you're Asian, but you're angry inside. Switching to his best black voice, Louis asked, Can you spell peach ass? Up the road my peach ass.

Everything is bigger in the country, Daron explained.

Hmmph. Charlie eyed the waitress and cook, leaning back as if at the base of a monument.

It sure is, Louis agreed. Even the parking spaces.

Please, hushed Candice.

They're fat. And I can say that. We're in the South. We're free to talk. Daron waved his fork like a magic wand. The muzzle was lifted. What had his mom told his uncle? Forget about unbuckling your pants, eat another bite and you won't fit your coffin.

Charlie studied the menu, mouthing out the options as if he had only recently learned to read.

After taking their order, the waitress stood at the end of the prep line and called out to the cook in a code only part of which they understood.

That's it? asked Candice.

Daron nodded. That's it. He remembers it all just like that.

They watched as the cook laid out plates and bowls in a mnemonic arrangement. Charlie continued to read the menu until Candice snatched it from his hands. Well?

It's one thing to talk about it. It's another to do it, answered Charlie.

We agreed, Louis reminded him.

Yeah. Candice's voice was both low and sharp. Remember. Make a difference. We'll have better luck in the real world, where people actually listen, not an amusement park.

It's different for me. Charlie held up his hands.

You think you're the only one? asked Candice. Okay, back to me on the tree and Louis issuing orders and you two asking questions.

Charlie cut his eyes at Daron and Candice banged the table, scowling as she realized that both Charlie and Daron were backing out.

Louis placed his hand over Candice's clenched fist, so tiny. I got this. Think about this a minute. Come on, Candy—

—Candy!
thought Daron. When did that start?—

—Think about it a second. We're asking a lot of him. Besides, if anyone sees Daron, they might think it's a joke anyway. So this is
better. I'm surprised Charlie ever agreed to this. For all we know, we could show up and they could shoot him for sport, just for the hell of it. They could have a past life flashback and try to hog-tie him and sell him; they could think he's a runaway and try to collect a bounty. They might eat him. Or maybe they'll only ask him to pump their gas or bag their groceries—

—Wait now, Loose, protested Daron. You're out of hand and making it sound—

—Like something that you two don't want to do, and for good reason. Right?

I live here.

Candice asked, So that makes it okay? Look around. We're raising the diversity level by one thousand percent everywhere we show up. You don't even know how to get to that black neighborhood, the Gutter.

I do. It's just you don't walk there. It's like, like, like, you fly over the ocean because it's quicker than swimming. And, it's the Gully, the Gully, like—he thought a moment—Like a gully, which is not a gutter.

Louis adopted his Indian, the other Indian accent. Me on your side, Kemosabe, but that no pearl. Maybe you should 'splain self later.

I only mean that as the crow flies isn't the quickest way. But I know how to get there. We could go there right now.

Nice try. Candice wriggled her fingers as if beckoning him to try again. This was your idea.

No, it wasn't. I mentioned it in class, and—

Charlie cut him off. Cut it. He's not backing out. His father asked him not to do it. He has to respect his family's wishes.

—It wasn't my idea, Daron insisted.

Candice was no longer listening to him. She'd turned to face Charlie as if he were the last man in the world. Charlie, Charlie, please don't back out now. There was real pleading in her voice.
Remember what you said? Remember. You wanted in. We wanted to put this BS to rest and you said we can't dig a grave without a spade. You said that. You. I was like, whoa, right on, that's my friend. We do need the right tools. Performance is a tool. Intervention is a tool.

Charlie hung his head at half-mast. The food came. Charlie, Daron, and Candice picked at theirs. Louis wolfed his down like a dog on death row.

Southerners. Candice snorted. Louis and I will go, and Daron and Charlie can do some interviews, okay? But you must do the interviews while we're there. Go to that weird store or wherever and ask people on the street what the war was about. You can't ask them after. If you do it afterwards, it's too late. Will your daddy let you go downtown? she asked, her tone saccharine.

My family came over as farmers. Then they worked the mill. They never owned slaves. If my uncle Roy said anything about crackers, he meant the sound of the whip cracking over cattle. No slaves.

Okay, Herr Vandenburg. And Ishi never lived at Six Flags Vallejo with Tweety Bird, but the Miwoks did, and they were massacred for gold.

That didn't work. He laughed at us. Vandenburg was the Six Flags park director in whose office they had spent, to Daron's mind, far too much time after their demonstration, or, as Candice called it, their performative intervention.

So you can go downtown? Can you go to the Gully? Why not ask them what they think?

D, can you at least drive Charlie downtown? asked Louis. We have to complete some interviews while the event is going on, before news of the performative intervention spreads.

That sounded fair enough to Daron. He wanted to contribute more, but Louis was right. If anyone saw him, they would think it was a joke, and their efforts would be wasted. He only wished he had thought of that sooner.

Charlie hadn't spoken for some time, and just sat there before his nearly full plate, his lips pulled into a sneer, tapping his incisor with his fingernail, which he often did during tests, and which Daron only now associated with nervousness.

I still can't believe this. We flew all the way out here. We had a plan, insisted Candice, making her hurt face.

But that morning it wasn't working on Daron, who was thinking, If you hadn't been fucking around interviewing and taking photos, you wouldn't have tipped off my parents.

Can we pay now?

Daron left a larger tip than usual, and covered his plate with his napkin to hide that he hadn't eaten the food.

T
HEY DROVE BACK IN SILENCE.
Charlie suggested they only do interviews, but no one responded. Daron said they didn't have to prove anything to anyone, to which Candice replied, We sure don't. You're proving it to us.

I told you, just because we're from Georgia doesn't mean we had slaves. My family never had slaves.

Neither did mine.

Even if we did, Harvard had that Moor, and no one complains about him.

I wish my family had slaves. In fact, I want them to bring that shit back. Maybe I'll convince some people of that today.

When they reached the south side of Old Man Donner's field, Charlie remained in the Bronco staring at the floorboards. Louis got out, tossed his oversize duffel decorated with Fu Manchu mustache patches on his shoulders like a drunken friend, and started walking without a word up the hill. After a moment, Candice turned and followed him. Daron and Charlie would return to the Davenports' home and wait for full sun before driving downtown to do the
interviews. It was early yet, and they had at least two hours before the detachment reached the nearest ridge, the point from which the troops would be able to see the tree planted by Bragg himself to commemorate his 1864 speech on freedom, the giant poplar under which Louis and Candice would stand dressed as slaves.

¿P
or qué?

Why did YOU go along with it? Because she spoke Spanish to the guard at the Mt. Olivet cemetery who, once informed of her plans, mucho gustoed all the brochures she wanted plus one plaque that danced between your spooked fingers like a shekel that still smelled of the mint. Because her great-grandfather was from near here, and could have been Ishi. Because to be one-eighth anything is to be one-eighth everything.

Because she spent three weeks ex-libris-ing the Doe Library, the Morrison noncirculating collection, the Gardner stacks, Moe's Books, et al., reappropriating Alfred Kroeber anthropology tomes until her shallow-bellied, two-burger hibachi sat ripe with enough ash to satisfy an urn (and she was nearly ticketed for that final cookout on the dorm balcony, all 448 pages of
The Nature of Culture
and all 243 pages of Mrs. Kroeber's
Ishi in Two Worlds,
but let off with a warning after she explained to Officer Hernandez, again in Spanish, what she planned to do).

You lounged on the beanbag, amused. You surreptitiously recorded the contact—as you called it—on your phone. But, you, you tried backing out then, packing while watching Hernandez whistle down Haste Street, miraculously absent that common cop
accoutrement, you. And you, you who had spent Officer Hernandez's entire visit seated on the tub lip or the toilet or listening at the door or inspecting the medicine cabinet, packed your bag even as she explained there was no crime, no law, no injunction against conspiring to dispose of simulated human remains. You and you said nothing, both equally skeptical of the possibility of success. You later relented because, truth be known not even to you, she also cried a little, expressed regret for her insensitivity, for forgetting that they all, except you, had very different relationships with cops (which you did, because, more than anything else, you were polite). And you, whose mom cried you a river that floated you right out of going to Howard, had no levee system, locks, canals, or channels to rout or reroute people in distress, your father had always warned you not to let your heart become, A bay for broken-down boats.

But on that day, the day Hernandez arrested no one, when Candice informed you that you could not walk out, you answered by way of tightening the straps on your pack. You added, Candyland, he can moonwalk out, and we're his backup dancers. And YOU left. At the corner, YOU parted, ostensibly for campus points distant. Thirty minutes later you returned, Just in case. YOU collided in the elevator. You told them you knew they were going back, and you couldn't let them go alone. You told them you knew they were going back, and you couldn't let them go alone. And you told them you knew they were going back, and you couldn't let them go alone.

Besides, she had a plan, and compelling raisons d'état, and, The First Peoples did, like, get kinda screwed, you know.