Chapter XIX

XIX.

JESSE TOOK HIS time driving to the Woodsman Plantation. He must have thought she wouldn’t notice he took the long way, making a loop around downtown instead of through it, or that he went five miles below the speed limit the entire time. Mira kept her mouth shut anyway, because at least he was getting her there, and she hoped that despite his stalling they’d still make it before dark.

By the time Jesse pulled into the parking lot the streetlights had flashed on. The glow illuminated the gravel of the parking lot. Jesse parked at one of the available spaces near the entrance.

“Well, we’re here,” he told Mira as he shut off the engine. They sat in the uncomfortable silence until Jesse began to jingle his keys, making them go around and round his finger.

“I’ve been thinking about what you said about joy,” Mira said. The whole car ride Mira kept bringing herself back to the photographs Jesse had taken, the joy unseen, and she wondered about her own life, their childhood, and how it had been.

“Oh yeah?” Jesse asked, not hiding his surprise.

“It made me remember how we used to spend weekend mornings at the dollar movie theater showings.”

“I forgot about those! They had that quarter soda machine too with the knock-off brands. We’d sneak in a bunch of Squirts and Dr. Perky’s and stay in there all day.”

“Until the manager noticed and kicked us out.”

“Yeah, true,” Jesse said, nodding. “Man, we used to do some dumb stuff when we were bored. Remember when we borrowed your mother’s garden hose one summer to spray ourselves cool and we came up with the genius idea to do a slip-and-slide with trash bags and dish soap?”

“That was a terrible idea all around, both because Mom was mad we took her hose but also because we ruined the lawn.”

“And our behinds.” Jesse laughed, unable to control himself, and Mira joined him. They both filled the car with their laughter and Mira wished it had been like this between them from the beginning. Mira laughed until her stomach felt sore and the silence returned.

“We had joy too, didn’t we? Before the rest of it,” Mira asked.

Jesse coughed as he contemplated her question. He turned to face her, his expression now serious. “I think it’s easy to forget sometimes, but sure.

We did.”

Mira smiled and looked out the window, unable to meet his gaze as she asked her next question. “I’ve also been thinking about that other thing you said. The part about loving the girl I was.”

She was asking once again if he could love her, if he did, and the rush of her vulnerability on full display made her want to disappear. The seconds passed, and she tried to find a way to brush off what she had said, but she couldn’t, wouldn’t. As much as she hated the way she felt as she waited for him to answer, she also wanted him to answer, because she wanted him, and wanted him to want her too.

“I don’t know you,” Jesse said. “You don’t know me. Neither of us knows the other. We know who we used to be, but that’s not enough. We can’t love ourselves in the past, or whoever we thought we were. We got to love ourselves in the now.”

“I get it,” Mira said, feeling the crushing blow of his response. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

Jesse seemed to sense her disappointment. After a moment of hesitation, he opened his mouth to speak. “But maybe after all this is over we could take some time to figure it out,” he said. “You’re not leaving right away, are you? You could stay a little while longer and we could learn who each of us is again. Would you do that? Would you do that with me?”

Mira told him yes, she would stay, and felt the surprising power one word could hold. Yes, she’d said, holding on to its promise of what her life could be.

The clock on the dash showed it was almost nine o’clock. She needed to go and do what she’d come for. She glanced toward the entrance, at the gate surrounding the grounds. Her hand reached for the door’s handle but as soon as she touched the metal she let go.

“What’s wrong?” Jesse looked at the entrance and then back at her before coming to his realization. “You can’t do it, can you?”

“No, I can,” Mira asserted. “I just—”

“You’re afraid because they won’t believe you,” Jesse continued. “Who would? It’s crazy.”

Mira needed to get out of the car and find someone to tell, but who?

Where could she go? Phillip, she reasoned, since these were mostly his guests. Phillip was the one most likely to believe her, and maybe she could convince him to make everyone leave.

Mira took a deep breath and briefly closed her eyes. She knew Jesse was watching her but she ignored him. She inhaled again in the hope of slowing her pulse, of calming herself so she could continue.

Jesse blew a raspberry and leaned forward in the seat. “Maybe I’m wrong, Mira. About all this. I could be.”

“You want to live with yourself if you aren’t?” Before Jesse could answer, Mira saw people running out of the entrance. Wedding guests hurried away from the grounds as they searched for their cars, dragging their suitcases behind them. Mira watched as what became two or three couples became four, five, six. Soon it was a small crowd of them, all with the same panicked look. They tripped over themselves as they ran across the graveled lot.

“Something’s wrong,” Mira said. “Everyone’s leaving.”

This was enough to make Mira get out of the car. She ran to the entrance and along the path toward the house. The path went past the gardens, eventually coming to the side of the house where it split in two directions, one around the front and the other heading toward the slave cabins, the restaurant and bar, and the cottages. Mira stopped at the fork in the path, catching her breath.

“I don’t know where to go,” Mira told Jesse, but he wasn’t there.

“Jesse?” she called, although it was pointless. She knew Jesse was back in his car, had probably roared the engine the moment she’d left, driving back home, escaping whatever fate awaited this place.

Farther up along the path a crowd of guests gathered and Mr. Tatum stood in their center. His eyes were wild, bloodshot. With a face reddened with fury, he clenched the stock of his rifle, sputtered, and shook his head as he listened to the clamor of the rest of the group. He’d gathered men from the town—laborers, it looked like from their clothes, men like him who

existed on the fringes of the town. Dried mud caked the bottoms of their overalls and boots. A few wore straw hats to block out the sun. They held bottles of liquor, the froth dripping down their chins as they gulped down the drink and threw the bottles in the dirt. They huddled around each other, their stammering growing to interloping yells.

Mira did not want to go near these men. Their anger was palpable. She didn’t want to get closer, afraid of what they might do. Soon they all shifted their gaze on her. She froze in response. Her heart raced, fearing they would come for her. Backing away, someone grabbed her arm and she turned and saw Phillip.

“Oh god, Mira,” he said, and the smell of his hot, yeasty breath made her want to choke. He gripped her shoulders hard enough that she gave a yelp, but he couldn’t hear her; it was too loud. “Celine is out there. Oh god.”

Mira stared down at Phillip’s hands, speckled rust all along the palms. It didn’t register at first, it took her a few seconds, that the stains on his hands and on the front of his shirt were blood. “Celine is where?” she asked Phillip.

“In the tobacco fields. She was in the fields. I’ve just come from there.

God, it’s terrible. I hadn’t meant to go out there, but I heard singing. Some sort of chant. It felt like it was leading me to her, and then I saw—”

“My daughter’s dead!” Mr. Tatum yelled, interrupting. “We need to get him. He killed her.”

Phillip quickly told her the story. It had started as a walk to clear his head and he’d made a wrong turn, ending up near the edge of the tobacco fields. That’s when he heard the song. It didn’t take him long before he got lost. The longer he was out there, the more frantic he became about not getting out, and soon instead of walking he was running. He ran and ran, going in circles, with the tobacco leaves cutting his face as he whipped through them, hoping that all he had to do was go a few more feet and he’d be out. He ran and, not noticing the ground below, tripped and fell into the dirt, hitting his head. It knocked him out. When he opened his eyes again, he sat up, wiped the sweat stinging his eyes, and stumbled up. He started to get up but noticed a shoe in front of him. A bedroom slipper the color of cream. He picked it up and rubbed his fingers over the fabric, and then walked a few steps in the direction he thought he’d come from. He took a couple more steps and then saw her—her body facedown in the dirt,

negligee torn up to the hips, eyes closed. “Celine?” he called, crawling over to her. He got closer but the smell caught him off guard, forcing him to turn away.

“I shouldn’t have,” Phillip said, shaking his head. “I shouldn’t have seen her exposed like that.” With this, Phillip’s body collapsed. His knees buckled and he fell to the ground. He stared at the patch of grass in front of him as his eyes watered.

Celine was dead. Mira could barely stand. She wanted to sit but the men crowded around her forced her to stand. These men surrounded her, screaming for justice, working themselves into a frenzy over the desire for it, and Mira stared at their froth and spittle, at their flustered faces burning in anger, and feared what their vengeance might do.

The ghosts must have lured her into the woods, wanting to show her the horrors of their lives. Come and see, they’d whispered, wanting to show her the knitted scars, their bruises and cuts. They held up their hands and showed the empty spaces where fingers used to be. They told her to come, following deeper, showing her where they were captured and slaughtered.

Come and see. Their heads on pikes, the skin of the chin sagging, the hollow caverns where the eyes were gouged out, mouths open but nothing inside, tongue cut, teeth stolen, every part taken except the shell of a face.

Come and see, come and see, come and see.

Had she seen? She must not have, refused to see what they’d tried to show her, and they killed her for it. If they had come for Celine, then they were coming for them all.

“Don’t you worry,” Mr. Tatum said, putting a hand on Phillip’s shoulder. “We’re going to get him.”

Him. This got Mira’s attention. “Get who?”

“Your boy. Jesse. Where is he? You got to know where he is. Y’all like to stick together.”

“Who are you talking about?” Mira was confused. Whatever they thought was wrong. It was the ghosts. They needed to go out to where Celine was, see whatever it was the ghosts had been trying to show her.

“No, you’re all wrong. We need to get Celine. Phillip, is Celine still out there?” Mira asked, but he wouldn’t answer, continuing to look blankly ahead. “Phillip, do you think you could find her?”

“I don’t know,” Phillip said, but his tone changed. He stepped away from Mira, as if he was afraid of her, of what she was asking of him.

In the background, Mira saw the golden-green leaves of the tobacco fields and she knew Celine had gone in the same direction Mira had, because just beyond their reach were the graves. That had to have been it.

The ghosts had lured her there to show her the graves. To unearth the bodies of those unknown men and women. To make known what had been done.

This had to be what all this was about and Mira needed to finish it—find the graves, their bodies, and maybe they would be saved.

“They’re coming,” Mira almost screamed. She’d tried to control herself, to keep her voice calm, but calmness was not going to work with these men and they were running out of time. She had to convince them to follow her.

They had to see.

“Don’t you understand? They did this to Celine and we need to find them or it won’t stop.”

“Who?” Phillip asked her.

“What we need to do is find that black boy,” Mr. Tatum boomed.

“Where is he? Anyone seen him? He’s done this before. He killed that man years ago.”

“That’s not true,” Mira yelled. “You know that. The police let him go.

Mr. Loomis drowned.”

“The police couldn’t charge him but I know the truth. That boy had something to do with it and now he’s hurt Celine. Where is he? Jesse’s his name. Where is he?”

Mira saw the way these men looked at her. They were looks to remind her of her unimportance. Looks to make her feel small. It was the same look the policeman had given her when she’d tried to help Jesse, his face full of amusement at first, because why would a girl like her have a point worthy of being heard? Then annoyance, which turned to anger. The way he’d raised his arm at her, close to hitting her, when all she’d wanted was to tell the truth. He didn’t want to listen to her. He never would have. These men, they weren’t going to listen either.

Still, she tried. “I’m trying to warn you,” she said again, this time her voice weaker, because they had long stopped hearing.

“He’s not getting away this time,” Mr. Tatum muttered, quickly joining the throng of other men.

“You don’t understand,” Mira stammered, but they’d heard enough. It was chaos, a chorus of voices growing louder as each of them yelled places

to go. The men shouted names of streets, all unrecognizable to her, and decided to split up to cover it all.

“No, stop!” Mira yelled, hoping with her last plea they’d listen, but they had already started running away from her, with Phillip and Mr. Tatum following behind. There was no way she’d find Jesse in time, but she had to warn him. She ran back to her cottage and stumbled inside. In the safety of the room she searched through her purse for her phone.

“Jesse,” Mira shouted after hearing the beep of his voicemail. “Celine is dead. They found her body. Mr. Tatum thinks you had something to do with it. He’s looking for you. Him and a group of other men. A mob. If you’re home get out of there. God, I hope you get this.”

The voicemail beeped, ending her message, but unsatisfied, she dialed his number again, hoping this time he would pick up.

“Mira?”

“Jesse! Thank goodness.” A wash of relief fell over her as she heard his voice. “Where are you? Are you home? If you are then you need to get out of there.”

“Why? What happened? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. Listen, they found Celine’s body in the fields. There’s a mob that thinks you hurt her. They’re coming for you.”

“I can’t hear you. Who’s coming? Were we right?”

Jesse sounded like he was in a tunnel. She could only hear part of what he was trying to say and that was muffled.

“You need to get out of there!” Mira yelled. She shouted in the phone for him to leave his house but he couldn’t hear her clearly either. She moved toward the window in the hope the service would be better, but Jesse continued to fade in and out. She had to get outside, to get a better signal, and she told him to hold on as she went to the door.

“I’m coming, Mira. Do you hear me? I’m on my way,” Jesse said, and before Mira knew it, her phone’s screen had gone black and Jesse was gone.

At least he wouldn’t be home, she thought as she threw the phone on the couch.

Mira glanced at the sky through the cottage window. There was still time to fix this; not enough, but she would head out to the clearing anyway.

She needed a shovel first and left to find one. It didn’t take long. At the gardens she found one lying against the shed. She picked it up and started running.

By now, all the guests had heard about Celine. “What do you think she looks like?” she heard a group of them ask as she passed by. “How bad do you think it is?” They gripped their phones, ready to take their photos, as they disappeared toward the trees in their search to find Celine.

Others hurried to their cottages and threw what they could into their suitcases. They flooded the pathway leading to the parking lots. As Mira left the gardens carrying her shovel, more couples rushed past her to the parking lot. None of them paid her any mind, their eyes fixed on the exit, on their cars, and on the looming safety of the highway.

The shovel dragged along the grass as Mira ran. Everyone would see the truth, she just had to get to the clearing and dig. They had to know what laid buried in the dirt. If she did this, the ghosts would stop.

She ran until trees surrounded her and she could no longer discern the path. “Where is it?” she asked, stopping. Which way was right? In the dark, who could tell? She started in one direction, hesitated, doubting herself. The sting of sweat made her rub her eyes. She was wasting time. “Where, where, where?” she called.

Just as quickly, as if an answer to her question, she heard movement in the brush. A breeze, subtle, but Mira felt the air on her skin, making her senses alert, alive, and it was enough. She began to run again. Someone was following her, or something, and as she picked up the pace she felt it telling her where to go, telling her to hurry, almost there, hurry, and she ran, going farther and farther still, until she saw the clearing and stopped.

This was it, where the slaves who’d rebelled were buried. She would find them and they’d be free.

Mira dug. Around her, the whispering call grew louder with each pierce of the shovel in the ground. A clamor of voices rising, pushing her forward, beckoning for her to find them.

She forced the blade into the earth. She lifted one foot and with her heel pushed down on the blade. It took a few tries to get it deep enough. Her arms lifted the broken dirt and threw it behind her. She repeated the process, again and again. Dig, push, lift, throw. She did this job with a desperate sense of urgency, because soon the day would be over, and she had to be prepared for whatever was coming.

Her muscles ached from the struggle but she kept on. Her breath was sparse and she choked on the summer air but she didn’t stop. Hair matted,

sweat beads dripping, sliding down her neck and into her crevices—give up, her body told her. Give up and go, but she wouldn’t.

With each lift she got better, and soon she fell into a rhythm. Each lift of the dirt brought her closer.

She dug through the topsoil, disrupting the grass and weeds. This was the hardest part and she struggled to get through.

She dug, hoping to finish before it was time. Dig, push, lift, throw. She repeated the movement, each time saying the words. They became her own mantra, a prayer, a song, as she dug. Dig, push, lift, throw.

As she dug, Mira thought of the inmates she’d driven past along the highway. Their image came to her as she lifted another scoop of dirt from the ground. Their bodies hunched over, eyes focused on the ground. She thought of the boy who had turned to look. So young. A child. What had he done to warrant such a fate? What had he done? Or any of the others? She wished she could save them, but they were long gone, lost.

Mira dug. An hour passed. She stood in the shallow pit she’d created, exasperated and tired. Her clothes were coated with the muddy earth. Dirt smeared across her arms and her face.

“I must be getting close.”

Just dig a little farther and maybe you’ll get there, she told herself. It had to be here. Had to be. She had to see this through.

Around her, the voices rose higher still, and as they gained momentum she heard a hymn. The work song sung before, and she dug along with their cadence. Soon, she joined in, her mumbled singing turning to hollering as she threw the shovel into the ground, lifted the dirt, and threw it over her shoulder again and again.

She forced her shovel down in the dirt once more, but this time the shovel got stuck. This must be it, Mira thought, relief spreading through her at the realization she’d hit across the bones. She dropped the shovel. Her body fell into the dirt, on her knees, and she began to claw with her hands.

She clutched fistfuls of the muddied earth and threw them behind her, picking up her pace, getting closer, and her heart raced. She found what her shovel had hit and she leaned closer to look. It was just another piece of rock.

Mira grabbed a chunk of dirt and threw it across the grass in one final, exasperated burst of energy. Her chest heaved as she struggled with the scene before her. “I don’t understand,” she yelled in between breaths. “I

thought this was what you wanted!” Mira had gone searching for the graves but the hole she’d dug was empty. No bones lay buried, no graves to be found. None of them were here. Nothing at all.