I am Honest.  That’s what I am called.  I don’t know how old I am, who my momma and dad are or where I come from.  I don’t even know if Honest is truly my name.  Working the fields is all I have known.  It is all I and the others have or will likely ever know.  In the fields, there’s no protection from the burning sun.  So I work, stripped to nothing but pants, every inch of my black skin coated and glistening with sweat.  It flows in rivers down my body to where my pants cinch my waist.  From there it sneaks out, ‘round my manhood, and runs down my inner thighs. Wet also trickles through the crack of my buttocks.

The work, like the fields, seems endless.  Rugged gray-black mountains with spears of scrubby pine stand at the edge of the fields.  I try not to think about what may be beyond the fields and the mountains. 

The earth beneath my feet shakes from the pounding of hooves.  Zeke pulls the gelding up alongside me and glares down from atop the horse.

“Ass and elbows,” he commands  “No singing.  No talking.  Nothing but ass and elbows.”

He’s as black as every one of us, but he is The Senator’s man.  The Senator has promised Zeke his own acres and some of us to work his fields.  When that may happen, no one knows.   

I keep my eyes downward and adjust the sack slung ‘cross my body to the side. I continue picking and do not speak. 

“Keep working”, snaps Zeke.  When the gelding’s hooves pound away, I release the breath I’d been holding. 

Willie Boy was my friend.  He was a dreamer.  He said we should leave.  Go beyond the mountains.  But I didn’t know what might be out there.  Staying here seemed safer.  But Willie Boy?  He made up his mind and left without me. 

Then, last Sunday morning in the big house’s front yard, The Senator suddenly stopped telling us how God had seen fit to flood the earth sparing only two of every animal and Noah’s family.  When he shut his Bible and we turned to see what he was looking at, there was Zeke with Willie Boy in tow.  Hands tied, a rope around his neck, Willie Boy was covered in dust, his skin ashy.  He staggered along behind the horse, struggling to stay on his feet as Zeke jerked the rope. One of Willie Boy’s eyes was swollen shut.  His nose squished flat against his face.  Dry blood was caked around his mouth and chin.  When Zeke reached The Senator, he handed him the rope.  The Senator, blue eyes blazing, dragged Willie Boy to the hitching post and tied him to it. Willie Boy slumped down, but The Senator yanked him up and lashed his hands high above his head.

The big house’s screen door slammed, startling us.  Wearing her Sunday best, The Senator’s wife had come out on the front porch with their little boy and girl.  Her arms were wrapped ‘round them and they leaned against the front of her dress. 

Bullwhip in hand, Zeke came ‘round from the side of the house.  The Senator stepped aside and pointed at Willie Boy.  Zeke nodded, licked his lips and uncoiled the whip.  He stretched out his arm, swinging the whip into the air.  It snaked and danced as his body rocked back and forth, wrist cocking and uncocking.  Then he stepped toward Willie Boy and let the demon loose.  It bit into Willie Boy with a crack loud as a gunshot.   He screamed, the sound leaping higher as the whip sliced his back open a second time.  Time and again the whip slashed Willie Boy, carving into his back.  When it finally ended, Willie Boy looked like he’d been skinned and Zeke was splattered with blood.  The rest of us stood there crying blood red tears. 

With Willie Boy dangling, The Senator pointed at three of us.  He marched us to the back of the big house.  There, he made us pull the slaughtered pig for that Sunday’s dinner out of the tub of briny water it had soaked in for days.  He ordered each of us to grab a handle and led us back to Willie Boy.  We struggled under the weight of the water.  At times, it sloshed over the tub’s rim, splashing onto us and the brown wilted sweet grass that was dry as tinder.  When we reached Willie Boy, The Senator made others help us hoist the tub and pour the water over him.  It thundered down, slamming his face and body into the post, leaving Willie Boy hanging there, limply. 

The Senator told us to get back to our shacks and that no one was to go near Willie Boy.  I stole a glance at The Senator’s wife and children.  Her cold eyes met mine and she turned and took the children back into the house. 

Willie Boy hung there for three days.  Then The Senator sent Zeke to get some of us to fetch him.  Sun hardened crusty streaks and patches of white salt mixed with dried blood covered him.  As we untied and lifted his broken body, I saw where his blood had soaked in and stained the wooden post’s grain.  We carried Willie Boy back to his shack and laid him inside on its sloping floorboards.  His head rolled to the side.  He never opened his eyes.   Then we had to go work the fields.

As we walked back at sunset, I watched Zeke canter the gelding to his shack.  It sat separate from ours, less than a stone’s throw from the big house.  Though some of the others had paired up to live together as if man and wife, I lived alone.  Except for the spirits.  They kept me company. 

Outside my shack, I grabbed the nearly dry catch rain bucket next to my slop bucket and went to Willie Boy’s.   Lying in the dirt next to his front step was the corn broom he and I had made together.  I picked it up, stood it against a post and went inside.  Willie Boy was on the floor, exactly where we’d left him.  I sat down beside him and lifted his head into my lap.  Then I ripped off part of my pants leg, dipped it in the bucket, and began gently washing him.  As I moved the wet cloth over his body I spoke to him softly.  I even tried to squeeze some water between his lips, but it only dribbled off his face.       

While I ate dinner I couldn’t stop thinking about Willie Boy.  Then the crunch of the pig’s ear between my teeth caused a big ball of sickness to well up inside me.  I jumped up, dashed out the door, and vomited into the dirt.  I spit and spit and spit until all the sour and bitter taste of nastiness was out of my mouth.  Then I went back inside, threw away the pigs ears, and only ate molasses I sopped up with cornbread.                         

That night, while I slept, the spirits came.  They poured visions in my mind and spoke of fire and blood.   I woke up shaking and covered in sweat.  As the sun came up, I went to check on Willie Boy.  Biting my lip, I entered his shack and saw what I already knew. Willie Boy was dead.

That morning the ground in the fields felt as hot as a smithy’s forge. The thorns pricked my fingers more than usual.  By mid-day my knees were tired and my back hurt from stooping.  Then with no warning, rain poured from the sunny sky – the devil beating his wife.  It hammered the ground into mud that squeezed up between my toes. I stood up straight, leaned back my head and closed my eyes.  I let the rain from heaven wash my face, my body, and my soul clean.  Then it stopped as suddenly as it had begun.  And when I opened my eyes, the most beautiful rainbow I had ever seen hung in the sky above the field.        

At the end of the day, we covered the bales at the far side of the field with the cloth tarps.  Heading home, I saw the sky was full of birds.  They always seemed to know where and when to go.

Late that night all was silent and still.  No tree frogs burping, crickets chirping, or owls calling.  Not even the buzz of a single fly’s wings.  Sitting on the edge of my porch in the full moon, I thought about how Willie Boy and I would sit together looking at the stars.

Just as I got up to go inside a jagged lightning bolt shot down from the sky.  It hit one of the highest mountain peaks and it burst it into flames.  They raced along the ridge, then down the mountainside.   Something chained up deep inside me broke free.  I ran toward the fields.  Crashing through the rows, thorns tore at me, but I kept running.  When I got to the far side of the fields, the flames there towered above me.  Their heat and angry roar filled the smokey black air.  I snatched hold of one of the tarps and swung it into the flames.  Then ran.  I zig-zagged bringing fire to the fields.  Flames jumped from row to row.  Stalks and branches shriveled, sizzled and exploded in pops and snaps.  Sparks shot upward.  The fire was burning it all.

At the edge of the field, I dropped what was left of the tarp and ran to the shacks.  I grabbed the corn broom and dashed back to the field where I set it ablaze.  With the broom my torch I ran to Zeke’s shack.  There, I dragged it in the dry sweet grass.  The grass and thatch caught fire, creating a wall of flames around the shack.

Heart hammering and chest heaving, I stared at the big house.  High above me,  The Senator’s little boy stood looking out a window into the night filled with fire and smoke.  As he raised a hand and placed his palm to the window, I lowered the burning broom to the sweet grass and thatch surrounding the big house.  Then I watched the flames climb high into the night.    

# # #

J L Higgs’ short stories typically focus on life from the perspective of a black American. The primary goal of his writings is to create a greater understanding between racial, ethnic, and religious groups in America. He has been published in various magazines such as Indiana Voice Journal, Black Elephant, The Writing Disorder, Contrary Magazine, Literally Stories, The Remembered Arts Journal and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He and his wife live outside of Boston.

Photo:  Viviane Okubo