This Is My America

by Kim Johnson

  There are moments when my thoughts are a betrayal to him. Uncertainty wrapping itself around me, poisoning my mind. But out here, visible to the world, there are no doubts about my daddy’s innocence.

  “Last night that cross burning wasn’t just a message to my family. A statement was being made to our community. People outing themselves to let us all know what place we supposed to take. There’s a hate group growing in our community. Recruiting people. We can’t let our town, our home, be threatened by violence. By hatred. My father went to prison, not because of guilt, but because it was easy to think an outsider like a Black man killed the Davidsons. Now that generational curse is passing down to my brother. The son…of a ‘killer’ must be a killer.”

  My voice catches. I take a breath to calm myself.

  “But we can stop it. We can be vigilant and look out for each other. And now my father has a second chance. Some of you know about Innocence X and what they do. Well, a representative is here tonight because he’s working on my daddy’s appeal. Many of you were here when my daddy went through his trial. Some of you even shared or tried to share information with the police, but they didn’t follow up. This is your chance to right that wrong. Retrace that time seven years ago. Every memory is important. He’s a good man. An innocent man. And he has less than two hundred and fifty days to live. If you know something, anything, please help us free my daddy. Free James.”

  The audience rises, fists up, and chants, “Free James. Free James. Free James.”

  I’m taken aback by the crowd being moved. Hope fills me up, and I’m glad I took the moment that was supposed to be about last night to focus on Daddy. When the crowd quiets, I introduce Steve and give out his number. Frantically, people take down his information. Then I end by sharing the dates for my next Know Your Rights workshops.

  Pastor Jenkins closes out, using this as an opportunity to highlight the church, so I dip out into the hallway to catch my breath.

  I spot Dean. I know him too well. He’s never been good about pretending things weren’t the way they were. I can see he’s burning to talk about what happened, in a lot more detail. He follows me into the hallway, catches me by surprise, and kisses me on the cheek.

  I step back. “Not here.”

  He bites that side lip, and his dimple appears and disappears.

  “You think this will help with catching whoever was sending that message to us last night?” I say.

  “I hope so. If people can stop making it about themselves. It was driving me crazy that everyone was making it about them,” Dean says. “All the complaints about the police. Why can’t they focus on you and your family? Y’all are the ones that were hurt.”

  I pause. I also wanted everyone to focus on how to help my family. But I get it. Trusting someone who’s been harassing all our lives to now stop harassment from escalating isn’t easy. This isn’t one moment in time, but a longer one that bleeds in and out of all our lives. Our history of Blackness in America. Dean doesn’t get that. I watch him, wondering if he ever will.

  Dean takes my hand, leading me away from the doors and around the corner, like we’re a couple. I take my hand back. Not here. Not now. I have too many questions, like will his mom make things harder for us? And really, I want to get back to the community meeting, hear what people have to say. I wish he didn’t come so I could focus on this and not him.

  “You okay?” Dean asks.

  I’m about to answer him, but then I realize he’s talking about what happened before our kiss—the attack. A sick billowing feeling rushes through my stomach.

  I nod unconvincingly. “You?”

  There’s more to what I’m asking him. It’s one word that wants to drill down to the scare last night, our kiss, my uncertainty.

  Dean doesn’t answer. My eyes well; it hurts too much. I want to run from facing a decision.

  “Will you ride with me so we can talk…about last night?” Dean’s eyes carry so much pain, hurt from me pushing him away. It stings to watch.

  “I’ll meet you after.” I tug his shirt when he looks away. “I promise.”

  Dean nods.

  Last night, Dean was everything I’d been waiting for, but then at the community meeting he was the farthest thing from my thoughts. All I could think about was rushing back to the community meeting. The flutter from seeing Quincy. I swallow hard because I don’t have an answer about Dean or Quincy—who I can’t seem to shake.

  WILL WE EVER BE

  THE SAME?

  Dean hangs by his steps, so I perch myself on top of the rail. I mist up at the carvings DE + TB TAKE THE WORLD and run my finger around our initials. I can always tell what kind of mood his mama is in based on whether we go straight inside the house or hang out on the porch.

  I’m worried things will never be the same. There’s weird tension now since the community meeting. I don’t know how our kiss might affect our friendship, but I also don’t want to run away from facing the truth. I take a long breath as Dean keeps his head down.

  “Ready to talk?” A lump builds in my throat. The things Quincy was saying about Dean have my head spinning.

  “We kiss, then today you push me away. I don’t know what you want,” Dean says.

  “What do you want me to say?”

  “So, you regret last night?” Dean runs his hands through his hair. I don’t answer fast enough. His eyes get wide.

  “I don’t know.”

  “God, Tracy.” Dean gives a heavy sigh. “Please don’t act like you regret it. Don’t say you take it—”

  “I don’t. I don’t take it back. But there’s so much going on right now…What do you want, Dean?”

  “I wanted you last night.” Dean’s lips quirk, and my heart races.

  “I did, too…”

  “But now?”

  I’ve loved Dean for so long, but that love was something different. When we crossed that line, it didn’t feel bad; it felt safe. And last night, I needed safe. Now I know I need something different.

  “Do we have to have an answer about us?” I look at Dean. “There’s so much going on right now. I don’t want you to be weird around me now. I need you. As…the friend you’ve always been.”

  “I’m not in a rush.” Dean swallows hard. “A lot is going on.”

  “Then let’s forget this for now and get back to normal? Because I need normal right now.” I’m not sure that’s true. But one thing that I do know I need: my friend Dean. I don’t want to lose him.

  “Sure, I want to forget it all…because our kiss was terrible.”

  “What?” I slap his arm. “Terrible? Who was terrible?”

  “It wasn’t for you? I practically had nightmares.”

  “Dean.” I dig my elbow into his ribs.

  Dean wraps his arms tight around me. “How could anything with us be terrible? You’re too easy to mess with, you know that?”

  “Well, thank you for clearing that up.” I dig my elbow into him again. I know there’s a lot more we should say.

  “I don’t take it back, though. I love you,” Dean says. “I always have.”

  There’s a silence that sits between us. I want Dean’s words to swallow up the pain that’s been suffocating me. His eyes look heavy because I don’t make him feel better. It breaks me seeing him like this.

  My throat burns from holding in the words Dean loves me. I knew it. But I’d been in such denial that Dean would always have a bigger piece of his heart for our friendship. That it was so big, there would be no more room for anything else. All of this runs around in my head while Dean waits for me to say something.

  “I…I love you, too. It’s so hard with everything going on. If we didn’t have the attack at the house, would you feel the same? What about your mom?”

  “If you’d be with me, I’d choose you, Tracy. I’d always choose you
over her, over anyone.”

  “I’m not asking you to choose.” I pause to breathe in again. “I want to know you won’t change your mind.”

  Another silence takes us over. I wish we didn’t start talking about it at all, just moved on. Because this is so much harder.

  “If we were together, would you tell your mom?”

  Dean pauses before saying, “Probably.”

  “Two important questions: (a) Will she ground you forever? And (b) Will she kick Steve out of the loft?”

  “I don’t know what she’d do.” Dean breathes out. “But I don’t know if I could hold it in. I shouldn’t have to lie. It’s not how I’m built.”

  I don’t respond. The world will always try to push us apart. It already feels like it’s happening. Because I don’t feel that pull to Dean the way I feel like I should. It’s a bond through friendship, maybe nothing more.

  Dean’s mom calls for him. I follow him inside, and he motions for me to wait in his dad’s study. Mr. Evans’ll be closing up the shop tonight.

  I notice there are open boxes all over the desk.

  My curiosity building—Mr. Evans is always tidy—I peek inside.

  A gasp catches in my throat.

  I tear through the box in disbelief. Stuck, shaking my head and mouthing, No, no, no, as I try to convince myself the image isn’t real.

  I think I might be sick.

  SECRETS DON’T STAY

  HIDDEN FOREVER

  With trembling fingers, I pick up a black-and-white photograph. A man hanging by a noose. His feet splayed, and a bloated face much darker than the rest of his body. A burning cross next to him. Like the one that was staked in front of my house. Men in white sheets stand beneath the dead man. They are surrounded by women and children. All white. Those without hoods are beaming like it’s the Fourth of July.

  Dean enters the den with a wide smile. I don’t return it. His smile shrivels.

  “What’s wrong?” Dean rushes to me.

  “I don’t know why I looked. I…I…Did you know about this?” My hand shakes as I hold out the photo.

  Dean takes it from me and gasps. I feel sick inside all over again as I watch the horror cross Dean’s face. He drops it as though he’s been burned, then sifts through the box.

  Dean picks the photo up again and looks closer, then points to a girl near what must be the Grand Wizard’s feet. Another slightly older girl locking arms with her. He flips the photo over.

  In my shock, I didn’t even notice a list of names with a date, November 17, 1979.

  “I think…I think this is my mom.”

  I shut my eyes. Sickened.

  “And if that’s my mom as a little girl, that means this is my grandfather.” His voice cracks when he points the Klan leader out.

  “I can’t…Tracy. This can’t be real. Why was she there?” Dean looks through more of the boxes, and I can see he’s putting the pieces together.

  “You don’t even know if it’s—”

  “It’s her.” Dean bends over and grabs another box. This time he pulls out a white cloak. “And this is my grandfather’s?”

  Dean’s mom comes downstairs, calling for him. I cover the cry escaping my lips. Dean runs out of the study to cut her off. I can tell he knows that now is not the time for me to see his mother.

  I’ve never been so close to something like this before. In this town I call home, a man was lynched, and people are living here who were complicit. Involved. Dean’s parents knew it. I think back on the way Dean’s dad stood by the burning cross on our lawn and glanced over at Mrs. Evans. He’d known all along who had been in the Klan.

  The white cloak haunts me with its bloody history. The fear it shaped, and the lies they told to incite terror toward Black people. My stomach’s nauseous; shivers run down my spine.

  The door opens.

  Dean. Alone. Thank God.

  “Put it away.” Dean shoves the cloak back into a box with a heavy weight of shame.

  “Has this stuff always been here?”

  I’m hoping he says no. That he’s never seen it before, because then I could try and believe that Dean’s dad wasn’t involved.

  “I remember my mom having boxes of my grandpa’s stuff delivered after he passed away. She wanted his things, so my dad helped gather them for her.”

  Dean keeps a slight distance, like he wants to touch me but can’t.

  “Does this mean my mom’s involved with the Klan? My dad?” Dean puts his hands to his head. “What does that make me, Tracy? Klan legacy?”

  I think about Daddy, how the town accused him so effortlessly. My anger grows. I’m not sure I can contain it.

  “They couldn’t be involved,” Dean continues. “I’ve never heard my dad say one racist thing in my life. Hell, he voted for Obama. Klan wouldn’t do that, would they?”

  “I don’t think he’s Klan.” I sigh. Mr. Evans has always been good to us. I wouldn’t think someone active in the Klan would have dinner over at our house, much less hire my mama.

  “But my grandpa was, wasn’t he?” Dean pauses. “And my mom…it’s no secret, her thoughts. She’s said things, things about our worlds being too far apart. But nothing that would lead me to something this…heinous. She can’t think like they do, can she?”

  There’s nothing else to explain the robe and the photos of his grandpa. His mom was certainly raised around it.

  “Why do you think your dad was pulling these out?” I try to keep my voice flat, even though I can feel a scream building. I have to stay calm.

  “What happened at your house could’ve triggered him. Like he wanted to get rid of it? Or he thinks he can find out who did it by going through the boxes?” Dean’s voice sounds hopeful, but it teeters and cracks, because he’s not convinced. Neither am I.

  “He said he’d get Steve information. He could’ve already done that. If he has, that’s good, right?”

  I think about something Mr. Evans said to Officer Clyde. How this shouldn’t be happening in our town. That’s what he was thinking. That it died out with the previous generation. I’m sure the town doesn’t want to raise skeletons of the past. Even though it’s been lingering at the Pike—infecting the next generation.

  “What about the rest of the boxes?” I point to the pile in the corner.

  “I don’t know,” Dean says.

  I begin searching the rest of the boxes. Sorting through papers, unearthing a few more photos that I pull out and stack together. We comb through the boxes for an hour, silence taking over the room.

  I skim through a notebook. At first it looks like nothing in particular, but then I notice initials, names, almost like attendance records.

  “I think this is a membership list,” I say. “Meeting records of who was there? Like it’s a damn community organization or something.”

  “What?” Dean takes the notebook. “All the writing is the same.”

  Dean’s hands rattle. I place mine over his, so they stay steady. Both of our hands are cold.

  “What is it?” I ask.

  “I recognize the handwriting.”

  “Tell me it’s not your dad’s.” A sinking feeling weighs me down. I hope it’s not true.

  “No,” Dean says. “The squiggly-lined cursive and the loops on the t’s that aren’t supposed to be there—they’re like my grandfather’s writing on birthday cards. I—Tracy, how could the person I loved be filled with so much hate?”

  I don’t say what I’m thinking. I don’t want to hurt Dean. But if he recognizes the handwriting, and all this came from his grandfather’s house after he passed, he was definitely some kind of leader in the Klan. My mind is spinning. There’s Klan in my community. People I know could be members. Raised to think these things. They burned a cross at my house. They went after my brother.

 
My dad.

  “We’ve got to take a closer look at this stuff,” I say.

  “But what about my parents? My dad will notice.” He doesn’t say “mom.”

  “We can take a few things and put everything back like it was. We’ll replace it in a few days.”

  Dean holds on to the box. I can see why he wouldn’t want things to be exposed about his family. The photo of the man being hanged. I can’t stop thinking about that man’s family. Their pain.

  I feel lied to. Crowning Heights had its own set of rules—a life could easily be taken if you’re the wrong color. No wonder they were so quick to blame Daddy.

  “We have to use this,” I say. “Learn more if it’ll help my family.”

  “You should do it. I don’t want to stop you, but I don’t think I can face anyone in my family. They were involved in…” He points back to the box with the photo, then where the white robe is shoved back in a box. “All of that.”

  “Don’t you want to find out, though? Maybe your grandpa changed.” I’ve been through hell over the years with my father’s sentence, and Dean so easily wants to give up. I shake my head.

  “Find out my dad knew about my mom’s history, or worse, that he might be a member? That everything he taught me about treating everyone equally was a lie? I…I can’t face that. I know it’s wrong to hide from that, but I can’t.” Our eyes meet. “Even if you’ll hate me forever.”

  “It’s not a lie.”

  Dean looks away, a tear escapes, and he quickly wipes it away. I don’t want Dean to see that I think differently about his family. About him. But I can’t help feeling betrayed that they kept these boxes. I don’t understand the intent of keeping it. Why would Mr. Evans allow his wife to keep memorabilia and records if he didn’t agree with these beliefs? Last night my house was threatened. The same hate I see in these boxes put the cross on my lawn, lit a match, and threw a brick through my window.

  I pull away from Dean and create some distance, my heart breaking all over again.

  SKELETON IN THE CLOSET