Mr. Kern watched with slow recognition as the Missus guided him inside. She sat present at his bedside like a good wife for as long as his recovery took, never moving an inch unless it was to beckon Silva to bring water or supper upstairs. Floyd was sure to mention that neither he nor Silva were allowed to see the Mister during this time and that they were quite certain by the time the Missus emerged the old man would be dead.
Surprisingly, however, Miss Lula’s intentions were not to end her own suffering by ending Mr. Kern’s life, at least not at that present time, but to keep him alive for as long as it took for her to fulfill whatever plan she had next, her motivations leading her to take a front-row seat to the Mister’s suffering. In the wake of Fletcher’s unfortunate timing and decency toward the Mister, Miss Lula assigned him duties farther out, placing him at a distance where he was just barely visible in view from the house, although one could still make out his slim figure, Floyd said, recalling how he once saw the boy along the horizon like one of the trees, never knowing it was him until Fletcher finally moved.
Still, Mr. Kern recovered quickly enough, and as a treat of the most malicious kind, Miss Lula kept him by her side, dragging him outside each day like some abandoned puppy she’d found and nursed back to health. With his strength slowly returning, they walked the muddy grounds, venturing amongst the cotton and swampland, yet always returning to that porch, by her insistence, where he sat dutifully. And so it was her fault that it happened at all, Floyd insisted, for Miss Lula had not observed Mr. Kern’s wandering eyes during their time together, concluding that his presence beside her for the whole of the day was enough to stave away any knowledge of the boy. She figured she had placed the boy far enough that Mr. Kern would never see their identical faces or have that warmth return to the old man’s heart. And so it occurred one day near the middle of my departure that the Missus relapsed into another of her episodes and was locked inside her room for three days in such bad spirits that no one dared offer her food or water, merely placing these items outside her door and collecting the dishes once she had finished. It was during this time that Mr. Kern was left to walk by himself, and sure enough, he caught sight of the boy once more, just as he had each of those times beside the Missus, and the knowledge of the boy’s identity reawakened his sleepy heart.
Mr. Kern watched Fletcher from the marshes on this particular day, the old man’s thoughts remaining to himself as he stared with those dark eyes and that aging expression that had removed most of the sternness from his face and left him tender and exceedingly helpless. Mr. Kern stood for what had to be hours in this confused state, reminding Floyd of some story the old man had told about his cousin from Atlanta when they were younger and her offer to one day show him her rabbit fur and that look on the old man’s face as he described the horror when she finally did. And so it was here that Floyd laughed, stopping his story completely before regaining his composure to add that the old man watched in the same manner on this day without a word, waiting for the boy to move, leaving only when the boy left for the evening and returning the next day when the boy arrived. He watched the boy throw the hoe in silence again and again, yet still the old man breathed not a word. It was after some time of this ritual that Fletcher finally noticed a presence in the trees and stopped his work abruptly.
“Who is that?” Fletcher asked. “Floyd? Jesse?”
Fletcher moved toward the sound, sticks, and gravel all moving at once as Mr. Kern now revealed himself.
“Fletcher,” the old man said softly, his body fully exposed from the willows and vines that clung together like nets around him, his voice a soft pucker that if materialized into a structure of mass and weight would not be substantial enough to hold him up. “Don’t mean to scare you. It’s just me.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” Fletcher said. “I thought you were Floyd or Jesse playing a joke on me.”
“No, no,” Mr. Kern said, the nicest he’d been to Fletcher since the boy could remember, “just having a walk that’s all. Nothing like fresh air.”
Their interaction was clumsy, like two strangers made to share a space but not sharing a similar language. It came with long pauses and glances at nothing, stares into the open space of the plantation, where branches and leaves held their attention for minutes at a time, then their bowed heads remained lowered until one person moved and the other looked up to see. One sighed and the other held his breath. One flinched and the other let not a single muscle in his body move. Fletcher eventually forced his face into a smile—or the best expression he could muster in response to the old man’s kindness—which, although not as warm as Fletcher would afford to his mother or Jesse, seemingly unlocked a chest of emotions in the old man, who stood animated with an enthusiasm or curiosity that was plain as day to anyone who might view this chance encounter—as Floyd did.
This led Floyd to comment that he thought it nothing but the hand of grace that love could hibernate in one’s soul for so long yet never truly fade—how at any moment it could reawaken and lead our hearts to bleed again. For Fletcher was Mr. Kern in younger skin, Floyd insisted: the handsomeness, the charm, the reserve. It was all there. Surely whatever thoughts drip through the consciousness of those who have loved and lost, yet get the chance to love again, were in Mr. Kern’s heart at that exact moment, for how he did stare and linger and find joy in the place of his sorrow. How he gawked for millennia and never grew weary of his position, until finally the old man reached out his arm, saying gently, “Help me to the house, Fletcher,” accepting of Fletcher’s arm like a debutante to her white knight.
“Yes, sir,” Fletcher replied, immediately dropping his tools and guiding the old man in the right direction, which was ultimately a considerable distance from their current location and took some time to reach.
Mr. Kern admired the boy’s smooth skin, the firmness of the boy’s jaw, the subtlety of his eyes beneath eyebrows that sat low on his forehead, downward cast as both men surveyed the fields in unison; all those muscles and tissues and pieces of Fletcher that worked together as one and made him complete, that had grown from a little boy into a man and were reminiscent of that passion that grows inside all young men of a certain age. Fletcher’s skin held story lines of a younger Mr. Kern when that same passion had led him to Miss Lula’s doorstep (but truly to Silva, if he’d had the courage to admit it) and now caused this white man to love this negro just as he did during Fletcher’s youth. In truth, he’d never stopped loving him, as Fletcher’s reflection cast sparks of himself and Silva alike, and made the boy’s rounded nose and thicker lips somehow beautiful. Floyd likened this passion to that adrenaline that rushed through them both with a big catch down on the lake saying, “It’s that slight flinch of tha line, that deep gulp it takes, an’ then ya know ya got ’im, reelin’ an’ pullin’ like crazy till it comes flyin’ from tha water.” That uncontrollable force that even the fish could not explain, he went on to say, that inability to manipulate the air so easily as it did the water.
It was this passion that consumed him and caused Mr. Kern’s entire body to cease moving, sending shivers that left him stranded in this moment as the two stopped to rest. The old man’s face sat in the direction of the boy’s smile and did not move at any moment during this episode, and even if he did blink or rear his head it was only in the direction of Fletcher.
“You okay, sir?” Fletcher asked.
“Just catching my breath,” the old man replied gruffly. “You’ll have many a moments like this when you my age. You’ll see.”
“I believe you, sir,” Fletcher said. “Sometimes I already feel it in my legs.”
Mr. Kern smiled, surely aware that the boy’s young body had never felt the creaks of old age a day in his life, and if it did it was only a passing heartbeat. Mr. Kern knew Fletcher was strong and could bear the weight of those fields for a hundred years without ever fainting. He could sustain that plantation and the life Mr. Kern had always know
n, giving spirit to it once more.
When Mr. Kern felt of good-enough mood, he gave in to the pull of Fletcher’s arm, allowing the young man to ease him toward the house. That it all spoke of that love he had for the boy, that all of the anguish and pride and shame and remorse were all gone, and indeed that those feelings of fear and uncertainty or of wrong and right were all vanquished, too, Floyd swore at his most animated. That love made him forget it all.
The minute lingered between them as Fletcher walked oblivious to the old man’s mood. Floyd swore it was destined the two of them meet like this. My vehemence fell in stark disagreement, but it was one of those moments you just had to see to understand, Floyd said.
The two of them met again that next day, which was the third and final day of the Missus’s fit. He recalled it happened out back by the shed and garden, where the Mister had previously fallen.
Mr. Kern was of a particularly decent spirit that day when he first spotted Fletcher.
“Seems like the weeds get us every year before the flowers,” Mr. Kern said.
“Every time,” Fletcher acknowledged of the flowerbed nearby, turning to see Mr. Kern and smiling a soft grin. “Might as well grow the weeds and forget the flowers.”
“Might as well burn the whole lot,” Mr. Kern agreed.
Mr. Kern drew closer, an easiness he now had about him and indeed felt with the boy that allowed him to look directly into Fletcher’s eyes and forgo any feeling of regret or grief at the years he’d lost. The boy’s humor was duly noted by the old man as well, a frequent occurrence between boys and their fathers, I’d noticed, that when those men now of full lives look upon their seeds they see a certain pride at the men they’ve become and take joy in those telltale signs that make those boys likely to attempt the same schemes those men tried in their youth. And, in this manner, those men became young again.
“How is it today?” Mr. Kern asked.
“Just fine, sir,” Fletcher replied, keeping his answer short.
In truth, you didn’t say much in those days, and Fletcher knew it. Still, Mr. Kern was of a quiet spirit too, soon disappearing inside the house and returning with a jar of ice water, which he handed to Fletcher.
“No, thank you, sir,” Fletcher protested with an insistence he’d been taught by Silva to display toward such strange acts of kindness. “I just use the barrel.”
“You need it,” Mr. Kern said, his life seeming to fade with every word he delivered. “A hard head sure makes a soft bottom, especially out here in the fields. That sun can take you before you know it.”
Fletcher watched him for a moment then reluctantly drank, thanking the old man kindly as he took the glass, managing to forgo any further fights. The boy sipped the water until it was empty, every single drop, feeling strangely, I was sure, to return a glass to his employer, let alone a white man, let alone Mr. Kern. But Mr. Kern smiled, accepting the glass willingly as he then placed a locket into Fletcher’s hands. Fletcher recoiled, pulling back his arm as if he’d made contact with fire.
“Sir?” Fletcher questioned.
Mr. Kern touched the wet parts of Fletcher’s palm, saying simply, “That there’s my family stone. You been good to me, and I can’t take it wit’ me. Makes a damn good marble too.”
“I can’t, sir,” Fletcher said.
Mr. Kern barked, “You’ll learn to accept good things when they come to you. It don’t always happen this way. Don’t have to be a reason, just is.”
He then left Fletcher alone in those parts with the locket still in his hands and the old man’s lesson stamped upon his brain.
This final story concluded Floyd’s account and made Floyd laugh, a snicker that grew into a resounding chuckle at the Missus, feeling that Mr. Kern and Fletcher had somehow won this battle. Still, no good deed in that house ever went unpunished, and joy could be recalled at a moment’s notice here, in this most direst of places, with the marsh that stretched like seaweed into the nothingness that went forever. I hated this place, and rightfully so, for I knew there would be retaliation for the Mister’s kindness, and I hated him for his goodwill and despised even myself for feeling such bitterness and trepidation toward it. I knew what the Missus was capable of and, as such, I feared her retribution.
CHAPTER 24
The Missus learned of this encounter by her own means of scrutiny, spotting that bit of cheer that existed between Mr. Kern and Fletcher as clearly as Floyd had seen it. That morning had been of a cooler disposition, the kind that roused the squeakiness of rockers and encouraged a spot of coffee or heavier jacket before venturing outdoors. The countryside sat white with frost, a crunching of the ground beneath their feet that sent no lack of hurried footsteps toward any particular destination. The sky was clear of clouds or smoke or anything that was not the soft blue of heaven’s basement above their heads, and for a time it seemed that only this plantation existed, the lark singing a gentle song as Floyd started up the tractor and the normal sounds of the workday returned to life.
From what Floyd told me, the Missus emerged from her bedroom having relinquished that bit of madness that had consumed her. She was stealthy in her mood, remaining quietly observant and making no perceived actions or comments that would alert anyone of her attention. She was actually pleasant, Floyd insisted, and seemed of a new spirit that was more welcoming than the last. She found Silva’s company and took a seat near the half-closed kitchen door, saying, “If I live one more day, I’m sure it’ll be a crazy one. So, if anything, I’d better die today.”
Silva looked up from her dishes, startled for a second at seeing the Missus in this condition, then resumed her fighter’s stance as she replied, “No, Miss, you’re not crazy. A crazy person don’t know they crazy. You know exactly what you do.”
The Missus smiled, as she and Silva had felt each other out a long time ago, and she knew every card Silva was likely to play. And so the Missus moved to trump her, replying, “You’re right, Silva. There’s nothing wrong with me except for all I suffer.”
“And what’s that, Miss?” Silva asked.
“The usual wears and tears that come with life on the plantation, although I seem to have more. Housewives usually do. It’s the burden we bear for our families.”
It was impossible to tell whether the Missus believed this or not, but she did not waver a second in her delivery and was never in fear of smiling throughout the remainder of their conversation. Silva shrugged it off, leaving the dishtowel draped over the faucet, wrung of all water, as she limped toward the stove and the biscuits that cooled there.
“I bet mothers make it to heaven first,” Miss Lula continued.
“What would you know about that?” Silva replied under her breath.
Yet heaven was no joking matter, and once Silva had collected her senses and prayed that God would settle her heart, she turned to the Missus once more and said, “They have to be there to take the little ones in.”
Miss Lula embraced these words, her eyes a deep well that showed no bottom, her face thin now from months of neglect, yet still there was a beauty that shone through the sunlight that hit her at just the right angles to make her attractive. She exhaled a deep breath that forced the air throughout the room then made herself comfortable with these thoughts, as if the words were spoken directly from God to her ears.
Once Silva had finished her duties, she left the kitchen, leaving the Missus seated there alone. Outside, Miss Lula found the company of Mr. Kern who had managed to walk from his parlor to that front porch where he now sat bundled beneath several layers of clothing that made him appear to have regained some of his former size. He had become a peaceful man in his old age and sought not the vindictiveness of his younger self, when he’d pursued nothing but indifference toward the Missus. He was now kind to her and indulged her moods more than ever before.
“Quite cold out here if you gots the patience,” he said as she s
at beside him.
“I got about as much as the next,” she replied. “Ain’t seen a cold one like this in a while.”
“Sure shake the leaves from a tree if it got any left,” Mr. Kern said.
There was a moment following these words where they both watched the trees, as in them they saw the coldness that left those trees stripped and brittle and bare, the branches stretching high like lifelines drawn out amongst the sky in streams of decay. Then she saw him—that line out there mixed with the trees that stood and fell then stood again. And she looked up to see Mr. Kern’s eyes upon him as well, and she knew that warmth had returned. And it was there that she watched this show for minutes, if not hours, if not days, before she finally stood and would have no more of it. Floyd swore she shot up like she had fire ants at her tail and found the boy by the marsh as he took respite by the sunny veil of the outer fields, where the warmth had collected around the once-harsh edges of swampland.
The boy sat planted on the ground like the very seeds he’d sown when she approached.
“Fletcher,” she said kindly, her eyes drawn immediately to that spark from his hands that he’d quickly covered, making that object all the more recognizable with its light gone.
“Yes, Miss?” he said, placing the locket inside his pocket then turning toward her.
“Don’t hide it, Fletcher,” she said. “I knows you didn’t steal it.”
He sighed.
“Mr. Kern gave it to me,” he admitted. “Honestly, I don’t know why.”
“He’s old and trying to buy his way into heaven,” she said. “Don’t pay him no mind. Besides, who can blame him? If you can’t get there the right way, then do it the best way you know how.”
She took a seat beside Fletcher in the grass, allowing her feet to bathe in the sun, her hair a reflection of that persistent light.
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