Copperhead

by Alexi Zentner

  “I didn’t do anything,” Jessup says. “It was an accident.” He knows that he’s whining, that he sounds like a little kid trying to pass the blame.

  And now David John sounds like what he is: a father comforting a child. “I know,” he says. “I know. But there are things we can’t change, and we’ve got what we’ve got. There’s a dead kid and he’s black and you’re white, and if this goes south, people will string you up. Ricky didn’t do anything wrong, either. They attacked him. He was just protecting himself. And I’ll be an old man by the time he gets out.” He doesn’t say anything about the four years of his own life gone by.

  “I don’t want Brandon Rogers involved in this,” Jessup says. “I don’t trust him. Don’t like him.”

  David John lifts the football up, spins it. “Game ball.” He puts it back in his lap. “I don’t know, Jessup. I think Earl has the right idea. Maybe it would have been different if we were rich. If I could have hired some smart New York City lawyer for me and Ricky.”

  By which Jessup knows that David John means some smart Jew.

  David John hesitates, says, “Or maybe if I raised you all some different way. A different church.”

  It’s still not a question, so Jessup still doesn’t answer.

  David John shakes his head. “Lawyers could have made a difference with your brother. Good lawyers. Expensive lawyers.” He says it again: “Maybe if we were rich . . .”

  But they weren’t. They aren’t.

  THE CREAMERY

  Jewel and his mom are waiting for them at the Creamery. There’s only a couple of people in line, which is a surprise. They expanded the entire building the year before, tripling in size, and they offer breakfast and lunch now to go with the ice cream. It’s been in the same spot for eighty years, a local institution, the kind of place that’s featured in tourist brochures and that the university likes to suggest to visiting parents. It’s Jewel’s favorite place in town. A treat for her.

  His phone buzzes while they are waiting. Wyatt.

  wat the fuck

  Jessup thinks it says something about him that his first thought is annoyance that Wyatt texts him “wat” instead of “what.” The sloppiness bothers him.

  can’t talk talk later

  Notices he’s got a couple of missed texts from Deanne.

  call me

  call me

  are you okay?

  I’m scared. call me, please

  He texts her back.

  sorry. getting ice cream with family. see you at work

  He watches the screen. Almost as soon as the text goes through he sees the thought bubbles, quick response.

  what’s going on? you okay?

  yes. nothing. it’s nothing. I’ll see you soon. everything’s okay

  you sure?

  yeah. don’t worry.

  can you come in early? want to see you. 145?

  okay

  okay

  Okay. Okay. Everything’s going to be okay. Everything’s going to be okay. Don’t think about Corson. Don’t think about Corson. He notices his sister watching him. He slips the phone away and then shoos her forward.

  She orders a scoop of Cortaca Crunch in a chocolate-dipped waffle cone. Jessup’s mom gets an ice-cream sandwich. David John just orders a coffee. Jessup doesn’t feel like eating.

  NUCLEAR FAMILY

  Jessup waits at the counter for their order while his mom and David John and Jewel go sit at one of the tables in back. Jewel is talking brightly about something, moves from her chair to sit on David John’s lap. He wraps her up, beaming, and Jewel keeps turning to look at her dad, like she’s afraid he’s going to disappear again.

  The three of them look happy sitting at the table. Jessup’s mom smiling, reaching out to take her husband’s hand, Jewel leaning against her dad, the three of them a Norman Rockwell painting: “Saturday Afternoon at the Ice-Cream Parlor.”

  Jewel is wearing a pair of stretchy jeans and one of Jessup’s hand-me-down sweatshirts, which makes her look even smaller. She eats well—she’s never been picky, and they try to cook fresh vegetables, eat lots of fruit—but she’s a skinny thing. She’s about the same height as most of her friends, but she has the ungainly awkwardness that comes in the space between being a child and being a teenager, and it hurts Jessup to think how fragile she is. But right now she looks happy. Having her father back is her birthday and Christmas morning and hope springing eternal all dipped in chocolate. As good as it gets. Jessup’s mom looks that way, too.

  The boy behind the counter delivers the ice cream and David John’s coffee, and Jessup brings them to the table. “I don’t know how you take your coffee,” Jessup says.

  “Just sugar,” David John says. “I’ve got it.” He shifts Jewel off his lap and takes his coffee back to the counter. Jewel is already working on her cone. She offers Jessup a bite, but he turns it down.

  His mom reaches out and puts her hand on his forehead to see if he feels hot. “Are you okay?”

  It is, Jessup thinks, the most maternal action that has ever occurred in the course of human history. He’s good-natured about it, but he brushes her hand off. “I’m fine,” he says. “Just tired.”

  His mom looks off to the side and he follows her gaze. David John is holding his coffee and talking on the phone. He shakes his head and then nods, an active listener.

  Jessup wishes it were something as simple as a fever, because the truth is, he does feel sick. He’s sure that the phone call is about him. Can’t get rid of the feeling that everything is about to shake itself to pieces.

  But when David John comes back to the table, he’s smiling. “Got a job already,” he says. “Somebody in Cortaca Heights used a little too much force trying to turn off the water to the outside hose bib. Don’t even know how they got my number, but I’ll take it. Jessup, I’m going to need the van this afternoon. Do you think you can get a ride home after your shift?”

  “Yeah,” he says. “I’m going out with friends. Somebody will drive me home.”

  Jewel rotates her cone to take another lick. “You have to work, Dad? I thought we were going to—”

  “I know, honey, but I’m not really in the position to turn down a job right now.”

  “But you just got home.” She makes a pouty face, puffing out her lips.

  He sits, pulls her back onto his lap. There’s a part of Jessup that wonders if she’s too old to be acting like this, but there’s a bigger part of him that’s glad she isn’t.

  “Now, honey,” David John says, “I know. But it’s not going to be easy to build up the business again, and this is a good job.” Jokes, “How do you think we’re going to pay for this ice cream?” He turns to look at Jessup. “You’re going out with friends tonight?” It’s a question. It’s an accusation. “I don’t like that.”

  Jessup doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t look away, either. He could just tell the truth, which is that he is going to spend time with Deanne, but that’s another universe that he doesn’t want explored.

  David John relents. “If you can’t get a ride, you call me. I’ll come get you. But not too late. Church in the morning.” He looks at his watch. “We better get moving. Why don’t you drive the van up to the mall and we’ll follow you?”

  HUMMINGBIRD

  Jewel decides she wants to ride in the van with Jessup. She’s bouncing up and down in her seat, holding the football in both her hands. “Why did Dad take your truck? Where did he take your truck? What’s wrong with it?”

  “Engine trouble,” he says, and that satisfies her, because now she’s talking about a video she saw that featured two dogs playing tug-of-war with a plastic bottle of soda.

  “And then it exploded, and they both yelped and ran away. It was pretty funny. I’ll show it to you later.”

  She gets quiet for a second. Crosses her arms, hugging the football, and looks out the win
dow at the cut of the highway up the hill.

  “You okay?” Jessup reaches out and pats her leg.

  “Why does he have to work today? He just got home.”

  “You know,” Jessup says. Because she does. She’s a good kid. Knows they’re broke, knows that having David John home and working again means things will change. A cell phone for Christmas. A better car for their mom. Mom not constantly worrying about the bills. Space to breathe.

  “One of the girls at school a couple of weeks ago said we was on welfare.”

  “Were,” Jessup says. “Use proper grammar.” It’s an instinctual correction, and it gives him a few seconds to think. He’s not a parent. He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do. “What did you say?”

  “Duh. I said we weren’t.” She shrugs. “She’s a bitch.”

  “Jewel!”

  “Well, she is,” Jewel mutters. “I told Emily last week at church. She said . . .”

  Emily is one of Jewel’s friends from the Blessed Church of the White America. She’s slept over a couple of times. Goes to school in Brooktown. In Jessup’s opinion, she’s a little shit. Talks back to their mom. He hasn’t met Emily’s parents, but the way his mom avoids the subject of Emily and has insisted that Jewel have Emily to their house instead of Jewel going there makes Jessup skeptical.

  “What? Why did you trail off like that? What did Emily say?”

  “She said that only niggers go on welfare.”

  He squints at her. She’s watching. Testing. Waiting for his reaction.

  “Don’t say that word.” Tries to keep his voice from sounding sharp. “We don’t use that word, okay?”

  “Why did the cops come?” She’s calm. Possessed. Sometimes she’s a little kid, sometimes she might be forty.

  “Nothing,” he says.

  “If it was nothing, I wouldn’t have had to go to my room.”

  “Don’t be a smart-ass. It’s nothing. I mean, it’s something, but it’s not me. A kid got drunk at a party last night and drove his car into a tree.”

  “You shouldn’t drink and drive.”

  “Oh really, little missy?” He takes his hand off the wheel to poke her in the side. “Is that a fact?”

  She squirms and laughs. “Well, you shouldn’t. Did he die?”

  He’s surprised, but he shouldn’t be. “Yeah.”

  “What did the cops want with you, then?”

  He takes the exit, waits for the light to turn green, and then turns left and then left again, into the mall parking lot, driving around the back to where the movie theater is. There’s a small snowbank at the edge of the lot where the plows made a pile, but the pavement is clean, the afternoon sunlight doing its job.

  “I don’t know. Nothing,” he says. “We were at the same party and he wanted to fight me, but I didn’t fight him, didn’t do anything, but it was loud, so my name came up. That’s all. Cops are just doing what they do. Busybodies. Nothing to worry about.”

  “Why can’t I say that word? Mom says it.”

  Jessup is surprised again. “She does? No, she doesn’t. You know how David John is with our language.”

  “I heard her say it to Uncle Earl.”

  “When?”

  “I don’t know. Over the summer. They were talking about Ricky.”

  He pulls the van into a space in front of the theater. The parking lot is sparsely attended, most of the cars there for the budget gym that’s across from the movie theater. It’s too early in November for Christmas shopping.

  “Just don’t use that word, okay?”

  “Why?”

  “You’re better than that. That’s why.”

  THE WATER

  But is she better than that? He says good-bye, hands the keys off to David John, asks him to put the game ball on his dresser, promises to be home at a decent hour (“Stay out of trouble,” David John says. His voice is quiet. Jewel’s in the van, Jessup’s mom is in the car, but David John is careful that they don’t hear. “Remember, they’re just looking for an excuse”— and heads into the mall.

  He worries about his sister. Baptized in the Blessed Church of the White America. She only knows what’s around her. Only knows how she’s been raised.

  He should be worried about himself, too. The snow comes down and it covers everything, makes it look clean and fresh, but just because it hides things doesn’t mean there isn’t anything rotting underneath. Sooner or later the snow melts and turns into a river, the water washing away everything its path, uncovering what lies beneath.

  But this could stay hidden. Nobody can say he laid a hand on Corson at the party. Nobody saw the way the truck slid, Corson crumpled on the driveway. Corson was just dumb and drunk and made a bad decision, nobody to say anything different. Nothing to stop Jessup from getting out of Cortaca, from leaving his history behind. He’ll gladly trade his body on the football field for four years of college, a degree. College is an island; he’s been swimming his whole life, trying to keep his head above water, and solid ground for a few years is all he can hope for.

  But what about Jewel? If family history is a weight around his neck, what is Jewel? You don’t hand a drowning man an anchor.

  FOR YOUR VIEWING ENJOYMENT

  It’s 1:40 by his phone when he walks into the back office. He changes into his Regal Cinemas shirt, tucks it into his jeans, pins on his name tag. Shoves his long-sleeved T-shirt and hoodie into his locker. His manager, Norma, walks in. She’s in a good mood. She’s always in a good mood. She’s somewhere in her sixties—“You kids don’t need to know exactly how old”—and is working because she likes it. Her husband is retired military, and he’s been driving her crazy at home, so the job at the theater and her two grandkids keep her out of the house. Claims the movie theater gig has saved her marriage. She sees Jessup, starts telling him about her granddaughter’s dance recital. Jessup smiles and nods, pretends like he’s listening.

  Deanne comes in, says “Hi,” puts her car keys in her coat and then her coat in her locker. Norma, oblivious to how fragile Deanne looks, says, “Oh, I’ll head out into the lobby, give you two lovebirds a few minutes before your shift starts.” Norma imagines herself a matchmaker, thinks it’s “adorable” that Jessup and Deanne are an item; since she found out, she’s been scheduling them so their shifts line up, start together, end together. Jessup likes working for Norma. Everybody likes working for Norma.

  As soon as the door closes, Deanne crumbles. She’s not gulping in air, but she’s crying hard. Jessup freezes. He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do, and he’s relieved when she moves to him, presses against him. That makes it easy for him: he knows enough to know that he’s got to put his arms around her, hold her tight.

  “I just—” she tries to say, but chokes up. She gathers herself. Still crying, but she can talk: “I just, I got all these texts, and Megan called me and she said that Kristen was at the party and she said that you and the running back from Kilton Valley got into a fight and this morning they found his body and—”

  “Hey, hey, no,” Jessup says. “Just hold up.” She has her face cradled between his neck and his shoulder. He feels like he’s pretending to be an adult.

  WORDS AND ACTIONS

  There wasn’t a fight.”

  “But Megan said that she heard—”

  “I didn’t get in a fight, Deanne. Okay?” He feels her nod against his neck. “Corson came at me. He was drunk and yelling, but I didn’t do anything.”

  Her voice is quiet. “Megan said that it’s going around that you called him . . .” He’s holding her, but her body is stiff now. Fight or flight. “Did you call him the N-word?”

  “Jesus, Deanne. No.” Corson standing in front of him, shaking his finger, just say it. The word on the tip of Jessup’s tongue. “I don’t use that word. You know that. You know me.”

  “Because if you�
�”

  “Deanne.” He’s pleading. “Please. Come on. I didn’t do anything. Corson was drunk. He came at me because of my brother and my stepdad, okay? It’s not like it’s some secret what happened, my family history. Everybody thinks they know the story.” Good God, his voice is shaking, his jaw trembling, too. Why can’t it just be the two of them alone in this room, the world around them something imagined, a construct of their imagination, no past shackled to his ankle, his life unfettered, the chance for him to hold Deanne like this, hold her tight like nothing could ever be wrong, just him holding her, this girl he has fallen for?

  “He was drunk, and he was yelling about my brother and my stepdad, and he was the one saying it, the N-word, accusing me of wanting to call him that. I mean, after the game last night, in the parking lot, he came up to me and said it was a dirty hit before halftime.”

  She sniffs. “That was a clean hit. He was behind the line of scrimmage and you got there at the same time as the ball anyway.”

  He tries to laugh. It comes out choked. “Coach’s daughter, huh? He said it was a bullshit play, and then he kicked out my taillight.”

  She pulls back, looking up at him. Angry, but angry for him, not at him. “What? Really?”

  Jessup shrugs. “Yeah. I was even pulled over on the way to the party. Got lucky and only ended up with a written warning. Actually,” he says, realizing he can’t tell her the real reason why he needs a ride, “I’m not supposed to drive it until I can get the taillight fixed. My mom wouldn’t let me take it to work. Any chance you can give me a ride home tonight?”

  “Sure.”

  “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

  “It’s nothing. But what happened?”

  “At the party? Look, he was drunk. Had a bug up his ass. Said a bunch of crap, and I didn’t do anything. I didn’t want any trouble. And then he and his friends left, and he was drunk, and he had an accident. Whatever you’re hearing, you’ve got to trust me. I didn’t say anything. It’s not my fault Corson killed himself. It’s not fair. I just . . .”