Copperhead

by Alexi Zentner

  Not a single one of them knows what it is to have something held out of reach.

  It is easy for Deanne to say he’s seventeen and he can make his own decisions: she thinks that to jump is to fly, can’t understand a world of falling.

  If she were here right now, watching him, she still wouldn’t understand that if he steps off the edge of this dock he’ll sink and never come back up.

  Seventeen, but all Jessup can think of is David John carrying him off the football field, holding him on his lap all the way to the hospital, knows that however old he is, there is a part of him that will always be that kid, and right or wrong, he’s going to trust David John. Has to.

  Texts Deanne back:

  I love you.

  Doesn’t wait for a response. Just puts his phone back in his pocket, walks up to where Jewel is, takes her hand, heads back to Earl’s house.

  LIGHTS

  Brandon pulls him to the side, gives him a quick pep talk. “Look her directly in the eye. Don’t look away, nothing shifty. Keep your hands still. Talk slowly and firmly. Don’t say too much. We want to be the voice of reason here. Let the protesters get all angry.”

  “I don’t understand why there are protesters here. How did they know about this?”

  “I called them.” Brandon chortles. “Anonymously, of course. It’s an ‘antihate’ group up in town. They put out one of those ridiculous calls to action. Not a bad turnout, though. There’s already twenty or thirty of them with more coming. Thought it would make for a good visual. Have them stomping around with signs and crap. There’s nothing the news likes more than a bunch of snowflakes protesting. Means we’ll get more airtime. If we get really lucky, they’ll start coming in from the city to protest when we hold the rally on the pedestrian mall tomorrow night.”

  Jessup wonders if his mouth is hanging open. Tries to remind himself that Brandon is only three years older than him. But Brandon seems to have it all figured out, so sure of himself. He wants to say something, to tell Brandon this isn’t what he signed up for, that all he wants is to take back that singular moment, the car sliding, the sound of Corson’s body, Corson’s body, Corson’s body, but this moment, like that moment, gets away from him, and he doesn’t know how it happened, but he’s in the church, sitting on a pew next to a reporter.

  The reporter is a woman from MSNBC who looks vaguely familiar to Jessup. He wonders if she was here when Ricky and David John were arrested. He’s turned toward her. They’re supposed to be sitting in a conversational manner. Natural, Jessup thinks, just a casual chat with a reporter in a church, like this is something he does all the time. The camera guy sets a couple of lights and what looks like a white umbrella, and then they’re off.

  Jessup feels like he barely says anything, a couple of “yes ma’ams,” “no ma’ams,” says he didn’t say anything to Corson at the party, agrees that the video makes it look like Corson was the one being aggressive, no, he doesn’t know what happened with Corson’s accident, but yes, Corson seemed like he’d been drinking, and no, he doesn’t know why the cops served a search warrant, and yes, since you bring it up, ma’am, it does seem like the cops are conducting a witch hunt, no the church doesn’t preach violence, Jesus Christ is about love, no, he’s not involved in the church’s militia and can’t really speak to that, yes, ma’am, my brother and stepfather did serve time, but it was self-defense, not like you’re making it out to be, and no, ma’am, I don’t spread hate, yes, ma’am, I’m proud to be white but that doesn’t mean—

  The camera guy stops rolling, snaps off the light, and he and the reporter stalk out of the church without another word. Jessup is stunned. He understands what the deer in the field must have felt like, the bullet ripping clean through without warning. It’s all moving so fast. He doesn’t have time to process: Brandon swoops in, clasps Jessup’s hand, looks pleased.

  “You’re a natural,” Brandon says. “If I didn’t know better—and if I didn’t have such a pretty face—I’d be worried you’re going to take my place.”

  It’s nine thirty. Close enough to the start of services that people are coming into the parking lot, drifting into the church. Brandon sees the look on Jessup’s face, takes pity. “Come on. Why don’t you go wait in the house for now? You can come back over right before church starts so you don’t have to talk to anybody. It’s going to be a busy day.”

  As Jessup walks across gravel, he can hear the sound of people chanting. He stops.

  Brandon stops, too. “The protesters,” he says. “Bunch of libtard college students and hippies from Cortaca. You’ll see, though. There will be more of them later. As soon as this gets on television, the protest will grow. We’ll get the social justice warriors driving up from the city, and mark my words, sooner or later you’re going to have at least one Negro preacher grabbing the microphone. The news folks love this stuff, and it’s like catnip to the eggheads and radical liberals. There’s nothing those social justice warriors like more than a chance to get in front of a camera.”

  Brandon pats him twice on the back, like he’s some sort of chum, and then gives a gentle push, steering Jessup toward the house before heading off to talk to the reporter and cameraman standing by the CNN satellite truck.

  PEWS

  At two minutes to ten, Jessup heads over to the barn with his mom and David John and Jewel. The church is almost full, and it feels like every man and woman sitting there is staring at him as he works his way up the aisle. It’s only when they are already halfway up the aisle that Jessup realizes there’s an empty space in the very front pew reserved for him and his family, right next to Brandon Rogers. The choir sits off to the left.

  He sees Wyatt’s girlfriend, Kaylee, sitting with her parents and her older brother, Peyton. Kaylee smiles and Peyton just tips his head. He’s finishing up an associate degree in sustainable farming and food systems. He’s the one who got Mr. and Mrs. Owen to take the farm organic, back when he was just a freshman in high school: he argues that the premium prices are worth the hassle and organic farming is the future if you want to make a living.

  Some of the other faces are people he knows—old Mrs. Holland, who was old even when she was Jessup’s first-grade teacher—but there are others who look familiar but he can’t place, four years’ absence enough to wipe the slate clean.

  He sees Mr. and Mrs. Dunn seated with Wyatt’s two younger brothers and his sister—she’s a year younger than Jewel, and while they aren’t besties like him and Wyatt, the two girls get along okay—but no Wyatt. And across the aisle from them, Leanne Gray, who’s only two years older than Jessup, nineteen, but already married and, by the looks of things, about ready to pop out a baby. He used to have a crush on her something fierce when he was in middle school. Still has dreams about her sometimes.

  They sit down, Jessup next to Brandon, and Jewel hops up into Jessup’s lap. He doesn’t mind it. Likes it, in fact. She’s getting big, but he knows he won’t be able to hold her like this for much longer, knows she won’t want it soon, won’t be caught dead on her big brother’s lap in a year or two.

  Uncle Earl comes out from the back.

  Jessup’s mom takes his hand, gently squeezes.

  The service starts.

  GRACE

  Even though this is the first time he’s gone since Ricky and David John were arrested, this church has been part of his life, and Jessup does have faith: he believes in God and Jesus and salvation. When he clasps hands with his brothers in the locker room, bows his head and prays, when he asks for protection for Jewel, for some relief for his mother, he believes. He believes in God’s love and grace. He has to.

  The entire congregation rises to their feet as one, singing out the praises of God. Despite his long absence, he settles into the rhythm: standing, singing, sitting, praying.

  That familiarity, however, means that even though it feels like a homecoming, he’s bored at times, his thoughts
turning to Deanne and the way it feels to be with her, or to how happy his mother looks here, in this moment, with her family in church together—Ricky a permanent absence, always a shadow, but lessened now—but mostly, despite himself, he’s happy. He’s sitting with his family, a smile on his mom’s face, David John’s hand on her thigh, and next to him, Jewel sitting on the pew now, holding his hand, leaning against him.

  He tries to ignore the fact that Brandon Rogers is on his other side.

  Jessup puts his arm around Jewel. He remembers how when he was eleven, the age she is now, he’d lift her sleeping body from the car and carry her into the house, lay her gently in her bed, close the curtains and the door so that she could nap.

  He’d do anything for her. He isn’t a parent, but he understands it, understands how David John gave himself to the moment in the alley, the knife wiped clean of prints and shoved into that black kid’s hand, understands how his mother works two jobs, catches an hour of sleep in her car between cleaning houses and standing at the register at Target.

  He steals a glance over at David John. The man is shining with hope. Every one of his letters to Jessup talked about faith as refuge. Jessup has faith, but that’s not the same as what David John has. David John has surety. Jessup’s eleventh-grade social studies teacher, a Mormon, said there were all kinds of studies showing that religious people, specifically people who go to religious services, are happier. Jessup believes it.

  SERMON ON THE MOUNT

  He should have been expecting it, but Jessup is still taken aback when Earl focuses his attention on the front row. He goes through it quickly, how Jessup—his nephew, he calls him, no mention that Jessup is actually David John’s stepson—is a victim, Corson provoking him but Jessup turning the other cheek. And now, even though it’s clear that Jessup did nothing wrong, there has to be a scapegoat, doesn’t there?

  “Isn’t that how it is today? No black man can die without it being some white man’s fault,” Earl says, shaking his head. It’s clear that he’s both amused and deeply sorry about the situation.

  Somebody from the back yells out, “Dindu nuffin!” and there’s an appreciative chuckle.

  “That’s right,” Earl says. He leans forward in the pulpit, hands grasping the side of the podium. “We hear that all the time from black folks, don’t we?” He looks around the church, makes eye contact. “I didn’t do nothing.”

  Jessup tries not to stir. Doesn’t want to call more attention to himself than what is already being thrown at him. He feels sick. An acid swelling in his throat. Whatever grace he felt is gone. He doesn’t want to be here. Shouldn’t be here. Doesn’t belong here. This was a mistake. All of this. Everything from the moment of the thump of Corson’s body against the truck.

  What if he had simply stayed in his truck, driven away after the accident? But what then? Somebody would have found Corson’s body on the driveway, called the cops that night, and Jessup would still be in the same place, a dent in his truck, a dead body, his own life hanging in the balance. What if he’d done the right thing right away: called the police on himself, told the truth, it was an accident, nothing more, taken his medicine? He’s only seventeen and it was slippery with snow. He’d lose his license, community service. The police would understand. A slap on the wrist, the guilt enough, right?

  But he glances over at David John, holding his mother’s hand, hears Earl’s voice, thinks about the Confederate flag sticker on the back window of Wyatt’s truck, the tattoos on Ricky’s back, the flaming cross, “eighty-eight” on Ricky’s right shoulder, standing for the letter H, eighty-eight meaning HH, meaning Heil Hitler, and on his left shoulder, “pure blood,” no explanation needed, David John’s tattoos marking him just as clearly as Ricky, lightning bolts and swastika, unambiguous, the entire family marked, no matter that Jessup is clean of ink. He’s stained anyway.

  All this thinking of a different set of choices is fantasy. He knows that. There’s nothing he could have done differently. Nothing that would have allowed him to walk away unscathed.

  “We aren’t asking for anything radical,” Earl says. “Africa for Africans, Asia for Asians, America for Americans. Every other group can play identity politics, but when we do it, when we fight for the rights of good, white Christians, we get labeled as racists.”

  Jessup has heard all of this before, but he’s aware of how tight his body feels right now. Every muscle clenched. He can feel the pulse of the congregation, the way they are leaning forward slightly, every word that Earl says soaking through them.

  Earl raises his hand, open: “We aren’t trying to take anything away from anybody. We just want to keep our God-given rights. If we don’t fight against reverse discrimination, then we’ll be left with nothing.” His cadence has picked up, and his voice goes into a roar as he comes to the fourteen words: “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children!”

  The congregants answer back, amens and applause, but Earl gestures for quiet. “This is an opportunity for us. We’ve got television crews here. Protesters on the road outside.” A few boos. “You don’t have to worry. We’ve got some of our brave soldiers out there”—he means the church’s militia—“right now, keeping the peace. When you leave today, I want you to leave as Christians. I want you to be polite to those people outside of the gates.” There’s a smattering of unrest, sounds of dissent, but Earl isn’t bothered. “Let them be angry. Let the world see what the radical Left looks like. Besides, doesn’t Jesus tell us to turn the other cheek? If the social justice warriors want to spend their Sunday mornings standing around with signs instead of praising the glory of our lord and savior, if those snowflakes think they don’t need Jesus’s blessing, well,” Earl says, a wink, enough charm to explain why there is a church here at all, “I know I’m going to heaven, for I have faith. And to that, I say, let us pray. Our father . . .”

  It’s a sea of voices joining him.

  Jessup is alone and adrift.

  HONOR GUARD

  Brandon has been checking his phone regularly throughout the service. He does so tastefully, keeping it down low by his leg, but it’s hard for Jessup not to notice since they are sitting right next to each other. As Earl seems like he’s winding down, Brandon reads something, and it seems like he’s been shot through with electricity. He grabs Jessup’s elbow. “They’re here,” he whispers. He makes a motion with his hand—discreetly—that catches Earl’s attention.

  Earl speeds up, has things wrapped up in record time, and then he’s down in front of Jessup and Brandon, hustling them out. “Come on,” he says. “Let’s go.”

  They stop in the back room behind the pulpit to grab their coats—Jessup wonders how their coats got there, who had this planned out, but the answer is right in front of him—and Brandon already has his phone to his ear. Jessup assumes he’s talking to his minion, Carter, because he asks the person if he’s ready to film, tells him to make sure the news crews have their cameras rolling, lens on Brandon and Jessup “without fail. Without fail, okay? Just keep shooting the whole time. Record everything.”

  They are out in the parking lot, and even with Earl’s borrowed coat on, it feels to Jessup like it’s dropped a degree or two. There’s still no wind, but there’s a dark huddle of clouds, the afternoon no brighter than the morning. It smells like snow again, like the weather is tuning itself up for the coming winter, Friday night’s snow a prelude for today. He wants to admire the way the sky is ready to burst open, but it’s not a peaceful moment: he can hear the chanting of protesters.

  David John slides next to Earl. “Are you sure about this?”

  “A show of force,” Earl says. “Nothing more. The militia is just there to show them they can’t roll over us. Don’t worry. We’ve got it under control.”

  Brandon hears this, speaks without looking back. “All we’re doing is standing our ground. They have no reason to come on church land, war
rant or no warrant, and we’ve got the cameras here. We’re just making a statement.”

  But what, Jessup thinks, if he doesn’t want to make a statement? He’s quiet, though, and he follows behind, hating himself at every moment, not able to figure out any other choice.

  As they turn the corner, he sees that there are now two pickup trucks parked in the grass off the road, one on either side, backed in so the beds are toward the gate. The gate itself is closed, with eight men standing in front of it. Another two or three are standing in each truck bed. All of them are armed: a mix of military-looking AR-15s, shotguns, hunting rifles. A couple of them are wearing bandannas over their faces, or balaclavas. Plenty have pistols in holsters on their hips. They are all wearing matching tan bulletproof vests, a uniform of sorts, and when Jessup gets closer, he can see they all have patches sewn onto the back left shoulder of their vests: the Blessed Church of the White America’s flaming cross circled by the church’s name.

  They’re bracing against what’s on the other side of the gate: a swelling group of protesters and a convoy of police cars. The group of protesters has doubled in size, large enough now to be almost imposing, sixty, seventy people. It’s a mix of college students and middle-aged and older men and women, professors, the kind of hippie Cortaca residents who keep the farmers’ market afloat. Some younger kids, too, high school students, sons and daughters, people carrying signs and placards, some black people, more white. He thinks he sees his AP European History teacher, Mrs. Howard, in there, and recognizes at least two of the high-school-aged kids, the familiarity of a town the size of Cortaca. But the protesters aren’t what captures Jessup’s attention. What he’s taken by are the cops: at least four Cortaca PD vehicles, four more from the county sheriff’s office, and on the side of the main road, a giant truck marked “Cortaca Police S.W.A.T. Mobile Command.” Mixed among all of it are the camera crews, and Jessup overhears a reporter talking earnestly into a microphone. Hears the words, “assault rifles” and “militia.”