The Brightest Day: A Juneteenth Historical Romance Anthology

by Alexander, Kianna

  What day was it? What was her daughter’s birthday?

  “Day?” Missy croaked to Ruby. “Is it a new day yet?”

  “Oh, yes, Miss Baxter. A new day for sure.” The young girl responded back to her, smiling.

  “We getting the time down,” Miss Annie said. “The things they make me do now. Getting down birth certificates and such. White folks ain’t never been this much in our business afore. She was born at 6:38 in the morning. Today is June 19.”

  Yes. Missy remembered. Her daughter had chosen the most fortuitous day, the best day to be born. Arlo had been making all of the noise in the corner to get the wood in, as Miss Annie had directed. “Miss Ann is still cleaning her off. She’s a miracle. What you want to call her, Missy?”

  “A good day to be born. It’s Juneteenth.”

  “You still teaching from the bed? What’s that?”

  “The day the last slaves got word they were free. June 19. What the play at the schoolhouse was about. It actually happened forty-five years ago today.” She slumped back on her pillow as Miss Annie handed the baby to Arlo and went back to attend to her. “Ruby, let’s get Missouri cleaned up while Arlo go to fussing over that child.”

  “You hear that, girl?” Arlo said. “Your smart mama said you picked a good day to be born. It’s a little early for you, but you’re going to be fine. We’ll take good care of you. And your sisters.”

  “Yes.” She need not be ashamed. Mrs. Lewis and the college would be glad to see her and her daughter come to visit the school. Maybe June would be a teacher. June. That’s what they would call her.

  “Her name is June.” Missy pronounced.

  “Ahh. Yes, that’s good. But she’s my little Rose too, so we name her something more special than that. Juneteenth Rose Tucker.”

  Miss Annie squealed high in her voice. “Juneteenth. Arlo, you is something.”

  “Hey, she not just anyone’s child. We’ll call her Juntie.”

  Juntie. Leave it to Arlo to come up with something different. Something extra special. And his long, skinny daughter was an exact reflection of him.

  When Arlo turned the face of the baby to Missy, she could see it was true.

  ~~~

  Missouri felt much better in a few hours. Sitting up and eating some broth made her feel stronger.

  “When you want to marry me? When you are better, I got to get going to the hill country to get those girls.”

  “Pastor is still here, isn’t he?”

  “I’ll go see.”

  “Ruby, come and help me with a fresh nightgown. And my hair.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Missy should have felt strange with her recent student helping her with her needs, but Ruby’s hands were so gentle. A Negro nurse could do very well for herself and for her people in this world. Lord, help this girl find a life’s purpose.

  Arlo came back in. “He’s here. I didn’t know they all out there having a morning picnic. Folks is out there having a fine time.”

  Missy smiled. “It’s Juneteenth.”

  “Oh yes, a fine day.”

  “A great day for a wedding anniversary too.”

  “Hey, a day to never forget. I’ll get him.”

  Once Ruby and Miss Annie promised Missouri she looked fine enough to sit up in the bed with her new daughter beside her, the pastor came in with his wife.

  “Well, let’s get this going. We going to have a wedding and a blessing.”

  Missouri looked up to see the entire Bledsoe clan, among others of her students and their parents, cram themselves into every nook and cranny of the house.

  Arlo arranged himself in the chair next to the bed, not jolting her body on the bed. So thoughtful of him. “Get on to it, pastor. I’m ready.”

  “Praise God!” someone shouted from the back, and they all laughed. The baby made tiny mewling sounds, and everyone hushed instantly at the command from the small person.

  “She’s probably hungry. You all had your breakfast and little bit here, she ain’t had none.” Miss Annie frowned on the proceedings. “Got to get something more in her to get all of them inside fluids out of her.”

  “I’ll marry you all with the short version.”

  Before she knew it, Missy was Mrs. Missouri Tucker.

  “That’s how her name is going down, too,” Miss Annie said. “Baby born and wedding on the same day. No need for folk to know which one happened first.”

  “Thank you.” Tears of gratitude sprang to Missy’s eyes.

  “My wife. Thank you.” Arlo leaned over and pulled her close to him, kissing her forehead. “I love you, you know that, right?”

  “If I didn’t know it before, I know it now.”

  “I’m going to wait until you’re okay and the baby is strong before we get the girls. Don’t want to heap everything on you in taking care of us.”

  “I can’t wait.”

  “John said Sissy is fine with you being the schoolteacher in the fall.”

  “Hmmm. Guess I’m acceptable now that I’m Mrs. Tucker.”

  “Could be. But more than that, I think she knows you a great teacher. You sure taught me.”

  “People learn in all kinds of ways. You just have to find the way to get through to them. It’s a Milford teaching method.”

  “It worked over here.”

  Missouri beheld the long face of her sleeping daughter. She couldn’t get enough of looking at her. “Juneteenth is a teacher too, in her own way.”

  “She will be. I see it for her.”

  “I see a lot for all of us.” Missouri grasped his hand. He laced his fingers with hers and squeezed. Juntie whimpered and stirred round. And, naturally, as Missy knew how to do, she unbuttoned her nightgown, ready to nourish the future. With love.

  Epilogue

  God knew how to ask a whole lot of him. Missy needed a whole long time, like weeks, that she needed to recover from Juntie’s birth. Course, there was the small matter that Juntie wasn’t the most cooperative baby in the entire world. She insisted on being held, fed, sang to, whatever she wanted. What a girl child. But like him.

  “Bless you, honey, I don’t know how it’s all going to work with you if you keep asking everything of everyone around you. Your mama isn’t strong enough just now to be up to it, so all you got is me.”

  When, about a month later, he left to go get her sisters to bring them to their new home, Juntie’s strong, lusty cry was the last thing he heard as he left the teacher cabin. Lord, he almost wished he had the equipment on him to take care of a baby just a month old. Her cries tore at him so.

  Still, it was her cries that guided the wagon back to the teacher cabin days later. He pulled the wagon up to the house with two wide-eyed, scared souls clinging to the sides in the back. Katie and Addy in their nicest white dresses came to meet their new mama and sister. Juntie sounded like someone was murdering her. Arlo tied up the mule right away. He ran around to the back and reached his arms out to his small, light daughters. They jumped into his arms—one on each side.

  His heart beat fast as he ran to the small house, his arms full of daughters. His new wife stepped outside of the teacher house, patiently holding the new baby. Juntie’s mouth was open and her new gums flapped red.

  “She all right?”

  Missy turned and smiled at him. “Arlo, she’s fine. Just wanted to know where you were, is all. Who are these lovely ladies?”

  And they made the exchange, with Missy bending down to grasp the hands of the girls after he let them stand. She then handed over Juntie, gladly, as if she couldn’t give him that baby fast enough. When she did, Juntie quieted almost immediately.

  In a way she hadn’t done before, Juntie opened her eyes and stared at him. Her brows knitted together, looking for all the world as if she could speak, she would say: Where have you been?

  He drew her closer, feeling her baby grip clutch his heart more tightly than she ever had before.

  “I’m here, love. Look, I’ve brought you si
sters.” He peered over Juntie’s silky smooth head to see his wife encourage Katie and Addy into the house for something to eat. Missy’s schoolteacher training worked just right. She knew just what to do to make those girls feel at home.

  He placed a big old kiss right on Juntie’s sloped yellow forehead. “Girlie, let’s you and me get one thing straight. I’m the one who’s in charge here. Got that?”

  Missouri edged the girls to the table. They each sat down in a chair, lost in it. “Yes, she heard that all right. If she’s anything like her daddy, she’ll let you believe that too.”

  “Or her mother.” He rested the baby against his shoulder and approached Katie and Addy to introduce them to their new sister.

  It was all so new, so sweet, like a candy ribbon in his mouth. The curiosity of the girls, the tired, but shining eyes of Missy, the sweet scent of the new baby…all of it filled his heart up. For the first time in his life, he felt as if he really were complete. Together they made a sort of circle going around his heart. He didn’t need no drink, or the approval of some other man to make him whole because he had a family.

  Right there he made up his mind. If it meant working in that mill from dawn to dusk, he would do whatever it took to keep that circle strong and whole. There was no need to wander anymore.

  He was home.

  Author’s Note

  Everyone has that one uncle who seems to get away with everything. I remember when that uncle for me—he was actually my great-uncle—died. My mother often told the story about how six or seven women came up to her at the visitation/funeral. Each one of them, in their turn, said, “Georgie told me I was the only woman he ever loved.”Another time our family went somewhere to dinner and was served by a former girlfriend of this same uncle. She was so incensed at their mention of him. She uttered a profanity and everyone was afraid to eat their food!

  Those stories always made me wonder about what the life of a charmer was like. What if that charmer met his match? Who would be the love of his life? What would that look like? Making the choices to change paths are never, ever easy for those who lead that kind of “charmed” life and they weren’t for Arlo either. His fate is determined in the opening pages of the story of his niece, Ruby Bledsoe. Her story, A Virtuous Ruby, will be released by Samhain in July 2015.

  Some sources that helped me with this story:

  Anderson, James. The Education of Blacks in the South 1860-1935

  Brodie, Janet. Contraception and Abortion in Nineteenth-Century America

  Ken Burns: Prohibition

  Kunzel, Regina. Fallen Women, Problem Girls

  Okrent, Daniel. Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition

  About the Author

  Piper G Huguley, named the 2015 Debut Author of the year by Romance Slam Jam and a top ten historical romance author in Publisher’s Weekly by Beverly Jenkins, is a two-time Golden Heart® finalist. She is the author of “Migrations of the Heart,” a five-book series of historical romances set in the early 20th century featuring African American characters. Book one in the series, A Virtuous Ruby, won the Golden Rose contest in Historical Romance in 2013 and was a Golden Heart® finalist in 2014. Book four, A Champion’s Heart, was a Golden Heart® finalist in 2013. A Virtuous Ruby will be released by Samhain in July 2015. Book two, A Most Precious Pearl, will be released in September 2015.

  Huguley is also the author of the “Home to Milford College” series. The series follows the building of a college from its founding in 1866. On release, the prequel novella to the “Home to Milford College” series, The Lawyer’s Luck, reached #1 Amazon Bestseller status on the African American Christian Fiction charts.

  Piper blogs about the history behind her novels at www.piperhuguley.com. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her husband and son.

  You can reach Piper on Facebook and Twitter, as well as her blog:

  Facebook: Piper Huguley

  Twitter: @piperhuguley

  Let It Shine

  Alyssa Cole

  Sofronia Wallis knows that proper Black women don’t court trouble by upending the status quo, but it’s 1961 and the Civil Rights movement is in full swing. Sofie’s spent half her life being prim, proper, and reserved—as if that could bring her mother back—but the nonviolent protests happening across the South bring out her inner agitator.

  Ivan Friedman has devoted his life to boxing, loving the finesse of a well-delivered punch and the penance of receiving one. His family escaped from Europe before the horrors of WWII, and Ivan decides to help fight injustice in their new country, even if it goes against all his instincts as a fighter.

  When Ivan and Sofie meet, they realize that their pasts are intertwined and—with the sparks that fly between them—perhaps their futures will be too. With everything in their society lined up against them, will Sofie and Ivan be able to beat the odds? Or will their chance at love be destroyed by the tumultuous times they live in?

  CONTENTS

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Dedication

  Dedicated to those brave men and women who stepped onto buses heading toward danger armed with only their hope for a better, more just, America.

  The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.

  -Alice Walker

  Chapter 1

  1961, Virginia

  Sofie usually felt at peace after church—there was comfort in the rote liturgical acts, and in the familiarity of her fellow parishioners. She sorely needed that familiarity after almost two semesters of college at Virginia Union, where she felt more out of place than she ever had. But for some reason, Ms. Simcox’s pained repetition of “Praise Jesus” hadn’t made her giggle, as it had when she was a girl; instead, she nodded along at the soul-weary sound. Reverend Mills’ showmanship and bluster, which often made her suppress an eye roll, resonated with something deep inside of her this time.

  “Change is coming!” he’d shouted while mopping his brow. “If you believe in the power of God Almighty, you know that change is on the way!” A chill had gone through her as those words rang through the small church, echoed by the approving shouts and soft murmurs of the congregation. Sofie didn’t know if Reverend Mills could actually channel the will of the Lord, but his words seemed like an answer to the doubt that had been gnawing at her all semester.

  You went to school to learn, not to fight. Her father’s words echoed in her head. You know better than anyone what fighting gets you.

  Sofie glanced at her father across the basement of the church, where he sat with his brows drawn, shaking his head at something one of his friends was saying. She wished, just once, that she would look over and see him laughing like he used to.

  “They finally let that child out of jail today,” Mrs. Pierce said, pulling Sofie back to the after-church social gathering. “It wasn’t right for them white folk to arrest her, but Patty knows better. The girl can read! Had the nerve to sit right under the ‘Whites Only’ sign, like she was daring them.” The woman ran an age-spotted but manicured hand over her exquisitely coiffed gray hair, and passed a plate of food to one of the visiting pastors working his way down the buffet line. The young man accepted it with a gracious nod and a lingering glance at Sofie, who was just the right age to attract the attentions of promising young men in need of a good, obedient wife. Sofie scooped a spoonful of macaroni and cheese and let it fall to his Styrofoam plate with a moist plop. He fumbled to keep the plate from tipping and moved on.

  “She lost the baby, you know, after they threw her off that bus,” Melba Adams said in a hushed
tone. Sofie almost dropped the next spoonful of food she was distributing. Her usually steady hand was shaking like old Mr. Duffy’s when he needed a nip but couldn’t afford it. Melba shook her head sadly. “It’s sad, but I can’t help but think it’s for the best. The Lord works in mysterious ways, and she was awful young to be having a baby.”

  The women continued gossiping, but Sofie felt the bite of food she’d snuck earlier rising up her throat. Patty’s baby was dead? She couldn’t call the younger girl a friend, exactly, but just last week—in this very room—Sofie had felt that baby move. She’d felt its enthusiastic kick right against her palm. Why was everyone acting like that was okay?

  Sofie felt a pressure building up in her chest, a burning hot anger that surprised her. She didn’t get mad. Everyone knew that, and if everyone knew it, it must be true. Just like everyone knew that a black girl who sat at the front of the bus deserved whatever she got for causing trouble. The belt that cinched Sofie’s favorite blue dress suddenly seemed too tight.

  She took a small, tight breath and tried to calm herself, an act that was second nature to her by now. It was why, when people described her, they used words like nice and quiet and docile as if they spoke of the cows on Harris Withers’ farm instead of a young woman. She should’ve been happy—that was what she’d wanted, right? For everyone to see how good she was? But, if Sofie were honest with herself, she’d felt like none of those things lately. Every time she had to give up her seat on the bus, she considered saying no. Every time a store clerk followed her as if she had the word CRIMINAL stamped on her forehead, she wanted to whirl and demand they leave her be. And every time a group of men, white men usually, shouted crude insults from their car and made her fear the worst, then she wished she could damn them to hell herself without waiting for God’s plodding judgment.