The Last Blue

by Isla Morley

  “What?” she whispers.

  “I—”

  “Would you rather go?”

  “It’s very peaceful here,” he whispers through her hair. Her ear tingles. She ignores the fact that his hand is right beside her knee, his fingertips grazing the edge of her skirt. If they can just keep looking straight ahead.

  But he keeps turning to her.

  Isn’t this what he said he loved about his outings with his tutor all those years ago, waiting for the right moment to photograph something special? Why is he so restless? “What’s wrong?” she whispers. The instant she matches his gaze, he grows still. He doesn’t blink. He doesn’t move a muscle, only his breathing changes, becomes more of an effort, like he’s become a bit winded. Beneath that fresh-laundered white shirt, his chest rises and falls.

  Up ahead, a movement pulls their attention from each other to the hollow underneath the log where a furry orange and brown face with two pointy ears peeks out. Slowly, Havens moves his hand to his camera, but as soon as he shifts his weight for a view through his lens, the fox kit pulls its black front paws back into its den. Of the litter, he is the most bold, but he’s not sure what to make of Mr. Havens. Soon enough, though, he crawls out from the den, sniffs around for whether Jubilee’s brought scraps again, and gives his sibling the all-clear by sitting down and scratching himself with his back paw. The second kit doesn’t like to put up with his brother’s one-upmanship very long, and ventures out to nip his brother’s muzzle and provoke a tussle. Jubilee nudges Mr. Havens and points to the den’s entrance, where the timid third littermate watches the antics of his siblings.

  The foxes quickly become accustomed to the noise of Mr. Havens’s camera, and he shoots whenever they pause from chasing each other and pouncing, bushy red tails flicking one way and another. For her part, she mostly watches Mr. Havens, who, it turns out, is not so immersed that he doesn’t beam at her, eyes sparkling. Leaning to the right, he motions for her to move in front of him and look through the viewfinder, and to her delight, there she sees a pocketsize scene worthy of a book of folktales. Suddenly, his hand is around her wrist. In slow motion, he lifts her hand and situates her fingers on shutter, and just then both foxes look their way, and, together, Jubilee and Havens press the shutter.

  She slides from his reach. She tries to act casual. If she appears to be watching the foxes, she is really trying not to pay any attention to his body. He’s not bulky like a man who throws sacks of grain all day, neither is he wiry like some of those mangy layabouts who line up for Socall’s shine, and she tells herself it’s just the novelty of the city, that the hairs on her arms standing straight up have nothing to do with his heat. His arm brushes up against hers, and she thinks she’s nodding at him, agreeing about foxes or picture-taking or whatever it is he’s telling her, but she can’t be sure.

  “I’ve run out of film.” Has he had to repeat himself?

  They’re to go home now. She stands, dusts off the leaves, and steps back to give him room to fold up his stand, and gets herself snarled in a bush. What’s worse is not being able to free her own hair. Levi would sort out her embarrassment with one yank, but Mr. Havens unwinds each strand gently, apologizing for even the slightest tug.

  “You have beautiful hair,” he says of her bird’s nest.

  On the way back, Mr. Havens is lively, thanking her and asking her everything she knows about the family of foxes and whether they can return so he might have a chance to photograph the mother, and she decides that she’s been imagining things, until his hand rests on the small of her back, letting her go first where the trail narrows. She points to a row of mushrooms growing like doorknobs at the foot of a tree so he won’t keep staring at the back of her, and as soon as the path widens again, she hangs back and lets him walk ahead. Though he’s limping worse, he won’t let her carry his stand.

  She catches herself stepping in every one of his footprints.

  Coming out of the woods, they look down at the farm and see Levi has just returned. He puts the saddle away and turns Lass out in the pasture, before heading for the back door. Even from this distance he looks beat.

  “It’s not easy to give up someone you care about,” says Mr. Havens.

  A kindness to her brother is a kindness to her. “You’ve had to do that?”

  He lets out a heavy sigh. “Once, a long time ago.” He tells her about his tutor’s daughter, Virginia, how she would often come for walks with them, until she turned seventeen and decided it was time to ask him on a date. “Except for my cousins, I’d never been around girls, so I wasn’t at all sure of myself, but she was full of confidence.”

  Before she has time to think better of it, the question is out. “Did you take pictures of her?”

  He nods.

  “I’m sure she was very pretty.”

  Again, he nods. “She had strong opinions and she could be moody, and at the time, I thought that made her interesting to photograph.”

  Jubilee regrets bringing up the subject. She resolves not to say another word.

  “We were nineteen when we married, and neither of us knew what we were getting into,” he says, stopping before the path winds down to the barn. “And then we discovered we weren’t ever going to have children. A complication from mumps, it turns out; not exactly the news a husband wants to give his young wife when she’s got her heart set on being a mother.”

  “That’s why you aren’t together anymore?”

  He won’t let himself look sad. “I hear she’s happy. She’s married to a history teacher, and they have three boys.” They start down the path. A lightness returns to his tone when he says, “What about you? Have you broken any hearts?” and it seems only fair that she should volunteer a private matter.

  “There was a boy once.”

  “Aha!”

  She thought back to two summers ago, when Tick Hickman would meet her in the quiet glade with flowers in his hand; she’d longed so much to be loved it hardly mattered who it was that came, only that someone was willing to show affection, and Tick had none of the roughness or meanness of other town boys, not till the end, at any rate. “It wasn’t anything like you hear in ballads, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  “It never ends well for the lovers in ballads, does it?” he jests.

  “Why does one of them always have to die?”

  “Where’s the ballad where she gets tired of his snoring and him leaving his stuff all over the place so she decides never to cook his favorite meal again, just Brussel sprouts and boiled eggs every night?”

  Jubilee laughs. “And where’s the ballad where he stops noticing her and makes up songs about his dog all day?”

  Softly, he says, “He’d never stop noticing her.”

  They’re at the barn door now and Mr. Havens rests his stand against the wall. Neither of them speaks. She raises her shoulders. “Well, I’ll let you—”

  “If you have any other special places, I’d love to see them.”

  “I could show you something in the morning. I don’t know that you’d like to photograph it, though—it’s pretty spooky.”

  He mock-shivers. “It’s a date!” he says. “A deal.” He reaches toward her and she feels like that shy little fox that knows only how to watch or retreat. “Hold still.” She feels his fingers in her hair, then he hands her a twig and acts as if he can’t see her going ten shades darker.

  * * *

  “Yoo-hoo!” Socall calls from the other side of the yard. She’s come for dinner. Carrying a pie in one hand and a brown jug in the other, she meets Jubilee and Mr. Havens at the kitchen door. She hands Mr. Havens the pie. “How you doing, Snakebite?”

  “Almost back to normal, thanks to Jubilee.” Stammering, he’s quick to add, “And Mrs. Buford. Everyone, actually. Everyone’s been so kind.”

  “Is that right?” Socall raises an eyebrow at Jubilee and goes inside, where Mr. Massey and Pa are deep in conversation and Levi is letting Willow-May wrestle him.

 
; Mama greets Socall by saying, “I told you not to bring any more liquor,” to which Socall replies, “I’ll quit bringing it the day you quit being such a sourpuss.”

  Socall pours Grandma a glass of shine, then looks down her nose at Mr. Massey. “Heard you’ve been making the rounds in town again.”

  Pa answers for Mr. Massey, boasting that his cellar is about to become a picture studio, and Socall acts like she’s got seeds stuck between her teeth.

  “Pictures of what? Don’t tell me your ugly mug, Delbert.”

  While Pa and Socall trade banter, Mr. Havens pulls Mr. Massey to one side, and whatever exchanges between them leaves neither looking too pleased with the other, but soon Mama has us all gather at the table and Willow-May reminds everyone about Socall’s frolic on Friday, an invitation that seems to perk up Mr. Havens. Mr. Massey, though, says, “I expect we’ll be gone by then.”

  Nobody looks as sorry as Pa. “Why the hurry?”

  Mr. Massey first glances at Mr. Havens before saying something about deadlines.

  All through supper, Pa talks about the land, how it once produced hemp to make rope for sailing ships, but when steamboats came along, he decided to farm tobacco. Two glasses of Socall’s shine and he lays out a full history of transporting produce on wagon trails first, then railway, then on the new highway built a few years back. Every time Jubilee checks, Mr. Havens’s eyes are fixed on her.

  Mr. Massey says highways have led country people, young especially, to urban areas. “Have you given any thought to moving?”

  “Blues moving to a city is Pa’s worst nightmare.”

  “No, not the worst.” Pa’s low tone is meant to caution Levi not to test his patience.

  “Cities do offer a degree of protection you might not get from a town as remote as Chance,” says Mr. Massey.

  Levi scoffs. “In a city, I’d blend right in, wouldn’t I?”

  “I’m not saying you wouldn’t draw attention,” and here’s where Mr. Massey pauses and takes stock of Mr. Havens, who’s staring back with knit brows. “But nobody could hurt you or threaten you or prevent you from exercising your rights, at least not without running afoul of the law and getting himself hauled into court.”

  “It takes some nerve to lecture a man on his rights as if he don’t already know them,” Socall says. Pa motions for her to settle down, but she’s on a roll. “There’re two sets of law books in this country. One set for those with money and influence and the right color skin, and another for everyone else.” She lifts her glass, a finger cocked at Mr. Massey. “Don’t tell me it’s different up north.”

  Mr. Massey wipes the corner of his mouth, weighing whether or not to take her on. “You’re right. But when the blindfold slips from Lady Justice, is it enough to notice it, or does someone have to report it?”

  “Oh lord, tell me you’re not suggesting what I think you are.” Socall turns to Pa. “The man is going to write about blue.”

  Pa is busy correcting her when Mr. Massey says, “There are terrible misconceptions about your family, sir, and I don’t need to tell you how dangerous misconceptions can be.”

  Mama leaves the table because she doesn’t like skin talk. Wild-running-at-the-mouth talk, she calls it. To her, talk about blue is never just talk, there’s always something to follow it—fists sometimes, bruises, hurt for sure.

  “You’ve likely heard that my son’s the instigator, but the troubles go back to when my mother was young, and she never did put a foot wrong.”

  “Unless you count catching the eye of a Right-colored,” counters Levi.

  “Not just any Right-colored,” Socall adds.

  Pa explains that before Boyd Gault became mayor, long before he became Urnamy’s father, he took a shining to Opal and set out a-courting her, until his own father caught wind of it. “Boyd’s father was the one who’d decided blue would bring misfortune or sickness or death to anyone who got too familiar with it.”

  “What happened?” asks Mr. Massey.

  Pa rakes his fingers down his cheek and pinches his lips together and then sighs the way a person does before giving in to a dare. It’s a partial account, to be sure, but that Pa even tells some of the story doesn’t seem natural. It’s not the liquor; it’s being friends again with Right-coloreds. It’s Mr. Massey listening and nodding and acting like everyone’s one-colored.

  “All manner of pressures were brought to bear and that’s when Blues were told not to mix with people from town.”

  “Don’t tell me they cited laws prohibiting mixed marriages,” Mr. Massey guesses correctly. “That’s absurd.”

  “You have any idea what would happen to a Negro if he even entertained the idea of feeling affection for a white woman? He wouldn’t make it to the courtroom, I’ll tell you that much, and for Blues, it’d be no different.”

  “Dictating who a person can and cannot love is tyranny!” You’d think Mr. Massey’s been the one given restrictions on who he can marry.

  “So we give in to pressure, and live like cowards, which is worse than tyranny,” Levi chimes in.

  Pa turns to him. “Don’t think I wasn’t a young man full of starch once, but live long as I have, and you’ll realize it takes less courage to get even than it does to get by.”

  “Intimidation, threats, acts of violence—these don’t stop on their own.” Mr. Massey says he has a proposal for Pa. “Let me do a story about the trials of your family, the history of the Bufords, along with the Prices and the Ellises, tracing the origins of blue. I’ll research case histories of other families that were stigmatized for similar reasons, and consult with medical experts—”

  “You think people around here are going to listen to you tell them how wonderful Blues are?” interrupts Socall.

  “I’m not suggesting my article will end years of deep-seated prejudice overnight, but it will do two things—those who are the instigators will be put on notice, and those who’ve looked the other way or been on the fence or maybe even too afraid to speak up will have information and facts instead of superstition.”

  Socall turns to Mr. Havens. “Does your friend here live on the moon?”

  “You’re overlooking another possibility,” says Pa. “It could make everything worse.”

  “Worse how exactly?” counters Levi.

  Jubilee wants the arguing to stop. “Who else is going to your frolic, Socall?” Nobody minds her except Mr. Havens.

  Mr. Massey suggests another reason for his article. “What if someone somewhere reads the story who knows how to help on the medical side of things, maybe knows of a treatment?”

  “Oh lord, the man’s talking about cures now.” Socall pours herself more shine. “Would someone please enlighten him.”

  If Pa was starting to be swayed, he swings back the other way. “Don’t think we haven’t tried all kinds of cures. My poor mother was about sucked dry by leeches.”

  Why must there now be all this attention on what’s wrong with blue? Jubilee leaves the table with her plate while Pa explains that one doctor ordered Blues to be scrubbed with salt, another for them to be washed with ammonia, and yet another that they be startled on a regular basis—as though by then they weren’t already scared witless. Dipped, scraped, peeled, boiled, and peppered—that’s what’s been done to Blues, thanks to doctors.

  “A lot has changed in the medical field in the last thirty years,” Mr. Massey persists.

  Few subjects are as tiresome to Jubilee as cures. She puts water on to boil for the dishes. When Mama was laboring with Levi, Socall had to call Dr. Eckles to get Levi turned around, but no sooner was he born than Dr. Eckles began paddling his bottom something fierce to get him to take his first breath and quit being so goshdarn blue until Socall told him that Levi was breathing just fine. “God have mercy, I’ve delivered a ghost” were the doctor’s words. What kind of cure is there for a diagnosis like that? Because of that man’s words, people acted like they had some kind of license—license to throw stones at Blues to see if they’
d pass through, license to put their hands around their necks to see if Blues needed air like everyone else, license to force them to keep to themselves, to cover themselves so nobody else had to look at their color. Force them not to speak, not to touch anyone, and, above all, not to go getting any notions to love a person.

  Pa’s giving his theory about blue, likening it to sheep, that among white ones will occasionally come a black one, which leads to more discussion about how a story can change the destiny of blue. There are twice as many opinions than there are people at the table.

  All of a sudden, Mr. Havens is beside her. Gently, he removes the dishrag from her hand, letting his fingers slip between hers. “Let me.”

  She takes a towel, and chances a look at him. He is smiling at nothing in particular.

  “Something amuses you?”

  “Just thinking about those foxes.”

  She passes him plates and twice their hands touch in the soapy water, once when she’s sure his thumb hooked her little finger deliberately.

  Softly, he hums. She looks at him.

  “I’m working on a ballad,” he says. He shows a great deal of interest in the soiled plate.

  Heat’s turned her nails dark gray, which means her cheeks must be a deep violet by now, her lips dark blue. Strong feelings can make her look ten-days dead, and letting him see her go from twilight to midnight is like having her skirt ride up and not smoothing it down. She ought to excuse herself. Instead, she hands him back a plate that’s already been washed and points to where food is still stuck, and he scrubs it and gives it back for drying, and when he comes to the end of all the dishes, he puts the stack back in the water and washes them all over again. “I didn’t do a proper job,” he says, humming again.

  When it comes time for pie, he is quick to help Mama clear the table, and he volunteers to serve, insisting Jubilee sit so he can bring her the first slice. Rather than take the only vacant chair on the other side of the table, he eats his pie standing beside her.