Welcome to Braggsville
Page 13
All the same, you don’t mind me looking, do you now, miss?
I guess not.
Your phone, too.
Okay. I guess.
D, why did you back out?
I wasn’t going to disobey my father. You know how he gets.
Guess he hasn’t gotten it enough lately. So if it wasn’t for your father acting as the voice of God-given reason, you’da been out there, too? Was you scheming to string yourself up like the other one?
Hadn’t reckoned to, Sheriff.
D, what I still cannot understand is how this performative intervention is supposed to work.
Me neither, Sheriff.
So you went out there to California and got your . . . Never mind. You don’t know nothing about it, do you?
Not really, Sheriff. I never really got a good sight on it.
How about y’allses other plans? You said first—no, initial—plans. Tell me about the others.
The second plan was more provocative. It was Louis’s idea to use Charlie as the master. Louis said we should use the Veil of Ignorance, which meant lynching a white person, ideally a white female. Charlie was like, It’s highly possible that might provoke gunfire, and most people . . . How’d he say? . . . would be caught in a double-bind because they’re ignorant about the Veil of Ignorance, so it wouldn’t work. Charlie was like, It is what it is, they should call a spade a spade.
Well, Sir, Louis wanted to fabricate replicas of the discipline instruments he’d read about in Beloved, such as the spiked punishment collar. Louis wanted me to be the master because the irony would deepen the experience, but I couldn’t do that either, Sir. I backed out at the last minute.
I don’t know not all ’bout no complete second and third plans. We had considered some field modifications, but it weren’t like we were plotting a revolution. We ain’t a terrorist cell, Sheriff.
How about explaining that performance of inter-what again? Is that some private school high-jinking? You done any others?
It’s not our idea. We learned about performative interventions in school. It’s the theater of the real. Like holding a magnifying glass to life. It can be critical remixes, too. Someone in our class took a scene from Seinfeld and the dialogue from All in the Family and mixed them to prove that the shows were not much different. All in the Family Seinfeld. I think they call it that. Someone else updated Peter Pan. You know how Peter Pan flies? That’s where we got the harness. [Pause] It was a mash-up of Brit-kid-lit—Peter Pan leads the Hobbits on a revolt in Narnia, but he is captured, and while he’s imprisoned, rumors about his sexuality are spread, like Sir Roger David Casement in the Tower of London, and the Hobbits desert him. They call it The Killer Mockingbird. Another group did a project called Frankenmime, and acted out how Big Pharma creates and feeds addictions. One performance artist lined up ten kids in white suits with red dots on their butts to truck through communion. Sometimes it’s the only way to expose how accepted wisdom reinforces normative middle-class Christian values and sexual mores to our common detriment. According to Judith Butler, even gender is a performance, a real prison for us women. You have to call a spade a spade.
Well, Sir, the concept is not our creation. It’s a form of 4-D art. It’s activism. It’s the way of the future. No one writes letters anymore. Mass marches are inherently exclusive because access is restricted by geography and mobility, thereby fortifying the enduring social asymmetry they seek to undo. Instead, imagine a thousand performative interventions wherever injustice occurs, whenever it occurs. Social justice meets vaudeville. Or the troubadour. It’s the poetry of performance. Me, you, black, white. It’s all an act, Sir. Vershawn Ashanti Young says even race is a performance, Sir.
I didn’t make it up, Sheriff. It’s a theory. It means we’re all made up. There’s other words for it—big ones I don’t recollect right atop this moment—but in the end, it means to say we’re all made up. All of us.
How ’bout that. All made up? I still can’t figure out the sense in any of it. Whose idea was this again?
After Daron told us about it in class, everyone wanted to come here. We all did. We don’t do this in Iowa or California. Reenact, that is.
Well, Sir, the professor was extraordinarily enthusiastic, Sir.
They were talking about reenactments in class, and I mentioned our Patriot Days Festival. All I did was mention it, though. Like to defend the idea. We done reenactments since I don’t know when.
Young miss, are you telling me it was Daron’s idea?
No. He just mentioned it. We immediately thought about YouTubeing live to compare it to Mark Tribe’s Port Huron Project. But Louis had a good point—if we broadcasted it and left it at that, that would be too hipster-cool, just finger pointing.
How ’bout that! It’s the dead boy’s fault, now. That’s convenient.
No. Daron told us about it. He was a cub scout or junior ranger or ROTC or something, didn’t look like it when I first met him, but he was something like that and bragged about knowing knots and how he could make it look real. But it wasn’t supposed to be real. First, we’re not even black, right? We don’t even have real slave outfits. All I had were Uggs, which would make me look like a Flintstone, so I went barefoot. It wasn’t supposed to be real. If Charlie was the master, how could it be real? The irony, right? You see what I mean?
Not sure I do.
Before Daron backed out at Waffle House—
—Waffle House? How about telling me what . . . transpired at Waffle House?
We ate breakfast there. When Daron backed out, I kind of got pissed and decided to go with my original plan. Louis carried our costumes in the duffel bag. We took turns changing behind the tree. Then Louis showed me the shoe polish. Louis asked me to help, made me, really. I didn’t want to, but when he started smearing it on himself and trying to use the inside of the lid for a mirror, I had to do something, otherwise it was going to look like war paint instead of blackface. I don’t know why I agreed. I told him that every college student who uses blackface regrets it. He was so stubborn. A Virgo that acted like a Taurus, he always joked. [pause] I helped him put it on, and then he was like, Loose Chang in the big house! Who’s the realest? Who’s old school, now? [wet laugh] [sigh] He was always making a joke. [pause] By this time it was getting windy and the sun was coming up and I was disgusted already, but it was only a performance, like Frankenmime. Louis put on the wig, and that was it. He told me the night before it might be just the two of us. He sensed it somehow.
Well, Sir, way before the restaurant, I’d already changed my mind, Sir.
Part of me was hoping they’d back out, too. But I never figured anything could go wrong, least not these ways, Sheriff.
Go on, miss.
After he put on the wig and we hooked up the harness . . . What? . . . Okay. It looks like a dog harness because it has two straps that cross your torso and a middle strap that runs along the spine, with a hook at the top, just below the back of the neck.
[long pause]
Go on, miss.
Yes. I tied his hands, but loo— [pause] loose— [pause] not tight.
Go ahead, miss.
When I was seven, I chased my jacks ball into the street and looked up to see cars coming right at me. I froze. One of the drivers had to get out of his car and walk me back to the sidewalk and up to my porch. This was the same, but worse. Worse because I knew they were far enough away and walking slowly enough that I could run. This time I wasn’t frozen, I knew I could run, but I couldn’t leave Louis. Louis started braying and kicking and yelling, Sorry massuh, please don’t whip me.
I yelled for him to shut up because we had to get out of there. I tried to unhook the pulley cable, but I couldn’t. [Long Pause] That’s the only reason I yelled like that. I couldn’t concentrate.
So, you were the first to adjust the pulley?
Yes.
Before anyone else even got up close, you’d already tinkered with the pulley?
Yes.
I don’t remember.
You don’t remember what he said, or you don’t remember if he said anything?
Both.
[Long Pause]
You didn’t have no help with that pulley, getting it up or over or nothing? He didn’t help you hoist his weight?
Maybe. I’m not sure.
[pause]
Go on, young miss.
I tried to run. I felt myself backing away without wanting to, and by the time they were fifty yards away, I was, too. There were just so many of them, and all the guns and everything. And this one guy, the captain maybe, asks what’s going on here. We had practiced what to say. It’s 1865, what do you think is going on here? This negro tried to run away. I couldn’t say the other word. This negro says he don’t want to work for free anymore. So, we got to make a lesson out of him.
—Don’t worry, I can focus. Not thirsty, thanks.—
Loose was supposed to wiggle and yell that he was sorry, and he wasn’t human, and he couldn’t think real good on account of his being black. He wrote that line out, and rehearsed until he was satisfied that it sounded right. I was dressed like a man. We didn’t think women did much of the whipping back then. That might make it too erotic.
But the captain guy was like, What in hell’s tarnation is this get-up here ’bout? And I’m like, It’s 1865, right, dude, wassup? For a moment, I felt like we’d already won, like we were having a dialogue. That’s all we wanted. Discourse. It was all going so well, or seemed to be then. I was thinking about how jealous Daron and Charlie would be to miss it all. The captain was so mad, I could tell he knew what we were doing, and we were doing just the one thing he hoped no one would ever do, the one thing that each and every fucking—excuse me—damn year they probably hoped no one would do. But, having a Civil War reenactment without slaves is like setting a love story during a bubonic plague outbreak and never having anyone get sick. Gabriel García Márquez never wrote a novel called Love in the Time of Cold and Flu Season.
The captain was a short guy, stocky, with a beard so thick I thought it was part of his costume until I saw him here later in uniform. He asks what the heck we’re doing and asks about a permit. I was like, We don’t need a permit in 1865. The men had grouped behind him until they had us surrounded. And one of them yelled, He ain’t even black.
That’s when they all started laughing, even the captain, kind of, and one of them stepped up and took the whip from my hand. I tried to snatch it back, but he was like, If it’s 1865 then a woman got no rights. You could see he was proud to have thought of that.
Miss, I thought you were some distance away?
I was. I think I was. [pause] I’m not sure. There was so much confusion. It felt like they were far away but they were close enough to take the whip from my hand. But before that, when they were just coming over the hill, and were far away, they felt close. [sigh] [PAUSE] After they realized he wasn’t black, they relaxed a little, and the whole thing seemed funny. They were laughing, the captain was laughing, Louis was kicking so I thought he was laughing, and I was laughing, too. It was like a moment in a film where everyone finally connects, and I thought it was okay, our work had been accomplished and we’d been successful. We were having discourse. Then the other one started whipping Louis. I just remember he had a cross tattooed on his hand. By the thumb and index finger. Next they were grabbing Louis’s feet to lift him up, but he just sort of flopped to the side and I turned away. Someone said something about cutting him down and then I heard a terrible thud. I knew they’d dropped him . . . Someone threw up, I could smell it. There were big waffle chunks on the ground. I thought, Oh. Someone else went to Waffle House, too. Maybe they were there when we were. [pause] I didn’t connect it to Louis at the time.
You’re saying that these men helped you? They cut him down, which you couldn’t have managed on your own. Looks to me like they helped you.
Yes. I suppose so.
And that could mean the man with the tattoo as well, couldn’t it?
He had the whip.
How many of them were there?
All of them. It was all of them.
But you said you turned away. So there’s a chance you might not be one hundred percent sure this guy might not have helped when you was turned away?
I guess he could have been.
Maybe the whip didn’t even connect. He could have been cracking it just for y’allses show.
My show?
My show, Sir?
My show, Sheriff?
Yes. Your show. Just a few more questions, young miss. When did you dial 911? At Donner field with the deceased? Or after?
I didn’t.
I’m sorry, I didn’t hear that.
I didn’t.
What happened at the end there, young miss?
I got scared. [Pause] I ran. When they cut him down, and were wrestling with him, I called for him to come on. I heard something going on and thought [long pause] I thought they were arresting him, maybe. I wanted to get to the Davenports’, so we could go bail him out.
You didn’t call 911 and report a rape?
No. [pause] Daron was mistaken.
You didn’t tell him you were raped.
No.
Did you suggest it?
No.
Did you imply it?
No.
Did one of your . . . ah . . . friends take advantage of the confusion?
[long pause]
Miss, I can help you, but only if you tell me the truth.
I wasn’t raped. That’s the truth.
Why’d Daron think it?
I don’t know.
And after you tied your friend’s hands behind his back, and after you hoisted him up in the tree with your homemade noose Charlie-rigged around his neck, these men in uniform helped cut him down?
Yes. I suppose it appears that way.
Chicago, why’d you report a rape?
I didn’t, Sir.
D, why’d you report a rape?
She looked like she’d been in a dogfight. Her clothes were all torn up, with her private wear sticking through. She was panicked.
[Long pause]
Tell me again whose idea was it?
I don’t know.
I don’t remember, Sir.
I should have never mentioned the reenactment. But all I did was mention it. I was only showing spirit.
Young miss, do you know what a spade is?
Of course.
Would you have done this in your hometown?
No.
No, Sir.
[pause] I get it, Sheriff. Cast iron’s cracklin’, Sheriff.
You done anything like this before?
No, sir.
No, Sir.
No way, Sheriff. No way. You’d know.
Mr. Chicago, what do you know about knots?
Nothing, Sir.
How did you decide what rope and pulley to use?
I never saw the rope or pulley, Sir.
And the noose?
Never saw it, Sir. I never handled any of it, Sir.
Not once?
No, Sir. I never saw the rope or harness until the morgue, Sir.
D, we contacted the Changs. They’re on the way. Do we need to contact Mrs. Judith Butler?
No, Sheriff.
D, do you know this Mrs. Judith Butler?
Not personally, Sheriff.
GO AHEAD, MR. CHANG.
When we arrived, I knew Daron wouldn’t be able to do it. I wasn’t mad at him. I understood and I saw it before he did. Charlie and Candice couldn’t see it, but I could. It was his father, the way he was, the way he looked at us. Not mean, not even wary, but measured, the way my elder uncle is. I imagined telling my elder uncle we were going to reenact building the railroad or the burning of Chinatown. Truth was, at that point I would have been disappointed if Daron had showed up because it seemed more important to honor his father’s wishes
than to needle a bunch of pinheaded white dudes with no fashion sense. Besides, there was always the chance they would like it, and where would that leave us? Oppression porn.
I got up early and asked Daron to show me the knots, just in case, I said. He was outside with Charlie. I knew what was happening. I couldn’t blame Charlie. If I were black, I wouldn’t swing any more than I’d dress like a ten-year-old Chinese virgin at a reenactment of Nanking. At sunup, I put on the blackface. I mentioned it to Charlie once. He didn’t like it. Candice liked it even less, and was reluctant to help me put it on. It smelled oily and was cold on your skin. For the first few minutes it keeps feeling like a cool wind is blowing on your face.
The wig? Mine was part of last year’s Disco Ronald McDonald Reagan Halloween costume. I liked Daron’s more. I put on the harness and then a torn shirt over it. We flung the noose over the highest branch and looped it around my neck. The noose rope was pretty thick. The harness was ballistic nylon and we used a cable for that. The cable was thin enough to hide behind the rope, and we threw the cable and a pulley over the lowest branch. She hoisted me up with the pulley, and at the same time, pulled on the rope, so it looked like I was being lifted by the neck.
I always wanted to be taller. It was a beautiful view. From about four feet higher than usual, I could see across the valley to where the Union soldiers were camped and I could see the center of town, which the Confederacy hoped to defend and make the new capital. I read that somewhere. I knew when they were coming. That many people you hear before you see. They came over the ridge with the sun striking those canteens and tin cups, making them glow like scales, like it was a massive, slithering creature. You’re never completely prepared for that. Candice was frantic. I felt kinda bad for her. And for a moment, I was scared.
But as they grew close, I thought, How could they hurt a hanged man? Then the big one snatched the whip from Candice and started cracking it in the air. He laughed and cracked it again. Another one grabbed the whip and did the same thing. We went on like this for several minutes, until another one grabbed it, and not being content to slap the air, started to whip me.
In the struggle to avoid the lashes, I must have snapped the hook, leaving all my weight to be supported by the noose, or maybe the harness caught my neck. What did I think as those troops continued to stream down that hill—their crushed gray hats so similar to the hipster style now popular in San Fran and New York? This would be a hit in the Castro.