“Not enough, and nothing I can count on. God, Charlie. You come in and hand me grimy twenty-dollar bills like you’ve been panhandling.”
He stood up. “And you take them. I’ve got rights.”
“I don’t want to argue with you.”
“I need to take care of the kids.” He paced around in a tiny circle, almost stepping on himself.
“I’ve made arrangements with a parent in the neighborhood to keep the kids after school. I’ve been considering it—”
“Ever since Bry—”
“Don’t go there,” she snapped. “We’re separated. And he’s going to leave his wife.”
“That is so daytime TV.”
“Don’t.”
“I have a right to see the kids. We have joint custody, if you hadn’t noticed.”
“You gave up that right when you walked out. Look, Charlie. You can see the kids on weekends. Take them to a movie or the park. The weather’s getting nicer. No way are they staying in that dungeon of yours, though. And you can’t come here, snooping around.”
“Fine!” he yelled. “Don’t take them up to Varmintville, either, then! That’s poison they feed them up there. ‘Nigger’ this and ‘Nigger’ that.”
“It doesn’t even come up when you’re not around.”
“Oh, so I make everything worse.”
“Finally you get it.”
“You’re not going to get custody,” he said.
“You know how it works.”
He did. She had motherhood, income, and house. Three strikes and he was out. And yet …
“There’s the matter of adultery,” he pointed out.
“It doesn’t matter what you say. You got kicked out for domestic violence and exposing the kids to porn. You’re on record with the police as mentally unstable. You really want to take me on?”
“None of that’s true, and once upon a time, the story was that I walked out.”
“Well, you said you got kicked out. I’m just going by what you’ve been saying.”
“Sounds better for you, doesn’t it? So you decided you’d do what you had to do, and that’s that.”
“Pretty much. I’ve got to think of the kids. I may move to North Carolina if I get a promotion.”
“You must really hate me.”
“You must really hate me, running off in the night and coming back to constantly mock me.”
“First I left, then you kicked me out, now I’m back to leaving. Would you please make up your mind?”
“I don’t have time for this. Face it, Charlie, it’s over. Give it up. Writing’s not working for you. Get a real job. Get a life.”
There was so much to say. He hung up on her.
So there it was. The marriage was over and he was locked out. Getting her to beg him to return hadn’t worked out so well, after all. She got to have sex and he didn’t. She got to keep the kids and he didn’t. She got child support and he didn’t. No fair.
His nerves were too jangled to work on the book, so Charlie spent the rest of the day doing odd jobs for regular customers. (Despite his agreement to be Kathleen’s full-time caretaker, he still snuck in a considerable amount of moonlighting.) He couldn’t keep his mind off the kids, however. At 2:00 p.m., he had to resist the urge to drive to Gresham Elementary. Instead, he went to Home Depot and bought mulch and fertilizer for Mrs. Williford’s flowerbed.
That night, Beck called. Ben spoke to him, too. They told him about their new playmates and said they missed him. “Mommy said you could see us on weekends,” Beck said. “Are you in jail?”
“No,” Charlie said, though he wasn’t so sure this was true. After he hung up, he wept quietly, then quit when he remembered one of his mother’s favorite sayings: “Tears are weakness leaving the body.” The sort of thing one says after a spouse jumps off a bridge.
* * *
The next morning, Charlie was in his office when his cellphone rang. He eagerly answered, hoping he’d land a job that would let him use his hands and keep his mind from wandering. “Hello, Charlie here.”
“Joshua Furst at Fortress. We want to publish Ethnic Cleansing. Is it still available?”
“Do what?” Charlie was blown away. “Flight from Forsyth? Great. What’d you just say? Yes!” He took a step forward and jumped for joy, coming down so hard the house shook. “Oh. By the way, I now have full rights to the manuscript as coauthor. I can send you the contract I signed with Dr. Talton’s daughter, who has power of attorney. Uh, so what are you offering?”
“We’re still developing the offer.” There was an awkward pause before the editor continued. “It’s a worthwhile book. But we don’t see it as a blockbuster.”
“There were twenty thousand marchers in Forsyth County that day.”
“Yes, we want the book out for the anniversary of the march next year, to give it a publicity boost. We need a clean manuscript by the end of September at the latest, and that’s pushing it. Can you give us that?”
“Sure. Fifty grand would be a good offer,” Charlie suggested.
“We’ll see.”
After the call, Charlie stared at the phone, wondering if he should get an agent or send the book to another publisher. After so many years of failure, this was a nice dilemma to have. But he needed quick money, so Furst things first. He drummed the desk with his fingers. A narrow shaft of sunlight cut through the window and behind the blind to warm his hand. This almost—
Wait. It did! Of course! This was all part of the plan. He felt the burden on his heart lighten. Life seemed bearable. Caring for the kids every day was a barrier to success, and it had been lifted. Now he could meet the deadline. Yes, he was better off locked out of Thornbriar, forbidden from that house of pain. He went into the kitchen and told Kathleen what had just happened.
“That’s wonderful, Gary!” she exclaimed.
He didn’t correct her or mention that Angela had given away her rights to the book. Why spoil a celebration?
They celebrated with tea. After a couple of heavily sugared cups, Kathleen was puttering happily around the house, doing tasks Angela had assigned to Charlie. Meanwhile, he was busy daydreaming about shooting to the top of the bestseller list.
* * *
Shortly after noon on May 15, a mailman in Bermuda shorts and long dark socks folded a manila envelope from Fortress Publishing into the black mailbox by the door at 432 Bayard Terrace. In it were two copies of a contract that would pay Charles T. Sherman a $20,000 advance—roughly a dollar for each 1987 marcher. (Charlie wished he’d told Furst there had been 25,000.) His deadline for completing the book was September 30, and Fortress planned to put it in bookstores on MLK Day.
Charlie signed the contracts with a flourish. After he mailed the documents at the post office, he crossed the alley to the coffeehouse and told Jean about his accomplishment. She seemed almost as happy as he was. They shared a toast, he with a double espresso, she with a bottle of spring water. Now that he was successful, Charlie thought that maybe she was attainable after all. But he was afraid of losing his only friend. Who would he celebrate with, then? After downing his drink, Charlie bid adieu.
He walked out into the sunshine, thinking about his kids, wondering how much he’d spend on attorney’s fees to win them back. When he returned to Bayard Terrace, he told Kathleen, “I signed the contracts on Thurwood’s book and mailed them.”
“That’s wonderful! Do I owe you any money?”
“No. It’s between the publisher and me now.”
She patted his arm and he saw adoration in her eyes. “Thank you, Charles.”
“You’re welcome, Kathleen.”
* * *
Summer brought a thaw and more mixed signals from Susan. When the school term ended, Susan agreed to let Beck and Ben attend YMCA day camp, if Charlie paid for it. Every weekday morning, Susan dropped off the kids and every afternoon, Charlie picked them up. He brought them to Thornbriar after Susan got home, but rarely stayed more than a few minutes.
> On June 26, the Shermans celebrated Ben’s birthday together with a trip to White Water amusement park. Charlie had another reason to rejoice. He’d just received $10,000—the first portion of his author’s advance. He’d given half that amount to Susan for child support, and she grew increasingly friendly throughout the day—laughing, joking, and even wiggling a little in her black tank suit. She complimented him on his appearance. Months of steady workouts and eating light had produced a salutary effect. He’d lost thirty pounds. While they were sitting on lounge chairs by the wave pool, she reached over and rubbed sun block on his heavily muscled, hairless chest. “After we get back to Thornbriar, we’re having cake,” she said. “Maybe you could stay and lick the icing.”
She blushed and looked away, then fumbled in her canvas beach bag, seeking something she couldn’t find. Even though Susan had told him she was no longer seeing Bryan Speeler, Charlie suspected some kind of feminine trickery. If he tried to kick the football, she might pull it away at the last instant. Besides, he’d been doing so well, succeeding as a writer despite her, not because of her, that he had another reason to be wary. Like a boxer who believes sex will make him soft, he reasoned that going back to her would make him weak just when he needed to be strong. And when he was successful, he would have … options.
Besides, she hadn’t apologized. Or begged him to return.
That evening, they had cake at Thornbriar. Her coy invitation was not repeated, and Charlie left before the children went to bed, pausing in the driveway to shuffle his feet and shadow-box. A contenduh. That’s what he was.
* * *
Charlie began work on the epilogue to Flight from Forsyth and scheduled an interview with Redeemer Wilson, which ended up costing $300 in the form of a contribution to Wilson’s Holy Way House and Hunger Palace Foundation. Charlie met Redeemer at Thelma’s Soul Food Kitchen near the Inman Park MARTA station for lunch on a hot July day. The writer wore his shipping uniform; the civil rights movement’s working-class hero showed up in trademark overalls and blue work shirt, his salt-and-pepper hair in a mini-Afro. When the ancient warhorse walked into the restaurant, people rose to greet him, hugging, and kissing Redeemer as he playfully struggled to make his way to a back booth.
They ordered lunch, which was on the house for Redeemer. For two hours—and through constant interruptions from old friends, well-wishers, and admirers—the barrel-chested World War II veteran talked in a hoarse voice about fighting Germans, coming home and getting beaten for drinking out of the wrong water fountain (“It was a beating I had to take,” he said), leading marches in his hometown, and later joining forces with the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.
“I was the shock trooper. I’d go into these racist towns and wear ’em down. After a week of me, the town fathers were ready to negotiate,” he said with a throaty laugh. “I got shot at four times, hit with clubs, bats, and bottles, beaten with fists fairly regularly, and arrested one-hundred-and-eighty-nine times,” he boasted. “They needed someone to do that, and I was their man. Then they killed the dream in Memphis.” Sadness etched Redeemer’s weary face as he talked about “the wilderness,” those years after King’s death, but his eyes lit up when Charlie talked about Thurwood’s book.
“Oh, yes, I knew Doc Talton well. I was lookin’ for him for that second march in 1987. Had a place for him right up front. He was walking the walk back in the sixties, you know. There were some days we’d have an event, and he was the only white man there. The only one.” Redeemer let that sink in. “Didn’t find out he’d passed until somebody called me the next day about his obituary. So sad.”
The old lion shook his head. “He told me about the book, but I figured it died with him. Now here comes you, and got him a publisher. So, I guess you want to know about the marches up in Forsyth. First time, it was just a local thing with Dan Greene from Gainesville. The Klan and their friends ran us out of town. Nearly killed us. Well, I didn’t go through what I went through to take that as an answer. So we came back twenty-five thousand strong. It was a sight to behold, a line miles long on a nasty winter’s day. We told the world that you can’t just hide yourself away and say you got your own laws to keep people out, no sir. Nothing like it since. Think of it, man! This was 1987, a generation after Selma. All those white folks in Forsyth told reporters, ‘I didn’t do nothing wrong to nobody, so I don’t understand what they protesting about.’ Well, if they didn’t do nothing, what exactly did they do?”
“I’ve heard that, too,” Charlie said. “They never did much for anybody, either, as far as I can tell.”
“Exactly!” Redeemer said, thumping the table. “Twenty years passed since then, and it’s no different now, is it?”
After the interview, Charlie took a photo of the grizzled old civil rights hero and they parted with a hug, new best friends. Charlie promised to come down and work at the Hunger Palace, Redeemer’s soup kitchen on Memorial Drive in Atlanta. “On any day but Christmas or Thanksgiving,” Redeemer admonished. “That’s when all the fakers come down. We need for you to be real, Brother. Especially these days. You gotta be the man who’s down there at six on a Monday mornin’, knowin’ what to do and doin’ it. Just remember this,” he said, peering intently into Charlie’s eyes. “It’s not just what they did that matters. What you do matters more. And like I always tell my marchers: ‘Look up when you walk.’”
* * *
The final stretch: In mid-September, Charlie was polishing Flight’s next-to-last chapter. Fueled by coffee and Gatorade, he worked fourteen hours a day while watching over Kathleen haphazardly, ensuring her cooperation by telling her he’d quit editing her beloved Thurwood’s book if she failed to take even one of her meds. She was fine most of the time, and they conspired to keep Angela in the dark about the true nature of their relationship, which boiled down to Kathleen helping Charlie help Thurwood get published. She was quite proud of the fact that they’d found a way to flip that nasty old “publish or perish” rule on its head. Charlie, being a contrary sort, was rather pleased about it, too.
He took his breaks and slipped out for coffee during Kathleen’s naps. On one of these afternoons, he was sitting by the window at Bay Street Coffeehouse when an extraordinary woman walked in. He smelled her before he saw her. Her cologne—sharp and musky, almost industrial, a chemical compound designed to break the laws of nature, yet still entice—distracted him from the Georgia governor’s 1913 message to the legislature. The woman’s dark, glossy hair was a sophisticated pageboy, and she wore a sleeveless white-trimmed beige dress. She took off her round-rimmed sunglasses at the counter, grabbed Jean’s shoulders, and kissed her lightly on the lips. Charlie felt a pang of jealousy for whatever they had going.
The woman slipped four paper cups of coffee into a caddy and turned to look at Charlie, who happened to be staring at her. She winked and slipped on her sunglasses, then eased out the door with the subtlest of sashays. Charlie was smitten. And not in a bad way.
Entranced, he ventured to the window and watched her walk down the street and climb into the passenger seat of a silver Porsche Carrera. He turned toward Jean, who leered at him and said, “I know what Writer-Boy wants for Christmas.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said as he approached the counter. “So, uh … who is she?”
“As far as you’re concerned, that’s Danger Girl,” Jean said in a hushed tone as she toweled off a white cup. “I told her about you, and she thinks you’re interesting. Her name is Dana Colescu. She owns a Midtown art gallery. Knows all the right people.”
“Too bad for me. I have never been one of the right people.”
“That may change, if your book’s a bestseller.” She poked him in the chest. “So get to work, you.”
* * *
Charlie completed the manuscript on Wednesday, September 26, a few days before it was due. (If he hadn’t already believed in miracles, getting the book done on time certainly would have changed his mind.) As the bibliography
printed out, he leaned back in the swivel chair and smiled at Talton’s photo on the wall. Thurwood smiled back. The younger man had done well, and the dead guy knew it. Charlie wrote a cover letter, then signed it and put it in a box with the manuscript and a CD containing the book’s text.
When he came out of the study, Kathleen was napping. He decided not to disturb her, even though she’d be overjoyed to hear the news. Anyway, this was his moment.
After paying for priority delivery, he emerged triumphantly from the post office and stared into the bright sunshine like a man exiting a cave. Yes, it was over. Finally. Night had been conquered; the long storm was over. Perhaps now the contract would stop oozing blood. Or did the manuscript have to make it to New York? Be published? Arrive in stores? Win the Pulitzer? When exactly is a writer finished? He’d never come close enough to know.
And what next? Work as a handyman, to take his mind off his mind? Maybe he’d get a regular job and look for a loft. With Susan’s help securing a loan—was it too much to ask?—and the second $10,000 check, he might be able to buy a fixer-upper. Would Susan resent his attempt to solidify their separation? She’d been acting like a woman scorned since that day at White Water. Well, she hadn’t asked him back, and he had to go somewhere, because his days in the dungeon had come to an end now that his mission was accomplished.
In any case, he should celebrate. A sudden chill wind whipped through his shirt as he crossed the alley to the coffeehouse. Jean, alone in the shop, looked up from the magazine she was reading when he walked in. Pat Metheny was playing jazz guitar over the sound system. The triumphant coauthor gave her a weary smile. She glanced outside. “Getting cloudy. Sometimes I think you bring the rain.”
He looked over his shoulder. Where had those clouds come from? “I finished.”
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