“And who might you be?” Mother’s “charitable soul” disappeared like the holy ghost in a whorehouse, and I knew I’d better find that horsewhip and hide it good.
Harry kept a cool head and asked if he could have permission to talk to me. I didn’t hear the whole conversation, but my heart was beating around inside my chest like the time that sick raccoon got stuck under the house and went wild. I didn’t know if I wanted to cry from joy or if I wanted to die from it so I wouldn’t have to face Mother.
A few minutes later, she called my name with some level of politeness and let me talk to Harry on the front porch. She left the door open, and I knew she must be listening by the screen, but I didn’t care. He told me that he was supposed to leave town in the morning, but that he couldn’t stop thinking about me. It was the first time I’d heard a boy say out loud that he was sweet on me.
He touched my hand ever so lightly, and it made my heart stop feeling wild, and instead, it felt like it was melting, filling my chest with a warm, bubbly, glowing liquid like carbonite sunshine. I wanted that scrumptious feeling to last forever. But Mother cleared her throat inside the house, and Daddy’s snore slipped out from one of the open windows, and I knew that burst of light was just the clouds parting momentarily on a cold, stormy day.
Harry asked if I could come to the fair again that night. I knew it was impossible and I said so, taking my hand away from his. He all but begged me, saying he hadn’t slept or eaten since meeting me.
“Meet me by the cotton candy at ten, won’t ya? Just to say goodbye,” he begged, whispering so softly I was sure Mother couldn’t hear.
“I can’t,” I said again, turning away so he couldn’t see that I had tears in my eyes. I wanted to go. I wanted it more than air. But even though there were no bars or chains, I was in as much of a prison as Al Capone.
Mother stepped onto the porch, grim and silent in her gray dress and with clasped hands. Harry, giving me one last pleading look, said his farewells, placed the cap he’d been clutching in his nervous grip back on his head, and took off down the road that led to Main Street.
I wanted to run after him and beg him to take me with him and his rodeo. I knew how to work and clean, and I’d even muck stalls like a farmhand. Mother put a firm hand on my forearm like she could read my thoughts.
“Did you let that boy touch you?” she asked, as she watched him turn the corner out of sight. I thought about him saving me from the river, holding me in his arms, keeping me warm, grazing my hand on the porch—
“No, ma’am” was the only answer I could possibly give. She whipped me around in front of her, twisting my arm till it felt like it might snap.
“If you ever speak to that . . . cowpuncher . . . again, I will . . .”
“Whip me?” I said with just as much sass as when I’d shown up Lucy at the gap. Mother’s eyes widened. I winced as she dug her nails into my skin till I wanted to cry, but I didn’t look away. She dropped my arm. I rubbed it, wondering how long it would be till she broke something inside of me that she couldn’t hide.
Or shot her? Hannah pondered. Mother or Harry—those were her two suspects. Her father was too ill. Her sister loved her. Not enough mention of the stepsister. As far as Hannah could see, it was one of the two.
“No. I’ll send you to the Convent of the Good Shepherd.”
The force of that threat was harsher than any whupping. We’d all seen beautiful, vibrant Francine May, a cheerleader and the head of every social club in the senior high, be sent away to the home for wayward girls last spring and come back a frail, pious, broken thing who could barely hold a steady hand to sew a straight line, much less find a man to marry. To be sent away, just like my brother and my little sister. To leave Myrtle all alone. Leave Daddy all sick and eating whatever it was his wife put in his food.
I held my rebellious tongue and followed Mother’s every instruction, pretending that my arm didn’t ache. I willingly walked back inside my prison cell. I’d had my dose of sunshine. I thought it could keep me warm enough.
But then Harry Westbrook left the rodeo and moved in with some friends down the street. He’d walk past my house every day on his way to and from work at the railroad station. He’d smile and say hello. And soon, there were few places I could go in town without hearing him whistling some tune, coming down the street in the opposite direction.
I’d heard the preacher talk about temptation my whole life, but I never really understood until then. It doesn’t look like a fast-talking snake or some fancy fruit seduction. No—temptation looks a lot like happiness, and I wanted it more than just about anything in this world, and I thought Harry Westbrook wanted to give it to me. But Mother was determined to stop that from happening—no matter the cost.
The bell on the door to the convenience store rang, bringing Hannah back to the present. A young woman carrying a baby on her hip paid for her gas with some crisp bills as the little boy innocently grabbed for the rack of lighters just out of reach.
Temptation, Hannah thought ruefully, completely understanding Evelyn’s internal conflict.
She checked her watch. It had been longer than she’d thought. Rather than going through more of her research, it was probably best to pack up her belongings. If the car service wasn’t there to pick her up in the next ten minutes or so, she’d need to beg Frank to make another call.
“Well, there you are,” said a familiar voice coming from a tall figure casting a long shadow over her spot at the table. She scrunched her eyelids and held back a curse word. Of course Mamaw wouldn’t call a stranger to come retrieve her stranded granddaughter. She’d call someone she knew and trusted and likely had on speed dial.
“Hello, Guy,” Hannah said without looking up, the embarrassment from their first meeting resurfacing. She didn’t need to see him. His accent would’ve been enough, but his outfit was nearly identical to the one he’d been wearing the first time they met. His somewhat dressy gray shoes with matching laces, the straight-leg, medium-blue jeans and tan belt with an almost-too-tight white T-shirt and an unbuttoned collared shirt with rolled-up sleeves all made it look like he’d picked his outfit out of a “hot handyman” catalog somewhere. For some reason, Mamaw seemed determined to make Guy her granddaughter’s knight in shining armor. With an excruciatingly meddling mother, Hannah half wondered if it was a matchmaking attempt, but Mamaw had never seemed the type to meddle.
“Your grandmother—”
“I know. Mamaw sent you.” Hannah cut him off, not meaning to be rude, but at the same time not daring to make eye contact. Why Guy Franklin was destined to be a witness to all the most embarrassing moments in her recent life, Hannah had no idea.
“Yes, ma’am. Said you’d had some car troubles. Asked if I’d give you a ride home. I said I’d be honored to help as long as you didn’t run away this time. You don’t have a bike here, do you?” he asked, acting like he was searching the inside of the market for a wayward bicycle.
Hannah ignored his teasing and stood up with her hands full of empty snack wrappers. “I asked her to get an Uber.” She tossed the garbage and chugged the last bit of her lukewarm coffee without gagging.
“Oh, gracious, an Uber? That’s what she was sayin’? Well, guess you’ll have to settle for the next best thing, huh?” He smiled big, like the eight-year-old Cub Scout who won the pinewood derby she covered a few weeks ago.
She’d felt smart and vivacious when she was standing in the shadows bantering with Senator Peter Dawson, but here in the Gas Depot with Guy Franklin, Hannah felt like a bumbling idiot. But why? Peter was a well-traveled, experienced politician with a deadly wit. Shouldn’t he be more intimidating than the overly polite carpenter from a small Mississippi town? She had no idea what it was about Guy that made her feel so out of sorts. He looked at her like he knew her, like he had a story in his head about little Hannah Williamson and he found it funny. It left her feeling vulnerable, like a snail without a shell, far too easy to dissolve with a dash of salt.
She threw her empty-enough coffee cup in the garbage and then retrieved her full bag from the chair. Her breath was stale, and she didn’t dare look at her reflection in the window, especially in contrast with the ruggedly handsome and just-put-together-enough Guy.
“Ready,” she said, limiting the number of words she spoke.
“All right, then. Let’s get this show on the road. Thank you, Frank!” Guy waved at the surly man behind the counter.
“Have a good night,” Frank said and waved back like they were old friends. Was this man pals with everyone in Mississippi?
“Do you know him?” Hannah asked, stumbling after Guy as they left through the swinging front door of the convenience mart.
“Just about everybody around here knows old Frank. His family has run this place since the first car drove down 51.” Guy dug in his pocket for his keys.
“Well, good ole Frank looked at me like I was trying to rob the place.” Hannah followed him through the brightly lit parking lot of the gas station, looking for his truck but only spotting a compact car parked under a yellow streetlight.
“He doesn’t always take to strangers well. But Frank’s come a long way. Back when he was just a kid, this used to be a whites-only establishment. Let’s just say that Frank’s family was . . . reluctant to make changes.”
“Oh my God, seriously?” she said, glaring at the convenience store. “Why would you still go there?”
“Why, ’cause I’m Black?” he said matter-of-factly and stopped by a silver Honda Civic. He hit the button that automatically unlocked the doors, making the lights flash and horn chirp. Hannah couldn’t read his tone. Rarely, if ever, did southerners of any race bring up the topic of racism.
“No,” Hannah squeaked, stuttering and trying to correct herself as quickly as possible, her neck and cheeks burning. She felt outraged as a human being, but she didn’t know how to communicate that, unsure what would sound offensive coming from a white woman who hadn’t been raised in Mississippi. “I mean . . . it should bother everyone . . .”
“As a Black man, of course it bothers me. But”—Guy skirted around her to open the passenger-side door with an extended arm—“if I didn’t go places because of people’s families’ spotted pasts, I’d go nowhere.” He gestured for her to get into the car and stepped away, crossing in front of the vehicle as Hannah responded.
“I get that, but shouldn’t there be some . . . some consequence?”
“I’d like to think so, and there are plenty of places I won’t give my business, but Frank’s different than his daddy,” Guy said thoughtfully, standing inside his opened door, leaning against the top of the roof, pausing like he was thinking. He tapped the roof with his keys and then pointed at Hannah. “He’s made real changes since he took over. My daddy taught me to judge a man based on his actions, not his family. I think you’d be on my side with this one, anyway. I mean, I’m wonderin’ if you’ve ever visited the Williamson plantation.” He cocked his head, winked, and disappeared into the car, leaving the implications of his sentence to hang in the air.
A hot poker blazed through her conscience. She wanted to be different from her ancestors, better. She wanted to carry on the new path her father had forged by teaching his children to think and live differently than other Williamsons had. But Guy was correct: everyone had a past. She didn’t fully know the right answers anymore.
But what she did know was that she was officially out of control when it came to conversations with this man. He had a way of twisting every word she said into something she didn’t mean merely by using polite charm, a straight smile, and an electric wit as his tools of manipulation.
“No, you’re right,” she said, as she ducked into the car herself. “My family has its own Confederate skeletons in the closet—”
“And I still talk to you, don’t I?” he cut in, starting the car.
“Unfortunately,” she said, returning his slightly playful sarcastic tone, closing the door. “I’m kidding. But my father didn’t try to hide that fact from us. It’s nothing I’m proud of, but it’s different actually being here. I know racism is everywhere. It’s just crazy knowing it was so proudly displayed not that long ago.”
“You found her!” a young female voice called out from the darkened back seat before Guy could respond to Hannah’s contribution in the surprisingly deep discussion.
“Oh my God!” Hannah gasped, turning around with her hands up like she was about to be mugged. A petite girl dressed in a soccer uniform sat with an iPad on her lap. Eleven or twelve, maybe a little younger—Hannah wasn’t very experienced at estimating a kid’s age, so it was only a guess.
“Rosie, you’re going to scare the poor woman to death,” Guy chided gently, talking through the rearview mirror as he pulled out of the parking spot.
“I’m sorry!” she said, singsong, making her sound on the younger side of Hannah’s age-guessing spectrum.
Hannah’s heart was pounding faster than a hummingbird’s wings. If she’d thought she was at a loss for words when talking to Guy, she was three times as confused by the kid in the back of the car. She glanced between the two figures, one focused on the road and the other entirely focused on Hannah’s face.
“Are you all right?” Guy asked quietly, checking on Hannah before turning onto the highway.
“I think so,” she responded, her nerves still rattled by her walk in the dark. Walk in the Dark. Yup. Another good one.
“Miss Williamson is doin’ just fine, baby,” Guy called into the back seat.
“Uh, Hannah. You guys can call me Hannah,” Hannah said, addressing both the grown-up in the front seat and the miniature human in the back. “And you are . . . Rosie?”
The girl sat up as tall as her over-the-shoulder belt would allow and smiled. “Yes, ma’am. And I heard you are a reporter from Chicago and that you write stories for the Record and that Miss Mable is your grammy and—”
“Whoa, Rosie, where did you get my bio?”
“My daddy told me,” Rosie said, clearly proud of her daddy and his vast knowledge of Hannah’s personal and professional life.
“Your daddy?” Hannah questioned, looking at Guy with a raised eyebrow. He couldn’t be more than thirty. She’d thought Rosie could be a niece or a cousin, but his kid?
“I may have slipped her a few details on the way over here,” he joked.
“I was surprised he could tell me much of anything with how fast he was drivin’,” Rosie teased her father, and Guy flinched.
“Oh, hush now,” he said. “I wasn’t goin’ that fast.” Rosie coughed. “All right, a little fast, but your grandma was very upset on the phone.”
Hannah paused, her emotions swelling unexpectedly. She turned her body toward Guy, grateful despite herself.
“Thank you for helping her,” she said, pushing through the warning bells in her body telling her to stop being nice.
“Your grandmother is a gem and has been close to our family for years. I appreciate any opportunity to help Miss Mable.”
“Which is also very helpful to me, it turns out,” she said, her own way of saying thank you for herself, which was even harder than the praise for helping Mamaw.
“Ha. I guess so,” he said, glancing at her from the corner of his eye while keeping most of his focus on the road.
Hannah wanted to change the subject, feeling a little sick, either from the car or from opening herself up ever so slightly. “So, this is your daughter, then?”
“Yes, ma’am. I’ve been her dad for going on—what is it, 12.5 years, Miss Rosie?”
Twelve and a half years. Hannah did some mental math. Even if Guy were thirty, that’d mean Rosie had been born when he was still in high school. She’d thought about the concept of having children one day, but it was surprising to see someone her age with a child who was approaching her teens. At thirty-one her biological clock was starting to tick louder every day, which only added to her anxieties about the future.
“You
know how old I am, Daddy. Don’t let him fool you, Hannah.”
“Miss Williamson,” Guy corrected.
“Oh no, I told you—I prefer Hannah,” she corrected. The only time she was called Miss Williamson before moving south was in the official letter she got relieving her of her position at the Tribune after Tom had broken the news on the phone a few days earlier. And then again, when the doctor came into her hospital room and told her she couldn’t go home and would be put on a seventy-two-hour hold. She’d rather be Hannah.
“I’m sorry, I’m sure it is fine with you, but I think Rosie should show some respect for her elders. So, for now, if you don’t mind, I think she should go on calling you Miss Williamson,” he said, patting the wheel as he made his point.
“Elders? God, how old do you think I am?” Hannah scoffed, not sure if she should be insulted by the term.
“Some things are a little different round here. I’m sure it would be the same way if we visited y’all in Chicago. As I see it, there’s no harm in respect, is there?” he said it like it was a casual, well-known thought. Hannah understood, especially after living with Mamaw and working at the Record, and she knew that little nurse Nancy would likely swoon at Guy’s parenting style.
“That’s fine,” Hannah said, because ultimately it wasn’t any of her business. Painfully bad at starting up small talk, she looked out the window during the lull in conversation, watching the murky patches of forest with occasional houses set far back from the road blur by. An awkward silence filled the car. When Rosie broke it, Hannah was almost grateful to hear her name.
“Miss Williamson?”
“Yes, Rosie?”
“What story are you working on? Miss Mable said you were writing a story and doing research up in the city and—”
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