The Song and the Silence

by Yvette Johnson

When I was finished getting everything out of the car, I went back inside, where everyone was sitting close together on a couple of couches. Throughout the room, wild blueberries were gathered in candy dishes and plastic bowls of varying colors as if on display. They were on the coffee table, side tables, shelves, and a computer desk. Rena kept offering them to us. She’d gone out and picked them herself.

  The problem was that, as a rule, I never ate freshly picked fruit. I was a city girl and believed I could only trust food that had passed through the legal regulations imposed on grocery store conglomerates. But since I’d already failed at the simple act of ordering a pizza, I wanted to find a way to fit in, so I decided to take my chances and taste the berries. After all, considering how many bowls of them were scattered around the room, it seemed that Rena ate them all the time, and she was still standing.

  I put a few berries in my mouth and bit down. The juice that gushed from their outer shell tasted like nothing I’d ever had in my mouth before. They were remarkably sweet but not cloying, and they had a flavor so far from the blueberries I’d eaten in my life that I almost felt as if I were sampling a new candy from Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory. I reached for the bowl to grab another handful, but Bishop had taken it for himself and was stuffing his face so fast that his lips were already bluish-purple.

  While we waited for the pizza, Rena gave me a tour of the house. We were back in the kitchen when we finally started catching up on each other’s lives. Rena had attended a university in New York, but after a few years there she got sick—really sick. She was diagnosed with lupus. She moved back to Greenwood to be close to family and never looked back. Rena worked at the middle school. When she mentioned this, I thought about Vera saying the schools weren’t integrated when she was young, but that was decades ago. I wondered how things were now.

  “So, is there a lot of diversity at your school?” I asked while Rena began to wash the dishes. She shook her head and said that her school was around 95 percent Black.

  “When we move into White neighborhoods, they just move out. Everything’s still segregated here. They put their kids in private schools.”

  Over the next several minutes, while Rena talked about life in Greenwood, I went through a series of shifting thoughts and emotions. My immediate response to her claim that her school was still almost completely segregated was that she was obviously exaggerating. Then an image flashed in my mind of a Black person trying to make life sound harder than it really was in order to justify their own complacency. But Rena was smart; she’d lived in New York, so certainly I could trust her assessments.

  As I watched myself climb that ladder of judgment, I was shocked by my own thinking. Even the fact that Rena’s college career was the detail that made me consider her to be a trustworthy source was something that brought me instant shame. If she’d never left Greenwood, would I be more inclined to believe she was exaggerating?

  My most vivid memory of Rena was from a night out during that summer visit when I was eleven. Rena was the only cousin old enough to drive, and she’d taken me, my sister, and another cousin out to the store. Everyone got something, including Rena. She bought herself a Kit Kat. I can’t remember who started it, but one of us mentioned how much we loved Kit Kat and asked Rena for one of her bars. She said, “Sure,” and handed it over. Then someone wanted another one, and then someone else wanted yet another one.

  Rena only got to eat one out of the four bars in her Kit Kat, and she didn’t complain at all. She was in the driver’s seat and I was sitting behind her on the backseat wondering about this curious girl who’d just given away all her candy.

  It’s true that I knew very little about Rena, but none of what I did know would logically lead me to believe that she’d lie or exaggerate about anything. Where had those assumptions come from?

  The pizza arrived, and while everyone was grabbing a slice and talking about life, I kept thinking about how quick I was to disregard Rena. I thought back to my childhood. Was my image of her connected to the narrative of Black life I’d been taught in my all-White schools in the 1980s? The sense I had was that the civil rights movement was a good thing that was effective, achieved its goals, and was definitely over. Now, everyone just needed to move on. Anyone who continued to speak about relations between the races or the quality of life for Blacks had a chip on their shoulder.

  But it wasn’t even Rena who’d brought up race relations, it was me.

  Maybe I just didn’t want to believe that things were still so bad. Or maybe I had an underlying yet unassailable conviction that anything amiss in Black communities was a result of inherent defects in Blacks themselves. Whites had done all they could do, and it was time for Blacks to pull their shit together.

  I was disgusted with myself.

  As if he was channeling my inner frustrations from across the room, my three-year-old, Dexter, suddenly threw up. I figured he’d just eaten too much. We rarely ate pizza, so he may have just overdone it. I apologized and cleaned up the mess. Then he threw up again. After the second time, Dexter tried to crawl into my lap. I picked him up and moved over to the couch, where he laid his head on my thighs. It was warm. I mentioned this to the group and Rena jumped up, ran to the next room, and returned with a brand-new thermometer, still in the plastic. We took his temperature. It was 103 degrees. I always broke Bishop and Dexter’s fevers with Motrin. Rena sent her husband to the nearest store to get some.

  I gave Dexter the medicine and waited an hour. I took his temperature again and it hadn’t changed. Another hour went by, and there was still no change. Not only was it late in the evening but we were at least an hour and a half from Jackson, where I figured there was a decent emergency room.

  After discussing this with Milton, he looked down at Dexter and asked, “Why can’t we just take him to urgent care or a hospital here in Greenwood?”

  All I could think about was what had transpired several years earlier when I’d traveled back to Greenwood for my grandmother’s funeral. I’d become almost violently sick after eating a serving of creamed corn. After about eighteen hours of constant vomiting, I finally asked my mother to take me to the hospital. Instead, she called her sister, the only one who’d never moved away from Greenwood, to see what we should do.

  She insisted that my mom not take me to any Greenwood doctors. She said I’d end up worse off than I already was. Instead, she recommended a few home remedies and over-the-counter meds. We followed her suggestions, and soon I was at least well enough to travel back to Phoenix.

  When Milton inquired about why we couldn’t just take Dexter to a doctor in Greenwood, I said, “Because my mom told me not to go to the doctors here. She said they’re backward.” Without even looking around the room to gauge the expressions on everyone’s faces, I knew they thought I was overreacting. I knew this because even I could hear how ridiculous I sounded.

  I stayed up with Dexter for hours after everyone else had gone to sleep, giving him medicine, taking his temp, only to find that it wasn’t going down. His temperature was climbing. This had never happened with Dexter before. On the few occasions when I’d failed to break Bishop’s fevers, I’d always taken him to urgent care. But this night, I was in Greenwood. I felt panicked—panicked enough to call my mom.

  We hadn’t spoken in months and she’d only met Dexter once, so I wasn’t even sure if she’d answer. As I listened to the phone ringing, I remembered myself as a little girl lying on the living room couch with a hot towel on my chest. Then I thought about the metallic smell of the iodine she used to drench my sister’s tonsils with. Both treatments had been effective.

  “Hello,” she said groggily.

  “It’s Yvette. Did I wake you?”

  “That’s okay. What’s up?”

  “I’m in Greenwood—”

  “Oh, that’s nice.”

  “And Dexter is sick, he has a fever. Can I take him to a doctor?”

  Suddenly sounding very awake, she said, “No, absolutely not.” />
  “Okay, Mom, I need you to tell me one of your home remedies, something passed down to you.”

  “You need to give him an alcohol bath,” she said.

  “A what?”

  “An alcohol bath.” She said it again in a louder voice, like she thought I hadn’t heard her.

  “How do I do that, Mom?”

  “First, you take off all his clothes, and then you take a bottle of alcohol, pour a good amount of it onto a washcloth, and rub his whole body with it. Rub it in real good. Don’t miss a spot.”

  “Okay,” I said, waiting for her to go on.

  “Okay,” she echoed, and then, “Call me in the morning to let me know if he’s any better.”

  “I will. Thanks.”

  I looked up and explained her instructions to Rena, who immediately went to grab alcohol and a washcloth.

  When she returned, I carefully removed Dexter’s clothes and kissed his little hands and arms as I did so. His skin was a golden brown, so I always told him that he tasted like chocolate. He looked up at me as if he was wondering what I was doing, so I kissed him and whispered, “Yummy, brownies,” then, “Mmm, chocolate pudding.”

  I did what my mother had instructed me to do, rubbing the alcohol all over Dexter’s perfect, warm brown skin. When I finished, I put his clothes back on, and then leaned back. He put his little head on my chest, and I could feel the heat of his breath on my breast as he fell asleep.

  An hour later, I took his temperature again. The thermometer beeped and I pulled it from under his arm with my eyes closed, afraid to look. His fever had broken. Tears stung my eyes. I squeezed him to me, but he’d already fallen back to sleep. I sat there and cried. Even before I called my mom I’d known Dexter would be okay. After all, it was just a fever. Even still, I cried because I felt relieved, but also because I felt guilty.

  That night my mom had reached back into her memories to hand me a remedy, one she’d received decades earlier. From her ancestors—my ancestors—my mother learned about the healing powers of alcohol baths, olive oil, and iodine. But if one of those individuals were somehow brought back to stand in Rena’s house to help me with Dexter, how would I have responded? Would I have trusted them, or would I have questioned the veracity of their treatment ideas the same way I’d done with Rena’s description of segregated schools?

  * * *

  THE NEXT MORNING, I woke up with the sun shining on my face. My kids were already awake and in Rena’s care. When she had heard them stirring, she’d gotten out of bed, washed their faces, fed them homemade blueberry pancakes, and put them in front of the TV so they could watch cartoons. My dad and his brother were going to spend the morning shopping and cooking for a family dinner later that evening. My morning was wide open.

  I called my mom to thank her and to tell her that Dexter was alright. We made small talk for a few more minutes. I didn’t really know what to say, and I sensed she didn’t, either. We said we’d talk again soon and then quickly ended our call. I made plans to meet with Honey Wright, the woman Booker married after he divorced my grandmother. The two of them were together until the day he died. I still felt reluctant about looking deeper into Booker’s life because I was fearful it would end in disappointment, but I was curious. Though I knew it could turn out he’d had no idea how important his words were or he was just blowing off steam and not really thinking about his statements, more and more I felt as though I just needed to know. His entire life felt like a secret that had been kept from me, one I was slowly beginning to unfold.

  Honey and I had a few brief conversations before I arrived. Over the phone, her voice was cryptic, like it came from someone in the final stages of death. Every syllable she produced seemed to take considerable effort.

  When I arrived at Honey’s house, I found it to be small but thoughtfully kept. A garden of delicate, light-colored flowers hemmed her home in with understated beauty. On her porch were plants and two plastic chairs that were both free of debris and dust. The rest of the street didn’t look as nice as Honey’s house. Few, if any, had flowers in front, and the porches looked as though they were about to fall down.

  I climbed the steps leading to Honey’s front door. This visit marked the beginning of my Booker Wright research in earnest. My heart pounded as I rang the bell. I took a long, slow, deep breath to calm myself, but then almost gagged because I reeked of mosquito repellent. I was rubbing my nose, trying to get the scent out of it when I heard the front door open. I couldn’t see inside because my view was blocked by a black iron security screen.

  “Well, hello, there,” I heard Honey say. I knew it was her because I recognized that labored voice.

  “Hello,” I said in response. When she opened the security door, I stared at her in silent surprise. If I hadn’t heard her voice through the screen, I would never have believed the woman standing before me was Honey Wright, because nothing about her belied effort. A few years shy of her eightieth birthday, Honey Wright was strong and effortlessly beautiful.

  She was short and slender, with skin so light it was barely brown at all. Aside from a few strategically placed freckles, it was clear and thin, almost translucent. Dark, girlish curls fell carelessly onto her unwrinkled forehead, and the corners of her plump lips turned up into a warm, easy smile. A simple dress with bright flowers barely hid Honey’s well-kept figure. Her brown eyes were warm, she was feminine, and her posture was strong. I sensed she knew her beauty was there, even understood its power, but had grown bored with it. I felt self-conscious as I stood in front of her in wrinkled gray linen pants and a sweat-stained blouse.

  Honey’s real name was Mildred, and even though everyone seemed to use her nickname, I wanted to be respectful, so after saying hellos I asked, “Should I call you Mildred?”

  “Of course not,” she said as she leaned forward and wrapped a long, slender arm around my waist, pulling me into her darkly lit home. “Everybody calls me Honey.”

  Hanging on the wall in her front room was a picture of Booker. It was a photograph treated to look like a painting. In the portrait, Booker had a small, Mona Lisa–like smile on his face. I knew Honey had married again after Booker died, and her second husband had also passed away, but I didn’t see any of his photos hanging on the wall.

  We spent close to three hours together that day. She shared with me what she knew of Booker’s television appearance, which wasn’t much. She told me about the food they served at Booker’s Place and how Booker had to go to Lusco’s in the afternoons. Then she told me a story of loss and longing that was more profound and more beautiful than I could have imagined. It was the story of Booker and his mother, Rosie—how they were lost to each other and then how they were found. What I didn’t know as I sat in Honey’s living room taking in the horrible circumstances surrounding Booker’s upbringing was how much more meaning and depth the story would have for me as I continued in my journey to understand what life was like for Blacks during those years, and what his two minutes of television had actually cost him.

  Town on Fire

  The details of how Emmett Till was murdered, coupled with the farcical nature of the trial that followed, made the entire event both unbelievable and unforgettable. Rich or poor, White or Black, the torture and murder of an innocent child and the subsequent release of his killers marked a shift in thinking throughout the nation; it was a horror that defied all reason, an event that could not be forgotten.

  There had always been tension in Greenwood, but previously it was primarily experienced by Blacks who had to struggle to build lives for themselves and their children amid the constant threat of violence. They obeyed not only the segregation rules known as the Jim Crow Laws but also had to submit to the unspoken, unwritten laws enforced by lynchings and other acts of violence. For Blacks, Till was a stark reminder of what could—and would—happen when those unspoken laws were broken.

  Greenwood Whites, on the other hand, allowed themselves to believe that the silence of the Blacks in their midst, the
reason they didn’t complain about segregation or the unspoken rules, was because Blacks didn’t mind them. Actually, it was common for Whites to lament the national attention with statements like, “Our Blacks are happy.”

  After Till’s murder, the tensions that had previously been felt so deeply by Blacks began to wade into the White community. The town of Greenwood was now on the radar of national news crews who were searching for stories about the burgeoning civil rights movement. They were not disappointed.

  In her memoir, Sara Criss recalled a night, in June 1963, when she was watching television with her husband and “[Medgar] Evers came on with a rather strong plea for Negroes to register to vote. At the time we commented that he certainly was brave to appear on TV with such remarks knowing how many White people there were listening who were developing a growing fear of racial disturbances. Then on June 12 we were in Birmingham on a short trip and awoke to the morning news with a bulletin that an NAACP leader in Jackson, Medgar Evers, had been shot and killed.”

  Nine days later, Byron De La Beckwith, a well-known Greenwood resident and a member of the White Citizens’ Council, was arrested for the murder of Evers. The following year, two hung juries failed to determine De La Beckwith’s guilt and soon afterwards all hell broke loose in Greenwood. Marching, picketing, and arrests became common occurrences. Shortly thereafter, people from far-flung parts of the country began pouring into town to challenge Greenwood’s way of life.

  Then on July 2, 1964—less than a year before Booker’s interview with Frank De Felitta—the Civil Rights Act, signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson, made the segregation of public places illegal and “heralded the beginning of some of Greenwood’s most trying times.”

  Greenwood Whites were torn between two desires. They wanted to stand in defiance of the Civil Rights Act, a law they believed was misguided at best and dangerous at worst. But they also longed to maintain the community they’d built. They were desperate to find ways to make it feel as if their world was not really changing at all. The odds were stacked against them, not just because of the Civil Rights Act but also because of the numbers.