The Greats

by Deborah Ellis

  Gather has gone for a walk.

  7

  Jomon is trapped inside his nightmare.

  He has nothing to do.

  No books, no television, no homework, no distractions. He has no way to keep track of the passage of time. He has no way out and no way to get away from the what now question that comes at him like a tidal wave, screaming at him, drowning him. If his feet weren’t bandaged, if he had shoes, maybe he could jump high enough to see out the window, if the window wasn’t so grimy.

  But his feet are sore and he doesn’t want the bandages to come off, in case they don’t give him new ones.

  WHAT IS THERE NOW?

  He tries to sleep. He can’t.

  He pictures Officer Grant going home to her kids and cooking them breakfast. He imagines their sleepy faces, their chirpy voices. It all makes him feel more alone.

  As bad as his life was before, it’s worse now. Before, he had his routine and the possibility that things might get better, that he would outrun the emptiness chasing him.

  He misses the what now of yesterday. Yesterday, he could sometimes come up with an answer, like work hard at school, earn some money and hide it from Dad.

  Today, there is no point even trying.

  He suffers through every long Saturday minute. Some prisoners sober up and leave and new ones come in. Jomon eats the meals of rice and peas, chewing without tasting. He smells the Dettol-soaked mops that are swirled back and forth between the cells.

  Prisoners call out to him all day long — some friendly, some nosy, some disgusting, some mean. Jomon doesn’t say a word.

  Inside his head, the emptiness shows him his future.

  There is sure to be something in the news about the broken window at the liquor store. Would they give his name?

  Jomon can’t remember if the names of teen criminals are printed in the paper or not. He’s never paid attention to that before, since teen criminals had nothing to do with him. If his name isn’t printed, they would print that a first-place geography medal was found at the scene. People would easily figure out who it belonged to. His school, his teammates, even that annoying politician who wanted him to work for free would know. They would say, “Oh, that rotten Jomon, shame on us for putting our faith in such a nothing boy.”

  He attends a public high school, so they will have to take him back when he gets out of jail — if he gets out — but they won’t want him representing the school again. Without scholarship money he’ll never be able to afford to go to university, and even if he could get work to pay for his tuition, would the university let in a criminal?

  The daylight outside the small window gives way to dusk. The bright lights come on in the ceiling of the hallway. Jomon faces another night in lockup, then another day, then another night, and then court, where no one will stand with him to bail him out and take him home. More jail time will follow, and when he gets out, what?

  The future that seemed hopeless yesterday seems glorious compared with what he pictures now.

  Instead of graduating with a college degree, then getting a decent job in an office with a clean shirt and a good salary, he’ll have to work much harder for less money. That’s if anyone will hire him with a criminal record. And who would want him as a boyfriend — or a husband? No one, and why would they? He’ll be all alone with a lousy job, bitter about life, probably drinking, probably hitting any woman who tries to come near him, just like his father hit his mother.

  Why put himself and the world through that? The least he could do would be to spare others from having to deal with him.

  Jomon’s grandfather killed himself. His father often brought that up when he was drinking.

  “The old man offed himself,” Jomon can hear his father saying, with slurred words and boozy spit. “He didn’t love me. And you don’t love me. I’m going to do what my old man did. You wait.”

  And Jomon would say, “No, I love you, Mum loves you. Don’t do it!”

  Jomon used to say that. He hasn’t said it in a while. He hasn’t said anything to his father in a while.

  Jomon feels a flutter of hope in his chest. Maybe there is a way out of all this after all.

  If it’s good enough for my grandfather.

  He looks around the cell.

  There is a place where the bars in the door meet the bars in the wall — a crossbar, a place to tie something.

  He looks down at his school uniform shirt ...

  “It won’t be that easy,” says a voice.

  Jomon is startled. He looks in the direction of the voice.

  It’s coming from a boy around his age sitting in the cell across from him.

  Jomon thinks he must have fallen asleep without realizing it. He doesn’t remember the police bringing the other boy in.

  “It’s not that easy to hang yourself,” the boy says again. “You get the knot wrong, you’ll fall. You fall the wrong way, you break your spine and then you’re alive but can’t move. And even if you do it right, which is unlikely, it takes a long time to die by hanging. A long, painful time.”

  Jomon turns his back on the boy.

  “Just because you can’t see me doesn’t mean I’m not here,” says the boy. “And just because your mind thinks you want to die, don’t count on your body agreeing. Your body will fight to stay alive. So, even if you get the knot right — which, again, is unlikely — you’ll be up there fighting with yourself, getting your neck scarred up, probably pooping your pants, and at the end of it all, you’ll be on the floor with a messed-up neck and poopy trousers. How does that make anything better?”

  “Shut up,” Jomon says, still with his back to the boy.

  “I won’t shut up. I’m telling you things you need to know. Although it doesn’t really matter anyway because you take one step toward what you are thinking about doing, and I’ll raise such a stink that every cop for miles around will come running to save you. Look at me when I’m talking to you! Give me some respect.”

  Jomon whips his head around.

  “Why the hell should I respect you?”

  The boy in the other cell just smiles and answers calmly.

  “Because I am your great-great-grandfather. That’s why.”

  8

  Jomon’s day is going from bad to worse.

  “Shut up,” he says again to the boy.

  “Oh, very clever,” the boy says.

  There is no point trying to kill himself while that kid is watching him. Jomon has no doubt the boy will do as he says and stir up such a ruckus that the lockup will be flooded with officers in a second. But that kid won’t be across from him forever. Jomon will wait and watch for his opportunity.

  Jomon moves to the very back of his cell to try to get away from the annoying voice, but that only buys him another two feet of distance.

  “I am your great-great-grandfather,” the boy says again. “My name is Hiram Jomon Fowler. Folks call me Hi. You’ve heard of me.”

  Jomon has not but he doesn’t say so. He doesn’t want to do anything that might encourage Hi to keep talking.

  But Hi needs no encouragement.

  “Yes, you have,” he says. “You’re my great-great-grandson! I’m here to tell you there’s been enough hanging in Guyana.”

  Jomon doesn’t respond. That doesn’t stop Hi.

  “You don’t agree? Hello, everybody!” Hi yells out to the rest of the cells. “Who here thinks there’s been enough hanging in Guyana?”

  The other residents shout back. “Too much hanging!” “Hanging’s what the slave owners did to try to control us!” and “Shake my family tree, there’s someone hanging from it. Shake all our family trees, same thing.”

  “See?” says Hi. “You don’t know your family history, but you went to school. Must have studied something. Must have studied the slave uprisings in the 1700s, in the 1800s. T
hey strung up bodies all over Georgetown and left them there to rot, while the white people danced in the streets.”

  Still Jomon says nothing.

  “You have bad manners,” says Hi. “Are you sure you’re my great-great-grandson? Too much hanging. And you want to add another one. What’s wrong with you?”

  “Why are we talking about hanging?” says a voice from a cell down the hall.

  “My great-great-grandson here is thinking of hanging himself,” says Hi.

  A heavy silence drops over the lockup.

  “The boy is thinking of hanging himself?” one of the men asks in a quiet voice. “That young boy?”

  “He is,” says Hi.

  “Don’t do it,” says the man.

  “How old is he?” asks another man.

  “He’s fifteen,” Hi tells him.

  “Fifteen,” the man repeats. “You got no trouble at fifteen.”

  Shut up, thinks Jomon. What do you know about anything?

  “He thinks he’s got nothing to live for,” says Hi. “He thought he had nothing before he broke the law, but now that he’s a criminal, he really thinks he’s got nothing.”

  “That must mean he thinks we should all hang ourselves, too,” another man says. “I don’t like that, son, I don’t like that at all. Who are you to say my life is not worth living?”

  “I didn’t …” Jomon starts to say but then stops. He doesn’t have to explain himself to these men.

  “Plenty to live for,” says another man. “Sure, this moment is rough. It’s rough on all of us, but it won’t last forever. Plenty of good things ahead.”

  “He doesn’t see it that way,” says Hi. “He thinks he’s tossed his future in the garbage.”

  “Welcome to the club,” says one of the other men.

  Jomon squeezes himself up against the back wall, squishing his face into the cement blocks. He wishes he could just push himself right through them. He wishes they could swallow him up.

  “You won’t be in here forever,” a man says. “You’ll see the sun rise again. You’ll be with your family again. Plenty to live for.”

  “Shut up,” Jomon whispers. “Just shut up.”

  He hugs his knees to his chest and slumps against the wall. He stays that way until he gets a cramp in his back. He stretches out and turns himself around.

  The boy from the other cell is sitting on the other end of Jomon’s bed.

  Jomon springs to his feet. “How did you get in here?”

  “It’s all right,” says Hi. “Like I said, I’m your great-great-grandfather. I’ve got some things to tell you.”

  “I don’t want to listen to anything you have to say,” Jomon tells him. “Just leave me alone.”

  “All right,” says Hi. He leans back against the wall and stares out the bars.

  Slowly the evening darkens. The ceiling lights are bright in the hallway but Jomon, in the back of the cell, is in a shadow.

  He is so tired. His eyelids droop, then close. Sleep finally begins to swirl around him.

  Chatter monkeys in the trees

  Swaying branches in the breeze

  Sleep the hours of dark away

  Wake up to a brighter day.

  In an instant, Jomon is back on his feet and his hand is around the other boy’s throat.

  “Who taught you that?” Jomon spits in Hi’s face. “That’s the Soothing Song. That’s my father’s song. He wrote it. Who taught you that? Who are you?”

  Hi breaks Jomon’s clutch and sends him tumbling to the floor.

  “I told you who I am,” says Hi. “Do I really need to tell you again? I thought my great-great-grandson would be smarter than this. My father sang that song to me when I was small and I sang it to my boy. He sang it to his son. Your father sang it to you. And, if you don’t kill yourself, you’ll sing it to your child.”

  “You’re my age,” says Jomon.

  “I know,” replies Hi with a big grin. “It’s great to be fifteen again, for however long it lasts. I’m here to tell you about my life.”

  “I told you, I don’t want to listen.”

  “I’m here to tell you anyway.” Hi’s calmness is maddening.

  “And then what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Jomon tries to wriggle farther away from Hi but, of course, there is nowhere to go. His wriggling only makes him feel foolish, so he stops.

  “I don’t want to hear it,” he says again. “I’m not listening.”

  “Listen or not, that’s up to you,” says Hi. “I’m going to tell you anyway. You should be thanking me. I would love to be able to talk to my great-great-grandfather. I’ll bet he has all kinds of things to say.”

  “Then why didn’t he come instead of you?”

  “For a very good reason,” says Hi. “I came because I’m the first suicide.”

  9

  Great-Great-Grandfather’s Contribution

  I loved your great-great-grandmother the moment I saw her.

  I was only ten years old at the time, but I knew it was love. I knew it deep in my soul, like I know my own name.

  The first time I saw her, the sun was going down. I was in the cane field not far from Georgetown. I was there with my daddy and his friends, all sugar workers. I worked in sugar, too, alongside the men, although I was too small and scrawny to do the work of men. The workday was over. Our machetes were down and we were sitting around a fire, eating some fish I’d caught. I always kept a fishing line in my pocket. Made the hook myself.

  Anyway, I was so proud that they were eating my food! They all had places to go, but they delayed their journeys to sit with Daddy and me and eat the fish I’d caught and cleaned and cooked.

  The men were kidding me about my size, saying I couldn’t be ten, I didn’t look a day over six. I didn’t mind them teasing. I knew they weren’t being mean. Calling me six years old got them talking about when their fathers were six, back in 1834. That was the year of emancipation, when all the slaves were freed and there were big celebrations on all the plantations.

  Except it was a lie. Anyone six years old and over was still a slave for four more years if they worked in the house, and six more years if they worked in the field.

  Lies, lies, lies.

  Of course, people were mad. They went on strike. Hundreds of people refused to go back to the fields and went into a church instead. They raised up their own flag, declared their own freedom. The government sent troops. A friend of my grandfather’s, a man named Damon, was hanged for refusing to be a slave. If he were here today, he’d sure tell you to smarten up.

  As the sun went down and we ate our fish, along the track by the sugar field walked a Chinese family, looking like they had just arrived in Guyana. We were used to seeing Chinese people because after the slaves became free they didn’t want to work on the plantations any more for the men who enslaved them. Why would they? They left the sugar fields and started their own little farms and villages, sometimes on old plantations.

  So the government imported people from India, Portugal, Ireland, Scotland and China to be indentured servants, which was a little better than slavery but not much. Those who came were desperate. Things were hard at home. They agreed to come to Guyana but then spent years working for next to nothing to pay off their passage and other debts to the landowners.

  This family that I saw, there was a man and a woman and six children plus a baby. They looked like they were wearing most of the clothes they owned. Everyone had bundles. Overdressed, in the heat, looking tired beyond tired, they were moving so slowly I didn’t think they would ever get to where they were going.

  In the middle of this family, I saw my wife-to-be. The most beautiful girl. The rest of the family looked exhausted, bent under the weight of their journey and their belongings. But this girl was not bent. She
looked at everything! She saw everything! The sky turning the color of cannonball flowers, the insects, the birds flying into the trees to shelter for the night. She saw all of it.

  And she saw me. She looked at us around the cook fire and she did not look away.

  Maybe you’ve never been looked at as if you were not there, but I have. You get so you expect it. So when someone actually sees you and does not scrunch up their nose or look away, oh, my great-great-grandson, that is like God himself is smiling down on you from heaven.

  I stood up. I left my father and his friends to their memories and I carried my leaf full of cooked fish right over to her. I held it out to her.

  Her father said some words I didn’t understand. I learned later that he was telling her not to take food from a boy she didn’t know.

  She didn’t listen to him. There was just enough light left in the sky for me to see the laughter in her eyes as she helped herself to a morsel of fish.

  She chewed and smiled. Within moments my dinner was gone, spread among the little hands of many children.

  I sensed movement around me. My father and his friends joined me on the path and were holding out their fish, too!

  Finally, the mother and the father took bites of fish, nodded their thanks and then the family went on their way.

  To this day I remember my father’s arm around my shoulder and the pride in his voice when he said to his friends, “My son is a kind man.”

  Years went by. There was a growing Chinese community in Georgetown and I asked a rice grower to teach me some of his language. I kept my eye out for the girl. Her family opened an odd-goods shop. This shop happened — with a bit of detouring — to be on the same route I took to the field every day. My father walked the extra half-mile with me instead of going the shorter route, no matter how tired he was.

  Every morning I would nod to the girl’s father and say, “Good morning,” in his language, and every night I would nod again and say, “Good night.” My father did it with me.

  At first we got no reaction. But who could resist my charms forever?