Every mile took us away from the land of tan and dust to a land of green and grass. Trees spread their arms wide, bright leaves fluttering from their fingertips. Fields full of growing crops on either side of us passed in a blur of emerald as we sped by.
I’d long since lost track of where we were, but I did know one thing—we were a world away from Oklahoma.
Mama told me I could take off my mask and I breathed easy for the first in a good long time. The air was so clean, so fresh, I could already tell it was healing me with every breath. I wished so hard that I could’ve talked Mama into letting me ride in back with Ray. I didn’t dare ask, though. I knew she’d just tell me no.
I held that old mask on my lap for at least half an hour, fidgeting with the strap and feeling the weight of it. I thought of all the times Pastor said the dust was a curse, the wage of our sin. The way he’d made it sound most every Sunday of my memory was that God had sent the storms to break us to nothing so we’d have nothing left to turn to but God.
I hated that Pastor was right. The dusters had broke us. We had lost so much.
Picking up that mask, I held it close to my face. It was the last of the curse.
“I’d sure like to throw this thing out the window,” I whispered.
“What’s that, darlin’?” Daddy asked.
“I said I wanna throw this old mask out the window.”
“You best keep it,” Mama told me. “Just in case.”
I couldn’t think what might happen that would make me need that dumb old thing ever again. I sure didn’t want to keep hold of it. Mama took it from me, holding it on her own lap as if she couldn’t think of letting it go again.
Leaning my head back against the seat, I paid attention to every smooth and sweet intake of air until I fell asleep.
Hours passed with me hovering between shallow sleep and hazy waking. If any dreams came, I wasn’t aware of them. Mama and Daddy spoke seldom, but when they did it was in hushed tones so as not to wake me. I listened, keeping my eyes closed so they didn’t know I could hear.
“You feeling better?” Daddy asked.
“A little,” she answered. “It comes in waves.”
“You think you’re getting sick?”
“I don’t know,” she said, her voice sounding dull, flat. “It feels more like being sad.”
“I know it. I do.” His voice got softer. “Is there anything I can do?”
“I don’t know,” she said again.
She shuffled in her seat and I peeked to see her body turned so she was facing the window once again. I couldn’t tell if she was crying, but her shoulders did go up and down, up and down with slow and deep breaths.
Seemed to be awful hard work trying to fight off the sadness.
I was in one of those places between alert and snoozing when Daddy shook my shoulder. Blinking my eyes, I saw his face close to mine.
“You awake?” he asked. “You’ve gotta see this.”
Rubbing at my eyes, I slid off the seat of the truck and put my feet down in grass so tall it tickled my bare legs. First thing I did was work off my shoes and socks so I could wiggle my toes in the cool blades. Remembering my promise to Millard, I bent over and tugged out a handful of it. Holding it to my nose I breathed in the fresh scent of it. If green had a smell that was it.
“What are you doing?” Daddy asked, a laugh in his voice.
“I promised Millard I’d send him some.” I held my hand to Daddy and grinned. “Can I?”
“Well, you promised. I suppose you’d better.” Daddy put his hand out and put it on my elbow, pulling me away from the truck. “But I didn’t wake you up just to show you grass. Come on.”
I let him lead me to the front of the truck and lifted my eyes to see when he told me to look. In my surprise I dropped all of Millard’s grass. It didn’t matter. I figured there was plenty more where that came from.
“Is it real?” I asked.
“Sure it is,” Daddy told me.
I had never seen so much water in all my life. Wide and long and beautiful it rolled, lazy and brown. The damp air filled me all the way up, soothing me like a balm. I wanted to put my feet and hands and head—all of me—into that water. Seemed it would feel like a miracle to let it soak up into my bone-dry skin.
“Is it the ocean?” I asked, only managing a whisper.
“Nah. Just the Mississippi River.” Daddy stood behind me and rested both hands on my shoulders. “Big, isn’t she?”
Mama stood to the right of me, her hands held to her chest and it rising and falling. Ray was on the other side of her, a step or two ahead. He let his mouth hang wide open.
“Can we go in?” he asked, bending down and folding his pant legs up.
“I don’t think we better. It’s deeper than you might think,” Daddy answered. “We can go to the edge, though.”
We did, Mama staying put by the truck, calling after us to be careful and not to fall in. Daddy kept me steady so I wouldn’t stumble. I didn’t tell him I could manage on my own on account it was real gentlemanly of him to help me.
We didn’t go too close, really. Just near enough to watch the river travel like a slow-poke turtle moseying along a path. I didn’t think I could ever tire of looking at it moving along. I only wished I could collect a little of it in a bottle to send back home to Millard. He sure would have liked that, I knew it.
“What state are we in now?” I asked.
“Missouri,” Ray answered.
“That’s right.” Daddy nodded.
I didn’t have to so much as look at Ray to know he stood taller just then.
“See that bridge over there?” Daddy asked, pointing. “We gotta cross over that. Then we’ll be in Illinois.”
Closing my eyes I tried to think of where that was on the big map of Daddy’s. I couldn’t picture it, though. All I could do was listen to the splashing of water.
I’d never once in my life heard anything like it.
Mama spread a blanket on the ground so we could have ourselves a little picnic up by the truck. I found I was so hungry, I almost ate as much as Ray. The dried meat and slices of cheese Mama had gotten at the store earlier in the day tasted as good as anything ever had.
Daddy finished eating and lit himself a cigarette, resting his elbow on his bent knee. The ribbon of smoke danced into the warm Missouri air. If I’d had a camera I would’ve made a picture of him just like that. How he looked was content, nearly happy.
“You know,” Daddy said, nodding at the river. “It runs all the way out to the ocean.”
“If I had me a boat I’d go all up and down it,” Ray said. He was laying on his stomach and watching the river. “I’d just live on that old boat. Bet there’s good fish for eatin’ in there.”
“Guess you’re right about that,” Daddy said.
“I could live the rest of my life on the river, I think.” Ray picked a long piece of grass and stuck it between his teeth. “I’d be real happy, I reckon.”
“Doesn’t sound so bad.” Daddy squinted as he dragged on his cigarette. “Sure would be an adventure.”
Ray smiled but kept his eyes on the Mississippi.
“Was Red River ever this big?” I asked. “When it had water still?”
“No. It never was.” Daddy took a pull of his cigarette. “This here’s ten times as big. It goes on a couple thousand miles, I reckon.”
Ray made a hum of agreement like he already knew so much, so I didn’t let myself show how amazed I was.
“There’s bridges all along it so folks can cross over whenever they want.”
“How’d they get to the other side before the bridges?” I asked, imagining Indians on horseback, crossing with the river up to their knees.
“By raft,” Daddy said. “That’s what I’d guess at least. Wasn’t the safest way, though. I imagine they’d sink pretty easy, especially when taking over a wagon or any kind of heavy load.”
“Bridges are safer,” Ray said. “Ain’t they?”
“That’s right.” Daddy looked at his cigarette and took one last draw on it before tossing it in the grass. “They build them real strong. Put the legs of the bridges all the way into the river bottom, real deep, to support a lot of weight.”
“How’d they do that?” I peered at the water and wondered how deep it was. Seemed to me it went all the way to the middle of the earth.
“Well, darlin’, they had men swim all the way to the muddy floor.”
“Didn’t they have to breathe?”
“Nah. They’d just take a good breath before going down,” Daddy said with a dead serious look on his face. “They’d take in air, filling up their arms and legs with enough to keep them going all day long.”
“Is that true?” I asked, turning to Mama. She’d never lied once in all her life, far as I knew.
She shrugged and kept her eyes fixed on the water.
“Took them years to build even one of them. I read that whenever the river froze over, they’d have to stop working until it thawed all the way out. Sometimes the water would ice over so fast the men wouldn’t get out in time.”
“Not that I ever heard of. Didn’t I say they were good at holding their breath?” He puffed out his cheeks and made his eyes cross.
I gave him my sideways, I-don’t-know-if-I-believe-you look, but smiled anyway.
“Weren’t they cold?” I asked.
“I’ll bet anything they got half-froze themselves. Can’t imagine how glad they were for a hot bath after they got out of all that ice.”
Ray rolled to his side, watching Daddy tell the story and grinning like all get-out.
“I read another something that said once they got that bridge up nobody dared step foot on it.” Daddy felt of his shirt pocket and pulled out a fresh cigarette. “Mary, I never did tell you thank you for that lunch. It was real good, sugar.”
“Uh-huh,” she said.
“See, folks were scared that bridge wouldn’t hold up under them,” Daddy went on after lighting his cigarette. “You wanna know how they got them to trust it?”
Ray and I both nodded.
“They hired themselves an elephant.” Daddy raised his eyebrows and nodded his head. “You believe that?”
I told him I wasn’t sure I did.
“If I could find that book I’d show it to you,” he said. “They borrowed that elephant from a zoo not too far from here. Miss Jim was that elephant’s name, if I remember right.”
“Miss Jim?” I giggled.
“That’s right. Miss Jim. Can’t quite figure out if it was a male or female. Guess it doesn’t matter too much.” Daddy took a drag off his cigarette. “Anyhow, they put a collar and leash on Miss Jim and had him stomp across the bridge all the way to the Illinois side and back again.”
Ray gave out the biggest laugh I’d heard from him in too long a time.
“It’s true,” Daddy said.
“Tom …” Mama shook her head and sighed.
“I’m telling you, this part is the God-honest truth.”
“Did the bridge hold up?” I tilted my head, still not sure I believed him.
“It’s still there, ain’t it?” Ray said, still chuckling at the idea of it.
“Mama, is that a true story?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she answered, getting up off the blanket. “I never know when it’s your daddy telling the story.”
“Well, I tell you, it’s true. Most of it, at least.” Daddy stood and brushed the crumbs and ash off his pants. “Sometimes the most true stories are the most ridiculous.”
I helped Mama clean up the lunch things, all the time imagining Miss Jim the elephant walking heavy-footed across that bridge. And I pictured me riding along on its back with Daddy leading it by the leash.
I wouldn’t have closed my eyes even to blink for fear I’d miss seeing something. Far as I could figure, it would take a full day to walk all the way across, especially on a slow-moving elephant. The river was just that wide.
I thought the God who’d carved out that river, scooping down in the earth with His own hand, must’ve been just as big as Meemaw had always said He was.
Just thinking of it made me feel small.
Daddy let me ride in the back with Ray. Mama sighed like she didn’t approve of the idea one bit, but she didn’t say a word of argument. I was sure glad for that. I didn’t want to go over that bridge and see it all from behind a window.
When we made it about halfway across the river I got a feeling that sunk deep in me. If anybody’d asked me that day what it was I felt, I wouldn’t have had any words for it. It was like nothing I’d ever had in my heart before. Akin to grief, but something different, too.
Part of the feeling was knowing how far we were from home. That river was a big, long, thick line, and once we were over it we couldn’t go back. Even if we did, it wouldn’t ever be the same again. Not like it had been before.
I went ahead and let myself cry. Not a loud one or a messy one. A quiet cry.
When Ray asked me what was wrong, I told him I missed Millard.
It was the truth.
Once we crossed over to Illinois I settled in, using a soft quilt as a pillow, and let myself fall asleep with the open air and sunshine on my face.
I dreamed in black and gray and white.
Running, I kicked up sprays of black dust with my bare feet. My legs were strong again, my stride wide. It felt good, the air against my face and the way my hair fanned out behind me.
A swooshing, whooshing wind pushed at my back, forcing me to run faster and faster, the noise growing to a growl, to a roar. Turning, I saw a black duster lunging at me, its jaws open and spitting rocks and stones to sting at my heels, my legs, my back.
Try as I might, I couldn’t see anything that looked familiar. Nothing that could lead me home.
The duster pawed at me, catching at me with a sharp claw and tossing me up into its swirling, twirling body. Arms waving wild, I tried to grab hold of something, anything, that might save me. Nothing but dirt and rock to catch in my hands.
Beanie stood on the ground, staring up at me, her hair standing on end and her skin tinged blue. She stepped right into the duster, her arms spread wide, letting it catch her up until she was spinning, spinning, spinning right along with me.
We fought the dust, the two of us, bleeding and bruised and scared. We fought to get to each other. Catching her, I grabbed tight and we flew round and round as one person.
Then she tore at my hands, forcing me to let go. She pushed me and pushed me again until I couldn’t reach her anymore, until I was falling out of the duster and to the ground.
The black sucked her all the way in and carried her off to wherever it was headed next.
When I jolted awake it was dark and the truck had stopped. Ray sat beside me, his head leaned back against the truck, his eyes shut tight and chest rising and falling with asleep-breathing.
The truck moved on again and I rolled onto my back to watch the stars above me, trying to put the bad dream from my mind.
For the life of me, I couldn’t get Beanie’s face out of my head.