THE SMELL OF BREAKFAST—BACON FRYING WITH EGGS—lifted Adam’s head from the tangle of blankets on the pull-out couch. He reached to the coffee table for his watch and was not surprised to find that it was just a little after six. His uncle believed in getting an early start. Adam believed in sleep, but knew there was no sense resisting. So he dutifully climbed out of bed. He yawned and stretched, then went padding into the kitchen, where Luther, in boxer shorts and T-shirt, stood over the gas stove, stirring the eggs.
“Morning,” said Adam. He was careful not to say more. It was two days now since they had stopped at the remains of the farm in Stubbs County, two days since his stoic uncle had shocked them both by collapsing in the high grass, bawling like a lost child. Adam knew Luther was mortified to have been seen that way. As a result, they had coexisted since then in a cold silence broken only to say what was absolutely necessary to say, and even that in a tone of stiff impatience on Luther’s part, as if he resented whatever question or need required him to expend some part of his meager store of words.
When they hit Mobile, Luther had stopped at a package store and picked up a bottle of amber liquid. He had sealed himself in his room that night and, apparently, proceeded to get epically drunk, because the following morning, he had emerged dressed for work but walking as carefully as if walking were new to him, fingers pressing lightly against his temple, scowling at the kitchen light, scowling at the television, scowling at the sound of traffic from the street. He had also scowled at Adam as if the hangover was his fault.
In a way, Adam supposed it was. They would not have gone to the farm if not for him, and if they hadn’t, Uncle Luther would not have had to drink away the pain. Adam had spent every moment since then making as little sound as cotton, trying to be invisible as air whenever Luther was in the room, to draw no more attention than a wallpaper design. Now, awakened by the smell of breakfast, he went into the cupboard for plates, opened a drawer to remove a pair of forks, and set two places at the table.
“Don’t get too used to this,” said Luther as he lifted a spatula full of eggs onto Adam’s plate and forked four pieces of bacon on to keep it company.
The unexpected words almost made Adam fumble the bottle of orange juice he had just retrieved from the refrigerator. “Sir?”
“Me givin’ you room service. Your arms ain’t broke. You can fix your own breakfast tomorrow.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you ain’t got to ‘sir’ me. ‘Luther’ is fine.”
“How about ‘Uncle Luther’?” asked Adam, who had not been raised to be on a first name basis with an elder.
“‘Luther’ is fine,” Luther repeated, as he fixed his own plate. He gave Adam a look. “Just ain’t much for formality is all,” he explained.
“Okay,” said Adam, who doubted he’d ever be able to be so familiar with his uncle. He poured two glasses of orange juice, took his seat, and started automatically to bless his meal; having grown up with a preacher for a father, it was an ingrained habit. He caught himself when he realized that Luther was already eating.
“What happened at the farm the other day, that ain’t your fault,” Luther was saying around a mouthful of eggs.
It was, Adam realized with a jolt, an apology of sorts. Or at least an explanation, which was likely as close to an apology as Luther could manage. He saw that his uncle was waiting for a response, but Adam didn’t know what to say. Finally, Luther grunted. “Just wanted you to know that,” he said. “Ain’t your fault.”
“Yes, sir. I mean, Luther.”
They ate in silence for a moment. Then Luther said, “You’re feelin’ better?”
Adam nodded. “Yeah. Headache’s mostly gone. The light doesn’t bother me.”
“So, what you plan to do now?” asked Luther. “You going back to Selma?”
“I’m not sure yet,” said Adam, pausing a forkful of eggs on the way to his mouth. “King’s people are trying to get the injunction lifted. If they’re able to do that and they march again, I want to be part of that. Like to see us finish what we started. But if they don’t beat the injunction, I’ll probably just go back home.”
“That’d make your mother happy.”
“I know,” said Adam. “Right now, all I can do is wait and see.”
In response, there came another grunt. Emboldened by the fact that they were apparently on speaking terms again, Adam nodded toward a cheap bookshelf next to the couch; it was so jammed with paperbacks and hardbacks that some were double-shelved and more than a few were piled haphazardly on the floor. The shelf had intrigued him from the moment he arrived, but with his head pounding and his eyes hating light, he hadn’t been in much shape for reading. Besides, given Luther’s mood, he had been scared to touch any of his property, much less ask about it. Now he said, tentatively, “You got a lot of books.”
“Yeah,” said Luther, following his gaze. “I read a lot. That stuff on TV’ll rot your mind. Gilligan’s Island? My Favorite Martian? Who thinks up that bullshit? Rather have me a book.”
“I like to read, too,” said Adam. “I was hoping you wouldn’t mind if I look through your books?”
Luther regarded him as if trying to think of a reason not to allow this. Finally, he shrugged. “I don’t mind,” he said. “Just put ’em back when you finish. But don’t think you gon’ spend the whole day with your head in no book. I expect you down to the shop every couple hours or so to sweep up, maybe do the lunch run for the barbers. Make yourself useful.”
“Okay, Uncle Luther.”
“Done told you, ‘Luther’ is just fine.”
He looked as if he might say more, but the telephone rang in the bedroom just then and he got up to answer it. Adam stuffed a last forkful of eggs into his mouth. He drained his glass, then cleared the table and ran dishwater.
“Hello?” he heard his uncle say. “Hey, George. Yeah, he here. He washin’ the dishes. Nah, he was shaky the first day or so. He fine now.”
Adam tried not to eavesdrop, but in such a small place and with the bedroom door open, it was impossible not to.
“Uh uh,” Luther was saying, “I hadn’t heard about that. Somebody was hurt? Shit, that’s too bad. I’m sorry to hear it. How about you? You okay? Oh, I know how that is. Had my ribs busted one time, too. Took about a month and a half to get right again. You told Thelma?”
Alarmed by this turn in the conversation, Adam turned off the water. He went over and stood by the open door to better hear what was being said, no longer worried about eavesdropping. Luther acknowledged him with a glance.
“Uh huh,” said his uncle. “I can imagine. Well, you can’t hardly blame her. Uh huh.”
Adam made an imploring gesture. Luther raised his index finger. Wait.
“Uh huh. So, what you gon’ do now?” Pause. Adam heard the indistinct murmur of his father’s voice. Luther said, “What time you be here? Uh huh. Okay. Hold on, Adam standin’ right here. He fit to bust if he don’t talk to you.” Luther extended the receiver and Adam took it eagerly.
“Hello? Dad? Hello?”
“Hey, son. How are you?” His father’s voice sounded washed out.
“Forget about me,” said Adam. “What’s happening with you?”
“Just a rough couple of days, is all.”
“What do you mean?”
“Have you seen the news?”
“Not really.”
“Read the paper. It’ll tell you the details. But briefly: I’m here in Selma.”
“I heard you were coming down.”
“Yeah. I guess we got in about the same time you were leaving with Luther. We did the march—well, sort of—and I was with these three ministers afterward and we got jumped, beat up pretty badly.”
Adam’s heart jumped. “Dad, are you …?”
“I’m fine. Well, outside of a cracked rib. But one of the other fellows has a brain injury. They had him in surgery, but it’s really touch and go at the moment. His wife has flown down from Boston. The poor guy has four kids.”
“So, what are you going to …?”
“We’re waiting to see if the injunction will be lifted so that we can march again. In light of what’s happened, Reverend Porter is determined—we’re all determined—to see it through to the end. Meantime, I’m getting a Greyhound down to Mobile. I’ll be there this afternoon. While I’m waiting to see what happens, I thought I’d visit my father. Maybe you’d like to join me?”
“Yeah, Dad, sure.”
“All right. I’ll see you then.”
Adam returned the phone to its cradle, looked up to see his uncle watching him intently. “He’ll be all right,” said Luther, reading his mind. “Busted ribs, that ain’t nothin’.”
Adam nodded dumbly. “Yeah, I suppose. But he said the other guy, he was hurt pretty bad.”
Luther shrugged. “Just be glad it wasn’t George.”
“I guess.”
“Take a lot of guts to do what he’s doin’ … what you doin’, too. I respect Dr. King and all, but if one of them crackers try to hit me, I’m hittin’ back. That nonviolence stuff …” His voice trailed off. “Ain’t everybody can do that,” he said finally. “Ain’t everybody even want to.” A pause. Then Luther said, “You think it’ll make a difference?”
“I think we’ll get a voting rights bill, yeah.”
“But do you think it’ll make a difference?” pressed Luther.
“I don’t follow.”
“Read your history. They done passed laws before. Hell, they even had constitutional amendments before. But somehow, don’t never seem to make no real difference. Colored people always end up gettin’ tricked. Been that way since my grandfather left the plantation at the end of the war. Thought he was free, but them paterollers taught him different. Tol’ me once they arrested him for ‘vagrancy’ while he was walkin’ to his job.”
Luther’s laugh was bitter as smoke. He shook his head. “That’s the way it always is when we try to get so-called ‘freedom.’ We always get tricked.”
“You think that’s what will happen this time?”
Again, Luther shrugged. “That’s what done happened before. But you think it’ll be different now.”
It wasn’t a question this time, noted Adam. More like a judgment. He considered it for a second. Then said, “Yeah. I do. I have to.”
Luther regarded him for a moment, his expression unreadable. Then he said, “I’m goin’ to get ready for work.”
Minutes later, freshly bathed and shaved, Luther walked out the front door and trotted down the exterior steps. Moments later, Adam heard the radio come on in the empty barbershop downstairs. It was tuned to some station playing swing jazz from twenty-five years ago, but Adam knew from experience that by the time the shop opened at ten, Luther would have turned to a station playing something hip—some Motown or some James Brown—as a reluctant concession to his customers.
With his uncle gone, Adam felt able to breathe for the first time all morning. Somehow, when Luther was in a room he seemed to suck up all the air. Adam flipped on the television. On the Today show, anchor Hugh Downs was reporting the arrest of three men in connection with the attack his dad had told him about. Downs then cut to an interview with the wife of the man who’d been most badly hurt. Marie Reeb, they said her name was. She seemed dazed. The reporter questioned her gently.
He asked, “Do you think the cause for which your husband came to Selma was worth it?”
She said, “I don’t feel that I can answer that for myself. I can only answer for Jim, that any consequences that might occur did merit this.”
Her sad composure moved something inside Adam. And, not for the first time, the terrible portent of what the movement was doing here—of what he, personally, was doing here—struck him like a fist. They were standing against the forces of white people and their white power, and those forces were declaring, clearly and unmistakably, in the words of a Negro freedom song, that they, too, would not be moved.
But the Negroes who sang that song and the bastions of white power they were contending against could not both be right, could not both be immovable. Something had to give.
“You think it’ll make a difference?” Uncle Luther had asked him—challenged him.
As far as Adam was concerned, it had to. The alternative was unthinkable.
Partly to free his mind from such grim thoughts, Adam lowered the volume on the television and went to explore his uncle’s bookcase. The contents surprised him. There was The Fire Next Time and Nobody Knows My Name by James Baldwin. One shelf contained copies of The Crisis, the magazine of the NAACP, going back a good fifteen years, plus a smaller collection of Muhammad Speaks, the newspaper of the Nation of Islam. Then there was Black Reconstruction and The Souls of Black Folk by W. E. B. Du Bois. A collection of poetry by Langston Hughes. Another by Gwendolyn Brooks. Black Skin, White Masks by Frantz Fanon, The Mis-Education of the Negro by Carter G. Woodson, A Voice from the South by Anna Julia Cooper, Why We Can’t Wait by Martin Luther King, Jr.
Paging through some of the books, Adam was further surprised to find them dog-eared and heavily notated. Scribbling in the margins in his cramped handwriting, Uncle Luther—just “Luther,” Adam reminded himself—was given to debating the great thinkers or expanding on their points. His observations were often trenchant and incisive.
“Bullshit!” he wrote, next to a passage in which King claimed that American history taught the Negro “that nonviolence in the form of boycotts and protests had confounded the British monarchy and laid the basis for freeing colonies from unjust domination.”
“What really freed those mf’s was muskets and sabers,” continued Luther’s note. “We’re nonviolent with people who are nonviolent with us. But we are not nonviolent with anyone who is violent with us.”
Adam recognized the last part as something Malcolm X had said. Taciturn to the point of abruptness and with the ungrammatical English so often found in undereducated Negroes from the South, Luther, it turned out, was nevertheless a well-read man with an agile intellect. This was something Adam would never have guessed.
He was replacing the King book on the shelf when he noticed it had been resting, not against the back of the bookcase, but against a small white metal box. Curious, Adam removed another few books and pulled the hidden box out. It was not locked. With faint foreboding, Adam opened the clasp and lifted the lid.
Inside, he saw photographs, military insignia, and paperwork. It took him a moment to realize that he was looking at memorabilia from the war. On top was a shoulder patch. It depicted the profile of a snarling black panther and beneath that, the words “Come Out Fighting.” Adam guessed that this had been part of his uncle’s uniform during the war.
Beneath were a series of black-and-white photos. Adam recognized his uncle in some of them—younger, thinner, often caught staring down the camera as if it were some kind of enemy. In one photo, his uncle stood with four other men next to a tank. In place of his usual grumpy expression, Luther’s face in this picture reflected a grim and even swaggering pride. In fact, he was almost smiling. There was an emblem painted on the tank. Adam had to squint to read it. “Lena Horne,” it said. Apparently, this was what they had called their tank.
Adam put the pictures aside. Digging deeper, he found discharge papers and a faded military ID. At the bottom was a bundle of letters bound by a rubber band; it was so brittle and old that it broke when he lifted the envelopes out.
“Shit,” hissed Adam. He would have to scrounge a new rubber band if he didn’t want his uncle to know he had been snooping.
Adam was vaguely ashamed of what he was doing. Uncle Luther, whatever his faults, had driven across the state to rescue a nephew he barely knew and had given him a safe place to recuperate. He deserved better than to have that same nephew, first chance he got, invade his privacy by rifling through his things.
But Adam couldn’t help himself. As Luther barely knew him, he barely knew Luther. This was a chance to shed some light on the mystery of his mother’s brother, to learn something about a man who, along with Mom, Dad, and his father’s father, was the only family Adam had. That was, if you didn’t count Dad’s brother and sister, which Adam did not; from family stories, he knew that his aunt and uncle had made it clear the moment his parents got together that they wanted nothing to do with a brother who married a black woman. They had disowned Dad and his wife and kid.
Adam was happy to return the favor.
So yes, he reassured himself, since Luther was part of what little family he had, he had an absolute right to know more about him. Thus justified in his own mind, Adam began examining the envelopes. But it soon became apparent they were all from the same person, all from his mother and written to Luther between 1942 and 1945 while he was serving in Europe. This was what finally made Adam pause.
It was one thing to invade his uncle’s privacy, but it was quite another to do the same to his mom. For some reason, that felt like a greater violation. He argued with himself, tried to convince himself otherwise. He told himself maybe it would be all right if he just read the first letter she had written after February of 1944—when he was born—just to see what she said about her new son? Surely reading just that one wouldn’t be such a sin, would it?
Adam tried to convince himself, but he couldn’t. So in the end, he put the letters down, went into his uncle’s bathroom and scrounged up a rubber band, then came back and stacked them and bound them more or less as he had found them. He replaced the other contents of the box and returned it to the shelf. He opened the Frantz Fanon book and began to read, determined to ignore the curiosity that gnawed at him like some burrowing animal.
It was after five when Luther came back up the stairs. Adam had spent the day with his head in Fanon’s book, notwithstanding four forays down to the shop to sweep up hair and empty ashtrays. He glanced up at his uncle’s entry. “Want me to sweep up again?” he asked.
Luther shook his head. “Nah, they still down there cutting. They’ll take care of it when they close up at six. You and me, we need to go pick up your daddy.”
They rode together to the Greyhound station where they waited on the platform until the bus from Selma came wheezing into its slot. Dad was the fifth person to climb off. He looked worn and preoccupied, but smiled when he saw Adam and Luther. They shook hands all around—some old white woman pursed her lips in disapproval—Dad picked up his bag but winced and touched a hand to his ribs when he did so. Adam took the bag, waving off his father’s objections, and they were off.
West Haven Rest Home was on the west end of town, where the lawns were vaster and the homes they encircled more capacious, where the trees canopied the streets and there was a sense of peace and order one was hard put to find in parts of town where there was less money and more colored people.
“So,” said Dad, as they turned into the parking lot. “You’ve seen my father more recently than I have, Luther. How is he doing? Is it any worse?”
“Depend on the day,” said Luther. “Never know what you’re going to get. Some days, he clear as a bell and you’d swear he got no business even being in a place like this. Other days …” He finished the sentence with an eloquent shake of his head.
“Well,” said George, opening the car door, “let’s go see what kind of day this one is.”
It seemed to be a pretty good one, as near as Adam could tell. When the door opened, Johan Simek, dressed as always as if he might be going to court at any minute, stood up from the chair where he had been watching television, a broad smile of recognition splitting his face as he shook each of their hands in turn.
“George,” he said, happily. “And Luther. And my goodness, is this Adam? You’re all grown up. I would not have known you if I had seen you on the street.”
“Hey, Grandpa,” said Adam.
“Sit, sit,” said Johan. There were only two visitor chairs, so Adam stood as his father and uncle took their seats. “So, what brings you to town, son?”
“We drove down overnight on Monday,” said Dad. “We came down to join Martin Luther King’s march.”
“His march?” Grandpa looked mystified.
“The march for voting rights,” said Dad.
“Is that why Adam is here?”
“Yes,” said Adam, nodding.
“And you, Luther?”
Uncle Luther shook his head. “I live here, remember?”
“Ach,” said Grandpa. “Of course, you do.” He made a vague gesture. “My mind,” he said in a low voice, his head bowed. “My mind isn’t what it used to be.”
“That’s okay, Dad.” Adam’s father laid a hand on his own father’s shoulder and repeated himself. “It’s okay.”
Dad looked as if he might say more, but then there came a knock at the door. Looking up, Grandpa smiled. “So popular I am, today,” he said. And then he called out to the unseen newcomers. “Yes, by all means, please come in and join us.”
The door opened and a white man and woman stepped through. She had dark hair and was probably in her thirties, dressed in a stylish jacket and skirt the color of cream and a blouse the color of coffee with matching hat and gloves; he was about the same age, with short-cropped blond hair, and was wearing green fatigues. They had been talking animatedly to one another, but pulled up short when they saw Adam, Dad, and Uncle Luther.
For a moment, nobody spoke. Everybody stared. The man and woman looked vaguely familiar to Adam, but he couldn’t place them. When he looked to his father for a clue, he was surprised to see that he had risen from his chair, his posture tense, as if to confront a threat, eyes filled with wary recognition.
“Cora,” he said. “Nick.”
Only then did Adam realize that these two were his aunt and uncle. As far as he knew, his father had hardly seen or even spoken to either of them in years. Uncle Luther came slowly to his feet, standing alongside Dad.
“Well,” said the man. “Well, well, well.”
“Nick …” The woman’s voice was a warning.
“What are you doing here?” Dad asked his younger brother. “Last I heard, you were overseas.”
“Vietnam,” said Nick. “Killing gooks for Uncle Sam. I got leave when I heard about Pop.”
His eyes traveled to Luther. “So I suppose, this’d be your brother-in-law, huh?” Something in his tone mocked the words. Then he swung his eyes toward Adam. “And I guess this is him?”
Him?
Somehow, the word made Adam feel as he if wasn’t really there. He straightened. “My name is—”
Dad cut him off. “Stop it, Nick.”
Dad’s brother didn’t say anything else. But he stared at Adam like meat. Now Dad turned to Luther. “Would you mind …?” he asked, nodding toward Adam.
Luther spoke without taking his eyes off Nick Simon. “Are you sure?”
Dad nodded. “Yes, I’m sure.” Still, Luther hesitated a moment. Then he moved to Adam. “Let’s go,” he said. “Let’s leave them to it.”
Adam was surprised. “Uncle Luther? I don’t want to.”
Luther gripped his bicep in a way that said he had no choice. “Let’s go, boy.”
“But …”
Before he could get another word out, Luther had opened the door and steered him through it, brushing against Nick, who turned to watch them go. The door closed behind Adam, and immediately he heard his father’s voice. The words were indistinct, but the tone was furious. He tried to remember the last time he had heard his gentle father speak with fury. He couldn’t.
“It’s about me,” he pleaded. “I should be in there. Why can’t I be in there?”
“This is somethin’ they got to do on their own,” said Uncle Luther. “Probably somethin’ they should have done a long time ago.”
“It’s about me,” repeated Adam.
“No, it ain’t,” said Uncle Luther. “Not really.”
Which was so obviously a lie that Adam could only stare. Luther met his gaze, but something flickered in his eyes, and after a moment Luther turned away. He made a point of reaching for a cigarette and lighting it, but there was no mistaking it. Luther Hayes, who had driven tanks through Nazi shellfire, had turned away rather than face him.
“Come on,” muttered Luther, cigarette bobbing in his lips. “Let’s wait in the parking lot. They likely gon’ be a while.”
They retreated through the front door and into the coolness of an early evening in spring. His uncle, never the most voluble of men, seemed to struggle for something to say.
“Look like it might rain,” he said, gazing up at a fleet of tattered clouds passing across the moon.
“Yeah,” said Adam, uninterested and not bothering to disguise it.
“Done rained a lot lately.”
“I guess,” said Adam. He looked back at the building. “What do you suppose is going on in there?”
“I don’t suppose,” said Uncle Luther. “Ain’t my business to suppose.”
He leaned against the trunk of the Buick, smoking his cigarette. After a moment, Adam joined him.
“What you want for dinner?” asked Uncle Luther.
And since when did his uncle ask a question like that? Adam stared at him. “I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve got no idea.”
“Catfish might be nice. Got to defrost ’em first, though. That might take too long.”
“I don’t care.” Adam’s voice was sharp.
Luther looked at him. “Okay,” he said, carefully. “You don’t care.”
“I should be in there.”
“If George wanted you in there, he wouldn’t have told me to take you out.”
“But they’re talking about me.”
Luther nodded. “I expect they are,” he said, abandoning the lie. “Expect they talkin’ ’bout a whole lot of other shit, too.”
“Did you hear what he said? ‘I suppose this is him.’ ‘Him.’ Like I ain’t got a name.”
“I heard.”
“I’m his damn nephew. And he acts like I don’t have a name?”
“That’s fucked up,” said Luther. “You got a right to be mad.”
“I’ve got a right to be in there.”
“Maybe,” said Uncle Luther, crushing out his cigarette. “Ain’t my call, though. Ain’t yours, neither.”
They were silent for a moment. Then Adam said, “Why would he treat me like that, Uncle Luther? What did I ever do to him?”
Luther gave him a look. “You askin’ me to explain white people? Might as well ask me to explain an atom bomb.”
And this was a truth Adam could not deny. He was white himself. Half white, at least. But white people were the Mariana Trench. White people were the far side of the moon.
They waited.
Uncle Luther lit another cigarette. Smoked it down.
They waited.
The door of West Haven flew open. Nick Simon came stalking out, his sister trotting to keep up. He had a cigar clenched so tightly in his jaw that it was a wonder he didn’t bite clean through it. The two of them walked toward a shiny black Cadillac parked on the other side of the small lot.
And Adam couldn’t help himself. “Hey, man,” he yelled, “what did I ever do to you?”
Nick’s head came up and he spun toward Adam. Uncle Luther came off the trunk, ready for confrontation, but Cora Simon hooked her brother’s arm and steered him back toward the car, whispering something in his ear.
Dad stepped through the door then. He looked drained. And Adam’s fury surged all over again. “Hey, man,” he cried. “What did you say to my dad?”
Now Nick wrenched his arm loose from his sister’s and whirled around. He closed the gap between them with three angry strides. Uncle Luther moved to intercept him, but there was no need. Nick stopped short of Adam and gave him a hard stare. His voice was like concrete slabs.
“Nigger,” he said, “I’ve never even met your ‘dad.’”
He waited. And then, apparently satisfied by whatever it was he saw on Adam’s face, he turned and allowed his sister to lead him away. She had backed out her Cadillac and was pulling into traffic before Adam remembered to close his mouth.