FOR THE FIRST HOUR, THEY HARDLY SPOKE.
It wasn’t a comfortable silence. Rather, it was the silence of things unsaid, the silence of Lord, where to begin. It was a silence flowing from that brand of kinship shared by strangers with blood ties, but no frame of reference in common. Of “family” with nothing to say to one another.
Yet though it was a bad silence, Adam was grateful for it just the same. His head was throbbing as if a convoy of eighteen-wheelers was driving down the middle of his skull. And simple sunlight felt like someone dumping hot coals on his eyes. Even in the balm of shadow—the hospital had given him a pair of disposable sunglasses—he had to squint to see.
He had a bad concussion, the doctor had said. He was over the worst of it, but he would still need a few days to recuperate. And there was no way he would be able to participate in today’s march. The doctor had said this as if bracing for resistance. But Adam had only nodded and mumbled, “Okay.” Even if he hadn’t been in excruciating pain, he had no interest in facing down white men with clubs again any time soon.
So he sat there next to his uncle in the front seat of the careening Buick, peeking through the flimsy plastic shades, giving thanks for the blessing of a silence broken only by the grumbling of rubber against asphalt. Not even the radio played. His uncle lit a cigarette, cranking down the driver’s side window to lure the smoke.
Adam had been surprised to find Luther waiting for him when he was discharged from the hospital. He had supposed he’d have to call one of the Negro cab companies or try to reach someone in SNCC to give him a ride. Instead, Luther was there, announcing that he’d been dispatched by Adam’s mother to take him back to Mobile and let him rest up for a few days.
It had caught Adam by surprise. He knew that even two months later, Mom was still angry he had slipped out of town a semester short of graduation and come down here to join the voting rights campaign. Whenever he saw her again, he knew he would catch a basket full of hell for that. But your mom is always your mom, he supposed. When you’re in trouble, she sends help.
Even when she’s angry with you. Even when you’ve never been close. It was a reassuring thought.
At length, Luther spoke out of the silence.
“Ain’t got but the one bedroom,” he said.
“I remember,” said Adam. “The apartment over the barbershop.”
“That’s right. But the couch in the living room folds out. You can sleep on that.”
“That’ll be fine, Uncle. Thank you.”
“Your mother was real worried about you.”
Adam didn’t know what to say to this, so he didn’t say anything.
“She said you sneaked out of town without her knowin’.”
“I guess I did. Wasn’t like it was that hard, though.”
Adam felt, rather than saw, Luther’s gaze tighten. “Mmm,” he said.
There was another silence. Then Luther said in a mild tone, “I was surprised to find out you were here. Been here a couple months, Thelma said. Why didn’t you call?”
“I was going to wait till we were done with our work up here. Come down and surprise you.”
He was relieved when his uncle simply nodded, accepting the explanation without pushing for more. Because what Adam had said was truthful without being honest. The fact was, he had not reached out because he was intimidated by his mother’s brother—almost as much as by his mother herself. For some reason he could never quite explain, he always felt like he was on trial when he was with them. Luther had never mistreated him, never even raised a voice toward him, but Adam was pretty sure all the same that his uncle did not like him. In fact, if his mother’s brother had ever so much as smiled at him, Adam couldn’t recall.
Luther was getting older. He was thick around the middle, flecks of white colonizing the hair he kept cut short enough to make an army drill sergeant smile. But his face was still all hard angles and eyes that seemed to see everything but give away nothing. He still made you want to take a step back and not give him any grief.
Now Luther said, “You may see George while you’re down here. Your mother say he and your pastor and some others comin’ down to join this next march.”
Adam brightened. “Dad’s coming?”
Something unreadable crimped Luther’s lips. “Yeah,” he said. “But don’t ask me about driving you back to Selma to meet him. He can come down to pick you up in Mobile if he want, but I’m for getting out of here fast as I can—and staying out.”
“Me too,” said Adam.
This seemed to catch his uncle by surprise. “Really?”
Adam nodded, wincing from the pain. “I’ve seen enough of Selma to last awhile,” he said. He tried to smile, wasn’t sure if he made it.
Luther regarded him for a moment. “I guess that make two of us,” he said. “And I ain’t even been hit upside the head with no billy club.”
“It’s not something I recommend,” said Adam.
This brought a snort that might have been laughter, then his uncle turned his attention back to the road. He finished one cigarette, lit another from the lighter on the dashboard. A moment later, Adam lowered his window. He had always hated the smell of cigarette smoke, but this morning, it made him downright nauseous. Another effect of the concussion, he supposed.
They drove. Ramshackle homes alternated with farm fields. Luther seemed in no hurry to speak again, but the silence suited Adam just fine. After a moment, he closed his eyes. The motion of the car, the hiss of the tires on asphalt, were therapeutic, hypnotic. Time passed. Safe in the darkness, Adam was lulled, pulled into tranquility’s embrace. He almost slept.
Then the gunshot brought him wide awake.
He bolted upright, looked over at Luther. His uncle was grimacing, hands curled hard upon a steering wheel that was trying to wrench itself from his grip. There was the ugly flap flap flap of deflated rubber on asphalt as the vehicle slowed. And Adam realized he had not heard a gunshot after all. Just a tire blowing out. He dry swallowed. Tried to get his breathing under control.
The Buick rolled to a stop on the side of the road next to a winter-dead field where stray puffs of white fiber still clung to brown stalks. “Shit,” said Luther. “Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.”
“You got a spare?” asked Adam.
A deep sigh. “Yeah, I got a spare.”
He turned the ignition off, pulled his keys. Adam said, “You need help?”
“Best help you can give me in your condition is to stay right where you are.” Luther was already out of the car.
“You don’t have to tell me twice.” Adam sat back and closed his eyes.
The world became sounds. The creak of the trunk popping open. The clanking of the jack as it was pulled out. A grunt of effort from his uncle. The whisper of the spare on asphalt as Luther rolled it along.
The flat was on the driver’s side in the front. Adam heard the metallic groan of each lug nut as it came loose. The jack scraped as it was put in place. After a moment, Adam felt the car rising beneath him. The ruined tire came off and the spare went on. Then Luther said, “Oh, shit.”
“Don’t tell me,” said Adam, his eyes still closed. “Your spare is flat.”
Luther’s vice was rigid. “Open the glove box. There’s a gun in there. Give it to me.”
Adam’s eyes opened. “What?”
“Do what I tell you. Do it now.” Uncle Luther was standing straight as a plumb line next to the driver’s door, his right palm splayed wide behind him, reaching into the open window, waiting for the gun. Adam followed his uncle’s gaze to where a pickup truck was slowing to a stop behind them. A dirty Confederate battle flag was draped across the grill.
Adam said, “Shit.” He fumbled the glove compartment open and was just sliding the pistol into Luther’s hand when the doors of the truck opened on both sides and three white men came out. Using his body to shield his actions from their view, Uncle Luther tucked the weapon in at the small of his back, covering it with his shirttail. The three men moved with the unhurried authority of police making a traffic stop. But these men, in their overalls and jeans and rough work shirts, were not law enforcement. Their authority stemmed from the fact that they were white—and Adam and his uncle were not.
Two of them confronted Uncle Luther. The third came up by Adam’s door.
One of them, a bear of a man with a reddish-brown shrub of beard hanging to his sternum, addressed Luther. “Havin’ car trouble there, boy?” There was a smile down in the tangle of his facial hair, but it was as false as the friendliness of his voice.
“Flat tire,” said Uncle Luther. He returned the false smile with one of his own. “Nothin’ I can’t handle. Got to tighten this spare here and we’ll be on our way.”
“You from here?”
“Mobile,” said Uncle Luther.
“That’s where you headed back to?”
“Yeah.”
“Y’all had some business up here?”
Uncle Luther was still smiling and it was still as false as a car dealer’s promises. He wanted to tell the man it was none of his damn business what business he had here or anywhere else. Any fool could see this and there was a crazy moment when Adam thought his uncle would give in to that temptation. Instead, he said, “Yeah, you might say that.”
The bearded man cocked an eyebrow like a gun. “I might?”
The man behind him piped up now. “Danny, this one’s plumb got a attitude. Can’t you see it? I don’t think he like you much.”
Another fake grin. “Really? You got to be mistaken there, Buddy. Everybody like me. Hell, I’m the easiest guy in the world to get along with.”
“Ain’t got no attitude toward you,” said Luther. And then he added, as an afterthought, “Sir.” He had held the false smile so long that it was just a grimace with teeth showing.
Any second now, the man would see that. Any second, he would call Uncle Luther on it. Then, the one next to Adam spoke. “Hey, what’s with Ray Charles here?” He reached in and snatched the flimsy sunglasses from Adam’s eyes. Adam recoiled from the sudden explosion of light, brought his hands up to cover his face. He heard the one next to him say, “Hey, y’all, look at me,” and supposed he must have put the sunglasses on. The supposition was confirmed when he heard the moron start singing in a toneless approximation of Ray Charles.
“Georgia … Georgia …”
“What’s wrong with your friend?” asked Danny with what sounded like genuine curiosity.
“Eyes are messed up,” said Uncle Luther. “The light hurts them.”
“That ain’t all.” This was the one called Buddy. “His head’s all bandaged up.”
Adam heard the big man give a low whistle. “I do declare, you’re right. How’d you get all banged up, boy? You ain’t one of them protesters was makin’ all that racket, are you?”
Adam forced his eyes open in narrow slits. He was about to reply, though he had no idea what he would say. Then Uncle Luther beat him to it. “Yeah,” he said in a hard voice, “he one of ’em, all right. My sister’s boy from New York. When I heard he was here, stirrin’ up trouble, I was plenty pissed off, I tell you. Drove up here ready to kick his ass all over lower Alabama, then I found out one of them state troopers done saved me the trouble.” Uncle Luther’s hand rested casually on the door frame, just inches from the gun in the middle of his back.
“Is that a fact?” The man called Danny was scratching at his beard reflectively.
“It is a fact, sir,” said Uncle Luther. “Takin’ him home with me so he can rest a few days, then I’m puttin’ his ass on a bus back to New York City where he belong. I done already told him, don’t come back down here till he know how to stay in his place.”
The one named Buddy said, “That’s a right smart idea.” He yelled to Adam. “You hear that, boy? Pay attention to your uncle here. He’s smart. He’ll keep you out of trouble.”
The moron said, “We should beat him up anyway. Make sure he done learned his lesson.”
Danny regarded Luther for a long moment without speaking. Adam saw his uncle’s hand move fractionally closer to the center of his back. Then Danny smiled, and for the first time, there was genuine humor in it. “Nah,” he said. “We can mosey along. His uncle got things in hand.”
And then, to Luther: “You can carry on. We just wanted to stop and make sure you wasn’t one of them so-called ‘nonviolent protestors.’”
Uncle Luther gave another lying smile. “No, sir,” he said earnestly, “I don’t believe in that nonviolence.” And as the white man had not seen the falseness of the smile, neither did he hear the duality of the words, the threat sleeping quietly within them like a viper in a woodpile.
Danny waved at the other two. “Come on, fellas, let’s let these boys be on their way.”
They made their way back to the truck, the moron still wearing Adam’s hospital glasses, walking with his hands out before him like a blind man, as the other two guffawed. “Willard, you’re such a fool,” one of them said.
The truck came to life with a roar. Moments later, it swept past the Buick in a great gust of road debris. Uncle Luther stood there until they were gone. Then he went back to changing the tire, his movements as brisk as if he were on a pit crew.
When he was done, Luther cranked the jack down. He returned it to the trunk, which he slammed. Then he slammed the car door as he took his seat behind the wheel. For a moment, Luther just sat there. Adam feared to speak. Abruptly, Luther turned, spearing him with his index finger. “When I tell you give me my fuckin’ gun, boy, you give it to me, you hear? Don’t be hesitatin’. Don’t make me ask you twice.”
Adam nodded. He could manage nothing more. For a moment they sat facing one another, still as stone. Then, whatever he saw in his nephew’s face slowly gentled Uncle Luther’s gaze. He reached up to his sun visor, produced a pair of sunglasses and handed them across. “Here,” he said, “put these on.”
Adam did as he was told. The shade was like a kiss of grace. His head was throbbing. He hadn’t realized it until just this moment. “I’m s-sorry,” he stammered.
Uncle Luther sighed as he started the car and wheeled it onto the road. “No,” he said, “I’m the one sorry. Ain’t had no call to yell at you. It’s just … I hate dealin’ with these country-ass crackers. Think they can talk to you any kind of way, treat you any kind of way, like you ain’t just as much a man as they is.”
“That was slick the way you handled them,” said Adam.
“Done had lots of practice,” said Uncle Luther. “Too much practice. If you a Negro in Alabama, you learn.” He was lighting a cigarette. “Don’t make it easy,” he said, blowing out smoke. “Ain’t easy by a long shot.”
“Mama hates it down here,” said Adam.
“Yeah, I know.”
“Says she got out once and ‘ain’t never goin’ back again.’ Dad used to try to get her to come with him just for a visit and she wouldn’t even do that.”
“Can’t say I blame her.”
“How come you stay? How come you never left like she did?”
The tip of the cigarette glowed fiercely orange as Uncle Luther took a long drag. His eyes were distant as he blew out smoke that was instantly shredded by the breeze. He said, “We look at it different, your mother and me. She don’t want nothin’ else to do with Alabama and I understand that. But me? These motherfuckers drove us off our land when I wasn’t but a boy. I’ll be goddamned if I’ll let ’em drive me out the whole state. I got as much right to be here as they do.”
Adam was silent for a moment. Then he said, “You know, Mama won’t talk about that. What happened, I mean.”
Luther said, “She was only a baby. Not even three yet. She don’t remember it.”
“No,” said Adam, “I mean, she won’t talk about it. None of it. Not at all. When I ask her, she changes the subject. If I ask her again, she gets mad.”
“Well, you can’t blame her,” said Luther. “That ain’t easy to talk about. Even for me, it ain’t.”
“I know,” said Adam. “But they were my grandparents. And I don’t know a damn thing about them.”
“No way for you to know,” said Luther, nodding.
Adam hesitated. Then he said, “Would you tell me about them?”
Luther glanced over. Then he returned his eyes to the road. “You don’t know what you askin’,” he said.
Adam felt like a trespasser. “I’m sorry,” he said, softly. “I guess I don’t.”
His uncle did not respond. After a moment, he pulled over. They sat by the side of the road. A hawk drifted lazily overhead. The trees were filled with the sawing of insects. Uncle Luther gazed inward. Adam feared to speak. Finally, his uncle’s mouth twisted, a decision made. He wheeled the car around in a great wide arc and turned it back north.
“Where are we going?” asked Adam.
“You want to know about your grandparents,” said Luther. “Fine. You got a right. I’m takin’ you to their farm.” He turned so that their eyes met. “I’m takin’ you to where they died,” he said.