CHAPTER 27

In this new world that existed with the Missus dead and Mr. Kern halfway there, I wondered what Fletcher would do with his blessed freedom. Would he move to some faraway city and join a cause? Would he dash back to school in such haste that none of us would even have opportunity to say goodbye? Would he remake his identity into that of his own choosing and live by that deliverance it gave? The world was truly before him like never before and, for once, it seemed that no one held him back. So it came as a shock to both Floyd and myself when Fletcher returned to the plantation with his bags in hand that spring, the leaves a supple green behind his head as he stood on that front porch.

Fletcher took Mr. Kern’s old room, as the old man was now confined to a wheelchair and unable to manage the stairs on his own. Because neither Silva nor I could carry him, he remained downstairs permanently from that day on. Fletcher declined to change a single detail of the room, from the opened box of baking soda that sat on the dresser to the old man’s boots lying on the floor beneath the window. Even the bedsheets were left as they were, the shredded curtains remaining parted at the exact same measurements that he’d found them, only the wind changing their original position once he’d arrived.

From Fletcher’s window the young man could look out and see the shaded area near the backhouse where the shed and stables sat, a comfortable spot situated between two trees where Silva and I would roll Mr. Kern in the afternoons so the old man did not spend his entire days alone in his parlor, which he was quite content to do if we’d allowed him. During these times, whatever we thought was good for him stuck, as he could not argue in opposition, although he did wiggle and grunt as a child would. While seated there with Mr. Kern in that outside area, it occurred to me more than once that I’d glance up to that second-story window of Mr. Kern’s old room and catch sight of Fletcher seated there with his eyes set on the Mister, as if trying hard to draw a connection between himself and the old man, attempting to find any emotion that would show one was father and the other son.

Nonetheless, Fletcher was an army of one most times, rarely seen outside of his room during this period of Mr. Kern’s recovery. He did not venture downstairs except for mealtimes where he ate slowly and purposefully, both he and Mr. Kern seated across from one another like opponents inside a ring. They ate silently, watching each other before they returned to their respective rooms as quietly as they’d emerged. Fletcher’s presence inside the house was easy to forget, as he did not welcome family or friends as others might have, and was not even a pain like the Missus had been with her frequent requests. The young man was a locked box, forgetting us all, including Jesse, whom he’d somehow failed to remember was his own kin. Sadly, the two rarely spoke unless Fletcher had some new directive, which he delivered to Floyd and subsequently had Floyd pass down to the other workers, Jesse included. It was in my snooping that I overheard Floyd once refer to the young man as Mister, his words emerging like some barking dog to my ears, as if Floyd himself had not raised the boy out there and taught him everything he knew about this life.

Even Silva found herself arriving to work on schedule, completing her duties in a timely manner, and leaving by nightfall without a word or even a sighting of her son other than those mealtimes and his sullen presence at that upstairs window. Fletcher spoke to no one during those days and kept his intentions to himself more than a thief before police interrogation. Still, by the time that summer arrived, we had each settled into new routines and that unmistakable rhythm the house possessed. It had consumed us all, its order coming by way of that returned silence the house impressed upon our civility, its watchful eye a soothing matter at the end of the day, as we knew we would never escape this servitude but that this protection kept us alive and breathing even if only to torture us. Fletcher, although quiet in nature, commanded all we did, and indeed noticed everything that took place inside that home, even if he never left that upper room. His omniscience was a sight from God that could notice even the smallest detail of his space.

It was one afternoon that he stopped me at the table. Although he had skipped breakfast that morning of his own accord, as he sometimes did, he looked at me as if he’d somehow seen everything we did.

“I swear something’s different about this place, Miss Bernie,” he said flippantly.

“Can’t be any different than last night,” I teased back.

“Maybe I’m different then,” he acknowledged. “I don’t know if I look different, but something’s off.”

“No, Fletcher, you don’t,” I said. “You still look like that same little boy to me.”

“But we’ve all changed,” he sighed. “It’s inevitable, and I don’t doubt things can happen overnight anymore. If God created this world and everything we know in it in six days, who says He can’t change it in just one?”

“Now there you go poking at a Pandora’s box,” I said. “Don’t open what you can’t close.”

Fletcher smiled, his eyes that innocence that remained from his childhood and would be with him until the day he died, I was sure.

“What makes me think you’re talking about more than just moving the bed frame?” he now said, feigning a smile that was no better than a snare.

“No, Fletcher, that’s about it,” I said, hesitant in my delivery as if speaking to God Himself. “We needed a cool area to put Mr. Kern now that summer’s approaching. Silva and I thought it might be okay to place him in there for now.”

“Mama knows best,” he said, forcing his face into another awkward smile.

He studied the room carefully.

“I think this summer’s gonna be hotter than the last,” he continued, “but only time will tell. By the end we may all need a cool place to hide. You just never know with this type of heat.”

His eyes reminded me of the Missus at that moment, cold and distant, always perpetuating some secret inside his own mind. Still, the young man was charming, a glint of the old boy I hadn’t seen since he’d moved inside the house. He was just as lovely and pleasant as he’d ever been as he now looked around wistfully in recollection of this place from his youth.

“Seems I got my wish then,” he said, not seeming to direct these words at me as much as he directed them inward, although he awaited my response nonetheless.

“What’s that, Fletcher?” I asked.

“I got my wish,” he repeated. “You remember when I told you out at the stables that I wanted to stay here for a long time?”

“Yes,” I replied.

“Well, my wish came true,” he said cunningly, with a smile that burns me even to this day to remember.

In that moment he was no longer a slave, as he’d once considered, for his existence inside that house was now a circumstance of his own choosing, although he failed to recognize the score of wealthy men who were each slaves to their fortunes and indeed all of those fanciful tyrants who wielded influence over many people yet held less authority over their own lives than the servants they commanded. With every part of my being that was sane and full of sharp thoughts and reason, I believed Fletcher to be insincere in his words, yet part of me somehow knew he was nothing if not truthful. For I had seen that boy remain in constant search of a place to belong ever since that rocky childhood when the lie was first created. That it had started at that house when he was only sixteen years old and told he could not remain throughout the winter like his mother and brother who stayed on to work for the family indefinitely. That he then traveled to Jackson and hoped for a place amongst his family in those parts, only to be sent back to Greenwood and hushed anytime he spoke about his time in the city or how well he fit in with those negroes and their just cause. Still, he’d had school to look forward to as he’d journeyed to that far-off place where he had hoped he’d find a loyal community amongst the intellectuals, yet this reality was stripped away just as quickly as the others when he was summoned back to the plantation for work alongside those negroes who picked and chopped cotton each year, their hands rough and their sights set far away from those enlightened souls he’d known up north. He’d finally lost the tan he’d developed with those workers out there and was now as pasty as the Missus (on her better days nonetheless) while those workers retained their color like the dark shade of midnight when that hour finally came. Then there was that final connection he’d held to the most, that was shattered some million times over with the realization that Jesse was not of his family. And so now all he had left was this house and this family, for throughout his life it was the only place he truly belonged. He had accepted it and would never leave, God help him.

Never had I judged a person so wrongly before in my life, for so long attributing Fletcher’s desire to belong as some type of ambition that would lead him to do extraordinary things, when it was in fact nothing more than a chameleon’s flesh that covered his coward heart as the boy sought acceptance wherever it was he journeyed. The boy was just another wanderer amongst us who’d desired to fit in and asked for nothing more of this world than that simple wish to bear fruit. He was a vagabond, a soul freed from heaven and tarnished, dipped in this earthly pool and rusted like iron, the scars shown upon his heart like Adam when he’d eaten the apple. But who could blame Fletcher for his preference, to choose a life of consistency over the upheaval he’d endured for so long? Indeed, we’d all sought acceptance at one time or another: Henry in his flight from this cruel land, me with my hopes to one day join him, Floyd in his unwillingness to leave this plantation even as that work killed him, and even the Missus if one considered those forgone hopes she had of one day living alongside Elizabeth, the only person in this world who’d ever loved her, even if that young mouth knew not the words to call it. And then there was Jesse, the stubborn one, whom I feared had all the complacency in the world lodged inside that weak muscle in his chest, yet it was actually courage that propelled him to seek recognition inside the house and a way out of his circumstance in those fields and into a higher position that he might escape the sun and the calluses formed by working the land. He had all the guts yet none of the glory, for that was reserved for Fletcher and Fletcher alone.

Still, Fletcher was nothing if not smart, a stern man who held no strong emotions for one thing or the other. He made decisions based on reason and not a single ounce of pride or subjectivity. He treated others fairly, yet that fairness applied equally when considering both punishment and reward. He was a Kern for sure, and it was becoming more apparent with each passing day, as his silence drew longer and his eyes keenly perused the world around him. This control he had over the house now made sense the more I understood the pain he stood to lose it, that staunch resolve he had to never leave another place again in his life, fleeing once more in search of some distant home he was never sure he’d actually find. No, Fletcher made do with this world around him, and I never feared for one moment that he would not be content inside that house for the rest of his life.