Good Fortune (9781416998631) (55 page)

As we returned to the church setting, John's arm clasped around my shoulder, Daniel approached us. His figure was almost hazy to me.

“Daniel,” I said, “it's John …”

Daniel laughed, hearing the disbelief still weighing down my words. There was a sad edge to his laughter that I barely noticed in my daze.

“Just doesn't seem real,” I said, tightening my grip on John's arm for fear of him disappearing.

“Yeah, he came by this way,” Daniel explained as Florence walked up to his side.

“Heard us out here an' stopped to get somethin' to eat. Said he had been travelin' for a while. But then I caught
sight of him, or I reckon he saw me first. You shoulda seen him! His face lit up like a candle when he saw me. 'Course, the first words he muttered to me was somethin' like ‘Sarah … where's Sarah.'” Daniel smiled, but I saw some sadness in him behind his joy. After talking with John for a little while longer, sharing conversation I only caught bits and pieces of, he disappeared back into his celebration. Florence lingered longer, a large grin stretching across her face.

“So this is the John you told me was still livin', but we convinced you he wasn't.”

“This is him.”

“Well, John,” she said, smiling over at him, “I'm Anna's good friend, Flo.”

Hearing my new name, he looked down at me, and then back toward Florence.

“Well, it's good to meet you, Flo.”

She smiled once more, then turned and followed Daniel back into the crowd.

“Anna? That's what they call you round here?”

“That's what they call me.”

“Think I like it.”

I smiled.

“You know,
Anna
”—he looked out at the dancers who had gathered—“got somethin' to ask you.”

I laughed up at him, and held out my hand, knowing he wanted to dance with me. He took it without pause, and we walked toward the dancers together. Every person around us had disappeared. It was only him and me.

“Can we jus' sail away, you think?” And I flew away on his whisper, in his strong arms.

When we stopped dancing, breathless, we heard shouts of praise from the people around us. But we walked slowly away from the celebration, shoulder to shoulder, just the two of us.

“I was worried, but I think I know now that you're still just plain old John,” I said, looking up at him.

He laughed. “Wouldn't be no one else.” After a few minutes, he stopped and asked me another question.

“Sarah—
Anna
—can I look at you good? Ain't bin able to do that so well yet.”

I stopped in front of him, and he backed away and crossed his arms, attempting to examine me while I giggled. But his eyes locked with mine, and he seemed to have lost the key. I laughed and leaned back onto him, and we fell back into step.

“Don't have to look at me so hard, John. I'm here!”

“Ya, you here, Sarah. Anna. You here.”

As we walked farther and farther away from the wedding, we drifted in and out of conversation. We shared memories, ones that just appeared out of the hidden places in our hearts, and we tried to speak of John's escape and my school and the kind of life John wanted in Ohio. But disbelief stalled those conversations. They would need to wait for another time.

“Looka here, Miss Anna, if that's what I'm s'pose to call you. I don't wanna hear nothin' else 'bout nothin'! Jus' sing or laugh or don't do nothin' but lean 'gainst me like you
doin' now. That's good 'nough fo' me. Got the whole world an' my whole life to talk 'bout all that important stuff. Right now, jus' wanna be wit you. That's all that mattas.”

So we walked on down the path toward the school building. I found myself lost in John's frequent smiles down at me, every glance proof that he really walked by my side. When silence descended upon us for long moments at a time, it spoke louder than our words. I observed that John had new lash marks around his neck that disappeared down his shirt and that his hands were calloused like before.

“Anna, these three years done made you different. You a grown woman, taller than befo', tho' still pretty an' all. You sound different, too, like bein' free done made you handle life as if you know you really own yourself.”

I smiled softly. “I do, John. I do.”

He nodded and continued, “Speak like you done bin educated yo' whole life, too. Got a lot to teach me.”

I laughed at that, sipping in his talk like I was quenching my thirst.

“But even wit all that, you still ain't changed. Your soul is still the same, an' that makes me happy.”

I looked in his eyes and sighed, shaking my head.

“What?” he asked, innocently. “That's good, ain't it?”

I laughed. “Sure it is. It's just … John, I thought you were dead! I thought I'd have to wait until I died to see you again.”

John stopped and turned to me, seriousness covering his smile.

“Sarah, I didn't know three years could be so long—three
years away from you. I'm … I'm sorry, Sarah. Three years waitin' sho' ain't the same as two years runnin'. Didn't know where you were. Gotta say, there was times I didn't think I could keep lookin' my whole life. I figured jus' wat you say, that when I die, an' when you die, then I see you agin. So, well, I thought 'bout bein' wit someone else. But there ain't no harm in that, right?” he asked, looking at me uncertainly.

I shrugged the thoughts away, my eyes on the ground ahead of me. “John, how can I say there's harm in that when you're here?” I asked him, softly, my eyes returning to his face.

“Well, anyway, it seems I could neva think that too long, anyhow,” he said, walking once more. “Jus' couldn't. Made up my mind I'd search round an' round this country fo' you, long as you still had to be found.”

“How'd you find me?” I asked him.

He looked at me strangely and laughed.

“Sorry, Miss Anna, but that's one question I jus' don't have no good answer for 'cause I jus' don't rightly know.”

We reached the school. John stood in front of it, his hands on his hips, and inspected it from the edge of the clearing.

“So, this is what you bin up to. Havin' schools built an' all. All this, fo' you?” he asked, amused.

I laughed. “I'm a teacher, John. It's for the children.”

He nodded. “Teachin'. Well, you sho' is my Sarah.”

We lay down, him on his stomach, and me with my head on his back. The sunset looked on, brightening the sky, expressing how happy it was to see my joy. John hopped
up and lifted me again in his arms. We danced to our own music. We ran through the schoolhouse. We laughed until it hurt our bellies. We fell, exhausted, to the grass when the sun had completely set, and looked at the stars.

I drifted off to sleep lying in John's arms, guarded by his watchful gaze. He touched his lips with mine. He wiped my tear away. He picked up my finger and ran it down his cheek, under his chin, and up the other side. I knew what God had brought back into my life: John was my angel whether he knew it or not.

If I had two wings, I would take those wings and cover you, completely, until not an inch was visible, so you'd be protected … from everything
.

CHAPTER
 
52 

I
T WAS DANIEL
,
THAT NIGHT
,
WHO BROKE DOWN CRYING
.

John had been around for two days, and it was the second night that the four of us decided to come together, eat, and share stories of escape.

There were living quarters on the second level of the schoolhouse. In the weeks after it had been finished, I had fixed it so that I could live there until I could build my own house. It had two small rooms. The bedroom had a round table that was pushed into the corner and a single broken-down night table next to the pallet I had set on the floor. The cooking area was actually in a room below.

But I wouldn't be alone here now. I had John. He would be living with some of Daniel's friends until it was appropriate for him to move into the schoolhouse.

“One day real soon, after I find me a job, I'm gonna make you one of them nice beds, Sarah,” John told me. I grinned with delight.

Each of the rooms upstairs had a single window, while the large schoolroom downstairs had three. In addition, there was plenty of room outside to start a garden if need be and for the schoolchildren to play.

It was in my room that I intended the four of us to sit that evening. When Daniel and Florence arrived, I was setting two biscuits and some bacon on the four plates. I greeted them, sat them in my room with John, who was busy fixing my night table, and went back to preparing the food. Daniel poked his head through the doorway.

“Anna,” he said softly, walking into the room.

“Hey, Daniel, what is it?” He had hardly sat down in the chair near me before the tears came to his eyes.

“I know … I know you may have it in your head that Mama jus' didn't run.”

I stopped what I was doing, staring hard at the food in front of me before turning toward him.

“Well, I figured since John came by himself, she …”

He hung his head. “He didn't come by himself, Anna. Talked to John about it. Mama, she ran with him, Anna.”

My knees buckled and I sank to the floor.

“Where is she?”

“She went wit him, Sarah, but she didn't make it.”

“They didn't catch her, did they?” I asked Daniel in a horrified whisper.

“Naw,” he said, shaking his head. I felt relieved, but overwhelmed with sadness. A memory suddenly came to mind.

“I had a dream about Mary,” I began, afraid to look up, afraid I would see accusation of me not sharing this with him leap from Daniel's eyes. “She was flying in the sky with my real mother, and they both had wings, like angels. I think Mary … I think she wanted to tell us that she …
she's content where she is. That she's happy, and even freer than we are.”

Daniel's tears flowed as he ran his nails across the floor boards.

“They was split up, like me an' you. John found her. He found her lyin' there. He said—he said there wa'an't a line of struggle 'cross her face. Seem like God jus' come an' stop her heart so quick, she ain't feel a thing.”

I pulled lightly at my earlobe and looked up at my brother. “You're not feeling that you're to blame, are you Daniel?” I asked him softly. He put his thumb to his lip in thought.

“Thought I would. Thought I—” Florence pushed the door open, cutting him off, and got ready to open her mouth as if to ask what was taking so long. But seeing Daniel seated like he was, and his wet cheeks, and me seated on the ground, she changed her mind. She walked over and stood behind Daniel, placing her soft hands on his shoulders.

“Thought I would feel that way, Anna,” Daniel continued, “but it's almost like I hear her sayin' that's what was for her—that's what was to be. Wa'an't nothin' I could do about it.” He then stood up. Florence leaped at the chance to embrace him in a hug, which he fell into weakly. I found my breath and told them to grab their plates of food. We headed on into my room and listened as John recounted his escape.