Where (14 page)

Listen, our Creator lifted me up! No prophecies this time, no burning bush to signify change. It just happened.

We woke up here, set out like chess pieces on a white board without markings, shuddering in the murderous heat. I took it as a sign. My people delivered to me, diminished by the glare. Helpless and terrified, they turned to me.
At last.

For their sake, I raged at the elements. I ran; I thought they would follow as I cried to heaven,
Explain!
They were poised to follow me anywhere. The great screen overhead came to life, and like dumb animals they turned away from me, looking for answers up there on the screen.

We watched and watched, but there were no answers up there, just TV.

Now, we Poulnots ruled on Kraven island for too long for Hampton Poulnot IV to give up. Delroy Root stood by me; he was weeping. I seized on him and climbed, and he was glad. I rose up like Gabriel, trumpeting,
Explain
! We ran like angels,
Explain
, and in that one perfect moment all of Kraven island united behind me, even Ray Powell, every one of us bawling,
“Explain.”

I had the power; it was magnificent. I thought,
This is my time.
Until the unknown entity moved its huge hand. Overhead, the pictures died. Then, God!
My people
turned on me! Me, the new Moses,
this close
to leading them out of the desert.

They blamed me.

My people dragged me down. They fell on me like jackals and then, help me, help me Jesus. It wasn't God, intervening. It was Ray Powell. He rose up all sacred and holy like the saints and popes, Ray Powell and Dorcas—
Where did that come from?
No!

He and Merrill,
your daughter,
carried me away before I could …
Dorcas? Is that you?

What were you up to all those years ago, you and sanctimonious Ray Powell, so grand. Kind, you told me the night before you left, so kind, were you meeting in some big city, planning our ruination?

Do you know what's happened? Do you even care?

Powell and that ingrate Merrill brought me to this white egg crate of a house, along with your perfidious son. My daughter and my best friend. Well, God. Damn. Them.

You will rot in hell for this you …
Dorcas,
and it will serve you right. At the door to this white hell, you … Merrill! You told your baby brother, that
child,
“Keep an eye on him,” and shoved us inside.
Imperious,
with your “Ned will take care of you,” and then— as if I'd forgotten!— Powell put both hands on my shoulders, “You need time to regroup,” and pushed me backward into this room, saying exactly what he said last time,
It's for your own good.

You said it with that same monstrous, kindly smile you smiled when you forced me out of the courthouse, Ray Powell. Like a father distracting a child with a little toy, you added, “You have a book to write,” you righteous prick.

Now the boy is gone, he waltzed out with that stalking dagger Rawson Steele; the man tweaked my hair as though I'd ceased to exist.

Well, I'll show you.

THINGS TO DO

First:
gather forces to find and confront the authorities here, and I will do it, but first!

A.
Regain control. Let my people dispose of Ray Powell.

No!
First:

A.
Regain my people's trust. They must follow without question.

a. Make them see every God. Damned. Thing I did for them, so they'll keep the faith!

It was Ray Powell who turned my people against me. Ray Powell shut me inside this box and locked me in, and they won't come and they don't send messages and they never visit, not even Merrill. The image of her mother and … Don't. b. What's b?

b. Make a Plan and lay it out for them, so they'll stop thinking what they're thinking and believe in me again.

Second:

Thank God the boy is gone, he and that sleek weasel; he came slinking into our town just before,
what was he doing there, why is he here—
he and my ungrateful little …

Et tu, motherfucker, the next time I lay hands on you …

I saw you leaving, Edward LaMar Poulnot, you and your friend the Antichrist. You cheeky bastard, you didn't even bother to sneak, but if you think I don't have the power to stop you, then God damn your eyes. You didn't escape. I let you go. It was a conscious decision, and I am damn glad to get shut of you. I need the space, and now. Now  …

When I die, and you turn me to ash  …

Stop that! No verse, not now, not when I  …

Second  …

Dear God, I don't know what
Second
is.

Understand, I am Hampton Calhoun Poulnot of the Poulnot family out of Charleston and Kraven island and nobody takes that away from me! I will go forth, and my people will rise up! With my people at my back I will find Ray Powell and lock Ray Powell in this antiseptic cell and see how he likes it. Then my people and I will march out and get Them or It or He who extracted us and dumped us here, we will get
out
of this place and I will get even, no matter who or what I have to destroy.

Although this is no Egypt and much is uncertain, I am, by God, their leader, and if I need to prove it all over again, I will. Without distractions, without the incessant chatter of the boy, badgering, cajoling, threatening me:— Eat this, Father.— Father, do that!— Father, can I  …

Like Moses, I need solitude to think.

When I die, reduce me to ash  …

Agh! Where did that come from? Dorcas, poetry I used to write for you, for all the good that did. Now, go away. Like Moses in the desert, I know my time has come, but unlike Moses, I don't have forty years! Are my people unfaithful? Were you?
Leave me alone!

Stop. We were put here in the great white nothing for a purpose, and I
will not move
until I have divined it.

You who put me here, listen!

I was in charge! Now look. Moses and his people made it out of the desert by the grace of God, but if Ray Powell could bring me down, who's to say whether or not there is a God, or whether He caused this or if He is watching or whose side He is on, and if He or It or They.…

Don't!
About the explanations, there will be no explanations. Focus on the plan.

My list. Must. Make. List.

First
No.
Second  …

And once it's done, sift my ashes for gold  …

Damn you, damnable, mealymouthed, shiteating
verse
drifting in like the perfume in the handkerchief that Dorcas left behind. His people complained but they followed Moses, unlike my egregious, whining malcontents.

Every great leader has moments of doubt, but this  …

Look at us, honest Carolinians all, born of good families, set down in the desert like so many objects, rearranged to please the eye. Unless we're livestock, waiting for the the butcher's axe.

God it's quiet. Guilt rushes in to fill the space.

When I die, sift my ashes for gold.

No, forgiveness can't be bought or sold  …

Dorcas, not now, I have things to do. But at this great distance,
after all this time,
certain
things I did
rise up and congeal in my throat: the past lodges like a clot— can't cough it up, can't make it go down. Must think, I have to
think,
but you entered the space like an invading army, filling me with  … If I knew, I would put it away, but vengeful God, you have raised Dorcas Lanieuville, and I can't.

… but gold pulled from ash can be melted down

“Don't!”

What do you want from me, Dorcas? Presents, after all the presents you refused? Apologies? Why should I apologize? You're the one who ran out on us. After everything I did for you.

God I need a drink.

Even Moses had bad days, right?

Every leader was young once, idealistic, full of hope. I came back to the island from Clemson and two years in the Army, three in law school, and in time, my people made me a judge and I was happy, up to a point. I met Dorcas one night in Savannah— so pretty, but we in the Carolinas come out of a great tradition, and her people didn't
do
like we do. Still, I went back to see Dorcas again and again; she was so lovely and so needy, we loved each other so much.

I rescued her from her sordid life. Voodoo white-trash family, squatting in the Savannah salt marsh; their kind goes in and out with the tides, but my Dorcas rose up out of the mud all glowing and lovely. I brought her home to Kraven, and then. Oh, then  … I'm sorry you made me mad, but  … I gave you Mama's diamonds to make up for it, and that other time, I gave you the Calhoun coin silver because I couldn't erase the scar and you know I loved you
so much.
Never mind what we said to each other that first time or what came between us or what I did to her later, when I was drunk. You were wrong to leave my offerings behind when you ran, but you.

It was the pressure. The demands on a great leader are tremendous. You may control your people, but you can't curb their wants. Blame the pressure of their expectations, Dorcas. It's huge! Could you not grant me that? Was it that bad between us, certain things I said or did to you? It was an accident! Some, I still remember. Most, I'd rather not, but you have to understand. A leader is a force of nature, like God. In hurricanes, when the eye crosses our island the air is still, but the wind will come, and when that 'cane roars back in on you, there's no stopping what comes next.

So wrong.

Woman, what do you want from me?
I carried the weight of all Kraven on my shoulders. Their wants. No, their
needs
bored into the living heart of me, and if I snapped in your presence and let it all fly, you know I loved you, and you must have known why. So what if I drank to relax and sometimes I flew off, I'll never forgive you for taking our problems out of the house.

That night I followed you to his office, you were in there past midnight, conspiring! I didn't ask and you never said, but I know. And what were you and he doing on all those other nights when you left my house in tears, what were you doing anyway?

Second
  …

“Bitch, what do you want from me!”

Things you should have said and never said.

When I die, if the things I said  …

Dear God, here I am with all our lives and safety at risk, with all our futures in my hands, and I'm hung up on a God. Damned. Poem. This is what failure does to you. Can't talk, can't argue, can't get out to raise my army, I can't even finish this wretched to-do list.

Instead I sit here pushing words around as though, as soon as they march in order, I can get her back, no. As though I can make certain corrections and move on. OK, woman! I'll do this thing, and then, and then  …

When I die, sift my ashes for gold.

No, forgiveness can't be bought or sold

but gold pulled from ash can be melted down

to a medal or a golden crown.

The best I can do, after years of shit.

You were wise to run away from it.

Hours here, and this is all I have? Oh God. Woman, I have responsibilities! So much to do, so many things standing in my way and now, you, whole in spite of certain things I did to you, Dorcas, you're back again, too big for the space.

You do what you have to, to get things done.

I lived in the hour, but Dorcas foresaw. The woman knew what I would become without her to stand between me and her young, but the woman left me— was I that bad, that she vanished with no warning and without explanation? Did she not care what happened to them?

Winds destroy, survivors float

Unfaithful women drown and bloat.

The bitch didn't even leave a note.

 

16

Merrill

Now

Ned comes in, and night and silence blow out the door. After years spent battling Father, after a string of so-so roommates, after all the joy and confusion that came with Davy moving in, I was getting used to coming home to peace and order. I like walking into silence, everything where I left it, nothing to do, nobody expecting anything.

Now my still, featureless house is filling up with need.

Neddy slams into me and locks his arms so tight that I gasp. Clamping me in that hug, he twirls us so my back is to the door. I know he's hiding something, but I'm so glad to see him that I let it play. We're spinning in the moment, Neddy and me, all,
not yet, make it last, it's been too long!
I could swear he's grown. He's so strong that I have to run my fingers up under the baggy hoodie and drum on his ribs to make him giggle and let go.

He smells like my brother but he doesn't; I catch subtle hints of, what. Men's deodorant and motor oil and— wait. One other thing. Oh! I get it, but I don't want to.

I hold him off so I can study him. Instead of acknowledging the man poised on the sill, neither outside nor in, I draw on recent history. “You were smoking weed.”

“As if!”

So much for assumptions. This is not his shirt. Everything we thought before here— before
this place
— is long gone.

The intruder speaks. “In your dreams, lady. Hello again.”

Yes, this is what I have been avoiding. Magnetic, in spite of everything that stands between us.
You're not that person now, leave her back in high school, you're done yearning after guys you know are bad for you.
“What are you, stalking me?”