A Dead Man Speaks Read online

  Daddy.

  The letter I’d been waiting for, for so long felt like a knife that had been jabbed in me. Not deep enough for me to die right away, just enough for my life that had been to trickle out of me in a slow stream. The letter fell from my hands. I felt Daddy there on that cool fall day, sitting next to me, trying to make it all right. I could almost feel his heavy arm around me, just like the day he took me from Gramma Deedee’s. Making the hurt go away. ’Cause the truth hurt so much.

  I lay there for a long time that day. Until the blue sky had turned to black and the cool breeze was a cold wind cutting through me. A strange silence settled over me. After a while, I could hear the dawn starting to come, the birds and the wind and the sounds of the town below me. I think that’s when the change happened. Because from that moment, I decided that I wouldn’t be hurt by the truth ever again. From that point on, the only truth would be what I decided it was gonna be. So now I was somebody new. Hendersonville with its foul secrets and unhappiness weren’t a part of my truth anymore. It was dead. More dead than Daddy, more dead than the little boy who died with him.

  I was now Clive January, from Atlanta, GA, only son of a decorated Vietnam vet. Hell, Daddy could’ve kicked ass in Nam if he’d had to. So I didn’t feel bad. And it gave me a whole new feeling as if I’d shed the old skin and become someone new. And I wasn’t looking back. I squeezed the last drops of my drink out of the glass as I heard a loud voice behind me.

  “Congratulations big guy. We made it!” Red slapped me on the back, sloshing beer on the table as he lowered himself into the chair. Red was one big white boy. He got that nickname ’cause of the color of his skin, bright red with blondish red hair. When I first met him, I thought he was just another cracker only from up North instead of the South.

  But as I got to know him, I realized that he wasn’t all that different from me, except that he was white and I was black. Red was running from something, too. He didn’t talk much about his family or his past, and I didn’t ask him. He didn’t ask me much about myself either. I guess that’s why we became friends. Neither of us talked about the past. Just the future. And we both had the same dream. Money. Shitloads of money. So much money that we could say “fuck you” to anybody and mean it.

  Red leaned over to me as he took a huge gulp of beer. “You know partner, I got this feeling in my bones that we’re gonna make it real big in New York. You ever been to New York?”

  I shook my head no.

  “Me neither, but a buddy of mine used to go there every summer. He’s the one that told me that New York is the place to go to make the serious money.”

  I smiled. I got a little thrill every time I thought about New York. Almost like the city was a woman. Waiting to be conquered. And I was ready. I grabbed a pretzel, biting down into the salty part. I kicked back in my chair. “Why else do you think we’re going there? Not to fuck around, that’s for damn sure.”

  Red cracked up. “I hear you, buddy.”

  I turned to the bartender. “I’ll take another one of these.” I held up my empty glass. “And he’ll…” But before I could finish my sentence, I saw her. Through the film of my glass. Like a dream coming to me, only it wasn’t a dream. She was walking slowly toward me, with this come hither smile on her face.

  “It’s been a long time, Clive.”

  I put the glass down quickly. I didn’t want her to see my hand trembling. Instead, I gave her a peck on the cheek, hoping that I wasn’t breathing too hard. “Yeah, it has. You look good.”

  And she did. She hadn’t changed at all: same smile, same small hands and round ass.

  Red nudged me. “Introduce me, buddy.”

  I turned around quickly. “Oh sorry…Red this is Miss Dav…I mean Laurel.”

  She smiled coyly at Red, holding out her hand to him.

  “It’s a pleasure.”

  The deejay threw on another tune, Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get it On.” Laurel grabbed my hand.“Well aren’t you going to ask me to dance or do I have to ask you?” She smiled. I could tell that the old Laurel was back. Whatever had changed after that night in Hendersonville had faded away, and she was back in control. Never betraying her real feelings.

  But I wasn’t a kid anymore, even though at this point, I felt like one. Laurel seemed to have that effect on me. Like I’d always be her student. But I figured I’d play it off. I led her onto the middle of the dance floor, draping my arms around her. I’d forgotten how tiny she was. I was more than a full head taller than she was. She could almost fit her entire body in the space between my shoulders and my waist.

  All these thoughts were galloping through my brain so fast that I couldn’t really make much sense out of them: the last night that I’d seen her, the police station, the pain of my college applications, and her touch.

  I remembered her touch, and now I was feeling it again as she whispered in my ear. “I love this song.”

  I held her closer. I was almost afraid. Afraid that I wouldn’t be able to let her go. That she’d take back part of my soul. She leaned her head into my chest. I could feel her heart. Beating steadily. Not like mine that felt like it would explode through my chest. I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t. So I just let myself go, surrendering to the music.

  * * *

  “Ok, now, Laurel, tell me about, Clive. You said you knew him way back…in Atlanta?”

  Laurel looked right through me. But she didn’t miss a beat. The old Laurel was definitely back. Always cool.

  “Yes, I guess it was in Atlanta. Our families lived next door.” She turned to me defiantly.“Isn’t that how we know each other, Clive?”

  A thin film of sweat beaded up on my forehead. In the four years since I’d left Hendersonville, she’s the first person who knew me, the real me.

  “Uh right, yeah…neighbors…” I was hoping that Red would just cool it at this point, but he kept up. Beer always did make him curious.

  “So tell me about my buddy. What was he like and all?”

  I could tell that Laurel was enjoying this. “Well, let’s see. All the girls wanted him, but he always said that he was saving himself.”

  Red slapped down his beer, laughing until his face was so red that you couldn’t tell where his forehead ended and his hair began.

  “This guy…save himself…shit, things sure did change at college. He was with so many chicks…damn I couldn’t even keep up, and that was saying something, believe me.”

  Laurel just smiled mysteriously. “Well you know people do change.”

  “Right,” I jumped in. “So Red, I think we’re gonna split. It’s been a while since Laurel and me have had a chance to talk.”

  Red winked at me. “Sure thing, buddy. I’ll check you in the morning. The bus for the Big Apple leaves at eight. I’ll see you on it.”

  “Later, man.”

  He disappeared through the crowd.

  It was just me and her. Staring at each other.

  “Why do you lie about your past?” she asked.

  My head throbbed. But I wouldn’t let her know that. I turned back to her, unsmiling. “It’s not a lie.”

  “Oh really, neighbor.”

  “It’s the truth. My truth.”

  Suddenly, she understood what it meant to hate who you were because the only person who’d ever loved you was dead. She stroked my cheek, the way she’d done that night so long ago at her house. She kissed my hand.

  For a minute I saw the look she had in her eyes that night in Hendersonville. “It’s okay, Clive January, I love you no matter who you are.” She got up and walked away.

  I wanted to run after her, but my limbs were frozen. My voice was frozen. Then something snapped, and I bolted up. I ran past the crowds to find her. This time, I wasn’t letting her disappear into the night, only to see her face, and feel her touch, but know that she’s not there. I dashed into the street. Nothing. She was nowhere. Only a cat scratching itself against the lamp post. She couldn’t have gotten away that qui
ckly. I ran down an alley. Nothing. All of the emotions of the past four years and the aching loneliness I tried to deny rushed over me. I collapsed against the wall, and tears streamed down. I hadn’t cried since Daddy died. But now I couldn’t stop. All the times I’d held it in were coming out now.

  I don’t know how long I was there, crying alone. When I opened my eyes, I saw a man staring at me. He was far away. I couldn’t really make out his features. Except that he was just still, very still. He reached out his hand.

  “Who are you?” I yelled at him, my voice echoed back against the empty walls. He just stood there watching at me. Then his face became very light. Blotting out his features completely. Only his outstretched hand was clearly visible.

  “Who the fuck are you? I don’t know you!” I ran toward him, but as I got there, he disappeared in a flash of light, and I saw her. Laurel.

  “Clive.” I could see that she’d been crying. “Oh, Clive, I’m so sorry.” She buried her face in my chest. We stood there holding each other, drawing strength from each other. I knew it was right. I knew she was right for me. But I couldn’t. Not yet. I couldn’t.

  “Let’s sit down.” She gently pulled me down onto a damp park bench. I didn’t want to let her go. She whispered to me. “I knew I’d see you again.”

  For the first time in years, I could let go. I lay my head in her lap. She kissed my forehead, softly.

  “When did you leave, Hendersonville?” I hadn’t actually spoken that name in so long, it still stuck in my throat. All the tortured memories, Ma, everything I’d shoved away.

  She smiled, brushing my fingers lightly against her mouth. “Right after you did. I was bored with teaching. I was only twenty-four, with the whole wide world waiting for me. Hendersonville was just a way station. I needed a break. I had begun to feel like a top that had spun out of control. Hendersonville had centered me. For a minute. After you left, I knew it was time for me, too. So I packed up and stayed with about every friend I knew. When I’d stretched my pennies almost to the point of non-existence, I’d take a short-term teaching job. Substitute teaching usually. Something where I didn’t have to go in every day. The rest of the time, I’d read, and think. and try to figure out why I was here. Was there something I was supposed to be doing other than exploring life’s possibilities? But maybe that was enough. More than most people ever do.”

  She cradled my head in her hands, propping me up from her lap so that her eyes bore into mine. “Do you believe in fate?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know what I believe in.”

  “Well, I do, I believe in star-crossed love. And I believe that we’re part of some larger romantic scheme where we’ll always be in each other’s lives. But not completely. Like the perennial ships that pass in the night. To touch briefly, but always passing. Why else would I have walked into that little club? I knew that I’d see you. I just knew it.”

  “But how did you know it? I figured I’d never see you again.”

  She smiled. “Well, truthfully, I knew you were at Whitmore.”

  I sat up, shocked. “How?”

  “Your freshman year I got a call from the registrar’s office there, somehow they had tracked your high school down to Hendersonville High. They got my name since I’d been your faculty advisor. Whitmore wanted to verify that you had graduated, and you were who you said you were. The school sent your transcripts and pictures, but Whitmore still wanted to talk to me to make sure that you’d actually done the work in the classes.”

  I looked away from her. I couldn’t believe that Whitmore knew all those years, and here I’d really thought I was slick. I was just stupid, that’s all, and lucky. Damn lucky they didn’t boot my ass out after they found out. I shook my head, realizing how close I’d come to blowing everything.

  She kissed me softly on the forehead. “I’d left a forwarding number at the school with Ralph Warner.”

  Ralph Warner, I remembered him. A big line backer type guy who was my high school principal. He seemed to know exactly what I was thinking, especially when it came to Laurel. I remembered the day he’d taken me aside and said seriously, “Boy, remember you’re a student in this school, and we don’t allow any crossing that line between students and teachers. Miss Davenport is your teacher. You remember that now, hear?” I smiled remembering how I’d just shrugged him off, frankly not giving a damn what he or anybody else in that hell hole of a school thought.

  “He knew I had a thing for you. And he didn’t like it.”

  Laurel sat up and looked at me. “Ralph Warner, no…I don’t believe that.”

  I drew her closer to me and whispered teasingly, “Well believe it ’cause it’s true. He knew I wanted you.”

  “Well it was mutual then.” She snuggled closer to me. “Right from the first time I saw you outside of town in front of those trees that had all grown together…remember?” She laughed a light, sparkly laugh that I’d almost forgotten, but which still sent little shivers across my back.

  I played with her small hands, remembering again her touch. “So why didn’t you ever call me? I tried you, but you’d left.”

  “I almost did, a couple of times, but I knew you needed to be free to make yourself what you wanted to be without me or anybody else pulling you back to a past you so obviously hated.” She was quiet for a minute, and then she said softly, “So mostly, I just thought about you…a lot, and hoped that you were thinking of me…at least sometimes.” She looked up and I could see that her eyes had changed; they were clear and seemed to be pulling me into her so fast that I couldn’t turn back.

  I drew her closer to me. I didn’t want to let her go this time. “Oh God Laurel, I was. So much…I had to stop myself.”

  She looked away from me, but her words tumbled out even faster. “I almost came to your graduation. I got to Whitmore and went there the morning of commencement. Then I got cold feet, so I turned back. I knew I still wanted to see you, and knew that somehow I would.”

  I pulled her into my arms, feeling her against me, needing her to know that it was the same for me, the same feelings, the same wanting.

  She burrowed closer to me, saying, but looking away from me, “When I was eleven, I had this dream…about someone who was a part of me in a way I couldn’t really explain, but we were linked by something outside of us. For a long time I didn’t remember the dream, I think because it happened on one of the worst days of my life.”

  She paused a minute. “And the funny thing is, the day started like just about every other day in Cleveland. I walked to school passing other kids who all seemed to have some best friend or somebody to share a laugh with. But I was alone. It didn’t really bother me anymore. I had my routine. I’d run through the back playground and try to get to school before the other kids so I could take out my books and read before class. But this day when I got to my locker, Linda and Celia, two girls I didn’t really like, were waiting for me. Linda stood in front of my locker and looked at me defiantly.”

  * * *

  Laurel Age 11:

  “Guess what I heard?” Linda asked to no one in particular.

  I ignored her and kept stuffing books in my locker.

  Celia chimed in, “What did you hear, tell me. In fact…” she raised her voice a couple of notches so that anyone passing by could hear clearly, “Tell everybody, what did you hear, Linda?”

  Linda looked over in my direction smugly, then said loudly so that all the kids streaming into homeroom could hear, “Well I heard that Laurel has a secret, and it’s so secret, that even she doesn’t know what it is!”

  Hearing my name, I whirled around abruptly. “What are you talking about?”

  They smirked at me. By now other kids had started gathering around to hear my big secret that I didn’t even know.

  I glared at Linda saying coolly, “Whatever it is, I’m not interested!”

  Unperturbed, Linda blurted out, “Well I’d sure be interested to know if I found out that I was adopted!”

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sp; You could almost hear a pin drop. Everybody looked at me. The blood rushed to my head, and the word “adopted” jumbled around inside of me I felt sick and light-headed. I couldn’t breathe, but I had to get away from the taunting stares, whispers, and giggles. So I just ran all the way back home, bolting into the room, with tears choking my throat so I could barely shout out at my mother.

  “Is it true? Is it true that I’m adopted?”

  Silence. My mother just sank onto the couch, and I knew. She didn’t have to tell me that it was. I knew it was true. And everything that I’d ever been or thought I was had been a lie. And it hit me that I had no real family. That I had no one.

  That night I prayed, “Please God, show me that I’m not alone, that there is someone for me.” I don’t know if I was dreaming or awake, because I all of a sudden felt this light and warmth all around me, like someone who loved me was close. I closed my eyes and saw a face, faintly at first, just his eyes, then his smile, and then he began taking shape. I sensed something or someone say, “He will love you and you him because you’re the same.”

  * * *

  Laurel’s eyes were half closed, and her breathing was shallow. I held her closely to me until she started speaking again.

  “And when I woke up, I felt this peace.” Laurel turned to me and said almost sadly, “The eyes were yours, the face was yours. I never told you before, because I thought you’d be afraid, so I didn’t say anything. But I wanted you to know.”

  I could feel a tear against my face. Her tear. And I don’t know why, but her words shot through me like little pellets, leaving pin pricks. Tiny holes for my soul to seep out through. There was so much I wanted to ask her, to tell her, but for some reason I didn’t or couldn’t say anything. I kissed her, slowly at first, then more and more until my head was spinning again, and I was throwing aside her jacket and blouse and my coat and shirt. I could feel the hardness of the park bench jabbing against me and the softness of her under me, the hard edges and the soft touch. The fear and the love mingled together, fighting each other, filling me up, and at the same time emptying out every other thought or feeling I’d ever had.