Southern Cross by Jen Blood Page B

are you doin’ here, old man?” he
demanded. “You ain’t got no right being within a hundred miles of this place.
My daddy was a good man.”
    “Your
daddy strayed,” Barnel said. He was a barrel-chested old man who hadn’t aged
well, his face slack and his coloring a deep, unhealthy red. “And you know it
full well, son. We’re just here to warn anybody who comes near, just what we’re
facin’ right now. Somebody put your daddy in the ground for the sins he done
against the Almighty.”
    “Somebody
oughta put you in the ground, you old bast—”
    I
grabbed Danny before all hell broke loose, and physically dragged him back to
the church while Barnel shouted after us.
    For
the first time since I’d set down in Louisville, I felt myself slipping.
    Between
the two of us, Solomon and I managed to wrangle Danny into the church. Once he
was inside, I walked away for a minute—away from Barnel and his flock, away
from the church, up the road toward freedom. Solomon walked alongside, eyeing
me with concern.
    “I
could beat that guy up for you if you’d like,” she said. “The crazy old
preacher, I mean. Juarez taught me some moves. I’m not saying I’d come out on
top ultimately, but I’d probably give him a run for his money.”
    I
laughed, a breathless rush of air that felt better than anything had all day.
“Maybe later.” I walked another few feet. A cold drizzle started, but I
couldn’t bring myself to go back. Solomon laid her hand on my arm. She gave me a
solid smile. Rock steady when it really counts—that’s my Solomon.
    “You
can do this, Diggs.”
    I
nodded. My palms were damp, my suit too warm despite the chill in the air. “I
know. No sweat, right?”
    We
turned around and headed back. The air smelled like damp earth and fresh rain.
I thought of Wyatt and me, leaping streams and crashing parties as kids. Our
freshman year, rooming together at Columbia, when Wyatt left every party early
to call Mae while I bitched him out for passing up opportunities to sleep with
the hot coeds throwing themselves at him.
    I
don’t want whatever those girls are sellin’. I pictured him, always a head taller than anyone else in the room.
Broad-shouldered and powerful, with a sense of empathy that ran deeper than
anyone I’d ever met. Women loved Wyatt. They’re too skinny. Anybody’s that
skinny, it’s bound to make ‘em mean. I don’t want my girls mean. That’s the
difference between you and me.
    That’s
the only difference? I’d asked, grinning. 
    Well,
that and I dress better. Other than that, we might as well be livin’ in the
same skin.
    A
pressure I’d been feeling in my chest all day got steadily worse. Solomon
bumped up against me as we walked. She wore a deep blue sundress that fell
above her knees and made her green eyes shine. The cut showed off the new
definition in her arms and calves, the physical manifestation of whatever
transformation she’d been through in the six months since I’d seen her last. A
transformation Juarez had been witness to; maybe was even partially responsible
for.
    She
stumbled on the uneven terrain, and I held onto her elbow.
    “Just
a second,” she said. She took off her heels and held them in one hand. “I never
did get the hang of walking in these things.”
    “I
don’t think Wyatt would mind.”
    She
glanced at me sadly. “No. I don’t expect he would.”
     
    <><><> 
     
    I sat
in the front row beside Mae and the kids during the funeral. Wyatt’s father
never showed—not a surprise, really. I remembered him at his wife’s funeral and
in the days that followed: not a pretty sight. George was the kind of man who
preferred to grieve in privacy. Solomon told me she’d find a seat on her own,
insisting that I should be with the family. When I scanned the crowd, I spotted
her sitting alone in the back. There’s always been something solitary about
Solomon, something strong and isolated and a little sad about her, as though
she was set adrift at