“You know that SCOPE program?”
“Those Yankee kids comin’ down here to tell us how we should be runnin’ things?”
“That’s not what it’s about, Buddy,” I said. “The Voting Rights Act is coming and some of the people in poor areas will need help registering. I want to work with SCOPE to help them.”
He leaned away from me to look at my face. His blond eyebrows were nearly knitted together in the middle. “Are you messin’ with me?” he asked.
“No, I’m absolutely serious. I’ve already spoken with the minister in charge and—”
“Uh-uh, little sister,” Buddy said. “Not gonna let you do that. Think about them three boys that got themselves killed a couple of years ago.”
“It was last year,” I corrected him, “but that was in Mississippi. North Carolina isn’t like the Deep South, and you know it. I’ll be perfectly safe.”
“This is stupid, Ellie.”
“I know Daddy’s going to be disappointed about the pharmacy.”
“That’s going to be the least of his objections,” he said. “And Reed ain’t gonna be thrilled about it either.”
“He’ll survive without me for one summer.”
We were quiet for a moment. Then Buddy said, out of the blue, “I treat Ronnie at the car shop the same way I treat the other guys. No better or worse. That’s how it should be.”
“I should hope so,” I said.
“I ain’t no racist,” Buddy said.
“That’s a double negative. What you just said actually means you are a racist.”
He stared at me. “What’s your problem?” he asked, but then he immediately softened. Put his arm around my shoulders again. “What did you do with my sweet sister, huh?” he asked.
I sighed. Leaned against him. He smelled like motor oil. I’d come to equate the smell with him and I liked it. “I’m just tired of seeing a wrong and doing nothing to make it right, that’s all,” I said. “I wish you’d give me some support.”
He tightened his hand on my shoulder. “How can I support you when I’m afraid you’re gonna get yourself killed?” he asked. “Or worse?”
“What’s worse than getting killed?” I asked, momentarily sidetracked by his question.
“Think about it,” he said, and then I knew. Rape. He meant rape.
“I’m not afraid,” I said. “I think I’ll be fine … if they accept me. The minister I spoke with wasn’t all that enthused about having me work with them.”
“What’s his name? I’ll call him up and tell him not to take you.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Have you really thought this through, Ellie?” he asked. “Some parts of Derby County have more colored than white. Would you really feel all right with them being the majority when it comes to votin’？ They’d make laws that favor themselves. Before you know it, we’d be the minority.”
“I thought you said you weren’t a racist?”
“I’m just playing devil’s advocate.”
“I’m not going to tell Mama and Daddy until I know for sure SCOPE will take me,” I said, changing the subject. “But let me be the one to tell them. Okay?”
He laughed. “I promise you I’ll just sit back and watch,” he said. “With Aunt Carol gone, it’s been a while since we had a good fireworks show ’round here.”
Chapter 7
KAYLA
2010
My father, Rainie, and I head to the new house late in the afternoon after I get home from work. I’m not excited about going.
I fell asleep easily last night, but that red-haired woman came to me in a dream. She carried a gun and it was clearly me she was after. When I woke up, I had to get out of bed and walk around the quiet house until the image of her—the memory of her—was gone, or at least had faded. Then at the office this morning, I constantly looked over my shoulder. I keep wondering if I might one day soon read about a murder in the paper, a murder I could have somehow prevented.
We approach the Main Street intersection. I turn left onto Main and drive past the Round Hill Theater, where my middle school boyfriends and I used to make out in the back row, and the Food Lion, where I worked one summer a lifetime ago. Then I make a right onto Round Hill Road. We pass some newer developments, those clots of homes that seem to spring from the ground overnight, erasing trees and cornfields. That’s why Jackson and I’d been excited about Shadow Ridge, where the developers required the builders to retain so many of the trees.