I set my suitcase on the bed and began hanging up my skirts and blouses, while Peggy headed for the door. “Where are you going?” I asked.
“To find David,” she said without a glance in my direction.
She left and I stared at the door as it closed behind her. I felt very alone. Here I was, on a campus where I knew no one, with a roommate who didn’t like me. Would all the students treat me so coolly? There wasn’t much I could do about my accent or my heritage. I missed Brenda, whom I knew I was losing to Garner and a baby. I missed Aunt Carol, who would have cheered me on. And I missed Reed, who loved me more than I deserved. In that moment I would have given just about anything to feel his arms around me.
I wanted to go outside to explore a bit but thought I’d better read over the orientation material instead. Tonight was a welcoming session. Monday through Friday looked like very long days filled with speeches and training sessions and workshops. We’d learn about the history of Negroes in America and there would be a lot of sessions about the South with a capital “S.” I wondered what I had yet to learn about the land I’d lived in my whole life. The words began to swim in my vision and before I knew it, Peggy was waking me up to go to dinner and the welcoming session.
* * *
We filled the metal folding chairs in the sweltering gymnasium and listened to a number of speakers warn us of the danger in the weeks ahead. The head of SCOPE, Reverend Hosea Williams, whose name was familiar to me after all the reading I’d been doing, introduced what felt like dozens of other folks who had various roles in the program. Everyone who spoke gave us the same message: our work was important but dangerous. We needed to keep our wits about us, be sure to let someone know where we were at all times, and always be mature representatives of the program. And we had to produce. I knew that meant we needed to persuade people to register to vote. I looked around me at the serious faces—all those white students from up north and out west, as well as a good number of Negro volunteers who would help us connect with distrustful residents. I listened to the speakers and thought to myself, What am I doing here? I’d never felt so out of place in my entire life.
At the end of the evening, a gray-haired woman named Mrs. Clark taught us “freedom songs.” “You’ll know ’em all by heart by the end of the week,” she promised, handing out the mimeographed lyrics. I liked singing, but in that cavernous space, with unfamiliar melodies, my voice sounded as small and inconsequential as I felt. When we sang “We Shall Overcome,” our last song of the night and the only one slightly familiar to me, I felt so false. I had nothing to overcome. It wasn’t until I was lying, hot and exhausted, on my sagging mattress later that night, that I realized I carried a huge burden of my own creation—a burden it would take a miracle for me to overcome.
* * *
Monday afternoon, Hosea Williams announced that he wanted to speak with two students and I was surprised and unnerved when he spoke my name into the microphone. “Those two students, please meet me in the back of the gym,” he said.
Oh, great, I thought. This could not be good. I felt hundreds of eyes on me as I walked from my seat near the front of the gym to the rear. I waited my turn as Reverend Williams spoke to the other student, a boy, who looked angry by the end of their conversation. The boy stomped past me without making eye contact, and Reverend Williams waved me over.
“How are you doing?” he asked when I reached him. This close to him, I could see his neatly trimmed mustache and serious brown eyes.
“Fine.” I tried gamely to smile. “Though I’m wondering why you wanted to see me.” I glanced in the direction the angry boy had gone.
Reverend Williams nodded. “We have some concerns about you,” he said, getting right to the point. “First, you’re from North Carolina, and second, you haven’t been vetted by any of the universities that are working with SCOPE, nor have you been through the campus briefings on fieldwork. All the other students have gone through a thorough educational process to be sure they know what they’re getting into and to assure us of their … stability. The fact that you’re a Southerner’ll make it hard for you to gain anyone’s trust.”
“Reverend Filburn mentioned that,” I said. “But he thought it would be okay.” I didn’t know if I should address his concern about my stability. I wasn’t feeling very stable at that moment.
He nodded. “Yes, Greg Filburn persuaded me to give you a chance,” he said. “But I warn you, it’s going to be tough.” His dark eyes were unsmiling. “I’m going to make sure you’re assigned to Greg’s county. What is it? Derby?”