A Thousand Never Evers by Shana Burg Read Free Book Online Page B

laughs.
    Jimmy stretches out his arms and holds Flapjack between them. Then slow, real slow, Jimmy swings back his leg to take the kick.
    I squeeze my eyes shut, prepare for the worst.
    But what I expect to hear—the crack of Jimmy’s boot against Flapjack’s skull—is not what I hear at all. Instead, I hear glass crash against pavement.
    When I open my eyes, I see Flapjack scamper free across the lot and Jimmy’s body strewn across the rocky ledge of the bayou, looking dead as they come. A shattered honey jar rests by his side. And there on the Corner Store steps stands my brother, looking mighty pleased his pitching practice paid off.
    From the look of things, that brother of mine threw the honey jar and knocked Jimmy down the stony drop to the bayou. And I reckon Jimmy must’ve caught his foot on the root of a cypress tree, because now he’s passed out cold.
    After Buck takes a second to figure out Jimmy’s not getting up, he bolts after my brother.
    As soon as he does, Elias hops the railing of the Corner Store steps. He sprints across the lot to the bayou, and when he gets to the water’s edge, my brother turns to me and shouts, “Run!”
    Usually I do what my brother says, but when I try to stand, my legs buckle.
    So I sit here on the pavement and watch my brother jump into the bayou. Buck Fowler splashes in after him. Then my brother and Buck vanish behind the cypress trees.
    I can’t feel my bloody knees. I can’t feel anything. So I take in the scene like I’m watching television in Old Man Adams’s living room: Here’s Honey rushing to her brother Jimmy’s side. And there’s Mrs. Worth running out the shop, dropping her ham hocks on the steps, holding her hands over her mouth. Customers are swarming out the store to see what’s what. And, oh look, there’s Jimmy groaning about his leg while he’s loaded onto the back of a flatbed truck. Then Mrs. Worth and Honey slip into the seat beside the driver. They’re off to find a doctor. And that’s the end of the show.

CHAPTER 7

    July 12, 1963, Night
     
    When at long last I peel myself off the parking lot pavement, I race across the tracks to the Negro side of Kuckachoo, where there aren’t any streetlamps to light up the dirt roads and news travels faster than shooting stars.
    By the time I stumble through the front door, the blood on my knees has dried, my head pounds, and the fact that this is real and not some made-up television program boils inside me like water in a steaming kettle.
    Mama blinks at me, backs herself against the wall, and whispers, “My baby, my baby.” Then she wails. And one thing’s clear: she’s already heard about Elias.
    I wet a rag in the kitchen, lie on my bed, and rest the cool cloth across my forehead, but as long as Mama keeps screaming, there isn’t a thing I can do to make my head stop thumping. So I start to play a game. I light the lantern and stare at the paper map of the United States hanging on the wall. Each time Mama lets out a howl, I move my eyes to a different state and try to name its capital.
    Lots of nights Elias quizzed me, but now I’ve got to quiz myself. “Alabama…Montgomery,” I whisper. My eyes roam across the southern states. “Tennessee…Nashville,” I say. My gaze gets stuck on Georgia. What’s the capital? I can’t remember, so I get out of bed to check the small print.
    Whenever times get rough, Reverend Walker finds men with guns to stand guard by the railroad track and surround the home of anyone threatened. Folks call it the Reverend’s Brigade. But tonight one of their own is missing, so now the brigade has a different job: find Elias before the sheriff. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out the sheriff wants my brother dead after what he’s done to Jimmy Worth.
    But playing the geography game reminds me how smart Elias is. Why, he’s going on to college after he finishes his last year of high school. How many folks can say that? And remembering how smart my brother