A THOUSAND NEVER EVERS

Chapter One

June 12, 1963

Now get this. There's a boy in Jackson so rich when he finished high school, his daddy bought him a brand new car. At least that's what I heard. In my family, we don't have that kind of money, but my uncle gives a whole dollar to any Pickett who graduates Acorn Elementary School. It's tradition.

So here I am soaring through the sky on my swing that hangs from the oak tree, when Uncle Bump calls out the door of his shed, "Go on. Get your brother. He'll take you." He stretches a dollar bill between both hands and I jump right off. Sure it's not enough for a car, but that dollar can buy a whole lot of good like twenty Hershey bars. After my brother graduated elementary school, he bought a baseball. But I'm not going to waste my dollar on something dumb. I want something important like dye to turn my corn-colored dress new for the first day of school.

"Mama will be proud you're spending your dollar to make a bright impression at County Colored," Uncle Bump tells me.

"It's West Thunder Creek Junior High School," I tell him and stuff the dollar into my sock. Sure, I'm going to the Negro junior high school, but a school's a school. Folks should call it by its proper name and make it sound important.

"Don't dilly dally, Addie Ann," Uncle Bump says. He pulls the harmonica out of his pocket and blows a chord. And it's real good to hear him sound those notes, because ever since our boss, Old Man Adams, got the whooping cough Uncle Bump hasn't had time to play music. "Mama's bringing home some hen tonight," he says. Then he sinks down on the steps of his shed and slides that harmonica across his lips.

I'm heading across the tracks to the white side and I reckon some furry company won't hurt. My cat Flapjack and me have a secret code. When I whistle and click my teeth twice, he comes running. Tweet. Click. Click. Tweet. Click. Click. Other folk think it's magic, but here he comes, dashing across the pine needles, purring as he threads a figure eight round my ankles.

When we pass Brother Babcock's chicken shack, my stomach growls. And when we get to Daisy's Dry Goods, I kick up the dirt on the path, because I've been itching to buy a real new dress in there, but right about now, we don't have the money.

As always, once we cross the railroad tracks everything seems whiter and brighter, and I don't mean just the people who live here. The fresh painted shingles and white-picket fences gleam in the late-afternoon sun. Even Flapjack's tan fur lights up a fiery orange. And my feet are glad to walk on pavement.

By the time we get to the edge of Mr. Mudge's place, the sun is diving toward the horizon. Flapjack and me pass by Mr. Mudge's greenhouse and his stable full of cows and pigs to his farm where my brother works. "Now don't squish the squash," I tell Flapjack, before we head across the leafy rows to meet Elias, who's bent like a rainbow over the tomatoes. He's been working this land since he was five.

"Uncle Bump says you have to take me to get the dye," I say and hold up the dollar to prove it's true. But Elias stares straight past me like I'm not even here. Mama always says he's "half legs, half smile," but today his grin is gone. His eyes are sad and distant.

"What's the matter?" I ask. He's probably worried up about getting into college, so I tell him, "I bet you'll even get a scholarship to Morehouse. Then I'll come to Georgia and visit you and we'll . . . "

"Shut up," he says.

Usually Elias doesn't live on the edge of his mind like me, so right about now I don't know what to think.

"Don't you know about Medgar?" he asks.

"What's that?"

"Medgar Evers got shot. Down in Jackson. Last night. Someone killed . . . " His voice stretches and tightens. Then he swipes the side of his hand under his nose. That's what he does when he gets close to tears. Usually it stops them from sliding down.

Here one guy I never heard of gets shot dead, and now my brother is all ripped up and I'm just about crazy. "He a friend?" I ask.

"No."

"He owe you money?"

"No!" Elias rolls his eyes.

"Well if he ain't a friend and he don't owe you money, what's a matter?"

"Don't you know anything?" he asks.

I turn away. Elias knows I know something. Otherwise, why did I get the highest score on the geography quiz in the whole sixth grade? Okay, sure there are only four kids in the sixth grade at the Negro elementary school, but still, a ninety six is a ninety six. I want to remind Elias of this but my throat squeezes shut. I swipe my hand under my nose but my tears escape anyway.

My brother puts his hands on my shoulders, tries to turn me around. "Sorry," he says. "Sometimes I forget you're a little kid."

"Seventh grade's not little," I tell him. Then I blink a lot to get the tears to stay inside. "Now come on. Tell me! Who's this Edgar Mevers?"

"His name is Medgar Evers," Elias says. "He's from the Movement."

I nod so my brother will think I know what he's talking about. But I wonder why he can't answer my questions plain and simple. If he's so smart, why doesn't he tell me this: Why do they call it the Movement? How can he swipe under his nose and stop crying? And why did Medgar Evers' mama give him such a silly name?

"Well, they killed him," Elias says and looks away again. "Left three young children without a daddy."

I reckon Elias probably knows how those poor children feel.

Our daddy died of pneumonia when Elias was four. Mama still says, "Your daddy went to Heaven proud of his little boy." Whenever she says that Elias grins, but truth be told, I get this hollow feeling in my chest because it's not fair. I was nothing but a lump in Mama's tummy when Daddy met his Maker. He never got the chance to be proud of me. He never watched me jump double dutch. He never tasted my honey cake. He never saw my ninety six on the geography test. Daddy missed my whole life because he went and died of pneumonia a couple months before I was born.

Bad as I feel thinking about Daddy, Elias feels worse. So here I am, trying to think of a way to help him feel better but I can't. Still, Elias rubs his hand over my head like I'm his good luck charm, and I get the notion he likes knowing I'm here.

I follow him across the pumpkin patch into the forest on Mr. Mudge's land. We don't say a word. All we hear are blackbirds chirping in the trees. We cross the thick woods to the parking lot of Mr. Mudge's Corner Store. Then we head out of the lot and turn down the road to The Very Fine Fabric Shop.

At The Very Fine Fabric Shop, Elias doesn't take but two seconds to get caught up chatting with my best friend Delilah's second cousin Bessie. She's in tenth grade. She cleans all the shops on the white side of town. And I can't deny it: Bessie's fetching. She's got green eyes and all kinds of curves. I reckon I shouldn't be too surprised the whole while I'm picking out the dye-and I could use some help deciding the color-Elias is yapping with Bessie about that Medgar guy. So without a hint of advice, I choose yellow and pay. And even though it's getting dark, Elias won't leave the store, not till Bessie sprays the counters and sweeps the floors.

It's between hawk and buzzard when at long last Elias and me set off home. I know Mama won't be happy with us. But that doesn't seem to bother my brother.

The whole way back, Flapjack weaves around my calves while Elias talks about that Medgar guy and the movement to get us our rights. I reckon my brother thinks he's the reverend and he's got to convert me to the fighting side.

"Now everybody's got some fire, some anger," he says. "It's how you use your fire that counts."

While we cross the tracks, I tell him to stop preaching.

"I'm just trying to help," Elias says. Then he shakes his head like he's thirty years older than me and not just five.

By the time we get home the sun is under the earth. Elias and me slog into the kitchen where Mama's sitting at the table with Uncle Bump. As expected, she's in a dither. There's no sweet smell of hen wafting through the house. Worse, her usual I-been-working-hard-and-I'm-glad-I'm-home smile is gone.

"Where you been?" she snaps.

My bottom lip shakes. I hate how that happens. Then everyone can tell I've got the fidgets. I wonder why I have to have a give-away lip.

"Sorry," I tell her. I pull out the chair and sit. And I don't know how I think so fast under pressure but I do. I cross my fingers under the kitchen table so God won't hold anything against me. "What actually happened is . . . ," I say. I'm about to tell Mama and Uncle Bump how a big mean dog came and chased Flapjack up a tree right outside The Very Fine Fabric Shop. I'm about to tell them no matter how much I whistled and clicked, Flapjack wouldn't come on down. I'm about to tell them if I left Flapjack there that dog would have eaten my poor cat for supper, but before I do, Mama cuts her eyes at me real mean and says, "If there's one thing I can't stand, it's a fibber!"

And I just put my lips back together right there.

"I been worried sick about you! You know how I feel about you two being out late! 'Specially when you got your sister with you. She's just a little girl, Elias."

"Sorry, Mama," Elias says.

"I'm not little!" I say.

Uncle Bump tries to change the subject. He bows his head. "Thank you, Lord, for the food you placed before us," he says.

There's a bowl of gray boiled potatoes in the center of the table. And one thing's clear: They sure aren't hen. Mama probably fixed up the hen so good that the Tate family ate it all, and there wasn't any left to bring home.

"This looks delicious," Elias says. He spears a potato with his fork.

But Mama, she yanks that forkful of potato right out of my brother's hand. "I don't want to see no one eating till I get an explanation." The fork trembles in Mama's hand because she's so worried and mad. Being worried and mad is like biscuits and gravy for Mama. The two just go together.

"We were picking out dye for Addie Ann, when we run into someone to talk to," Elias says. "It was real important."

But Mama doesn't see it that way. Not at all. She points her potato fork at my brother, then at me. "When I send my kids over to the white side, I don't expect them to come through that door after the sun has set." Mama's so angry she doesn't even ask what color dye I have in my sack. "Now who's so important to talk to when it's already getting dark?"

"It was just Bessie," Elias says. "She was working at the shop. We got to talking about Medgar Evers and . . . "

It seems Mama's heard the news too. She sets down her potato fork, closes her weary eyes, and starts praying for the dead man's soul.

But her prayer sounds more like complaining. "Dear Lord," she says, "that Medgar didn't deserve to die. He been stirring up trouble, trying to get them schools mixed up, colored and white, as they should. And he been helping sign up Negro voters, Lord, because don't every person supposed to have a voice in these United States?"

What's so special about the vote? Mama always carries on about it, but what difference could one of her votes make anyway? Well, one thing's clear: She thinks Medgar Evers' work to help Negroes vote is more important than eating dinner while it's hot.

Now Mama shakes her head like she just can't believe this Medgar guy is dead and gone. "Lord, you listen to me," she says. "You bless Medgar's hard-working, full-of-courage soul."

After that, how am I supposed to eat? Hen or no hen, my stomach's knotted up knowing someone can get killed for doing heaps of good.