BROTHER
and the DANCER
ABOUT THE JAMES D. HOUSTON AWARD
Known as a masterful writer in both fiction and nonfiction genres, James D. Houston was also a dedicated teacher and passionate promoter of emerging authors. Friends and family have established a fund to honor his memory and further his legacy. The James D. Houston Award supports publication of books by writers who reflect Jim’s humane values, his thoughtful engagement with life, and his literary exploration of California, Hawai‘i, and the West.
BROTHER
and the DANCER
———— a novel ————
KEENAN NORRIS
Heyday, Berkeley, California
© 2013 by Keenan Norris
All rights reserved. No portion of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from Heyday.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cover Design: Lorraine Rath
Interior Design/Typesetting: Joe Lops
Orders, inquiries, and correspondence should be addressed to:
Heyday
P.O. Box 9145, Berkeley, CA 94709
(510) 549-3564, Fax (510) 549-1889
This book is dedicated to my mother and father, Hiawatha Gwendolyn Norris and Calvin Preston Norris. Love. Honor. Peace.
This dedication extends to both family lines, those here still and all who have passed on. From our families come my stories.
Touissant remembered a better world. Christmas candles set upon shelves and mantels, the spirals of wax melting away the green and red decorations, the little gold of the chandeliers, all of it shining so lovely. The small, low-ceilinged house of narrow snaking halls, of little rooms and crowded tension. Golden and shaded luster, nostalgic light, magical in his memory.
He could see the light in the steam and smoke that filtered from the kitchen, smell it burning behind the door like an unattended ache. People’s images misted over and their voices slowed and thickened with the hot old air. It was Christmas night, it was the family house, he was six years old and yet this beautiful world already seemed dark and distant to him.
“They did him dirty,” his gramps proclaimed, remembering his own dad, who was Touissant’s great-granddad, who had been dead the boy had no idea how long. “They did him dirty!”
“He was a criminal, how you expect he get done?” Granny’s gummy voice rose up in tired opposition. Touissant had heard the story once for every Christmas in his life; how many times had she heard it? Hundreds, probably. She might even know its words by heart.
“They did him dirty jus due to he wadn’t tryina fight in no World War they made like he hated his government, chased him across the South to put him on the chain gang. It didn’t have nothin to do with no government, it had to do with he wadn’t tryina die in Timbuktu. So one day he woke his woman up, said, ‘Tain’t happenin. This is one man won’t take it lyin down. You keep still now, girl, get yo rest. Don’t fret. I’m free ’n plannin to stay that way.’ Then he left.
“He left his life in Lou’siana, which he couldn’t keep no-way, then never looked back. If he had, all he’d ’a seen woulda been them dogs ’n federal agents on his tail. He tol me how he evaded them slave catchers, ’cause that’s what they called ’em, slave catchers, by hookin on with travel crews, then have hisself the time ’a his fugitive life. Ain’t matter, white, black or green, them crews courted his services ’cause too many they boys was gone overseas ’n not enough was comin back. So he’d get a train ticket for work in the next county, freight over there wit whatever work-crew, then sell the ticket for somethin ’n get a new one so’s to keep hustlin. Always snuck away first chance he got, them chasers on his tail. Seen the whole entire South that way. Womens e’rywhere, he tol me. So many husbands, boyfriends, lovers gone, they womens was lonely onto restlessness.
“So one night he was stopped in Jackson, had got down to business with this beau-ti-ful Coke bottle bird, ’n right while he’s obligin her, his ears commences hearin this rustle-noise outside the house. Gets to thinkin it’s them dogs ’n federal agents. He untangles from her, jumps out the bed, jumps out the window two-three stories down, ’n what do you know, on the backside ’a that broad’s house she been tendin her a graveyard! Her old man must had been a coffin-maker ’cause there’s all these empty coffins just a-sittin out brand new, all ’n whatnot. So he scared as hell, you gotta understand. He jumps hisself down in one ’a them there coffins, closes the lid, ’cause, what’d he always tell me, ‘Ain’t no Freeman dyin in no Si-beria, or wherever it was they fought that mother.’
“So he waits out the night, falls asleep in that coffin, ’n when he wake up all’s there is, is darkness. But he knowin it’s gots to be light outside. Then he remembers the girl. He wonders what it is she do with the coffins. He tries to open the thing, but he cain’t. It won’t open near as easy as it closed. So he starts to flustration. It’s bad times now. He feels hisself gettin borne up ’n there’s voices, old tired patty-rolled voices talkin, hollerin, ’n after a while they commences to singin them ol’ field songs. He thinks, they done took me back to slave times, oh Death. But then he gets a-hold ’a his composure, realizes that he bein borne along by the chain gang. He can hear they chains a-rattlin, he can hear they voices a-singin, ’n he can feel where it is he headed. So he musters all his strength, ’n he wadn’t no small man now, ’n straight pushes that coffin-top clean off. Breaks it off like it were a feather or somethin. Now he in the open air ’n the mens jus lookin at him like he Christ returned. Don’t nobody touch him, not even the authorities. He jus walk off nice as you please. He come back next day, finds the girl whose daddy had him such a lucrative business, ’n he tells her how he done lived through death. She laughs at his story, tells him the real news: e’rybody who had managed not to die had lived through the end-time,