Dreamland Burning Read online

  “Fifteen minutes,” he said, and hung up. Which was fine and not fine all at once, because even though I knew he’d get there as fast as he could, and even though the sound of his voice only made me feel like I wasn’t alone, I kind of wished he would have stayed on the phone so I could pretend.

  The thing about James is, he knows stuff about me that no one else does. It’s been that way since last December, when he came over to keep me company during Chase Oil’s annual employee Christmas party. I’d snagged a bottle of peppermint schnapps from the bartender’s supplies, and the two of us had played drunk Monopoly in the basement.

  The rules were simple: Buy a railroad, take a shot. Ditto for properties. Land in jail, take two. We weren’t really drinkers, so it didn’t take long for both of us to get completely wasted. Neither one of us remembers who won.

  What I do remember is waking up the next morning with a tidal wave headache and a fuzzy recollection of lying next to James on the floor, staring up at the ceiling while he told me how he’d gotten sent to the principal in seventh grade for kissing a girl on the playground. “I’ve never wanted to kiss anyone, girls or boys,” he’d said. “I just didn’t want Dad to think I was broken.”

  And I remembered telling him about the birthday party I’d gone to in first grade. The one at the nicest country club in Tulsa, where all the mothers drank margaritas by the pool while we swam. I told him how beautiful Mom’s dark skin had looked against the pale pink of her bathing suit, and how ashamed I’d felt for wishing she looked just a little bit more like all the other grown-ups there.

  We never talked about those confessions afterwards because we never needed to. James and I realized we were soul mates that night, and soul mates are okay with all the bad shit hidden in each other’s dark corners.

  I think that’s why I called him instead of Mom or Dad that morning. To them, I was still a little girl who needed protecting. To James, I was just me.

  After ten minutes, I started listening for his car. Then a siren started up in the distance and my heart jumped into my mouth. The construction guys must have called the police, I thought. Because that’s what you’re supposed to do when you find a dead body.

  I considered running back to my room and pretending like I’d never gotten up. Even if the cops pulled my phone records, there was no way they could prove I hadn’t called James from bed.

  Which was probably an overreaction. For one thing, the skeleton looked like it had been in our back house for a long, long time. Maybe since the place was built. And even though the whole setup had a distinct crime scene vibe, there was no way I could have been involved in something that happened before I even existed.

  Then again, it wasn’t like there was a shortage of news stories about bad cops assuming the worst when it came to brown-skinned kids like me. So on second thought, maybe it wasn’t such an overreaction after all.

  Either way, the siren was moving away. My heart settled back where it belonged. My shoulder blades pressed into the seat cushion. But my hands didn’t unclench until the noise faded completely, and the urge to run didn’t leave until Ethel had growled her way down the street out front and gone silent in our driveway.

  WILLIAM

  A bead of sweat rolled down my nose and dripped onto my forearm. I watched it shine in the glow from the Two-Knock’s old-fashioned gaslights as Clete eyed the Negro sitting next to my Addie.

  “Will,” he said in a false whisper. “If you don’t do nothin’, then you’re a yellow coward.”

  I drained the last of the Choc from my glass and asked him if he had my back. “Always,” he said, with something flat and mean in his eyes that I mistook for loyalty. So here’s what I did: I walked over to Addie’s table and I said to that full-grown man, “You best get away from her, boy.”

  The man pushed back his chair and stood up, and even though our eyes met on the level, I knew straightaway I’d never best him in a fight. Addie watched, her own beautiful eyes big with worry. Then a funny look crossed her face and she said, “Aren’t you Will, from school?”

  “William,” I said, affecting a deep voice that wasn’t truly mine. “William Tillman.”

  “Well, William Tillman,” her companion said. “I’m Clarence Banks. Would you care to join Miss Dobbs and me for a drink, or have you had enough already?”

  I stood there swaying, trying to figure out if he was mocking me. In hindsight, it shouldn’t have taken much figuring at all.

  “I told you to get away from her, boy!” I near shouted. And Addie said in her kind, sweet voice, “William, Clarence and I are old childhood acquaintances, just here to catch up with one another. If you’ll go back to your friend now, you and I can have lunch together at school next week. How does that sound?”

  That’s when the molasses in my brain cleared enough for me to realize Addie was trying to get rid of me. And I set to blubbering like a fool, saying, “He touched you! Don’t let him do that, Addie. Don’t let him touch you!”

  At which point Clarence moved between me and the girl I loved and said, “Now, William, I know Miss Dobbs appreciates you looking out for her, but she’s fine. Everything’s fine. You go on back to the bar and have another drink, my treat. Miss Dobbs and I will take our leave, and we’ll all finish out our respective evenings, nice and peaceful.”

  I checked to make sure Clete was behind me like he’d promised, but he was way back at the bar, watching the spectacle unfold like he didn’t know me from Adam. There was disappointment in his stare. Pity, too, as if I’d failed him and every other white boy in the world. It stung so bad that something inside me broke like rotted boards under a fat man’s foot. And when I swung at Clarence Banks, it was with all the broke-hearted fury inside me.

  He saw it coming, of course, for I was a poor fighter sober and a downright hopeless one drunk. Clarence caught my fist and pushed me away. I stumbled backwards, landing hard on the rough pine floorboards. Pickled as my brain was, I felt no pain when my hands caught my fall. But when I lifted the left one afterwards, it flopped sideways like a dead thing.

  Addie paled. Clarence looked sick, as if all his shine and confidence had snapped right along with my bones. “I… I didn’t mean to…,” he stammered. Then Clete was beside me, saying, “You’re gonna get it now, boy! Just you wait. You’re gonna get it!” He motioned towards the people around us. “You all saw it! You saw him attack my friend!”

  That’s when the owner came out from behind the nickel bar, saying, “Now, son, let’s just settle down and sort things out.”

  Clete shook his head, saying nuh-uh and looking around for support. Only nothing came back to him but stares. That’s when his face went mean and ugly, and he said he’d show us all and ran out of the Two-Knock into the night.

  The bartender turned to Clarence. “That was a fool thing you did, son. Best be on your way quick before that boy comes back with the law. I’ll see that missy here gets home.”

  He was a big man, that bartender, and could have passed for black or white. Either way, he knew Clarence Banks was in trouble.

  Clarence pulled himself tall and said something I didn’t hear. Addie shook her head and put her hand on his arm and told him, “Clarence, please… you have to go.” Something passed between them. Something I felt more than saw. Then it was over, and Clarence Banks walked out into the night.

  After that, the bartender hoisted me up by the armpits and dragged me to a stool. “Let’s see what we got here,” he said, straightening my wrist. That’s when the first of the physical pain hit, all hot and sharp, like someone pounding a railroad spike into me. I yelped. The bartender scratched his head.

  “You got folks to tend to this?”

  I nodded.

  “Well then,” he said. “Since it ain’t your leg, you can walk home just fine. And listen close: you and your friend keep clear of my establishment from now on, understand?”

  I must’ve nodded again, for he grunted, then told me to beat it. I wobbled across the room,
trying to keep my feet. And as I pushed open the door, his voice found me once more, like a kick in the pants.

  “And don’t you tell no one where you been!”

  The cold, dark air hit my hot cheeks like a tonic, busting through my muddleheadedness enough so I could steer myself homeward. I cradled my hand against my chest and took a few steps.

  “Will! Will, wait!” Clete hollered from somewhere behind me. I turned, trying to find him in the scant moonlight. But when I finally managed to make sense out of the shadows, there were two figures coming at me instead of one. I closed my eyes, shook my head, and looked again to make sure the Choc wasn’t making me see double.

  Sure enough, there were two: Clete, and a policeman who grabbed my elbow when he got to me, saying, “Hold up there, fella. Your friend here tells me you’ve been attacked by a Negro.”

  He spied my wrist and grabbed it, and the sound of my yelp tumbled down the street.

  “Can’t see a thing out here,” he grumbled. Then we were back inside the Two-Knock. Me, Clete, and the policeman.

  The place was still as a tomb. Even though Prohibition was in full swing and drinking was every bit as illegal as thieving, most coppers would turn a blind eye to it so long as speakeasy owners kept free booze and cash bribes flowing their way. Still, every man and woman in the Two-Knock that night could’ve been arrested on the spot.

  The cop looked at my wrist, tutted, and said, “I hear a colored boy assaulted this young man. That so?”

  Not a soul in the room moved save for Clete, who was practically hopping up and down, saying, “Course it’s true! It’s like I told you—he went after Will here just ’cause Will told him he shouldn’t be pawing all over a white girl!”

  The cop’s lips pulled back from his teeth like the notion of such a thing made him sick. “Which white girl might that be?” he asked, looking around.

  “She… she left,” mumbled a moon-faced boy no older than myself. And the cop stared him down so hard I thought that boy would crack. Then the cop said, “Ladies and gentlemen, I’m runnin’ out of patience here. Where. Did. She. Go?”

  Clete cleared his throat, and for half an awful second, I thought he might just be riled enough to give Addie up. Instead, he said, “I don’t know about the girl, sir, but that Negro said his name was Clarence Banks. Will, here, was just trying to get him off of her, and that boy started cursing and going after him like a mad dog. Ain’t that so, Will?”

  My wrist hurt so bad I couldn’t think straight. My head ached. I needed to throw up. And, God forgive me, I croaked out yes.

  The policeman looked around, asking if anybody could corroborate Clete’s account. And when a few white heads bobbed in the affirmative, he said, “What about it, Ed? Was the boy called Clarence Banks?”

  The bartender’s eyelid twitched. The cop shook his head sadly. Said, “You’re a good Negro, Ed. Never missed a payment for all the protection I give you. But now that I think about it, last week’s envelope felt a little light…”

  Well, that big old bartender’s jaw clamped tight as a vise, and one of the veins in his neck near popped through his skin as he took the cash box from behind the bar and handed over every last cent inside. The cop stuffed bills and coins into his pocket and said to me, “Young man, I suppose we’d best take you down to the station and get a statement before we telephone your folks.”

  I panicked at that, stammering how I was fine and could get myself home and there was no reason to phone anyone, no reason at all. That made the cop smirk so that I felt about two inches high, which, in retrospect, was an inch more than I deserved. “In that case,” he said, “I’ll just head on back to my patrol.”

  To which I mewled yes sirs and thank yous until the cop was near out the door. Then that fool Clete yanked off his cap and slapped it against his knee, shouting, “Wait a minute! Is that all you’re gonna do? You gonna let that boy get away with attacking a white man? You just gonna leave?”

  The cop’s eyes narrowed, and he stalked back and grabbed Clete by the collar and yanked him onto the tips of his toes, growling: “You oughtn’t question how an officer of the law goes about his business, son.”

  Clete shrank inside his clothes. Even still, that boy was so stubborn and cussed that he squalled like a stuck pig, saying, “I just want him to pay for touching a white gal, is all!”

  The cop let go of Clete’s collar and watched him work to catch his balance. “We take care of our own in this town,” he said. “Understand?” And his voice was so low-down and ugly that Clete finally hushed. Then the cop took his billy club from its belt loop and aimed it around the room in a slow circle. “You all remember that,” he said. “The law around these parts takes care of its own.” And he smacked the club against his palm and gave me and Clete a dead-eyed stare that chilled us to our toes.

  Now, soon as the door closed behind the cop, the bartender told me and Clete to clear out before we got someone killed. And Clete, knowing then that the big man was a Negro, went off half cocked, spouting nonsense about him not having any right to tell us what to do. That’s when I grabbed hold of Clete’s arm with my good hand and steered him out, saying to the bartender how very sorry we were, and that we’d never trouble him or his establishment again.

  But he turned his back before I finished, indicating in no uncertain terms that he’d had his fill of us. Which was fine, for my thoughts were already drifting towards the selfish matter of how I’d explain my wrist to my parents. It never did cross my narrow little mind that I should worry about Clarence Banks, or be bothered by the fact that I’d just unleashed the full force and fury of Tulsa’s crooked police element on a Negro.

  And an innocent one, to boot.

  Rowan

  Ethel is James’s 1969 El Camino. She’s old, moody, and so ugly she’s beautiful. I love the sound her engine makes—the mean, sexy rumble that turns heads on warm spring nights when we drive past the stretch of outdoor restaurant patios along Brookside. Last year, before James told his dad he was asexual and his dad stopped looking him in the eye, the two of them had rebuilt Ethel from the wheels up. They were always doing stuff like that: taking fishing trips, driving to small towns in the Panhandle to drum together at Kiowa powwows and dances. Those days were long gone, but at least James still had Ethel. The nose-in-the-air types at our private school can trash-talk him all they want for being a scholarship student, but Ethel is and always will be completely badass.

  That morning, he parked Ethel behind my Acura and sauntered toward me calmly, like I hadn’t just called him in a complete panic.

  “Nice look,” he said.

  I was still wearing the bike shorts and Tulsa Roughnecks T-shirt I’d slept in. My breath was rank, and my hair was sticking out all over the place even though I’d pressed it the day before. Not that James had a lot of room to talk; his own hair was cut into a tight fade on the sides, but it was high on top, and so flattened and messy that I knew he hadn’t stopped to comb it.

  Which I appreciated, because James is more than slightly obsessive about his appearance. He’s this six-foot-four, part-Kiowa, part-black guy with crazy broad shoulders, a Willy-Wonka-goes-to-Wall-Street wardrobe, and more skin care products in his bathroom than Mom and I have combined. In other words, it was a big deal for him to leave the house ungroomed. I gave him shit anyway, to distract myself from the situation and make things feel more normal.

  “Nice hair.”

  His hand went halfway to his head and stopped.

  “Uh-uh,” he said. “Only one of us gets to be bitchy this early in the morning and I’ve got dibs. Now, tell me what’s going on.”

  So much for normal.

  “Come see what I found,” I said.

  “You gonna tell me what it is?”

  I shook my head. “You’ll see.”

  At the door to the back house, James whistled long and low over the mess. “They tore this place up!”

  “Tim and Isis Chase never do anything half-assed,” I said.
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  We stopped at the edge of the hole and stared down together. James talked first.

  “Did you call the police?”

  “No. I thought maybe the construction guys would do it. But it doesn’t look like they did.”

  “You mean they just left?”

  “Yeah.”

  James sighed, like he had a few thoughts on the matter. But after a pause, all he said was, “Who do you think it is?”

  It was such a simple question, but somehow I knew the answer was going to be anything but. I got down on my knees to look closer. With my living, breathing best friend at my side, the existential awfulness of an abandoned dead person was a lot easier to take. Bones were just bones, after all. Unless they were something more.

  I reached toward the tarp. “Haven’t got a clue,” I said. “Let’s figure it out.”

  James grabbed my arm. “Don’t touch it!”

  “It’s been dead a long time,” I said, getting braver by the second. “I think I’m safe.”

  James nudged my hip with the toe of his oxford. “I know. But you’re the murder mystery fangirl. Aren’t you supposed to leave crime scenes intact for the police?”

  “It’s skeletonized,” I said, showing off my fangirl vocab. “And it looks like it’s been here forever. My guess is, anyone who might have been looking for this guy is dead, too.”

  “Well, it’s still nasty, and you shouldn’t touch it,” he said, making a face.

  “Yeah. You’re probably right.”

  I yanked up a corner of the tarp. The top layer came loose with a thrip. Underneath was cleaner fabric that didn’t give so easy. I worked my fingers into the ground by where the hip bone should have been, found a loose-ish edge, and squatted on my toes so I could put all my weight into pulling. It gave. I fell backwards, hitting the ground hard enough to raise a cloud of dust. Once James and I recovered from our coughing fits, we looked down at the exposed body together.

  “I bet that’s blood,” I said, pointing to a heavy spatter of brown on the yellowed shirt that must have been white once.