Sweet, Hereafter Read online

  sweet, hereafter

  sweet, hereafter

  ANGELA JOHNSON

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2010 by Angela Johnson

  Photograph of girl copyright © 2010 by Chad Hunt

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  is a trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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  Book design by Laurent Linn

  The text for this book is set in Aldine.

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Johnson, Angela, 1961–

  Sweet, hereafter / Angela Johnson.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Sweet leaves her family and goes to live in a cabin in the woods with the quiet but understanding Curtis, to whom she feels intensely connected, just as he is called back to serve again in Iraq.

  ISBN 978-0-689-87385-0 (hardcover)

  [1. Identity—Fiction. 2. Interpersonal relations—Fiction. 3. Iraq War, 2003—Fiction. 4. African Americans—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.J629Sw 2010

  [Fic]—dc22

  2009027618

  ISBN 978-1-4169-9865-5 (eBook)

  For those who did and did not come home

  sweet, hereafter

  Prologue

  THERE’S A FRONT PAGE PHOTO OF MY friend Jos standing by the side of a road on a hot summer day. I almost don’t recognize him, because he’s out of place. It’s a frozen moment in time—but I’m so used to Jos being animated, funny and moving. It bothers me that one picture can define everything in other people’s minds but never really tell the whole story.

  A cop in dark shades is touching him on the arm. Gently. The photographer was close, ’cause you can see every line on the cop’s and Jos’s face. There weren’t any lines an hour before.

  • • •

  It’s early. Everything is quiet. Too quiet. I turn on the radio to make sure there hasn’t been some kind of world-ending disaster. Hell—they do happen. More than you could ever dream they do. I’ve seen them, been a part of them, don’t even have to watch the news to see one happening.

  My feet are cool on the old hardwood floors, and I don’t even mind that I’m still trying to work out a splinter. I walk to the front window.

  I love the cool.

  And I love the feeling I get knowing I’m walking on floors people walked on a hundred years ago. I blow the candle out ’cause finally the sun is struggling past the clouds.

  The radio crackles as I stare out at Lake Erie haze.

  I press my face against the window and feel cobwebs on the side of my head but don’t pull back. If I listen close I can hear cars blowing past on the road about a hundred yards away.

  I listen for Curtis over the drone of the radio—I do it without thinking. Then I see the groundhogs through the window and start peeling apples for them.

  I do it like I breathe or walk to the sink to get a glass of water.

  Automatic.

  It starts to rain, and I watch like the photographer did on that burning hot summer day, while rain streaks every inch of the window.

  Curtis

  1

  THERE ARE LONG ARMS ALL AROUND ME and I know I’m gonna have a serious curb put on my social life if I don’t get off this couch right now and go home.

  When I try to get up, Curtis’s arms squeeze me more, and I know that I’m not going anywhere, not until he gives it up and lets go.

  Still, I’m thinking I got so much homework I’ll be up all night trying to finish it. And if I want the parents outta my business I have to keep the low B going. I ain’t never been an A student, so my parents are happy about those Bs I drag out every semester.

  And there’s Curtis….

  I’d miss him if I were grounded for life. I’d miss the way he always smells like sweet leaves underfoot in the fall. I mean, that’s what I think of when I’m close to him. The woods. Leaves. Pine needles.

  And the feel of his skin …

  Shit like that….

  I don’t say shit like that when I’m with Curtis, ’cause he doesn’t swear. And even though he’s never said anything when I do—I do my best not to do it in front of him.

  Raised by a religious grandma is all he’ll say about it.

  I’m cold.

  I’m cold and awake, and he’s not here. No arms pull me back. I walk to the open window and smell the woods. I miss Curtis in his place on the couch beside me.

  But I live here now too. So when I lean out the window to see what kind of morning sky is out there, I see Curtis, leaning against a tree. And just like that—the cold is gone.

  2

  THE DAY I LEFT HOME, MOST OF MY JEANS were in the washer, and once I was gone, I wondered what I would have to wear. If you slam the hell out of your front door, you better have your bags packed and everything you’re going to need with you.

  It don’t look good to have to come back an hour later to get your shit.

  I left home on a sunny day.

  I left home on pot roast day.

  I left home the day my brother scored three goals at his soccer match.

  I left home the day our neighbor’s cat got stuck up a tree.

  I left home the day I couldn’t find my house keys.

  I left home the day the mailman delivered about a thousand catalogues.

  I left home the day I accidentally broke my favorite CD.

  I left home the day I couldn’t think of a good reason to stay. I left home, and two days later nobody came for me, so I stayed where I was.

  Which is here, in the woods in an old cabin surrounded by trees, bushes, and things that look harmless in the daytime but scratch the door in the night.

  I left home, and Curtis told me to come right on in and stay until I was happy not to stay.

  The day I left home, I had to go back for my jeans, but I didn’t have to go in. They were waiting for me folded in a box outside the front door.

  Curtis doesn’t talk much. Some days he hardly speaks at all. In the end he tells me what he needs to tell me by smiles, touches, or the tilt of his head. I don’t mind. I love the quiet. I love his quiet.

  I like living here in the cabin with him, and I know he wants me here. I walk through the cabin and touch the books that are lined against the wall. And there’s just enough to remind me of him every day—just enough. Just enough to make you comfortable, but not enough to tell you too much about Curtis. And I didn’t know that when I walked in the door, but that’s the way it stayed.

  I just know him—enough.

  And that’s okay, ’cause most people only know me enough. My own family only knew parts of me. My friend Marley knew a few parts. I’ve had secret parts of me since I was little. I’m used to it, and I guess it makes sense I’d love the secret parts of another.

  3


  THE BOARD SAYS IN PINK CHALK—

  THE REVOLUTION WILL

  NOT BE TELEVISED—SO

  READ A FUCKING BOOK.

  Ms. Jameson is way mad.

  And everybody thinks they know who did it. So we all sit around with stupid looks on our faces glancing toward the back of the room at Carl.

  AGB. Angry Goth Boy.

  Black nail polish—kicked out for two weeks for turning over desks and screaming “fascist” at the art teacher when she was talking about the Impressionists.

  Now I remember why I decided to take up merchandising and not be held hostage in rooms with thirty other people five days a week.

  Ms. Jameson puts the evil eye on Carl.

  He smirks at her.

  I like Carl, though. We used to skip class together, back in middle school.

  “So who will start today?” she says.

  I don’t remember too much after that until somebody taps me on my back and I jump.

  Brodie.

  “Was I snoring?”

  Brodie starts to laugh. Even though I haven’t turned around, I’d know that laugh anywhere. He can’t ever hold it in, and I can’t count how many times we’ve gotten busted because of that laugh.

  “Brodie!”

  “Sorry, Ms. Jameson.”

  And I go back to sleep and start to dream again. This time I know I’m dreaming. I’m sitting on the side of the road and it’s raining. I’ve always loved being in the rain. Now a man that I realize I should know but can’t remember his name walks up to me. It could be Jos or even my brother. In my dream the familiarity is just there. I can’t tell if his face is wet because of the rain or because of the tears. And even in my dream all I want to do while I’m sitting there is to go after the photographer and beat the hell out of her for freezing this man’s crying face in my mind. But it’s just a dream.

  I walk out of school with Brodie and try to remember how we came to be friends. He’s a jock, class president, and dates cheerleaders—but he’s funny, kinda twisted, and mad smart. And I’m pretty sure the class president thing was just so he could get snack machines in the senior lounge.

  “I need a ride,” he says.

  “Alice is funny about who she gives rides to. Last time you were in her, there was that thing …”

  “Dag, Sweet. All I did was change the radio a few times and mess with the heat. That shouldn’t make a truck stall.”

  Brodie busts open a bag of chips and laughs while throwing some at three sophomore girls walking by. They laugh and scream his name.

  “Cute.” I pull Alice out of the parking lot.

  “I know,” he says.

  “Where do you need to go, then?”

  “I don’t know—just drive. Or we could go get food. There’s only so many chips I can eat before I start to starve to death.”

  I slow down for a dog crossing the road.

  “Snack machines not working out so hot, huh?”

  Brodie turns and looks at me like I just went through his underwear drawer. Then he looks hurt. I laugh. Then I remember it’s the reason I introduced Brodie to my friend Jos: Sometimes they’re both just too much fun and full of shit. They play well together and make me laugh.

  “C’mon, Brodie—class president? You’d rather be watching football or some crazy cartoon with people as underwater creatures or dogs and cats playing saxophones …”

  “Yeah, okay, that’s me.”

  “Yeah, but why don’t most people know that about you?”

  “You do. But that’s who you are,” he says.

  “What do you mean, that’s who I am?”

  Brodie finishes up the chips and sticks the empty in his courier bag.

  “Yo, Sweet, have you ever really looked at yourself in a mirror?”

  “Where you going with this—way to get the subject off of you, huh?”

  Brodie smiles. “If you ever even acted like you would look at somebody from this school, there’d be a riot. Man, everybody would be creeping around your locker—stalking you. I don’t know what the problem is, ’cause at first like any dumbass guy who gets viciously rebuffed by a mommy, I wanted to believe you just liked girls.”

  “I do like girls—”

  Brodie smacks me with a balled-up bandana he finds on the seat next to him. “You know what I mean. Anyway, whatshisname is lucky.”

  “His name is Curtis.”

  Brodie laughs, then hangs out the window and hollers something to a passing car. I pull off the road into the parking lot of Tony’s Café.

  Me and Brodie jump out the car and head inside. I think about locking Alice but decide not to. Brodie is about four steps ahead of me when he shifts the bag on his shoulder and a box of pink chalk falls out.

  4

  THERE’S A BIG SUGAR MAPLE TREE THAT sits in the corner of the yard. I sometimes lean against it and fall asleep. Curtis always asks me why I’m leaning against myself.

  In this cabin with Curtis I wake up to the sound of the wind. Or an animal running underneath the house. Groundhogs have moved in. Well, they’ve probably always been there.

  Curtis likes them.

  He calls them the wild pigs and leaves them vegetable scraps and tells me that they like salsa music. He says that he plays salsa music to the groundhogs. Then they come and hang out in the front yard.

  I thought he was making it up.

  So one day I’m leaning against the tree and there’s salsa music coming from the window—and there they were. Three groundhogs sitting and chewing. I sat and watched them for a long time, until it started getting cold. But just when I thought about going back in, Curtis came out the door dressed in camouflage and carrying an old canvas jacket.

  He knelt down and wrapped me up in it.

  Then he sat down and wrapped his arms around me.

  Reason six hundred and ninety-two why nothing should shock me but it always does.

  Where we live there is nothing strange about men in full camouflage. You see that stuff in the woods, in the supermarkets, and going down the back roads with gun racks and pickups. I never did understand it. Got used to it, but never understood it. But I still wanted to know why he was covered in the gear.

  He could read me.

  “I’m in the reserves. Already been to Iraq—probably have to go back.”

  Curtis took out apple pieces and threw them to the groundhogs.

  “You mean the army? I mean, I can get with them when they’re rescuing people and shit.”

  “We do that.”

  “Did you ever shoot your gun?”

  “Weapon,” he said.

  Curtis threw more apples to the hogs—who now were seriously eating.

  “But you’re going to college. Why are you in the reserves?”

  Curtis frowned and kept pitching apples.

  “It’s helping me pay. I got this cabin and my car. That’s it. I can’t sell the cabin. It came from family. It’s mine, but I could never sell it. So it’s the reserves.”

  “I thought you were nonviolent, a pacifist. You look sick every time you read about someone getting shot.”

  Curtis frowned again and said, “They might be coming for me—any day now. Any day.”

  He leaned against me again and kissed the back of my neck.

  “If you’ve already been, why do you have to go back? I mean, damn it, you got responsibilities. You have to feed the wild pigs. Give them the money back and get a job on campus.”

  The groundhogs looked up at me like they were thinking, YOU ARE SUCH A BIG-ASSED LIAR. IT’S ALL ABOUT YOU?

  They were right.

  • • •

  A story Curtis tells.

  When he was little, there were always cousins that lived with his family. Sometimes there were as many as thirteen kids in their house. It never mattered. They got by. When his parents were alive, they made a lot of money and believed in sharing everything with everybody.

  He was six years old when one of his cousins got sick and had to
go to the hospital. She never came back. But because he was only six, the older kids told him she wouldn’t be back because a dragon got her. He liked fairy tales, and they thought he would understand.

  They didn’t let the little kids go to the funeral.

  So he stayed home and started going through all his books. Afterward, when the family went to malls, he’d always want to go to the bookstore. He was looking…. He was looking in all the fairy tales that had dragons in them. He was looking for his cousin. He expected her to appear in the window of a castle. Or maybe she would be running across a moat. But the girls never looked like his cousin.

  They were pale, blond, and looked like teenagers.

  His cousin was chocolate-skinned, had black plaits, and was five.

  He never found her.

  The dragon had taken her a long way away and for good.

  5

  I WATCH THE TELEVISION IN THE FRONT window of Morry’s Electronics. The flat screen is so big it takes up the whole window. I blow cigarette smoke over my shoulder. A few minutes ago Jos told me I smelled like a smokestack. That’s why I try not to get too many fumes on me.

  I’m not as into the TV as I’m into what’s on it.

  There’s long lines of troops coming out of a hangar onto a runway. And if you don’t look at their faces, you don’t see that most of them are so young it’s probably the first time a lot of them have ever left their state, let alone the country.

  My dad said the fatigues are different than when he was in Vietnam, ’cause they were in a jungle. The colors now are better for the desert.

  The farm kids are the same as they were when my dad went to Vietnam. The city kids have that walk … like they know where they’re going.

  I know somebody like that. He walks ahead, sure of himself, and never acts like he doesn’t know where he’s going. He moves like he was here and did everything before people even walked the planet. He’s that comfortable in his skin.

  His skin. His skin.

  I put my cigarette out and watch as boys and girls, men and women, fill up a whole transport plane, and I feel cold. After a few minutes a woman with a stroller is standing next to me. She watches the TV and moves the stroller back and forth. The baby starts to babble, but in a minute it’s asleep.