Apex Magazine, Issue 118 by Elana Gomel & Ben Serna-Grey & Russell Nichols & Jonathan L. Howard & Tabitha Barbour

Author:Elana Gomel & Ben Serna-Grey & Russell Nichols & Jonathan L. Howard & Tabitha Barbour [Gomel, Elana]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Apex Publications

Letty by Regina Bradley

3,100 words

Folks say you start to see things when you laying there, dying. I wasn’t ready to see because I didn’t expect to die that day. I worked in the saw mill as a dust sweeper because I refused to crawl on my hands and knees to scrub and clean for white folks. “You being uppity for a Negro girl,” my sister scoffed. She didn’t scrub floors, but she cooked in white folks’ kitchens. Same damn difference to me. That job at the sawmill paid better than any white person’s dirty house. When I was hired, the manager said I had a strong back. I swept the bottom floor to avoid mishaps. At night, I swept the dust into the holding gate. This time, I didn’t see the gate that held the sawdust swing open, but I heard it snap. Even though flecks of sawdust danced ’round my eyes and lay gently on my lashes, they lay heavy on my body and chest. How can something so nothing feel so heavy? I close my eyes. They're burning. Shadows and sawdust. Shadows and sawdust.

When I open my eyes, one shadow gets big. Real big. My head bobs like I been drinking hooch. The good hooch. The kind made with corn left in the fields too long and is a little too ripe and in the dark jar to save its flavor. People say the good hooch let you see the devil, and if you share it, it can save you from death or hand you on to him. My head snaps up and down. The big shadow turns brown. Then black. Brown. Then back-black. I squint to focus. I see a head and shoulders. The sound of swishing comes from somewhere I can’t see. Wood flecks stay in the air and silent.

The figure lets out a raspy voice. It sounds irritated. “Stuck, huh?”

“Just taking a break from sweeping is all.” It laughs.

“How you get in here?”

“Key.”

“Who’s key?”

“Mine.” The swishing turns to rustling that sounds like leaves scooped up dancing in the wind. The shadow thing comes close to my face. I’m queasy. It smells sweet and sour like old eggs. I squint again and see two wrinkly brown titties on the saw dust pile in front of me. Realize it’s a woman. She got old-woman titties, but a young-looking face. The shadow woman looks comfortable and stares me straight in the face. She got eyes that burn like hot coals. She don’t blink. The three plaits in her hair twitch in place. The two by her ears look undone. I see she got wings. They look like old crow feathers. Her features run from my view because they hide behind a piece of iron that sits right down the middle of her face and across her nose and cheeks. Her face shiny like molasses. Got a shackle around her neck and three pokes sticking out. They’re connected to a patch over her mouth with little holes. She thumps one of the pokes.

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