the first. It feels good on my face and running down the front of my shirt.
We reach the river. The tide must be out. Between the bank and the water is pluff mud, soft and black and warm. We walk through it and reach the water, and then the singing starts again. I look back at the riverbank, and everyone’s watching. Someone’s leaning me backward into the rushing water, and I go under, and everything gets washed away. Here in the cool and dark at the bottom of the river, I feel the water moving through me. It pulls out images that pass in front of my eyes:
There I am as a kid, climbing up the moon path above the RC beach, alone.
There we are, Billy and I, throwing rocks in the pond.
There we are playing mud ball on the beach.
The beach! I’m older now, and Reggie’s kissing me.
And now we’re behind the Main, and he’s giving me a joint. I push it away, but he roughly puts it to my lips again…. I understand, he whispers. I’m the only one who does.
Now he’s planting the first crop at the RC. There he is, with a spade; it’s Reggie, ripping up my mother’s precious plants.
And finally, he is with Crystal, standing where the Sanctuary used to be. He’s holding her the same way he did in the soccer field, and she’s laughing. But for some reason, I don’t care when I see them this time. It’s like watching two strangers. He looks so ugly to me, with his scrawny body and his liar’s eyes. I let the water pull him away.
I stand up, gasping for breath. Someone hands me a bottle of champagne, but it tastes flat and boring. I let it drop into the water. My salty tears fall into the brackish water, and that’s the last thing I remember: crying into the Vernon River because of all the ways this world has disappointed me, while in the distance the heat lightning flickers out at sea.
20
When I wake up, the angle of the sun streaming in the window suggests late morning. I sit up, gasping, and put my hands to my face.
All right, things are looking up: I’m alive and okay and not burned or possessed or in some freaky forest. In fact, I’m very comfy in my four-poster bed, and from what I can see through the window, the sky looks nice and blue.
Man. That was one trippy dream.
I wonder how long I’ve been asleep. Oddly, instead of being groggy, I feel completely energized, as if I’ve just had a massive amount of Italian espresso injected into my veins.
Okay, obviously the MGs drugged me with something. I’m not one to use profanity lightly but… those bitches! Why would they do that? To haze me or something?
I shoot out of bed, looking around the room. I’m wearing the same clothes I had on last night. No weird robes or markings.
My mom used to say dreams were really important to reading your inner self. She’d write them down as soon as she woke up so that she wouldn’t forget them. Maybe if I quickly scrawl down what I remember… I grab a notebook and sit at my desk.
Hayes.
Madison.
Sunglasses?
Sam. Sina. My grandmother…
Jonta.
What a minute. Isn’t that what Madison was chanting that night at the party?
Jon-ta-conku-er.
I scrawl down the syllables and flip open my laptop. A Google search immediately suggests some person called John the Conqueror. As my skin prickles, I click on the first Web page:
John the Conqueror is a central figure from African-American folklore. Sometimes known as High John the Conqueror or John de Conquer, he is associated with the John the Conqueror root, or John the Conqueroo, which is believed to contain magical powers. John the Conqueror root is central to the hoodoo tradition of folk magic.
Hoodoo? What the hell is that?
I scrawl the name and fly down the stairs and outside, then jog across the street to the Georgia Historical Society building, conveniently located kitty-corner to the grandma-mansion. The librarian, a formidable-looking lady with a halo of white hair as wispy as dandelion petals, raises her eyebrows when I burst in, breathless.
“Excuse me,” I say, my face turning red. “I’m looking for information on African folklore. But American. Rituals and stuff. The kind that might be around here. In a field in the country, maybe. With cakes and champagne.”
She blinks at me.
“Sorry. Let me try again. Okay. Is there a person in Georgia history called John the Conqueror?”
“Not