Read Online Under a Dark Summer Sky by Vanessa Lafaye - Free Book Online

back across the Potomac. Hope gone, faith gone. Only anger remained.
    And then, when it had seemed they could sink no lower, a lifeline had found its way to them in the form of a letter from Lemuel. He wrote that a government construction project in the Florida Keys was hiring, for real pay. Not as good as the bonus, it seemed, but better than picking fruit. More than that, Henry decided the location of the project was a sign that the universe wanted him to go home. If it was going to work that hard, he figured, then the least he could do was see what purpose it had for him.
    But when he arrived back in Heron Key, he was unprepared for the shock of so many familiar sights and smells, having long ago given up on ever seeing the place again. It looked exactly like it had all those years ago, as if he had only stepped away for a few minutes. He half expected to see his younger self stroll by. It was eerily disconcerting, like an endless attack of déjà vu. He felt like a ghost, haunting a former life where he didn’t belong anymore. His men went to town, especially on payday, but he made up excuses to stay behind. The months went by, and still he made no contact. Although his cowardice shamed him, he could face no one from the past, no one who had known him as he was. The extra shame barely registered, just got added to the great big well of it inside him. He was unwilling to face the questions and curious stares of the people he had left behind, even the ones he cared about. The only place he had felt at home was in Doc’s kitchen, drinking bourbon after dark. Only Doc, who had served and understood. So once in a while, he snuck into town like a thief.
    And then it happened. One night, on his way back from Doc’s, he saw her. At first he thought it was a drunken hallucination. Missy passed by in the direction of her Mama’s house, head down, weary feet shuffling on the dusty road. Although she hummed under her breath, it was not a happy sound. And then she was gone around the corner. Suddenly he felt completely sober…and very, very foolish. The next day, he had presented himself at Selma’s house, as protocol demanded. Reporting for duty.
    He thought back to the scene at the Kincaids’ house. So now Missy was all grown up. His little Missy, no longer little. She used to leap into his arms each time he arrived to help with her homework, fairly vibrating with the excitement of learning. Even smeared head to foot with gator gore, she was still pretty. And the embarrassment made her prettier still. She was a girl no more, not even a young woman. He had missed all of that. Still working for the Kincaids and living with Mama, Selma had said with a sad shake of her head. He ran his dirty cloth around his neck. Missy could have been something. There had even been talk of her getting a scholarship to college at Howard. And then her useless daddy got himself drowned. Still, where was her husband, her babies? He had wanted to ask Selma, but that would have alerted her extremely keen senses to an interest he was not sure he felt…or even deserved to feel.
    The coast road bent around the curve of the point that brought him within sight and smell of the camp. The sulfurous stink of the latrines caught in his throat. On the colored side, he could see Jeb sluicing his skinny torso at the pump. The last of his men were here. His men. There was Jeb and Franklin, Lemuel and Sonny. That was all.
    Henry noticed that his shadow had lengthened on the walk from town. He marched faster, boots kicking up puffs of coral dust. There was just enough time to get clean before they would need to turn around and go back for the barbecue. He did not mind the walk. It was something he knew well how to do. It seemed he had done little else than walk for years and years—always away, never toward anything.
    Jeb looked up as he approached.
    â€œHey, man.” He straightened with a grin. “You look like shit.”