That love was tested one disastrous evening in April.
Meriday walked off the field after his work was done and saw how the Master’s daughter tended to the dogs. They were wild and vicious, same as they had always been, and barked and growled at the girl that brought them water.
When the girl saw Meriday the butterflies in her stomach took her for a spin. She lost her focus, took that one horrendous step too many, and one of the dogs jumped and pulled at her arm.
Briefly the two animals quarreled with each other over who would get the best part and then they tore at her arm and shoulder. The flesh went straight off her bones, exposing veins and muscle.
It took a moment for the girl to start screaming, as it took a moment for Meriday to react. He ran toward her and was determined, hellbent, on saving the one person that had ever shown him kindness in this horrible, new world.
As he approached, Meriday realized how big the dogs really were. How terribly strong their enormous white teeth looked. He wanted to kick them, stab their eyes, and pull at their awful, wagging tails. Yet all he could do was stand a short distance from the bloody spectacle and watch, paralyzed, as the dogs struck the girl’s once beautiful face and disfigured her.
The Master and his helpers came running from the farmhouse with rifles in their hands and executed the vicious dogs with four loud bangs. The animals yelped through their horrible growls and then there was the most brutal silence that had ever settled on the farm.
Then, through the shock and excruciating pain, the girl called out for her father. She sat in the puddle of her own blood mixing with that of the dogs that had assaulted her, and screamed aimlessly into the heavy air.
“And he just stood there! He didn’t do anything!”
The Master’s helpers picked the girl up and carried her inside the farmhouse. The Master himself remained and turned his attention to Meriday, who still stood as if made out of stone.
The Master wanted something to burn, wanted everything to burn in his terrible rage. He hated the world for what had happened to his beautiful daughter, for the pain he had felt through her suffering, and he feared that he would never get her screams to leave his nightmares.
Meriday had to burn. Meriday would burn. His crime?
He hadn’t sacrificed his meaningless black body to save the Master’s daughter.
The following afternoon the Master’s helpers beat Meriday and dragged him away from the farm.
They carried him along the dusty road that extended from the farm all the way to the woods and edged the many fields where other slaves were working. The black men and women tried their hardest not to look as the crippled Meriday passed them by.
Before they reached the woods the men took a left turn and dragged the barely conscious Meriday behind them.
The men shuddered as they saw the field that was their destination. Yet they could not disobey the Master who sat on his horse, waiting in the middle of the field, kept company by a bottle of kerosene and the terrible oak that loomed over them.
They dragged Meriday across the field until they reached the oak and threw him against the powerful tree.
With long ropes they tied the helpless slave against the oak and stepped back, clearing the way for the Master that had the final honors.
The Master got off his horse and took the bottle of kerosene as he walked toward Meriday. Without a word he opened the bottle and poured it down over the slave’s head. Its terrible stink mixed with Meriday’s blood, sweat, and tears to leave a vile and bitter aroma.
The Master took a few steps back and pulled a box of matches from his pocket. With a swift movement he lit one and tossed it in Meriday’s direction.
The barely conscious Meriday was reawakened by the terrible sensation running over his body as the fire took hold. It ate away at his skin and forced the most horrible screams from his charring mouth.
The pain drove him toward a final insanity no man could ever come back from and burned itself into his skull. He could smell his own flesh roasting, his muscles dying, his blood boiling in the heat of the punishing flames. When he tried to close his eyes he found that his eyelids had already burned off.
This was hell. He had arrived and he would never be allowed to leave.
Then a gentle wind blew across the field and entered Meriday’s mind. It took the pain from him and pushed it back, all the way back in his mind, where it was bearable.
The oak whispered to him about the truth of nature. About the origins of the stars and the moon. It was all a chaotic dance that could only ever end in destruction, and his screaming was the most beautiful song the oak had ever heard. Would he not abandon his pain and offer himself to the oak that could allow him to forget?
Meriday said that he would, and he meant it. The oak was so beautiful and so kind; its whispers felt so very true. Meriday knew that the tree would save him and protect him from all the cruelty designed in man’s name.
The oak took the flames running across Meriday’s body and burned in his place. Its bark that had once been pure and powerful blackened and the leaves that were its crown turned to ashes.
In return, the life force that fed the mighty oak claimed Meriday’s soul for itself and allowed him to die a quick and meaningless death. His screams would sound no more and his pained madness would not ever linger beyond those few short moments before his demise.
The Master and his helpers left Meriday’s charred body tied to the blackened oak that would surely die. The animals could have whatever was left of the slave’s useless remains.
None of the men ever spoke of the terrible fact that the oak had been completely restored the next time they passed by the field, not two days later. Meriday’s body was nowhere to be seen.
DAY 2
OCTOBER 25, 2019 – PART 1
The morning coffee at Sparky’s Diner was fresh and, contrary to Agent Bradford’s meager expectations, delicious.
He sat in the corner of the diner near one of the windows, reading Jane’s report on his phone as he waited for his eggs and bacon. He could hear Becky complain in the back of his head about fat and cholesterol and all the other shit she read in her garbage magazines. Luckily his wife wasn’t here to bother him with whatever was trending in her tabloid-riddled mind. Agent Bradford would enjoy his eggs, and his bacon, because life was too short to listen to the shrill tone of his wife’s nagging.
Jane had emailed her report late last night after he’d already gone to bed. Reading it now he realized that what he’d feared would happen had happened. Not even a day in Brettville and she was already moving things around that she had no business moving around. Sending patients off to Bryce? She didn’t have the authority to do that.
When his breakfast arrived he put down his phone. Agent Bradford decided that he would head over to the hospital later to see if the patients had already been moved. Maybe he could still stop the transfers from happening.
Agent Bradford attacked his breakfast with short and jerky movements. The annoyance running through his body forced whatever taste the food might have to the distant background of his busy mind.
She always did this. With her dark gaze. Did things he didn’t understand. With her constant smile. He could never predict exactly what she would do. With her golden hair. But it always undermined him and the office he was working for in one way or another, as if the girl took some kind of twisted pleasure in their bureaucratic power struggle.