A Heart Divided by Cherie Bennett Page A

decade.
    Crystal giggled. “Remember last year, Jackson, after the South Columbia game? We got wasted, and Sara dared us to go skinny dipping in the river?”
    “′bout froze my ass off!” Chaz hooted. Everyone laughed. Anxiety fizzed up in me like an Alka-Seltzer. Jack was a part of them in a way I never could be.
    The waitress came back to the table with our Cokes. The football discussion continued, and I continued to have nothing much to say until an odd-looking man entered the restaurant. Rail thin with a long beard, he wore ancient gray woolen trousers with a long jacket and cap and carried a canteen, a shoulder bag, and a vintage rifle.
    “What’s up with that?” I asked, nudging my chin in his direction.
    “Bo Alford, curator of the Battle of Redford Museum,” Terry said, sipping his Coke. “On Saturday afternoons, he plays dress-up and leads tours. The beard’s fake, but all the clothes are a hundred and forty years old. So’s the gun.”
    I made a mental note to try to interview Mr. Alford for my play. Not that this play actually existed. The week before, I’d talked to Nikki’s father, as well as Malik El Baz, a black activist lawyer in Nashville. Reverend Lucas had been thoughtful; El Baz, fiery. I’d been trying to get an interview with a local white separatist leader named Ron Bingham who’d been profiled in the
Tennessean.
He lived forty miles south of Redford in the small town of Pulaski. But though I’d sent e-mails and left phone messages, the closest I’d come to actual contact was when his wife hung up on me.
    After each new interview I’d sit down at my computer, hands poised over the keyboard, waiting for inspiration to strike. Evidently, inspiration was busy striking some other lucky writer, because everything I wrote seemed worse than the previous effort. I’d end up deleting it all, sending it—with all the other attempts—to the cosmic trash bin where really bad writing goes.
    Tisha rolled her eyes. “That reenactment stuff is
so
hokey”.
    Terry nudged her playfully. “Hey, where’s your Southern pride, girl?”
    “Up my ass,” Tisha deadpanned.
    I laughed. The problem was, no one laughed with me.
    Though Jack gave my hand a reassuring squeeze, my cheeks burned.
    “Hey, I’m with Kate,” Tisha said. “You can’t take that crap seriously.”
    Chaz wagged a finger at her. “You don’t mess with tradition.”
    “That is such a load of bull,” Tisha insisted. “The thing is—”
    We lost the rest of Tisha’s sentence as the hip-hop was cranked back up to earsplitting volume.
    “That’s it.” Chaz half stood and twisted around, cupping his hands around his mouth. “Hey, could y’all turn it down a little?”
    One of the black kids leaned into the aisle. It was Nikki’s brother, Luke.
    “Yo, I said, turn it down!” Chaz repeated.
    Instantly, Luke and another guy were sauntering toward us, coiled rage beneath ebony skin. “You talking to me?” Luke asked when they got within spitting distance.
    Chaz stood to meet his challenge. “I’m just asking for y’all to turn down your music, bro.”
    Luke edged closer. “Do I look like your bro?”
    Chaz held his palms up. “Look, I’m not trying to start anything. But if you start it, I’ll finish it.”
    “Why don’t you get your cracker buddy to lend you one of his sheets,
bro.”
Luke jutted his chin toward Mr. Alford.
    “Jeez, man, you got a chip on your shoul—”
    The front door swung open. A huge man who had to be Big Jimmy followed his massive stomach into the restaurant. “What in the Sam Hill is goin’ on?” he bellowed, gesturing toward the offending CD player. With a heavily bandaged middle finger, he looked as if he was flipping everyone the bird.
    “I already asked them to turn it down, Big Jimmy,” Chaz said.
    Big Jimmy waddled toward Luke. “I
said
, turn that crap off!” he thundered.
    Luke nodded toward his friends. The hip-hop went silent.
    “You people are welcome in my