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The water clapped below as the girls abandoned their perch. Pickett Rock was chalky where dry and black where wet, so that the wet parts, once the last Rhiner slapped water, were like the shadows of dancing figures, and Daron was reminded of a tenth-grade lesson on Nagasaki, after which the teacher had been transferred out faster than a mad cow. She had read to the class a first-person account by a survivor who was lucky enough to be not only swimming, but also submerged when the blast passed over him. After seeing the flash reflected in the pool, he surfaced to discover that where his friends had once stood only their twisted silhouettes remained, draped on the ground like shadows, forgotten clothes, except white not black. With no frame of reference for such a phenomenon, he could only imagine a bizarre prank, so bizarre that he didn’t immediately notice the damage to the pool house or that the water he trod now felt near boiling. The survivor said he could take no credit for it, that it was preordained that he would live and his friends would die, and he would never understand why. All he knew was who. Who is who? asked the teacher, closing the book with a resolute thump and letting her readers jangle from their rattling beaded-glass tether. It’s us. Japan was ready to surrender as early as the defeat at Midway.

Jo-Jo dragged a heavy hand across his eyes. Now what about those juniors?

Yeah, Daron repeated, nodding, certain that it couldn’t matter because Berzerkeley and Braggsville were two worlds always on opposite sides of the sun.

Chapter Five

His sophomore fall was without incident, but halfway through his sophomore spring, everything changed. As Quint would say, his pancake got flipped. The class was American History X, Y, and Z: Alternative Perspectives. The course reader, peopled with notables such as Freire and Marx, was book-ended by Chomsky and Zinn. The 4 Little Indians had taken the class together to satisfy a core requirement and because they heard it was fun, or at least that’s what they told each other. The professor wore a monocle and resembled Mark Twain, and, better yet, video projects were accepted as capstones.

The first day of class the professor shepherded the students through the maze of Dwinelle Hall and down the front stairs, broad as a stage, across the plaza where Mondays through Wednesdays a man lay on his back all day with his bicycle across his chest like a security blanket, his arms and legs clawing the air in slow motion like an upturned turtle; and into the grand lobby of Wheeler Hall, where an elderly blond man wearing a kung fu gi and curly-toed shoes like a court jester practiced tai chi, his ragged braid gently sweeping his yellow belt: and ending in the Grinnell Grove, where upon a fallen blue gum eucalyptus a bearded man lunched each day wearing Indian dress and twelve multicolored berets stacked on top of his head like a Dr. Seuss character. The point? By the end of the semester, the professor hoped they would be able to tell him.

On Fridays, the professor hosted Salon de Chat, an informal class with the tagline: People who don’t know their history are doomed to eat it! The desks were arranged as four-tops covered with butcher paper and a sandwich board was installed in the hallway. Their bistro, like all classrooms on the south side of Dwinelle Hall, overlooked a thin creek spanned by a wooden footbridge and straddled by a tree shed that blocked the worst of sound and sun. The first few weeks of class, Daron arrived early to ensure a seat near the window from which he could observe the world four stories below—the students eating along Strawberry Creek, rushing to and from the Bear’s Lair café, hustling through the breezeway leading to the bookstore—and imagine himself already a Berkeley graduate; a king of industry on high appointment in his city club; a Carnegie, but a true philanthropist. In his employ even the cafeteria worker who napped where the roots had riven the retaining wall and the earth opened into alcove would be warmed by his generosity. (He would never forget that workingmen, like his father, carried this litter, as the prof called it.) This fantasy lasted only so long as he was alone and soon gave way to fancying that the students tromping in behind were assembling to hear him speak. That whimsy he could retain only until hearing chalk scrape, sometimes a screech as anguished as a balloon at the edge of constraint.

He then was back in 512-A, a narrow classroom with chalkboards on the long walls and, on the ceiling, cocked fluorescent fixtures with those damned baffling fins, Candice never seated beside him. Those fantasies lasted only the first few weeks because by then it was apparent that the professor thought it impossible for a rich man to be a good man. Salon de Chat, though, was always fun. After being assigned to a table of three or four diners, each student received a menu of conversations.

SALON DE CHAT

Starter

Civil Disobedience

Entrée

Tradition and Social Justice

Dessert

Uncivil Disobedience and Protest

As usual, Daron and Charlie sat together, and Louis sat elsewhere with Candice. How Louis always managed to partner with Candice, Daron had not yet figured out. The prof lurched from table to table, ears out, eyes to the floor, finger to the ceiling, nodding, rarely talking, more a mascot than a teacher. Daron was still unaccustomed to this practice, most common among humanities professors, of mm-hmming more than speaking, which was the exact opposite of high school.

Laughter shot across the room. From Louis’s table. His three partners were all doubled over, and Louis wore his famous face of fatuity, eyes wide, mouth straight and slightly open, head back like he’d narrowly missed a slap, an expression that asked, Did I say something?

At Daron’s table, a junior from L.A. blathered about documentary filmmaking as the next social protest movement. Documenting protests, that is. A performative intervention, she explained, drawing the words out like a foreign term. Read Mark Tribe. She had hair blonder than Beyoncé’s (her dyed coif quite unlike, he imagined, her Southern cousin’s) and he doubted she could read anything through those sunglasses, maybe not even without.

Another volley of laughter from Louis’s table. Candice was literally crying, her mascara fanning like Tammy Faye’s. Why had she started wearing so much makeup? Last semester, she wore none, to honor her Native heritage.

L.A. continued her litany of the merits of documentaries.

Vous n’êtes pas sérieux? What is performative intervention? That could be sex, or shoplifting. Daron counted the options out on his fingers. Is sex or shoplifting going to change the world? Better yet, how ’bout shoplifting sex?

That would be rape. And that is not funny. That is very serious. Failing to believe the humor in that remark, I’m departing for another table. L.A. stood then, but not before daintily counting out three index cards on her seat. There are my notes for the next two courses. That should cover my portion of the bill.

She strutted off, shorts nibbling cheeks, perfectly painted legs tucked into huge furry boots, like she was wearing the feet of a baby wooly mammoth.

Daron clambered to his feet, but Charlie extended his arm like a parent coming to a sudden stop. She’ll be back.

Daron muttered his agreement. He believed Charlie. There was never a shortage of girls volunteering to be in Charlie’s group, and he wasn’t even on the football team, he only looked like it.

She was here until the shoplifting sex part. You can recover as long as you don’t apologize or follow her now. Saying sorry would be giving up the advantage.

Daron considered this. If that was the case, he should draft an official apology. Forget La-La Loosey, as they called her. He had forgotten about Kaya, his freshman obsession, it was now Candice who inflamed him. The way she laughed, like she had a big appetite.

Daron ignored the fun being had at Louis’s table. Louis probably could have gotten away with a shoplifting sex comment.

The professor chose a replacement from the five coeds who volunteered and soon they were again picking at their appetizer, but they would not have room for dessert because for their entrée someone mentioned reenactments. A few people were surprised to hear that a professor at Brown was holding reenactments of famous civil rights demonstrations. The immediate consensus: It was a joke. It had to be ironic.

They have a reenactment every year in my hometown, announced Daron.

That can’t be serious, piped La-La from her new table. Vous n’êtes pas cereal.

Pull, Daron mumbled, borrowing Louis’s skeet-inspired euphemism for shooting the bird. They’re real cereal.

A reenactment? ¿Por qué? ¿Por qué? Candice groaned as if someone had run a fat baby up a flagpole. ¿Por qué? ¿Por qué? was her way of saying: Why? … No! That’s not why. Have a seat. I’ll tell you the real reason, whether you want to know or not. Worse yet, her conversations had astral bodies, as Louis joked. They’d be hearing about this for weeks (as they had been about Ishi).

And she was not the only one. The table was shocked. The entire class in fact. They’d heard tell of Civil War reenactments, but they were still occurring? The War Between the States was another time and another country. As was the South. Are barbers still surgeons? Is there still sharecropping? What about indoor plumbing? Like an old Looney Tunes skit, Tex Avery tag ensued. Charlie gawked at Louis, who gawped at Candice, who generously suggested it as a capstone project to the professor, who Googled the event and announced that it coincided with spring break, Serendipity has spoken.

Candice’s eyes were still pinwheeling as they had when she’d learned about Ishi, last of the Yahi. In 1911, that wild Indian wandered into Oroville, CA, where he was caught stealing meat. ¿Por qué? Because, according to Candice, Ishi was driven to desperation by California’s Gold Rush–financed Indian removal campaign. Seeing as how the locals didn’t take neatly to theft, the sheriff took Ishi into custody for Ishi’s own protection. ¿Por qué? Because, according to Candice, Ishi’s scalp alone was worth $5 U.S. After reading about Ishi in the paper, a kind UC anthropologist named Alfred Kroeber became Ishi’s benefactor, and installed Ishi in a comfortable apartment in the Museum of Anthropology at UC Berkeley. ¿Por qué? Because, according to Candice, Ishi wasn’t considered fully human. This was institutionalization, no different from being imprisoned or placed in a zoo. And, according to Candice, a Civil War reenactment was little better. She insisted they spend the break in Georgia recording the reenactment. Because!

About this idea Daron felt as he had during that first face-off with sushi. No matter what Candice said, mixing boiled eggs into chicken salad was not the same as dropping a dollop of roe on raw tuna! Not at all! Not when eating, not the next morning. And wasabi? That word sounded like a scourge for the soul as well as a torment for the tongue. But, because they were enthusiastic, and Candice suddenly so interested in him, and the entire class chanting, Go for it; because at that moment seventeen students were hunger striking in response to the reduction in funding for Ethnic Studies, Gender and Women’s Studies, and African American Studies; because it was Berzerkeley, dammit to Hades, Daron couldn’t say no. He didn’t say yes, but couldn’t yet say no. Never mind that at home, his friends would have half considered—briefly—a hunger strike only if it meant getting classes canceled, not added. Never mind that he had never actually ventured onto Old Man Donner’s grounds while the reenactment was being staged. Never mind that the notion of recording morphed into participation.

But mind he did when Candice suggested a performative intervention, or, in Louis’s words, a staged lynching. Daron protested that lynching never happened in his town.

That’s even better! The prof clapped his hands softly, his right eye red-rimmed from the monocle. You can force States’ Rights to take a look in the mirror and they will not like what they see. Will this be safe? There won’t be any danger, will there?

The class looked at Daron expectantly, all twenty-nine eyes.

He snorted. What did they think Georgia was like? Of course not! There’s no danger at all. It’s safe. The reenactment is open for public viewing. It was decided then, in the wink of a cat’s eye. Next month, spring break, would not see him in Tijuana or Los Cabos or Guadalajara enjoying tacos, Tecate, and tequila with other Berkeley students, though perhaps there was still a chance of dissuading them. During the walk from Wheeler Hall to Foothill, he wasn’t sure he wanted to dissuade them, not with Candice at his arm, Please-please-pretty-pleasing him to tell her all about Braggsville, which there was ample time to do because it was uphill all the way. He savored every step, every time she touched his elbow, every time she exclaimed with disbelief, every time she waved her hands like flippers, which she did when excited.

At first Candice had not seemed different from the girls he went to high school with, didn’t look any different, but her enthusiasm distinguished her, and once committed, her zeal was of a predacious intensity. She would be, in Quint’s words, Hard to wife.

If I were Southern, Candice whispered, I’d be real angry about that kind of history being celebrated. She repeated herself, the words again spoken softly, almost hummed.

Daron heard her as surely as if she had screamed. (What had Nana always said? The good Lord speaks with fire on tongue but man heeds man’s counsel only when spoken softly, almost sung.)

I’d plan something big, really big, she added, just as quiet as the first time.

Their plan: Three of them would dress as slaves, one wearing a harness under his clothes. One would act as the master, cracking a whip and issuing random, absurd orders. They assumed there would be enough rocks or branches nearby to form a pile for the slaves to carry back and forth. While this was happening, they would run a hidden camera and record the reenactors’ reactions and ask them a few questions about the war, local history, and the reenactments. Then the slave wearing the hidden harness would get uppity, maybe make some untoward comment about the lady of the plantation or try to run off or just complain that there wasn’t enough salt in the food. Then the party would get started. That slave would be hoisted from a low limb as if lynched. They debated whether or not to hang Charlie. Louis argued that using the Veil of Ignorance as a guide meant lynching a white person, ideally a white female, pretty, blond, because they were the most treasured people in the whole, wide world, if not the entire known and unknown universe, in this life and the next, in this dimension—Charlie cut him off, worried that might provoke gunfire, that most people were ignorant of the Veil of Ignorance, so it wouldn’t work. Candice had said (parroted Charlie, really), It is what it is. They should call a spade a spade. At that the debate came to a halt.

Maybe we should do a practice run? Remember that quote from the Gold Rush? From that Pierson Reading guy? “The Indians of California make as obedient and humble slaves as the Negro in the south. For a mere trifle you can secure their services for life.”

Daron remembered it all right, but didn’t think it had anything to do with Braggsville. He felt indignation rising as one of Nana’s sayings came to ear: Don’t curse a child for doing childish things, but don’t ’courage him none neither.

Chapter Six

¿Por qué? ¿Por qué? ¿Por qué?

Porque it was her idea to ride Medusa—Because! Because! Because! Nonetheless! Understandably!—it was her idea to ride Medusa; because when she whispered in your ear that foggy A.M. in that class that only you two share, that morning after—OR but days after—that party when YOU dressed in vintage polyester and pleather like the cast of the Rocky Horror Picture Show and paraded down Bancroft Ave á la East Bay Story, a new itch stitched YOUR ribs; because when she whispered, beeswax binding her riotous golden dreadlocks, bundled solid, squat enough to pinch you with envy, of course you thought FUCK calculus, FUCK history, FUCK ethnic studies, and not at all metaphorically; because when she whispered, voice riding up from her gut, wearing the sun like a saint, hair riding the air as she turned to you, you envisioned Legend of the Overfiend, bukkake, that fifth-grade slide on conception, now most immodest; nonetheless, YOU are forgiven because she routinely refers to herself in the third person by her First Peoples name or her Tibetan name or her Burner name; understandably forgiven by even the sardonic professor who, midmarker, raised only his left eyebrow when you pressed cracked lips to hand after Goldilocks whispered, Haven’t you ever wanted to ride Medusa?

Then THEY texted you. Couldn’t back out then, even if you wanted to—Because! Because! Because! Nonetheless! Understandably!—your heart exploded like a watermelon being eaten by an elephant.

And so YOU are at Six Flags in Vallejo. Va-yay-ho! Screams overhead; fluorescent math problems ride the sky. Vallejo was once the home of the Miwok, Suisunes, and the Patwin, a Wintun people, according to her. In 1850, the government drafted plans to build a new city within the city, a well-appointed capital district complete with a university and botanical garden, according to her. This gilt municipal zone was to be called Eureka, according to her. The irony is lost on you. The irony is not lost on you, but neither is it found. And you, Ferric, you say. A wink your reward. A tickle in your gut, shame, because that’s how it always is, Banks loan quickest to those who least need money. Celaka!! Fuucked up, you say. You don’t know what a ferret has to do with anything, but you’ll, Ferret it out, you promise, you’ll have that vayay-ho, that va-jello, that earthy gash, your own Eureka.

But first you tried to eat, Charlie and his Macho Nachos, Candice and her Paddle Handle Corn Dog (could the universe be more unfair?), Daron and his Smokehouse burger, and Louis and his Totally Kickin’ Chicken, which he pushed away after two bites, I’m throwing in the chopsticks. Was it nerves, or was it that centered on the picnic table marred with initials carved, etched, and drawn, and stained with mustard and food scraps, sat a fluttering stack of memorial brochures doctored by Candice—Adbusters-style complete with new photos—to extoll the virtues of the Six Flags Graveyard, and one box of ashes. The remains of Ishi, if asked.

Chapter Seven

Was this what Mrs. Brooks meant by a like-minded group? How did he get into Berkeley anyway? Professors, students, Miss Lucille—that dining hall attendant who always complimented his manners—even Daron himself. They all wondered, he knew, especially hearing his Friday-night accent, you—fermented—becoming a long y’all, and ain’t rearing its ugly head before, worse yet, being distilled into ’ant. He could reckon the direction of the wheels turning in their heads: budget cuts plus more out-of-state fart-sniffer students equals lower standards. They were wrong, and if they dared ask, he’d say so. Unlike some of them, he’d done it on his own. No college counselor, no private consultant to groom and polish his applicant profile, no practice admissions interviews. Hard work, summer school, and all the AP he could eat were his salvation, the price of his admission. That, and he wrote a damned fine application letter.

He had revised for weeks, reading every Wikipedia entry on writing, watching every YouTube video on the application process, some links provided by the school, others he found on his own, checking out every book of cover letters from the library. He even ordered online, with his lunch money, a book entitled 100 of the Best Application Essays Ever! He consulted, at their insistence, his father and his AP English teacher. His father’s advice: Tell the truth. A man’s word is his only honor, and honor is the only currency that never needs exchanging. His English teacher’s advice: Teachers spend most of their lives reading piss-rich attempts at mind reading. Distinguish yourself in writing by being completely yourself and speaking your piece, even if your opinion runs contrary to the popular position, in fact, more so in those instances. D’aron had done just that, at the end, working in secret.

Freshman applicant prompt:

Describe the world you come from—for example, your family, community or school—and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.

Dear _______ Application Committee,

I am submitting respectfully this essay written for your perusal.

If we were a TV show, we’ d be a soap opera. If we were a musical, we’ d be a rock opera. But, in real life, we’re a Shakespeare play, Romeo and Juliet.

I was born into a working-class family in the heart of Georgia. My mother’s family was Irish and my father’s family was descended from coal miners. They never had much, but we worked hard and made our way up. Mostly everyone works for the Kenny Hot Air factory where they make motors for the hand dryers used all across our great United States of America. The Davenports and the McCormicks never got along until my folks were married. We believe in diversity and multi-cultural-ism.

My father wanted to go to college, but after coming back from Honorably serving his country in the First Gulf War, the GI Bills weren’t any use because he had to work and couldn’t commute seventy-five miles each way to the nearest community college. Now he is a floor manager and enrolled to earn an online degree in business because capitalism is the future of the world and even China realizes that now, after what Reagan did to Russia and Germany.

My community is working class. When we get together each summer for the annual town picnic, we all share food and really we’re like one big community. We have the most Special Forces soldiers in all of the state per capita. We don’t have a school in town or a college nearby. The nearest community college is 75 miles away and the high school is in the next town.

My town is small, only 700 people, so I had to be bused to school. I integrated well and managed to get along with everybody. I was captain of the debate team and I once saved my grandmother after she was lost in the woods for three days with cancer. It was a scary time.

We’re blue collar, but proud and my family supports the American spirit and the freedom we’re bringing to the middle east, and our town has that same kind of spirit. We’re all red, white, and blue underneath.

I want to major in political science, bio-engineering, and bio-technology because people require peace, parsimonious food, and hygienic water. We also need to protect the earth. Ecology is the future. Not a day goes by when we don’t see a volcano erupting or an earthquake. Global warming is debasing the atmosphere and only we can prohibit it.

I am also interested in education because we need better schools and no child should be left behind. The children are the future. After I graduate, I will also teach. My town needs a summer camp that doesn’t involve hunting and camping and whittling. Trees have rights, too. It should involve things to prepare you for the real world, like math and science and computers.

That is why I am applying to ______________. _____________ has the best programs in these majors. Every time I read the paper, I see someone from _____________ being quoted in the news and giving scientific evidence and explanations for how we can make the world a better place for everybody. That’s how I know that ______________ is the school for me.

Prompt for all applicants:

Tell us about a personal quality, talent, accomplishment, contribution or experience that is important to you. What about this quality or accomplishment makes you proud and how does it relate to the person you are?

One day I was down at Lou Davis’s Cash-n-Carry Bait Shop and Copy Center, where the slogan is “You Want Credit, Come Back Tomorrow.”

I was after gum, but killing time. It’s dim in there, the only light comes off the iceboxes. Ever since I was little I liked to stand there in the blue glow and pretend I was on a spaceship. That day it was hot, so hot I had to walk to cool down. I walked along the big fridge and freezer, feeling the chill, and saw all the venison sausage and souse and Georgia hash, which was all pretty cheap, cheaper than Jimmy Dean, but more than it would really cost to hunt. I added up the cost of the shells, and the gun, and the time, and the deer lick, and the beer, and whatever else. They’ d just built a Super Walmart two towns over, and I thought about how you could track out all day after a deer, or you could shoot up to Super Walmart or Lou’s and be back in a couple hours with all you needed for a week.

So I decided I didn’t need to hunt anymore. It didn’t make sense.

Now understand that my hometown has produced more Special Forces soldiers per capita than any other town in America.

And when the season opens there’s more hunters out than trees can shake a leaf at. When the season closes, there’s still more hunters out than trees can shake sticks at. Everyone has trophies mounted over their mantels or the front porch and the first buck is a bigger occasion than the 13th birthday.

You got to understand we’re proud, and we respect prey drive. We put down dogs that don’t hunt.

So, I got more hell for this than for being a Battlestar Galactica fan or complaining that Lost was stupid. But I argued that we didn’t sew our own clothes even though there were still patches of wild cotton at the edge of the old Southerby Plantation and that we didn’t make our own shoes even though there was a dairy two exits up, and a hemp farm in the next county so we could make laces.

I’d been a scout all my life, all the way up to Eagle Scout, but hunting just didn’t make sense. I stuck with my guns and am proud of that decision to this day, even though everyone still teases me about it. I won’t repeat here the names they call me.

My father took it hard because that was the one thing we did together that my mom just wouldn’t go for. But he hasn’t given up on me, right now he’s snoring soundly, thinking that I’m pecking away at a letter to UGA.

Freshman applicant prompt:

(Revision)

Describe the world you come from—for example, your family, community, or school—and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.

Dear Sir of [sic] Madam,

My mother helped me write several previous drafts of this personal statement. In them, we listed accomplishments such as the Eagle scouts, the volunteer work for the local Red Cross, and my membership (for one day) in the Braggsville Historical Preservation and Dissemination Society. We also listed my participation in several school organizations and the time I saved my cousin from drowning, saved a cat from a bird, and saved my grandmother from certain starvation when she wandered off into the Holler and got lost. I also claimed a long-term interest in about a dozen majors that aren’t even related.

I learned a good word in the process: logorrhea. Not only were those letters too long, and had too many fancy words, the biggest problem was I didn’t remember many of these things. I will not dare to question their veracity. It was my mother who spoke those words, mind you. But the fact that I could neither remember these renowned events with which my extended family regaled each other around the Green Egg, nor supply my own memories, explains exactly how my world has shaped my dreams and aspirations. As my cousin Quint would say, I’ve been worked over by a one-armed potter.

It is not a college admission board who I write at this late hour, long after the parental units have retired because I need to write this on my own, it is to a parole board that I write.

I love my family and my town. My parents never went to college, but have done right by me all their lives. They didn’t take my schooling for granted and they made me study and take summer classes, and made me read all those test-taking books because they wanted me to go to college, but neither could tell me what for, other than that I have to. And for years I never understood why I have to, especially when they want me to go right up the road. But I need to get out of shouting distance of this place where everyone secretly calls school, Juvie!, and openly calls prison, School!

So in addressing the parole board in this hearing I feel I must demonstrate that I have changed, that I have atoned for whatever sin caused me to be born in this partially dry county, that I have learned my lesson. And I have.

I have learned that no matter where you go to school, it’s what you do after school that counts. But, we don’t have an afterschool program. I have learned that kids from all different areas can get along if given a chance, but our schools rarely meet and have only limited contact with other schools. I have learned that sports can bring people of different races and colors together to work for a common goal, but I don’t play sports and we only have one team, and it has only one race on it. I have learned that with access to public health care people avoid dying unnecessarily painful and lonely deaths, but the nearest hospital is over 100 miles away.