I live here.
I have convinced myself I live here. Well, not convinced, but it's better than saying I'm an orphan living in a crack house. And I accepted that.
Ferness is different by himself. Around the rest of the congregation, he's pretty silent. He told me a child should be in a child's place. A child's place is not heaven.
The next day we were out by the sandbox. Beulah was around because Jesse bite his finger off and she had to take him to the baths. Jesse was now gone and Uma was by herself. She made a sand castle, and another. After she made five sand castles she made three more until she had used up all the sand she could. "Will you fucking stop!" yelled Clayton. "You just piling sand everywhere!"
"And?" Uma filled a bucket with sand. With her was a broken pole meant for hanging the clothes. She had a bucket full of sand, patted the sand down in the bucket firmly then flipped it over. She took the pole and dug it in the little castle of sand. Uma went back in the house and came back with a bowl of water. She went back to the castle and poured the water in the hole. She kneeled down and flexed her fingers, "Person." she said and the sandcrafted into a human. "Small." the sandman shrunk and she made several more.
"We have all gathered here today to give thanks to the mountain." she said.
"Uma?" I took away from her. "This is Mount Holler." she told.
"Y'all Muslim people is so strange..." Shuja's son Janna rolled his eyes. "So what you build it for?"
"To mind my fucking business." she turned away and the little sand people started praising and bowing at the castle. "Bitch..." Janna sneered. He came to my side and grabbed my hand. "Cedrica?"
I looked at him, "Yeah?"
"Do you like horses?"
"It's whatever to me." Now, to my understanding. Little girls like ponies, I wasn't that type of person. I was a stupid kid but smarter than Tori. I believed in giant dogs and leprechauns. I thought you could buy a fairy from a gypsy or something. "You wanna see a horse?"
"Cece! Don't do that!" snapped Uma. "Shut up! You've seen the dead horse--"
"Cedrica, go in the house and tell Mama Beulah!"
"What--"
"Hush!"
"You know you ain't supposed to go there." Wayo says. "I hate y'all always snitching on me."
"Ain't that yo whole purpose?" said Clayton. "What are y'all talking about? I wanna see a dead horse" chimed Raquel. "Alright." Janna let my hand go. Raquel stood up from the edge of the sandbox and Janna grabbed her hand. They walked off towards the other barn.
"I'm telling." Wayo looked towards the main barn and started walking. "How come nobody talks about the ditch?" I asked. "The ditch?" Uma raises her brows.
"The one I was in. With the beast."
"Oh, you don't have to worry about Monolo anymore."
"But like... what's the ditch for?"
Clayton crossed his arms. He looked in the distance of the second barn and then at me. "It used to be a big pond but Shuja tried to drown Janna and he never forgot it. I remember."
"What happened?"
"Shuja was all naked and he told Janna to take his clothes off. They went in the water and Shuja drowned him. He started beating his kid under the water and blood came up from Janna's broken nose." explained Clayton.
"Shuja loves cocaine." added Uma. "There a voodoo doll in the barn."
"What's it for?"
"Cocaine..."
.
.
.
Inside the church, Raquel and Janna were still gone, but we had tomato soup. Beulah cooked and she made soup with toasted bread. I listened to the adults talk in the kitchen even though we were sent to the room. "I told that nigga he was a fool for tryin. Man say, when I saw it, the car flipped over--IN THE AIR. I was behind the line and the police staring at me--"
"What is they talking about?" asked Uma.
"Sounds like a car crash..." I could only assume.
"Have y'all had sex yet?" asked Clayton. "I mean sometimes I jack off..."
"EW..." gawked Uma. "Why would you ask that?"
"Because like, I wanted to fuck a girl young."
"Clay, hush!"
"Bitch you hush. I planned it and everything--"
"Um, excuse me?"
"Oh shit..."
I was right next to the door and I fart silently looking at Beulah's feet. "Clay."
"I didn't say anything..." Clayton stared with big eyes. "You finna get it being fast like that..."
"I didn't--"
"Didn't what?" Beulah crossed her arms as she leaned on the frame of the entrance. "Why are you so obsessed with sex?"
"I don't know." he lifted his shoulders. "Stop touching ya-self."
"But I like--"
"Hush!"
I looked at both of them. I felt I was in trouble to.
One time Torielle and I were watching TV in the apartment. She turned on the late-night channels that show a bunch of sex stories. So we stood up to watch one out of curiosity.
It was about two lesbians in the house together. They were roommates and they watched a movie. I can't remember the whole thing but they had a bet and ended up goosing each other. And the girls had like these brown dildos and Tori wouldn't shut up about them shitting.
So they having sex and this girl ends up thinking about the guy in the movie till we get to the point the other who is fucking her appears as said man.
I told granny about it, and she told me if you watch shit like that you'll grow up gay too. Tori kept watching the channel and once I woke up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and I went to see what was all the noise and Tori is rubbing the goddamn remote against her coochie through her night gown.
I went to sleep.
She got beat in the morning.
"Clayton, this is my last time telling you to stop talking about sex."
"Yes ma'am..." he sat on the floor with his hands in his lap. "Now, has anyone seen the other two? Especially Janna?"
"Yes ma'am." I plucked the carpet as I looked at her. "Where are they?"
"They went to that barn in the back..."
Beulah eyes got big, "To the barn in the back."
My head was just like, 'I didn't tell them'. "Yes ma'am..." I said.
"Oh my..." she walked off to the backdoor where I heard, "Y'all about to get it!"
Raquel hurried to the door and sat on my foot with her knee. I pushed her and got up. "Where have y'all been?" Beulah fumed.
"We went to see Limerick." I heard Janna. "What the fuck is wrong with you going to see that goddamn dead horse!"
"But he's not dead!" yells Janna.
"I saw it to." I can't keep myself from narrowing my eyes at Raquel's voice. "You shouldn't be going out there period!" she chastised. "What is wrong with you kids?" I heard Zanna. "Don't you know that thing is back there?"
"He don't touch kids!" exclaims Janna. "And what's her name is dead. So, it's two dead bodies back there."
"Imma beat you until you see wings..." grunts Beulah.
"She mad as hell." Clayton mutters. "Is Beulah your mom?" asks Raquel.
"No. My mama dead." he answers with a straight face. "They went out there for a mission and he won't tell." said Uma.
"What?" I questioned.
"They went to the horse for a mission."
"What kind of mission?" Raquel gets up. She rubbed my shoulders. "Like hay?"
"No!" I shove her violently. "What mission could a horse have!"
"Water!"
"NO!"
"If y'all could both be quiet. The Horse is a thing. Like a devil thing." says Clayton.
"It talks." adds Wayo. "He just can't walk."
"IF HEAR ANOTHER WORD FROM THAT ROOM!"
We all faced the entrance.