James

by Percival Everett

“It’s darker than the inside of a cow,” Norman said. I found this funny and laughed. Norman laughed and soon we were laughing like two children. It felt good. It wasn’t that anything was so funny, but we needed to laugh.

White people often spent time admiring their survival of one thing or another. I imagined it was because so often they had no need to survive, but only to live.

“My name is James. I’m going to get my family. You can come with me or you can stay here. You can come and try freedom or you can stay here. You can die with me trying to find freedom or you can stay here and be dead anyway. My name is James.” “Morris.”