The Great Mann

by Kyra Davis Lurie

I’m accustomed to white folk sizing me up, trying to work out if I’m a predator they can beat down to prey. Invisibility feels clean.

The undeniable spark of mischief her mama was always trying to slap out of her.

“If a book got somethin’ to teach me, I’m gonna read

I suppose all frontline soldiers are pawns in one way or another.

he switched out the champagne Anna and I were drinking for some one-hundred-year-old cognac that he took from his private collection. Anna had no taste for it and switched to water. But me? Those

smoky notes of status went down smooth. It was like I was drinking somebody else’s history, swapping out my red blood for blue.

The path toward drunkenness is always scenic. The road back is a damn ugly mess.

It’s a city that’s always roaring, but you only hear it when you listen.

“I don’t spend a lot of time on why things are the way they are,”

The Green Book is filled with hotels Negroes can stay in, almost all worse than what’s available to whites. But now we have this.

“Short for Celestine…Uncle

Love seeing my legal name in a book

A bargain with the devil’s bad enough, getting into the debt of the Grim Reaper gotta be a hell of a lot worse.

“The way I talk ain’t got nothin’ to do with my intelligence or my education. It’s a marker of where I’m from. As my mama always says,

only the most vacuous and ignominious of men try to act like they’re from somewhere they ain’t.”

“When it comes to the white man? Nothing’s too horrible to be true.”

a few steps behind her man, it’s because she’s been trained. And you could only train a woman to be like that through violence. He also told me that a white man who hits his wife will jump at the chance to kill a Negro.

“When white folks get jumpy, Uncle Sam does whatever the hell he wants with the

rest of us to make them comfortable.”

The way he’s looking at me is how I always imagined the Indians looked at the white pilgrims when they first showed up on these shores. Like he can’t tell if I’m cursed or divine.

If comfort is luxury, then there ain’t nothing more luxurious than delusion.

the difference is between the North and the South?” I shake my head. “The California police do quietly what the Southern Klan does loudly.”

“There are so many idiots here who act like the green in their wallets make them untouchable.”

Being Terrance’s friend is a mixed bag.

But being Terrance must be amazing.

“The fear Lester was using to keep her in line has fermented, turned into desperation. Desperation has no lines. No borders, no rules.”

Because that’s what families do… They lie.

Lies on top of lies

“Ambitious men are so peculiar, aren’t they?” she says, directing

her words to the bitter beast. “They never love what they have as much as what they want.”

“Obsession.” James frowns. “An ugly word for a beautiful thing. I wish they’d come up with another.”