![]() The only thing they ever had in common was that they were somehow related to Ethan. Their clothes, car, family, and everything of earthly value were left behind as they made a dash for the border of the city and a better life. Daisy-Mae, then the following day, rumors would spread that they just up and left town, leaving everything behind them. One day they would be down at the Quick Stop saying hello to Ms. He started to notice people, adults mostly, begin to vanish. Ethan began to feel out of place in his own family.Īs Ethan grew up in his tiny town, constantly having to look over his shoulder in case he should make a mistake with one of his family watching. All family members were to live by a strict code, which eventually shifted from the one his earlier ancestors had adopted for the survival of their people and culture to one of superiority over everyone else. Everything was reported back to the family and dealt with harshly. Everyone knew one or more of his cousins, uncles, aunts, etc. The vast majority ran the county governments and businesses, while his family barely made it by on what they sold to the locals from their farm and the feed store. Over time the family had become contemptuous. Eventually, the two prominent families grew closer and mixed over the generations leading to the region being run by the family. ![]() All of this in an attempt to protect the sacred lands of their ancestors. Her family had managed to hide in the swamps and bayous of the Mississippi delta escaping persecution and slowly blending into the population. But the story would change after his grandfather’s family left and his grandma’s family came in. He heard every year at the reunions about how his grandfather’s family came from Virginia two hundred years ago to help settle and work the land. Growing up, Ethan had always been told his family’s history. He didn’t miss stepping out of the shower in the summer, already sweating more than when he stepped in but was that enough for him to have picked up everything he owned and moved across the country? “Our family has worked and honored this land for over SEVEN generations, Ethan, and y’all just want to up and give it up?” his dad had said when he told the family he was leaving on his eighteenth birthday, “You walk out that door, don’t y’all come back through it again!” If only his father had understood the reasoning behind his yearning to leave. Granted, his life back home in rural Arkansas wasn’t the greatest, but he had everything he needed while working his family’s farm in the summer and managing the feed store the rest of the year.Įthan thought had thought life in the rural south was quiet. Ethan stared up at his popcorned ceiling, wondering what exactly led him to be here, at this very moment in time, in this crappy bug-infested apartment. “Again?” he thought, “every week, at 3 am, why can’t they just come later?” He rolled over, covering his head with a pillow, a vain attempt to block out the dumpster’s loud clanging, Earth-shattering crashes below. The sounds of the trash truck backing up in the alley downstairs startled Ethan from his sleep. Photo by Alejandro Barrón (used with permission)
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