I was experiencing hellacious withdrawal symptoms—after so long, I couldn’t function without Scotty, and I used a few more times before I could honestly say I quit. I had no health insurance and I knew I needed to find a free clinic in order to truly detox and finally tear myself free of the drug. It turned out that the nearest place was in Shreveport. When I let Elmunda know that I had decided to get off drugs and move there, she said, Shreveport! as if she had opened her purse and a palmetto bug jumped out. Didn’t even congratulate me for kicking my habit. I chose not to argue with her about the merits of Shreveport, since it still meant a lot to me.
At the end of the trial, Sextus had received a fifteen-year sentence for selling drugs and polluting the water supply, and a fine of five thousand dollars for financial restructuring. The court banned him and his family from the agriculture business for life, and the high legal fees required the Fusiliers to sell a large portion of the farm’s acreage. I stayed out of the brouhaha to the extent that I could, because I’d finally admitted to myself that my desire for Sextus depended mostly on my perception of his power as well as my need for Scotty. The Fusiliers went through a great deal of infighting and agony as Sextus steeled himself to do hard time and Elmunda and Jed prepared to move to a smaller house with Elmunda’s great-aunt in Baton Rouge, closer to where Sextus would be incarcerated. They put the majority of their belongings in storage and cleaned up Summerton, hoping to rent it out for weddings and family reunions. Elmunda wore herself out trying to contact somebody who could make what she kept calling a computer page for the home and its grounds.
Though I felt no obligation to assist her, and she put up a confusing amount of resistance to my efforts, I found her a new caretaker before her move to Baton Rouge. When she said that she would miss me, I doubted her sincerity to the point where I had to stifle a laugh. On the other hand, I believed Jed when he said the same thing, and when he wept over his father’s upcoming departure, I wept as well, but maybe not for the same reasons. The withdrawal was racking my body with seizures and sweating, I was constantly anxious and paranoid—at one point I had myself convinced that I would actually die within the hour without a hit. Just about anything could make me weep.
I arranged to move my own belongings with a local guy who had a van, and when I left Summerton, I did try to turn around and take a moment to appreciate everything I had experienced there, but the thick kudzu that had grown up around the farm obscured the view. I couldn’t see the place at all.
In Shreveport, not many folks have the stamina to go running in the midafternoon even during the spring and fall, and very few—only the extreme types—can tolerate running in the triple-digit heat of midsummer, which could leave the most seasoned athlete dried out like a worm at the side of the road. But it’s possible to get in a few sweaty miles during the early-morning and late-evening hours. Once I finally got sober, I instituted a regular exercise routine for myself, one of many good habits I established in the first six months after I left Scotty behind. I also quit smoking, which I found almost more difficult than detoxing from crack cocaine.
But I had always gathered strength from this city, and even though everything else in my life had changed drastically, I still could find, tangled somewhere in its grassy blocks and stooping live oaks, the person I had once known I would be, and traces of the husband I lost. I felt this most strongly whenever I stumbled across a diner that served undercooked grits the way Nat liked, or when I stood on the sidewalk in front of the place we had once lived on Joe Louis Boulevard, where Eddie had been conceived, or if I touched the gas lamp outside the Renaissance Bed & Breakfast (which had not changed at all) and looked up to imagine our shadows still crossing the window frames. One Saturday afternoon, not long after I got to town, I took a walk over to Centenary on what turned out to be graduation day. From the far side of Dixie Road I tearfully watched all the children in their black robes and square graduation hats streaming down the stairs and out of Gold Dome, then snuck into the rapidly emptying building myself. In the foyer, as I peered at all the basketball trophies Centenary had won during Nat’s day—especially with his friend Robert Parish—I could’ve sworn that I felt Nat touch my shoulder. Once I entered the court, I heard Nat’s proud, silky voice echo over the shiny floor and up to the spectacular roof that sheltered the bleachers like a space-age quilt.