Katie Farris
What We See in the Dark
“This boy is so black he’s like a hole into hell,” his grandmother said, swaddling the newborn. “He’s got a hotline to the devil,” she said. “Shave his head.” And he stayed bald as he was black. Sure as you’re born.
The boy is black where no one has ever been black: black palms and soles, black tongue—even the whites of his eyes are black. His healthy strong teeth are lined up like ebony soldiers in his mouth. The boy is so black his mother once lost him. The boy is so black, he was easy to find. At school, they call the boy over and use him to gauge the blackness of all the Black kids. Compared to the boy, no one is black.
One day a reporter steps out of his van, holds out a microphone, and asks the boy, “Can you see yourself in the dark?”
The boy looks into the camera’s lens with his eyes as shiny and jet as marbles, and says, "Can you?"
When the interview airs, the boy’s response causes a revolution in race relations. People wear black t-shirts with the words “Can you?” printed in black ink. Everyone wants to claim him. Some whites argue that the boy is too black to be Black; he must be white instead. Black people shake their heads in wonderment. It is understood that the blood that beats through this boy must be the purest blood: the very purest blood. Rumors begin that his blood heals ills—impotence, infertility, depression—everything but sickle-cell anemia. Dusky girls become the rage overnight, and new beauty products flood the marketplace: “darkens complexions invisibly” they advertise, “naturally brings out the deep tones of your hair.”
People start using the word "black" to mean something total, absolute, transcendent. They analyze the boy’s actions to understand what it means to be Black. Black, for instance, means waiting for the water to warm up before stepping into the shower. It’s cracking your neck twice to the left and once to the right. It means being able to predict the trajectories of people moving through public space, their velocity and vector, and the safest distance between.
*
At some point, scientists notice the barest cooling of the surface of the earth, a slight dimming of the sun. After years of sifting through data, they traced the dimming to the exact date of the boy’s birth. And so, the boy’s fame is redoubled; he’s lauded as a savior in this, our secular age; absorbing radiation to pardon us all, black and white, from the dangers of global warming, the sins of our fathers. Sure as you’re born. Sure as you are.
The boy, now a man, shrugs his shoulders, enters some more numbers into his spreadsheet, and glows, just glows, in the heart of our country.
__________
Katie Farris
Katie Farris is the author of boysgirls, a collection of short-short fictions published in 2011 by Marick Press, as well as the co-translator of several books of poetry from the French, Chinese, and Russian. Her translations and original work have been published in many literary journals, including Virginia Quarterly Review, Triquarterly, Hayden’s Ferry, and others. She received her MFA in Literary Arts from Brown University in 2010. She currently teaches fiction writing and comparative literature at San Diego State University.
What We See in the Dark
“This boy is so black he’s like a hole into hell,” his grandmother said, swaddling the newborn. “He’s got a hotline to the devil,” she said. “Shave his head.” And he stayed bald as he was black. Sure as you’re born.
The boy is black where no one has ever been black: black palms and soles, black tongue—even the whites of his eyes are black. His healthy strong teeth are lined up like ebony soldiers in his mouth. The boy is so black his mother once lost him. The boy is so black, he was easy to find. At school, they call the boy over and use him to gauge the blackness of all the Black kids. Compared to the boy, no one is black.
One day a reporter steps out of his van, holds out a microphone, and asks the boy, “Can you see yourself in the dark?”
The boy looks into the camera’s lens with his eyes as shiny and jet as marbles, and says, "Can you?"
When the interview airs, the boy’s response causes a revolution in race relations. People wear black t-shirts with the words “Can you?” printed in black ink. Everyone wants to claim him. Some whites argue that the boy is too black to be Black; he must be white instead. Black people shake their heads in wonderment. It is understood that the blood that beats through this boy must be the purest blood: the very purest blood. Rumors begin that his blood heals ills—impotence, infertility, depression—everything but sickle-cell anemia. Dusky girls become the rage overnight, and new beauty products flood the marketplace: “darkens complexions invisibly” they advertise, “naturally brings out the deep tones of your hair.”
People start using the word "black" to mean something total, absolute, transcendent. They analyze the boy’s actions to understand what it means to be Black. Black, for instance, means waiting for the water to warm up before stepping into the shower. It’s cracking your neck twice to the left and once to the right. It means being able to predict the trajectories of people moving through public space, their velocity and vector, and the safest distance between.
*
At some point, scientists notice the barest cooling of the surface of the earth, a slight dimming of the sun. After years of sifting through data, they traced the dimming to the exact date of the boy’s birth. And so, the boy’s fame is redoubled; he’s lauded as a savior in this, our secular age; absorbing radiation to pardon us all, black and white, from the dangers of global warming, the sins of our fathers. Sure as you’re born. Sure as you are.
The boy, now a man, shrugs his shoulders, enters some more numbers into his spreadsheet, and glows, just glows, in the heart of our country.
__________
Katie Farris
Katie Farris is the author of boysgirls, a collection of short-short fictions published in 2011 by Marick Press, as well as the co-translator of several books of poetry from the French, Chinese, and Russian. Her translations and original work have been published in many literary journals, including Virginia Quarterly Review, Triquarterly, Hayden’s Ferry, and others. She received her MFA in Literary Arts from Brown University in 2010. She currently teaches fiction writing and comparative literature at San Diego State University.