We Cast a Shadow: A Novel - Softcover

Ruffin, Maurice Carlos

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0525509070 ISBN 13: 9780525509073

Verlag: Random House Publishing Group, 2020

Inhaltsangabe

“An incisive and necessary” (Roxane Gay) debut for fans of Get Out and Paul Beatty’s The Sellout, about a father’s obsessive quest to protect his son—even if it means turning him white

“Stunning and audacious . . . at once a pitch-black comedy, a chilling horror story and an endlessly perceptive novel about the possible future of race in America.”—NPR

LONGLISTED FOR THE DUBLIN LITERARY AWARD, THE CENTER FOR FICTION FIRST NOVEL PRIZE, THE PEN/OPEN BOOK AWARD, AND THE PEN/FAULKNER AWARD • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPR AND THE WASHINGTON POST

“You can be beautiful, even more beautiful than before.” This is the seductive promise of Dr. Nzinga’s clinic, where anyone can get their lips thinned, their skin bleached, and their nose narrowed. A complete demelanization will liberate you from the confines of being born in a black body—if you can afford it.

In this near-future Southern city plagued by fenced-in ghettos and police violence, more and more residents are turning to this experimental medical procedure. Like any father, our narrator just wants the best for his son, Nigel, a biracial boy whose black birthmark is getting bigger by the day. The darker Nigel becomes, the more frightened his father feels. But how far will he go to protect his son? And will he destroy his family in the process?

This electrifying, hallucinatory novel is at once a keen satire of surviving racism in America and a profoundly moving family story. At its center is a father who just wants his son to thrive in a broken world. Maurice Carlos Ruffin’s work evokes the clear vision of Ralph Ellison, the dizzying menace of Franz Kafka, and the crackling prose of Vladimir Nabokov. We Cast a Shadow fearlessly shines a light on the violence we inherit, and on the desperate things we do for the ones we love.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Maurice Carlos Ruffin has been a recipient of an Iowa Review Award in fiction and a winner of the William Faulkner–William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition for Novel-in-Progress. His work has appeared in Virginia Quarterly Review, AGNI, The Kenyon Review, The Massachusetts Review, and Unfathomable City: A New Orleans Atlas. A native of New Orleans, Ruffin is a graduate of the University of New Orleans Creative Writing Workshop and a member of the Peauxdunque Writers Alliance.

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1

My name doesn’t matter. All you need to know is that I’m a phantom, a figment, a man who was mistaken for waitstaff twice that night—­odd, given my outfit. I managed to avoid additional embarrassments by wallflowering in the shadow of the grand staircase. Their cheeks pink from Southern Comfort, the partners—­or shareholders, as the firm called them—­stood chatting in clusters around the dining room.

I had been invited by my law firm’s leaders to attend their annual party at Octavia Whitmore’s mansion on the Avenue of Streetcars. It was a highlight of my life, an honor for a lowly associate just to be invited, although I was surprised to be told to show up in a costume.

Rough fabric chafed against my collarbone. I was dressed as a Roman centurion. I had rented the mega-­deluxe option, no expense spared: full tunic of lamb’s wool, leather sandals, and five—­count ’em, five—Hollywood-­prop-­grade weapons: a sword, a javelin, a bow and arrow, a shield, and a dagger. I never knew that Roman soldiers used daggers. But the costume guy assured me that they did too use daggers, the dagger being the preferred weapon of choice for when shit got real, which apparently it did from time to time.

The first floor of Octavia’s mansion was a series of large rooms. Playful notes of sandalwood and jasmine lingered in the foyer. I spotted my fellow black associate Franklin beyond that entryway. Franklin, who got white-­girl drunk at every firm function, karaoked “I Feel Pretty” into a microphone. Franklin had come wearing the perfect icebreaker. He wore a white smock and a black bow tie, the uniform of every black busboy and waiter at every old-­line restaurant in the City. Café de Réfugiés, Carnation Room, Pierre’s—­no, not Pierre’s; there were no brothers at Pierre’s. I wasn’t sure what must have been more mortifying for Franklin: that he was singing so poorly or that no one paid him any mind. It couldn’t have helped that he was too black to be pretty.

My frenemy, good ol’ back-­slapping Riley, was bent over a table giving the managing shareholder, Jack Armbruster, a foot massage. Sweat made Riley’s bald head glow. He looked like a scoop of chocolate ice cream melting under the parlor lights. Riley was dressed as a parish prison inmate, which rankled my sense of propriety. They saw enough of us dressed that way in news reports. However, I had to admit it was an impressive getup. He wore a Day-­Glo orange jumpsuit, and even a fake chest tattoo. He carried clinking leg shackles slung over his shoulder, as if ready to reincarcerate himself on request.

Riley was working the old fart’s feet, feet so gnarly they seemed like roots ripped from the field behind the mansion. He dabbed his dome with a handkerchief. Was a promotion and bonus worth the kind of humiliation Franklin and Riley were undergoing? Confetti rained down on the junior shareholders in the adjacent parlor. You betcha.

My son Nigel’s procedure would be expensive. After feeding the snarling, three-­headed beast of mortgage, utilities, and private school tuition, I only managed to pocket a few copper coins each month. But if I were promoted, I would earn a fat bonus, and Nigel would finally get a normal face, over his mother’s objections.

I idled on the sidelines, nursing a rum and Coke, which, in turn, nursed my ever-­present migraine (thankfully, almost down for the night). I had lost count of how many drinks I’d had over the last few hours, which meant by now my blood was probably 75 percent alcohol by volume. And that was on top of the dissipating effects of the Plum I took that morning. I told myself on each awakening that I didn’t need Plums anymore. I told myself I could quit anytime I chose. But I knew better. Those petite purple pills, which turned my nervous system into a tangle of pleasurably twinkling Christmas lights, had become a constant companion.

Riley ambled over. He exaggeratedly wiped his palms on his jumpsuit pants. Smiling, he jabbed his hand out for a handshake. I shook my head.

“Where is the love?” Riley glanced at his hand and sniffed. “I don’t blame you actually. I think Armbruster’s been on his feet all day.” He grabbed the sleeve of my tunic, tossed his head back, and chuckled. “You don’t think you’re going to win in this, do you?”

“I like my look,” I said, taken aback. “Check out this hand-­stitching—­wait. Win what?”

“Win this hazing ceremony. Tonight is a competition, after all. There’s three of us, but only one promotion. You knew that.” Riley raised his eyebrow. “You didn’t know that.”

“But this is just a party.”

“And one of us will have something to celebrate.” Riley always seemed to have inside knowledge about the firm’s workings. But he was also the kind of person to say things just to get a reaction from me. Still, he wouldn’t joke about this. The stakes were too high.

“What happens to the losers?”

He leaned in to whisper. “You know how it works. It’s up or out.” Riley adjusted my breastplate. “I didn’t mean to mess with your confidence. You’re right. This is a great look.” He straightened up and nodded. “Really authentic.”

Riley patted my shoulder and trotted off, his manacles clattering against the back of his jumpsuit. He shook the hands of a couple of shareholders and laughed.

I suddenly realized I had made a serious miscalculation. Riley’s costume was a great way to get attention and spread good cheer. Mine, on the other hand, was the sartorial equivalent of a glower. Centurions were badasses who killed anyone who crossed them. The only way I could have made this group any more nervous was if I showed up as Nat Turner, but I knew better. Or I should have. There were many unknowns in my pursuit of happiness, but one thing I understood: law firms like Seasons, Ustis & Malveaux didn’t hire, let alone promote, angry black men. If this was a competition, I needed a new strategy. The shareholders wanted entertainment. They wanted a good time. They also wanted subservience. They did not want to feel threatened. If I was going to win, I would have to demonstrate I was willing to give them exactly what they wanted.

I quickly moved from room to room searching for anything that could help me. In the back den, I spotted Octavia Whitmore in a gingham dress, carrying a terrier in the crook of her elbow and a drink in each of her hands. If anyone could help me find an advantage, she could. After all, she was a senior shareholder, and I her legal footman. I was the associate who did the grunt work that was beneath her valets. She needed me.

“You look just like Judy Garland,” I said. Octavia hadn’t noticed me, so her face momentarily lit up in surprise as I approached. I kissed her cheek.

“Well, aren’t you sweet?” she said.

I liked Octavia. She was one of the good ones, even if, as she once drunkenly admitted to me in a stalled elevator, she sometimes fantasized about wearing blackface and going on a crime spree. After shattering storefront windows and mugging tourists by the Cathedral, she would wash the makeup from her face, content in the knowledge that the authorities would pin her deeds on some thug who actually had it coming.

That was when I realized that the Toto in her arm was a cat— ­a Ragamuffin cat wearing a wig. I’d never seen a cat wearing a wig. It was a night of...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Random House Publishing Group
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2020
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0525509070
• ISBN 13: 9780525509073
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 352
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar