Across the River - an 1800s Black / Native American Novella

Chapter 1

Tennessee, December 24, 1809

Naomi put her hand over her mouth, her stomach heaving, and she raced across the plank floor for the front door. Flinging open the latch, she stumbled out into the fresh-fallen snow, hoping to make it to the ramshackle outhouse across the clearing.

She didn't.

She collapsed to her knees, the contents of her stomach emptying across the glistening white. The sunset overhead was rich in tangerines, golds, and crimsons. Normally she would take heart in its beauty – in its sign that God's mercy still offered hope.

But not tonight.

The Blackburn Fork roiled in its wintry anger, just on the other side of a mess of brambles. The rest of the oak and maple which surrounded her small shack were barren and lifeless. The wind whistled through their stark branches as she continued to heave.

It seemed an eternity before she was done, before the last of the dried carrots and trout jerky had left her system. She picked up a handful of snow and ran it across her face, then took a fresh ball to swish around in her mouth.

A tremulous voice called from the doorway. "Mama?"

She turned, tenderness seeping into her. Johnny, her oldest child, was standing in the doorway, his dark face blending in with the shadows. He was nearly three, and already he was a handful. She could tell he would be one of those wild, willful men when he grew up.

Just like his father.

"I'm right as rain, Johnny," she assured him. "Just not feeling well, is all."

"The baby's cryin', mama."

"Go rock her. I'll be in in a moment."

His dark eyes held her, as if he might refuse out of sheer childish stubbornness - and then he turned.

Naomi sighed, braiding her long, straight, dark hair back from her face. Little Polly was almost seven months old. She was quickly becoming a toddler. She was no longer the baby of the house.

Naomi's hand went to her belly, and her throat tightened.

The child within her was.

Just the thought of that tiny life brought her both ecstatic joy and mind-numbing terror. It was the most beautiful miracle God could have given her – but could she force another child into this soul-wrenching terror of a life?

A man's voice called out from the thick woods, harsh, laced with anger.

"Naomi! You damned black injun squaw. What the hell are you doing out in the snow!"

Naomi flushed, guiltily spun, and pushed up to her feet.

Before her stood Bill Williams, the father of her children. He was a bullish beast of a man - tall, husky, with short-cropped, dirty blond hair. His skin was as white as the snow which surrounded them.

She remembered a time when his staggering strength and sharp arrogance drew her like a moth to the flame. She had been young then, barely twenty-one. She had wanted him like she had wanted nothing else on Earth. Her desire for him had blazed like the baking heat of the sun on a hot August day.

But within four brief years ...

Bill's face darkened. "Naomi!"

Naomi shook herself. "I'm ... I'm sorry, Bill. I got sick, is all. I must've eaten something wrong."