“I’ll take care of it,” Miriam said. She summoned Jean-Jean, who barely looked like himself in his fine funeral clothes. His work clothes were in a satchel by the outhouse, which he would start sealing “after the last mourner leaves,” as Miriam had instructed him when he arrived much earlier than he was told. Pending jobs made him uneasy. The sooner he sealed the hole, the less of a chance Miriam would have to change her mind; and the sooner he would get the rest of his money.
“Leave your shovel behind the house,” Miriam had instructed him before the funeral. That thing was like an extension of his hand. He carried it everywhere, always hoping someone would hire him. “You can start tonight,” Miriam had added, to his delight. She had read the impatience in his eyes, though she was the one who could no longer wait once word had reached her ear about some sneaky schoolgirl who had dropped her newborn into a nearby latrine. A suspicious houseboy had followed the trail of blood from the outhouse to the girl’s thighs, and she’d confessed. Jean-Jean almost slipped into the hole and died himself, when frantic neighbors sent him down there with a bucket on a rope to try and scoop out the remains.
“I remember your mother well,” Jean-Jean said. The thought of getting paid in just a few hours had cured his stutter for now. “She was a good person.” Gwo Manman always had a kind word for him. He would do anything, anything at all, for the Malbranche family.
“We need ice,” Miriam told him.
“I’ll get it,” replied Jean-Jean. For once, no one seemed to care where his hands had been.
Miriam embraced her sister, saying, “Pran kouraj. You did what you thought was best.” She lifted up her hand and her voice: “A toast to Gwo Manman!”
Someone gave Miriam a fresh bottle of rum. She put it to her mouth and drank. She passed the bottle to Foufoune. Do this in remembrance of me.
“To Gwo Manman,” Foufoune said. The liquid burned her throat on its way down. She was not a drinker. Her petite frame had never been able to meet rum on its own terms. A single sip would send her head spinning. But for Gwo Manman … just this once …
When Jean-Jean returned with the ice, the disgruntled mourner thanked him and drank and toasted for several hours before he stumbled out of the house. Foufoune, too, continued to toast her departed mother until her stomach churned and her thoughts began to swirl. Everyone was now stumbling with five-star grief. Foufoune teetered toward the bathroom. It was occupied, but she could not wait.
“Of course,” Miriam said when Foufoune, trembling like a little girl, asked her sister to escort her to that wooden stall behind her house. It had been years since she last used it, but if memory served her correctly, it would be pitch-black inside and densely populated with flying roaches. She would have waited, if she could have, but the rum had instigated a riot inside her stomach and everything she’d ever eaten in her life was seconds away from a violent uprising.
Miriam listened as Foufoune retched into the thirty-foot drop.
“Water.” Foufoune could barely say the word. She would splash her face with water; surely that would make her feel better.
“Yes,” Miriam responded. “I’ll get you some.”
Miriam returned to the house for a pitcher. Jean-Jean was leaning against the wall, an anxious look in his eyes. The last of the stumbling mourners kissed her goodbye and said, “Be strong.”
Miriam filled the pitcher and headed back to the outhouse.
Foufoune slurred something Miriam did not understand as she bent over the latrine, vomiting—too intoxicated to care about the stench or the roaches. Her chignon was still intact, Miriam noted.
The back of Foufoune’s neck was bare, except for the heart-shaped links of a gold chain which Miriam had given to Gwo Manman one Mother’s Day—purchased with money she should have used to extract a molar that was so infected it ended up costing her half of her bottom teeth. Miriam wondered if Foufoune had taken the necklace off their mother’s neck after she died, or if Gwo Manman had willingly given it away.
Without taking her eyes off the gold hearts, Miriam gripped the pitcher in a tight fist and drenched Foufoune in a vengeful baptism.
Stunned, Foufoune turned to ask why. In that second, Miriam reached outside the door and wrapped her fingers around the wooden handle of Jean-Jean’s shovel. She shifted her weight and steadied herself on her callused heels, leaning back just so. As deftly as stirring lumps out of her cornmeal, Miriam delivered a blow so precise that Foufoune’s chignon came undone. She fell sideways over the latrine’s mouth. Miriam hit her again and again.
“This is for Gwo Manman.”
Blood streamed out of Foufoune’s mouth. Her eyelids pulled back in blinding shock. Miriam snatched off the heartshaped necklace, and with a strength she didn’t know she possessed, worked Foufoune’s ever-so-svelte little frame into the hole. Foufoune’s body went through with minimal force, landing with a sound as faint as a serving of rice and beans onto a Styrofoam takeout container.
Miriam held the necklace in a clenched fist, peering into the darkness. She tried but could not see her sister below.
Thick mud clogged Foufoune’s mouth, her nostrils, her ears. Her head was heavy with mud—was it mud? She could not move her legs. Dear God, help me, she tried to say, but the words could not make it past the gunk in her throat. She attempted to lift her hands toward the strange dappled light filtering out of the darkness, but the movement caused her to sink even deeper.
Miriam covered the hole with a sheet of plywood. Soon Jean-Jean would pour concrete, turning the latrine into a memory. She sighed heavily as she returned to the house. Jean-Jean was standing like a shadow on the porch, waiting for her to give him the word. The sooner he started, the sooner he would be done. The sooner he would be paid.
“Everyone is gone,” he said.
“Then get to work,” Miriam told him. It had been a long day. She was tired, but took comfort in knowing that her mother and sister had both returned home to her in Puits Blain. This time to stay.
More about Haiti Noir
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The print edition of Haiti Noir is available from our website and from online and brick & mortar bookstores everywhere. The Haiti Noir e-book is available wherever e-books are sold.
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Haiti Noir, edited by Edwidge Danticat
Akashic recruits Danticat, one of the truly great contemporary writers, to edit this timely volume featuring stories set both before and after the devastating 2010 earthquake.
Launched with the summer ’04 award-winning best seller Brooklyn Noir, Akashic Books continues its groundbreaking series of original noir anthologies. Each book is comprised of all-new stories, each one set in a distinct neighborhood or location within the city of the book.
Featuring brand-new stories by: Edwidge Danticat, Rodney Saint-Éloi, Madison Smartt Bell, Gary Victor, M.J. Fievre, Marvin Victor, Yanick Lahens, Louis-Philipe Dalembert, Kettly Mars, Marie Ketsia Theodore-Pharel, Evelyne Trouillot, Katia Ulysse, Ibi Aanu Zoboi, Nadine Pinede, and others.
Haiti has a tragic history and continues to be one of the most destitute places on the planet, especially in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake. Here, however, Danticat reveals that even while the subject matter remains dark, the caliber of Haitian writing is of the highest order.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Part I: Which Noir?
“Odette” by Patrick Sylvain (Christ-Roi)
“The Rainbow’s End” by M.J. Fievre (Kenscoff)
“The Finger” by Gary Victor (Port-au-Prince)
“Paradise Inn” by Kettly Mars (Gokal)
“Which One?” by Evelyne Trouillot (Lalue)
“Twenty Dollars” by Madison Smartt Bell (Morne du Cap)
Part II: Noir Crossroads
“Claire of the Sea Light” by Edwidge Danticat (Ville Rose)
“The Harem” by Ibi Aanu Zoboi (Delmas)
“Rosanna” by Josaphat-Robert Large (Pacot)
/> “Maloulou” by Marie Lily Cerat (Martissant)
“Dangerous Crossroads” by Louis-Philippe Dalembert (Pétionville)
“Blues for Irène” by Marvin Victor (Carrefour-Feuilles)
Part III: Who is That Noir?
“The Last Department” by Katia D. Ulysse (Putis Blain)
“Departure Lounge” by Nadine Pinede (Cap Haitien)
“Who Is that Man?” by Yanick Lahens (Saint-Marc)
“Mercy at the Gate” by Marie Ketsia Theodore-Pharel (Croix-des-Bouquets)
“The Leopard of Ti Morne” by Mark Kurlansky (Gonaïves)
“The Blue Hill” by Rodney Saint-Éloi (Ozanana)
About the Akashic Noir Series
The Akashic Books Noir series was launched in 2004 with the award-winning anthology, Brooklyn Noir. Each book is comprised of all new stories, each taking place within a distinct location within the city of the book. Stories in the series have won multiple Edgar, Shamus, and Hammett awards and the volumes have been translated into 10 languages. Every book is available on our website, as eBooks from your favorite vendor, and in print at online and brick & mortar bookstores everywhere. For more information on the series, including an up-to-date list of available titles, please visit www.akashicbooks.com/noirseries.htm.
ALSO AVAILABLE IN THE AKASHIC NOIR SERIES
BALTIMORE NOIR, edited by LAURA LIPPMAN
BARCELONA NOIR (SPAIN), edited by ADRIANA V. LÓPEZ & CARMEN OSPINA
BOSTON NOIR, edited by DENNIS LEHANE
BOSTON NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS, edited by DENNIS LEHANE, JAIME CLARKE & MARY COTTON
BRONX NOIR, edited by S.J. ROZAN
BROOKLYN NOIR, edited by TIM MCLOUGHLIN
BROOKLYN NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS, edited by TIM MCLOUGHLIN
BROOKLYN NOIR 3: NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH, edited by TIM MCLOUGHLIN & THOMAS ADCOCK
CAPE COD NOIR, edited by DAVID L. ULIN
CHICAGO NOIR, edited by NEAL POLLACK
COPENHAGEN NOIR (DENMARK), edited by BO TAO MICHAËLIS
D.C. NOIR, edited by GEORGE PELECANOS
D.C. NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS, edited by GEORGE PELECANOS
DELHI NOIR (INDIA), edited by HIRSH SAWHNEY
DETROIT NOIR, edited by E.J. OLSEN & JOHN C. HOCKING
DUBLIN NOIR (IRELAND), edited by KEN BRUEN
HAITI NOIR, edited by EDWIDGE DANTICAT
HAITI NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS, edited by EDWIDGE DANTICAT
HAVANA NOIR (CUBA), edited by ACHY OBEJAS
INDIAN COUNTRY NOIR, edited by SARAH CORTEZ & LIZ MARTÍNEZ
ISTANBUL NOIR (TURKEY), edited by MUSTAFA ZIYALAN & AMY SPANGLER
KANSAS CITY NOIR, edited by STEVE PAUL
KINGSTON NOIR (JAMAICA), edited by COLIN CHANNER
LAS VEGAS NOIR, edited by JARRET KEENE & TODD JAMES PIERCE
LONDON NOIR (ENGLAND), edited by CATHI UNSWORTH
LONE STAR NOIR, edited by BOBY BYRD & JOHNNY BYRD
LONG ISLAND NOIR, edited by KAYLIE JONES
LOS ANGELES NOIR, edited by DENISE HAMILTON
LOS ANGELES NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS, edited by DENISE HAMILTON
MANHATTAN NOIR, edited by LAWRENCE BLOCK
MANHATTAN NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS, edited by LAWRENCE BLOCK
MANILLA NOIR, edited by JESSICA HAGEDORN
MEXICO CITY NOIR (MEXICO), edited by PACO I. TAIBO II
MIAMI NOIR, edited by LES STANDIFORD
MOSCOW NOIR (RUSSIA), edited by NATALIA SMIRNOVA & JULIA GOUMEN
MUMBAI NOIR (INDIA), edited by ALTAF TYREWALA
NEW JERSEY NOIR, edited by JOYCE CAROL OATES
NEW ORLEANS NOIR, edited by JULIE SMITH
ORANGE COUNTY NOIR, edited by GARY PHILLIPS
PARIS NOIR (FRANCE), edited by AURéLIEN MASSON
PHILADELPHIA NOIR, edited by CARLIN ROMANO
PHOENIX NOIR, edited by PATRICK MILLIKIN
PITTSBURGH NOIR, edited by KATHLEEN GEORGE
PORTLAND NOIR, edited by KEVIN SAMPSELL
QUEENS NOIR, edited by ROBERT KNIGHTLY
RICHMOND NOIR, edited by ANDREW BLOSSOM, BRIAN CASTLEBERRY & TOM DE HAVEN
ROME NOIR (ITALY), edited by CHIARA STANGALINO & MAXIM JAKUBOWSKI
ST. PETERSBURG NOIR, edited by NATALIA SMIRNOVA & JULIA GOUMEN
SAN DIEGO NOIR, edited by MARYELIZABETH HART
SAN FRANCISCO NOIR, edited by PETER MARAVELIS
SAN FRANCISCO NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS, edited by PETER MARAVELIS
SEATTLE NOIR, edited by CURT COLBERT
STATEN ISLAND NOIR, edited by PATRICIA SMITH
TORONTO NOIR (CANADA), edited by JANINE ARMIN & NATHANIEL G. MORE
TRINIDAD NOIR (TRINIDAD & TOBAGO), edited by LISA ALEN-AGOSTINI & JEANNE MASON
TWIN CITIES NOIR, edited by JULIE SCHAPER & STEVEN HORWITZ
USA NOIR: BEST OF THE AKASHIC NOIR SERIES, edited by JOHNNY TEMPLE
VENICE NOIR (ITALY), edited by MAXIM JAKUBOWSKI
WALL STREET NOIR, edited by PETER SPIEGELMAN
FORTHCOMING
ADDIS ABABA NOIR (EGYPT), edited by MAAZA MENGISTE
BAGHDAD NOIR (IRAQ), edited by SAMUEL SHIMON
BEIRUT NOIR (LEBANON), edited by IMAN HUMAYDAN
BELFAST NOIR (NORTHERN IRELAND), edited by ADRIAN MCKINTY & STUART NEVILLE
BOGOTÁ NOIR (COLOMBIA), edited by ANDREA MONTEJO
BUFFALO NOIR, edited by BRIGID HUGHES & ED PARK
CHICAGO NOIR 2: THE CLASSICS edited by JOE MENO
HELSINKI NOIR, (FINLAND) edited by JAMES THOMPSON
JERUSALEM NOIR, edited by DROR MISHANI
LAGOS NOIR (NIGERIA), edited by CHRIS ABANI
MEMPHIS NOIR, edited by LAUREEN P. CANTWELL & LEONARD GILL
MISSISSIPPI NOIR, edited by TOM FRANKLIN
NEW ORLEANS 2: THE CLASSICS edited by JULIE SMITH
PRISON NOIR, edited by JOYCE CAROL OATES
PROVIDENCE NOIR, edited by ANN HOOD
SEOUL NOIR (KOREA), edited by BS PUBLISHING CO.
SINGAPORE NOIR, edited by CHERYL LU-LIEN TAN
STOCKHOLM NOIR (SWEDEN), edited by NATHAN LARSON & CARL-MICHAEL EDENBORG
TEHRAN NOIR (COLOMBIA), edited by SALAR ABDOH
TEL AVIV NOIR (ISRAEL), edited by ETGAR KERET & ASSAF GAVRON
ZAGREB NOIR (CROATIA), edited by IVAN SRSEN
NOIR SERIES AWARDS, PRIZES & HONORS
Following is a list-in-progress of the various awards, prizes, and honors that Akashic Noir Series stories have either won or been short-listed for.
Boston Noir
Edgar Award Finalists 2010
Dennis Lehane, “Animal Rescue”
Dana Cameron, “Femme Sole”
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2010
John Dufresne, “The Cross-Eyed Bear”
Dennis Lehane, “Animal Rescue”
Shamus Award Finalist 2010
Brendan DuBois, “The Dark Island”
Anthony Award Finalists 2010
Dennis Lehane, “Animal Rescue”
Dana Cameron, “Femme Sole”
Macavity Award Finalist 2010
Dana Cameron, “Femme Sole”
Agatha Award Finalist 2009
Dana Cameron, “Femme Sole”
Bronx Noir
Winner, New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association
Book of the Year Award, Special Category 2008
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2008
S.J. Rozan, “Hothouse”
Brooklyn Noir
Edgar Award Finalist 2005
Pete Hamill, “The Book Signing”
Robert L. Fish Memorial Award Winner 2005
Thomas Morrissey, “Can’t Catch Me”
Shamus Award Winner 2005
Pearl Abraham, “Hasidic Noir”
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2005
Tim McLoughlin, “When All This Was Bay Ridge”
Lou Manfredo, “Case Closed”
Anthony Award Finalist 2005
Arthu
r Nersesian, “Hunter/Trapper”
Pushcart Prize Finalist 2005
Ellen Miller, “Practicing”
DC Noir
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2007
Robert Andrews, “Solomon’s Alley”
Detroit Noir
Shamus Award Finalist 2008
Loren D. Estleman, “Kill the Cat”
Kansas City Noir
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2013
Nancy Pickard, “Lightbulb”
Las Vegas Noir
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2009
David Corbett, “Pretty Little Parasite”
Vu Tran, “This or Any Desert”
Lone Star Noir
Shamus Award Finalist 2011
Lisa Sandlin, “Phelan’s First Case”
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2011
David Corbett & Luis Alberto Urrea, “Who Stole My Monkey?”
Long Island Noir
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2013
Nick Mamatas, “The Shiny Car in the Night”
Los Angeles Noir
Southern California Independent Booksellers Association Winner 2007
Edgar Award Winner 2008
Susan Straight, “The Golden Gopher”
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2008
Michael Connelly, “Mulholland Dive”
Robert Ferrigno, “The Hour When the Ship Comes In”
Manhattan Noir
Edgar Award Finalists 2007
S.J. Rozan, “Building”
Thomas H. Cook, “Rain”
Included in The Best American Mystery Stories 2007
Robert Knightly, “Take the Man’s Pay”