Third Place

A Different Shade of Death by Mary Ann Back Mason, OH Henri Leon made a fine looking corpse. Everybody said so. Still, we didn’t admire him too long. Bodies turn south of cheese quick in the Luzianna heat. The band struck up a dirge and we took Henri to a crypt on the northeast side of St. Sebastian Cemetery. After a proper reading from the Good Book and a respectable show of tears, the dirge gave way to the joyful noise of Cajun jazz that leads the dead to their final reward. And the living to the closest bar. Aside from the fact that Henri wasn’t truly dead, it was one hell of a send off. And to be fair, here in the bayou, sometimes it’s hard to know when dead is really dead. Down here, there’s a different shade of death. It was Lamont Braxton who made Henri dead and Mammie Odette who made him undead. I know ‘cause I saw it all. And even though that cemetery was hotter than the flames of perdition, a chill slithered up my spine like a snake sliding through high grass. I knew what night would bring. I left St. Sebastian’s whispering, “Be seeing you, Henri. Just remember, we was friends.” That’s true enough. But Henri and Lamont, now there were two souls destined to collide. Henri and Lamont loved the same woman, Ophelia, daughter of Mammie Odette. But Henri beat Lamont to the punch and popped the question. No one was surprised when Ophelia said yes. Henri was a catch and Ophelia is just about the prettiest gal in Terrebonne Parish. Tiny as a hummingbird she is with eyes the color of the ocean. Her gumbo can make a grown man weep. Mammie, well Mammie took me and Henri in when we wasn’t much bigger than tadpoles. Orphans we were, livin’ on the streets and eatin’ out of garbage cans. That upset Mammie’s sensibilities. She’s as round as a whiskey barrel and not a whole lot taller. She’s a powerful woman who can sing a babe to sleep or summon hell fire. She was mighty fond of Henri. So was I. The night Henri died he and Ophelia was sitting in Mammie’s parlor spinning big dreams and making plans like lovers do. Mammie was teaching me about herbs and such. We moved to the back room pulling the long purple curtain across the doorway to give them some privacy. Everything was right as rain ‘til the door burst open and Ophelia screamed. Mamie and I jumped up. She motioned for me to hush. We peeked out from behind the curtain and saw Lamont pulling a bloody knife from Henri’s heart. “Teach you to steal what’s mine, Henri Leon! Rot in hell you stinkin’ thief!” screamed Lamont. Poor Henri was dead before he hit the floor. Mammie charged Lamont and he lunged at her with the knife. But her eyes rolled back in her head so all I could see was white. Shaking like a sapling in a storm, she lifted her hand straight out in front of her and shouted, “I bind you from me!” A beam of bright light rose between them. No matter how he moved Lamont couldn’t get to her through that light. Mammie grabbed for a small canister from the pantry shelf and dumped its yellow powder into her hand. “You’s a murderer, Lamont Braxton!” she shrieked, “But hear me, it ain’t over between you and Henri. Not just yet.” She leaned over Henri, blew the powder in his face and cried, “When you hear me call, Henri, you shall rise!” Lamont looked like he’d just seen the second coming and I wasn’t sure he hadn’t. He dropped the knife and took off runnin’. But I’d heard that spell Mammie laid on Henri. I understood what it meant. I knew I’d be seeing both those boys again real soon. And Lamont was smart to run. At midnight after Henri was laid to rest, Mammie and I returned to the cemetery. The day’s heat rose from the ground and hovered like ghosts dancin’ in the moonlight. Sounds I’d never heard before filled the air ― terrifying sounds I imagined came from the dead who wanted no part in what we was about to do. Mammie stretched out her arms toward the crypt, held her head high and bellowed, “Come to me, Henri! Awaken, child! Vengeance is yours!” Didn’t Henri rise from that crypt! Lookin’ like Henri, but not. It was his eyes. There was nobody home behind those eyes. He started walkin’ and we started followin’ all the way to Kitchame Swamp. That’s where we found Lamont curled up on the soft muddy bank and crying like a baby. My blood ran cold as Henri jerked him out of that swamp like a sack of corn. “God have mercy on your soul, Lamont!” I prayed out loud. But God wasn’t in Kitchamee that night. Just Henri ― undead Henri ― who proceeded to claw his way through flesh and bone snatching Lamont’s still beating heart right out of his chest! Lamont’s body won’t never be found. The swamp don’t give up its dead. Mammie took Henri by the hand and led him back to the crypt. With tears on her cheeks she laid him down, brushed her hand over his eyes and said, “You did well, Henri. Vengeance is done. Sleep well, child. I won’t be callin’ you again.” I believed her. I took some pretty white oleander to Henri today and visited for a time. Thinkin’ on everything that happened. Tryin’ to make sense of it all. I reckoned I’d glimpsed that gray space between life and death, where what could never be, is ― where the dead walk and can finish unfinished business. I’d glimpsed a different shade of death.