STORY: Jacob and Matilde

So that’s the way it’s going to be, Jacob thought. The argument he’d had that evening with Matilde somehow made him believe that no matter what she’d said to him, she wouldn’t be sneaking out any more, at least not right away, not tonight. The thin summer blanket was a crushing weight on his chest as he lay there in their bed, listening as she softly closed the door behind her. Her footsteps quickened and faded into the night before he’d let the tears run down into his flattened pillow.
“You’ve got to stop this,” he had begged earlier that evening, and even tried demanding but she’d laughed, the scorn in her eyes prickling into his skin to penetrate the soul she claimed he didn’t have.
“Men are tired and broken,” she spat back at him, “women withering up young from working all day in the fields and not having enough to eat at night. There’s no decent clothes with winter coming because people think that your black skin keeps you warm.” Her lips were curled back in hatred. She eyed him defiantly, knowing that he wouldn’t fight back. Jacob was a gentle man, and Matilde knew he understood that what she said was true and he’d done nothing to make it better. She turned her back in a gesture of dismissal that cut to his heart. “I’ve got babies to feed,” she’d thrown at him over her shoulder. And that was the end of it.
Lying in the bed, feeling the warm spot left by her body, Jacob thought back to a better time, a time when he was happy. Jacob held the respect of the other men then, but now that everyone knew what was going on, they snickered behind his back. Matilde had been his playmate as a child. They told each other secrets and hid in the bushes when they heard their mamas calling and they giggled and counted to ten before they’d answer them back. They grew up and realized they were in love and got married when Jacob was eighteen and their mamas could no longer keep them apart. Jacob was an honest man, and like his father before him, a hard worker. Slavery was something Jacob and Matilde grew up with, but its black cloud had never before cast the shadow on their life as it was doing now. You see, even though Jacob hated it, he came to accept it, and Matilde…well, she just grew to hate it more.
Jacob was a patient man, but thoughts of Matilde and her lover ate into every waking moment of his day. The nights she was gone were worse. He saw their hands explore each other, black on white, white on black, finding all the secret places lovers seek in their passion. One night he woke as she slowly sidled over to her edge of the bed. He felt himself sink further into the mattress as she slipped off and he watched the form of her white nightgown glide like a ghost through the dark. His fists closed in quiet rage but he could say nothing. He’d tried once before to stop her, but in her misguided resolve to do what she felt was the only thing she could do, she had snarled at him in anger. Accused him once more of being less than half the man she’d married, and went out of the room, slamming the door in open contempt.
Jacob arose before dawn, dressed but didn’t bother washing last night’s tears from his face, now dry and stinging as he grimly set his mouth into a hardened line of determination. He stood outside their door, listening as the birdsounds of the woods waking up began in the darkness. He gripped the pistol with both hands from arms limply hanging down in front of him. He heard her footsteps through the woods before he saw her filmy outline on the path. He drew up the gun and fired, and Matilde fell as softly as he knew she would.
A few hours later, he stood with the others as the man from County confirmed that Matilde had been shot dead. The pistol too was there, laying close by the empty satchel she still clung in her right hand. In the morning light, Jacob looked down in grief at the slight hint of smile left on her lips.
“Sorry, Jacob, but you had to have expected it to come to this,” the official said. “You should’ve put an end to it before now. Them folks don’t like their men messin’ with the white folk any more than we want them touchin’ our women.” Jacob didn’t speak at all, knowing it was useless.
“We’ll try to get him, ask around and all, but it’ll be hard findin’ which it was,” the man told him, even as he handed Jacob back his gun.