Cotton Ronald - Picking Cotton: our memoir of injustice and redemption

I USED TO WALK three miles to campus and back every day from my apartment in Burlington. There werent any sidewalks on West Front Street, so during the summer I hugged the edge of the road, trying to stay in the patches of shade when the magnolia trees provided them. I didnt know many people in my neighborhood, although I passed their houses and proud lawns every day. I dont know if I ever even noticed the brick home with white trim just beyond my apartment complex, but on the night that I ran through the damp grass, wearing only a blanket, it was that door I pounded on.

On my way to school, my head was always buried in index cards. I had stacks and stacks of them, careful notes all hole punched and ring bounda different ring for every class. Just across from campus was a Hardees, where Id stop and get a coffee, then sit outside and keep studying. I didnt look over my shoulder or pay too much attention. My focus was on what lay ahead: I was going to graduate in the fall with a perfect 4.0, and my boyfriend, Paul, and I were talking about getting married. He was in his first year of business school at UNCChapel Hill. Thats all my life was really about: college and my boyfriend. I was twenty-two years old and those were the kind of crystal-clear pictures I carried in my mind.

One night coming home in the darkit must have been the beginning of JulyI noticed a small orange glow as I was walking up to my door. It was just a pinprick of light cutting through the branches. The dry burn caught in the back of my throat. In the tree across from my bedroom window, someone was smoking a cigarette. I couldnt see who it was, but someone was there. I told myself it must be a kidsomeone who had climbed up the tree to sneak a smoke. I gave it no further thought.

But thats the picture that flashed in my mind afterward, a snapshot uncovered by my brain as it was reeling for answers to what happened later that monthJuly 1984.

Burlington, North Carolina, is like most college towns: It swells during the school year with kids from Elon College, and contracts during the summer, when many of them return to their hometowns, to their parents, to the summer jobs theyve had since they were in high school. Id decided to stay that summer because I was taking classes, and because Paul was from Burlington, and would be home for the summer break from his classes in Chapel Hill. His parents ran a barbecue place in downtown, or what was left of it. Already the little mom-and-pop stores were emptying out or moving closer to the newly built mall near Huffman Mill Road, right off of I-40. But people still came to J.J.s BBQ no matter what. They came for the vinegared pork and sweet tea that were as much a part of the Burlington summer as the humidity.

Most days I taught aerobics at Spa Lady, and on Saturdays, when I finished teaching, I would stay to lift some weights and put in a few hours at the sales desk. That Saturday was no different. When I got off, Paul and I spent the afternoon together, browsing at a shopping mall and eating lunch nearby until the heat finally got to us. We ended up back at my apartment, napping in the comfort of the air-conditioning. In the early evening, it cooled off enough for us to play tennis at the Alamance County Country Club, where he and his family were members. We were famished when we finished our showers, so we headed over to China Inn Restauranta favorite of ours. It was one of those all-you-can-eat deals, and I loaded up on fried rice, spring rolls, and refill after refill of sweet iced tea. Im sure all the MSG had something to do with itby the time we got to his friends party, a fierce headache was blooming behind my eyes. We didnt stay very long.