Long Division

This chapter continues City’s story about 1985. City sits on Mama Lara’s porch, writes in his notebook, and waits for Shalaya to come over. Meanwhile, he thinks about Mama Lara’s late husband, Lerthon Coldson, and Shalaya’s late grandfather. In 1964, his and Shalaya’s grandfathers disappeared one day while at the Shephard house, a shack in the Night Time Woods. He and Shalaya therefore never met their grandfathers and sometimes wonder what really happened to them. Mama Lara comes outside and teases City about his weight. City loves her more than any other relative.

City leaves Mama Lara’s and visits Shalaya at her trailer. She’s never met her parents and lives with her grandmother. She comes outside looking upset, and the friends head into the Night Time Woods. Everyone tells them to stay out of the woods at night because the Shephard house was burned down by Klan members in the 1960s, and they think the area is haunted.

Shalaya starts talking about the future again, describing all the terrible things she guesses will happen. She still wants City to help her change the future, but City just wants to talk about how much he loves Shalaya. Shalaya accuses him of being “so long division” because he is determined to “show all [his] work” (14). She teases City about using words he wouldn’t normally use, and the friends tell jokes and laugh.

City takes Shalaya’s hand as they move deeper into the woods. They stop when they reach a hole in the ground with a hatch. Shalaya asks City if he’ll come into the hole with her, as she doesn’t want to go again by herself. City isn’t sure what’s happening but agrees. They go into the hole and then reemerge into the woods. However, the woods and air feel different. There’s a building called the Melahatchie Community Center where the Shephard house used to be. Shalaya explains that they’re now in 2013 as they wend their way toward the edge of the woods. She’s visited several times before on her own. At the edge of the woods, City sees a house that resembles Mama Lara’s house with a girl sitting on the porch with objects that look like a calculator and silver briefcase. She looks somewhat like Shalaya. City approaches her while Shalaya stays in the woods.

The girl is Baize Shephard. She tells City her briefcase is a laptop and warns him not to take her things while she goes inside to see if City can stay for dinner. City is curious about the way Baize dresses and talks but takes her computer, calculator, and book and races back to Shalaya in the woods. They take Baize’s things and climb back into the woods as Baize runs and screams after them.

The friends return to 1985. Shalaya starts asking questions about Baize, but City is distracted by the laptop (Shalaya herself now has the calculator). At Mama Lara’s, he finds Baize’s rhymes on her computer. He clicks around, trying to make sense of the laptop and her writing. He starts typing in Word, admiring how famous his words look.

City keeps playing with the computer the next day while Mama Lara goes on her walk. He’s been reading Long Division, the book he took from Baize, and he doesn’t think Mama Lara would approve. City takes the book and computer back into the woods, where he runs into a white boy with a sickly look. The boy introduces himself as Evan Altshuler and tells City that he’s Jewish, not white. City guesses that Evan must be from 2013. Evan explains that he’s actually from 1964 and wants to change the past. He invites City to come into the hole with him so he can show him the past. City wants to find Shalaya first, unsure how much of Evan’s story to believe.

Later, City returns to the woods and finds Shalaya and Evan playing with Baize’s calculator together. Shalaya has figured out that it’s actually a phone. She then tells City Evan’s theories about the hole and how it leads to 1964 too. City disagrees with the theories and wishes Evan would leave them alone, but Evan starts sharing his story. He explains that his family “was one of a few Jewish families” helping Black citizens get the right to vote in 1964 (45). They were attacked by a group Evan describes as similar to the Ku Klux Klan for their involvement: The Klan trapped them at the Freedom School and burned it down. City is still skeptical, but Evan and Shalaya want to return to the past and change it to change the future. They all start arguing. City finally agrees to go back into the hole because he still wants Shalaya to love him. He takes his book and the computer when they leave.

They push open the hatch and appear in the woods in 1964. The air feels thinner, and the trees look greener. They soon encounter the Freedom School where the Shephard house and community center were in the other years. While walking through the woods, the friends argue about Evan’s supposed sneakiness, and Evan accuses his friends of being antisemitic. He explains what happened to his people during World War II, but City and Shalaya don’t understand, asking why white people would kill other white people when they could kill Black people instead. Evan does his best to explain. Frustrated, City suggests they abandon the plan and go home. Shalaya and Evan ignore him and keep talking.

City leaves Shalaya and Evan behind and ventures toward Old Ryle Road on his own. There, he finds a store called The County Co-Op. He’s shocked to see that the co-op has separate bathrooms for white people and Black people. He tries to get into the white bathroom and runs into a cat with a collar labeled “Red Naval.” City talks to the cat, expressing his frustrations with the segregated bathrooms and everything going on in his life. A nearby dog scuffle interrupts his thoughts. He looks over to see two dogs mating in the gravel. The cat starts scolding City when City throws rocks at the dogs. City has no idea what’s happening and races back to the woods with the computer. The cat and dogs chase after him. Shalaya and Evan are missing. City checks for them in the hole but finds nothing, and he realizes he’s trapped in 1964 alone.