The Swamp Don’t Forget…And Neither Do I!

“Fawn needs my help! She’s in pain!”

Remy tries to push his way into the bedroom as Fawn lets out a pained wail, but Silvain blocks his path.

Resembling a southern-fried version of boxer John L. Sullivan, mustachioed, barrel-chested Silvain Thibodeaux shakes his head, calmly offering, “She’s in good hands, boy.”

Twenty-two-year-old fisherman Remy Fontenot and his twenty-one-year-old wife, Fawn, grew up in Rocky Point, Louisiana, often poor, hungry, and sunbaked by the bayou sun, yet they were in love from the moment they met as children.

Fawn is struggling to deliver their first child and is under the care of eighty-five-year-old Josette Thibodeaux, Silvain’s wife and Rocky Point’s midwife and healer.

Fawn shrieks, “I CAN’T!”

The silence that follows shakes Remy and even unsettles Silvain, who, in his eighty-seven years from Reconstruction to the Great Depression, has helped Josette deliver nearly every one of Rocky Point’s 118 residents.

Rocky Point is a Cajun town in Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, six miles from Dulac. It survives on fishing and farming and is so far back in the bayou that most people travel there by boat. Cypress trees frame the area, their branches heavy with Spanish moss, rising from the dark water patrolled by monstrous alligators. Rocky Point’s self-appointed, profit-zealous Mayor, Lucien Lavey, spearheaded the effort to modernize the town, resulting in the construction of a marina and a train station in 1932. The train is the town’s lifeline, bringing groceries from Houma and hauling away logs and cabbages to places as far away as Chicago.

The bedroom door flies open.

Holding the baby in a blanket, Josette moves past Remy and Silvain as fast as her reedy legs can carry her.

“Wait! Where are you going with my baby?”

Both men follow Josette to the edge of the bayou.

Josette steps into the knee-high water, holding the child above her head.

Remy can see that his son’s body is blue.

“…Stillborn…,” Silvain mutters.

Silvain holds Remy back as Josette immerses the baby in the bayou.

Josette utters, “…Stand clear of this innocent soul, death. Let him grow strong and wise, and protect him and his loving parents from harm…”

Josette submerges the baby in the still, green muck again and again.

Spitting up water, the baby coughs and cries as it begins to breathe.

Josette hands the baby to Remy.

An alligator zigzags toward her, hissing.

Josette puts her hands on her hips. “I suggest you recede, Mr. Gator, ’Less you wanna be made into a pair’a boots.”

The gator halts its advance, engaging in a staring match with Josette.

Hissing, it turns away.

                                               ***

Watching Silvain’s coffin being lowered into the ground, Mayor Lucien Lavey says, “You’d think that with all her voodoo magic, she could have saved him.”

Fisherman Blaise Broussard, Lucien’s bony assistant, scratches his chest-length beard. “Don’t think there’s any kind of magic that can stop a heart attack.”

Like everyone else in Rocky Point, Forty-four-year-old Lucien Lavey has known Josette all his life. Scrawny, scowling, beady-eyed, and beak-nosed, Lucien is Josette’s most vocal critic, claiming her cures are parlor tricks. Lucien often speaks in his native Cajun tongue and enjoys showing off his intelligence by translating his words into English.

“Now that Silvain is dead, everythin’, his farm, the boardin’ house, and Chubby’s Saloon now belong to Josette,” Blaise says.

“Ca c’est bon. Good for her.”

“You think she’ll sell out?” Blaise asks.

“Not without a push,” Lucien replies. “And I intend to push real hard.”

                                               ***

Sylvain hasn’t been in the ground for a week before Josette notices the townspeople acting strangely toward her. They whisper about her when they think she’s too far away to hear. When they don’t need her herbs, spells, or nursing, they ignore her, and when they pass, they don’t look her in the eye.

She knows that Lucien Lavey is behind the strategy to isolate her.

The pair cross paths when Josette goes to Chubby’s Saloon to collect the week’s profits.

Lucien and Blaise are holding court at the back of the teakwood bar with a group of fishermen, who scatter like frightened guppies when Josette flashes her mismatched eyes at them.

“You can scare them, but you don’t frighten me,” Lucien says.

Josette fixes her stare on Lucien. “Don’t I? I’ve saved a lotta blue babies in my time. You’re the only one I wish I hadn’t.”

Josette knows Lucien has feared her ever since he was a boy, when he swore he saw her fly from one end of Rocky Point to the other. Thirty years later, her wispy figure, waist-length gray hair, and heterochromatic eyes, one black and the other blue, still make Lucien feel like a boy again.

“You should sell everything. Start with this place. Toi, tu bois même pas. You don’t even drink.”

“No.”

“Why?”

“’Cause you want it.”

“What have you got against progress? We got a train that comes to town once a day now. If we build a sawmill and enlarge the docks, on va être la prochaine grosse affaire – We’ll be the next big thing.”

Josette waves Dawson Dewar toward her. The beefy bartender hands her an envelope, which she tucks into her blouse. “Laisse les choses comme ils sont.”  

“Let things remain as they are?” Lucien snorts. “Why? I can make you the richest woman in the bayou.”

“Ain’t you heard? I already am.”

“You can’t live forever, you old hag.”

“You better hope I do.”

                                               ***

Josette continues to grow more isolated. Sitting on her front porch, Josette shouts at passersby, deliberately trying to intimidate them into responding.

“…I betcha got a flask of moonshine hidden in that boat of yours, Jo Jo Robideaux… Hey, Essie Mae Clarke! …You still sneakin’ ‘round behind your boyfriend’s back with Beaver McClain?... And how ‘bout you, Fuller Bremerton, Mister big shot gambler? You still deal from the bottom of the deck?”

Only Remy and Fawn come to visit with their new son, Sage. Most of the time, Josette stares at the skittish passersby with her mismatched eyes, singing and playing a beat-up guitar.

The people of Rocky Point notice that the song Josette sings most is about them:

“I deliver your babies, I set your bones to mend,

Yet none of you ever call me friend.

Every dirty look, side glance, every rap,

Will haunt you when Rocky Point is wiped from the map.

And all of you will cry and wail,

But only three will tell the tale.

For its disrespect, you and Rocky Point will die,

The swamp don’t forget…And neither do I!”

                                               ***

 A few days after their tense meeting with Josette, Lucien and Blaise stop at Chubby’s Saloon for a late afternoon drink. They immediately notice the patrons’ worried expressions.

Dawson points to the far corner, where Josette is sitting.

A short man with dark hair, a curled mustache, and a pointed Van Dyke beard is painting a portrait of Josette.

“She hired the famous portrait painter Jean-Francois Benet to immortalize her,” Dawson says. 

“Some folks is best forgotten,” Lucien replies.

Dawson whispers, “Be careful what you say around him. C'est un mauvais sujet. He’s bad medicine, a powerful conjurer. Dangereux.”

Lucien and Blaise approach Benet and Josette, who gives Lucien a detestable smirk.

“Waste of paint if you ask me,” Lucien remarks.

“There is no such thing, monsieur,” Benet retorts. “Especially when it comes to capturing the essence of an accomplished healer such as Miss Josette.”

Lucien is fascinated by the painting’s ornate gold frame.

“Are those cherubs around the frame? They’re a bit too playful for such a grim subject.”

“They’re angels. They protect the subjects I paint,” Benet replies. “We’re nearly finished, Miss Josette. Time for the final and most important touch.”

Benet places his brush on a nearby table. Reaching into his vest pocket, he pulls out a jackknife. He slices open his forefinger, letting the blood drip into a cup of red paint.

Josette offers him her forefinger.

“This may hurt a bit, Miss Josette, but as the saying goes, ‘Un p’tit peu de douleur, c’est bon pour l’immortalité,’ a little bit of pain is worth immortality.”

Benet slices open her finger.

Josette’s blood drips into the cup of red paint. He stirs their blood into the paint, then brushes it onto the canvas.

“Barbaric, ain’t it, Blaise?”

Blaise’s mouth goes dry, and he looks away, unable to answer.

Lucien chuckles at Blaise’s queasiness. “You’re a coward. T’es un couillon. You can guta a marlin, but you can’t stand the sight of a little blood? For shame, Blaise.”

The pair looks at the picture, absorbing Josette’s stern expression.

“Least you could’a done is smile,” Lucien comments.

They look at the picture again. It’s smiling.

“Maybe the heat’s got me, but I think it just changed expression,” Blaise whispers. “That paintin’’s alive.”

                                               ***

After the painting is finished, Josette’s health deteriorates rapidly. When Lucien hears that Josette is deathly ill, his only comment, accompanied by a broad grin, is “C’est bon. Good.”

Fawn moves into Josette’s house to take care of her.

“…You and Remy are my only true friends…,” Josette says weakly.

“Everyone loves and respects you. They’re just too afraid of what Lucien Lavey might do to them to show it.”

“…My painting… Bring it to me…”

Fawn retrieves the painting and sets it up in a chair in front of Josette’s bed.

Josette’s voice is a weak rasp. “…Like a little water before I go… Can’t cross over thirsty…”

Fawn goes to get a glass of water.

What she sees when she returns makes her drop the glass.

A translucent form rises from Josette’s still body, entering the picture.

Looking at the crowd of mourners, Blaise says, “Miss Josette got a great turnout. Everybody in town is here.”

“Most of them are here out of fear that hag will cast a spell on them from the grave,” Lucien replies haughtily.

“I bet a lot of them feel guilty about the way they treated her after Silvain died. I know I do.”

“T’es un couillon. Coward. I paid these bumpkins a lot of money to shun her. The people of Rocky Point were her life. What did I tell you? Take them out of her life, and we end her life, and that’s what we did. Now, with no family to inherit the farm, the saloon, and all her other holdin’s, they’ll be auctioned off. And guess who’s going to buy them?”

Lucien and Blaise are among the last to pay their respects to Remy and Fawn, who arranged Josette’s funeral.

Lucien glances at Josette’s portrait placed next to her closed casket.

He sneers at the portrait’s glaring expression.

“Désolé pour ta perte. Sorry for your loss,” Lucien says to Remy and Fawn. “Guess you’re the closest the old crone had to family.”

Cradling her son, Fawn fights back tears. “Yes, we loved Josette, and before she passed, she showed us how much she loved us, too.”

“Ca veut dire quoi, toi? What do you mean?”

“The day Sage was born, she drew up a will naming us her heirs.”

Lucien’s blood pressure rises. He glances at the portrait. It’s smiling.

                                                           ***

The mid-September air turns inexplicably cold as Lucien passes the cemetery on his way home.

He pauses, shrugging off the feeling of being watched.

A familiar voice carries on the wind:

“I deliver your babies, I set your bones to mend,

Yet none of you ever call me friend.

Every dirty look, side glance, every rap,

Will haunt you when Rocky Point is wiped from the map.

And all of you will cry and wail,

But only three will tell the tale.

For its disrespect, you and Rocky Point will die,

The swamp don’t forget…And neither do I!”

Josette appears on the sidewalk ahead of him, staring at him with her mismatched eyes and a knowing smile, then vanishes into mist.

The wind picks up.

                                               ***

The following day, a Category 4 hurricane with 100 mph winds strikes Rocky Point.

Lucien steps into the street and is nearly swept away, forcing him to hold onto his front porch for support.

Blaise runs toward the house, followed by a crowd of terrified people.

“What do we do, Mayor?”

“Head to the railway station! It’s the strongest building in town!”

Lucien turns back in time to see his porch ripped from his house and smashed into kindling.

The residents huddle together at the railway station, looking up at the roof as it groans and swells in the wind.

“Ne t'en fais pas. Don’t worry! We can ride out the storm in safety here. We’re gonna be all right!”

Lucien turns to Blaise. “How’d this happen? We should’a been warned.”

“You’re the Mayor. This is on you! The radio at my place died just before I bolted. It’s sunny and mild everywhere else, but not here.”

“C’est impossible. If we’re gettin’ hit like this, Houma and Galleno should be too.”

“Guess it’s a one-of-a-kind disaster,” Blaise replies.

“Everythin’ happens for a reason.”

“So, what’s causin’ all of this?”

“Not what. Who.”

Lucien looks toward the station’s front door.

Josette’s shadowy figure stands in the doorway, taunting him with a triumphant smile.

Lucien charges at her.

Blaise calls after him. “Boss? Where ya goin’?”

Lucien flings open the door, which tears from its hinges and strikes him on the side of the head, opening a bloody gash.

Inside the station, Blaise watches the roof tear away.

The building collapses, burying Rocky Point’s population in the rubble.

                                               ***

Lucien looks into the sheet of rain at Josette’s transparent figure.

“Démon! Why couldn’t you just go away and let me have what I deserve?”

“…This is what you deserve…”

A twenty-foot-high wall of water surges down the street, obliterating everything in its path.

Josette laughs as the wave swallows Lucien, carrying him off.

“…The swamp don’t forget…And neither do I…”

Remy shields Sage from the wind as he and Fawn abandon their house.

He sees a massive wave of water rushing down the street.

“Hurry, Fawn! We have to get out of here before we drown!”

Fawn comes out holding Josette’s portrait.

“Are you kiddin’?”

“Miss Josette’s gonna watch over us. You’ll see.”

Trees, branches, and debris fly by as the couple rushes to the docks and Remy’s fishing skiff.

A mountainous wave of water, muck, and grass hits the skiff as Remy struggles to untie it, but the boat stays on an even keel. 

Passing flattened homes, demolished buildings, and miles of washed-away railway tracks, Remy pilots the skiff away from Rocky Point.

Fawn covers her ears against the screams of those drowning in the swamp.

A few miles out in the murky bayou, the skies clear. Fawn looks back at the chaos behind them.

“That dark cloud feeding the hurricane just seems to be hanging over Rocky Point. It’s sunny everywhere else.”

Remy checks on Sage, who is contentedly gurgling in his sleep.

“Looks like we’re safe. I can’t believe he slept through it all. And I can’t believe you risked our lives to save Miss Josette’s painting.”

Fawn lifts the painting up from the bottom of the skiff to look at it.

The canvas is blank. All that remains are angels dancing around the gold frame.

“I told you Miss Josette would protect us.”

                                               ***

Remy and Fawn return to Rocky Point a month later, hoping to save something from their home. They stop at Josette’s house, the only structure left standing in town.

“A hundred and fifteen dead,” Remy laments. “All of our friends. Everyone but us…”

A warm breeze passes through town.

They hear the creak of a rocking chair on the porch and the strum of a guitar as Josette’s voice sings:

“All of you will cry and wail,

But only three will tell the tale.

For its disrespect, you and Rocky Point will die,

The swamp don’t forget…And neither do I!”