Souls That Won't Stay Buried

Two families torn apart on a Georgia plantation. Two souls who found each other 185 years later. A black, queer, short story by J.R. Whittington

Part One: Georgia Heat and Stolen Names

The Georgia heat was a physical thing—thick as molasses, mean as a whip. It sat on your chest like a master's boot, pressed into your lungs until breathing itself became an act of defiance. On the Whittington plantation, even the air was owned.

Abena and Kwame. Those were the names they whispered to each other in the dark, in the quarters where the floorboards creaked like old bones. Names from Ghana, from a place that lived now only in the curve of their mothers' songs, in the way their tongues wrapped around certain words when massa wasn't listening. But in daylight, they were Patience and Joshua. Good Christian names. Names that fit in white mouths without causing a fuss.

Patience could make anything grow. Her hands in the soil were prayer and magic both—okra that climbed to the sky, collards so sweet they made you weep. She was all angles and muscle, skin dark as river bottom, with a laugh that could crack open the hardest day. When she smiled, which wasn't often but was always earned, you felt it in your chest. Real. Like maybe tomorrow wasn't promised but today was worth surviving.

Joshua could fix anything. Broken wheel, broken fence, broken spirit—he'd sit with it, study it with those careful eyes, and find the way through. Tall and lean, moving through the world like water finding its path. He had hands that could cradle a newborn calf or snap a man's neck, though he'd never done the latter. Not yet. Not ever, if he could help it. His wife, Dinah, said he was too gentle for this world, and she meant it as both compliment and warning.

Their families lived in adjacent cabins. Close enough to hear each other's breathing at night, close enough to share the last of the cornmeal when rations ran low. The children—Patience's three, Joshua's two—played together like fingers on the same hand. Inseparable. Necessary.

Both families carried the Whittington name now. Not by choice. Never by choice. But that's what happens when you're owned—even your name becomes someone else's property. Patience Whittington. Joshua Whittington. Dinah Whittington. Their children, all Whittingtons. A name that would outlive the plantation, outlive the chains, outlive the people who gave it to them. A name that would carry forward through generations who'd never know why they shared it with strangers. Who'd never know it was a scar, not a birthright.

Master Whittington was the dangerous kind of Christian. The kind who believed his own lies. "We treat our people well," he'd say at church, chest puffed like a rooster. "Like family." He'd buy Patience a new headscarf after having her whipped for humming too loud during work. He'd let Joshua play fiddle at the big house parties, then make him watch as massa's drunk friends pawed at Dinah in the kitchen. The gift and the wound, always together. That was the Whittington way.

But Patience and Joshua—Abena and Kwame—they had carved out something massa couldn't touch. Secret midnight meetings in the woods where the old gods still listened. Where they spoke their real names. Where Patience taught Joshua the songs her grandmother taught her, songs in a language that predated chains. Where Joshua shared the maps he was drawing in his mind—rivers, stars, roads north. Where they dreamed of escape not as fantasy but as plan. As when, not if.

"We go together," Patience said one night, her hand in his, both their families circled close. "All of us. Or none of us."

"All of us," Joshua echoed. "I swear it."

The children slept between them, limbs tangled, and for a moment—just a moment—they weren't slaves. They were just people who loved each other. And that love was the most dangerous thing on the plantation.

Then came the debt.

Master Whittington had gambling debts. Cotton prices were down. The war everyone whispered about was coming closer. And when white men get scared, Black bodies get sold.

Joshua was in the barn when he heard. A slave trader from Alabama, a man whose eyes were empty as a well, had bought his family. All of them. They'd leave in two days.

Patience found him that night behind the quarters, on his knees in the dirt, making sounds that weren't quite crying, weren't quite screaming. Something beyond words.

"No," she said, kneeling beside him. "No, no, no."

They held each other while the world ended. Made plans that crumbled before they finished speaking them. Run now? But the children. Fight? But the guns. Beg? But massa's smile, that Christian smile that promised nothing and took everything.

The morning they left, Patience pressed something into Joshua's wife Dinah's hand. A piece of fabric torn from her headscarf, stained with indigo. "So you remember," she whispered. "So you know we're still here."

Dinah pressed her own into Patience's palm. Red clay, baked into cotton. "Find us," she said. "In this life or the next. Find us."

The children cried. The adults didn't. Couldn't. That kind of grief was too big for tears. It lived in your bones. It became your bones.

As the wagon pulled away, Patience and Joshua stood side by side, their shoulders touching. They didn't wave. They stared. Memorizing. Storing every detail for some future that might never come. And in that moment, their spirits made a promise that had nothing to do with words, nothing to do with this world's logic. A promise that transcended the violence of separation.

We will find each other again. Even if it takes forever. Even if we have to claw through death itself.

The drums in the quarters that night were silent. But something else started beating. Deeper. Older. Patient.

Part Two: The Recognition (2040)

Time is a liar. It pretends things end. It pretends death is final, that separation is absolute, that some loves can be killed by distance or dollars or the crack of a whip. But the body is just a house. The spirit? That's the tenant. And when the lease is up, the tenant moves on. Sometimes it takes 185 years. Sometimes it finds its way back home.

Marcus Whittington first saw him at a fundraiser in Brooklyn. All exposed brick and white liberals with good intentions and better wine. His agent had insisted—"It's good for your profile"—which was code for "you need all the help you can get." At forty-two, Marcus had gone from leading man to character actor, which was Hollywood for "we remember when you were fuckable."

He was nursing his second whiskey when a man walked up to the mic. Dark-skinned. Sharp suit. The kind of presence that made the room lean forward.

Destin Whittington. City Councilman. Marcus had seen his face on campaign posters, heard his name in political circles, but had never been in the same room with him. Never felt the pull of him.

He spoke about housing justice, redlining's long shadow, the violence of displacement. And Marcus—who usually tuned out politicians—listened. Really listened. The way you listen when someone is saying something you've always known but never heard spoken aloud.

When Destin finished, Marcus found himself walking over. Couldn't have explained why if someone asked.

"Marcus Whittington," he said, extending his hand.

The man's grip was firm. His eyes were sharper. "Destin Whittington." A pause. "Same last name."

"I noticed."

"Everyone does." He smiled, and something in Marcus's chest tightened. "Black folks with white names. Could be the same plantation. Could be coincidence."

"Which do you think it is?"

"Does it matter?"

They talked until the crowd thinned. Until the caterers started clearing glasses. Until Destin's chief of staff came looking for him with an urgent expression that said you're late for the next thing.

"I should go," Destin said, but didn't move.

"You should."

"Can I call you?"

Marcus gave him his number. Watched him leave. Went home and couldn't sleep. Stared at his phone like a teenager.

The call came the next morning.

They started seeing each other in stolen hours. Destin's schedule was brutal—early meetings, late votes, weekend town halls. Marcus's schedule was empty, which was somehow worse. He'd scroll through casting notices, apply to roles he was overqualified for, refresh his email like a slot machine. One more pull. One more rejection.

But when they were together, none of that mattered.

Destin would show up at his apartment at midnight, still in his suit, exhausted but wired. They'd order takeout. Talk until 3 AM. Fuck like they were running out of time.

Marcus hadn't felt this way about anyone. Not with his ex-boyfriend who'd wanted him to be smaller, quieter, more convenient. Not with the casual things that had filled the years between. This was different. This was—

He didn't have words for it.

With Destin, he could be a mess. Could admit that he was terrified of aging out of an industry that had barely let him in. Could cry about his mother. Could laugh at the absurdity of his own ego. He saw all of him—the insecurity, the vanity, the deep well of need—and didn't flinch.

And when they came together—bodies learning bodies, mouths finding new ways to say yes—it was like remembering something the world had tried to make them forget. That two men touching could be holy. That desire didn't need permission to be beautiful. Marcus would trace the architecture of Destin's spine, the geography of his shoulders, and feel like he was reading a map his hands already knew. Sometimes after, they'd lie in the dark, breath syncing, and Marcus would feel his chest crack open. Not breaking. Opening. Like something buried was finally allowed air.

Three weeks in, Destin's fingers traced idle patterns on Marcus's chest. Stopped. Started again.

"I have to tell you something strange."

Marcus waited.

"After we met. After your last name." Destin pulled out his phone, hesitated, then turned the screen toward Marcus. "I'd done Ancestry years ago. Curiosity. Roots. You know."

Marcus saw his own name on the screen. Marcus Whittington. A match.

"You searched for me."

"I had to know." Destin's voice was quiet. "If we were connected. If that's why—" He stopped. "We're not. Not by blood. Not even distantly. Just the name."

"Just the name," Marcus repeated.

Destin put the phone down. Looked at him. "I've never searched for anyone before. Never needed to. But with you—I couldn't not know."

Marcus understood what he wasn't saying. That sometimes the body knows things the mind hasn't caught up to yet. That recognition doesn't need logic to be real.

"Okay," Marcus said. Simple. True.

And that was enough.

They got married six months later. Small ceremony. Just them and a clerk and two witnesses pulled from the courthouse hallway. When the clerk said "you may kiss," Destin grabbed his face with both hands and kissed him like a claim. Like he was saying mine to whoever was listening.

And for three years, they were good. They were so fucking good.

Part Three: The Unraveling

The callback was for a streaming show. "Wise mentor figure," the breakdown said. Marcus showed up prepared. Nailed the sides. Made the director laugh.

His agent called a week later. "They're going another direction."

"More talented?"

"Younger."

After that, it was a cascade. Three more auditions. Three more rejections. Then his agent stopped calling altogether. Just let Marcus's contract quietly expire.

The money got tight. Not broke—Destin made good money—but for the first time in their marriage, Marcus was making significantly less. He felt it. The shift. The way power moved like water, always finding the lowest point.

He started sleeping later. Stopped going to the gym. Would sit in their apartment scrolling casting notices, applying to roles he knew he wouldn't get, refreshing his email like prayer.

Destin's career, meanwhile, exploded. A viral speech. Profile in The New York Times. Speculation about Congress. He was on CNN, MSNBC, everywhere. The apartment filled with the sound of his success—phone calls, strategy sessions, his voice on the radio talking about policy while Marcus sat on the couch in sweatpants.

Marcus was proud of him. He was. But pride and resentment can live in the same body, and resentment is patient.

He started drinking more. Not drunk—just enough to blur the edges of 3 PM, which was the worst time. Too late to pretend the day might still bring something. Too early for it to be over.

Destin would come home energized, talking about some bill or coalition, and Marcus would be on the couch in his third day of sweatpants. Same spot as that morning. Same defeated posture.

"Did you get out today?" Destin would ask, trying to keep judgment out of his voice.

"I'm an actor between jobs. This is the job. Waiting."

The sex changed too. It stopped being homecoming. Became negotiation. Became sorry. Became proof they could still touch each other without flinching.

They started fighting about small things—dishes, laundry, who forgot to buy milk—because the real thing was too big to name. How do you tell your husband that his success makes you feel like you're disappearing? How do you admit that you're drowning while he's flying?

The breaking point came on a Tuesday.

Destin had a press conference. Big housing initiative announcement. He was wearing the navy suit Marcus loved, rushing around the apartment, electric with purpose.

"Come with me," he said. "I want you there."

"As what? The washed-up actor husband? The arm candy past his expiration date?"

Destin stopped. Turned slow. "What did you say?"

"You heard me."

"Say it again. Without the coward behind it."

So Marcus did. Said everything. How he felt erased. How Destin's success made him feel smaller. How he was supposed to be the one with the career. How he was tired of pretending he was okay when he wasn't.

Destin listened. Didn't interrupt. When Marcus finished, he picked up his bag.

"I think we need space," he said. Voice measured. Holding everything back. "Real space. To figure out if we actually want this or if we're just going through the motions."

"Destin—"

"I have 200 people waiting for me to care about something bigger than your ego."

The door closed with a sound like finality.

Part Four: When Spirits Call

Marcus sat in the apartment three weeks after Destin moved out. The space felt wrong now. Too big. Too quiet. Just his breathing and the refrigerator's hum and the sound of his career dying in real time.

His agent had officially dropped him that morning. Professional email. No phone call. "Wishing you the best in your future endeavors."

On the coffee table: whiskey (half-empty), his phone (seven missed calls from Destin, he couldn't bring himself to listen), and a prescription bottle of Ambien. Sixty pills. He'd been saving them. For what, he hadn't let himself think about. Until now.

He wasn't making a plan. Wasn't thinking clearly. Just kept picking up the bottle. Putting it down. Picking it up.

What's the point?

He was forty-two. No career. No husband. No legacy. Just a man who used to be wanted. Who used to matter.

He opened the bottle. Shook ten pills into his palm.

That's when he heard it.

Drums.

Not from outside. From inside his chest. A rhythm that wasn't his heartbeat but was beating where his heart should be. Deep. Insistent. Ancient.

No.

The voice wasn't his. Wasn't audible. Was just suddenly there.

Not like this.

He dropped the pills. They scattered across the floor like dice. The drumming got louder. He pressed his hands to his chest but the beat wouldn't stop.

Images flashed. Not his memories. A man in a barn. A woman with rough hands and kind eyes. Children crying. Red clay pressed into fabric. A promise.

Find us.

Marcus couldn't breathe.

Destin was at the podium in Brooklyn Borough Hall when it hit him.

Not pain. Not panic attack. Something else. A percussion in his ribs that wasn't his heartbeat. Calling him like a name.

Come. Now.

He stopped mid-sentence.

"Councilman?" The mayor prompted.

The drums got louder. He could see—not with his eyes but with something older—two families torn apart. Hands pressed together. A promise made across impossible distance.

And he knew. Marcus was in trouble.

"I have to go."

"What?"

He stepped away from the podium. Questions erupted. His chief of staff grabbed his arm but he pulled free.

"I have to go."

He ran.

Out of the building. Into the street. Flagged a cab. The driver started to protest but something in Destin's face made him just drive.

"Washington Heights. Fast."

The drums were deafening now. He dug through his bag for his keys and his hand closed around fabric. Soft. Old.

He pulled it out.

A headscarf. Indigo and red clay.

He'd never seen it before. Had never put it in his bag.

His hands shook. The drums got louder.

He shoved it back and didn't look again. Couldn't. Because if he looked, he'd have to accept what it meant.

He texted Marcus. Called. No answer.

The cab couldn't move fast enough.

When he burst through the apartment door, Marcus was on the floor. Pills scattered around him.

Marcus looked up. "I heard you," he said. "The drums."

Destin crossed the room. Fell to his knees. Grabbed his face.

"I'm here."

They held each other. Both shaking. Both crying. The drums so loud they weren't sure if they were internal or external anymore.

For a moment—just a moment—they weren't Marcus and Destin. They were something older. Something that had been separated and had spent lifetimes finding its way back.

Then the moment passed.

Reality rushed in.

Part Five: What Love Leaves Open

They sat on the floor until the light changed. Let the pills stay scattered.

"I'm sorry," Marcus said. "For all of it."

"Don't apologize for hurting. You're allowed to hurt."

"But I hurt you."

"And I hurt you. Couldn't see past my own momentum to notice you were sinking."

The drums had quieted but hadn't stopped. Just settled into background rhythm. Like breathing.

"What was that?" Marcus asked.

"I don't know." But he did. Not the details. Not the names. But he knew they'd been here before. And it scared him. Because if they'd found each other before, they'd lost each other before too.

"Tell me we can fix this."

Destin wanted to say yes. Wanted to promise that love was enough. That the drums calling them together meant they'd make it.

But he looked at Marcus and saw a man still lost. Still building his worth on external validation. And he looked at himself and saw a man who'd been running so fast toward success he'd forgotten to check if Marcus was still beside him.

"I don't know if we can," he said. "I want to. But wanting isn't enough."

"Then what is?"

"I don't know."

They sat with that. The brutal honesty that love—even soul-deep, ancestral love—doesn't fix the day-to-day work of being two broken people trying to make a whole.

"What do we do?"

Destin stood. Extended his hand. Marcus took it.

"You start by getting help. Real help. Not because you're broken but because you're human."

"And us?"

"I don't know."

They cleaned up the pills together. Flushed them. Stood shoulder to shoulder watching the blue disappear.

"The DNA test said we're not related," Marcus said. "But what if we are? Just not in a way science measures."

"Then that's terrifying. Because if we're meant to be together, why is it so hard?"

"Maybe being meant for each other doesn't mean it's easy. Maybe it just means it's worth it."

"Or maybe we're cursed." Destin's voice was quiet. "These drums don't beat for us—they beat through us. Like we're just skin stretched tight over someone else's grief. What if the souls who won't stay buried aren't blessing us? What if we're just their latest attempt at an ending they never got? What if the inheritance isn't the love—it's the breaking?"

The drums pulsed once. Hard.

They both felt it.

"Or," Marcus said, "what if we get to choose a different ending?"

Destin wanted to believe that. Wanted to believe in agency. In choice.

But he'd spent his career in politics. He knew that wanting something didn't make it real.

He kissed Marcus. Not like their wedding. Not like homecoming. Like goodbye. Or hello. Or both.

"I'm going to go," he said. "Give you space."

"When will I see you again?"

"I don't know."

"Destin—"

"I love you. But I also love me. And I can't save us both."

He left.

Marcus stood alone. The drums still there. Quieter now. Patient.

He picked up his phone. Found his therapist's number. Stared at it.

Outside, Destin stood on the sidewalk. Could feel the pull. Could walk back up right now. The drums were still beating.

But he also felt himself. His dreams. His life beyond this love.

He started walking. Toward the subway. Toward his own future.

But he didn't take the key off his ring.

Three blocks away, Marcus pressed dial.

Three blocks away, Destin's phone buzzed. He saw the name. Let it ring.

Somewhere deeper than bodies, deeper than time, older than memory, two families torn apart kept vigil. They'd been split like kindling. Sold like grain. The choice wasn't theirs—it was made for them, written in a ledger, sealed with a signature that wasn't theirs either.

But they'd left something. A name that sat heavy on tongues that never asked to carry it. Whittington. White man's word in Black mouths, passed down like stolen silver melted and reforged. Something that could find itself across impossible distance. That could call to itself in the dark.

And now two people wearing that weight stood where their ancestors couldn't stand. At the edge of choosing.

The drums pulsed. Not answer. Not direction. Just witness.

Marcus. Destin. Two names they got to keep. Two lives they got to claim. And between them: the terrible gift of agency. The brutal freedom to stay or go. To love or protect themselves from loving.

Some inheritances you can't refuse. Some you shouldn't.

The answer wasn't written yet.

But the pen was in their hands now. Not massa's. Not history's. Theirs.

The drums knew. They'd keep beating either way.

END

Author's Note: Some promises transcend death. Some loves outlive bodies. But survival—real survival—sometimes means letting go of even the most sacred things. Or it means holding on despite everything. The spirits can only guide. The living must choose. And choice, unlike destiny, has no guarantee.