Twenty-eight year old Tommy Lee Tyson steps off the Greyhound bus in his hometown of Swamp Creek, Arkansas - a place he left when he was eighteen, vowing never to return. Yet fate and a Ph.D. in Black Studies force him back to his rural origins as he seeks to understand himself and the Black community that produced him. A cold, nonchalant father and an emotionally indifferent mother make his return, even after ten years, practically unbearable, and the discovery of his baby sister's death and her burial in the backyard almost consumes him. But his family seems unwilling to disclose the secret of her death. Only after being prodded incessantly does his older brother, Willie James, relent and provide Tommy Lee with enough knowledge to figure out exactly what happened and why. Over the course of a one week visit, riddled with tension, headache, and revelation, Tommy Lee Tyson discovers truths about his family, his community, and his undeniable connection to rural southern black folk and their ways.