NIGHT ONE:
THE FALLOUT
PEACH STREET
The opposite of calm is a frenzied feeling. It is the scratch of wool mittens, necessary to stay warm. It is the foam that spills out from the hole of a beer can, the pop-rush-damp, a first careful sip, then a chug.
The opposite of calm is concentric circles, the ripple effects of a stone in a pool. One smooth black stone—plop, rush, shimmer, and the stillness is broken.
The opposite of calm is the skitter of pebbles. When the people are distressed, so is the surface of the street. Every crack in the sidewalk echoes their scream.
WITNESS
“Man, nothing.” How many ways can you say it? “I was walking home. Turned the corner, came upon the cop and the dead kid. That’s it.”
“What did you see?” the officer asks again. The room is small and growing smaller by the minute. You wonder if people are watching you through the dark window in the wall. You assume you’re being recorded. “Describe exactly what you saw.”
“Cop and the dead kid.”
“The officer and the suspect. Did you witness the shooting?”
“Naw, man. It was over already. Kid was on the ground, cop was kneeling over her.”
“The suspect was on the ground?”
“Yes. Lying there dead.”
Cop nods. “The suspect was on the ground. Was the suspect lying face-up or face-down?”
“Face-up. He turned her over to check for a pulse.”
Cop’s voice sharpens. “Did you see him do that?”
“Naw, you could tell by the way the body was turned.”
“I’ll ask you not to speculate, then. Was the suspect lying face-up?”
“Yes.”
“So, the suspect was facing the officer at the time of the shooting?”
Steam fills you up. You let it slide out your nose, like a bull. Let it slide out your ears, like a cartoon. “How you gonna call a thirteen-year-old girl a suspect?”
“Answer the question. The suspect was facing the officer at the time of the shooting?”
“I told you, I ain’t see it.”
Cop sighs. “I expect your cooperation in this matter.”
Cooperation? As in, lying to support the cops? Screw that. “Now you want me to speculate?”
“Boy—” Cop looks like he’s about to blow a gasket. Whatever that is.
The legal aid lawyer clears her throat. “What do you expect to gain from this line of questioning?”
Cop breathes in and out a couple times. Almost makes you laugh. Someone’s been to anger management. You know a little something about that yourself. You’re sitting here hoping they don’t look up those records and use it against you.
“Ma’am, we’re trying to determine an order of events.”
“My client has been clear about his experience of the incident. If there’s nothing further, and there are no charges to level, then he’s free to go.”
You stand up, following her lead.
“On TV they can tell that shit.” Mistake. Too impulsive. You’re baiting a hook, and you’re the only fish in the room.
“Excuse me?” Tall cop wheels around.
Lawyer puts her hand on your arm.
“Forensics, right? You got some lab techs somewhere who can tell if she was shot from the front or from the back.”
Tall cop flinches toward his cuffs, a reflex. “You wanna be charged with impeding an investigation?”
Lawyer sweeps you out the door using the full meat of her arm. “My client has been fully cooperative. If you have further questions, you may direct them to my office.”
You are walking, suddenly and briskly through the precinct, the lawyer’s small arm around you, propelling you.
“Not another word. To anyone, ever, about this. You hear?” Her strength comes from somewhere invisible. The bull inside you paws against her grip. You’re spoiling for a fight. They’ve tipped you past the breaking point. You’d march straight back in there, tell them how it is. You have a daughter, almost thirteen.
The night air is surprisingly chill. It was hot in there. You walk, walk, walk. Stop next to a parked car. The lights come on and the doors click unlocked.
“Tell me you heard me,” the lawyer says.
You stare at her blankly.
“Don’t talk to anyone. No reporters. No one. No matter what.”
“They wanna silence me?”
She sighs. “It’s for your own good. You didn’t actually witness the shooting. There’s nothing good that can come from speaking out.”
You do the sensible thing, nod.
She hands you a card. “I’m dead serious. Not a word.”
Dead. The image has been floating there all along, but the word brings it into full focus. Smooth young cheeks, gone slack. Eyes unfluttering. Sleeping but not sleeping.
“Need a lift?” she offers.
“I’ll walk.”
You need time, and space. To clear your head. You have a daughter, almost thirteen.
TINA
I am the last to know
most things.
Mom crying means there has been
an occurrence
or maybe it is just one of those days.
I don’t ask questions
put on my headphones
and wait.
DEVANTE
“My roommate is driving me nuts!” Robb storms into my dorm room. I turn down the music.
“Still?” It’s the third week of January. Freshman year, second semester. You’d think they’d have pulled it together by now.
Robb throws himself down across my bed and starts fiddling with the throw pillow fringe. All the guys make fun of me for that damn fringe, but Ma said we needed to dress up the place a little. Whatever. Between the throw pillows and the homemade quilts and the cookies she sends, my half of the room is cozy as hell and everyone knows it. Where do they all come sit when they’re feeling out of sorts? That’s right.
So, I’m making friends left and right around here. Ma knows what she’s doing. Can’t deny her. Not that she’d let me.
“He never wants to do anything interesting,” Robb gripes. “Studies around the clock.”
“It’s almost like he’s in college or something.”
“I know, right?” Robb sighs.
I half laugh. “You know you’re gonna have to make your peace with it eventually. Half a year to go.”
I don’t want to hear about this from him. His roommate is black and the way Robb complains about him … I don’t know, it’s not racial in a serious way, but it feels like it might be underneath. Robb doesn’t quite get that some of his aversions are coded.
“It’s madness,” Robb says. “We have scheduled music hours and quiet hours.”
“Sounds fair.”
It’s hard being the one everyone comes to gripe to. I’ve already decided that I’m applying for RA as soon as possible. Might as well get paid if I’m doing the work, right? And it does feel like work. It doesn’t really seem like my suitemates or any of the guys on the floor really like me that much.
Robb’s my one good friend on campus so far. All semester he’s been cool to me, when some of the other guys around here come across pretty standoffish. I wasn’t expecting that. I thought there’d be more of a community feel, but for some reason that doesn’t work when you’re one of only two black guys on the whole floor.
It’s weird. All my friends from high school were white. I feel perfectly comfortable here. But I also feel like I’m coming from some other place, or they think I am, and there’s a distance there. If it wasn’t for the damn throw pillow situation, I’d probably have no friends at all, and be stuck in my room all the time, like Robb’s roommate.
Sometimes I feel guilty for not making more of an effort with him myself. Black guy to black guy, or something. But I also don’t want that kind of obligation.
“Dude,” Robb says. “Twitter’s blowing up.”
“Yeah?”
Robb’s thumb flicks over the screen. “Another shooting. Cop versus kid. In the hood.”
It’s when phrases like “in the hood” slip out of his lily-white ass that I have to give him the side-eye. He doesn’t notice. He’s too into his phone.
“That sucks,” I say.
“They gotta stop this crazy shit, man, seriously.”
“Tell it to the history books,” I say.
“It’s the twenty-first century,” Robb answers. “For crying out loud.”
I bite my tongue. We’ve been crying out loud for quite some time now, haven’t we?
“Whoa. Check it.”
“What?”
“This is the same neighborhood as that other famous one, Tariq Johnson.”
That other famous one? Come the fuck on. “Oh yeah?”
Robb scrolls. “Yeah, they’re saying it’s the same exact street.” He doesn’t even look up. “How messed up is that?”
“Pretty messed up.” It’s easier to agree with Robb than try to get into a conversation.
Robb rolls up off the bed. “I’ll be back,” he says.
No doubt, no doubt.
When he’s gone, I pull up the news on my laptop. It’s good to stay current. And it’s happening not that far from here, really. Less than six hours away.
News of the shooting is popping up all over everything. It stabs me all the way through. My eyes get thick. I pull on a sweater and tuck myself among the cozy pillows.
My mind replays the scene with Robb from moments ago. How … excited he sounded. To him, it’s all a story, all a theory. It’s not everything he sees when he looks in the mirror.
I close my eyes. Things had been feeling okay with Robb, finally feeling okay with some of the other guys, too. My gut says this is going to shake us up.
TYRELL
Differential equations are a slice of heaven as far as I’m concerned. My pencil slides across the page, and I lose myself in the math. Solve for x. Solve for y. The more complicated the better. Mental gymnastics is better than meditation for making the whole world disappear around me.
“Yo, T,” Robb says, bursting into our room. All semblance of calm slips away.
“Tyrell,” I correct him for the thousandth time.
He barrels in like he didn’t even hear me. “Yo, you hear the latest?”
“I’ve been studying.”
“You gotta check your Twitter at least sometimes, dog.”
“I do.” I’m just not on it 24/7, brah.
“Check this. Some kind of shooting happened.” Robb flips his phone toward me so fast that only the key words jump out at me: Police shooting. Child. Underhill.
“That’s tragic,” I mumble. My skin tingles in little ripples, like goose bumps.
“Cops shot a girl. Only thirteen, and retarded or something.”
“Don’t say ‘retarded,’” I correct him automatically.
“Yeah, whatever you call it.” He waves his hand.
Breathe. Robb gets under my skin without even trying, and at the moment, it seems like he’s trying. Ignore him. Focus on the next problem set in the textbook in front of me.
“That’s all you got to say?” Robb looks annoyed. “That’s your hometown, dog.”
I’m well aware of where I come from, thanks.
He pushes the phone closer, like it’s going to make me see something I didn’t already.
I turn away. “So?” The cold feeling starts to rush in.
I don’t want to think about home. Definitely don’t want to think about people dying there.
My head is full and pounding, out of nowhere. My fingers curl around the lip of the desk.
Shootings are way too common. Anytime one happens anywhere, it reminds me of Tariq. Not that I forget about him the rest of the time. T’s always with me. I carry him, like a satchel, everywhere I go. I don’t mind. He’s still my best friend. I carry him, and he helps me carry everything else. Sometimes it’s like I can even hear his voice.
This is different. It’s not in my mind—it’s physical. A head-throbbing, throat-clogging, stomach-aching feeling sets in when the news hits too close to home.
Breathe in and out. Hold the edge of the desk. It’ll pass. It’ll pass.
“So, did you know her?” Robb says.
It’ll pass. “You think I know every black person in Underhill?”
Robb rolls his eyes. “I’m not racist like that, yo. It’s just, if there were riots where I come from, I’d be all over it.”
“Lots of dissatisfaction down there at the country club?”
Robb laughs. “I know, right?” He doesn’t even feel the dig.
“News at eleven,” I say. He thinks we’re buddy-buddy. A couple of guys, just joking around. It will never make sense to me. I’ve stopped trying to understand.
Robb scrolls through his phone. “Peach Street,” he says.
A shiver goes through me. “What?”
“Dunno. They’re making a big deal about where it happened.”
The story writes itself in my head. I can see the street, the convenience store. The block I’d avoid like the plague, except I can’t because I have to walk down it to get just about everywhere.
“Dunno,” Robb says again. Scrolling. “Oh, wait, it’s the same block where—”
He’s going to say it, and I don’t want him to. He doesn’t know.
“I don’t want to talk about it!” I push the words at him. I’m rarely this direct with Robb, but he can’t take a hint. I need to sit with it all in my own mind. Calculate the odds of a second shooting happening in the same exact place. Like a vortex. A Bermuda Triangle, right down the street from my so-called home.
He smirks at me. “I don’t get you.”
That’s right. You don’t. You don’t get me. And you don’t get to get me just because you want to. You can’t have me.
“Leave me alone.” I reach for my headphones. I need better ones, the kind that really block out all the noise.
Robb huffs over to his bunk. I breathe in and out slowly until I can see straight again. Until my fingers uncurl from the edge of the desk and it becomes bearable again. The truth, that my best friend was shot for no reason, by a man who will never be prosecuted.
“This is wack,” Robb mutters, still fixated on his phone.
When you’ve lost someone, the way I lost Tariq, nothing makes sense anymore. “Mmmhmm,” I mumble. Robb doesn’t know from wack.
BRICK
Noodle was right. The block is lit. Quite literally. Floodlights and flashing lights, and Noodle in the middle of it talking about trying to move some product.
“Unwise,” I tell him. “Just let it shake out. Come on.”
I don’t like the look of things here. The crowd is on edge and it feels like things could all boil over. We gotta bounce. ’Fore it’s our faces on the news.
“Come on.” I grab his arm. Nothing’s moving tonight. And even if it was, Noodle’s not going to be the one to do it. We got kids for the nickel-and-dime shit.
We start pushing back, back, away from the center of this mess. We’re almost out when the scream comes.
“Shae!”
The deep cry pierces, like something being torn to shreds. A sound both full and empty at the same time. And close. “Shae?” Bill Tatum tears through the crowd, a wild man. “Shae! Shae!”
The murmurs begin. Oh, God. That’s the father. Her father.
Cops move toward the place where he will emerge.
The next five minutes play out in my mind in sped-up slo-mo fashion: He’ll run at them. Try to bring them down with his own hands. Then he’ll be laid out beside her and they will feel justified.
No time to think. I’m moving.
I use my size, my power to part the crowd. People jostle around me. No complaints. The urgency wins.
We meet at the edge of the caution tape barricade. My hands go up, blocking his path. “Tatum.”
He bursts forth into my arms. He’s tall and wiry, but I am a wall.
“Let me through! Shae!”
I am a wall. A shield. A punching bag.
“Shae!” he screams. “Answer me, baby!”
He pummels me. I’ve taken worse, but just barely.
“Back it down, bro,” Noodle shouts. He’s trying to get an arm in.
Tatum pushes hard, slips past me. A man possessed.
I catch him again, this time from behind. My arms X across his narrow chest, locking him to me.
Holy fuck.
We’re facing a crescent of cops, guns drawn. “Hands in the air! Freeze!”
Tatum strains against my grip. “That’s my baby. Let me go! That’s my baby!”
“Back it down,” Noodle shouts, as if reasoning with a madman is possible.
Keeping hold takes all my willpower. “I got this,” I tell Noodle. “Get us a doctor.”
“Doctor?” Noodle echoes.
“You killed my Shae! Get up baby, Daddy’s here.”
“One of them ambulance guys.” I can hold Tatum for now but he ain’t gonna stop. We are two big black men under the gun, and still, I can feel it. He ain’t gonna stop.
The cops call out in a cacophony.
“Hands in the air!”
“Stop right there!”
“Freeze, asshole!”
“Put your hands up!”
“Show your hands!”
“You can fucking well see our hands!” I answer. “It’s her father. You get that?”
Noodle edges away, one step. But he can’t, really. He’s in the crescent with us. We are three big black men under the gun.
Noodle looks to me, uncertain. If I order him to go anyway, he will go. My bones hum with the power of it. Even as my muscles ache with powerlessness. Under the gun.
“Stay cool,” I order.
“We need a doctor!” Noodle shouts.
A Mexican-looking dude in an ambulance suit runs toward us. He pauses, becomes a part of the crescent.
“It’s her father,” I tell him. “You got something to knock him out?”
He glances sideways at the cops, takes one step forward. Pauses.
Tatum bucks and screams. We’d be on the ground already but for the crowd behind us, and the television cameras.
“He ain’t deserve to get shot,” I scream. “Fucking sedate him!”
The paramedic takes another step. “You got him?”
“I got him.”
“Going in,” he announces to the police. They shout at him, but he comes toward us with a syringe. He has a ring on his finger. Probably some little rug rats at home. He meets my eye, brown man to black man. All I gotta do is hold on.
“Give him more,” I tell him. “It wasn’t enough.”
“That’s the standard dose,” the paramedic answers. “It’ll just take a moment to kick in all the way.”
“You sure?” Even as I’m asking, Tatum begins to slacken in my arms.
The paramedic’s dark eyes are clouded with worry. “You good to get him home?”
“I got this.” But over his shoulder, the crescent is firm. “They gonna let us walk away?”
He looks at me, looks at Noodle, looks at the crowd. “Walk him straight backward. Right now. No hesitation.”
Our eyes are locked. Brown man to black man. He pulls in all his breath filling his chest and broadening his shoulders. He takes one step back, takes my place as the wall.
I move, on faith. Straight back into the crowd, dragging Tatum with me. The cops are shouting, but the crowd enfolds us.
The stone-cold ache of the crescent is with us, all the way to my car. Out of sight, out of mind, my ass. We shuffle Tatum into the backseat. His listlessness is no comfort. “Shae, baby. Daddy’s here. You’re okay, baby.”
Noodle starts to hop in the front seat.
“No, sit with him.”
“Man,” he complains. “He’s all spread out. What you want me to do back there?”
“Fuckin’ Christ,” I shout. “Just sit with him.”
“Shae, baby,” Tatum moans.
The paramedic didn’t give him enough. Black pain is deeper than Western medicine.
In the car on the way home, even through the sedative, he keeps repeating, “My baby. My baby.”
EVA
Daddy comes home late, and he’s not alone. When the garage door starts creaking, I run to hug him like usual. Our routine is for me to hang up his coat while he takes off his uniform shoes.
I wait by the door. Mommy said Daddy had a problem at work today, and I am to be well behaved and not cause any trouble.
“We’ve already had dinner,” I tell him. “We covered your plate.”
The other men with Daddy are also in uniform, and looking Very Serious. The cold air comes in on their clothes.
“Come in,” Mommy says. “I’ll take your coats.”
I get a bad feeling in my tummy. Everything is wrong.
Daddy kneels in front of me, which is not from our routine. His cheeks are bright red with cold. I lay my hands on his stubble. “What’s wrong, Daddy?”
His whole face folds up. “Eva, baby.”
Daddy never cries.
OFFICER YOUNG
We holster our weapons. Crisis averted. Still, nothing is calm. The dark sea of worried, angry faces still looms behind the barricade. They shout. They hiss. They hold up their phones, filming us.
“You blocked our shot, idiot,” snaps the officer to my left. O’Donnell.
Chip Mendez caps his syringe. “Gonna shoot a grieving father on national TV? Really?”
O’Donnell sniffs.
“If that was the plan, then I saved your ass, O’Donnell.”
“Shut up, Mendez.” O’Donnell sneers. “Get back in your rig.”
My eyes comb the crowd. That’s the job, after all. The father is gone. We’ve just come face-to-face with the leader of the 8-5 Kings. And his lieutenant. They’re easy to recognize. We got their faces up on a wall in our precinct.
O’Donnell might’ve been set to shoot, but I doubt it was at the father.
Every glint of silver is a double take. Weapon? Phone. Weapon? Phone. No one wants to screw up tonight. But here we stand, in the open. A thousand eyes on us. A thousand unseen hands out there. All angry.
“No respect for authority.” O’Donnell curses. “We need to shut this down.”
He’s right. The gathered faces didn’t flinch when we drew our weapons. Not a good sign.
O’Donnell’s radio hums with static. “Sit rep, O’Donnell. Stable?”
O’Donnell squeezes the button at his shoulder. “That’s a negative,” he reports. “This side is hostile.”
“Status?”
“We’ve had to draw weapons.”
Brief silence. Then, “How many are you looking at?”
O’Donnell looks at me. I shrug. Glance at crowd. I’m no expert. I shrug back, hold up two fingers. Best guess.
“Can’t tell for sure. A couple hundred, easy,” O’Donnell says.
“All hostile?”
O’Donnell speaks into his radio. “They refuse to disperse,” he reports. “They’re behind the line but only for now.”
“Pull back,” comes the order over the radio. “Tactical unit coming in.”
We don’t turn our backs to the crowd. We amble, toe to heel, in reverse.
“We need masks,” O’Donnell says. “Asap.”
“Masks?” I echo.
The canisters whistle overhead, each trailing an arc of smoke. The white-gray cloud that billows up sets people choking.
The line we held firm for hours is shattered. So long, tenuous peace. The string of yellow tape bursts and drifts to the ground as people run and scream.
KIMBERLY
“Her body is still in the street?” Zeke says. “What’s it been?”
The clock reads 11:27. Six hours exactly since I looked last. Dang, I really need to get home. I have to be up to work morning hours at the salon, and then back here for a couple of hours in the late afternoon.
Even though this organizing work feels more important than cutting hair, SCORE isn’t what pays the bills.
“I really have to get home,” I say. “I’m sorry.”
“You’ve gone above and beyond tonight,” Zeke says. “Thank you for all your hard work.”
I gather my purse, for real this time. “I can come back tomorrow as soon as I’m done at my job.”
He nods. “We’re going to need all hands on deck.”
The rest of the UCC is usually bustling, compared to the SCORE office. Tonight it’s past closing. Everything is quiet. The community room with all its colorful chairs, unoccupied, feels strange and ghostly. In the dim light, the carpet looks worn, the chairs well used and wonky. Amazing, how people and voices and chaos can make a space come alive.
The building is silent and yet there’s noise. Faraway noise pressing toward me from someplace beyond.
The front doors of the place are two tall wooden arches. This part of the building is historic. They’re locked. I’m never here this late. I forgot that the staff entrance is around the side.
A heavy knock comes at the wooden door. Again. It shakes in the frame.
“Hey,” says a voice. “Hey, anyone home? Help!”
My feet take me back a step, even as my arms stretch forward to open the door. Pause. “Who’s there?”
“This Rico. Yvonne? Open up!”
There is a big brass key sticking out of the right-hand door. My fingers start to grasp it when there’s a sound like glass shattering.
“Shit. Help! Open up!” The voice grows more urgent.
My fingers are on the key ready to turn, but I’m scared now. “Come to the side door,” I say. “I can open that one.” The staff entrance is a glass door. I want to know exactly what is on the other side before I make a mistake.
On the other side of the glass, people are running, shouting, frantic. The strobe of police lights echo against the bricks.
A light-skinned man with a scraggly beard lurches around the corner, his eyes wide and fearful.
“Rico?”
“Where’s Yvonne?” He’s holding his hand to his head. Blood seeps between his fingers.
“Come in,” I say. Maybe I’m not supposed to, but there’s an instinct when someone is bleeding in front of you. Rico staggers forward. I settle him at the social services intake desk, which is the closest thing. “Wait here.”
The clinic is on the back side of the building. We share a wall and a door, but it’s locked.
Zeke startles when I burst back into the office. “Oh, you scared me. I thought you left.”
“It’s—go look. It’s loud out there.”
“Whoa.” Zeke moves up beside me. His hands wrap warm and firm around my arms, just above the elbow. He’s touching me. “Everything okay?”
“Yes—” That’s the automatic answer. His thoughtful frown pulls the truth out of me. His hands on my arms make me safe to say it. “Actually, no. I don’t think everything is okay.”
TINA
It is hard to sleep
the world sounds like broken bottles
smells like gasoline and fire
looks like police in boots and helmets
it is bad enough to hear all the sounds
without the crying smoke
Mommy comes into my room
into my bed and holds me
she teaches me the names for things
which helps
riot gear tear gas Molotov cocktail
we have plenty of reasons to cry tonight
other than tear gas
which really doesn’t help anything at all
ROBB
After midnight, and it’s still totally lit in Underhill. A bunch of guys from my floor are clustered into the lounge watching the coverage. Basically everyone, except Tyrell, the math-headed recluse. How’s this for math? If everyone else is doing something maybe you should be doing it too.
The footage right now is a split screen, between a distinguished-looking news anchorman, and Peach Street in Underhill. The street is crowded with people chanting, surging toward a growing wall of police with riot gear. The camera angle juggles and adjusts from time to time. It must be a handheld, and they’re walking around trying to cover what’s happening.
The live footage turns cloudy with smoke.
“Oh, shit,” says someone behind me. “No way.”
“Way,” says DeVante. “Remember Baltimore? Ferguson?”
Urgent, pounding music echoes from the television. A looming voiceover announces This is a National News Network Special Update. Breaking News.
A familiar reporter’s face comes on. The hot chick with the big lips. “Tensions are escalating tonight in Underhill, at the scene of the police-involved shooting of thirteen-year-old Shae Tatum earlier tonight. We’re receiving reports that police have deployed tear gas canisters in their efforts to maintain control of the crowd.”
The live image is blurring and jouncing at the same time. Smoke and silence come from that side of the screen. Then the live feed cuts away, and we see the scene from an angle, from a different camera, with plumes of tear gas rising up in the near distance. The slim blond man on screen has a cloth pressed to his face with one hand, and a microphone in the other. Screaming, crying, furious people run in all directions around him.
Hot chick continues, “Reporters on the ground estimate that several hundred people have gathered to protest in Underhill tonight. We’re live with the ongoing coverage. National correspondent Sean Toffee is on the scene in Underhill. Sean?”
She sorts the papers on her desk and the lapels of her tailored suit jacket widen, giving a better shot of her chest.
“Daaaaamn,” I groan. “Can we get a scroll bar with her number?”
A few guys laugh. Tom, a senior, smacks me on the back of my head. “Get a grip, dude. There’s rioting.”
I roll my eyes. Come on, can’t I think a girl is hot and still care about, like, race relations?
Wick, my next-door neighbor, says, “Leave it to Robb to try to get laid in the middle of a national crisis.”
DeVante says, “Rioting? That’s a white man’s word.”
We all look at him. Everyone in the room is white, except DeVante and two Asians. I mean, a Filipino and a … I forget. Chinese, maybe. Whatever—he grew up in Portland.
“Dude, there are people throwing shit through windows,” says Wick. “How is that not a riot?”
“Sounds like a reasoned response to militaristic policing,” DeVante answers.
I squint at him. “What the fuck are you talking about, bro?”
He throws a couch pillow at me. “I’m not your bro.”
The pillow comes hard, like a brick. I block with my forearms. Weird. He’s not the type to get worked up. DeVante’s usually pretty chill.
“Sorry,” I say. And I mean it. Maybe it feels particularly shitty to see rioting when you’re black. I don’t know.
“Wait,” Wick says. “So, you’re cool with rioting?”
DeVante sighs. “The point is, it’s more complicated.”
“Of course it is,” says one of the Asians. The Filipino.
DeVante says, “Everyone wants to say violence isn’t the answer. You have to remember that violence is also the question. That’s what we don’t talk about.”
ZEKE
The Underhill Community Center’s front doors are open. I stand beneath the wooden archway, trying to look fierce. I’m no kind of security guard, but I’m all we’ve got.
Yvonne bursts in the side door and immediately draws up short. Kimberly freezes amid her collection of wounded neighbors and shivering homeless people. It’s not that I thought she was wrong to bring people in, but it was definitely a bold move. Without permission. And now we face the music.
Yvonne sighs. “I wondered why all the lights were on.”
“What are you doing back?” I’m relieved to see Yvonne but she took a big risk venturing out to get here.
“It’s my job, honey,” she says.
“So, you’re not mad?” Kimberly asks.
“This is what a community center is for,” Yvonne says. “If we don’t open our doors now, what good are we?” She pulls out her big ring of keys. “Who wants to bust into the clinic with me?”
Kimberly follows Yvonne down the hall. I pull more paper cups and paper towels out of the supply closet.
Our little crowd has grown to about twenty-five. People seeking shelter, seeking warmth, seeking first aid.
We distribute blankets from the clinic, stragglers continue to dribble in. We stick on bandages, bust out crackers and peanut butter, read news updates out loud to the room. By the middle of the night—middle of the morning, really—things seem to have calmed down.
“How are you all getting home?” Yvonne asks. “Anyone need a ride?”
“I’ve got my car,” I say. “I can bring Kimberly home.”
Loud and renewed sirens pick up out front.
“On second thought,” Yvonne says. “Better to wait for first light.”
Kimberly and I retreat to the SCORE office with a couple of blankets. The chairs are not that comfortable in here, and we’re both too exhausted anyway.
“I have to lie down,” Kimberly says. She goes behind the other desk and pushes the chair away. She curls up in the space under the desk. I completely get the impulse, to pack yourself away in a small space, safe, with walls on all sides.
“Here.” I spread the blanket over her and sort of tuck her in. Maybe it’s weird to do that. I pull my hands back just in case.
“Thanks.” She smiles up at me. So pretty. Sleepy eyes are kinda sexy, I guess. Meanwhile she’s probably like, Why are you still sitting here touching my blanket?
“Well, I hope you can get some rest.”
“We did a good thing,” she says.
“You did this.” I would have stayed back here in the office all night, not helping anybody.
“Different kinds of helping.” She yawns.
“I guess…”
Her face slackens in sleep before I can come up with the rest of what I want to say. I scoot a few feet farther away and lie down with my back against the wall. Far enough to be proper, but where I can still see her.
Different kinds of helping. Kimberly’s good on her feet, quick thinking. I like to plan. Days, weeks, months in advance. But tonight we took care of things, together. We’re a good team, I think.
STEVE CONNERS
“I’m worried,” my wife says. “Will should really be home by now.”
She seems small all of a sudden, curled against my side. I know she’s worried. I’ve known it for hours, and yet the calm quiet truth is somehow more startling than anything that came before. We’ve crossed over, out of the yelling and weeping and the pacing and the “When I get my hands on him…”
The clock reads close to midnight, and he’s not answering his phone.
“We should call the police,” I say.
She freezes in my arms. “No. I don’t want them looking for him.”
“What?”
“The news,” she murmurs. “They’ll be trigger-happy tonight.”
Sometimes I forget, the difference between walking down the street looking clean-cut and grown, in a suit, and being a teenage boy you can’t wrestle out of a hoodie. Those damn low-slung jeans.
I shouldn’t forget.
“You think he’s in Underhill.” I mean for it to be a question, but it comes out flat.
“That boy should know better,” she snaps.
“Maybe he has a girlfriend,” I say. “Maybe they lost track of time.”
“Hmmph.” She shoots me sharp side-eye. If Will walks in fine, and it turns out he was with a girl, she’ll grill him sideways … and not about being late.
“I’ll take a look in his room, okay?”
She says nothing. Wants it done, but doesn’t want to grant permission.
It is a trespass. And yet in the moment it feels right. Needed.
A slight laundry-hamper odor hits as soon as I open the door. Random piles of dirty socks are to be expected from teenagers, I’m told. It’s not terrible. His room is not as neat as the rest of the house, is all. It would be hard to be; I keep things crisp. But he’s a good kid.
His walls are covered with drawings. He’s really quite talented. I feel somewhat objective in saying that, since I’m only his stepfather. We’ve grown closer in the last couple of years. But it was hard at first. To adjust to a small person’s energy and whims whipping through my condo. Now the space is all of ours, more fully than I could have imagined.
Most of his schoolbooks are piled on the bed. The guilt surges up through my chest. He’s a good kid. It’s not my place to do what I’m about to do.
I lift his pillow. Nothing. Kneel by the bed, lift the tails of the comforter, which is already in disarray. Covering my tracks will not be a problem.
How many socks does this child own? And how can they all be dirty? They are knotted like fists and they multiply when I touch them.
The never-ending laundry is concealing a stack of thin gray binders. They are so chock full of page protectors that they are widened like shark jaws. It looks scholarly and illicit. The one on top is full of Polaroids of graffiti art and murals, neatly organized in photo-protector slots. The older ones have regular photos, index card sketches, and random slips of paper poking out.
I gave him the Polaroid camera for Christmas. I thought he’d find it fun, and he seemed to really love it. Now I can see that he really does. He’s taken dozens of photos. The album is almost full.
The art is striking.
I know Will admires street art. He comments on it all the time, if we pass some. He’s got an eye for it, too. He can talk about what works and doesn’t in even a small patch of color on some bricks.
He’s much more into it than I realized, I guess. And he has a favorite artist, apparently. All of these pieces are signed with the same little squiggle: eMZee.
JENNICA
The customer bell over the door jangles at 11:58. I hope it’s not a regular. I’m not inclined to give anyone a break right now, when we’re about to close.
“Not a chance,” mutters Troy, the line cook. He’s already shut down the fryers and he’s scraping grime off the griddle. “Send them packing.”
“Yeah, got it.” The half door to the kitchen is still swinging as I push back through it.
Oh. It’s a regular, all right.
“Hey, Brick.”
“Hi, Jen.” There’s no one else left in the diner except Troy, but Brick still shortens my name. Easier that way.
“You know we close at midnight, yeah?”
Brick nods. “I came to take you home.”
Oh. He’s done this before. It’s awkward. I don’t mind that much when he comes at night, to sit at the counter and keep me company if business is slow, like earlier. It’s sweet.
Ever since Noodle and I split up, I stopped hanging with his boys. No one seems to care except for Brick, who keeps coming around. I don’t mind, it’s just awkward, because sometimes it seems like maybe he wants more from me. But he’s never so much as leaned in.
I close down the diner. Grab the to-go container of salad and chicken strips Troy prepared for me after Kimberly texted to say she was not going to be home in time to pick up our usual pizza.
The chaos in the neighborhood is worse than it looks on TV. One small lens can only hold so much. The diner is ten blocks from home. A comfortable walk on a normal night. Tonight the sidewalks are full of people running and shouting.
It’s not a bad idea to be with Brick. I’m safe, riding with him. The leader of the 8-5 Kings. Nobody will touch us. His low red car is a bubble floating on the surface of things. Out the windshield, it’s as if I’m still viewing it all on a screen. I don’t want it to come any closer.
At the stoop, I unlock the door and turn to him. If he comes in, it will get extra awkward. There’s a line we cannot cross, and it’s unclear whether he knows it. He’s looking at me with those eyes that seem to see something in me. But I can’t have it. The best choice is to lean in and kiss him on the cheek. Quick and gently. “Thanks.”
He squeezes my shoulders. “You know I got you.”
Once he’s moved back down the stairs, I go inside. I let myself into the apartment. Kimberly’s still not home. I text her:
I’m home. Where are you? You safe?
She answers:
Safe. At UCC, helping out. Don’t leave home!
I curl up on the couch to wait.
@WhitePowerCord: #Underhill What a mess. Barricade them in! Let them destroy themselves. It wont take long.
@Viana_Brown: Protest is our right. Our voices matter. Our lives matter! #Underhill
@Momof6: Doesn’t anyone trust cops’ judgment anymore? 
@BrownMamaBear: What will it take for black children to walk safe in their own neighborhoods? #BlackChildrenMatter
@WesSteeleStudio: White officer on duty, black suspect dead. Guess who’s under the microscope? THE WAR ON POLICE IS REAL. Click here for Wes Steele’s latest hot take. #SteeleStudio
@KelvinX_: Will someone please take this asshole’s microphone? I’m busy. #UnderhillRiot
@WhitePowerCord: TRUTH WILL OUT. #HeroCop
@KelvinX_: There isn’t a shovel big enough for @WesSteeleStudio’s bullshit. Anti-white racism is not a thing. Cops are the aggressors. Just look at #Underhill tonight.
@WhitePowerCord: Can’t handle the truth? We will hand you your ass. #WhiteMightWhiteRights
@KelvinX_: All those who feed on the racist White-Power structure will eventually starve. Our day of liberation is coming. #UnderhillRiot
@WhitePowerCord: Fuck these niggers. We’re gonna take it to them where they live. #MakeItKnown
@KelvinX_: Give us equality or face the consequences. #YouHaveBeenWarned #UnderhillRiot