Come the light, the street goes quiet. Business as usual, despite a lingering feeling of aftermath.
Curfew is a promise of one thing, and a threat of something else. The tension in the neighborhood makes it hard to move around.
The neighborhood is at war, day and night. The ice-cold pavement seethes with fury. The weather may be the only thing keeping them from lighting it up.
The squad car rolls past your house a few times nightly. Blip-blip.
The small sound speaks much louder to you. We are watching. We know who you are. Where you live. Remember that, when you speak about what you saw.
You draw the curtains tighter after the third time, turn the lights down as low as you can stand. Think about the girl. About the cop. About what is required of you.
You heat a pot of water. Stand by the stove, remembering the war in your wife’s eyes. Try to reconcile the dueling pleas for safety and justice. You prepare a mug. Chamomile is supposed to be soothing. But you’re out, so you settle for Lemon Ginger. You can cut the spice with honey.
The water roils and hums. The head of steam gathering in the kettle is emblematic of something. You watch the first curls escape through the tiny hole. Snap off the heat at the first hint of a whistle.
Blip-blip.
You can take the hint. Enough already.
You sip your tea. Think about your children, asleep in their beds, already so inured to the blip-blip that they do not even stir.
There is always a cruiser stationed outside our house. Daddy says it is to keep us safe.
There are a lot of people who are out to get cops. Especially cops turned famous by circumstance.
When your name is on the national news, Daddy says, it tends to bring out the crazies. “There’s a target on my back,” he says.
So there is always someone watching. I’m not to answer the door.
They don’t flash their lights or anything, but the warmth of the red and blue covers us like a blanket anyway. We are protected. We are part of something bigger than any one of us.
I can snuggle under the covers and know that no one is going to hurt me.
Still, it is hard to sleep.
I don’t like knowing that someone might want to hurt me.
Momma says
the world will never take care of me.
Helpful people are there to help little white girls.
I am on my own.
I read and read
the book about Helpful People:
police officers
firefighters
teachers
doctors
lawyers.
I want to believe
anyway
But I don’t.
I tear and tear
the pages out, one by one.
I am tired
of being disappointed.
“I get it, man,” Robb says. He lounges on his bed, while I slouch in the beanbag chair. I’m currently trouncing his ass at Mario Kart.
The more he says that, the more it reinforces that he doesn’t get it. I shake my head. “I don’t want to keep having this discussion. You aren’t afraid when you walk down the street. You have no idea what that’s like.”
I glance toward Tyrell, as if he’s going to back me up. He has his head buried in a calculus textbook. Headphones on and bobbing his head to the music.
“Damn.” Robb curses as his kart flies off a mushroom into the abyss. “I’m on your side. I’m not saying it’s right.”
I zip around the cartoon curves. I’m comfortably in first place. This is my arena. “You think the issue is police officers making mistakes.”
“A huge pattern of mistakes.”
I shake my head. “Black people doing nothing wrong, getting shot by police. That’s the issue.”
“Right, that’s the mistake.”
“My point is, the issue isn’t mistakes, it’s bias. The underlying reason the so-called mistakes are happening.”
“So-called mistakes?”
“The cops always stand by their actions, because the person was acting suspicious.”
Robb rolls his eyes. “They must’ve done something.”
“There it is!” I snap at him, grasping the truth like a steel trap. Whee-hee! My kart soars across the finish line, creating the victory sound. “You don’t believe they’re innocent.”
“Sure, I do. Not that they actually did something wrong, but the cops thought they did.”
“You don’t get it. Being black is enough to make you suspicious to police.”
“Shae Tatum, running from him. That’s just dumb.”
“She was a child. And had headphones in. She might not even have heard him. That deserves a death sentence?”
“Of course not. I’ve been watching all the coverage,” Robb says. “That’s why he shot. Obviously it’s messed up.”
The conversation goes in a circle. I’m ready to be done. I set my controller aside, as Yoshi dances in victory on top of the winner’s podium. “Look, we’ve got an organizing meeting at the Black House tomorrow. Come if you want to.”
“They’re thinking of going down to join the protests in Underhill, aren’t they?”
“Some people are talking about it, yeah.”
“Hell, yeah. Someone’s got to stand up.”
Yeah, I’m done. I drag myself up off the beanbag. “Lots of people are standing up. It’s on TV every night.”
“I know. Look at what’s going on with the Kings. We’re looking at gang members turned resistance fighters.”
“And getting arrested left and right.”
“Hey, Tyrell,” Robb calls. “Tyrell!”
Tyrell pulls off his headphones. “What?” He’s annoyed, and at the moment I don’t blame him.
“Kings versus cops. Who comes out on top?”
“That’s a stupid question,” he says. He shoots me a look that’s half sympathetic, half baffled. Headphones back in place.
Robb waves his hand. “Say what you want about me being white. At least I care about what’s happening. I’ll be at the march, with bells on.”
“With bells on? You’re going to bring superfluous metal objects to a public demonstration?” I force a grin. “Don’t stand next to me, white boy.”
Robb laughs. I slap the doorframe on my way out of the room.
They don’t know. They can’t know. They dip into this movement like they are going for a swim. Put on the right suit, slick your hair back, and glide. Tip your head at just the right moment for a breath above the surface, cry out “Justice!” Keep your arms and legs moving, feel the burn in your muscles like you’re doing some good.…
My arms flail. My legs flail. They don’t know. They can’t know. The full burn. The feeling. Of drowning.
I swing by Carl’s barbershop for a shape up. Kimberly’s bound to like the clean-cut type, based on the way she dresses. I can do clean-cut.
I own jeans, T-shirts, polos, a couple button downs, one blazer.
“Why you suddenly so big on the outfits?” my sister asks. I’ve got her in my room looking at the combinations with me.
“Just help me out, would you? Do me a solid for once. No commentary.”
Monae’s eyes narrow. “Who is she?”
“Shut up.”
The items on the bed look like a bunch of fabric to me. I can tell which ones go on which half of my body, but that’s where my fashion talents end.
“Do I know her?”
“Monae.”
“Do you want my help or not? I need to know who it is so I can dress you right.”
Sigh. That makes a certain amount of sense. I’m reluctant to admit it, though. Monae has a sly look about her. “You’re just being nosy.”
“Price of admission.”
“I never said there was anyone.”
Her brow arches. “Deductive reasoning. You suddenly care about clothes, there’s a woman in the picture.” She eyes me up and down. “Would I like her?”
“You don’t like anybody,” I chide.
She laughs. “Nothing wrong with having high standards.”
I pick up a polo and settle it inside the blazer.
Monae howls. “Boy, you are hard up.”
“What’s wrong with it?” I’m honestly mystified. “The blazer makes it nice, right?”
Monae wipes tears of mirth from her eyes. “Here.” She plucks a button down. “If you want to wear the jacket, pair it with this.”
“Over jeans?”
“Yeah, unless you’re taking her somewhere really fancy. Wait, let me guess, this is the girl from SCORE?”
“What girl from SCORE?”
“The one whose tweets you’re always gushing over.”
The grin steals over my face against my will. Caught. “She invented #TodayForShae, #TomorrowForAll. Now everyone’s using it. That’s her hashtag.”
Monae swoons and makes kissy faces at me. “In other words, she’s used to seeing you in that dank little office in a ratty T-shirt? You don’t need me. You can’t go wrong by comparison.”
I toss the rejected polo into her face. “Shut up. She basically jump-started the movement that’s happening. You can’t tell me that’s not impressive.” I slip my arms into the chosen shirt. Button it up and start tucking the tails into my waistband.
“Hmm, I think don’t tuck it in for now,” Monae says.
“Really?”
“And leave the top two buttons open. You don’t wanna look too buttoned-up. Casual. With the potential to be tidy.”
That sounds good. I grab the blazer by the collar, toss it over my shoulder. “How do I look?”
Monae laughs. “You look hard up. But you’ll do.”
Zeke’s apartment is small, and surprisingly girly. Lavender walls and paintings of flowers and dancers. Throw pillows with silver sequins. Everything matches and looks really nice. He makes us tea and serves home-baked cookies from a tin. The intrigue continues. Who is this guy?
We had a nice dinner out, and he paid with his own money this time. He puts my leftover lasagna in the refrigerator, all responsible and careful. That’s the detail I enjoy the most. He thinks I’m going to be here long enough that my leftovers ought to be chilled.
“We also have some beer,” he says. “It looks like we’re out of wine.”
“The tea is good,” I answer, sniffing the lemon steam. Tea and cookies. It’s sweet and wholesome, and somehow both fitting and opposite to what we are doing.
When Zeke sits on the couch beside me, I set aside the tea. I offer him the sexy grin I’ve practiced.
He smiles. Leans toward me. “I want to kiss you now,” he says. His face is close to my face. He pauses, and I’m nervous. Maybe we are both nervous.
“Then what are you waiting for?” I whisper. This time, I feel his smile.
His lips are soft. It’s not unpleasant. But I don’t know what to do. It’s supposed to be instinctive, or something, but what if it’s not? What if I’m not good at kissing? What if he tastes me and knows right away that I don’t know what I’m doing?
My hands find his shoulders. His tongue plunges in and out and I try to move mine in response. Like dancing, except not the way I usually step on everyone else’s toes. I hope.
My hands squeeze his shoulders and part of me wants to wrap my fingers around his neck and pull him closer, but how can he get any closer, and there is another part of me, in the back of my brain, that won’t let me lean into it at all.
My palms pump against his shoulder bones, pushing him away.
“What’s wrong?” Zeke is alarmed. “What happened? Did I hurt you?”
It takes a moment to catch my breath. Zeke’s hands slide down my back, soothing and comforting but also sending shivers through me. All my muscles are awake and intrigued by him.
“I’m sorry,” I blurt out.
He rubs my back. “Don’t be sorry,” he says. “You don’t have to be sorry.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No,” he says. “Do you want to stop?”
“No. I mean … no. I don’t want to stop.”
Zeke waits anyway.
“It’s … there’s something you should know.”
“Okay.” He listens to me, all sweet and open. He’s paying such close attention, but how do I really tell him?
“I don’t, I mean, I haven’t … before. I’ve never…” Why is it hard to admit it out loud?
“You’ve never had sex?”
“No.”
“Oh.” He lets go of me altogether. I’ve ruined it. Now he knows and he can’t see me the same way.
“Is it, like, a religious thing?”
“No, I just haven’t had the opportunity.”
“That’s probably not true,” he says. “Lots of people have been into you. You just didn’t know it.”
It’s nice that he thinks that. “Maybe,” I say. “Except it’s me.”
Zeke frowns, making a the-whole-world-should-see-what-I-see face. “Don’t you know how amazing you are?”
My I-hope-it’s-sexy grin. “Sometimes.”
He leans forward. “Good.”
“It’s not that I doubt myself. It’s more like … I don’t think most people really see me.”
“I see you,” he says.
“Maybe.” I lower my gaze. It’s baiting and coy and I don’t like myself much for doing it.
“You are beautiful,” Zeke says. “And not just because you’re so freaking hot.”
I laugh out loud.
His hands cup my face. “If you even give me the time of day, I’m the luckiest guy.” His thumbs stroke my cheeks. “And if no one has ever recognized all the amazing things about you, they didn’t deserve you anyway.”
“There was one man, once,” I whisper. “Nothing happened, but I thought for a minute that maybe…” Even now, I can lose myself in remembering. The shivers that used to come over me when Al—Senator Sloan—would look my way. I can’t believe he’s coming back here. I’ll have to see him. It’s a weight on my shoulders already.
He’ll whirl in, shake things up, and whirl away.
It’s different with Zeke. He’s present in a way I can touch. He’s real.
I cover his hands with my hands. My body is warm and eager and my mind is screaming at me to stop being so stupid. “Which way to the bedroom?” I ask.
He kisses me lightly on the lips. “We could wait, if you want.”
“No, I’m ready.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
Zeke is beautiful and sweet. He will never let me down.
Beyond Zeke’s bedroom, a door bangs open and closed again, shaking us out of our slumberous bubble.
“Roommate?” I ask.
“Not exactly.” His voice is suddenly wary and distant.
I raise my head to look at him. “I have a roommate. Jennica. You met her at the diner.”
Zeke’s squinting at the door, as if willing it not to swing open. Or, probably, checking to see if it is actually locked. “I live with my sister. It’s not weird,” he rushes to add. “Better than staying at home, is all.”
“Did you grow up around here?”
“My parents live about an hour away. I don’t like making the drive every day.”
“How do you like college?”
“It’s better than high school, that’s for sure. I’m about out of patience with school, though. This is my last semester. I’ll be looking for a real community organizing job when I graduate.”
“What will happen to SCORE?”
“If I can find a job here in Underhill, then I’ll stay on as an advisor.”
A jolt, like a current, courses through me. “You would leave Underhill?”
Zeke strokes my shoulder. “God, are you kidding? As soon as possible.”
“Oh.”
He rolls away, and the side of me that was touching him grows cool in the sudden open breeze of the sheets. All of me shivers. I pull up the blankets.
“Look,” he says, coming back to me. He has a book. It’s full of beautiful images from places around the country. “Don’t you want to see the whole world?”
“My world is big enough,” I lie. I remember dreaming that. I remember how quickly the dream died. The sharpness of reality, a thousand shards piercing my skin my muscles my bones. I am Underhill. Underhill is me. It’s all there is and all that ever will be. To imagine a different life … I can’t. That glass is too fragile to look through, let alone handle.
I pull the book from his hands and set it aside. I tuck my arm over his chest and he wraps his arm around my back. We shift and snuggle until we are comfortable and close.
“Can I stay?” I ask. “Can I stay here with you?”
“Of course,” he answers, holding me tight. “Right now, you are the whole world.”
I wake in the morning and the apartment is quiet. I can feel that Kimberly’s not here. Even under the warmth of the blankets, a shiver runs over me. I slide toward the bathroom, start the shower. Tremble and wait, with my arms tucked close, for the steam to rise around me. Brush my teeth quick to get it out of the way. Get the bad taste out of my mouth.
When the world was not ending, we ate breakfast together. Cereal out of quick bowls, or pancakes if we had time to shake out the powder and stir water into it. Kimberly knows how to cook and I like watching. You’d think I’d know some things after working at the diner, but it’s different here. Curled in my pajamas on the kitchen stool, studying how her hands go. Caring how it turns out. Waiting for her to look over her shoulder and smile.
It’s hard to forget that she saved me. It’s hard to forget all those good mornings, the sound of our dishes clattering into the sink beside each other’s. She leaves for work a few minutes earlier than I do.
I would sit there, cupping the cooling dregs of my coffee and worrying about the day to come. She’d slide her feet into her shoes, slinging her purse strap across her chest. Then she’d walk toward me. Predictable as clockwork and soothing as a salve. She’d kiss my bare shoulder. “Be strong.”
“Babe—” I stretch my legs out under the desk, switch the phone to the other ear. Rock back and study the ceiling.
My wife’s voice is pulled taut. “You think he’s still going down there? Don’t you?”
“Can’t blame him. Like it or not, he feels attached to Underhill.”
“It’s been eight years since we lived there,” she says. “Why can’t he accept the way things are now?”
“Look, he’s just having a hard time. It’s, I mean, everything that’s gone on over there is enough to get anyone upset.”
“We’ve bent over backward to give him chances he didn’t have in Underhill. Now he’s gonna go throw it all away?”
“Maybe he feels guilty. He’s got a better situation now. A lot of his friends don’t. That’s, well, it’s something to carry. You know what I mean?”
I swivel my chair toward the window. At first glance, it’s all white sky and insulated glass. From my 23rd floor office, it’s easy to stare at the grid of streets below and forget what it’s like down there for a lot of people. And it’s not as if I don’t care. I handle several pro-bono portfolios for nonprofits. I write generous checks.
Will is more compassionate than I am. Or he’s closer to it. I don’t know. “Your son—our son—has a very big heart,” I remind her.
She sighs. “The whole point of me moving us out of there was to get him in a better school.”
“Right. Not because you love me and wanted to live with me or anything.”
“Stop,” she snaps.
I should know better than to needle her when she’s already upset. “It was a joke,” I say gently. “I mean, I think…”
Silence on the other end of the phone. Damn. I done stepped in it good, as my wife would say.
“You wanna make this about us right now? Really?”
“Babe, I’m just trying to lighten the mood.”
“I can’t—”
“I know. I’m sorry. Look, I’m worried about him, too. You want me to talk to him again?”
“Whatever you said last time has him all but dropping out of school, so…”
That’s not fair and she knows it. But it’s easier to let that one slide for the moment. Deep breath. “How can I help, then?”
Mom watches the news when Daddy’s not home. “We need to know what they are saying about us.”
They are saying Daddy is a bad cop.
“Shoot first, ask questions later. That can’t be how we police our cities.”
“People need to show respect for officers of the law. Period. You’re out there doing your job, with people out to get you. In that kind of neighborhood…”
“This was a child.”
“In that kind of neighborhood, age doesn’t necessarily equate with level of threat.”
“This was an unarmed child.”
“Officer was under threat…”
“From an unarmed child?”
“The officer perceived a threat…”
“Perceived being the operative word.”
“… and took the appropriate action.”
“People make mistakes,” I say. “Why is everyone being so hard on Daddy?”
Mom takes me by the shoulders. “It was not a mistake.” Her voice is hard. “Never say that again.”
On TV they show her face again. Shae Tatum. Thirteen years old.
I am old enough
to walk
to the store on my own
my new favorite candy is Reese’s.
I am old enough
to understand
Hands Up Don’t Shoot
and all the people marching and shouting.
I am old enough
to listen
and to stop when they say stop
but everybody makes mistakes sometimes.
I am old enough
to know that
things are not always very simple
even when they should be.
I am old enough
to remember
people who are gone now
Tariq and Nana and Shae.
I am old enough
to die.
So many arrests. I’ve spent enough of my time, my capital getting my guys out of lockup. We need a better plan. I pace behind my chair, near the windows, glancing out at the dusk. Shooting time, says the voice in the back of my head. Cops and niggas in a game of chicken—who’s more afraid of the dark?
If that’s not the lyrics to something, it should be. I’ll write it in my notebook. Later, when no one’s looking. Too busy now. Got some of my lieutenants gathered up on the couches, working it through.
“They ain’t messing around with the curfew,” Sammy says. “People gonna die.”
“Aw, hell no. They’re not doing this on my block again.” I mutter it, but not enough to myself.
Sammy agrees. “This Kings’ territory. How you gonna let it go down like that?”
“We can’t walk out there with guns blazing.” Noodle. Ever the voice of reason. “It’s not like going up against the Stingers, right?”
My ass.
“They rollin’ up in motherfucking tanks, yo,” Sammy declares. He holds up his phone to the live footage. It’s nowhere near curfew, but they’re ready.
“You really wanna walk against that?” Noodle says.
I nod. “The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
“They straight up infringing our rights, yo. They down there doin’ it right now. What we gonna say back to that? What? We just gonna roll over like dogs?”
“Sammy, shut up, man,” Noodle says, real easy. “Let’s not get all riled up.”
I laugh, straight up. Noodle is the king of flying off the handle. Some days he would pop you one for looking at him funny. Now he wants a reasoned and measured response?
Sammy’s on a roll. “They wanna shoot us like dogs, yo. I seen this mural about it.”
“I saw it.” Rules for dogcatchers, rules for cops. That’s good art. My man eMZee tells it like it is.
“You should come by some night,” Brick said. I dunno why I did. Not really my scene. Just curious, I guess.
The place is alive. I can feel it already, even walking down the hall. He must own the building, to get by with this kind of racket. Or at least all the neighbors know better than to speak up.
I seen kids in the elevator. Can’t help picturing all their moms trying to get them down at bedtime. With bass thumping through the floorboards, rattling the bones of the place. I’m not down for that.
Brick’s apartment is jamming. I didn’t know any buildings in Underhill had a penthouse. Maybe he took out some walls, to get a place this size. It’s like a nightclub.
Is a nightclub, I guess. Must be something like fifty people up in here. Dancing and drinking and being all loud. He’s got a DJ turning the music live. He’s got a girl tending bar who looks like a low-rent Beyoncé. Which is still pretty hot.
They drug test at my job. I’m not looking for a contact high to mess up my whole situation. But the music is pumping and it makes me wanna move. Throw my hands up and shimmy.
I admit, it’s crossed my mind to wonder what Brick’s world is like. To see it up close. To peel back a few of those layers that close him in. That’s why I came, I guess. I didn’t expect it to feel this easy. Throb with the beat and forget the world. Forget myself.
After a while, I realize I’m no longer dancing alone. Brick has moved through the mass of people to stand in front of me. Not dancing, exactly, but he still fits here. Presence, they call it. He’s the kind of person who takes over whatever space he enters.
Brick glances me up and down. Appreciating my outfit, I guess. I didn’t plan it out like that or nothing. But it feels good, him checking me out.
“Mel,” he says. “You came.”
“Melody,” I answer.
He nods, lip curling like he wants to laugh.
“What?” I can guess what he’s thinking: most girls let him call them whatever he wants.
“Come kick it with us a minute.” He gestures toward the top of the room. No better thing to call it. Top of the room. His chair is a throne, almost. The couches arced around it are reserved for his handpicked few. The inner sanctum.
“Me? Why?” Just go. Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, or whatever. Although that saying never made much sense to me.
“Lemme bend your ear a minute,” he says. His arm goes around me. “What are you drinking?”
The Trojans brought a great big horse to their enemies as a gift. If they’d looked in the mouth, they’d have realized it was full of soldiers. They’d have left it outside the gate. So looking a gift horse in the mouth seems like a perfectly good idea, really.
We’re already walking. “Okay, I guess.”
I don’t mind his arm being around me. There’s no denying he’s fine. He’s different here, somewhere between the hard way I’ve always thought of him, the way he goes around the neighborhood, somewhere between that and how he is with Sheila. He has a soft side. I’ve seen it. That makes him … interesting.
“House special.” He hands me a glass. Whatever is in it has the perfect flavor. Sweet but not too sweet. Nuanced. I could slurp it like nectar, but I sip slowly instead. Cautious.
The couch is burgundy, almost purple. I can see the spot where I’ll sit. At the right hand of the … whatever Brick imagines himself to be.
“I need your opinion about something,” he says.
“You barely know me,” I remind him. “What do you care what I think?”
“You’ve stepped to me twice already this week.”
My heart beats faster. “I tell it like I see it.” My big old mouth can’t help itself.
“That’s valuable,” he says.
“Valuable?”
“You’ll call me on my bullshit.”
Side-eye, all over his ass. Wave my hand around the room. “This is all bullshit. Where do you want me to start?”
Brick laughs. His hand, on the small of my back. Like they do. “See?”
It’s intoxicating, his orbit. Calling me out to lean in, but I’m still wary. “What do you want from me?”
“Sit down,” Brick says. “We can use a woman’s opinion on this.”
“I think we got it handled, yo,” says one of the guys.
“Shut up, Sammy,” says the other. I recognize him. He looks me up and down. Not flattering, like Brick’s way. More lecherous. I give him cold eyes back. He says, “What do you think about policing the police?”
I shrug. “I know it worked for the Panthers.”
“But that was fifty years ago.” Brick’s hand is still on my back. “We’re talking about making a response. To the curfew, to the cops.”
“Oh.” This, I know something about. “I have a friend who works with SCORE. They’re planning a protest. You wanna know about all that?”
“Naw, we wanna fry some bacon.” Sammy laughs.
I glance at Brick. “Really? You wanna be some kinda Huey P. Newton now?”
Brick stays serious. “Give me my spear and my rifle.”
“I don’t think you’ve got the chops for it,” I tell him honestly. That’s what I’m here for, after all. “They’ll kill you all. It’s a different time.”
The couch is comfortable. Brick introduces me around.
My parents don’t want me going to any more protests. As if they can stop me. They think they know everything, but they don’t.
“I’m going tomorrow,” I tell Steve over breakfast. I say nothing about my plans for tonight.
Tomorrow is a big deal. White Out, the white supremacist group, is coming to town. Not to Underhill but to the white side. Griffith Park. That’s where we live.
“You only said I can’t go to Underhill,” I remind Steve. “They’re bringing this mess to us. I’m supposed to look the other way?”
“I don’t know,” he says. “It sounds like there’s the potential for violence.”
Bring it. “So?”
He studies me over the rim of his coffee. “It’s different than before.”
“So you’re back to being skittish?” I slam a slice of bacon into my face.
Steve lowers his cup. “The march for Tariq Johnson was a peaceful protest. It was designed that way and it stayed that way.”
Bacon. It’s one of the miracle foods. It gets even more delicious when you’re pissed about something. Around a mouthful, I say, “It’s not the protestors getting violent. It’s the cops.”
“This is civil rights 2.0,” I argue. “Those guys never backed down from a protest. They faced down dogs and fire hoses. They got hit and went to jail and everything.”
“They were trained in passive resistance.” Steve frowns. “They still don’t teach you that in school?”
“I know about the dogs and the fire hoses,” I tell him. “You think that’s what we’re up against?”
“To be honest, I think they’ve moved beyond that,” Steve says. “I think they’ll straight up shoot.” He pauses. “What I meant was, you think those protests in the sixties were a bunch of angry people getting together one day? And singing ‘We Shall Overcome’?”
I shrug. Something like that.
Steve sips his coffee. “You can’t compare the sixties to now. That’s all I’m saying.”
“Whatever.”
“Know the history and know it right. We’re not trying to repeat it.”
“Because things are so much better now? Because we’re all equal and we just have to work hard?” I glare at him. “That’s bullshit, and you know it.”
“Look at this house,” he says. “You and I have opportunities we never would have had in the sixties. Don’t discount the progress.”
“Tell that to my friends who live on Peach Street.”
“You want this to be a simple conversation.” Steve sighs. He pours a fresh cup of coffee. “It’s a very complicated issue.”
“I know that. Geez.”
The carafe clatters back into place. Steve leans against the counter, weighing his words. I don’t care what he thinks. He doesn’t know what it’s like in the old neighborhood.
“You think they’ll shoot? At nonviolent protestors?”
“Everyone has a cell phone,” he says. “And the police are trigger-happy.”
“Exactly,” I say. “We have to take a stand.”
“I work with these people,” Steve says. “They don’t see anything wrong with what has happened.”
“But it’s wrong.” That sounds stupid and whiny. But it’s all I can think to say.
Steve looks out the window. Maybe he can’t face me while he says it. “I think they’ve moved past a segregation mentality. They’re back to a slavery mentality.”
“What?” In spite of myself, I’m interested in what he’s saying. This part of it anyway.
“You’ve seen other White Out events on the news, right? They’re carrying torches and talking about taking ‘their’ country back. They’re not talking separate but equal.”
“Duh. They’re white supremacists.”
“They’re speaking for a lot of prejudiced people who are afraid to come into the light.”
“That’s why we gotta take a stand!”
“Will—” Steve pauses. “Your mom and I don’t want you participating in these protests.”
“You don’t want me standing up for what’s right?”
“We want you to understand what all is at stake. For your future.”
“I do.”
“They hate us.” Steve’s voice chokes up. “It’s not enough anymore to push us to the side and pretend we don’t exist. We’ve proven we won’t stand for that. So they want to eliminate us.”
“I know. And I don’t want to let them get away with that.” My voice rises in response to his emotion. “I don’t want to grow up in a world that hates me and not be able to do anything about it.”
“I want you safe,” Steve says. “I love you.”
There are a few things that scare me more than anything else. Grown-up tears are one of them. I grab my backpack, ready to flee.
At the doorway, I turn around. Steve is at the counter. The coffee cup looks small in his hands and he looks small against the kitchen.
“I love you, too,” I tell him. Because I don’t know if I’ve ever said it before. And we don’t know what will happen. “But I have things I have to do.”
The plump envelope sits in the center of the table. It is the ugliest thing we have ever seen.
We eat dinner around its edges, because to move it means putting it somewhere. And it’s not clear where it needs to go.
So it sits there, right where I left it.
I am the one who checks the mail. I always do, after school. I like to sort it into piles. Things for Mommy, things for Daddy. Things for “Current Resident,” which is me.
I save all the catalogs and coupons to make my collages.
The white bubble package is thick and bulky and heavy. It would not fit in the mailbox, instead it was leaning against the post, all slumped against the grass like a mail-order T-shirt. It had no return label, but it was addressed to “The family of Darren Henderson,” which is me.
There was a manila envelope inside, one so worn and overstuffed that it was tearing at the edges. Poking out the seams, there were rolls and wads of bills. Cash money.
I rushed inside, plopped it on the table. Tore it open. So much cash money, rubber banded in small bundles. I wanted to unwrap it, toss it in the air, roll around in it like a lottery winner.
The note fluttered from the envelope. The note was typed on a piece of off-white paper and signed with a blood cross stamp:
ONE DOWN, ONE MILLION TO GO.
I wonder if it is a million dollars, but Daddy says no.
“It’s probably fifty thousand.”
Still enough to make my eyes bug out. Still the most money we have ever seen in one place.
But Mommy says the blood cross logo is a symbol of white supremacists. We’ve been sent money by the Ku Klux Klan.
More money than Daddy even makes in a year.
When it’s just the two of us in the office now, it’s different. We stay longer than we mean to. It is easy to get lost in the work, to get lost in each other.
“Did you call the local affiliates?” Zeke says.
We’re sitting side by side at his desk. Our knees might be touching, but we pretend they aren’t. Sometimes, when he takes a call, his hand drifts to my knee. I like it there. It is interesting, how different the world becomes when there is someone you can touch.
“Yeah,” I answer. “They’ll be there in the morning.”
We are sorting through the various flyers and materials for the White Out counterprotest tomorrow. In a minute I will get up and go make more photocopies on bright-colored paper.
Zeke’s hand finds my knee again. I will get up. Really. In a minute.
I put my hand on top of his. He leans in and nuzzles my neck. “You smell so good,” he says. “What is that?”
“Should I go back to my desk?” I grin. “I think I’m distracting you.”
“You’re not going anywhere.” Zeke kisses me again. “Everything else in the world is a mere distraction from you.”
It is hard to believe this is my life.
Minutes pass and we are mostly kissing. Maybe this is why the work is taking longer than usual. Maybe I don’t care. We will be here for hours. We will be here forever, and it will be all I could ever hope for.
Someone knocks on the door. Luckily. Zeke pulls back, sits up all straight and official.
“Yeah, come in,” he calls.
I grab the flyers and stand up, as if I was already headed to the copy machine.
The door opens. A girl a few years younger than me pokes her head around it. I know her, from ages ago, from school.
“Hi,” she says. “Do you have a minute?”
Zeke nods. “How can we help you?”
“Melody?” Her name comes back to me in time. “Hey, what’s up?”
She approaches me, looking a bit nervous. “I remembered that you work here. Something happened—” she pauses, glances at Zeke. “I think you should know…”
“Should I step out?” Zeke offers. “Do you want to talk to Kimberly alone?”
He’s so considerate. It makes my skin flush, even as I’m focused on Melody and whatever she’s brought to us. I don’t really think of her as the organizing type, but honestly, who among us was before Tariq died?
Melody squares her shoulders. “No, I just need to say this, so that you know.”
“What’s going on?” With a hand on her arm and the other in the air, I invite her to sit in a chair across the desk from Zeke. I pull my own chair away from his side and closer to Melody. We lean in to listen.
“It’s Brick,” she says. “You know Brick, right?”
“Yeah,” Zeke says. He glances at me. He doesn’t know the history there, either. Not even a little bit. There are things we haven’t discussed, but he knows I know pretty much everyone who’s anyone around Underhill.
“We know Brick,” I confirm. I’ve known him since grade school, when he used to pull my pigtails, so to speak. Except worse.
“I was up at his place last night,” Melody says. “His boys are pissed about what’s going down, and they want to fight back. They’re talking about taking it to the streets.”
“The Kings have been breaking curfew,” I say. “They’re out there every night.” I’ve been surprised, but it’s happening.
“And getting arrested,” Melody says. “Now they’re talking armed resistance.”
“Not a great idea,” I say.
“Unless they’re looking to get gunned down,” Zeke agrees.
Melody shrugs. “He’s talking it. I’m only telling it. Panther-level action, taking guns against the cops.”
“That’s suicide.”
“It’s also not what the Panthers were about,” Zeke adds.
Melody nods. “We’re dying anyway. We take some of them out with us. That’s how we get ourselves on the map, Brick was saying.”
“Damn,” Zeke says, drumming his fingers on the desk. “We can’t have that kind of thinking in play. It’ll undermine the whole movement.”
“That’s why I’m here,” Melody says. “If you hit up Brick before he goes off, maybe you can get him in on what’s already up.”
Zeke laughs. “You think I’m a miracle worker?” He glances at me.
“Brick is not one-dimensional,” I say. This much I know is true. “He’s smart, and he’s strategic.”
“And pissed as hell.” Melody holds up her hands. “I’m just telling it.”
“Maybe there’s a benefit to working with him,” I add. “He has guns. And lots of manpower.”
Zeke looks thoughtful. “The whole point of a movement like this is to underscore the fact that we’re not all violent, not all drug dealers and gang members.”
“We need people to come together,” I say. “We don’t need to start a fight.”
“Brick’s looking for a fight,” Melody says.
“So are we.” Zeke rubs the back of his neck. His mind is agitated, I can tell by his sudden restlessness. “I just don’t know what that alliance would look like.”
Melody stands up. “Me either. All I know is, if you don’t get to him, it’s going off.”
Thursday is pizza night. Kimberly always picks it up on her way home from the salon. We pull the blankets up and watch old episodes of Grey’s Anatomy or Project Runway on her laptop. The screen is small, so we have to sit close together. It’s okay if I rest my head on her shoulder. Sometimes, the best times, she wraps her arms around me. It’s the only time I feel okay. It’s the only time I can get clear on what it really felt like to be with Noodle. When I have someone there to lean on who’s better. Kimberly is solid, warm. Noodle is like smoke or vapor. Fleeting.
He hasn’t called. Hasn’t texted. Not since the other night. I stare at my phone. Nothing. And I hate myself for wanting it, when everything is wrong.
I’m already on the couch when Kimberly breezes in.
She plops her purse on the counter. Her purse … and nothing else.
“Hey, Jennica.” She swoops on down the hallway.
I sit up. Where is the sweet-hot scent of crust and cooked tomatoes?
A few minutes later, she’s back, dressed in boot-cut jeans and a flowy, belted top. Clothes to go out in.
“No pizza?”
She smooths down the belt, glances at her reflection in the microwave door. “Sorry. I can’t tonight.”
“No big deal.” I think the words sound light enough, even though my throat is closing.
Kimberly pops some lip gloss out of her purse. “No, you’re right. I should have called. It’s our standing date.” She smiles and it is warm. Still, the apology is not the blanket I was hoping for.
“No big deal,” I say again. “You look great. Have fun with Zeke.”
“It’s not a date. It’s sort of a work thing. We have to go to this party.”
Sounds like a date. “Well, have fun.”
Kimberly sighs. “I’d invite you, but it’s not a party you want to be at, you know?”
So it’s like that. “I’m fine,” I tell her. “Don’t worry about it.”
“See you,” she says. The door closes behind her.
I curl up under the blanket, alone.
It doesn’t make sense that they would keep coming like this. They know what’s going to happen. We have no choice. Curfew hits, and we go in. Like clockwork. But they just keep coming. Haven’t they made the point? Nothing is changing.
As the seconds tick toward midnight, I stare into my locker. Every piece of equipment in there is designed to make me strong. Strong is not how I feel tonight, suiting up.
It feels like going to war, which I have done once. Stateside, when you walk around in your army fatigues, people clap. It happened to me in an Applebee’s once, right after my tour. I was with my wife and my brother. We walked in, and someone—his kid was still actively serving, I think he said later—started up this round of applause for me. We got seated and all through the meal people kept coming over to say “thank you for your service.” Most of those people have no idea about long, quiet nights in the desert. Or how bad it gets when the nights are not so quiet.
I’m home now. I’m going to work, and more and more it feels like going to war. Police officers are supposed to be tough, like soldiers. I’ve been a soldier. That’s how I know there’s no such thing as tough. It’s all an act. There’s too much to fear out there.
“Come on, rook,” O’Donnell says, clapping my shoulder. “Saddle up.”
Host: Tonight, we’re in conversation with Senator Alabaster Sloan and law enforcement expert Garrison Hobart, here to discuss the legal case of Darren Henderson, and the shooting of thirteen-year-old Shae Tatum. Protests continue in Underhill.
Sloan: Qualified immunity shouldn’t be a get-out-of-jail-free card. There has to be accountability for law enforcement.
Hobart: Of course, but police can’t be in fear of being arrested for actions performed while on duty.
Sloan: Why not? If it makes them exercise force more responsibly …
Hobart: They’re well trained to react with professionalism.
Sloan: Should their first priority be their own safety at all cost?
Hobart: Yes.
Sloan: At all cost? Really?
Hobart: The point is, no one would ever become a police officer if they didn’t have this immunity.
Sloan: So, you’re saying people join the force to use violence without consequence?
Hobart: Of course not. The point is, using violence is often a necessary part of policing effectively. They can’t do their jobs if they’re afraid of being charged with a crime every time they discharge their service weapon.
Sloan: Why not? Wouldn’t it lead to more responsible policing?
Hobart: No. It would lead to chaos.
Sloan: It would save lives.
Hobart: For example, often during an arrest, if the suspect isn’t cooperating, you have to get physical in order to restrain them. Police officers can’t be counter-charged with assault every time they bring someone in. That’s qualified immunity.
Sloan: There has to be a line—
Hobart: There’s absolutely a line. It’s called “excessive use of force” and …
Sloan: AKA, police brutality. And yet—
Hobart:… and officers can be brought up on charges.
Sloan: Shooting an unarmed child is a far cry from putting someone into a wall a little too hard.
Hobart: There are shades to resisting arrest.
Sloan: “Resisting arrest?” You’re talking about Shae Tatum?
Hobart: Many cases—
Sloan: I don’t agree that a police officer’s first duty is to protect his own life. They want to be celebrated for nobly putting their lives on the line, but also to have carte blanche to engage in self-protective action? You can’t have it both ways.
Hobart: That’s far too simplistic.
Sloan: This was an unarmed child who, at worst, was attempting to flee.
Hobart: Resisting arrest.
Sloan: Is not a capital crime!
Hobart: First responders are trained to protect themselves first.
Sloan: Firefighters run into burning buildings. Risk is inherent in the job.
Hobart: They perform a risk assessment first. There are times they don’t run in, if it isn’t reasonable or safe.
Sloan: Henderson shot her in the back. Where was the threat?
Hobart: It’s akin to putting on your own oxygen mask before assisting others, in the event of a loss of cabin pressure while flying. A police officer’s first duty is to his own safety, because he can’t help anybody if he’s injured or compromised.
Sloan: Why become a police officer, then? The safest thing would be to stay home. We should be policed by a group of people willing to genuinely put themselves on the line for public safety. Not just their own safety.
Hobart: For any officer to discharge a weapon, they must perceive a credible threat. You think officers should be willing to die on the off chance that the suspect who appears armed actually isn’t?
Sloan: Credible threat. Which brings us back to the question you tried to dodge a moment ago. Where was the credible threat Shae Tatum posed to Officer Henderson? Innocent until proven guilty is the backbone of the criminal justice system. Why should police get to circumvent due process when they fire their service weapon?
Hobart: If their life is at risk, there’s no time to impanel a jury to determine guilt or innocence.
Sloan: Their decisions are based on snap judgments, and they routinely snap to the negative in black communities. If this was happening in race-blind ways across the country, you better believe we’d be looking closer at police procedures and practices.
Hobart: Probably true. Systemic bias is a reality, one that exists high above the actions of a single officer on the street.
Host: There are two sides to everything.
Sloan: At least. But let’s not erase the concept of accountability. We can’t throw up our hands and say bias exists, so black people are going to die.
Host: We’ll be right back, with more from Senator Sloan and Dr. Hobart.
They come to talk me down. Kimberly and her buttoned-up little activist boyfriend. Zeke is woke, but too brainy for the real world. All ideas, no clout.
He’s the type that thinks it was Martin Luther King’s powerful speeches that changed the world in the 1960s. It wasn’t. It was bodies in the street. It was a hundred cocked guns in Oakland. It was the promise of a revolution to follow.
They come talking to me about tweets and flyers and buttons. Naw, man. Let me hook you up.
They need me.
They need me to show them how to really make a stink.
Brick’s party is always the place to be. Does Kimberly think I’m stupid? “It’s not a party you want to be at.” I knew what that meant as soon as she said it.
I came anyway. In time to see Kimberly and Zeke sitting right up where I used to sit. Holding court with Brick. So I’m holding court with my good friend Jose Cuervo.
Screw them. Dance.
I don’t even know what she’s doing here. Some meeting. It’ll be a cold day in hell before Brick shows up to volunteer at a SCORE meeting. They’re barking up the wrong tree. I could tell them. But no.
Dance. Dance! Screw the revolution!
I miss this, if nothing else. The freedom of turning my body loose against the music. The softness of liquor in my veins. It’s been ages. Kimberly barely ever parties, says it doesn’t agree with her. So I’ve kept off it all, too, because we have fun together. I haven’t even missed it.
Doesn’t agree with her. Ha. Right now, tonight, I remember how crazy that used to sound. How could this feeling not agree with anyone?
Anyway, here she is, trying to live the life she wants me to walk away from. Hypocrite.
“Jennica.” Kimberly. She’s here now, with me on the dance floor. She puts her hand on my arm. “Jennica?”
I shake her off. “Leave me alone.”
“What are you doing?”
“Nothing. Dancing.” I writhe toward her, then away. The beat is strong, good.
“Let’s go home,” Kimberly says. Her warm eyes are concerned, and I hate it.
“I want to stay.” She’s with Zeke anyway. “It’s cool. You should finish your date.”
“We’re working,” she says. “It’s not a date. I care more about getting you home safe.”
Bitch. Now she wants to be the perfect roommate?
“I’m fine. I’m blowing off steam. I haven’t danced in ages. Just go. Have fun.” See? I can be the perfect roommate, too.
Kimberly’s reluctant.
I turn to Zeke. “Get her out of here. Show her a good time. I’m counting on you.”
Zeke pulls Kimberly aside. “She wants to stay. She doesn’t seem that drunk,” he says.
I smile inside. I’m trying not to seem that drunk.
“I don’t want to leave her here like this,” Kimberly says. “It’s a girl thing.”
“You wanna stay?”
“No,” Kimberly says. “But—” She looks over her shoulder at me.
Damn it. I come forward and hug her. “I love you,” I tell her. “I promise it’s okay. I’m okay.” Nothing will happen. I’m perfect. I’m beautiful. The music will never end and I’m here for it.
“You have your phone?” she asks. “You’ll call me if you need me?”
“Of course.”
They fade into the crowd. Everything fades, except Jose and me. He knows how to tango, how to swirl me right. Perfect. Beautiful. Music and music and music.
“She didn’t seem very drunk,” Zeke says. “And she wanted to stay, what were you supposed to do?”
“I don’t know. Friends shouldn’t leave each other in that kind of situation, is all.” It’s wrong. All wrong. “I shouldn’t have left her.”
“She seemed okay.”
“No, she didn’t.”
Zeke rubs my back lightly. “Text her, if you’re worried.”
“I did, but she’s mad, so…”
“So, not responding doesn’t mean anything bad.”
“I don’t even know what she was doing there. She hates those guys.”
“They are a lot to take.”
“They’re kind of a joke to me. I mean, not exactly. I know they’re dangerous and all. But I grew up with them.” I guess I want Zeke to be impressed with my chill or something. The Kings used to scare me, big time, but Jennica helped me see them for the puffed-up little boys they are. I know they could still hurt us. But they’re quick to flinch if you don’t cower.
“It’s crazy, the way they jump at Brick’s every order.”
“We don’t have to work with them,” I say.
“Yeah, we do.” Organizing 101. Consolidate community leadership around a common goal.
“They want to fight the cops. SCORE can’t get into that kind of thinking.”
“If all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail,” Zeke says. “We can give them some alternatives to the hammer.”
The image in my mind is Brick, holding a big-ass hammer that suddenly turns into a flock of butterflies, fluttering around his head. The expression on his face makes me giggle out loud.
“Maybe Sloan will have some ideas.”
Ice water.
On the dance floor everything feels fine and good. In the bathroom, the whole world tilts and I can’t tell which way is up anymore.
Someone knocks on the door. “Hurry up. There’s a line.”
It’s too hard to pull my tights back up, and I poked my finger through them anyway, so I strip them off and put them somewhere near the trash. I fuss with my skirt until I think it is covering me again. The walk home will be cold, but I don’t want to leave yet anyway. I want the music and its magic back.
The hallway is tilted and labyrinth-long. “’Bout time,” says the cat-eyed girl who was pounding on the door.
“Sorry,” I mumble.
My hand traces the wall. As long as the music is getting louder I am moving in the right direction.
“Hey, baby,” Noodle says. “You looking for me? I’m here.”
He’s here. In front of me like a wall. His arm slides around me and suddenly we’re walking again. But the music is getting softer, more distant.
“Music,” I say. “I want to dance.”
“We’re gonna dance, baby,” he says. “You and me.” The arm that’s around me is holding me up and also kind of cupping my boob.
It’s funny. Usually getting drunk makes me want to lean into him. Not tonight. Here and now I see him for the slithering snake he is.
No.
It’s funny, but not.
A soft click of a door latch and the music is muffled even further. My back is against the wall and Noodle presses up against me with his whole body. His hands push up my skirt. His mouth is on my neck, my chest. When I try to wriggle away, he takes hold of my wrists, pinning them beside my head.
“Shh,” he says.
Manhandled. I know what this means now. What it means to be up against a wall with no power and no recourse.
No. The word echoes in my brain. Maybe it has always been there, straining to break free.
“No!” When it comes out loud it feels like something should shatter. But nothing does. Not his grip on my arm. Not the look in his eyes.
“Stop!” I shout, but maybe it comes out like a whimper.
“You used to like it when I did this,” he says. “I know you like it.”
“No. Please.” There is nothing I can do. There is no fight in my body. I think about pushing against him but my arms are limp. I close my eyes. Maybe I can pass out and it will be like it never happened. He has been in me before. Maybe I won’t know the difference.
“Let her go.” Brick steps in and thrusts his arm like a bar across Noodle’s chest. He shoves him back. The front of me goes cold, now exposed to the room.
And then Noodle is gone, and there’s only Brick. Standing in front of me, holding me up. Someone has to.
“I have to go,” I mumble. “I have to get home now.” Somewhere, I have a purse, and phone. Kimberly—
“Nope. You’re staying here tonight,” Brick says. He lifts me up in his arms and carries me from this room to another one. Blue-gray walls, silver fixtures. Brick’s own bedroom.
He sets me down near the edge of the bed. He straightens my clothes and pushes back my hair. His face is so concerned. He’s sweet to me. Always has been. It would be easy. So easy to …
“Don’t,” he says. “Don’t come at me like that unless you mean it.” He puts his hands on my wrists, real gentle. My skin still stings there from Noodle’s grip. I want to erase everything that just happened. Put myself back in the column of good.
Brick pushes me back a step. But his eyes say different. His fly says different. I wrench my hand away, slide it down his front. Kimberly might walk away from me but Brick won’t. He’ll always be there for me.
He catches my hand again. “Jennica, you’re drunk.”
“You wanna prove you’re some kinda good guy?” He sways, or maybe it’s me. “Bullshit. You run this neighborhood. There’s nothing good in that.”
“Jennica—”
“You’re no good,” I shout.
He stands silent. Dizziness rises from somewhere behind my knees. My hands find the edge of the mattress. Toss myself against it. My shin cracks against the baseboard. “Ow.”
“You okay?”
He kneels beside me, massaging the sore spot on my leg. His hands feel good, like they could cover all of me, make the hurt go away.
He slides my shoes off. “Get some sleep, okay? I don’t know what’s going on with you, but we can talk tomorrow.”
Screw that. I reach for him, pull him in. When our mouths meet, I taste salt and beer and breath.
It’s one quick moment, or it lasts a hundred years. Something like that. It’s gentle and wet and, honestly, why is it always so hard to get ourselves together?
He tears his face away. And that’s what it feels like, a Band-Aid being ripped off, a curtain being torn from ceiling to floor.
“Jesus, fuck,” he says. “Jennica.” He’s somewhere else, not up against me. Why? I blink until the room comes back into focus. He’s all the way over by the windows.
I come up on my elbows. “What? Isn’t this what you’ve always wanted?”
He comes closer, sweeps my hair to the side. “For once in this fucking life, I’m gonna do the right thing,” he says. “And I’ll probably regret it.”
Brick comes out into the hallway, looking stressed. And furious. All at the same time.
“She okay?” I ask. He’s been in the bedroom with Jennica. I want to make sure I did the right thing. When I saw Noodle carrying her off to a bedroom … something about it ain’t feel right. I’m not some kind of tattletale. I hope that ain’t what he thinks. God, it probably is. He tells me he wants to go militant, and I bring him Zeke and Kimberly. I see a known asshole bringing a wasted girl into a quiet place, and I tell Brick. Maybe I am a tattletale.
“Do me a favor,” he says. “Help her get in the bed.”
“Noodle took off,” I tell him. “Don’t go looking for him.” Great. To top it off, now I’m the weak-ass chick who doesn’t want to see Brick in a fight. He’s never going to trust me. But why do I even care?
Brick nods. “I’ll wait here.” His voice is strained. “Just, make sure she’s okay, would you?”
“Yeah, sure.” Maybe I should have gone in there with him to begin with. But the look on his face was worse than thunder. And it all happened so fast.
The room is dimly lit. Jennica is already on the bed, asleep or passed out. Either way, not much for me to do. I prop a pillow against her back so she stays on her side, then I slip off her shoes and pull the sheet and blanket up over her. Tuck her hair back, out of her face, real gentle. Like a good friend would do. She’s breathing soft and even. I ain’t sure whether to wish she’ll wake up remembering or not.
True to his word, Brick is waiting in the hallway. “Thanks,” he says, when I emerge. “I owe you.”
No good way to respond to that. I shouldn’t get extra credit for doing a good deed. “Nah. I tell it like it is, right?”
“That’s only what I like most about you.” He touches my shoulder, his thumb kinda skating along my collarbone. My mouth opens, just a little. Brick’s eyes go cloudy. His hand’s up behind my neck and I’m not sure what to make of being caught this way. No time to think or to plan. He leans in and I don’t stop him. Why would I? He’s fine. He’s the king of all in sight and here he’s chosen little old me. He could have any woman he wants.
The unexpected thing is, it’s not just a hookup, either. I stepped to him and he liked it. He needs someone like me to keep it real with. I’m good for him. We balance.
Melody Jacquard, coming up in the world. And it feels great.
“Listen,” Robb says. “You gotta talk to Tyrell and get him on board. I’m sick of tiptoeing around his studious ass. You gotta tell him.”
I pause my game. “What makes you think I can do that?” Because we’re both black?
“You can speak his language, right?”
I pretend not to hate that. “His language is Excel spreadsheets.” I struggle to inject lightness to my voice. “Who else speaks that?”
Robb laughs. “I don’t know. Just try, okay?”
It’s easier to agree. “Okay.”
“Thanks,” Robb says. “You wanna walk down to the Black House together?”
I glance at my screen. The meeting doesn’t start for an hour. “Gotta hit the books a little longer,” I tell him. I hold up the controller. “This was my ten minute break, but I should read another chapter of Econ.”
“Okay. Just try to get T to come, for once.”
Pause. Save. Power off. “Why do you care so much if he comes with us? It’s not like you’re best friends to begin with.”
Robb pauses. Shrugs. “It’s where he’s from. He should stand up, don’t you think?”
“I think it’s his business.”
“Fixing the damn world?” Robb slaps the doorframe. “It should be everybody’s business.”
In my room I can pull up my sleeves and examine my bruises. When I am not looking, other kids reach out and pinch me as hard as they can. I say nothing. Like I’m supposed to.
In my parents’ bedroom, Mommy thumps something down on the dresser. Probably her hairbrush. Maybe her fist.
The walls are thin. I hear everything. But I say nothing, like I’m supposed to.
“You need an attorney, Darren. With this money we can afford the best.”
“I can’t accept their money.”
The floorboards creak as Mommy paces. It is always Mommy who paces. Daddy holds still, like a coiled spring.
Mommy says, “No one will know.”
“They’ll know. What does it say if I accept it?”
“It says you’re a father with a child to feed and a mortgage.”
Daddy’s voice is tight. So tight. “People already think I did it on purpose.”
“No one will know.”
There is no such thing as silence, but for a moment the air is still.
“I’ll know.”
@Viana_Brown: Why do they always call her “the slain black girl” on TV? #HerNameWasShae
@BrownMamaBear: IT COULD HAVE BEEN MY BABY. #EveryBlackParent #BlackParentFears
@Momof6: Teach your kids to listen to police. End of story.
@WhitePowerCord: Criminals get what’s coming to them. Underhill PD FTW!!!!!
@UnderhillSCORE: Curfew’s up. So are we. It’s time to take a stand. We know who’s against us. Who’s with us? #Underhill
@BrownMamaBear: All you kids go on home now. Stop your foolishness! They’re coming for you.
@WhitePowerCord: SHOOT THEM DOWN. SHOOT THEM ALL. CURFEW’S UP. WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR #UnderhillPD?
@Viana_Brown: No officer with a shred of humanity would fire into a crowd of peaceful protestors. #Underhill
@WhitePowerCord: Then maybe private citizens need to take matters into our own hands. You’ll see us up close tomorrow. #WhiteOut #MakeItKnown
@KelvinX_: Tear gas goin up! Say your prayers and make your stand, Underhill. #UnderhillRiot