People started shouting. And then he fired a gun at someone, who had just broken into a run.
He missed, but my heart stopped and I froze. Mr. Wallace turned quickly, grabbed at my shoulders, and screamed, “Inside!”
I followed his lead and ran back into the shop, but not before turning around and seeing the gunman get taken down by a sheriff.
Mr. Wallace was thrown off when we got inside. He turned to look through the blinds. “Let them haul him off. And then you should get home before the sun sets. Take your bike and avoid the scene. No detours, young man. I mean it.”
“Okay, sir,” I said. “What’s going on?”
“More drama between us and them over this elevator situation. Just go, so you’re safe.”
I followed his orders and once the shooter was gone, I took my bike. As I rode home, I saw more sheriffs gathering out front of several businesses. They were just standing there with their sticks, and there was a tense feeling in the air—a quiet mixed with chaos.
What was that toxic flavor in the wind? I wanted to graduate from Greenwood, but not because it felt unsafe. When I was home before dark, I usually didn’t fear something scary coming to hurt me. So, the tense feeling in the air took me by surprise.
I pedaled down the dirt roads and across the train tracks, where the commercial district made way for the houses, to my home. I saw mothers pulling their children inside, and a man standing on his roof, using binoculars to get a closer look downtown.
There were some horses in the stable yard whinnying more than usual. The scenes and sounds from my ride hung over me even as I crashed through my front door.
Pa was in the living room with an open shirt and a slack jaw. He was pouring himself a glass of something, but he’d stopped to look at me like a crazy man when I came through the door.
“Wherehave you been?” his voice boomed, cracking some.
“I was at work,” I said. “Like always. Pa, what’s going on?”
Pa went to the window and looked out, just as a lightning bolt blinked through the sky. “A storm is coming.” Thunder rumbled as Pa fished a tin of breath mints out of his shirt pocket. “Maybe the only thing that saves us tonight. It’s our word versus theirs on Mr. Rowland’s innocence.”
“I don’t understand what Mr. Rowland has to do with the rest of Greenwood.”
“Yes, you do, son,” Pa said, impatient at my naivete. “Dick was doing well. Andweare doingvery well. Running businesses better than they do, leading by example. And they feel threatened, so they’ve targeted one of our men, falsely accusing himof assaulting a white woman. And now they have their reason to attack the rest of us. Just like that.” Pa went to check the window again. “I want you to know, Nick, that you’re a fantastic writer.”
The words struck a funny chord in me—one that made me stare at him in confusion. I was sure I heard him wrong. Any time I showed him a piece of my writing, he said my words were overly sentimental, far too opinionated to make it in the news world.
“But I could not let you follow my path,” Pa went on, looking at me. “Words are dangerous—true words are lethal. You are innocent to life, and what it means to be a man. And you are far too well-spoken for your own good.”
“Pa, why are you saying this now?” I asked. Nothing else that I had seen today frightened me more than the timing of Pa’s praise. “You never let me publish so much as a single story inThe Tulsa Star.”
“There would be a target on your head the minute the press printed. You want this world to be a place where everybody’s welcome to all the same fruit, and it’s not that way—not yet. I can see you dream of it. I see the hope in your eyes. Your idealism is a threat to them, and anything that is a threat to them is a threat to you.” Pa turned to look at the window once more, and his face dropped. He spoke his next words into the glass, “I’m sorry, Nick. I just wanted to protect you. Don’t ever hold your tongue. No matter how afraid you might feel.”
BANG!A gunshot snatched the silence.
Pa twisted and fell, clutching the curtain, and he lost his grip.He stopped moving, slouched over like a folded couch cushion. He looked at me, his face like a cadaver come to life. Blood was leaking through his shirt.
I choked out a gasp.What... what just happened?
“Pa?” I whispered, running to him.
He held up his hand for me to stop, and so I did, one knee bent forward, the other poised to change direction.
“Run,” he whispered, shaking his head with urgency. “Run!”
Run? Where?
The white man who shot my father appeared on the porch. Through the white curtains, I saw his cowboy hat and a gun forming a long angle against his arm like a crocodile’s open jaw. He was coming toward the window to look in.
I ran to my bedroom, heart pounding, my brain only processing that one foot moves after the other.
Another gunshot.
