Gayle King appears on the screen announcing that CBS This Morning will be right back. After the commercials, they switch to a local news break. Riley’s perky colleague, Quinn Taylor, comes on-screen, looking every bit the Texas pageant queen Riley told me she once was.
It takes a second for what she’s saying to make sense, as if my brain is on a time delay.
“Fourteen-year-old Justin Dwyer remains in critical condition at Jefferson Hospital after being shot by police yesterday evening.”
Fourteen? I’m falling through a trapdoor, my iron grip on the armrest of the couch the only thing keeping me tethered to the room. He’s only a kid. Never once did Kevin say that he shot a child.
The face of a young Black boy fills the screen. He’s right there in the living room—handsome with a gap in his front teeth that makes him look younger than his age, light hazel eyes that remind me a little of Riley’s brother, Shaun’s.
The screen cuts to a shot of a woman—the mother—covering her head with a plaid scarf, hiding her face as she walks toward the hospital. When she reaches the glass double doors, she stops abruptly and lets the scarf fall away before staring directly into the camera, her face the very picture of heartbreak.
“That’s my baby in there. Please pray for him.”
Her baby. I reach for my swollen stomach.
It takes me a minute to realize I’m crying. I’m not a crier. Lou always said tears were like pets and men, useless and needy, and made a point of ignoring me whenever I cried. By six, I’d learned not to bother.
Don’t die, little boy. Please don’t die.
Quinn’s voice floats across the room again. “Sources close to the police department have confirmed the identities of the officers involved as Kevin Murphy and Travis Cameron.”
No. No. No. The room spins. Everyone knows.
When the doorbell rings it sounds like it’s coming from far away, like the voice on TV.
Please be her. Please be her.
I’m dizzy as I wobble to the front door. It has to be Riley, the person I need the most right now. The phone in my hand buzzes as the doorbell trills again.
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” I yell, wiping the snot off my face with the back of my hand, drying it on my sweatpants.
A white light blinds me as I throw open the door and stumble backward; a barrage of questions assaults me.
“What did your husband say about the shooting?”
“Did he see a gun?”
“Is your husband going to be indicted?”
A white man in his fifties with a complicated comb-over breaks from the pack of reporters to climb the porch stairs and thrusts a microphone in my face. I bat it out of his hand and try to step back inside. A cameraman has already wedged his foot in the door.
“I’m pregnant, goddammit!” Both of my arms wrap around my middle, and I push my shoulder as hard as I can into the guy who has his foot stuck in my door. Adrenaline pumps through my veins. I need to calm down. This is bad for Little Bird.
“Is your husband here?”
“Would you care to comment on the shooting?”
“Has your husband had problems working with the Black community before?”
A lanky Black kid pushes his way forward. He’s wearing a Temple T-shirt and a Black Lives Matter pin. It’s small, but I notice it as he thrusts his iPhone in my face.
“Are you a racist?”
He pointedly repeats the question. “Are you a racist?”
Am I a racist? You’re a teenager who writes for the school paper and knows exactly nothing about nothing and you come here to my house and ask me something so insane? I think of Riley, of all the nights I spent at the Wilsons’, of helping Mr. Wilson organize his fishing rods, and of rubbing Gigi’s feet when her corns were “acting up.”
“Fuck you.” I regret it the second it leaves my mouth, but I can’t stop now. “You don’t know anything! My best friend and godmother of my future child is Black. How dare you, asshole!”
I finally manage to slam the door shut and slide down the other side until I’m a heap on the floor. Fred licks the sweat that’s turned cold on my arms.
I remember my phone buzzed right before I answered the door. A text. From Kevin.
Meet me at our spot after work. It’s bad.
My nerves are so frayed, like guitar strings pulled too tight, it’s hard to get my fingers to cooperate. I finally type three words: I’ll be there.
* * *
With reporters practically barricading our street, I have to sneak out the back-patio door and trek through Mrs. J’s yard, where I step in a mound of fossilized poop on my way to meet an Uber three streets over. I gulp air from a crack in the window to escape the noxious mix of strawberry air freshener and dank weed in the car. The cold wind in my face does nothing to help the nausea or the nerves. I’m a mess by the time the guy drops me on Kelly Drive.
I trudge to “our spot”—a little azalea garden sandwiched in between the Victorian dollhouses of Boathouse Row and the looming burnt-orange columns of the art museum. In the summer, hot-pink flowers burst from every bush like confetti. Today the branches are bare, gray, and gnarled like an old woman’s hands. A flock of bored Canada geese that forgot it was time to migrate gnaw on bits of trash at the river’s edge.
Kevin chose to meet here so we could be alone, and sure enough, it’s empty—the temperature nosedived into the low forties this morning and it’s drizzling. As I walk along the river, I’m taunted by the happy memories we’ve had here. Like when Kevin dropped down on both knees to propose.
“I think you’re only supposed to be on one knee.” I laughed.
“I’m begging,” he’d replied, grinning like a fool.
Kevin didn’t notice there was a split second I hesitated, faltered before I gave him my hand. The proposal wasn’t a complete surprise, but the sudden panic that came with it was. This was the moment when everything in my life would change, and it was more terrifying than I thought it would be, the permanence, the “ever after,” all the other doors closing. I wasn’t used to getting what I wanted, and when it finally happened, this momentous thing, I didn’t know how to feel anything else other than confused fear. I never told anyone about that moment, not even Riley. And when I remember back to how we got engaged or when I retell the story, I gloss right over the part where I didn’t answer right away. In fact, I never answered at all. I just thrust out my hand for Kevin to slip on the delicate diamond ring and assumed he would think it was shaking from excitement and not from nerves. I falter again now, for a different reason this time, as I spot Kevin’s broad figure hunched over on the bench. I worked myself up on the way here, imagining what I’ll say. A child, Kevin. You killed a child. You shot a child. He was a boy, a kid.
But when I see his face, ashen and vacant, I can’t say any of those things. I can’t break down, can’t attack him. I have no choice except to be the strong one.
“Tell me everything,” I say as I ease myself down beside him.
Predictably, he doesn’t answer right away. I wait as patiently as I can, rubbing his back in a slow figure eight.
“Cameron and I are on indefinite administrative leave while they investigate.”
“Okay.” I’m not surprised. There has to be an investigation. But what else? I brace myself.
“The union rep told me this was going to be bad, Jen. Like they were going to make an example out of us. He said they had my back and blah, blah, blah, but he just ‘wanted to prepare me.’ And we have to get ready to ‘fight like hell.’ Fuck, Jen. This is not on me. This is on Cameron! He shouldn’t have shot. I mean, the kid didn’t match the description at all! And he just… he just fired on him. He kept saying, ‘The shot was good, the shot was good, right, Kevin?’ ” Kevin slumps back on the hard bench.
After a few minutes, he starts talking again, and this time he’s grabbed my hand but still isn’t looking at me: he stares out at the fast-moving current.
“They said to p
rep you too—it’s all going to start soon: the protests, the media hounding us….”
I don’t have the heart to tell him about the reporters banging down our door. It’s already started.
“They’re even sending over a media rep to talk to us. I can’t believe this is happening.”
When Kevin speaks again, his voice is barely above a whisper. “Am I a monster, Jenny? Do you think I’m a monster?”
“Kevin, look at me.” When he turns to me, finally, he has such intense torment across his face, I summon every ounce of my conviction and speak clearly and slowly so that he knows I mean every single word.
“Kevin Murphy. You are not a monster. It sounds like this was an awful mistake. But you are not a monster. And I am going to be here with you every step of the way, and we are going to figure this out. Do you hear me? It’s all going to be okay.”
I’m saying it as much to myself as I am to him. But I’m not sure either of us believes it.
Chapter Three RILEY
If there’s a sound more magical than the Ebenezer AME church choir, I’ve never heard it. They’re opening with an exuberant medley of gospel, funk, and some Broadway-style riffs that feels more like a stadium concert than a church service. A sea of golden robes sways like flags in a brisk wind as the notes of the organ bounce off the stained-glass windows and course through me. The choir calls everyone to their feet, and I rise, limbs loose, eager to abandon myself to the invigorating rhythm. It’s a packed house today, with some three hundred people filling the cavernous space, the energy palpable. There’s nodding and swaying, spontaneous shouts and murmurs. You don’t need an invitation to hug a neighbor, burst into tears, or sing along as loudly and proudly as Mahalia Jackson herself.
It’s been a while since I’ve been to church, but exultation is like muscle memory. For a blissful moment, I don’t feel stressed or self-conscious; I feel rejoiced. One of those rare moments when I understand what people mean when they say they’re filled with the Spirit. The sanctuary of this church is as close as I’ve ever been to feeling God. Back when I was a little girl, my insides wound up so tight I felt like I was suffocating, these gleaming pews on a Sunday morning were a kind of escape, from thinking about tests and grades and the kids who called me “Oreo” and said I talked so white when I used the SAT vocab words Mom had been drilling me on since kindergarten. I need this now, a cocoon from the outside world, even if only for an hour. A respite before I have to return to work, and to covering the story for which I’m now the lead reporter, the one about how my friend’s husband shot an unarmed Black kid.
By the time I arrived at the station Thursday night, after downing two espressos to counteract the vodka, Scotty was already huddled with a crew in his office, desk strewn with Burger King wrappers, the smell of grease and the anticipation of a big story charging the air. As soon as I walked in, his focus shifted to me.
“I want you front and center on this, Riley.”
I must have given him a look, because his next question was, “Is that a problem?”
No, of course it wasn’t. Of all the beat reporters, the rest of them white or Asian, I knew exactly why this was “my story.” I’d take it too; I had to, I wanted to—it was going to be a big one, maybe national. “No, Scotty, no problem at all.”
My first call was to a sergeant in the Twenty-Fifth District whom I’ve been cultivating since I started at KYX.
He finally called me back after midnight and confirmed what the tingles had already told me: “You didn’t get these names from me, but everyone’s gonna have them by morning. Kevin Murphy and Travis Cameron.”
When Jenny called a few minutes after that, I froze. Finally, before the last ring sent her to voice mail, I dashed into a conference room, slamming the door behind me. I didn’t know what I was supposed to say, but I needed to know she was okay.
We only talked for two seconds. But last night, as I reported live in front of the Twenty-Second District—Kevin’s district—I kept picturing her watching, her reaction, her biting furiously on her lip, as I spoke into the camera. “If Justin Dwyer doesn’t wake up from his coma, the officers involved—Kevin Murphy and Travis Cameron from here at the Twenty-Second—could be indicted for murder.”
Jenny was calling again by the time I reached my car to head home after the broadcast. Of course she’d been watching. She said she always watches my broadcasts. I couldn’t bring myself to answer this time. She’d know if I sent it straight to voice mail, so I stared at the phone as it rang and rang and then waited for a message that never came. I spent the rest of the night pacing my apartment.
So when Momma called last night, as she’s done every single Saturday since I’ve been back, to ask if I was finally coming to church, I gave her an answer that surprised both of us.
“Yep, I’ll be there.” I needed church. I needed something.
Momma reaches over and takes my hand in hers, warm and papery. “I’m so glad my baby’s here.” It’s not always this easy to please Momma, and the thrill of it makes me happy. Shaun, though, not so much. I lean over to my brother behind Momma’s back as she sways and swings to the music. Shaun is standing, stiff and sullen, like he’s determined not to let the music get to him.
“I’m surprised to see you here.”
He shrugs. “Wouldn’t be if I had my way. But you know, ‘house rules.’ ”
Shaun is always railing against Momma’s ironclad mantra, “In my house, you’ll do as I say;” he hates that he’s a twenty-seven-year-old man living at home, hates everything that’s gone wrong in his life to lead him here.
We’re whispering, but of course she hears. Momma always hears and then has the last word. “Don’t act like God is punishment, boy. God is a gift. And that’s exactly why you’re here. To remember that.” She starts clapping and singing even louder, as if she can channel the spirit to Shaun.
As the choir winds down, everyone is flushed and primed for Pastor Price, who lumbers up to the cherrywood pulpit. The imposing figure of Christ looms behind him, but even Jesus himself is no match for Pastor Price. He’s divinely exultant in his vibrant purple robes, his dark skin gleaming against the rich fabric, the lines of his strong jaw clenched as he prepares to give his flock the holy word.
“It’s a beautiful morning to praise the Lord, ain’t it!” Pastor’s baritone thunders up to the rafters. He hasn’t aged a bit since I was a kid, even though he must have rounded seventy. He’s led this church for more than forty years, and in that time has become the de facto leader of all the Black churches in Philly.
Daddy sometimes grumbles that Pastor likes the limelight a little too much. Momma will counter that even outside of the church, he’s doing God’s work, and so what if that means he doesn’t mind a crowd or a camera. He’s earned his stripes as a civil rights crusader and still has the scar up his arm from being beaten with a baton during Freedom Summer. Then she’ll remind us about how he’s “friends” with Obama. I don’t know about that, but Obama did visit one Sunday when he was on the campaign trail in 2012. Of course people here still bring that up every chance they get. Gigi loudest of them all. Apparently, our future president complimented her hat. When she’d told him he should get Michelle one just like it, Obama had winked and said he didn’t know if his wife could pull it off nearly as well. Or so the story goes.
As Pastor calls on the crowd to accept the Holy Spirit, my phone buzzes in my pocket.
“Don’t you dare,” Momma murmurs, barely moving her mauve-painted lips. Suddenly I’m seven years old again and about to get a slap on the thigh for not paying attention to the word of the Lord. Back then, when she scolded me, I’d bury my face deep in her armpit to hide my shame but also to be as close to her as I could. I fight the urge to do this now, to remember what it felt like.
I allow myself the quickest peek at the phone. Jenny. Again. I wish she’d leave a voice mail. I need to know what she’s going to say first, to figure out how I feel. Especially after she went on TV shout
ing that her best friend was Black. On one level, it’s such a laughable cliché—Me, a racist? Some of my best friends are Black—but, on a deeper level, it gnawed at me. Here I was worrying that I was the one betraying her by covering this story, and then she goes and uses our friendship and my “Blackness” as a shield, a defense. It brought back something she’d said years ago that I’d decided to let go since we were having such a good time and I didn’t want to rock the boat. I was home from Northwestern on my first winter break, and she and I went club-hopping on Delaware Avenue. We were beyond excited to be together again following our first and longest time apart since we were five years old. I wanted Jen to notice that I was different—three months at college and I already felt more sophisticated and grown. But I was also scared she wouldn’t notice, and that that would mean I was the same ole Riley after all. But Jen was too busy gushing about two new friends she’d made, fellow waitresses at Fat Tuesday. She talked about these girls with the breathless infatuation of someone with a new crush. “They think it’s so cool that my best friend is Black.” Jenny rolled her eyes as she said it, but it was still clear that it was some sort of weird badge of honor for her, like I was a trendy accessory—otherwise why mention it at all?
That first semester away, I had met more than a few white girls who were too eager to claim me, who were proud of themselves for going to college and getting themselves their very own Black friend, checking off all those freshman-year experiences—get a tattoo, hook up with a senior, meet people “different from you.”
I’d been thinking about this when I’d called Gaby last night. Ironically enough, she and I had become instant best friends in college by bonding over “these white girls” our first week on campus. We’d been in an endlessly long line at the bookstore when Gaby caught my eye and smirked at the girl in front of us whining loudly on the phone to her mom about how she should have been allowed to bring her car on campus and how her roommate said she didn’t like the matching comforters she’d picked out and wanted to “do her own thing.” It was the first thing Gaby ever said to me, leaning in with a stage whisper. “Man, oh man, these white girls with their tears and flat asses and rich daddies.” Never mind that Gaby comes from one of the wealthiest families in Jamaica. She told me that point-blank within five minutes, without even a sliver of humility. “Oh yeah, I’m hella rich, but it doesn’t matter, you watch, everyone here is going to think I’m a poor little island girl.” They did. As we inched forward in line, she went on an animated tirade about how she wasn’t going to get fat in America like all the tourists she saw spilling out of the cruise ships in Montego Bay. It was clear from the jump that this girl had a lot to say about everything, and she’d warned me, proudly, that she was “one of those people who tell it like it is.”
We Are Not Like Them Page 5