by Chris Crowe
worry. The peacenik
should have been there, not me. He
should have driven Mom
to the hospital
while she twisted and groaned with
labor pains. I stared
at the clock. If I
had known his name and number,
I would have dropped a
dime in the pay phone
and called him to demand that
he come to fix this
mess he started, to
take responsibility
for Mom and their new
baby. But all I
could do was sit and sulk and
worry. Before long,
a nurse walked in. “Ashe
Douglas?” I couldn’t read her
face. Was something wrong
with Mom? The baby?
I stood up, and she looked at
me with surprise. “You’re
the brother?” Then, “Well,
congratulations. You have
a baby sister.”
September 1968
Week Thirty-Nine: 247
“Miscegenation,”
the topic of the day in
Mr. Ruby’s class.
Arizona had
only recently dropped its
laws against inter-
racial marriage, he
said, but many states still clung
to their old statutes.
Dad was like those states,
still hanging on to racist
traditions and hate.
I slumped in my desk
and shoved those thoughts out of my
head. I didn’t want
to deal with it then,
even though it was staring
me right in the face.
October 1968
Week Forty: 247
Mom named the baby
Rosa, and the first time my
little sister grabbed
my finger with her
tiny hand, she grabbed my heart,
too. Something about
that flooded me with
love, and I was surprised by
the spontaneous
flow of tears that leaked
down my cheeks. She was perfect,
beautiful—and black.
The first time I saw
her, she was still so wrinkled
and baby-new, and
I was so rattled
with relief that she and Mom
had survived birth that
I didn’t even
think about her shiny black
hair and beautiful
brown skin. I didn’t
even think about what Dad
would say or do. I
didn’t even think
about the gossip that would
spread about my mom.
Seeing my baby
sister, my only thoughts were
about how much I
loved her, how I would
always love her, and nothing
anybody said
or did, even Dad,
could change how I felt about
my precious sister.
October 1968
Week Forty-One: 167
The very real weight
of responsibility
pressed on me from all
sides after Rosa’s
birth. I wanted to fight for
her and Mom, but I
knew the minefield of
divorce would be treacherous,
unpredictable,
and terrifying.
My parents’ war paralleled
the violence in
Vietnam, and I
dreaded, truly dreaded that
I might be called on
to fight in both wars
at once. I laugh now when I
remember how I
once believed that a
sweet, innocent baby like
Rosa might mend our
fractured family,
but when Dad finally heard
about her, he swore
he’d ruin Mom and
make sure her black bastard would
rot in foster care.
He must not have known
that when he attacked Mom, I’d
stand in the crossfire.
October 1968
Week Forty-Two: 100
Thursday, Angela
came over and we watched the
Olympic highlights
while we baby-sat
Rosa for Mom. Sometimes I
think Angela loves
Rosa almost as
much as I do. She calls her
“little soul sister,”
and she always wants
to hold her. Baby Rosa
took to her right off,
and I must admit
that it used to make me feel
kind of jealous to
see Rosa cuddle
up to a stranger more than
she did to me. But
Angela’s glow burned
off that jealousy pretty
fast, and it wasn’t
long before I loved
how happy my soul sisters
looked with each other.
★ ★ ★
It surprised no one
that American sprinters
Tommie Smith and John
Carlos finished first
and third in the two-hundred
meter; what shocked and
infuriated
people was what they did at
the nationally
televised medal
ceremony. While the “Star
Spangled Banner” played,
both men lowered their
heads and raised black-gloved fists in
a bold Black Power
salute. People booed
and hissed, but the two men took
the abuse in proud,
stony silence. Next
to me, Angela whispered,
“Right on. You look at
that, little girl. Just
look at what those two brothers
are doing for you.”
October 1968
Week Forty-Three: 109
The casualties
over in Vietnam slowed;
the carnage at home
increased. Dad filed for
divorce and hired a big-shot
attorney to sue
for custody. Not
Rosa’s, of course. Mine. He claimed
that Mom was unfit
to be my mother,
and he wanted to force me
to live with him and
to leave Rosa and
Mom all alone to fend for
themselves. Mom tried to
hide it from me, but
when I came home from school, she
was sitting in the
living room, Rosa
on her lap, and an opened
letter at her feet.
She’d been crying, but
she sat, still as death, staring
at the letter. “It’s
getting nasty, Ashe,
nastier than I thought it
would ever get.” Then
her voice caught, and the
tears started again. Rosa
sensed her mom’s heartbreak
and started wailing.
I picked up my sister, cooed
and rocked her, and tried
to convince Mom that
everything would be all right.
How, I didn’t know.
November 1968
Week Forty-Four: 150
Dinner with Dad at
Coco’s: cheeseburger, fries, a
chocolate shake, and
a huge serving of
quiet. He stared at his plate,
then at me; then he
sighed. Red rimmed his eyes,
and his body sagged like he’d
just finished a long
march through the jungle.
He couldn’t sleep anymore,
he said. He missed me,
but after what Mom
had done to him, he couldn’t
bear the sight of her.
Dad cleared his throat and
leveled his eyes on mine. I
felt sorry for him
when he said, “I’m just
trying to do the right thing
for you, son. Honest.”
★ ★ ★
When I got home, the
peacenik—with a mean Afro,
denim shirt, and bell-
bottoms—sat with Mom
and had Rosa tucked into
the crook of his arm.
He shook my hand, said,
“My name’s Marcus,” and smiled, but
behind his wire-rim
glasses, his eyes looked
nervous. Rosa’s father was
tall, broad-shouldered, and
handsome. Mom said, “You
two should have met sooner. I
should have . . .” She dropped her
eyes. “This wasn’t fair
to you—or to Dad—and we
never . . . well, Rosa
was a big surprise.
I’m sorry, Ashe, for what I’ve
done to our family.”
Marcus planted a
gentle kiss on Rosa’s head
and handed her to
Mom. “I’ll do right by
you and Rosa, but I’m tapped
out and on the run
from the Feds. When I
get settled in Canada,
I’ll take care of you.”
We believed him, but
in wartime, promises are
as solid as smoke.
★ ★ ★
The only good news
that week came on Halloween.
President Johnson
announced a total
halt to the U.S. bombing
in North Vietnam.
“It’s a start,” Mom said.
“Maybe it’ll turn out to
be the beginning
of the end of the
war. Maybe by the time you
graduate, we’ll be
out of Vietnam,
and you won’t have to worry
about the draft.” Mom
would turn out to be
right, but not in the way that
she and I had hoped.
November 1968
Week Forty-Five: 166
The optimism
we all felt when LBJ
announced a halt to
the bombing blew up
the next week when Nixon beat
Hubert Humphrey in
the presidential
election. Nixon had made
promises about
what he would do to
end the war, but Mom didn’t
believe him. To her,
he didn’t seem like
someone the American
people ought to trust.
★ ★ ★
The morning after
the election, Angela
drifted into school
looking fried. When I
asked her if she was okay,
she just ignored me.
I wasn’t surprised.
Mom had stayed up late watching
the election news,
and she was so mad
that morning she could hardly
talk. Angela felt
just as strongly as
Mom did, so I thought Nixon
was the reason for
her grave mood. We walked
to Mr. Ruby’s class in
silence, and before
we reached the door, she
pulled me into a fierce hug
and started bawling.
The Army, she said,
had just sent news about her
brother: MIA.
I didn’t know what
to do or say, so I just
stood there and held her
while she quietly
sobbed into my shoulder, and
for some reason I
thought about my mom
and dad and Rosa and the
brewing battle that
would tear us apart,
and I started crying, too,
because we had both
lost someone we loved
to a senseless war that could
have been prevented.
November 1968
Week Forty-Six: 127
Part of the divorce
wrangling included a court
order to appear
before a judge for
a custody hearing. Mom
showed me the papers
during dinner while
she was nursing Rosa. “I
don’t want to lose you,”
she said tenderly,
and I wasn’t sure if she
meant me or Rosa,
but as I watched my
baby sister snuggled with
Mom, I knew what she
had meant. I couldn’t
blame her. I was seventeen,
and I could handle
whatever crap Dad
threw at me, but Rosa was
only a baby
who still needed her
mother to love and care for
her. I’d had my turn
being raised by Mom,
and now Rosa should have hers.
I had to find a
way I could be a
hero for Rosa in the
coming war with Dad.
November 1968
Week Forty-Seven: 160
Angela gave me
a copper MIA wrist-
band with her brother’s
name and the date he
went missing on it. I was
supposed to wear it
until he came home—
or until his body was
found. I slid the smooth
bracelet over my
wrist and wished I had something
to give her, something
permanent like this
wristband that would remind her
of me if I went
missing in action.
Last night, Mom had talked about
running away from
Dad and the hearing,
taking me and Rosa to
California or
Florida or some-
place Dad wouldn’t be able
to find us. I tried
to imagine the
three of us living away
from home and friends and
trying to pay the
bills. It wouldn’t work, I said.
There’s no way we could
earn enough money
to live on and pay out-of-
state tuition: the
draft would snatch me on
my next birthday. Mom looked heart-
broken. “What else can
I do? Marcus will
send us whatever money
he can and join us
when we get settled
somewhere.” I believed her, but