But Chuck was standing in front of it. His back was to Lori, so she watched him watching the picture. He was absolutely still; he didn’t so much as scratch his nose. He had the same posture the minister had before the altar at church, breaking Communion bread: straight, erect, reverent. And Chuck never stood up straight. He always slumped, his shoulders hunched over as if that would pull his T-shirt forward to hide his fat belly.
Lori started giggling again, so she rushed out the museum door. But, out on the sidewalk again, she stopped laughing. This was weird. Maybe she didn’t want to send the postcard to Angie after all. Having Chuck be that weird might make Lori seem weird, too.
Lori started walking down the street, suddenly wanting to get away from the art museum. But she didn’t know where else to go. The thought of going to the Coke museum all by herself wasn’t appealing at all. She knew how it would be: all these other families and clusters of friends and then Lori, by herself, with no one to mutter back and forth with: They make how much Coke a day? Did you ever think it looked like that being mixed up?
Lori wandered down another street, aimlessly, hoping she’d see something else to catch her interest. She had money for shopping, after all; she had the whole day to do with as she wished. Lori tried to convince herself that that was a luxury, but she just felt forlorn. She had nothing to do and nobody to do it with.
Lori wasn’t used to being alone. At home, she complained about it: “Why do I have to share my room with Emma?” “Why can’t Joey leave me alone while I’m doing homework?” “Gram, can’t you just stop chattering about your tomato preserves for five seconds?” (She’d never actually asked the last question—just thought it.) And at school, more happily, she always traveled in a crowd of friends. She could always count on having Angie or Breanna walking beside her, or Dana or Chelsea sitting behind her in class, passing notes when the teacher wasn’t looking. It would be horrible to be alone at school.
It was worse in a strange city. Lori felt totally invisible, unnoticed. Nobody knew who she was. She didn’t matter to anyone here.
But that’s what Mom was all the time—alone in a strange city. What kind of a life was that?
For a minute, Lori was afraid that she’d asked the question out loud, because a black woman looked at her, then quickly looked away, just like Mom had looked at homeless people in Chicago. But Lori wasn’t that out of it—she would know if she’d moved her lips, and she hadn’t. She looked around.
She was the only white person in sight.
Something like panic started to rise up out of her gut, and she forced it down.
So you’re the only white person. So what? It was getting close to lunchtime; the street was crowded. It was just a coincidence that this street was crowded with all black people. Except for Lori.
Maybe I’m in danger. No—I shouldn’t think that. That’s racist. Lori felt like she was in danger, anyway. Her heart pounded, and she could feel the adrenaline flooding her system. She wanted to run, but she was still calm enough not to want to look silly.
You’re not in any danger. Calm down. But she didn’t know that for sure. She wasn’t used to big cities. For all she knew, she’d wandered into some notorious housing project, and there was going to be a shoot-out between rival gangs any minute.
There are nice stores all around you. These people are well dressed. Better dressed than Lori, actually. There were more Tommy Hilfiger and Nike logos than Lori had ever seen outside of a store before. Lori was staring so hard that she caught the eye of a teenaged girl walking past; the girl gave her a half smile and walked on.
Would she have smiled if I was about to be killed? Or assaulted? Abducted? Raped?
Lori started walking faster. In the next block, she saw a white man in a business suit. He didn’t even look her way. And then in the next block, there were as many white people as black. Lori wasn’t in any danger. She never had been.
She sank weakly onto a concrete bench, her heart still thumping unnaturally. Her new shirt was drenched with sweat. What was wrong with her? The worst thing anybody had done to her was smile.
But I was different. I was surrounded by people who weren’t like me.
For no reason at all, Lori suddenly remembered something that had happened only the week before at a Junior Leadership meeting. Everyone was clowning around afterward, throwing water balloons and laughing about it. Lori was thrilled because Roger Stanton had aimed one right at her—did that maybe mean he liked her? It was a great game.
Then one of the water balloons hit Chuck.
Everyone got quiet. Chuck wasn’t even out in the playing area. He was sitting alone on the ground by a fence, waiting for Gram to come and pick them up. Whoever hit him had to have been trying.