Now hidden in the curtain, Isaiah told himself that he surely didn’t know her well enough to go down there. He pulled the fabric around tighter until only his right eye would be showing from the outside. She’d be fine without his help. She would run.
“Run,” he whispered into the curtain. “Now.”
She’d run away, he thought. Of course she would. Anyone would.
But when the boys rose from behind the brush, Angel did not run. Instead, she stood tall, revealing her whole height to the unworthy troupe. She rose like she had on the stage of that talent show. Isaiah wished that he could snap a photograph or write a poem. The contrast between them was stark. Powerful in a way he’d never seen before. She nearly glowed; it was a wonder those white boys weren’t shielding their eyes.
They spoke to her. Some circling like dirty birds on a scent, a few sniggering, and the rest hanging back. Cowards. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, so he gently placed both hands on the sill and lifted the window.
The noise rang out much louder than Isaiah had expected, and every one of them looked—all sixteen white boys and Angel Hill, too. He curled himself deeper in the curtain and hoped they hadn’t seen him. Maybe they hadn’t, since they quickly turned their attention back to Angel.
“What you got there, gal?”
“Something worth something, I’d bet.”
“Sure looks it!”
“Well,” she replied slowly and deliberately, without an ounce of obvious fear on her words. “I’m not sure that’s any of your business.”
“Oh, you’ve got some nerve.”
They closed in on her statuesque frame, and something flipped inside of Isaiah. He couldn’t stand there, hiding in the curtain, while Angel Hill was ensnared by such filth. He parted his lips to yell out, but before he could holler at them, she dropped her contraption and ran into the night.
The thugs laughed and began inspecting the fallen equipment. Then, suddenly, the skinniest boy Isaiah had ever seen lifted the crutches and slammed them to the ground as hard as he could. The boy cursed the fact that even his most powerful whack left only a small scratch on them.
The other fifteen boys chuckled at him, and that’s when the skinny boy lost himself in a fit of rage. He began pounding the crutches onto the rim of the Frisco tracks with as much force as he could muster. After a few minutes, they were shattered.
“Yeah!” he yelled in the direction Angel Hill had run. “How do you like that?”
Isaiah watched them backing away from the Greenwood District, kicking up dust and rocks as they walked. Something sinister was in the air, Isaiah could feel it. Something was coming.
SATURDAY, MAY 21, 1921; 10 DAYS BEFORE
ANGEL
Angel’s father still slept as she and her mother prepped the kitchen for the Barney sisters’ arrival. While laying bright pink bows and barrettes across the cleared kitchen table, Angel saw the boy in her mind, lifting her father’s crutches high and slamming them down for no reason at all. He was the angriest boy she’d ever seen. Angrier than anyone should dare be with life in his lungs.
It hadn’t even been twelve hours since she’d watched the group of boys smash the crutches on the tracks. She’d saved up a month of helping her mother braid hair to afford them, and then spent another three weeks tinkering and repairing to make them perfect for her father.
Such a proud man, her father was. Before illness hit him, he reveled in the vigor of being born strong. When she was a small child, he’d throw her so far up into the air that she thought she was flying. Her mother would smack him on his purposely flexed upper arm, and he’d smack her right back on the rear end. Angel remembered covering her eyes for that, but what joy it brought her to witness such a love in her own home.
Then, like a slap, sickness made his strong body weak. He’d been in denial for a long time. Pushing away help and continuing to work as if he wasn’t unwell. Then, one day after church, he fell hard on the front stoop and bled more blood than Angel could imagine being inside of a body. After that, the decline was swift. He managed to keep his spirits up, right until he wasn’t able to walk on his own. After that, his smile never quite reached his eyes.
Angel had hoped those crutches would bring her father’s smile back. But the unhappy, skinny boy had smashed that hope in less than three minutes. Angel felt a tremble come over her.
“Baby?” her mother said before grabbing Angel’s shivering hands to her bosom. “What in the world are you thinking? You look like a fair ghost.”
Angel hadn’t said anything to her mother about the crutches. They were to be a gift to her, too. To see her beloved husband walk again would mean as much to her as it would have to him. Angel forced a grin onto her face.
“It’s nothing, Mama,” she said. “Dreading those Barney sisters is all.”
Her mother released her hands and shook her head in agreement. “Yes, goodness,” she replied. “Those are some hollering girls. I would send you along, but please, baby, I can’t handle them without you. How about I raise your money up? I’ll give you a ten cents instead of five. How’s that sound?” A thin smile floated on the surface of her mother’s tired expression. “Sounds good, Mama,” Angel replied, wondering if her mother could see through her, too.
It really did sound good, though. Maybe it would only take Angel a couple of weeks to save up for new crutches.
Suddenly, the three Barney sisters banged hard on the back-door screen and ran in like the kitchen was a playground. Something inside of Angel came alive when children were around. An ability to relate to them on their level in ways that adults could not. That’s why her mother couldn’t handle them without assistance. Angel was not great at braiding their hair, but she was wonderful at making them sit calmly.
“Sit yourselves down, girls!” Her mother yelled at a volume that accomplished nothing. “Right now! Sit! Sit! Sit! Lord have mercy, Jesus! Sit! Sit! Sit!”
“Mercy,” Angel said simply, and then she turned to the three sisters. “All right, girls. Ready for your surprise?”
They replied with a chorus of yeses so sweet that even Angel’s mother tilted her head and beamed at them cautiously.
“This week…,” Angel said, reaching for the basket atop the high kitchen pantry, “a puppet show!”
The three young Barney sisters bounced on their heels and rubbed their hands together like there was nothing on earth better than hand-sewn puppets made of remnant cloth.
“Gimmee! Gimmee! Gimmee!” they said.
“You’ll have to sit in your seats, real, real quiet, each of you,” Angel told them coolly. “And only after you’re all done getting your hair braided.” Angel replaced the puppets in the out-of-reach basket. “Then they’ve got a snazzy show to put on, especially for you three. Agreed?”
The sisters scurried to their seats and waited quietly for their hair to be greased, parted, and braided. Angel’s mother stood in awe and watched her daughter work.
“Mama?” Angel said to her adoring mother. “It’s showtime.”
SUNDAY, MAY 22, 1921; 9 DAYS BEFORE
ISAIAH