“Say more about why.”
“Same type of guys that own the businesses own our apartment buildings. They set the wages and the rent, just so. They want to keep us jiving and checking, keep us poor and struggling day to day.”
“So we don’t have time to think,” Bobby said.
“So we don’t have time to get together and rise up.”
Out the corner of my eye, something went creeping. A rabbit or a fox, most likely. Something I couldn’t turn my head fast enough to see.
But I did turn my head, away from the hinge gap into the darkness. I became aware then of the stark black air behind me. The new moon cast blankness over everything.
The house loomed up as a shadow in the foreground, miles of fields beyond. Miles of road beyond that, I supposed, and on into the cities.
What must it be like? I wondered. And in the breath behind that: Why have I never wondered before? I had seen so much of the city in the newspapers and on television, but I had never really wanted to go.
“What’chu doing?” said Bobby’s voice behind me.
I jumped about a mile.
He laughed as I turned to face him. “We’re even now. You about scared me into tomorrow. Hiding here in the dark like that.” His silhouette against the light from inside the barn made it hard to see his face.
“Oh, uh —” I stammered. “I was just coming to, I mean —” Sighing, I gave up the ruse. “I kind of just wanted to listen.”
“Sure, sure,” Bobby said. “I just had to . . . you know.” He shuffled. “Step out to the field for a second. I’ll be right back.”
I lingered behind the open doorway, out of sight of the rest of the Panthers. Bobby came back a minute later. I could hear the scratch of him zipping up his pants. He stopped a few yards short of me and flung his arms out in the country air. He tossed his head back and gazed at the sky.
“Whew,” he said. “How’d you hook up all these stars?”
I stepped out into the grass to join him.
“Don’t you have stars in Oakland?”
“Barely,” he answered. “Too much light from the buildings. I’ve never been in a place this dark. With so much open space. It’s amazing.”
“You don’t get outside of Oakland so much?” I asked. Maybe we had that in common.
“I’ve never been out of Oakland,” he said.
We stared at the stars together. Bobby nudged his foot toward mine and ended up stepping on my bare toe. “Ow,” I said.
“Sorry!” He put his hand out, as if to soothe something, and came up holding mine. “I didn’t know you don’t have shoes on.”
I always went barefoot. I couldn’t imagine not touching the earth. On TV, the cities looked dirty and crowded, but not the kind of dirt you wanted to let touch your feet.
But never mind my feet. Bobby was holding my hand. He slid his fingers between mine. The places where we were touching felt warmer than anything in the world.
“What’s it like in Oakland?” I asked him. “I’ve never been to a place where you have no space and it doesn’t get dark and you can’t see any stars.”
“You can go into the park at night,” he said. “You just gotta watch out for pigs and whatnot.”
“You have pigs in the city?”
Bobby’s shoulders pitched forward, following his laugh. “Not those kind of pigs. It’s what we call the police.” He snorted three times quick. “Swine. The lowest of the low. Filthy. Greedy. Getting fat off the scraps of everyone’s table. Politicians. Businessmen. Government. The Man.”
I got a little offended on behalf of my pigs. “That’s just mean,” I said. “They’re real sweet animals.”
Bobby laughed again. “I never seen a real pig before,” he said. “So I guess I can’t rightly judge.”
He was still holding my hand. Warmth radiated up my arm. He pulled lightly, moving toward the barn again. “I gotta get back. You coming in?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “I’ll get in trouble.” Right away I wished I hadn’t said it that way. I would have preferred for Bobby to think I was my own person. But Daddy was the one I had to live with.
“Your dad?” Bobby said.
I nodded. “He doesn’t want me to talk to any of you.”
Bobby nodded too. “My mom took a lot of convincing. But in the end, she knew it was right, what the Panthers are doing. Protecting the community. Educating and empowering people.” He tilted his head. “Your dad’s already involved, though, so what’s the holdup?”
Bobby was talking like I was going to join the Black Panthers or something. “I just wanted to listen, that’s all.”
He smirked. It was dark, but I could feel it. “That’s how it starts.”
“There’s no Black Panthers out here anyway,” I said.
Bobby waved his arm. “You got a barn full of them right now.”
“Ha-ha.”