by Steph Cha
The paper caught with a satisfying whoosh, the flame springing eager and immediate. He stared at it, mesmerized. It crawled across the pile, glowing and growing, and it seemed to Shawn that he had summoned this thing, not with a match and vodka, but by the sulfurous light of grief and rage that howled out from within him. Now, watching this fire outside himself, he felt nothing but curiosity and awe, like he was witnessing the birth of somebody else’s creature. He wanted to see what it would do next.
“Shawn!” Ray’s hand came down on his shoulder and yanked him away as the fire crept outward, warming his feet.
Shawn stumbled, pulled out of his reverie, and saw the others rushing past him out of the store. He followed, Ray leading him by the wrist, while the flame climbed up the magazine rack, building as it caught more and more and more.
They stood in the parking lot, all of them watching. Sparky laughed, and his crew laughed after him.
Sparky slapped Ray’s back and jutted his chin out at Shawn. “That your little brother?”
“Cousin,” Ray said, looking at Shawn like he hardly knew him.
Sparky whistled and laughed some more. “Little cuz is crazy.”
It lasted six days. Six days of fire, a judgment poured over the earth. Figueroa Liquor Mart was gone, and Frank’s Liquor. Florence Liquor & Grocery, Empire Market, and Jingle Bell Liquor, too. Laundromats were destroyed, the machines jacked for coins. Dry cleaners looted, plenty of people grabbing the chance to take somebody else’s clothes. Some places put up signs, like lamb’s blood, on their doors. BLACK OWNED, they said, and they were passed over. Sometimes. Terry’s Interiors got the torch, and Rod Davis Firestone, and the African Refugee Center. After a while, fire didn’t discriminate. They called in the National Guard. Sixty-three people were dead.
Shawn watched it all happen. When the law didn’t come, the lawless spread out. There were bangers everywhere, bold because the police were gone and because they had a truce for once, their priorities shifted away from each other. When they started getting crews together to ride up into Koreatown, Shawn went with them, riding in the back seat of Sparky’s grandma’s Ford Escort, not even bothering to lie to Aunt Sheila. Koreatown—it was where the Koreans were. Jung-Ja Han’s people. The people who believed and supported her, who thought Ava was Han’s bad fortune, a thing that had happened to her, like a car crash or a storm. It made sense to him, to take this outcry to Koreatown. They would bring this judgment to them. To her community, her family. To her.
When it was over, everything had changed. Wherever he went, he saw the extent of the ruin, the cooled remnants of days of unchecked wrath. Where there had been buildings, there were now building frames like children’s pictures scribbled in pencil, gray and blurred and skeletal, on the verge of disintegration. Roll-up doors defaced by graffiti and ash, the metal warped so they’d never close again. Rubble and trash littered the streets like fallen teeth, like dead skin, the rot of a ravaged body.
The neighborhood looked like a war zone, a place like nowhere he’d ever seen outside of photographs. But he lived in it now. Victim, civilian, soldier, insurgent.
He was different, still changing, the core of him destabilized and re-formed by the fire. He joined up with the Baring Cross Crips, Sparky vouching for him, saying he’d been through it, that he was stone cold for fourteen. Ray and Sparky and four other guys jumped him in at the parking lot of Trueway Baptist the week after the uprising, the church’s pink stucco walls charred black, all the way up to the steeple. They formed a circle around him, each of them locking eyes on him and nodding, starting the ritual. Ray came at him first, and they swung at each other like they had a dozen times before, landing a punch each before the other boys moved in in turn. He kept his fists up and gave them his best, and they knocked him down, each of them laying hands on him until he was on the ground. As he lay there taking hits, his muscles singing, the taste of blood in his throat, he gave himself over to the boys and the pain. How great it was, the controlled aggression of family. To know the hurt would never be more than he could stand.
Seventeen
Sunday, September 1, 2019
Grace combed the room for her Bible, going through her drawers, the boxes of books and photos and keepsakes in her closet. She knew she still had it somewhere, the pink leather NIV with the gold-trimmed pages, once among her most prized possessions. When she’d gone to youth group each week, the kids would chant when someone showed up without a Bible: “Naked Christian! Christian naked!”
“It’s fine, Gracious,” said Miriam. “You know they’re over the moon that we’re going. Just don’t wear a pentagram, and you’re golden.”
Last night, when Grace got home from Palmdale, Paul caught her slinking to her room, fatigued and defeated. He said to be ready for church in the morning, as if reminding her of something they’d discussed and settled. Yvonne was feeling strong enough, and Miriam had already agreed to come home and go with them. Grace slept poorly, waking up all night from stressful, realistic dreams. When she finally found her way into a deep sleep, Miriam came and woke her, a full hour ahead of schedule.
Miriam sat on the floor, watching Grace tear through the bedroom. She wore an embroidered white blouse and a conservative blue skirt. Her face was fresh, with a light layer of makeup: her skin dewy, her cheeks touched with a virginal blush. She picked idly at the fibers of the faded green carpet, rolling the long flossy threads in her palm, and looked for all the world like she was gathering summer flowers in a field. Grace could hardly stand to look at her.
For half her life, until Miriam went to college, Grace shared her bedroom with her sister. Twin beds two feet apart, their desks conjoined against one wall. They did their homework side by side, gossiped as they fell asleep, snoozed the same alarm clock until Yvonne scolded them from their doorway. It was one of the backdrops that gave color to her broad memories of childhood. She and Miriam tucked in like Snow White’s dwarves, like the little girls in Madeline.
But they weren’t little girls anymore. The room was small and stifling with both of them in it.
Miriam flicked the back of her leg as she walked by. “Will you sit the fuck down?”
“Ow! What the hell, Unni? That hurt.”
But she sat down, sullenly, on the floor next to her sister.
“So?” said Miriam. “Are you gonna tell me how it went?”
Grace hesitated, then gave her the short version of her visit with Ava Matthews’s family: that she had gone, and that it had not gone well. There was no one else she could talk to, and it felt good to unburden herself. Still, she kept the most embarrassing details behind, privately hoping she might forget them.
Miriam shook her head. “I told you not to go over there.”
“You’re the one who gave me the address.”
“Under duress,” she said.
Grace didn’t argue the point. She hadn’t threatened her sister, but she’d played it big, harping on the betrayal of Miriam’s lies by omission.
“Why did you even have it?” she asked.
“I tracked it down. Pretty much right after I found out.”
“How?”
Miriam shrugged. “It wasn’t that hard. I’m not a journalist or anything, but I can do basic research.”
“So why did Jules Searcey, of all people, know you had it?”
Miriam stared at a carpet fiber as she balled it up between her fingers. “I reached out to him. Like you did, apparently. We knew some people in common, and he seemed like my best bet to get in touch with the family. I asked if he’d feel comfortable setting up a meeting. And I think I asked if I had their address right, in case I wanted to send something.”
“What, like an Edible Arrangement?”
She closed her hand around the fuzz and raised her middle finger. “Better than just showing up.”
“But you never met them?”
“No. Because I respect people’s boundaries.” Grace started to object, but Miriam laughed in a way that let h
er off the hook. “Anyway, Searcey never got back to me. What’s he like, anyway? Shawn Matthews. I’ve never even seen a photo of him. He seems to keep a low profile.”
Grace tried to picture Shawn Matthews. He was a big man, tall and heavy looking. Not fat, but solid, with tattooed arms and large hands he kept clenching and unclenching, a nervous habit that seemed to be unconscious. He had an ordinary face that was already fuzzy in her memory. Dark skin, shapely lips, thick eyebrows. Black hair cropped close to his head. He wasn’t bad looking, but she doubted she would’ve noticed him in a restaurant or on the street, except that he was black.
And his eyes stood out. She remembered them now, the way they seemed to see right through her.
Paul knocked on the door, scattering her vision. “It’s time,” he said. “We’ll be in the car.”
She was too old for youth group now. She and Miriam sat with their parents, for the main service, the one Paul and Yvonne still attended nearly every Sunday. Grace surveyed the congregation, wondering where all her old church friends had gone. Maybe they’d dropped off over the years, as Miriam had when she was in middle school, as Grace had in college. They weren’t here, in any case. Small blessings, Grace thought.
She should have been overjoyed. Her mother was healing; her family, too. Technically, she owed it to God to be in church—she’d made about a hundred promises after the shooting, pledging eternal faith and gratitude for Yvonne’s deliverance. But as her lips formed around the old hymns, the words of prayer, she found her soul shrinking inside her, seeking refuge from God’s light.
Pastor Kwon was up now. Grace had known him since she was a child, and he always said hi to her when she came to church, usually on Easter. Today’s sermon was on the Parable of the Lost Sheep, and she was pretty sure Kwon-moksanim looked right at her family as he thundered through it.
She remembered why she’d stopped going to church. One of her college friends, Samaya, lost her brother, a senior in high school. He and his friends had been drinking, and he drowned in a swimming pool, sucked under by the pump. Nik was Hindu, insofar as he was anything, and Grace couldn’t stand the idea that he’d died in that pool to wake up in hell. It seemed so arbitrary, all of a sudden—that the shape of your faith could override everything, that the evil might be saved while the innocent were damned.
“The Park family is with us this holy Sunday.” Kwon-moksanim’s voice yanked her to attention. She turned to Miriam, who had a tight smile pasted on her face. “God has given them many trials, but we prayed for them, and He listened.”
There were cries of worship from the congregation. “Ju yo! Amen!”
“They are all here, together, humble before the Lord. It brings the Shepherd joy to see His sheep. Let us welcome them home.”
She folded her hands in her lap and looked down at them, wanting to hide. All these people—they knew who she was, who her mother was; what all of them had suffered and done. It was bad enough bearing their curiosity at the pharmacy, where norms of propriety kept most of them in check. This felt like a punishment—like Pastor Kwon had pushed them onstage, to be heckled and egged.
Then she felt a strong hand patting her left shoulder; another one, on her right, giving her a reassuring squeeze. She glanced at her sister, who had turned to the people behind her, bowing her head in polite greeting. Paul shook hands with an old woman, his face serene. And Yvonne sat tall and waved, acknowledging the attention. Her face bright with feeling.
For the first time all morning, Grace dared to look around.
Uncle Joseph smiled at her, from the other side of her dad, and past him, she recognized more familiar faces. There was Mary Oh, her old Sunday school teacher, and Hyojin Kim, who ran the nail salon across the street from Hanin. She saw Jonah Lee’s mom, who stopped speaking to him when he came out of the closet; Wayne Kang, who’d bankrupted his family with his gambling. One by one, they caught her eye and held it, their gazes fervent with blessing.
She knew they were nasty people, some of them, small-minded and flawed, sinful but quick to judge. Yet together, under this roof, they were one body, huddled in an embrace. No wonder her parents came here. The kindness in their faces—her heart swelled, the goodwill like oxygen after this excruciating week. Grace had never felt so forgiven.
Miriam made dinner: spaghetti with tomato sauce, one of the only things she was good at, and the best any of them could do without Yvonne commanding the stove. When it was ready, Paul led Yvonne to the kitchen; she was tired of taking her meals in bed and insisted on eating at the table.
They sat together, their family whole. Paul said grace, and they started their meal in shy, reverent silence. Grace could feel her mother looking at her, at Miriam, with so much love that it almost embarrassed her.
“This is good,” said Yvonne. “You’re a good cook.”
“It’s just spaghetti and red sauce, Umma. Anyone can make that.”
“I don’t know how to make it.”
Miriam laughed. “Okay, well, I hope you never find out.”
“Blake is lucky to have you cooking for him.”
Grace eyed Miriam, wondering if she would protest. She knew her sister feared being seen as the stay-at-home partner, the underemployed wife making dinner for her successful man. Anyway, Blake was so finicky about his food, he usually did the cooking.
Miriam just smiled and nodded. Even she seemed willing to give Yvonne her peace. It wouldn’t last, Grace understood, but it put her at ease.
“How is Blake?” asked Paul.
“He’s good,” said Miriam. “He sold a pilot to Hulu a couple weeks ago.”
Paul nodded. Grace could see him puzzling out what Miriam had just told him. Pilot. Hulu.
Yvonne smiled, hearing Miriam chatter. “How long have you been with him now?”
“Two years, almost.”
Paul and Yvonne had never met Blake. They’d only heard about him through Grace, when Yvonne pushed her for news on her sister. Grace had been vague and mostly complimentary. They knew he was rich, that he owned a house, and that he and Miriam were probably in love. Her minor reservations, she kept to herself. She had always hoped and believed her mom and sister would make up at some point, and she didn’t want to gunk up the bridge by talking trash.
“Do you think you’ll marry him?” asked Yvonne.
Miriam caught Grace’s eye. Grace bit the inside of her lip, but there was no containing it—the smile broke out of her, and then they were both cracking up. Yvonne glanced from Miriam to Grace and back again, looking stunned and confused but full of guarded pleasure.
Miriam laughed so hard she started coughing. She chugged her glass of water and set it down with a sigh. “Oh, Umma, you’re such a mom. You can barely move and you’re worried I don’t have a husband. You haven’t even met Blake. He could be anybody.”
“You’re thirty-one already. I had both of you by the time I was Grace’s age,” said Yvonne.
It was true, Grace thought. When Yvonne was twenty-seven, she gave birth to her second child. The same year she escaped a prison term and took on a second identity. Grace felt her high mood start to deflate.
“Okay, I’ll be a good girl,” said Miriam. “Yes, we’ve talked about marriage. Don’t worry, Mom. I’m not stupid. I do know I have to think about this stuff if I want to have kids.”
Grace tried to picture them all at a wedding. Miriam in a white gown, Paul walking her down the aisle. Yvonne dabbing her eyes. Grace the maid of honor. Was that in the cards for them? A day of joy and unity?
She sensed it now—the hope and happiness eclipsing the horror; the horror deferring. She wondered if this was how it would be from here on out. Everything in the open, none of it discussed. It was how her parents had lived, after all, for almost thirty years. The girl’s death a terrible incident, but just one moment in their shared history, one they avoided in favor of loving each other and building new and better things. And why not? What else were they supposed to do? Dwell on it for eternity? K
ill themselves? Grace could feel the horror soften its grip on her heart—it couldn’t survive the attrition of everyday life. Miriam was almost normal again, her anger weak and pale beneath the cover of stubbornness, now torn away.
Maybe this was just how the world worked: people forgot awful truths all the time, or at least they forgot to remember. After all, who wanted to think about ugly things?
She remembered Shawn Matthews’s face, clearly now: his taut mouth, his unblinking eyes. Not everyone got to forget. She knew that. But Shawn Matthews was right—Grace hadn’t done anything. So maybe she could move on. Maybe she would be lucky.
Eighteen
Monday, September 2, 2019
It was dark by the time they got the truck back to Northridge, and Shawn was eager to get on the road. Jazz and Monique were at the Holloway house. The kids had the day off from school, so Aunt Sheila had been feeding everyone since lunchtime; she’d promised to save him a plate. His stomach growled. He hadn’t had time to eat anything proper—they were always slammed on Labor Day.
He was steeling himself for the long drive to Palmdale when Manny found him at his locker.
“How was your Extra Labor Day?” asked Manny, grinning as always at his annual joke.
“Extra laborious,” said Shawn.
He closed his locker and turned to his boss. Ulises and Marco had left seconds before Manny appeared, and Shawn suspected he’d been waiting to talk to him.
“You in a hurry?” asked Manny. “Come sit with me a minute.”
Shawn wanted to get back, but he couldn’t put Manny off, not after flaking on his team twice in one week. He followed him to his office, trying to guess what kind of trouble he was in. Manny seemed like his usual self, but then Shawn had never seen what he was like when he was angry or even especially annoyed. There was no way he would fire him, Shawn knew that, but if Manny had stayed late to give him a talking-to, it had to be serious.
