Every Time a Rainbow Dies by Rita Williams-Garcia Page B

said, “No one claimed his body. I doubt if they will claim these tings.”
    Thulani expected as much from his brother. He combed through the garbage heap to find a bunch ofletters that had been thrown into the pile earlier. He sorted through what envelopes he could find, setting aside two with recent postmark dates. He would pack up the pictures, minus the schoolyard photo, and send them off to the person who had written to Mr. Dunleavy last.
    Truman tossed a kidney-shaped chestnut brown leather case onto the heap. Thulani had to investigate.
    â€œYou’re supposed to bag this junk, not play with it.”
    Just as Truman could turn Thulani off, Thulani could do the same to Truman. He unbuckled the leather case. The letters ED were embossed in its leather above the huge brass buckle. Edmund Dunleavy.
    Inside the case were a camera and a lens. It was a thirty-five millimeter, but not like the new ones he had seen in stores. This one was encased in metal, not plastic, and the lens was separate from the camera. He attached the lens, then raised the camera to the light to look through the viewfinder.
    â€œIt’s junk,” Truman said. “It doesn’t work.”
    Nonetheless Thulani set the camera aside with the box of photographs, the letters, and the schoolyard photo.
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    It continued to rain throughout the week. Thulani’s birds did not care much for the April rain, but he liked itjust fine. The rain cleared the air when he ran through the park or stood on his roof. It made the fruit in the market smell strong. It was raining, but not hard, when he saw her among the green mangoes. Actually he saw her skirt first. Multicolored stars, planets, and comets against a black background.
    Mr. Moon sighed. Yeeeh .
    Thulani made his way to the mangoes, where she waited for him. He knew this because she did not avert her eyes as he approached.
    â€œHey,” he said.
    â€œHello.”
    He was stuck for something to say and could only look at her.
    She said, “Don’t look at me like you miss me. You don’t miss me. You have a girlfriend the next day. I know.”
    He blushed. “You—”
    â€œOh, yeh, I see you. And her. I said, ‘Good for him.’”
    â€œIs that what you said?”
    â€œAnd I said, ‘Let him worry her to death.’”
    A woman shoved a bunch of grapes at him. He weighed them and handed the bunch to the woman without really looking at her. Mr. Moon grunted.
    â€œI’m sorry if I worried you to death,” he told hersarcastically. “I only cared about you. Wanted to be your friend.”
    â€œFriend. Ha.”
    â€œYou invited me into your house.”
    â€œIt was late. Cold. What, I’m rude? You think I’d say, ‘Go home, boy, in the cold?’”
    â€œOh,” he said. “It was cold and you were polite. You weren’t glad to see me.”
    â€œWhat you want me to say? ‘Yes, Tulani, I’m so happy you came to my house with flowers’?”
    â€œWas that so hard?”
    â€œLook, I didn’t want to like you. But there you are with your flowers. Tiny, little flowers with no smell. I don’t want to like no one that way. You don’t understand. I have things to do. I’m trying to graduate early. Get into a top design school. Boyfriends don’t care about that. They want girlfriends to do this. Be here. Don’t do that. They say, ‘My girlfriend doesn’t wear this. My girlfriend wear what I tell her.’”
    He also remembered that night in her home. Seeing her sketches of the carnival dancer’s body. A barely clothed body that was Ysa’s, glistening in gold, red, and blue. For a second he saw her body, nude and bleeding. For more than a second he wanted her even when he should not.
    â€œThat sketch…it showed too much,” he said. “Ididn’t want to share you with no one.”
    â€œHa. I didn’t want to share my