If I Should Die by Grace F. Edwards

home.”
    Outside, Ruffin had been tied to the bus shelter pole. He paced the length of the enclosure and everyone waiting had been forced back several feet. The cool spring air revived me somewhat as it hit my face. We crossed Lenox Avenue and walked slowly past several Sunday morning churchgoers who stared in disgust at my bloodstained sweat suit, uncombed hair, and swollen eyes. Tad, leading me by the hand, did not look much better, and the churchgoers drew their own conclusions, which were easy enough to read: we were nothing but a pair of Saturday night lowlifes who couldn’t take two steps to the corner without pulling a blade on each other. It’s folks like us who gave Harlem a bad name. I could see it in their faces as they edged out of our way. One couple pulled their child close—a small boy with large inquisitive eyes.
     … It’s not what you think. My friend’s life is hanging in the balance. In the balance …
    But there was nothing to make them understand that.
    I unlocked the door and managed to make it past the kitchen, where Dad and Alvin were fixing breakfast. Tad remained in the living room as I headed to my bedroom and changed into another sweat suit. Dad peeked out of the kitchen as I came back downstairs.
    He looked from me to Tad and back again.
    “You folks all right?”
    “We’re okay,” I whispered. “We’ll be better after some coffee.”
    He looked at me again. “Yeah, you better sit down … I’ll bring some cups.”
    Once again, I started to shake and Tad held me until it subsided. I wanted to fall asleep right there in his arms.
    “Take it easy … easy, you hear?”
    I heard but could not answer. Deborah was nearlykilled because of me. I could not answer and could not stop the tears. Dad came in with two large mugs of coffee, looked at me, and placed the tray on the table. Then he frowned at Tad. “Okay. You two look like hell. Want to tell me what’s going on?”
    Two days later I sat by Deborah’s bed and held her hand. I had promised to lay off the case, but Deborah had been my friend before she became “a case.” And even though Dad had acknowledged that I’d probably saved her life, he had been shaken to the core. “When are you going to learn to mind your own business? If that man had had a gun, you’d be dead. And I’d have lost another …” Tears had welled in his eyes and he had stomped out of the room, leaving me wondering if I should have told him anything.
    I looked at Deborah now. Her face was swollen to twice its size and her neck was immobilized, but she lifted my hand to her bandaged throat. No sound came but she recognized me.
    The surgeon said there had been no brain damage despite the blood loss. She recognized me … Thank God. Thank God, I breathed silently, and started to cry again.
    As I left her room, her mother and sister stepped out of the elevator. Mrs. Matthews was a short plump woman of fifty-five, and Deborah’s sister, Martha, was small and slim, a younger version of Deborah. Both women looked as if they had not slept in a week.
    “The police said it was a robbery,” Mrs. Matthews said, “but we can’t figure out what’s missing.”
    “Yes, all her jewelry was still there,” Martha said. “Her fur coat, even her purse had money in it.”
    They had flown in from Washington. Deborah’s father, bedridden for years, was left at home, so Mrs. Matthewshad to return as quickly as possible. Martha, however, planned to remain but she seemed on the verge of a nervous collapse.
    “When my sister’s able to travel, I’m taking her back to Washington to recuperate,” she said. “Why she ever moved into that damn building in the first place is beyond me. She knew its history.”
    I said nothing. Everyone knew its history. Everyone knew that the development had been built by a major life insurance company several years ago as a compromise—after a long court battle—to keep black folks from darkening the door of their