Random Acts of Senseless Violence by Jack Womack Page B

stolen from us. They looked innocent mostly but I knew better. I tried to figure out who looked guiltiest and I finally decided they all looked as guilty as they did innocent.
    While I was thinking about who looked the most guilty a black girl walked over to me. She looked my age and was very dark. She wore tight bike shorts and a dirty sweat shirt with a puppy on the front. When she spoke she didn’t sound like a black girl. ‘Moving in?’ she asked. ‘Yes’ I said. ‘You Columbia?’ she asked. ‘No’ I said. ‘Columbia building’ she said. ‘How do you know?’ I asked. ‘They awning the windows’ she said. The grocery in the bottom floor has a big awning and I guessed that was what she meant. ‘You gonna school here?’ she asked. ‘Public school?’ I asked and she nodded. ‘No I go to Brearley’ I said. ‘Private?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘What’s name?’ she asked. ‘Lola what’s yours?’ ‘Is.’ ‘Is what?’ ‘Is. Isabel. Call me Iz’ she said. ‘Okay.’ Daddy and Man With Van came back downstairs. She looked at them and I saw this big bruise on her neck like somebody hickeyed her. She wore four pairs of earrings and a nose ring and has a mouth so big I bet she could put a whole tomato in at once. ‘He wildeyed too?’ she asked. ‘The van guy?’ She nodded. ‘Not this one. You saw us yesterday?’ ‘Mmhmm’ she said. ‘Man oughta dillinger his ass second heblindside’ she said. ‘What?’ I asked. Iz smiled and held up her hand and made her thumb and finger like it was a gun. She put her finger on my forehead and wiggled her thumb. ‘Dillinger like that’ she said. ‘BaBoom. Later’ she said. Then she turned around and walked up Broadway. Was she bothering you, Daddy asked and I said no not at all. So that was my first conversation with somebody in the neighborhood Anne.
    Today it finally looks almost like somebody lives here. This apartment is so much emptier than our old place even though it’s smaller. We don’t have any rugs here because we put ours in storage, and also the furniture like the dining room table and cupboard. All the pictures we had hanging up are in storage too so we’re going to have to look for posters to put on the wall. Boob in fact did a drawing with crayons this evening before we ate dinner. It’s the four of us sitting in a big yellow square. We’re all smiling and happy. Outside the square are these thick black swirls like in a storm or fire. She showed it to us and then Mama pinned it up on the wall in our room for her.
    Everyone but me went to bed early tonight. I’m staying up not because I’m less tired but because I missed writing you and telling you what happened. Lately it’s so hard to tell if I’ll get the chance to write when I want to what with Boob so close by and so I’ll try to take advantage of every opportunity. It’ll be harder in some ways now. I’m writing this at the kitchen table because I don’t want to wake Boob up by keeping the light on in our room, and I can’t turn the TV on to provide distracting noise because the walls are so thin it’d keep everybody up. Outside I hear siren after siren and loud music. The subway goes by on the el every ten minutes and it’s incredibly noisy. I never knew how quiet our part of town was. I’ll be glad to go to school tomorrow Anne and get away from here.
    Well now we’re all moved in and we’ll see what happens next. Night night.
    * * *
    MARCH 30
    Great start to the week LIE. Boob and I left this morning at eight right after Daddy. We wanted to try to get to school before nine. When do you think we got there? Nine thirty. Everything went wrong of course.
    The bus didn’t come for ten minutes. Then when it finally did it was one of three that showed up