Dutch Read Free

Her mama said he was just standing on the corner waiting for the bus. I ain’t goin’ out
     there,” said Arnette, shaking her head. “Why don’t you go out there?” she asked Delores right back, leaning away and folding
     her arms across her breasts as screams of sirens filled the room and an ambulance sped down the block. “Ain’t no telling who’s
     in there,” said Arnette warning Delores of what evils lurked outside.
    Delores wanted to know firsthand what was goin’ on even though she feared what was on the other side of the door. She turned
     on her heel and grabbed her coat on her way out the bedroom door.
    “Where you going?” asked Arnette nervously.
    The slamming door answered her question. Delores was out the house in a flash. However, the moment she set foot on the cold
     street concrete, she knew she had made a mistake. For one moment, she turned around, ready to dash back into the safety of
     Arnette’s apartment, but deep inside something stopped her and she felt calm and her fears diminished. She headed up the block,
     stepping over trampled garments, bloodstained debris, and smashed and destroyed merchandise. She noticed an abandoned soldier’s
     helmet lying next to a smashed TV.
Good for ’em!
she thought as she bent over to pick it up like some trophy, but quickly pulled her hand back, realizing it was soaked in
     blood.
    She gasped for breath as she looked up to see a woman haulin’ ass down the street toward her with an armful of frozen chickens.
    “Baby, don’t go up there! Them soldiers is locking up everybody they can catch,” the woman informed her as she strained with
     her arms full.
    “Ain’t you comin’ from there?” Delores asked, wanting to say,
Why you ain’t locked up?
    “They ain’t catch me, baby,” the woman said with a rebellious chuckle as she continued home with her chickens, thinkin’ about
     dinnertime.
    Well, they ain’t catchin’ me neither,
thought Delores.
    As she turned the corner onto Springfield a crowd of people were gathered in a circle around a man lying on the ground. Delores
     walked up a little closer, maneuvering through the crowd, getting close enough to see that the man lying on the ground was
     clutching a bottle of Thunderbird wine. People were trying to identify him but his face was beaten badly and drenched in blood,
     making him unrecognizable to the community.
    “Is he dead?” a small, girlish voice ventured from the crowd.
    “Who is he?” asked an old woman in a housecoat looking for her son whom she hadn’t seen or heard from since the riots broke
     out.
    “He don’t look like he’s movin’ to me,” said an old homeless man known as Willie.
    “Call an ambulance,” shouted Delores to Willie.
    “An ambulance! Shit, girl, you think an ambulance gonna come over here if we calling for ’em?” questioned some chick wearing
     a fire-red wig, fire-red high heels, and a skintight dress to match.
Look at this broad, looking like Ms. Kitty from
Gunsmoke, thought Delores to herself as she smiled at the woman.
    “I think this nigga just drunk,” someone added.
    “Or dead,” chimed Ms. Kitty.
    “Or both,” said Willie, shaking his head, as the crowd burst into laughter and began to disperse in different directions,
     leaving Delores standing alone, still staring down at the man’s lifeless body. She had never seen a dead body, at least not
     in the middle of the street, and she wondered how people could find such a sight funny.
    She turned away as she saw the small grocery store on the corner she knew all too well. It seemed untouched, just sitting
     there in the midst of all the rubble and surrounding destruction.
    Sirens wailed, gunshots rang, and people could be heard shouting and cursing as they looted the streets. Yet the store sat
     serenely and intact by itself as if it were in another place. She made her way across the street and closer to the dark and
     deserted store. She saw signs plastered over the windows that