Every Time a Rainbow Dies Read Free

mother’s voice say, “Still yourself.”
    Thulani slowed to a trot, then a brisk walk, and none too soon. Up ahead he made out the distinct crawl of a blue-and-white in the next block. Spending his days on his rooftop did not make him ignorant of the streets below. He had seen enough to know how to carry himself and was determined to pass without being stopped by cops looking for a suspect.
    The patrol car broke left on Nostrand. Thulani slid his hands in his pockets and tried to walk casually in case he was being watched. This was not easy, as he felt he looked guilty to anyone who saw him. Especially to the girl who would not stop hitting him, the old woman who cursed him in her language, and to the eyes that peeped out from behind curtains. Guilty.
    She had to know that he had watched. That he could have been there thirty seconds sooner. That maybe she hadn’t had to take that last punch. Her eye wouldn’t be swollen, her lip busted up. She wouldn’t have had to take so much from them if he had come down off the roof at her first scream. Why else would she continue to hit him when he told her to stop?
    He was exhausted but not ready to come home. Home was where he settled, and he was far from doing that. He took President Street, which was still lively with people, then walked two blocks, where there was no one. When his head began to clear somewhat, and the images that haunted him were not as sharp, one thought occurred to him: They’re still out there. They had to have seen him, even if it was dark.
    Thulani turned into Kingston, then thought, What makes you think they’re not on Kingston?
    He turned down Bedford.
    What makes you think they’re not on Bedford? They could be packing. If they could rape her, they could just as easily shoot me.
    Then he heard it again: “Still yourself.”
    Thulani turned up Prospect Place and told himself, What will be, will be. If he had to step to them, he would. He had no one to back him up besides his brother, Truman, and Thulani didn’t carry anything to defend himself. For all the good it did him, he had fourteen birds on a rooftop and, to his surprise, some heart.
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    Thulani returned to his block on Eastern Parkway, back to everything familiar. Even so, he could not go inside his house. He was drawn to the alley and had to see the place where it happened. He looked down upon the spotwhere he had found her, knelt, and touched the rough ground where she had lain on her back. Though he could not see it, he knew her blood was on the street, perhaps where he ran his hand.
    To look at it, a strip between a Chinese takeout place and a barbershop, there was no trace of a crime scene. Just a place from which you’d naturally turn your gaze. A place where men took a piss in broad daylight and sanitation workers collected garbage from the Dumpster in the early hours.
    Even though he was not one to throw himself before people, he felt he should tell someone that a girl had been raped where he stood. But whom would he tell? Could he open his mouth and have sense come out? All through school teachers had implored him to speak up or speak clearly. Talking was not his favorite thing.
    He stood up and dusted off the grit from his hands on his shorts. It was then that he saw some figure billowing up from the ground on the side of the Dumpster. He approached it carefully, for it seemed alive. Thulani grabbed the moving thing. His fingers discovered it was merely a piece of cloth.
    The thin material slid through his fingers like silk, but it wasn’t silk. It was a fine cotton. Almost sheer. He couldn’t imagine why this fine cloth had been thrown away. When he held it up to the sky, he could see by theway the bottom danced in the breeze that it was a skirt.
    Instantly he knew it was hers. He thought it was the kind of thing she would wear, though he did not know her at all. He pictured her wearing it.
    He opened the skirt fully. It was a