Tana reached out to him with her heart and her words, and the gentleness of her voice. “I'd have done the same thing in your shoes.”

He shrugged and looked away, and a while later they went for a walk and talked about other things, Freeman Blake, Sharon, Tana's classes at Green Hill, and then suddenly out of the blue, Harry took her hand. “Thanks for what you said before.” She knew instantly what he meant. They had that kind of rapport, had from the moment they first met.

“It's okay.” She squeezed his hand, and they walked on, and she was amazed at how comfortable she was with him. He didn't push her at all, didn't ask her anymore why she didn't go out with anyone. He seemed to accept her as she was, and she was grateful to him for that. She was grateful to him for a lot of things, for the way he saw life, for the fun they had, the sense of humor that always made her laugh. It felt wonderful to have someone to share her thoughts with.

He was almost like a sounding board for everything she had in her head, and she was particularly grateful for that when she went back to Green Hill. When she saw Sharon again, it was as though her family had sent someone else instead, and all of her moderate political ideas had disappeared. She had attended a series of rallies and sit-ins with her mother and her friends, and suddenly she was as rabid as Miriam Blake was. Tana couldn't believe the change that had taken place, and finally, after listening to her for two days, Tana turned to her and screamed.

“For chrissake, Shar, what's happened to you? This room has been like a political rally ever since we got back. Get off your soapbox, girl. What the hell has happened to you?” Sharon just sat there and stared and suddenly the tears flooded her eyes and she bowed her head, the sobs choked her and her shoulders shook and it was almost half an hour before she could speak, as Tana watched her in astonishment. Something terrible had happened to the girl, but it was impossible to say what it was. She held her and rocked her, and at last Sharon spoke, as Tana's heart went out to her.

“They killed Dick on Easter Eve, Tan … they killed him … he was fifteen years old … and he was hanged.…” Tana felt instantly sick. That couldn't be. That didn't happen to people one knew … to blacks … to anyone … but she could see on Sharon's face that it was true, and when she called Harry that night, she cried when she told him the news.

“Oh my God … I heard something about it in school, that the son of an important black had been killed, but it didn't click … shit.…” He had been Sharon's brother, and barely more than a child.

“Yeah.” Tana's heart felt like lead. And when her mother called her later that week, she still sounded depressed.

“What's the matter, sweetheart? Did you and Harry have a fight?” She was trying a new tack, she was going to pretend to herself and Tana that it was a romance and maybe the idea would take, but Tana didn't have any patience with her and she was instantly blunt.

“My roommate's brother died.”

“Oh, how terrible…” Jean sounded horrified. “In an accident?”

There was a long pause as Tana weighed her words … No, Mom, he was hanged, you see he's black.… “Sort of.” Wasn't death always an accident? Who expected it?

“Tell her how sorry I am. Those are the people you spent Thanksgiving with, aren't they?”

“Yes.” Tana's voice sounded flat and dead.

“That's just terrible.”

Tana couldn't stand talking to her anymore. “I've got to go, Mom.”

“Call me in a few days—”

“I'll try.” She cut her off and hung up. She didn't want to talk to anyone, but she and Sharon were talking again late into the night. Suddenly everything in Sharon's life had changed. She had even contacted the local black church, and she was helping to organize sit-ins on weekends for the remainder of the spring. “Do you think you should, Shar?”

Sharon looked angrily at her. “Is there a choice anymore? I don't think there is.” There was anger in her soul now, an anger that nothing would help, a fire that no love could quench. They had killed the little boy she had grown up with. “… and he was always such a pain in the ass.…” She laughed through her tears one night as they talked in the dark. “… He was so much like Mom, and now … and now…” She gulped her sobs down, and Tana went to sit on her bed. It went on like that every night, either talking about marches elsewhere in the South, or sit-ins in town, or Dr. Martin Luther King, it was as though she wasn't really there anymore, and by midterms she was panicking. She hadn't done any studying at all. She was a bright girl, but she was desperately afraid now that she was going to flunk. Tana helped her as much as she could, sharing notes, underlining her books for her, but she didn't have much hope, and Sharon's mind was on the sit-in she had organized in Yolan for the following week. The townspeople had already complained about her twice to the Dean of Green Hill, but because of who her father was, they had only called her in and talked to her. They understood what a strain she was under, after her brother's, er … unfortunate “accident,” but she had to behave herself nonetheless, and they didn't want her causing trouble in town anymore.

“You better lay off, Shar. They're going to kick you out of school if you don't stop.” Tana had warned her more than once, but it was something she couldn't change now. She had no choice. It was something she had to do, and the night before the big sit-in in Yolan she turned to Tana just before they turned off the lights and there was something so intense in her eyes that it almost frightened Tana as she looked at her. “Is something wrong?”

“I want to ask you a favor, and I won't be mad if you say no. I promise, so do whatever you want. Is that a deal?”

“Okay. What's up?” Tana just prayed that she didn't want her to cheat on a test.

“Reverend Clarke and I were talking today, at the church, and I think it would make a big difference if there were whites involved in the sit-in tomorrow in town. We're going to walk into the white church.”

“Holy shit.” Tana looked shocked, and Sharon grinned.

“That's about right.” The two girls exchanged a smile. “Dr. Clarke is going to see who he can get, and I … I don't know … maybe it's wrong, but I wanted to ask you. But if you don't want to, Tan, don't.”

“Why would they get upset if I walk into their church? I'm white.”

“Not if you walk in with us, you're not. That makes you white trash, or worse. If you walk in holding my hand, standing between me and Reverend Clarke or another black … that's different, Tan.”

“Yeah,” she felt a twinge of fear in her gut, but she also wanted to help her friend, “I guess I can see that.”

“What do you think?” Sharon looked her square in the eye and Tana did the same.

“Honestly? I'm scared.”

“So am I. I always am.” And then very gently, “So was Dick. But he went. And I'm going too. I'm going to go every time I can for the rest of my life now, until things change. But it's my fight, Tana, not yours. If you come, you come as my friend. And if you don't come, I love you anyway.”

“Thanks. Can I think about it tonight?” She knew that it could have repercussions if it got back to the school, and she didn't want to jeopardize her scholarship for the following year. She called Harry late that night, but he was out, and she woke up the next morning at dawn, thinking about going to church when she was a little girl, and things her mother had said about all people being the same in God's eyes, the rich, the poor, the white, the black, everyone, and then she thought about Sharon's brother Dick, a fifteen-year-old child, hanged until he died, and when Sharon turned over in bed as the sun came up, Tana was waiting for her.

“Sleep okay?”

“More or less.” She sat up on the edge of the bed and stretched.

“You getting up?” There was a question in Sharon's eyes, and Tana smiled.

“Yeah. We're going to church today, aren't we?” And with that Sharon grinned broadly at her friend. She hopped out of bed, and gave her a hug and a kiss and a victorious smile.

“I'm so glad, Tan.”

“I don't know if I am, but I think it's the right thing to do.”

“I know it is.” It was going to be a long, bloody fight, but Sharon would be there, and Tana, just this once. She put on a simple blue cotton shirtdress, the color of the sky, brushed her long blond hair into a sleek ponytail, put her loafers on, and they walked into town side by side.

“Going to church, girls?” the housemother had smilingly asked and both had answered yes. They both knew that she had meant different ones, but Tana went to the black church with Sharon where they met Dr. Clarke and a small crowd of ninety-five blacks and eleven whites. They were told to stay calm, to smile if it seemed appropriate, but not if it would provoke anyone, and to remain silent no matter what anyone said to them. They were to hold hands and to enter the church solemnly and respectfully, in groups of five. Sharon and Tana were to remain together. There was another white girl with them, and two black men, both burly and tall, and they told Tana on the way to the other church that they worked at the mill. They were hardly older than the girls, but both were married, one had three children, the other four, and they didn't seem to question her being there. They called her Sister, and just before they walked into the church, the five companions exchanged a nervous smile. And then quietly, they stepped inside. It was a small Presbyterian church on the residential side of town, heavily attended every Sunday, with a Sunday school that was well filled, and as the black faces began to file in, every man and woman in the church turned around. There was a look of complete shock on everyone, the organ stopped, one woman fainted, another began to scream, and within a matter of moments all hell broke loose, the minister began to shout, someone ran to call the police, and only Dr. Clarke's volunteers remained calm, standing solidly along the back wall, causing no trouble at all, as people turned and jeered, hurled insults at them, even though they were in church. Within moments the town's tiny squad of riot police had arrived. They had been recently trained for the sit-ins that had begun to occur and were mostly composed of highway patrolmen, but they began to push and shove and drag the uncooperating black bodies out, as they made themselves limp, and allowed themselves to be dragged away, and suddenly Tana realized what was happening to them. She was next, this was not happening to a remote “them,” it was happening to “us” and to her, and suddenly two enormous policemen hovered over her, and grabbed her roughly by both arms waving their sticks in her face.