We Rip the World Apart

Kareela

I step out of the BLM headquarters and into the sun. Sweat beads on my brow, and despite the oppressive heat, I decide to walk the thirty minutes to our apartment. As I stride along Gottingen, an elderly man tilts his head, taking the time, despite my obvious rush, to give the nod. I return it with a small smile, my shoulders releasing ever so slightly, my pace slowing.

As I cross streets, moving closer and closer to home, farther away from the North End, the Black and Brown faces fade and that part of myself fades, too. I’m less likely to nod or wave or smile at the people I pass—whether I recognize them or not. A buzz in my pocket makes me jump and I pull out the phone, see the words from Thomas.

There. It’s all yours. I’m gone.

His message stops me midstride. And just like that, all my decisiveness from just moments ago swirls away like dirty dishwater. If I still want him, I should type:

I’m sorry.

Don’t go.

We’ll figure it out.

I should call him, tell him I can’t have this baby, but I can have him, want him. That we’ll have another baby when we’re ready. We’ll get the house and the dog. We’ll exchange rings. But I stifle a sob and slide the phone back in my pocket, almost certain too much damage has been done.

By the time I arrive home, I’m drenched. I drop my bag beside our dining table, peel off my T-shirt, and let the air hit my moist skin.

I walk through a quiet that has never seemed so loud, surveying the empty spots in our apartment—my apartment, for the time being—and grab a tank top from our too-bare closet.

I’ve never lived alone. Never taken the time to decide for myself how I like things done. Never considered who I am outside of others’ expectations of me.

Not wanting to unpack these thoughts, I sink to the chair beside my bag, reach for my laptop, and open up my case files. The light shifts as I read and make notes, stretch my neck, rub the small of my back, continue on. I rise for tea and some breakfast cookies Thomas must have made—my favorite. When the doorbell sounds, I tap my phone, see that almost three hours have passed. Pain slices at the thought of Thomas returning for something he forgot—ringing the doorbell instead of coming right in.

The chime sounds again, and I rise from my seat, step through our door, down the shared stairwell, and then pull open the outer door to see Carson. “Wha—what are you—” I stutter and step back. “How do you know where I live?”

He shrugs, looking sheepish. “Jasmine. Can I come in?”

I step aside to let him in. Upstairs, our cozy apartment seems smaller with him in it. “Nice place.” He smiles, and the sheepishness is gone. “Reminds me of our first apartment, Rania and me. Though this is bigger.” He shakes his head, his smile one of tender reminiscence. “Twenty-one, a baby on the way, just dropped out of uni—disappointing everyone who thought I’d be the first to get a degree. To get that money. That respect.”

My brows furrow. “You dropped out?”

He nods.

“Well, anyway, I guess you didn’t need it.” I step back, wishing I didn’t let him in. Wishing he would leave. Or that I could. “Don’t you have your own construction company?”

He nods. “That learning didn’t come from school. My dad is a carpenter. He wanted something more for me. So did I. He knew history was my love.”

“History?” I direct him to the table. My body tenses as I imagine why he is here, what he’s about to ask.

“Yep. I was going to be Professor Downey. Dr. Downey. Would have had a nice ring to it.”

“What happened?”

“A pregnant girlfriend, then wife. A need to pay the bills. To make sure at least one of us got to follow our dreams. It made more sense it was her.” He shakes his head, the smile still there, but slighter. “It was a constant fight, anyway, a constant struggle. The history I wanted to tell wasn’t the history enough people wanted to learn. Once Rania got her degree, started working, she wanted me to go back. But I decided I could make more of a difference as I was, at a job that would allow me the time and freedom to enact change, rather than merely teach the past.”

“BLM?”

“You got it.” He taps his fist on the table. “The past is important. I’m actually writing a book of Black history in Atlantic Canada, but the future—”

“Wait, what?” I interrupt him. “With all you’ve got going on, you’re writing a history book?”

He laughs. “It’s slow going. But as I was saying, the future—that’s my core focus. That’s what’s going to make the difference for my kids. For yours—” He gestures.

I lean back, my body instantly tensing. “You know?”

“I have three of my own, could see the signs.”

I nod, hating that he knows rather than suspects, hating that this secret isn’t one any longer.

“So whether you keep this child or have ones in your future, they’re who I’m fighting for, who I hope we’re all fighting for.”

“Which is why you’re here.” The pressure I feel, the frustration and betrayal—that this is why he’s been so kind to me—leaks into my voice. “To make me the face of the movement.”

He frowns. “I don’t know that I’d say it like that.”

I straighten, shoulders back, ready, at last, to listen to Gran, to stop being the person others want me to be.

“Rania told me not to come. She said if you wanted to speak, you would. And if you didn’t, we should leave you be.” He taps his fist again. “And maybe she’s right. But you showed up tonight.”

“Then left.”

“Which is why I’m here.”

“To convince me?”

“To talk.” He leans forward. “It’s your choice, . And I understand if you’re tired of this being your life. I’m tired. We’re all tired.”

I raise a brow at him, waiting.

“I understand if you’re afraid. Is that it?” I cross my arms and look to the ceiling.

“How could you not be? Of course you’re afraid.”

“It’s more than that.” I bring my gaze back to him, thinking of the promise. “It’s more complicated than you could imagine. My mother, for one.”

“It would bring things up?”

“To say the least.” The promise I’ve already broken. But this…“She’s white.”

“I know.”

“How do you—” Right. The file. “Anyway, she’s not like the white people who come to meetings. She’s not an ally. Not in that way. She…she wants nothing to do with any of it. Rallying. Protests. Which makes sense, given—” I stop. “But even before, I don’t think she wanted Antony to have anything to do with it. My father certainly didn’t, which is even crazier. And now that—”

“Not really.”

I hesitate. “Not really, what?”

“They came from Jamaica in 1980, right? At the height of political unrest, urban warfare, people dying in the streets, the people who did get out having to start anew with nothing.”

I stare at him, unnerved he knows more about my parents’ apparent history than I do.

He leans in, his tone softening. “It was rough there, . Your parents never talked about it? What they went through…saw? They were living in Kingston, right?”

“Do you have a PI on me or something?”

“No!” He laughs. “The year they immigrated, it was in the full report. That they were from Kingston, that your mom was a white woman from Nova Scotia before that. I didn’t ask for it. It was just there. And the rest…I’m a Black history enthusiast, remember? I know what it was probably like for them. Over eight hundred people were murdered. The city was terrorized. Almost everyone affected. Afraid to walk out their front doors, losing friends, neighbors, family.”

A wave of dizziness overtakes me. Had they lost more than Antony? Heat floods my cheeks.

“So I get why she’d be afraid,” continues Carson. “Especially now. But even before. I get why you would be. Just remember, this isn’t Toronto. This isn’t the US. It’s not perfect here. I’m not saying that. There’d be risk, but the rally will be televised. We won’t be breaking any laws. We won’t be rioting. It’ll be peaceful. It’ll—”

“And what about after?” My voice squeezes. Aunt Ella. I’ve heard little about her—from Mom, from Gran—but enough that Carson’s words have knitted what little I know together, that, like Antony, she must have died standing up for what she believed in or been killed in the crossfires. “What about the people who aren’t peaceful?” Anger and fear builds to a crescendo as I see those boys around me, their eyes. The officers’ eyes. “The people who’ll see me and know. See me and hate—”

Carson lays his hand on mine. “Those people hate you, anyway. What about the people who see you, hear you, and are convinced? What about the possibility for change?”

I yank my hand away as blood rushes through my ears. “They hate in general. You’re asking me to become the face they hate. To have them see me as not just another Black woman, but the Black woman who’s trying to disarm and defund the police. To become the focus of their hatred.”

He leans back. “You have a point. That’s possible. Though it’s not likely they’d do anything physical about it. Not here. Not now. But it is possible.”

“Yes.” I push back from the table, thinking of how I didn’t stand over two years ago, when it could have made a difference to my father, how, now that he’s gone, now that I’ve lost the chance to do this with him, it makes even less sense to speak. “It’s possible. And you brought that possibility on yourself, on your family. But my family has had enough.” My voice shakes as I see my dad on that couch, empty bottles around him, limbs contorted, lifeless. “I’ve had enough. I’m not Antony. And I don’t want to be.” I stand, my breath heavy, the fear heavy, weighted with the grief of that image, which will forever live in my mind. I wait for Carson to say something. But he’s doing that trick again. Waiting. Listening. “I won’t be your spokesperson,” I spew, my hands shaking, now, too. “I’ll work with you, for you—”

“For all of us.”

I turn from him, my gut twisting. I know he’s right, that my story, Antony’s, would be the most powerful story they have, the strongest example of how broken and inherently racist the system is.

My face—my light-skinned face—will make people more apt to listen than if Carson were to tell this story, with his dark skin, his broad shoulders and muscled arms. The Black man—whose kindness, intelligence, they don’t open their eyes to see.

I shake my head, pacing. “I don’t want people stopping me in the street, the grocery store, knowing I’m Antony Jackson’s sister.”

The Black man—who epitomizes their fears, embodies their ideas of danger, demon, who is safest behind bars, or not breathing at all.

“I don’t want his death to become my identity.” To end up like him…or like Aunt Ella.

Carson’s face softens, and I see something—pity?—in his eyes. “But it is your identity.”

I stop pacing. “It’s not.”

“It is.” His smile, his voice, is gentle. “A part of it, anyway, a big part. Everything in your life, every pain, every major event, it all connects to Antony’s murder. I saw it the first time I saw you, standing in the crowd at the rally. That hurt, that scar—it’s a part of you, .”

My brows tense, my eyes hot and wet, but I don’t blink, don’t let a tear fall. Who is this man who thinks he knows me? My fists clench. Thinks he can tell me my own life? I open my mouth to tell him he’s wrong, that Antony doesn’t define me, except—my mouth closes, my chest rises, then falls—he does.

“Even the career you chose. Where you chose it. Working in a province whose history is more rife with anti-Black racism, with tense Black/white relations, than any in the entire country. In a neighborhood that epitomizes it. That wasn’t an accident, .”

My fists unfurl.

“The best way to heal,” says Carson, standing, “to make meaning out of this kind of loss, is to not let his death be for nothing. Yes, I’m asking you to do this for the movement. But that’s not why I’m here, invading your privacy. I’m here for you. Because this is how you can take this tragedy, which has defined you, and turn it around, define yourself. You came to the rally, the meetings. You’ve been giving of your time, your energy. You’re the one who’s shown you wanted to take this tragedy and turn it into something else, in the hope, I imagine, that others won’t have to face the same pain.”

“You’re wrong,” I spout. “It didn’t have anything to do with that. I just wanted…wanted…” I look to the floor, my shoulders heaving, determined that my life can be about more than Antony without doing what he says. “Somewhere to belong. For once in my life, somewhere to belong.” That was why I broke the promise, took the risk that brought me to this moment. “It wasn’t about Antony. It wasn’t even about helping. It was about having a community. Not always feeling so split, so on the outside. It was about…” I breathe and look up. “It was about me. Only me.”

He nods and lifts his hands, palms out. “All right. You know you. And if that’s your why, fine. I’ll take it.” He stands and steps toward me, places his hands on my shoulders. “And you belong, .” My chest fills. “You are one of us.” My lungs a balloon too big for this small cavity.

The door handle clicks. Our heads snap toward it and the balloon deflates, taking that brief feeling of hope and fear and joy with it.

Eyes wide with hurt and the anger of betrayal, Thomas looks from Carson to me. Me to Carson. His shoulders square as Carson’s hands fall from my exposed skin. Thomas is not short. But next to Carson’s height and broad frame, he looks it. His gaze meets mine. “Is this why?”

My brain seems to short-circuit as it switches from these last minutes with Carson to Thomas’s question, to what he could mean, and then suddenly, it clicks. “No! No, that’s not…no.”

“Who are you?” Thomas turns to Carson. “What are you doing here?”

Carson extends his hand. “Carson Downey. I know from the Black Lives Matter meetings.” Thomas looks at the hand but doesn’t take it. Carson draws it back. “I just stopped by to talk to about an upcoming rally, but I’ll be leaving now.” He turns to me, probably thinking Thomas is some jealous monster, no way of knowing why Thomas is thinking what he’s thinking. “, there is no one in this city whose words would mean more than yours, would have more power, but with all you’ve been through, I understand if you don’t want to share that power. Because you’re right, it is a risk.” He smiles. “You’re doing good work. Whether it’s with us or not, and on whatever level you’d like it to be, I’m sure you always will.” He steps back, one foot, two, approaching the door. “Just think on it. The rally’s not for a couple of months. If you change your mind, great. If you don’t, great. Just don’t stay away because of what I’ve asked. Most of all, we want you, not your story. You have a community with us. A family.” He stops, his smile deepening. “I mean that, . You belong. Always.”

I nod, but don’t speak, my throat tight. Uncertainty pounding. Because I’m no longer sure how true my words are, what the full reason was that kept me going back.

“Nice to meet you, brother.” Carson steps forward to clamp Thomas’s shoulder, and Thomas’s entire body tenses as he shrugs off the touch. After a sidelong glance at Thomas, Carson looks at me. “Are you okay? Should I stay?”

I shake my head, but that doesn’t seem enough to make him move. “Go,” I say. “I’m fine. And thank you.” With another wary look toward Thomas, Carson nods, then steps to the door.

Once he’s gone, Thomas turns to me. “What the hell was that?”

“Nothing.” Exhaustion floods me.

“It was not nothing. What was he asking you? What did he want?”

I hesitate, unsure how to explain. “To talk at a rally, about Antony, about…” I shake my head, weighted by all the reasons I can’t share my story, but all the reasons I should, why I want to. “You wouldn’t understand.”

Thomas steps back, the emotions crossing his face even more pained than the ones when he walked through the door. “Maybe I could,” he says, “if you’d open up. Give me a chance. Hurt, betrayal, fear, they don’t just belong to you, . You’re not the only one.”

Regret slaps me. “Thomas, I—”

“Nah.” He scrunches his face, anger brimming behind the moisture in his eyes. “Forgot my laptop.” He crosses the room, then reaches for the drawer under the coffee table. He’s just about to pass me when he stops. “Figure out your shit, . Figure out what you want.” He pauses, his Adam’s apple working, his body so tense he reminds me of a jack-in-the-box just before it pops. “Or those choices will be made for you.”

The door closes gently, and I almost wish Thomas had slammed it. Wish I had a reason to feel anger toward him: for his unreasonableness, for demanding that I make a decision I feel unready to make. But he’s right. I need to make it. Have the baby, or don’t. Each is a choice I don’t know how I’ll live with, each is one that will define my life going forward.

The way Carson’s request would define it. And if I decide to go ahead with one of these choices before me, how could I possibly go ahead with the other? If I have this baby, I could go to the rallies, help behind the scenes. But it’s hard enough to be a mother in this world, let alone a Black mother—or at least visibly so. To be BLM’s spokesperson as well, to add any more reason to fear, would be beyond foolish. Self-harm at its finest.

I sink to the chair, look to my open laptop—all those files representing all those lives, each with their own trauma—and feel ill-equipped to help anyone right now. I slouch, the load of all these decisions depleting me.

Carson was right. Whether I like it or not, whether I want to admit it or not, Antony’s death has determined my identity, influencing almost every choice I’ve ever made. Gran told me not to change any part of myself to make others comfortable—the way my father obviously had, with his speech, his clothing, his refusal, until those last days, to try to stand up to the way people treated us. But after those boys made me realize how easily Antony’s fate could become mine, I understood my father’s actions. I became a chameleon: being accepted, finding places to belong, seemed pivotal to my survival.

I think to the flat iron and how it took two years of living in Halifax before I had the courage to stop using it, to the clothes my mother purchased at the local department store that never felt like me, but made me more like them—the girls in my class who became my friends, who welcomed me in when I stopped caring about who I was but molded myself to who I thought they wanted me to be, who my mother wanted me to become before she stopped bothering to care: a person who seemed less at risk.

I think of Thomas, of how I observed him in those early days, molded my preferences to his: dancing along to electronica, pretending it was something I could enjoy; keeping track of upcoming superhero movies and seeing them all in the theater, a tub of popcorn between us; following tennis, and true-crime shows—acting interested and involved, while baffled that people wanted to expose themselves to such sadness and depravity when life has more than enough.

Even the BLM volunteering, as I just revealed to Carson, was more about wanting a community and acceptance than about passion for the cause—about making them believe I was interested, so they’d be interested in me. Yet somewhere along the way…

I’m pacing again, desperate for some outlet for all this coiled energy, needing to make at least one decision—one choice—for me. And from that choice, hopefully, others will come—like falling dominoes, forcing me to figure out my life: Who I am. Who I want to be. I pull out the pamphlet on abortion the doctor gave me, stare at the number. This is it. I’ll make this decision, and then I won’t falter. It’s like Thomas said, if seeing that image on the screen, hearing that heartbeat didn’t make up my mind, what will? I continue to stare at the number, my own heart beating almost as fast as the baby’s did. One true decision. A choice based entirely on what I want for my life.

I stuff the pamphlet in my purse and dial.