Come Home Safe


 
 
 
 
 BLINK
 Come Home Safe
 Copyright © 2023 by Brian G. Buckmire
 Requests for information should be addressed to:
 Blink, 3900 Sparks Dr. SE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49546
 ISBN 978-0-310-14218-8 (hardcover)
 ISBN 978-0-310-14223-2 (audio download)
 ISBN 978-0-310-14222-5 (ebook)
 Epub Edition JANUARY 2023 9780310142225
 Publisher’s Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. All characters are fictional, and any similarity to people living or dead is purely coincidental.
 No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.
 Cover Design: Micah Kandros
 Interior Design: Denise Froehlich
 Printed in the United States of America
 
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 Information about External Hyperlinks in this ebook
 Please note that the endnotes in this ebook may contain hyperlinks to external websites as part of bibliographic citations. These hyperlinks have not been activated by the publisher, who cannot verify the accuracy of these links beyond the date of publication
 
 
 IN MEMORY OF OLIVE REID
 May these words help keep children safe, as
 your words continue to keep your children
 safe, and their children, and theirs.
 
 Contents
 
 
 Cover
 Title Page
 Copyright
 Contents
 Part 1: Come Home Safe: From the Subway
 
 Chapter 1: It’s Easier to Build Than Repair
 Chapter 2: A Mutual Network You Can’t Escape
 Chapter 3: When You Make Up Your Mind, Fear Diminishes
 Chapter 4: These Men Ask for Fairness and Only Fairness
 Chapter 5: It’s Not Your Inferiority, It’s Their Inhumanity
 Chapter 6: Ignorance Allied With Power Is the Most Ferocious Enemy of Justice
 Chapter 7: Where You See Wrong or Injustice, Speak Out Because This Is Your Country
 Chapter 8: It Must Be Faced to Be Changed
 Chapter 9: Decide Not to Be Reduced
 
 Part 2: Come Home Safe: From the Café
 
 Chapter 1: If They Don’t Give You a Seat at the Table . . . Bring a Folding Chair
 Chapter 2: The Highest Appreciation Is Not to Utter Words But to Live By Them
 Chapter 3: A Wise Woman Will Not Be a Victim
 Chapter 4: I’m Sick and Tired of Being Sick and Tired
 Chapter 5: No One Can Degrade My Soul Within
 Chapter 6: You Think Your Pain and Heartbreak Are Unprecedented . . . Then You Read
 Chapter 7: In a Rage Almost All the Time
 Chapter 8: What You Endure Does Not Testify to Your Inferiority but to Their Inhumanity
 
 Epilogue
 Author’s Note
 Acknowledgments
 
 
 
 
 Guide
 
 Cover
 Contents
 Part 1: Come Home Safe: From the Subway
 
 
 
 
 
 
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 PART 1
 COME HOME SAFE:
 From the Subway
 
 
 CHAPTER 1
 It’s Easier to Build Than Repair
 Frederick Douglass
 “Fourteen, fifteen, sixteen . . .” Reed counts out loud as he juggles his soccer ball from his knee to his head in the park. He’s always carried a soccer ball wherever he goes, but lately it’s been an almost constant presence. And the stakes of today’s practice are high because he’s determined to play for the Elijah McCoy High School varsity team. After he put his name on the tryout sheet, the coach smiled at him and said, “You know if you make the team, you’ll be the first freshman to make varsity? But no pressure, right?” Reed knows he has to be more than good enough to make the team because of that fact, so every little bit of practice counts—even if it’s just a few minutes of fooling around in the park across the street from Public Middle School 416 while he waits to pick up his little sister.
 Last year, Reed could just meet Olive at her locker after school, and their parents would drive them both home. But this year is different. Their parents still drop them off at Olive’s school in the morning, but it’s Reed’s responsibility to get Olive and himself home safe at the end of the day. He’d already done the easy part—walking the couple blocks from Elijah McCoy High School to Olive’s school—and now they simply had to take the train home together.
 “Getting your sister home from school each day is a big responsibility, but your mother and I trust you,” Reed’s dad had told him when he dropped them off at the beginning of the week. Reed felt proud that they trusted him to watch his little sister now.