Lies We Tell Ourselves: Shortlisted for the 2016 Carnegie Medal

“Keep the niggers out!” A group of boys chants in the doorway. “Stop the niggers! Don’t let the niggers in!”

But they have to let us in. This is Virginia, not Mississippi. They’ll let us in, and they’ll see that having us here doesn’t make any difference. Then things will settle down.

That’s what Daddy said. And Mama. And Mrs. Mullins, and Mr. Stern, and everyone else at the NAACP. It’ll be hard at first, but then things will go back to normal. We’ll just be going to school. A better school, with solid windows and real lab equipment and a choir that travels all over the state.

Everything will be easier when we get inside that big brick building.

I turn toward the police. They’ll make sure we get inside. That’s their job, isn’t it? To enforce the court ruling?

But the police are so far away, and the crowd is so thick. I can’t see them anymore.

We’re together now, all ten of us, surrounded by hundreds of white people who are shouting louder than ever. Chuck and Ennis press forward, and the rest of us follow. We’re so tightly packed I can smell the detergent Ennis’s mother used on his pressed white shirt. It’s the same kind my mother uses. I try to imagine I’m back at home on laundry day, helping Mama hang sheets on the line. My little brother playing by the porch steps. Ruth turning cartwheels in the yard while Mama calls for her to go inside and finish her homework.

“It’s gonna be open season on coons when y’all get inside,” a boy shouts behind me. “Just you wait.”

Ennis pushes past the boys blocking the doors. Ruth and I stumble after him.

We’re inside.

It’s done. We did it. We’re in the school.

But the white people are still staring at us. Shouting at us.

They’re all around me. And they still look hungry.

Someone shoves into my right side. From behind, someone else’s elbow juts into my lower back. Another tall boy with blond hair is right in front of me. All I can see is the thick white wool of his letterman’s sweater.

Someone pushes into me from behind. My face is crushed against the blond boy’s sweater, but he doesn’t move. I can’t breathe.

“Hey!” I hear Ennis shout, but he sounds far away. I don’t know where Ruth is. My chest feels too tight.

Someone is ramming me hard from the left, but I can’t move. There are too many white people. There’s nowhere to go.

I can’t do this. I can’t stay here. I can’t breathe.

A tight grip closes around my right arm above the elbow, cutting off my circulation. Fingers dig into my flesh. They’re going to drag me out of here.

I’ve just made it through, and already it’s all going to be over. But I don’t care, because all I want is to breathe again.

The hand on my arm tugs harder, pulling me through the thick knot of people. This is it. They’re going to take me away. I don’t know what they’ll do to me, and I don’t care, because I just want to breathe. I just want this to be over.

That’s when the screaming starts.

Lie #2 (#ulink_159f5f91-f394-5adf-bc77-8ff571639a98)

MY ARM FEELS as if it’s being wrenched from its socket as I stumble through the crush of white people. The pain rockets through me, and my eyes flood with tears.

The grip on my arm lets go. I clutch at my chest as the breath floods back into my lungs.

Then I remember where I am. I turn to run.

“Sarah!” It’s Chuck. It’s only Chuck.

Ruth is next to him, staring at me with her forehead creased. The rest of the group is gathered behind them.

“Sarah, you all right?” Chuck says.

I nod. I can breathe again, at least. But we’re not safe yet.

The shouts are louder here than they were outside. They echo off the walls and high ceilings of the school vestibule, pressing in on us from all sides. More shouts come from deep inside the building. All around us, white people press in, shoving at our backs and glaring at our faces. The building looks huge from the outside, but the vestibule feels tiny with all these people packed so tightly into it, every one of them turned toward us.

Where are the teachers? The principal?

“Where do we go?” Ruth asks. I don’t know what to tell her.

“Mrs. Mullins gave me the list,” Ennis says. “Seniors go to the auditorium, juniors, the atrium, sophomores, the gym, freshmen—”

“The cafeteria,” Paulie cuts in.

“No way.” I’m not letting go of Ruth. Not again.

She pulls out of my grip anyway. She’s holding her head up again. Back to her old self.

“What are you going to do, babysit me all day?” she asks me.

“I’ll walk the freshmen over,” Chuck says. He nods toward Yvonne, who’s still rubbing her neck. There’s a red mark near her collarbone, but no blood. “I’ll watch out for them.”

I’m not sure about that. I don’t want my sister out of my sight.

But I don’t know what else to do. Ruth is right. I can’t be with her all day.

Plus, I don’t know where the cafeteria is. Or the auditorium, or anything else. I’ve never set foot in this building before, but Chuck is looking up and down the halls as if he knows his way around. I’ll have to trust him.

My heart thuds as I watch Ruth go to Chuck’s side, turn her back and walk away. All I can do is pray she’ll be safe.

Yesterday I would’ve thought prayer was enough. Today I’m not so sure.

“Come on,” Ennis says. “We’ve got to go. If we’re late we’ll get detention.”

I’ve never had detention before, but Mrs. Mullins told us the white teachers would look for any excuse to send us there. We can never be late to class, no matter what.

But if we have to deal with shouting crowds every day, won’t we always be late?

No. The crowd was only for today. Tomorrow things will go back to normal.

Whatever “normal” is at this huge, looming school, with the shining glass trophy cases lining every hallway and the brand-new books everyone is carrying. And the huge white boys in letterman’s sweaters lurking around every corner.

Somehow Ennis already knows his way around Jefferson, too, so I follow him. The auditorium isn’t far from the front doors, but it takes us a long time to get there because the white people are still swarming.