Those Kids
Those Kids
who,
when waiting
for the
school bus
just past
dawn,
and having
no thought
for those of
us still sleeping
in the rest
of the complex,
were loud.
As one of
their grandmothers put it
“Talking
like everything they say
is the most
important thing anyone ever said.”
The boys
would brag about stupid things
they’d done,
and the
girls would call the boys out
telling them
they were liars
or stupid.
Because
Those Kids
were kids,
and kids do that.
My ex taught art in the complex
My ex taught art in the complex
and Those
Kids loved her classes,
and her,
and called
her Miss Heather,
which made
her feel weird.
Neo Nazis,
both kids
and parents,
threatened
to attack
Those Kids
after school
one appointed day,
in the name
of
white pride.
Those kids
mostly stayed home that day.
The attack
never came.
But I saw,
one day soon
after,
on the dirt
road behind the complex,
a young
white guy,
sitting in
an old car,
Diligently
and nervously
at work on
something in his lap.
And the next
day I found
a pipebomb
that had failed to go off.
I called the police.
The officer who arrived
I called the police.
The officer who arrived
confirmed
pipebomb,
and said to
me
with a
knowing tilt of the head
(that I’d
begun to take to mean ‘between us whites’)
“Those Kids
probably did it.”
I tried to say
something to the effect that,
had any of
those kids done it,
we’d have
heard about it
from them
while they
waited for the bus.
I mentioned
the white guy in the old car.
“Nah. It was
those kids.”
It reminded
me of the night
We were
robbed
while out at
the doctor,
Returning to
find
the security
chain on the door,
a window
open,
and my
guitar gone.
The
detectives got the facts,
and one said
with a conspiratorial
tone
“It was one
of Those Kids.”
I wanted to
know which one he thought it was,
because,
when Those
Kids heard Miss Heather had been robbed,
They all
showed up,
surrounded
our apartment,
a couple of
boys with baseball bats,
Just in case
the thief was still inside.
So I wanted
to know
who
in
particular
the
detective
suspected.
He could
only repeat
“It was one of Those Kids.”
“It was one of Those Kids.”
Weeks later
the thief
was caught, in another town,
by another
Police Department.
I saw
pictures of him.
Though
redfaced,
he was white
as me.
The
detective returned my guitar,
saying
nothing else
about
Those Kids.
Chris Walters,
August 7, 2014
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