Free The Dark-Thirty by Patricia McKissack Page A

a distant country in Southeast Asia, at home the races were divided over basic human rights. Nobel Peace Prize winner Martin Luther King, Jr., was killed in Memphis, Tennessee. His death was followed by days of rioting. Two months later, Robert F. Kennedy, brother of assassinated president John F. Kennedy, was himself assassinated after winning the California Democratic primary.
    When the day-to-day grind got to be a bit too much for some, a few people chose to “drop out.” At the time there was a saying: “Stop the world, I want to get off.” But since the world could not be stopped, many people just walked away.
    F rom the age of sixteen Leddy had been an activist, committed to nonviolent action against racism and discrimination. While in college, she’d participated in sit-ins, freedom rides,voter registration campaigns, and peace protests. Later, working in Memphis, Leddy had met and married Lieutenant Joe Morrison, U.S. Marine Corps. Two months before their son Nealy was born, Joe had been shipped out to Vietnam. He was killed six months later.
    With her husband’s funeral still fresh in her memory, Leddy heard the news that Martin Luther King, Jr., had been killed in Memphis at the Lorraine Motel. Although violence was contrary to everything Dr. King had stood for, Leddy longed for a physical outlet for her rage. “What is this world coming to?” she whispered.
    On the morning of June 7, 1968, Leddy addressed a small group who’d gathered outside the storefront office of the Center for Progress Through Peace, where she worked. “Yes, it’s true. It’s true. Robert Kennedy is dead. Martin was for peace and he was killed. Malcolm X said fight back and he was killed. Robert Kennedy said stop this senseless war, and now he’s dead!” Leddy was screaming at this point. “Anybody who stands up for right gets shot in this country! Robert Kennedy is dead! Love, peace, equality, justice, and freedom have died, too!”
    Someone snatched the mike and pulled her inside the building.
    “Hey, cool it.” It was Germaine, director of the C.P.T.P and a veteran civil rights activist. “Don’t start a riot,” he said firmly, though his eyes were gentle and kind.
    Since Joe’s death, Germaine and his wife, Sylvia, had been like parents to Leddy, taking mother and son in, giving Leddy a job.
    Leddy wouldn’t deliberately hurt Germaine or the Center. But she felt herself spinning out of control. She trembled with emotion. “That’s it! I’m sick and tired of cooling it! I’m burning up with
cool!
” Leddy paced back and forth as she talked. “I was
cool
when a woman put a loaded shotgun to my head just because I was sitting at an all-white lunch counter. I stayed
cool
when firemen turned hoses on me for peacefully protesting the murder of innocent children in a church bombing. I was
cool
when they murdered Martin Luther King. And I was
supercool
when they told me that little Nealy would never see his father, because Joe had been killed in a place most of us can’t pronounce. Don’t talk to me about being
cool
, Germaine! What has being
cool
done for me? Nothing!”
    “Okay, okay,” Germaine said gently. “Just calm down, now.”
    Leddy covered her face with her hands andwept. “I’m so tired,” she sobbed. Germaine handed her a tissue, and she wiped her eyes. “For all our efforts, what has changed, Germaine? Are people living in better housing? Are people getting good health care? Is it really better now than it was ten, twenty years ago? I wanted so much more for my son.”
    Germaine sighed. “So did I. We all did.”
    Germaine and Sylvia and all her friends at the Center tried to talk Leddy into staying, but she’d made up her mind. She was going to get out of Memphis.
    “I realize now,” she said, stepping on board the bus, “that there’s no way for me to change the world, but I do have something to say about the piece of earth where I live. We’re going where I hope it will be