Poor Black Teen Carried a Sick Old Man's Groceries Home — He Had No Idea Who the Man Was
Chapter 4
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The old man studied his face for a moment. Rain rolled down the deep lines around Arthur's eyes. There was something in those eyes Jamal did not understand: not pity, not exactly surprise, more like a man seeing something he had stopped believing existed."All right," Arthur said quietly. "If you're sure."They started walking. At first, they moved slowly past the grocery store windows, where light spilled warm and yellow over the wet sidewalk. Jamal could feel people watching from behind the glass: the teenagers were still laughing; the woman in the beige raincoat had stopped under the awning, shaking her head as if he were foolish.Maybe he was. Maybe a smart person would have walked away. A smart person would have kept the $6 dry, caught the bus, gone home, and minded his own business. But Jamal had never been good at watching someone suffer and calling it wisdom.They passed the bus stop just as the bus pulled in. The brakes squealed, the doors opened, and warm air breathed out from inside. Jamal looked at it for only a second. Then the doors closed and the bus rolled away.Arthur noticed. "You missed your ride," he said."I'll catch another one.""In this rain?"Jamal shrugged. "Rain stops eventually."They turned down Franklin Avenue, where small storefronts glowed under neon signs: a laundromat, a payday loan place, a fried chicken shop with steam clouding the windows, a liquor store with bars across the glass. Music thumped from a passing car, then faded into the storm.Arthur walked with one hand lightly gripping Jamal's sleeve—not enough to slow him down, just enough to steady himself when the coughing came back. Every time Arthur coughed, Jamal shifted the bags and waited without saying a word."You from around here?" Arthur asked after a while."Few blocks south," Jamal said."You live with family?""My grandmother. No parents." Jamal kept his eyes on the sidewalk. "My mom passed when I was little. Cancer. My father left before that. Grandma raised me.""I'm sorry.""Thank you."There was no bitterness in his voice, only the careful calm of someone who had said those facts many times and learned to survive the silence that followed.Arthur glanced at him. "Your grandmother must be proud.""She says she is." Jamal smiled faintly. "Even when I mess up.""What kind of messes?""Dropping out of school," Jamal said before he could stop himself.Arthur did not respond right away. Rain struck the hoods of parked cars like a thousand little fingers. "You wanted to leave school?""No, sir." Jamal swallowed. "She got sick. Heart problems. Medicine got expensive. Rent kept going up. Somebody had to work."