A Song Below Water (A Song Below Water, #1)

by Bethany C. Morrow

She’s my patronus. When I can’t deal with real life, I escape into her virtual space,

They just went along with her post-mortem character assassination because she was already the worst thing she could be: a Black woman.

Why didn’t you show him the registration, Tavia? Not, why did he pull you over in the first place? Not, why didn’t he ask to see it? Why didn’t you apologize, Tavia? Not, you didn’t do anything wrong. Not, I’ve been there before. Did you speak respectfully? Did you prostrate yourself, did you lie facedown and show submission, did you make them feel like they were overseers rather than civil servants?

Black and female and a siren is just layers upon layers of trauma.

the only ones who seem to stand for Black girls are Black girls.

But individual kindness or hate isn’t what makes the world go round. When it matters, when a larger population or institution could make the difference, it seems they don’t.

for a moment I’m thinking of how white girls in Portland seem to increasingly have names I’m pretty sure would be “ghetto” if they were Black.

If I’m in trouble—if Priam’s dad knows and Naema can’t be trusted, if the world is on the hunt and everything’s coming down—this power might be all the protection I have. After everything I’ve been through, that realization fills me with equal parts boldness and apprehension. I feel myself bouncing between fear and ferocity, my heart and my call fighting for space in my throat. You don’t have to take my voice, I tell my grandmother. Just teach me how to use it.

I never figured out how my anxiety gets lumped in with defiance toward elders, but that’s what it is.

!!!!!!!!!!! IT ME.

I can’t decide whether I’m glad they’re listening or whether I’m annoyed that the conversation’s gone unheard for so many years.

I stood in the middle of a tide of people who convinced me it’s better to make peace than to keep it.

all us grown folk seem to have fear in common.”

I’m a weird contradiction of wanting to know why and wanting to avoid knowing at all costs.