This is my home, Akila says, and I know that the moment between when a Black boy is upright and capable of speech and when he is prostrate in his own blood is almost imperceptible, due in great part to the tacit conversation that is happening beyond him, that has happened before him, and that resists his effort to enter it before it concludes. I know that the event horizon is swift because of the gulf between the greeting and the pavement, but in real time, as they press Akila to the ground, every second is long.
