I walked to the cigarette counter, where the same girl I had talked with every day waited on me. “Package of Picayunes, please,” I said in response to her blank look. She handed them to me, took my bill and gave me change with no sign of recognition, none of the banter of previous days. Again my reaction was that of a child. I was aware that the street smells, and the drugstore odors of perfume and arnica, were exactly the same to the Negro as they had been to the white. Only this time I could not go to the soda fountain and order a limeade or ask for a glass of water.
Nancy and 1 other person liked this
