Silver Currents of Change

Chapter 14

The day after meeting Harvey Wilson, Zarah got up early and drove home to Silver Water to access her old hard drive. She had the evening shift at Val-Mart, and that gave her plenty of time to make the one-hundred-sixty mile round trip home and back. When she got to her mother's house, she found her old PDF files and emailed several issues of her sixth-grade magazine to Mr. Wilson. Although certain she'd put in jeopardy the relationship they built on Friday, she was still hoping there might be a place at Wilson Publishing for a prejudiced, bigoted, white-supremacy-hating black girl like her.

When she got home from work on Saturday night, Mr. Wilson had already responded to her email. The subject line said: "From Harvey Wilson," and the email was brief—much too brief. In it, he simply said: "Great beginnings! Great content. Love the title and nameplate. Wonderful work on layout and design. Very impressed with Communications Day activities, the Green Room, and that magnificent Gallery of Courage. I'll try to catch your show online tonight."

He signed the email with a smiley face, but she was sure he thought less of her after she told him she hated that JCU was recruiting white students. It was the truth, but she never meant to say it to him with so much venom. Speaking out loud, to herself, she said, "At least he didn't say, don't call us, we'll call you." She tried to think of a really clever way to respond to his response, but all she wrote was "Glad you liked everything, and thanks for tuning in to Brion Reason." She'd wanted to ask for an internship and possibly a job after graduation, but she was sure it wasn't time for her to be that bold, especially after their last conversation.

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She worked extra hours over the weekend to make up for hours she'd missed during the week at Val-Mart, so she had no time to call Josie until after midnight on Monday. All settled into her room in her and Yvette's apartment, she knew it was too late to call, but she was too excited not to. She couldn't wait to let her sister have it for keeping important information from her about Harvey Wilson. She also couldn't wait to tell her about the wonderful day she had on Friday after meeting her old friend, the billionaire businessman and publisher, and, finally, to explain how she might have ruined everything with her big mouth. Josie picked up after the fourth ring.

"Why didn't you ever tell me you knew Harvey Wilson so well? He said he babysat for Kyle and Kate. How could you keep something like that from me? You know my dreams about working in publishing, and you kept that from me?"

"Zarah?"

"Who else?"

"Ah ... yeah, that's right ... we were good friends, and he looked after my kids. Actually, quite a bit. You know ... that was back when I had to take them with me to campus, when Richard started doing drugs and acting crazy ... before I found a good babysitter. And before we moved in with Aunt Liz."

"You had a billionaire white man watching your kids for you. Just who did you think you were? And why did you trust him with your babies?"

"At that time, it was just a rumor that he might be close to becoming a billionaire. His father was the 'for sure' really rich one, I think. Anyway, we were colleagues; friends. Richard was on drugs, so when he was supposed to keep the kids, I couldn't leave them with him. I never knew what condition his head would be in, and I refused to take a chance with my babies. He hung out with folk I didn't want anywhere near our children."

Hearing Josie yawning, Zarah knew her big sister was trying to wake herself up.

"Harvey was real nice though. His office was right next to mine, and his classes seemed to always end right before mine started. So he watched them for me sometime. I trusted him, plus there were always other people around. Dr. Broderick trusted him too and told me he was an upstanding guy. I had to trust somebody. Lord knows I couldn't trust Richard."