Kendrik didn’t trust the police. Policing was the most enduring aspect of the struggle for civil rights. It had always been a mechanism for racial control. Stories of police harassment and violence in the black communities where he grew up were common. The faces of the police officers he feared were faces that belonged to a larger system of inequality; inequality in the justice system, inequality in housing, inequality in employment, inequality in education and inequality in health care. Kendrik trusted his probation officer because, like Kendrik, Officer Kent was black. As a black man as well as a cop, Officer Kent had spent the last 15 years reconciling the warring perspectives within himself. As a black man, he had found himself on the receiving end of both profiling and discrimination more times than he could count. As a father to three black children, he had found himself having to have “the talk” about the reality of being black in America and about how to act in encounters with law enforcement so that they would be sure to leave with their lives.

As a cop, he knew how dangerous the job was. He had seen his colleagues killed on account of not pulling a gun fast enough. He knew that being a cop also came with its own share of unfair scrutiny. When Officer Kent showed up at the scene, he knew that some of the cops that had shot Kendrik that day had shot him out of implicit bias and some had not. One side of that war within him felt the honor of wearing the same uniform as the other brave public servants that served with him. The other side of him couldn’t help but wonder when tragedies like this happened, why so many of the faces of those who were killed looked like his.

Aria’s mood while she waited for Taylor to arrive at the café was dark. It was perfectly matched by the depressing wail of the indie music playing on the overhead speakers. Taylor arrived in his typical style, over half an hour late. He pulled up to the parking spot driving a sunshine-yellow Pontiac Solstice. He was dressed from head to toe in a tight-fitting designer suit with oversized glasses and Gucci sliders. He got out of the car in a Hollywood style that suggested there should have been film cameras about. When he reached down to hug her before sitting down at the table, Aria was engulfed in the attar of a cologne that blurred the lines between masculine and feminine.

“You look completely amazing,” Aria said. Instead of a response, Taylor used his hand to frame his face and strike a pose as if to say, I know, I know, darling.