“What the hell?” Arman yelled. “Wait—we talked about the telephone wire. You live over there.” Arman recovered slightly or was at least making an effort to appear more at ease.

The man nodded. “We were talking,” he said calmly. “Her and I were talking.” She could feel the weight of him standing next to her. His voice was deep, congested.

“What is going on here? What are you doing in our yard?” Arman asked sort of lightly, as if maybe he were dreaming or overreacting and this strange middle-of-the-night convergence could still turn out to be a neighborly misunderstanding.

“You know what?” asked the man. “People do nothing. People talk a big fucking game about being citizens, being brave, but then? What?” He made a show of looking around. “Fuckin’ crickets.”

“Listen, man,” said Arman, “I’m not sure what your problem is, but it’s the middle of the night and you’re on my property.”

“Ain’t your property. You’re renting. You came up here and—day one—I knew something was messed up. When you asked me about that phone wire, you should’ve seen your face. As if you have any right whatsoever to be so goddamn demanding. I mean, it’s you who doesn’t belong here. It’s you who doesn’t belong. Do you understand what I’m saying to you?”

Sarah said, “Listen—”

“Do you?”

“I’ve already heard this,” said Arman, “so you can spare me. I’ve heard it all before.”

Well, Sarah thought, so much for sympathy toward racial resentment.

Arman put his hands in the air as if to surrender, as if he’d do anything not to strike this guy but that he was getting close.

“I told you,” Sarah told the man. “You need to leave. Right now.”

He came around the table. He moved quickly, surprisingly so, and before Sarah even registered what was coming, he leaned into Arman and said, “You disgust me.”

“Get the fuck out of here, I mean it.”

“If you do anything to him,” Sarah warned the man, “you’ll be charged with a hate crime. Do you get that? Do you? ‘You disgust me.’ What is wrong with you?”

“Hate crime? You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. He can’t just beat you.”

“Excuse me?” balked Arman.

“What?!” Sarah cried. She was starting to shake with impatience.

“He hits you.” The man pointed at Arman. “I know something like that? I don’t stand by.”

“This is unbelievable,” said Arman.

“What are you talking about?” cried Sarah, then she finally understood:

Who’re you hiding from?

My husband.

“Just get off my property,” said Arman.

Now Matthew was slamming the screen door and running outside, and Kiki was right behind him, taking photos of the man with her phone.

“You’d better leave,” Matthew told him.

“She told me you hit her,” he said to Arman, sounding—for the first time—unsteady.