The vague became actual. He feared that he’d manifested reality with his mind, actualizing his own disease. Coinciding with how many medical professionals and healers concluded that his disorder was all in his head. Even his friends—except for Marguerite—began to quit coming around. As complaints went, his friends’ short-term forgetfulness about him was minor compared to him being sick in the first place. Until the day his legs refused to moved. The residual paralysis—the best any of them could describe the stiffness of his nonresponsive limbs—typically lasted the rest of the day. That was how everyone realized something was going on. His days largely shifted between bad and worse ones.

“Let all who have ears listen.” Mom began her ship-wide broadcast. “The library of Camara Xola Adisa has burned.”

With those words, all work ceased. The wails cascaded throughout the ship.

“We find ourselves grieving a loss of one of our own. One of our family. I learned much of what I know about doing the work of community from Xola. He was often a hard man to know, sometimes even to like. If he thought you in any way worked against community, he was quick to crawl up your ass. That didn’t make him any less of a friend. A pain to deal with, but a friend. You knew you could count on him to be about his people. His loss will be felt as long as we breathe.

“We have entered dark times, but this is not the first time we have been in this place in history. The crossroads of tragedy and promise. Sometimes we can get caught up in trying to get ourselves through the moment as a matter of survival that we forget, we neglect, our neighbor. Remember, they hurt, too. We hurt together. We grieve together. What was Muungano established for if not to be a community to help one another through hard times into better times? I can guarantee you that there will be more nights ahead. Which makes it that much more important to hold on to one another to ensure that we all make it through to the light.”

His mom being who she was, Bekele saw Xola on several occasions. Often enough to be greeted with “I see you.” Once seen, he underwent the usual grilling Xola gave young people. Every moment was a test with Xola, an opportunity to challenge someone’s thinking or seeing how they thought and what they were made of, so no one ventured near him unless they were prepared for a pop quiz of some sort. The questions tossed over and over in his head.

—“Who are you?”

—“If you could be any animal, what would it be and why?”

—“What gift do you offer the community?”

—“What are you into? Passionate about?”

—“If today were a color, what would it be for you?”

—“What drives you to get out of bed in the morning?”