In 2016, I think I finally understood what true fear felt like.
The Black history museum in Washington, D.C., my mom managed to get tickets for the opening week, still we waited on the side of the street waiting for hours, Ours all around us.
I’d never seen so many reflections of myself, a crowd of culture.
When we finally stepped in the air changed, my feet rocked as we started at the bottom of our history, on a ship, a slave ship, each floor a different chapter, it was heavy, to carry, to learn, to see, and nothing could’ve prepared me for the room.
One on Emmett Till. I hadn’t known who he was until I heard his story, even though I couldn’t understand.
Until I saw his face.
In an open casket he lay, his eyes popping from his head, the face of a boy mutilated, desecrated, it was too horrific to be real, the rest of the day I reeled into my soul, shut down, at the fact that it was.
That night I cried.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw his face…
I wailed to my parents, slept in their bed, my head a mess in a way it had never been before, and that night when my parents started to snore, I would see him in the open doorway, it felt like I was being haunted that night. I sat alone as the weight of this newly found grief settled at the pit of my stomach.
I did not sleep.
The next day I didn’t go to school, and I didn’t feel very Cool for missing, my heart still hissing; not only sad, angry.
But I didn’t regret what I saw; it was more important than any lesson or story from school—because I finally understood what true fear felt like, and I finally understood why his mother wanted the casket open.