Amara's day

Sunday, no booking. The danger lands at 9:42 AM when she walks out to get the paper and the black SUV is parked directly under her fire escape, the driver looking up at her window with a phone in his hand. She goes back inside and does not collect the paper. The embarrassment hits at 10 AM when she calls her mother back — her mother picks up and says, 'I got a strange letter this morning, sweetie, from a man named Hollis. he's asking about you.' The racism lands at 1 PM on Nostrand: a woman she has never met, white, mid-fifties, stops her on the sidewalk and says, 'you are the stylist, right? my doorman told me to be careful with girls who come to Park Avenue without references.' The threat arrives at 4 PM via the prepaid — a single line: 'she opened it. she is in atlanta now.' Amara sits at her kitchen table and does not move for eleven minutes. The decision: she takes the brass key out from under the lamp and puts it in her coat pocket.