oranges and peered through the grove to spot other flood lamps, other pickers. The sound came every minute or so, always from a different direction, and I glimpsed half a dozen more lights. The grove was a galaxy, the flood lamps and explosions stars and celestial events. My family steered through space, linked, until we reached the highway. To Dennis, I said, “How did you know?” He smiled at me but didn’t answer. He seemed to regard fatherhood and husbandhood the way a magician regards magic: the delight is in the mystery. His father had probably brought him to beg for free oranges the last time the crops froze. By the time Margo became an adult, there would be fences to keep us out.
We put the oranges in the car trunk. I figured I would make marmalade and no one would eat it. I would make orange-chocolate-chip cookies and Margo would say she preferred the regular kind. It didn’t matter. On the way home, Margo’s cheeks were pink in the brightening light. She chatted for a while about the orange groves, then grew quiet. After a long silence, she said, “When Carla moves, I won’t have a best friend.”
“You’ll make a new one,” I said. “Or two or four.”
“Mighty Margo,” said Dennis. “Many people will love you.”
This time she cried almost without sound. We’d made a mistake in pushing her ahead—of this, I was certain. I’d let pride influence me. Shamefully, though, I felt a little grateful for the mistake, because my daughter needed me, and I knew she wouldn’t need me in the same way for much longer. Still, I couldn’t shake the image of Margo sitting in Mrs. Madansky’s class, raising her hand again and again.
In mid-December of that year—Margo had been a sixth-grader for three months—a dozen Dade County police officers chased down and fatally beat a thirty-three-year-old black insurance agent named Arthur McDuffie. They said McDuffie had rolled through a red light on his motorcycle while giving a cop the finger, and that he’d kicked one of the officers, who in turn cracked McDuffie’s skull open—these were the prosecutor’s words—like an egg.
Mrs. Madansky sent home a typed letter addressed to all sixth-grade parents. “Dear Mom and Dad,” read the note, “your son/daughter’s class will study Current Events this term. Students are required to bring a news article to class every Monday/Wednesday or Tuesday/Thursday.” On our copy, the second pair of days was circled in red pen. “Please supervise your child’s choices to make sure they are appropriate. Parents have expressed concern that certain local events might cause students to become upset.”
At the dinner table, over lasagna, Dennis tore up the note and tossed it theatrically over one shoulder. “Your teacher is an idiot,” he said to Margo.
“Dennis!” I said. “She’s being cautious.”
“She’s being a coward.” To Margo, he said, “Something horrible happened and people are going to remember it for a long time.”
“The police killed a black man,” she said.
“Right,” said Dennis, “and now people have to face the fact that Miami isn’t so much a melting pot as, I don’t know . . . ”
“Potpourri,” I said.
“Why did they kill him?” said Margo.
“We don’t know exactly why,” said Dennis. “But people feel so strongly about Mr. McDuffie’s death that a judge moved the trial all the way to Tampa.”
“What will happen to the police officers?” said Margo.
I said, “They’ll be punished.”
“In Tampa?” Dennis said to me. His jaw tightened. “No, they won’t.”
After dinner, Dennis spread a newspaper on our bed and pored over it, trying to find an article for Margo to take to school. There was no use telling him this was her assignment. “Here’s one,” he said. He called for Margo and a minute later she appeared, wearing a Dolphins jersey and white ankle socks. Dennis tore out the article and Margo read it while I got ready for bed. When she’d gone back to her room, I asked him what they’d chosen.
“That fisherman who drowned in his nets,” he said.
I stared at him. “How is that any better?”
“She’s going to show the kids how to signal an airplane from water.”
“You’re using Margo to teach Mrs. Madansky a lesson.”
“Which one was Mrs. Madansky?” said Dennis. He walked to the full-length mirror that hung from the back of the closet door. “I look older.”
Dennis had become very focused. He either went on an interview or made phone calls every afternoon. Marse had begged him to interview with her firm, but he’d declined. I’d taken