PART 3: THE FIRE

Monday November 4, 2013–I Knew My Baby

Summary: Monday, November 4, 2013

Richard’s cousin Lloyd stops by Oakland High and tries to get Richard to come hang out with him. Richard refuses, so Lloyd waits for him after school. As he leaves the school, Richard hugs the security officer and calls her “Auntie.”

Summary: The 57 Bus

Sasha’s bus ride home from Maybeck involved multiple transfers and lasted an hour, but they did not mind. On November 4, 2013, Sasha chooses to ride at the back of the 57 bus, exhausted from school. They fell asleep at the back of the bus, having trained themselves to wake up when the bus hit an S-curve before their stop.

Summary: 4:52 p.m.

The audio and video recordings from the 57 bus cameras show Lloyd and Richard getting onto the bus and talking to a mutual friend, Jamal. During the ride, Lloyd hollers at some girls toward the front of the bus. Jamal points his phone at Sasha and hands Richard a lighter. Richard flicks the lighter several times near Sasha’s skirt, but nothing happens. Lloyd goes to the front of the bus to talk to some of the girls there but returns a few minutes later. Richard pretends to light Lloyd’s sleeve on fire while Jamal encourages him. Lloyd tells the driver to pull over and let Richard out through the rear door. Before exiting, Richard lights Sasha’s skirt on fire. From outside the bus, Richard stares, transfixed, at the intense fire that the skirt has become.

Summary: Fire

Sasha wakes up with their legs on fire and runs down the aisle screaming. Confused passengers try to run for the exits. Two older men grab Sasha and smother the fire. Sasha pushes their way off the bus but is urged by one of the men to call an ambulance. The other passengers are shocked at what happened.

Summary: Watching

Richard watches the bus drive away, but he can hear Sasha screaming and is running after the bus when it pulls over. People spill out, and Richard watches Sasha walk along the sidewalk with visibly burned legs. Richard, Lloyd, and Jamal run to a different, nearby bus. When Richard gets home, his mother can tell that something has happened.

Summary: The Man with the Mustache

After the police arrive, one of the men who helped Sasha walks home crying, wondering why it happened.

Summary: Phone Call

Sasha calls Karl and asks to be picked up: they have been set on fire and need a ride to the hospital. Karl and Debbie both arrive before the ambulance. Karl rides with Sasha in the ambulance, leaving Debbie standing on the sidewalk crying, believing that Sasha was attacked for having worn a skirt.

Summary: The Rim Fire’s Revenge

At Saint Francis Memorial Hospital, morphine makes Sasha talkative and excited. A surgeon from the hospital’s Bothin Burn Center tells Karla and Debbie that the burns are extensive and serious, but treatable.

Summary: The Ten O’Clock News

Kaprice watches the nightly news, knowing that if violence is reported, it will likely affect one of her students. When the news reports that someone was set on fire on the 57 bus, she wonders why someone would do such a thing.

Summary: Locked Out

The next day, when Richard tries to get out of class to talk to Kaprice in private, he is intercepted by police officers and led away in handcuffs.

Summary: Maybeck

After Sasha does not show up for school, Nemo calls their parents and learns what happened. When Nemo shares the news with their group of friends, everyone is baffled that such a thing could have happened in the “queer-friendly Bay Area.”

Summary: Shyam

Shyam Sundar, the science teacher at Maybeck, recalls what it was like finding out about the incident. What he mainly remembers is that the news kept him from teaching. He just showed up and handed out worksheets, unable to look at Sasha’s empty desk.

Summary: I Knew My Baby

Jasmine watches a news report about the incident. She knows that the suspect in custody is Richard, despite the report not stating his name or showing his face. Richard calls his father instead of his mother. By the time she gets to see Richard, the district attorney has decided to charge him as an adult.

Analysis: Monday November 4, 2013–I Knew My Baby

Part 3 describes the event that brings Sasha and Richard together from many different angles, through the author’s unique narrative style. The previous sections of the book have described Sasha and Richard’s characters and the worlds in which they grew up. The narrator has shown who they are and what brought them each to this point. Although the incident on the bus is the central conflict of the book, the moment is not treated like a climax. The previous chapters do not lead up to it with increasing tension. Instead, Richard’s attack is shown as a sudden, thoughtless moment. The narrator shows events from both characters’ points of view and describes the security footage from the bus. The narration allows for one to be drawn in as a witness to the incident, thus inviting the reader to try and understand the headspace Richard occupied to do something so cruel without thinking.

Again, the action appears to hinge on the motif of perception. It is Sasha’s appearance, and what they are wearing, that opens them up to being a target of Richard’s attack. His friend Jamal points out Sasha in particular to Richard. Specifically, it is Sasha’s skirt that is the target of the attack, rather than their shirt or their hair. Richard focuses on the part of Sasha that he perceives to be most notably different, something that does not fit within the expected parameters of someone he perceives to be a man. As the news spreads on television and among Sasha’s friends at school, public perception turns against Richard. Sasha’s friends and others, including Kaprice, are horrified and can’t imagine what kind of person would do such a thing. Kaprice’s knowledge of Richard does not fit into the story on the news. The public’s perception of Richard is shown to have real consequences for him when his crime is seen as being worthy of charging him as an adult even though he is still a teenager. Therefore, others’ perceptions have severe consequences for both Sasha and Richard.