Hot June, mid day. Streets were cleaned from the riots that happened a couple of weeks earlier. A lone man cleaned the messy avenue back to normalcy, and all the while, the block was empty. Countless copies of yesterday’s famous newspaper littered the streets and blew nonchalantly in the wind. All the same with those bold black letters shocking the world. The man didn’t understand, but knew what was bound to happen. It’s always the same, someone does good and says good and inevitably gets killed. And, if good enough, they change the world in life and in death. As he sweeps the newspapers away into a pile, he wonders about the future of the country. 

It was election year again. Will America ever sew the wounds of segregation? he thought. Better yet, will it ever move on from the scars of the civil war? He laid his weight on a broom and analyzed the empty street in front of him. Yesterday, there were hundreds of people protesting the death of a friend of civil rights for the people, the country, for-- quite possibly-- the world. That happened in April and people have taken it to the streets since then. Some peaceful, but most, ironically, violent, but not as costly as the one that happened last year. The man knew they would come back. 

As he walks down the deserted boulevard, the crunching crumbs of broken glass melded between the hot ground and his boots. Hands in his pockets, so no patrolling soldiers will suspect him of carrying a weapon of any kind. Looted shops, broken buildings, how could such things escalate to this? This isn’t the only city dealing with this though. The District of Columbia, Baltimore, Trenton, Kansas City, Detroit, everywhere across the country, far and wide. Then the night will fall and things will calm, and then start back up again the next day. Oscillating back and forth from peace to chaos, and the origin point where the rock fell into the river was in Memphis, Tennessee. And out from that moment in time where the friend of all, one of many who created a culture of a community, was shot at the Lorraine Motel, sine waves of protests wrapped the country. The lonely man’s mind was solemn at the thought, but that same day the candidate he was interested in gave a short, impromptu and powerful speech.

The man wished he could listen to it for the first time again. Not violence or lawlessness but love and wisdom. That speech also sent out ripples. Everything that happened from the 4th of April onward had a powerful effect on the nation, dare he think, internationally. Events that happened before then sent out larger, impactful waves, too. The man thought that through the entire decade so far, the United States turned into a calm river, and then, he thinks, the rain falls, each individual waves a page in history. Thinking about this, he zones out while listening to his candidate’s speech on the radio. He didn’t notice that he already concluded it and only got “So my thanks to all of you and on to Chicago and let’s win there.” through his head. 

“Oh,” the man said to himself. “Oops, I missed it. I’ll catch you again when you fly in here, Bobby!”

The radio droned the celebratory chanting from the crowd.

The man had hoped that he will continue what others have started, and soon enough, the USA will be healed.  The man looked behind him and saw a couple other people listening in. The diverse races present were hopeful for “Bobby” too. With this amount of support, certainly, “Bobby” will win the Democrats’ nomination with this speech-to-be in the city where they stand, yes? Suddenly, the happy faces in the small crowd turned to concern as the radio broadcasted distressing cries from the crowd in Los Angeles. Again? The lonely man, out of stress, zoned out again. There is no possible way… 

“Is this really happening?”