Harbor Me

Haley meditates on what the concept of “the Familiar” really means. She thinks about her daily routine and time spent with her friends at school. She treasures small details of life like Amari’s amusing drawings and Tiago’s Santa hat and beard. She feels wistful about things like how weekends go by too quickly. Haley also stops to think about small things that would typically seem inconsequential, such as the fact that her uncle always shaves the left side of his face before the right. These details about familiar life help Haley put the significance of the ARTT room in perspective. She realizes that Ms. Laverne has given her and her friends a unique opportunity to look beyond the familiar.

In the weeks after Halloween, the ARTT group has fun trading candy, but the seriousness of Esteban’s family situation is also clear. He frequently looks exhausted and withdrawn, and his friends keep close to him. At the next ARTT meeting, Amari takes a turn with the voice recorder. He begins with a rap again, which sets off a bout of teasing and flirtation between Amari and Holly. Amari suggests that the group meet back in the ARTT room in 20 years, no matter where they are. They are all on board with the plan, though it prompts them to think about how far-off 20 years seems, and how they will probably be separated from each other as they grow up.

Amari is upset at the idea of things changing from year to year as well as how once-loved things can quickly seem childish. For example, his father once said that Amari had grown too old to give hugs, however, Amari admits that he’d like to hug Esteban to help him feel better. Amari describes a talk he had with his father a few weeks ago. His father told him that the way things are in America means Amari can’t play with water guns or Nerf guns or similar toys. The ARTT group talks about how police have shot children who were unarmed thinking they were a threat. The boys daydream about how much fun it is to play with Nerf guns and water guns, but they also realize how the police shootings are tied to prejudice and racial profiling. Amari talks about how a Black boy like himself can be treated differently than a White boy like Ashton. He expresses discontent because Ashton can play with a Nerf gun without worrying about a cop shooting him. Amari admits that when he heard about the cops shooting a young unarmed Black boy, he felt some hatred toward Ashton. He clarifies that he felt this as a general anger at injustice rather than as a personal reflection on Ashton, who Amari considers one of his best friends.

It is already past three o’clock in the afternoon, when the ARTT group should leave school for the day, but they continue to talk. Ms. Laverne peeks in to ask if everything is okay and tells them to have a good weekend. Amari and Ashton keep talking about the idea of racial profiling. Ashton becomes somewhat defensive. Holly steps in to mention how even her 13-year-old cousin was stopped and handcuffed only because cops thought he matched the description of a suspect. Tiago mentions his cousin’s run-in with police, and the group discusses similar examples they have heard about. When Ashton insists those types of experiences could happen to anyone, Amari asks him to name one instance when it happened to a White person, and then walks out of the room.

Haley again meditates on the idea of familiarity. This time, she also goes back to the idea of the Lenape tribe. She considers that everything about Brooklyn, the place that seems so familiar to her, is only a story built on top of the story of Lenapehoking, the Lenape tribe’s home. Haley daydreams about the forested, idyllic world of the Lenape that looked completely different from urban Brooklyn. She imagines their first contact with Europeans, and the guns the settlers likely pointed at the Lenape. She thinks back to Ms. Laverne’s question, “Who would you have harbored?” (76), as Amari leaves the ARTT room and Ashton looks crushed.