Finding Isadora(46)

“It is. I’ll show you around.”

Alyssa dropped Jimmy Lee’s hand and tugged impatiently on mine. “Yes! I want to see the animals. I want to meet Pogo.”

Leaving Betty and my parents—whom she’d met on a few other occasions when they’d dropped in—to catch up, I took Alyssa off to meet the animals. Grace and Jimmy Lee joined us in a few minutes and we made a short tour of the clinic, with me telling the wide-eyed girl a little about veterinary work. Then I said, “Would you and Pogo like to play for a while?”

“Yes, please!”

Soon she and the terrier were occupied with a game of fetch in the courtyard. The girl was bright, sensitive, and clearly loved animals. “One day I want one just like her,” I murmured to Grace.

“We sure wouldn’t object. She’s a special girl.”

For a few minutes my parents and I leaned against a sun-drenched wall, contentedly watching Alyssa and Pogo, then I remembered I had less pleasant things to discuss with them. “Any luck last night, identifying who might be framing you?” I murmured to my father, asking the question I hadn’t been able to at breakfast because of Alyssa’s presence.

He shook his head.

Grace sighed. “It was horrible, Isadora. Looking around at all those faces, many of them people we’ve known for ten, twenty, even thirty years, and wondering if it could be one of them.”

I winced sympathetically. “But the meeting itself was productive, right? I’m surprised you decided on litigation. That’s not your usual method.”

Grace gave a dry chuckle and Jimmy Lee laughed, too. “I admit it, I like getting my hands dirty,” he said, rubbing them together energetically. “Grass roots stuff. Remember, Izzie, my first exposure to civil rights was as a little boy in Georgia, and the big issue was racial discrimination and desegregation. Situation wouldn’t have improved but for all the boycotts, sit-ins, marches, and protests.”

“There were lawsuits, too,” I pointed out. “That’s a large part of what the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People did, right? Legal action? Like for the little black girl who wasn’t allowed to go to a public school.”

I glanced at Alyssa, a child whose father must be black. During her lifetime she’d face some discrimination, but nothing like she would have had she been born in Georgia when Jimmy Lee was a kid.

“Yeah,” my father said. “Brown versus the Topeka Board of Education in Kansas, decided in 1954. Sure, that decision was major, but things didn’t change much, especially down south where I lived. African-Americans had to go to the back of the bus, couldn’t eat in the same restaurants as whites, couldn’t use the same bathrooms, couldn’t buy or rent a house in a white neighborhood. Couldn’t even get registered as voters most of the time.”

He, too, was watching Alyssa. “Even when the f*cking laws changed,” he muttered under his breath, “you didn’t see equality happening. It took grass roots action then, and it still does now.”

“True, but let’s face it, you just like mixing things up,” I commented fondly.

Grace linked her arm through his. “He does, and so do I. It makes us feel like we’re really doing something. But there’s a place for other methods too, and I think Gabriel’s route is a good one. Besides, it’s not just litigation, it’s publicity.”

“Grass roots action, combined with using the law to work the system,” Jimmy Lee said. “Like Gabe says, the voters have to care. The issue is equal rights for people with disabilities. Okay, most voters aren’t disabled; maybe they don’t even know anyone with a disability. But we’ll make sure they do when every plaintiff in the lawsuit is interviewed. When the cameras go into their homes and show how they live, and the impact the government cuts have had. It’ll be all over the Internet, then TV’ll pick it up.”

I nodded. “That makes sense. You’re making it personal, like those blood donor ads when they ask whether you’d donate blood if you knew someone who needed it. So, where do you start?”

“We’re splitting the duties,” Grace said. “The various organizations that support people with disabilities will put the word out and identify potential plaintiffs. Gabriel’s working out a list of questions, and volunteers like Jimmy Lee and I will contact the prospective plaintiffs. We’ll compile all the information then pass it along to Gabriel. He’ll interview our short list, finalize the list of plaintiffs, do the legal research, file the statement of claim, and so on. He and the disability organizations will work together on media releases, YouTube videos, and so on.”

“Sounds like you did some good work last night.”

“Yeah,” my dad said. “Fueled by Grace’s chili.”

Gabriel had provided the apartment, and Grace the meal. Almost as if they were a couple.

I studied my parents, who were leaning shoulder to shoulder watching Alyssa. They looked to be in perfect harmony. It wasn’t my business whether Grace and Gabriel got involved. If it didn’t bother Jimmy Lee, why let it bother me?

Deliberately, I turned my thoughts in another direction. “What do you think about Alyssa helping out at the clinic after school now and then? There’s a high school girl who comes in to feed the animals, clean the cages, and do some other chores. Britt’s a sweet kid, a real animal lover. It would be fun for her as well as Alyssa.”