Summary

Yamaye, Rumer, and Asase are at a party. Yamaye sees dancers and notes, “They’re dancing the Zella, the death ritual” (60). Two days later, Yamaye has not heard from Moose, so she calls his studio, where a man named Nile informs her that Moose was murdered by the police.

In the next chapter, Bluesing, Asase and Rumer come to support Yamaye in her grief. She stays home from work, sleeping frequently and dreaming of Moose and her mother. She calls Nile, who encourages Yamaye to “live for him [Moose]” (66), and also informs her that several of Moose’s friends are working with a social justice organization called Rights On to push for a formal inquest into Moose’s death. Yamaye asks Nile to tell her what the police claim happened. In the police account, Moose had been looking “suspicious...