Albert Stain Quotes

What do we have here?” Grant slurs at me. He seems different and it raises flags in my mind. His fingers wrap around a section of my hair and it scares me. His face is flushed red and his eyes are glassy and bright. I can smell the smoky scent of whiskey or scotch rolling off his tongue as he speaks and breathes heavily. “I’m lost and I need a ride home.” My voice wavers as I speak and I hate it. I fist my hands in the hem of my blazer. “I’ll get Albert for you, but first spend some time with me,” he slurs again, sounding like his tongue is too large for his mouth. As if sensing my attention, the tip of his tongue sneaks out and slides along his supple bottom lip. He smiles as he tastes the alcohol that’s staining his mouth. His eyes are bright and shiny and glazed over. He has a smirk on his face that shows off his dimple. It no longer reminds me of Whitt. It seems sinister and dangerous- promising something I’m not ready to experience. The feel of his fingers playing with my hair gives me goosebumps and I shiver as my scalp tightens, sucking up the pleasant attention. I do my first stupid-girl moment of my life. I shameless crush on a guy and let it turn my thoughts to mush. “Okay, if you promise to call Albert first.” I try to negotiate with him and he gives me a naughty smirk for agreeing. He backs me up with his physical presence. His front touches mine- chest-to-chest. His lips part and breathes the smoky, whiskey scent onto my chin. My back hits the door behind me with an audible thump. He reaches around me and I don’t wince. I anticipate him touching me and crave it. Instead, his hand twists the doorknob by my hip and I fall backwards. I’m pushed into a dark room until my legs connect with the edge of a bed. I can’t see anything, and the only sound is our combined breathing. I feel alive with caution. I’m aware of every hair, every nerve on my flesh. My senses are so in-tuned that I can feel my system pumping the blood through my veins nourishing my whole body.

What was the alternative? To go along with the accommodationists, who would integrate at the pace white Birmingham set? To believe that the eloquent Albert Boutwell would be a good mayor and not just a dignified racist? Fred “made Black people uncomfortable,” Walker said, and discomfort was the point of this campaign. Walker had grown up in Merchantville, New Jersey, with a portrait of Frederick Douglass on the wall. What Douglass wrote still resonated with him: “It is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.” Damn right. Fred was not the problem. Black Birmingham was the problem. Segregation was the problem. As Walker put it: “See, it was the uncomfortableness that the presence of a Fred Shuttlesworth created. You have to understand how segregation is like a stain and it’s on everybody, and Fred represented the person who had the task of going around trying to wash the stain off.” They would succeed, Walker argued, when Black Birmingham started scrubbing, too.