About: This story was written for my high school English class in 2005. The prompt was to write an ending to A Raisin in the Sun. This is what I came up with.
Word Count: 1,550 Words
A Flower in the Night
The house was bigger than the one the Younger family had lived in before. This new house also showed room for expansion for a growing family. As the small car pulled up to the drive, Mama felt her heart quicken. Travis bolted out of the car almost before it came to a complete stop and ran into his yard. He examined the grass in the front lawn carefully in curiosity. "We have a yard? A real yard?" he asked as he turned to face the adults who were just getting out of the car.
"Yes," Mama answered. "We have our own yard and a garden too!"
"You're going to wear my gardening hat, aren't you?" the small child asked innocently.
Ruth fought to hide the laughter as she turned to face the porch. "What a beautiful house Lena."
The family turned to face the house too. It had a large covered porch, and the house was all white with hints of black frame around the windows and door. "I'm surprised they have black mixed in with the white in their houses," Beneatha remarked.
"Why do you say that?" Walter asked.
"They didn't want a black family to live here, so why allow black siding!" she answered defensively.
"Now, now," Mama announced. "Let's not get to bickering. Let's go see inside!" The family followed her inside to find the house mostly bare. The rooms were far larger than their old house, and it even had enough bedrooms for all of them, including Ruth's new baby.
"Can I have this room?" Travis inquired. The adults smiled and nodded at him; then, he darted inside his new room and began to decide where his new bed would go. The adults found their own rooms and began moving all their belongings inside.
The next morning, Walter woke up early and headed outside to find the paper. It rested at the end of his driveway; he went to it, picked it up, and began reading it as the neighbors stared at him with fear from their own drives. "Good morning," he announced to them when he noticed them. Immediately, they turned away and hurried inside. When he went back inside, he found Ruth and his mother in the kitchen preparing breakfast. "They don't like us," he muttered.
"They'll learn," Mama answered.
"What if they don't?" Walter asked.
"They will, Brother. They learned to let us be free years ago; they can learn to live next door to us."
Walter nodded and searched the classifieds for a new job. He called several places, but no one was interested in having a colored man work for them. Ruth patted him on the shoulder and whispered, "It'll be alright Walter Lee. We'll get through this." He nodded halfheartedly and went back to bed.
Within a month, Beneatha had gone to Africa with Asagai, and they were going to have a wedding soon. Meanwhile, back in Clybourne Park, several various families had tried to scare the Younger family away. Several bombs had been stuffed in their mailboxes and bricks with threatening messages were thrown daily through their windows. Mama was beginning to feel that she had made the wrong decision for her family, especially when Travis came inside with a bloody nose. "What happened?" she asked him tenderly.
"This boy at school punched me during recess. He said I wasn't wanted here – that none of us were wanted here. He told me there was something wrong with me. He said God made a mistake when he created me because my skin doesn't look like the kids at school."
Mama straightened herself and frowned. "The Lord didn't make a mistake with you, Travis. He made you perfect! There's just different types of people; if we all looked alike, the world would be a mighty boring place."
Ruth woke up in the middle of the night and made her way into the kitchen. It had been three months since she and the rest of the Younger family had moved into their new house. As she sat down at the kitchen table, she thought of the old home and how cramped it had been. It had been a nice home though and had served the family well, even if it had become too small for the larger family. The new house was larger with four bedrooms. Ruth and Walter shared a room; Mama had her own, and Travis had his own. The fourth room had been Beneatha's until she decided to go to Africa with Asagai. She was already planning her wedding with him while finishing her education so she could become a doctor.
Ruth sighed as she turned to the refrigerator for a snack. Things had turned horrible since they first moved to the house. She closed the door to the refrigerator and returned to the table empty handed; nothing could cure the pain inside. She picked up a newspaper on the counter and read, "Black family moves to white Clybourne Park; neighbors angry and retaliate with bombs and angry letters attached to heavy bricks. No comment from black family."
"Horrible isn't it?" Mama began as she sat down next to Ruth.
"What are you doing up Lena?" Ruth inquired.
"I heard you get up, and I wanted to see how you were. Are you alright?"
Ruth nodded quickly to prevent herself from getting to emotional, but her tears fell down her cheeks anyway. "I'll…I'll be alright; thank you."
"How's Brother?"
"His hand is still bothering him. He should've known better than to reach inside the mailbox for the mail. He should've known to look before he did that!"
"I know, but there should not have been a reason to look."
Ruth nodded solemnly and looked down at the floor. The floorboards creaked a little as Walter walked in the kitchen. Without a word, he sat down next to his mother and looked at Ruth tenderly. "Are you alright?" he asked her.
"Yes, but are you?" She looked kindly at his arm with worry. The bomb in the mailbox had nearly caused him to lose his arm entirely, but the doctors had luckily been able to restore it. This incident had left Beneatha with another burst of inspiration to become a doctor, so she went to Africa to finish her degree so that she could help those in Africa. Walter touched his cast with his good hand, but he didn't say anything. He meekly nodded as he remembered seeing bones poking out of his flesh with tons of blood pouring out after the bomb had gone off. He had been sure that nothing would be able to save his arm, but he had been wrong.
"Is Travis sleeping still?" Mama asked Walter.
"Yes," her son answered. "I checked on him before coming in here to see you two. His eye is still terribly swollen."
Ruth looked out the window silently as more tears fell silently down her face. She remembered how Travis had come home from school, his clothes disheveled and bloody and his eye black with bruising. The children at school had listened to their foolish parents and thought that a black child was worth beating to death. Walter had silently wondered if the teachers had reacted quickly or if they had simply let his son be beaten by his peers for a little while. The thought disgusted him beyond reason.
"We'll find a way to move somewhere else," Mama said suddenly. The others looked at her in disbelief but said nothing, so she continued, "I can't let my family hurt like this any more. I wanted what was best for this family, and this isn't what is best for us."
"We don't have the money Mama," Walter disagreed.
"I'll find a way Brother," Mama whispered. "I promise; I'll find a way. Why don't you two go on back to bed?"
Walter stood up and went to his wife's side. He helped her up as best as he could with his one good arm and led her back to the room. He paused at the door and whispered, "We'll have another baby when the time's right."
Ruth meekly nodded as she touched her now empty belly that had once been swollen with life. She couldn't understand why her baby had been taken from her, but she knew she felt a great emptiness inside her heart. She forced away her tears as Walter led her into the bedroom.
Mama sat quietly in the kitchen, glancing over the paper for some sign that things would be okay. "Lord, help my children. Please help them make it through this. Help us, Lord," she whispered to herself. She looked down at an add offering a house for sale in a nice neighborhood where blacks and whites got along as neighbors. She knew she could afford it with the money she would get to move out of the current house. Silently, she wondered if that would be a mistake. She looked over at her plant on the counter for a sign and saw a tiny new flower beginning to grow in the dark. "Yes," she told herself with a smile. "We'll be alright. We'll move there, and my family will finally get the light they need to grow."