206. White Flight - Leslie

• FADE IN:


• INT. ITALIAN RESTAURANT - DAY


• JAMAL, ANDY, SUSAN, and KELSEY sit at a corner table in the well-lit, comfortable restaurant.


• Susan and Andy shift a bit uncomfortably, attempting to hide behind their menus.


• KELSEY
• Come on, you know you're not the typical black guy.


• JAMAL
• Oh I'm not? That's really unfair. What, because I'm educated, because I can quote Tolstoy and Kierkegaard, I'm suddenly not really black? So what does black look like to you?


• KELSEY
• That's not what I said.


• JAMAL
• It's what you meant. What does a typical black guy look like to you?


• KELSEY
• You know.


• JAMAL
• So to really be black, I should speak like this, carry a few guns, deck myself out in bling, and put on my ignant mask? What about Langston Hughes, Martin Luther King Jr., McCoy, Matthew Henson, James Baldwin? They weren't really black? Oh, so you think Frederick Douglass was a thug?


• KELSEY
• Hey, relax, come on, you are different.


• JAMAL
• And what about the black middle class?


• SUSAN
• Sure, you have the black middle class, but it isn't that large or that typical.


• Jamal rolls his eyes.


• ANDY
• I wonder how we would have developed as a society if whites hadn't fled to the suburbs when blacks moved in.


• JAMAL
• That would be interesting. Maybe more of an awareness of the black middle class for one thing.


• SUSAN
• Why does white flight happen when blacks move in?


• KELSEY
• Cause stuff starts disappearing. Hey! I'm just saying.


• Andy ducks behind his menu again and Susan looks away.


• A group of people one table over shuffle nervously.


• Jamal stares.


• Susan slowly picks up her menus and begins to study it intently.


• Jamal takes a deep breath and speaks very quietly.


• JAMAL
• Don't you dare equate my people with low class thugs. You flee because you fear what you don't know and you assume, you don't listen. My people are far more complex, far deeper, far more intricate than your caricature. So don't you dare justify your ignorance with the fears you believe to be true. I'm going to wash my hands.


• He stands and turns towards the bathroom.


• A woman walks past him and pulls her purse a little closer to her chest.


• Kelsey notices and blushes.


• Jamal sees and turns.


• JAMAL
• Typical enough for you now?


• FADE TO BLACK.