Zami: A New Spelling of My Name

A week before Christmas, Audre falls off her work stool and her father has a stroke. Audre goes to New York City to see her family, who she has not visited for a year and a half. After Christmas, she commutes between the NYC hospital and her work. Her father dies, and she goes to stay at her mother’s house. Her mother is a wreck, and she and Helen have to handle everything. Helen is withdrawn, playing the same record over and over. Audre moves into Cora’s house, and another person has been hired to take Audre’s place.

Audre is moved into a better-paying positionthat offers bonuses, although they are almost impossible to get and require not abiding by safety regulations and exposing oneself to dangerous radiation:

Some of the women who had been at Keystone for years had perfected the motions and moved so swiftly that they were able to make from five to ten dollars some weeks in bonuses. For most of them, the tips of their fingers were permanently darkened from exposure to X ray (145).

The employers could not keep track of the crystals after they were read, but rather kept a tally of how many an employee checked out.