There are literally hundreds of stories about women of color that

Host: The library was almost empty — a cathedral of forgotten voices. Dust floated through the air, glinting in the thin shafts of sunlight that slipped through high windows. Rows of bookshelves stretched endlessly, spines lined like gravestones, each one a name, a whisper, a world once lived.

Jack sat hunched over a long wooden table, flipping through an old history book, its pages yellowed and fragile. His grey eyes flickered with fatigue. Jeeny stood beside the window, holding a cup of coffee, her gaze distant but burning with quiet conviction.

The clock ticked softly above them, the rhythm of time itself measuring their silence.

Jeeny: “A’Lelia Bundles once said, ‘There are literally hundreds of stories about women of color that haven’t been told that are amazing, fantastic, better than anything else.’”

Host: Jack didn’t look up. He turned another page, the sound brittle, like old paper breaking under the weight of neglect.

Jack: “Hundreds? Try thousands. Maybe millions. Lost because history only ever wrote itself in one color.”

Jeeny: “And one gender.”

Jack: “Exactly. The winners get statues. The rest get silence.”

Host: Jeeny walked toward the table, the sound of her footsteps soft but steady. She set her coffee down beside the open book and looked at him — not accusing, not pleading, just seeing.

Jeeny: “It’s not just silence, Jack. It’s theft. Every untold story is something stolen — from the person who lived it, and from the people who could’ve learned from it.”

Jack: “You talk like stories are sacred.”

Jeeny: “Aren’t they? They’re proof that someone existed. That someone mattered. A’Lelia Bundles wasn’t exaggerating — there are stories so incredible, so brave, so beautiful, that they could have redefined how we see the world if anyone had cared enough to listen.”

Jack: “But that’s the thing — people don’t care until Hollywood gives them permission.”

Host: Jeeny frowned, the light catching the sharp curve of her jaw.
Jeeny: “And whose fault is that? The audience? Or the gatekeepers who decide which lives are worth selling?”

Jack: “Both. But mostly the system. It thrives on repetition — same faces, same formulas, same stories about the same five types of people. Familiarity sells better than truth.”

Jeeny: “And so truth gets buried.”

Jack: “Or rewritten.”

Host: The sunlight shifted, casting their reflections onto the glossy tabletop — blurred, overlapping. Two figures talking about justice in a room built to preserve knowledge that had already excluded half of it.

Jeeny picked up the book he’d been reading — The Innovators of the Twentieth Century. She flipped through the pages, scanning lists of names: all men, all pale.

Jeeny: “You see this? They talk about Thomas Edison, but not Lewis Latimer, the Black inventor who perfected Edison’s bulb. They talk about Amelia Earhart, but not Bessie Coleman, who became the first woman of African American and Native descent to hold a pilot’s license. The stories exist, Jack. They just got left out of the script.”

Jack: “Because inclusion doesn’t make the system money until it becomes a trend.”

Jeeny: “And when it becomes a trend, it’s suddenly treated like progress.”

Jack: “Exactly. History packaged for consumption.”

Host: The light dimmed as a cloud passed overhead, casting the room into half-shadow. Jeeny closed the book and sat across from him, her voice low but charged.

Jeeny: “Do you know what I love about what Bundles said? That word — amazing. She didn’t say important or necessary. She said amazing. That’s what people forget. These stories aren’t charity; they’re brilliance. They’re adventure, innovation, romance, rebellion. They’re cinema, Jack. But they’re invisible.”

Jack: “Invisible until someone with power decides they’re visible.”

Jeeny: “Then maybe the answer isn’t waiting for power. Maybe the answer is telling them anyway — writing them, painting them, filming them — even if no one’s listening yet.”

Host: Her eyes shone with something fierce now — not anger, but faith. Jack leaned back, studying her.

Jack: “You talk like the world’s ready for that kind of honesty.”

Jeeny: “No. But truth doesn’t wait for readiness.”

Jack: “Truth also doesn’t pay the bills.”

Jeeny: “Neither does silence.”

Host: The library groaned softly — old wood settling, old stories breathing. Jack rubbed the bridge of his nose, exhaling a long, tired breath.

Jack: “You really believe art can fix history?”

Jeeny: “Not fix it. But it can correct the lens. Every film, every book, every painting that tells one of those untold stories — it’s like restoring a lost color to the human spectrum.”

Jack: “And what about the people who refuse to see those colors?”

Jeeny: “Then we keep painting until they can’t ignore them anymore.”

Host: Her voice trembled slightly — not from fear, but from the sheer weight of conviction. Jack stared at her across the table, the glow of the setting sun outlining her like a prophet in denim.

Jack: “You really think it’s that simple?”

Jeeny: “Simple? No. Necessary? Absolutely.”

Jack: “You know, I read something once — that when a culture loses its storytellers, it loses its memory. Maybe that’s why Bundles is right. Maybe the most dangerous thing about silence is that it makes forgetting seem natural.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. That’s why we tell the stories — so forgetting never becomes comfortable.”

Host: The sun broke free of the cloud again, flooding the room in gold. The dust in the air glimmered like a thousand tiny stars — the ghosts of untold tales, rising and falling in the light.

Jeeny stood, pacing slowly.
Jeeny: “You know what I think, Jack? If these women’s stories had been told when they should’ve been — if the world had known them, celebrated them, learned from them — maybe everything would look different now. Maybe the little girls growing up today wouldn’t still be told their greatness is an exception.”

Jack: “Maybe the men growing up wouldn’t think their dominance is destiny.”

Jeeny: “Exactly.”

Host: Her words hung in the air — sharp, tender, unyielding.

Jack rose, walking toward the nearest shelf. He trailed his hand along the spines of the books — rows and rows of history, all missing half its soul.

Jack: “You know, it’s ironic. Humanity has invented a thousand ways to record knowledge, but still finds ways to erase it.”

Jeeny: “That’s why A’Lelia Bundles matters. She’s a historian of correction — a reminder that memory needs guardians.”

Jack: “You’d make a good one.”

Jeeny: “We both would.”

Host: A faint smile passed between them — weary but real. Outside, the snow had stopped, and the first traces of twilight pressed gently against the glass.

Jeeny picked up her coffee again, holding it close to her chest.
Jeeny: “So maybe the question isn’t why these stories were forgotten. Maybe the question is — who’s brave enough to remember them now?”

Jack: “And to tell them loud enough to be impossible to forget again.”

Host: They stood together, silent for a long time, their reflections blending in the glass — two figures facing the vast, unfinished library of the world.

Jeeny whispered, almost to herself:
Jeeny: “Hundreds of stories. Amazing, fantastic, better than anything else. Waiting.”

Jack: “Then let’s start telling them.”

Host: The light dimmed. The library sighed — as if awakening from a long sleep. And somewhere between the silence and the promise, something eternal stirred: the sound of forgotten women reclaiming their voices through the two souls who dared to listen.

Because as A’Lelia Bundles knew — the past doesn’t disappear. It waits. It waits for storytellers brave enough to uncover it. And that night, in that sacred library of shadows and sunlight, two of them began.