“That’s wild,” I say.
“Yeah, it is. I think anyone can be nice, but it’s not about being nice. You can’t escape a history like that and not be affected. Us Blacks, we start hating ourselves, and them whites start thinking they’re all better than us. Even if they aren’t thinking it constantly, it’s in there somewhere.”
I find myself smiling a little. He looks like one of those eccentric scientists after they explain a theory. His hair is wild too, sticking up in all directions. I don’t know if I fully agree with him. I don’t know if I want to fully agree with him. It’s a sad way to look at things.
“You sound like someone who should go to college,” I tell him. He looks like he’d major in politics or some other social science, writing articles and pissing people off whenever he speaks.
“World’s not ideal,” he reminds me.
“And if it was?” I ask, turning on the swing to look at him now.
“If it was, a lot of shit would be different.” He looks at me. “I might go to college, major in business or something. I might do well and get out of here. I might do dangerous things like kiss boys I like and do all the things I’ve always wanted to do. But the world isn’t ideal, so why poison my mind with thoughts that won’t make a difference?”
I get that. Dreaming can be dangerous. It’s hard to dream in a neighborhood like ours. Ma always told me to dream, though, that the sky was my limit. I’m scared to dream too high, in case I end up falling flat on my face. But I still do it.
It hurts to dream, but I dream regardless.
Ma has tried to create this ideal world for me. Despite my scholarship, she’s still spending so much on this school, hoping a good college takes a chance on me. But what if none of that happens? What if I fail? Or get expelled? What if Aces ruins everything?
What if I just get stuck here, disappointing her, wasting her time and money, for nothing?
Terrell’s hands are on my shoulders, and then they wrap around me as I try to breathe.
“S-sorry, was just overthinking … Worried about my ma and everything,” I say, wiping my eyes.
“Is she okay?”
I nod. “I just worry about not getting into college, her wasting her money on me for nothing.”
“It’s not wasted on you, no matter what happens. I get worrying about money, though. My sister’s sick right now and money’s tight. We can’t help her with medical bills, so I get it. But don’t let it take up too much space or make you feel sad.”
His sister is sick?
“I’m sorry about your sister.”
Terrell looks away. “No need to be sorry. Let’s do something else.”
I nod, taken aback by his abruptness. I should ask him if he’s okay. I feel like all I do is talk about myself, never check to see if anything is bothering him. I need to be a better friend to Terrell; he’s been so nice to me. But before I can say anything more, he’s up and running toward the jungle gym. I push myself off the swing, which creaks as I stand, and follow him. Terrell climbs the neon-green steps and crawls into the dark purple tube on top and doesn’t come out.
I wait …
… and I wait.
What if he’s stuck?
I survey the tube again. He seemed to fit fine when he was going in …
“Terrell?” I call out.
No reply.
I tiptoe, trying to see into the tube, but it curves up, blocking my vision. I sigh, moving to climb the steps slowly. My body still hasn’t fully recovered from when those boys beat me up, plus I’m pretty sure this was made for children, and I don’t want Ma to be charged money she doesn’t have for my senselessness if I break it. When I get to the top, I lean into the tube and I see Terrell in there, seated with his head ducked like he was waiting for me.
“Took you long enough,” he says.
So, he was waiting for me.
“I’m not coming in there,” I tell him, trying to sound serious despite the smile I’m holding back.
“Okay, I’ll just sit in here until you do.”
“That’s cool with me.”
He stares at me, and me at him. I sit down, resting my back against the pole by the steps.
“It’s pretty cold out,” he says.
“Really? I can’t feel it.”
“Sure about that?”
“Very sure.”
“Okay, if you’re very sure.”
He moves toward the entrance of the tube, climbing out and sitting on the slightly lifted entryway.
“I think I can convince you to come inside,” he tells me, running his hand over his miniature dreads.
I raise my eyebrows at his confidence.
“How?”
He smiles at me, eyes crinkling in the corners and dimples defined as he reaches into his jeans pocket, then takes his hand out with his fist closed.
“Come closer and I’ll show you what’s in my hand. Trust me, you’ll come in when you see it.”
I’m not sure what could convince me to do that, but I move forward, staring at the gaps between his fingers, hoping to see a glimpse of whatever is hidden there.
“I’m closer, open it.”
He looks ready to laugh.
I watch his hand again as it opens, revealing … nothing.
I stare at his empty palm and then back up at him.
“You’re so full of shit,” I say, which only makes his grin wider.
“And rice,” he says, before moving back into the tube.
I pretend to hesitate before following him in, sitting closer to the entrance, still a bit worried I’ll break it.
It’s not as dark in the tube as I thought it would be, but it is smaller than I expected. I have to slide down slightly in order to fit.
Terrell, on the other hand, has to duck, seeing as he’s taller. When I’m in, he moves closer to me, hitting his head, which makes me snort.
There’s a shimmer on his hoodie that catches my eye. A metallic green alien print in the middle of the hoodie.
It’s weird, the alien kind of looks like him.
“Told you I’d convince you to come in,” he says in a low voice.
“I came in because I wanted to,” I say, which isn’t entirely true. A part of me probably likes being in such close proximity to Terrell. Besides, he was right, it was kind of cold outside the tube.
“Who’s full of shit now?” he says.
“Still you,” I tell him, shivering again.
We fall into a comfortable silence. I try not to think about bad things, like Aces or college or Andre. I try not to think about how this time two weeks ago, I wasn’t worried about being kicked out of school. I was probably at Dre’s. Happy. Instead I block those thoughts. I think I’ve cried in front of Terrell one too many times today.
I glance at him. He’s resting his chin on one of his knees now, looking up at me. When he catches me staring, he smiles.
“Are you cold?” he asks.
“Kind of,” I finally admit.
He sits up, banging his head once again, which causes him to swear under his breath. I watch with warm cheeks as he pulls his hoodie off and tosses it to me.
“Wear this,” he says.
I take the hoodie, pulling it on over my school shirt and tie. It’s warm and comfortable and feels like I have a big blanket wrapped around me.
“Thank you.”
“No problem.”
I move a little closer, away from the cold entrance.
“You know what’s weird?” Terrell says softly.
“What?”
“I’m claustrophobic,” he whispers.
I furrow my eyebrows together. “Then why did you want to come in here?”
“Didn’t think it through,” he says, looking a little anxious. I watch him lie back, sticking his head out the other end of the tube. It kind of reminds me of the way dogs stick their heads out of car windows.
“Freedom!” he says with an exaggerated tone.
Like earlier, when I
tried to ignore all the bad things, now I try to ignore the exposed skin on Terrell’s torso. I focus on the ceiling of the tube.
Terrell decides he has had enough air and sits up, and I can focus on his face again. I notice some leaves stuck in his dreads now and burst out laughing.
“You have leaves in your hair,” I tell him.
He reaches up and tries to brush them off to no avail, and so I reach forward and help.
“You’re good now,” I say, pulling away.
Terrell looks at me and I swallow. His eyes kind of remind me of the way Dre used to look at me just before we’d kiss or touch or do more than that. I feel myself placing my hand on Terrell’s face, leaning in close. Something tells me to pull away, but then I feel Terrell wrap his arms around me and I ignore my brain and I kiss him.
I don’t expect Terrell to kiss me back as quickly as he does, like he was waiting for it. For a few moments I forget that we are in this small purple tube—everything’s quiet, I feel shaky, my heart won’t stop ringing.
In the movies, kisses are all wrong. It’s not fireworks or loud explosions. I used to think that every time I’d kiss a boy, the world would blow up. With Dre, kissing him felt like I was floating gently across a small cold lake. Right now it feels like I’m submerged in hot water, drifting deeper and deeper toward the bottom of the ocean.
I feel like I’m drowning, which is usually a feeling that makes me feel calm, but right now—
I pull away, breaking the kiss.
I need to leave.
I turn, scrambling out of the tube. I feel so warm, but I don’t stop and think; I start climbing down the steps of the jungle gym, but what I think is the last step isn’t, and I tumble to the ground.
“Fuck,” I whisper.
“Are you okay?” Terrell asks. I look back, a little horrified as his head pops out of the tube.
“I … I forgot something at home,” I say, probably looking and sounding like a mess. Terrell says something but I don’t catch it.
I just run.
* * *
Thursday
Today, I don’t care about the ogling. I need to get my composition sorted and finalized so that I can record it before the college applications open. I need it to be perfect. So perfect it wows the admissions people and they give me the scholarship I need to get out of here. I rush up the stairs to the music classroom.
“Mr. Richards,” Mr. Taylor says as I enter, like he’s been expecting me. Which he probably has, since I’m in here a lot. It’s weird, though; he usually calls me Devon.
“Morning, Mr. Taylor … I just wanted to work on the final section of my admissions piece for a little while today.”
“That’s fine.” He smiles. “Before you start, I just want to address a concern I have.”
A concern?
“I don’t normally listen to rumors … but I heard something and I wanted to check in with you.”
Mr. Taylor pauses, hesitant, like he’s not sure how to phrase the next part of his sentence. My heart is in my throat. I swear if it’s about Scotty, I’ll die—
“People are saying that you’ve been involved in drug transportation?” Mr. Taylor looks confused, like I’m the last person he’d assume would be involved in any of that.
My stomach flips.
“I haven’t,” I lie.
He nods. “I just wanted to let you know—colleges are quite harsh about that sort of thing.”
“I understand,” I say, feeling sick. He looks at me like he can see straight through me and my lie. Then he turns away.
“Good. It would be a shame if something like that harmed your chances. We wouldn’t want that to happen to one of our most promising students.”
I nod, feeling bad for lying—but what other choice do I have?
I haven’t dealt in nearly two weeks, for the obvious reason. The same reason that won’t answer my calls or texts. I miss the familiar sound of the wind chime text tone on my phone—I customized it so that I would know when it was Dre texting and not someone else. I push him back into the corner of my mind, and head to my usual seat at the back, blinking away the wetness in my eyes; I don’t want to think about him right now.
I take a breath.
Then I close my eyes and drown.
* * *
Even though I didn’t tell him to come, I’m not surprised to see Terrell outside Niveus after detention again. I didn’t see Chiamaka today either, but I bet she rushed out as soon as she finished.
I knew I’d have to talk to Terrell eventually about what happened yesterday in the park, but I didn’t think it would be this soon.
What am I even gonna say to him?
Sorry for kissing you—I’m not over Dre and I probably did that because I missed him.
I pretend to check a message on my phone, heart beating fast, knowing he’s waiting for me to come out.
After a few moments of aimless scrolling, I pocket my phone and walk down the steps toward him.
I approach the gates and see him clearly, on his bike waiting, in a huge gray hoodie and sweats.
“Hey,” he says, staring at me. I feel naked under his gaze. I think that’s Terrell’s superpower, making me nervous.
I wonder how long he’s been out here.
Just as he says, “Are you okay?” I’m saying “I’m sorry.”
“For what?” he asks.
“Kissing you, then running away. I just broke up with my boyfriend on Friday. I wasn’t thinking, and I probably made things really weird. I’m sorry.”
Terrell looks at me, then down at his hoodie, which I’m wearing again. It’s warmer than any hoodie I own.
“Can I walk you home?” he asks.
I wasn’t expecting him to say that, but I nod anyway.
We start walking, Terrell dragging the bright-yellow contraption he calls a bike along as I stroll next to him.
“Does he go to your school or something? The ex, I mean,” Terrell asks suddenly.
“No.” I look at Terrell now. “He’s just a guy from our neighborhood.”
“What’s his name? I might know him.”
I hesitate. “Andre Johnson.”
Terrell goes quiet again.
“So, he was the one who told them to do that to you?”
I shake my head. “He got angry because the messages Aces was sending were making people start to suspect things about us, so he broke up with me.”
“You don’t deserve to be treated like that.”
“I doubt Dre told them to.”
Terrell shakes his head. “And so what if he didn’t. Did he check on you?”
“It’s not easy for him, he’s had a hard life,” I say, even though I doubt it’ll make a difference in Terrell’s mind.
“We’ve all had fucking hard lives—doesn’t mean I’m gonna be an asshole about it.”
“He has a boss who’d hurt him—”
“So if not him, you? Andre can sit there and be okay with them beating you, just because he doesn’t want to deal with it himself—what a fucking pussy,” Terrell says angrily.
“I’ve known him for years, okay? Maybe doing the right thing is easy for others, but he’s always messing up and regretting it later. I don’t want to be that person who makes excuses for people’s shitty behavior, but we all make bad decisions.”
I don’t want to talk about this anymore. Talking about Dre hurts too much right now, like my heart’s been stung by a wasp.
Terrell looks at me as if I’m unstable. Then he looks away. “Has he texted you since?”
That question feels more rhetorical than anything. I haven’t heard wind chimes for days.
“Yes,” I lie.
“That’s good, then.”
I nod.
“Think you’re gonna get back together?” he asks, his face a little pained.
I’ve been asking myself the same question. Dre seemed pretty serious about not wanting to date me anymore. I swallow the lump that knots in my throat.
<
br /> “No, I don’t think so. Andre’s like family—I want to be his friend more than anything.”
Andre and I have been friends since he was twelve and I was eleven. I’ve known him for almost seven years, though we only started dating last year. Before any of this, Andre was a friend, a really good one. On days like this, I wish we’d just stayed friends, so that I could still speak to him and things weren’t all broken and weird.
The silence grows a little awkward as we walk on. Terrell’s probably thinking I’m pathetic.
“You know,” he starts, “you’re, like, really fast.”
“What?”
He smiles, dimples appearing. “Yesterday, when you ran away from me. You should consider being an Olympic runner if you ever change your mind about music—”
I push him and he laughs.
“Shut up,” I say, my face growing hotter.
“I’m going to start calling you Quick,” Terrell says, looking very impressed with himself.
“Well, I’m gonna start calling you Shit Talker,” I reply.
“I’m cool with that.”
We get to my place and Terrell walks me to my door. I feel bad for not inviting him in. I never invite anyone in.
I’m a bit embarrassed about the way my house looks inside, and scared he’ll judge me, even though I know he probably won’t.
“Thanks for walking me home, and sorry again for yesterday.” I say the last part quietly.
“I’m irresistible, so I get it,” Terrell says.
“Sure,” I say.
There’s a pause and then he hugs me.
I don’t think I’ve been hugged this much by a friend … ever. I have to admit, I like Terrell’s goodbye hugs. They always feel nice and warm.
Later, when I’m in my room, as my brothers sleep and the world is quiet, I think about how nice it is to have someone who doesn’t treat me like a burden.
I’d forgotten what that felt like.
* * *
Friday
Last night, while I slept, the melody seized my dream and took over. It played on a loop until I woke up, jumped out of bed, and rushed to school as fast as I could.
I finally know what my audition piece should sound like!
Ace of Spades Page 14
