by Susan Ross
But Jacques didn’t play football. He liked soccer—the feel of the ball as it smacked off the strike zone of his cleats, and the rush as he raced past the defenders, risked a shot and hit the goal clean.
Jacques picked at his food and glanced at the photograph of his mother on the dining room hutch. Her long brown hair was pulled back, and her crystal blue eyes jumped straight out at him.
Dad used to say that Mom was far and away the cutest cheerleader ever to attend Lakemont High. They had started dating junior year. Dad had gone off to college on a sports scholarship, but after a month, he broke his ankle and couldn’t play football. Without the scholarship, there hadn’t been enough money to keep him at school.
Mom had four brothers and two sisters. Both of her parents had worked at the Lakemont Mill, and after it closed down, she couldn’t afford college either. Mom’s father found a new job in Rhode Island, but when the family moved to Providence, Mom stayed behind to marry Dad. Grandmère Jeannette was happy to have Mom join her at the bridal shop, and Dad got a good job driving an eighteen-wheeler.
When Jacques was little, they’d go as a family to watch the high school football team. Mom knew every cheer, and for homecomings, Dad wore his old team jersey.
Jacques smiled to think how his mother always yelled the loudest at the football games, but when they got back, she would take him to the park and let him kick around a soccer ball. She’d liked whatever he liked, and that’s what he missed most of all.
4
The first day of school was warm and breezy. Kids greeted each other with loud whoops and high fives. Lucy and Nicole were standing with Sammy and Tim O’Shea in front of the large brick school building. Lucy had strawberry blonde hair with layered side-bangs, and her lips were always shiny. When Jacques arrived, he noticed Lucy’s hazel eyes flick his way, even though she was busy admiring Nicole’s new wedge sandals.
Nicole liked to match from head to toe; her nails, eye shadow and shoes were all aqua blue. She tossed her straight black hair over her shoulders whenever she was flirting, which was pretty often.
Jacques turned away from the girls and glanced around the school yard. Where were the African kids?
Boucher came by and was taking bets. “If that Mohamed dude doesn’t show up today, there’s no way Coach will let him play on the team.”
Jacques was wondering more about the girl with the scar.
“Over there!” Sammy nudged Jacques. A van filled with Somali teenagers pulled in front of the school.
Mohamed stepped out first, followed by six boys and four girls.
“Look what they’re wearing.” Boucher snickered.
The Somali boys were dressed neatly—too neatly. Each boy wore tan khaki pants with a belt and collared polo shirt, all carefully tucked in. Jacques looked down at his own oversized T-shirt and cargo shorts.
As the group walked past them, Jacques mouthed, “Hey Mohamed,” but the boy stared straight ahead as if he didn’t see him.
The Somali girls wore ankle-length skirts and long-sleeved shirts. Large scarves were wrapped around their heads, covering their hair and shoulders. Sammy said these were called hijabs. Jacques couldn’t imagine wearing heavy clothes like that, especially on a warm September morning. Most of the girls he knew wore shorts until November, and Nicole had been sent home last spring because her sundress didn’t reach her fingertips when she held her arms straight to her sides.
Suddenly, Jacques heard a faint giggle. He found himself eye to eye with the girl from Main Street. For a split second, she looked directly into his face and grinned. She had clear white teeth, with a gap in the middle that reminded him of Grandmère Jeannette’s. He saw that the jagged scar ran from the edge of her eyebrow all the way past her cheekbone. Sammy’s mom said that many thousands of people had been killed in Somalia’s civil war, and that sometimes boys were kidnapped to become soldiers, with girls treated even worse.
The second bell rang. Jacques grabbed his backpack and headed inside to find his room assignment. By the time he reached homeroom, the Somali girl with the bright smile and long scar was standing by the blackboard.
“Settle down, class!” Mrs. Sinclair motioned for Jacques to take his seat. “We have a new student today. Her name is Saynab, but she says that she likes to be called by her nickname, Kiki. Is that correct?” Mrs. Sinclair looked anxiously at the girl.
“Yes,” the girl replied in a low soft voice, “sometimes I am calling myself Kiki.”
“Kiki’s family is originally from Somalia; they’ve recently moved here from Georgia.” Mrs. Sinclair paused and glanced around the room. “Lucy and Nicole, I would like you to be Kiki’s school buddies today. Please help her get settled.” Gesturing toward the back, Mrs. Sinclair added, “Kiki, take that empty desk next to Jacques.”
As Kiki sat down, she turned and whispered, “Hi,” her round lips curling above the gap between her teeth.
Jacques couldn’t remember later that day whether he said hi back or not. He hid behind his math binder while Kiki spent most of the period filling out forms in large block letters. Jacques half wished that Kiki would turn his way again, but was half afraid that she might. When the bell rang, Kiki filed out behind the other girls.
At lunch, Jacques watched Kiki go with the rest of the Somali kids to the back of the cafeteria. The girls sat together at one table, the boys at another.
Jacques was about to sit next to Sammy and Tim O’Shea when Lucy slid over to make room. Nicole flashed thumbs-up, and Lucy started to giggle.
Nicole was breathless, as usual. “My father says the Somalis will be gone in a week! It’s way too cold in Maine; they’re not used to it. . . . That tall boy could hardly read! I heard he’s supposed to be in eighth grade, but they’re holding him back.”
Jacques winced as he pushed his tray to one side. “Hey, Nicole—didn’t Mrs. Sinclair tell you to go over there and help? You should ask them if they need anything.”
Nicole glared back at him. “They seem just fine to me. If you want to help, be my guest.”
“It looks like they’re doing okay,” Lucy added.
Suddenly, a voice rang out: “HEY SOMALIS! HOW DO YOU LIKE THE HAM SANDWICHES?” A girl gasped, and then the far end of the cafeteria erupted.
“What just happened?” Sammy put down his drink.
“It must be Boucher.” Jacques’ stomach tightened as he stood to look. “What an idiot. He should just shut up!”
Jacques felt sick. Somebody had tossed what looked like a half-eaten sandwich onto the middle of the Somali boys’ table.
“What’s going on?” Lucy asked. “What’s wrong with ham?”
“Muslims don’t eat ham, it’s against their religion,” Sammy replied.
“But I thought that was Jewish people.” Nicole looked confused.
“Well yeah, we don’t eat ham either.”
Several cafeteria ladies scurried over to hush the room, but the damage was already done. Muffled snickers and “Hey, Boucher!” spread throughout the lunchroom. The Somali kids pulled back from their tables and quickly gathered their things to go.
Jacques took a deep breath and stepped forward. Maybe he should yell out that Boucher was a tool or worse, but his palms were sweaty and he felt dizzy. It seemed over already, and he needed to get to his locker before gym.
By the time Jacques reached the hallway, Kiki was standing in front of her locker a few feet away, gently kicking it. Jacques still felt dizzy. He bent over to leaf through his binders while he caught his breath. He could see Kiki trying the locker combination over and over, but it refused to open.
Lockers at Lakemont Middle School were famous for getting jammed; plenty of kids lugged their books from class to class. But Kiki didn’t know this. Jacques saw that she was biting into her bottom lip. What if she started to cry? Maybe he should go apologize for the stupid way Boucher had acted.
But when Jacques glanced sideways again, he was startled by the set look on Kiki’s face. She wasn�
��t going to cry; she was simply going to get the locker open, no matter what. Kiki gave it such a sharp whack, it shocked him. What kind of trouble could a girl get into denting school property on the very first day?
Jacques rose to his feet and spun around as if noticing Kiki for the first time. In two long steps he was beside her. “What’s the combination? There’s a trick to it.”
He jiggled his thumb against the lock while he turned the dial. It immediately popped open.
Kiki grinned. “Thanks for that.”
Jacques saw that she had a dimple in the corner of her mouth just below the scar. A tiny wisp of black hair peeked out from the edge of her hijab.
A voice behind them started to boom. “My sister don’t need help!”
“I was just trying to . . .” Jacques began.
“She don’t need anything.” Mohamed’s eyes narrowed to slits.
Kiki lowered her head as Jacques shrugged and walked away. He could hear Mohamed yelling. Why in the world was Mohamed so mad? Jacques hadn’t been flirting with the new girl; he’d been trying to help.
Maybe they don’t want our help, he thought to himself as he headed to gym class. Was Nicole right? Was it better to just stay clear?
5
That night Jacques set two alarms, but he woke up the next morning before either went off and made it to homeroom early. With his eyes darting between his notebook and the door, he practiced saying hi under his breath. But Kiki never arrived. Mrs. Sinclair called her name out twice: “Saynab Husen,” and then, “Kiki?” No answer.
Maybe that was it. Maybe the new girl was done with Lakemont Middle School. And just maybe none of the Somalis were ever coming back. But at the end of first period, Jacques saw Mohamed in the hallway, and at lunch, a group of Somali kids were sitting at the same tables as yesterday. Actually, it looked like there were even more of them this time—five or six girls, all dressed in long skirts and hijabs, and several more boys. No sign of Kiki, though.
When school let out, Jacques went to the neighbors’ apartment to pick up their twin boys, Ricky and Robby. The family lived on the first floor beneath Grandmère Jeannette’s apartment, and the twins were always coming upstairs to play with Pelé. The boys were in first grade, and starting this fall, Jacques was going to get paid to watch them sometimes while their mother worked the afternoon shift at the bakery. Jacques figured he could save up enough money to buy the Arsenal jersey that he wanted so badly.
Robby chased Ricky to the park while Jacques kicked a soccer ball across the pavement. Tryouts were coming up fast. Jacques took aim at the old wooden bench at the entrance to the park. Slam, the ball swiftly knocked an empty soda can off the seat.
“Good shot! Do it again!” a voice squeaked. When Jacques turned, he saw a small black child standing behind him. The little boy was cheering with his hands clasped above his head. In the distance, there was Kiki, pushing a baby stroller. The baby was dressed in a blue knitted sweater and was waving a plastic truck.
“Hey,” Jacques stammered, “do you live around here?”
“Oh hi.” Kiki looked surprised, then kind of pleased. “We are staying in a place over there.” She pointed at a dilapidated apartment building with a rickety wooden porch.
The boy hopped to the swing set where Ricky and Robby were pushing each other in the air. “You’re it!” He tagged Robby and in a minute, the three children were racing around the playground, giggling.
“Is that your baby?” Jacques asked. “I mean, are these your brothers?”
“Oh yeah, the baby is called Amir. And the one who likes to talk so much—Ismail, he is nearly five.”
“You weren’t at school today.” Jacques coughed into his elbow.
“My mother, she is looking for work, so I had to watch the little ones. I am there again tomorrow, though.”
Amir threw the toy truck on the ground. Kiki leaned forward to pick it up, but Jacques reached it first. He handed it back to the squealing baby.
“And those two must be your brothers?” Kiki nodded at the twins.
“Oh . . . no,” Jacques replied. “I’m babysitting; I get paid to do it. I don’t have any brothers or sisters.”
“That is sad.” Kiki tilted her head to one side. “Why no brother, no sister?”
Jacques hesitated and then surprised himself by telling the truth: “My mom died in an accident.”
Kiki nodded her head slowly. “I am sorry. For me, it is like that too—my father died in my country, before we came here.”
Jacques suddenly realized that he’d never talked to any of his friends about his mother. It had been two and a half years since she’d been killed in a car crash during an April blizzard. A week later, Grandmère Jeannette had come for Easter and brought him a tiny rabbit—Pelé—in a brown wicker basket.
Kiki pulled Baby Amir from the stroller and began to sing in a low voice as she opened his bottle.
“What does it mean?” Jacques asked.
“The song?” Kiki laughed. “It is just a foolish thing we sing for babies.”
“I like it.” Jacques remembered how Mom would sing to him at night in her clear, sweet voice. Sometimes she and Dad would do a duet of “Frère Jacques,” with Dad booming low and slightly out of tune. At Christmas they’d go caroling with families from church, and when Jacques was really little, Dad would carry him high on his shoulders, bouncing through the snowy streets while they sang.
It suddenly struck Jacques that after Mom died, they didn’t go caroling anymore. He never heard his father sing off-key again.
Kiki wiped Amir’s chin and put the bottle away. “I am guessing that you like Messi. Am I correct? Are you a fan?”
“What?” Jacques blinked.
“Messi, you know—the soccer star.”
“He’s okay . . . I guess.” Jacques wondered whether Kiki could possibly know that he had three posters of Messi on his walls at home. “Why are you asking?”
“Mohamed says you are the best on the team,” Kiki replied. “You will be the captain, for sure, he says.”
“Your brother told you that?”
“No.” Kiki smiled. “I heard him say it to my uncle.”
Jacques dug his sneaker into a rut in the pavement. “Do you play?”
Kiki hesitated before answering. “In my family, girls are not supposed to play soccer like that, not really. Some girls do, but my father, he was very strict.”
“You can try this out if you want to.” Jacques tapped the ball in front of her.
“I don’t know. . . . If Mohamed catch me, he would be angry!” Kiki squinted as she gazed past the swing set toward the edge of the playground. “My brother is not even one year older, but he watches me now as if he is the father.”
“It’s really okay, there’s nobody around,” Jacques replied.
Kiki cocked her head, pursing her lips. She still had Amir in her lap, burping as he shook the bottle.
“I can hold him.” Jacques remembered how Mom used to sing and play clapping games with the babies that came into the bridal shop. He put his hands out toward Amir; it couldn’t be that hard.
“I should not . . .” Kiki began, but suddenly Amir decided for them. He lunged forward, and Jacques instinctively squatted and caught him. Jacques whistled and made clucking sounds. To his amazement, Amir began to coo.
“It’s no big deal, go ahead.”
Kiki stood on tiptoes, shielding her dark eyes as she carefully scanned the park. Then she concentrated on the ball for a minute, taking aim. She was only wearing leather sandals, but with a firm smack, the ball soared straight and sure to the other end of the playground.
“Hey, your sister’s not bad!” Jacques whispered to Amir. The baby pulled on Jacques’s nose and bounced.
Every time Kiki kicked the ball, she stopped to look over her shoulder, craning her neck to search the four corners of the park. Finally, a calm look came over her face. She ran straight ahead, whacking the ball hard, pivoting and driving it forward.
When Kiki jogged back, she was panting, but the gap between her teeth showed through a broad smile.
“You’re good! You should go out for the girls’ team.”
“No.” Kiki beamed. “This is not true. I am no good at soccer, and my English is terrible too.”
“You speak really well! How’d you learn?” Jacques asked.
Kiki sat and rubbed her foot. “When we left my country, we came first to a place near Atlanta. We stayed there almost a year, and I had a good teacher.”
“What was her name?”
“Her name was Kiki.”
“Seriously?” Jacques looked up.
“In Somalia, it was not always safe to go to school, and I had to help at home. When we got to America, I was behind in every subject. My teacher’s family came from Africa. She understood my situation and was very kind to me. Now I like to remember her, so I use the nickname.” Kiki smiled. “It makes things easier, you know?”
“I get it,” Jacques replied. “I was named after my grandfather—but sometimes, kids just call me Jack.”
“Hey, you are not too bad with babies.” Amir was resting his head on Jacques’s shoulder. Kiki scooped her brother into her arms, but Amir reached back and grabbed Jacques’s hair.
“Ouch, this little man is strong!” Jacques grinned.
Ricky and Ismail ran over, with Robby three steps behind: “We’re starving!”
“I got something in here.” Kiki pulled out two triangle-shaped pastries and divided them among the open mouths. “You want to try?” She held out a piece for Jacques. “Hooyo made it this morning.”
The pastry was filled with spicy meat mixed with onions.
Kiki laughed when she saw the expression on Jacques’s face. “It is called sambusa. They are like your hot dogs—we eat them all the time.”
A loud rustling noise came from the other end of the playground.
“Hey, Gagnon!”
Jacques’s stomach flipped. Duane and another teenage boy were standing by the fence. A blonde girl was tucked under Duane’s shoulder. When she turned slightly, Jacques took another look and blinked. Monique! What was she doing with Duane? Was it possible she was actually marrying that creep?
