“I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation,” she said, softly bumping me with her shoulder. “Girls like Monday are hard to lose.”
I nodded, praying that was true.
“So, why is this the first time I’m seeing you?” I asked. “Where you been hiding?”
“Ha! Why you miss me or something?”
I giggled. “Sort of. All the other teachers are so . . . boring.”
“Well, the school was a bit short on staff and they asked me to teach fifth grade and be a team leader, so I’m in the East Wing this year. But, you know . . . if you miss me, you can always visit the dark side and I can give you some extra homework. I know how you love that.”
“Anything is better than Ms. O’Donnell.”
Ms. Valente raised both of her eyebrows and chuckled. “Ah. She’s a tough one. But she’s fair. She’ll get you ready for high school. I’ve seen students come back and visit just to admit they were wrong about her.”
“We’ll see,” I sighed. “Just wish Monday was in class with me.”
“Well, maybe you’ll be in class together next year—in high school. Speaking of, any thoughts about where you want to go yet?”
“Banneker,” I said, blurting out my practiced answer. A decision Monday made for the both of us.
“Hey! Now, that’s a good school. I know a few students who went there.”
“Yeah, but ain’t it, like, really hard to get into?”
“I wouldn’t worry about all that. You’re pretty dang smart, so you’ll do just fine. Got any other schools you’re thinking about?”
I held my breath, scratching at my sleeve. “I, um, don’t know. I guess it depends on where Monday wants to go.”
“I know. But where do you want to go?”
I shrugged. I hadn’t put much thought into it.
She laughed as we approached the office door. “Y’all a two-headed horse, that’s for sure.”
Ms. Clark sat behind the front desk computer, her lunch spread out, tuna on white bread with a bag of Utz crab chips. Monday’s favorite.
“Hey, Susan. Can you do me a quick favor? I’m looking for a student I had last year. Monday Charles?”
Ms. Clark nodded, stuffing one last bite into her mouth before clicking a few keys. I bounced on the balls of my feet, holding back an exploding grin. Ms. Valente put a hand on my shoulder with a smile, but I couldn’t calm down. We were about to find Monday!
Ms. Clark stopped typing and peered over her big glasses. “Hm. Not registered.”
“Um, okay. How about her little brother? August Charles?”
Ms. Clark smirked. “Wait, the girl’s name is Monday and she has a brother named August?”
Ms. Valente raised an eyebrow, her lips tightening. “Yes, like the famous playwright August Wilson.”
“And Tuesday Charles,” I added. “She should be starting kindergarten.”
Ms. Clark shrugged and clicked her computer some more, seeming bored. She shook her head. “Not registered either. Could they have moved?”
Ms. Valente glanced down at me, eyebrow raised.
“Her mother still lives at the same house. I . . . uh, saw her.”
“But you didn’t see Monday?”
Ms. Valente glanced back at Ms. Clark with a fake smile. “I know I’ve only been in this school for a couple of years, but back in New York, when a student doesn’t show up for class nor register for school, the school follows up. Is that not the case here?”
“A lot of students didn’t return this year. Most had to move due to rent going up and stuff. But I’ll pass a note along.”
The After
Dear Monday,
Ms. Manis moov me up to Group Five in jazz! Wit the highschol girls! I was the only 1 she did tht for. In this Girls are class on dance teams—those travling ones. Me and Ma and Daddy went to Chili’s to celabreat. Wish you where here to.
“How’d she get in this class?” A girl with thick, short hair stretched up to the ceiling, then bowed down to her feet, holding her position and letting her arms dangle toward the hardwood studio floor. She glanced up, eyeing me in the wall mirrors of the Manis Dance School for Girls.
“And ain’t she, like, twelve?”
Another girl sat in a comfortable split on the floor next to her, with her hair wrapped in a high bun. Both had the same creamy brown complexion and wore black leotards, pink leggings, and dance shorts.
“Naw, she ain’t that young. And you saw her in that last recital? She killed it.”
There were ten in the class: a bunch of juniors and seniors, one sophomore, and three freshmen, with me being a strange new addition. A brown horse in a field of unicorns.
“Yeah, but was it enough to jump out of group four, though?”
Keeping my distance, I stretched in the corner by the windows, listening to Daddy’s last album on my iPod. Go-go isn’t classical music, but I needed the adrenaline boost.
I pointed the new black ballet flats Daddy had bought me toward the windows, holding the arches of my feet, feeling the stretch in my sleepy hamstrings. Warm muscles help you jump higher so you land like a feather rather than a brick. That’s what Ms. Manis would say. It’s what I loved most about her. The tricks she drilled into our heads with sweet words, how she allowed us to incorporate hip-hop, jazz, and ballet moves into our pieces, how the music she selected didn’t make me feel like I was counting sheep.
Another girl, much thicker than the other two, stretched her leg up on the barre next to the mirror with a deep breath. “But shouldn’t she be with the little kids ’cause—”
The high-bun girl’s smile dropped. “Shannon, quit playin’. Ms. Manis said to leave her alone. So leave her alone.”
Short-Hair Girl exhaled as she backed up. “Well, as long as she don’t fuck up at recital and make us all look stupid.”
I gulped up a few short nervous breaths, pretending to focus, my confidence slipping through soft fingers. What if I didn’t belong in Group Five? What if I wasn’t good enough? And even if I was, was it worth being hated by another class of girls? I had enough trouble at real school; I didn’t need to add dance school to it.
“I wonder what song Ms. Manis is gonna give her for her solo,” High Bun said, rotating her head counterclockwise.
I could go a whole dance season without saying a word to the girls in my class. I wasn’t good at making new friends. Never needed to. I had Monday, and that’s all that mattered. But without her, the void she left stretched far, unexpectedly looping around every part of my life. I found myself wondering . . . what would Monday do?
Ms. Manis arrived, clapping us to attention, and we sprang into formation, the music starting. After warm-up, we moved into more intense steps. In the back of the room, I counted the beats, focused on Ms. Manis’s footwork, avoiding eye contact with the others. They might as well have broken out a measuring tape the way they sized me up. But I pushed through. I imagined being in our invisible bubble where their slick talk couldn’t hurt me, my force field impenetrable.
For the last twenty minutes of class we began learning the first steps of a routine that would eventually be a part of our big recital in June. An all-black dance school located smack in the middle of DC, our recitals could have up to five hundred spectators—including the mayor and senators working on Capitol Hill. Group Five dancers participated in their category dance, and then each girl had their own separate solo performance before the company-wide finale. It would be my first solo ever. I had ideas for my piece, but I needed Monday around to help me perfect them.
Ms. Manis counted out the steps, and we each took turns with the routine. Short Hair went first, sweeping across the floor, flashing a cocky smirk at me. High Bun was second to last, gracefully stepping, staying on count and leaping into a perfect landing. I bounced on the balls of my feet, waiting my turn. With a nod from Ms. Manis, I sprung, kicked out into a layout, then added one last twirl to a stop. Ms. Manis smiled in approval.
“Excellent, Cla
udia.”
Eyes scorched the back of my head red and I cowered inside my bubble for the remainder of class. Maybe showing off wasn’t the best way to make friends.
“Told you she’s good,” High Bun mumbled with a grin to Short Hair as they passed in the locker room.
“Yeah, whatever.”
The Before
We should be practicing.
That’s all I kept thinking as Daddy’s album kicked through my mini speaker in the living room. Once Monday got back from wherever she was hiding, we’d have a lot of work to do. We couldn’t mess around. We needed to be super tight, so that when we got to high school, making it on the dance squad would be nothing. We’d even be cocaptains. Everyone would want to be us—the best dancers, the most popular girls in school.
Lost in that go-go beat, I caught a glimpse of myself in the hallway mirror, noticing the way my swiveling hips made my ass shake. Slowly, my hands found my knees and I squatted, poking my ass out—a muscle I’m not used to dancing with—and forced it to move the way I wanted.
Monday used to do this, twerk in the mirror like girls in the music videos we’d studied, face stoic and focused as if was she solving a complicated word problem. I’d laugh until tears streamed down my face, but now I see it. The draw. How I went from a little kid to a hot girl in a matter of a few moves. Sexy. A word I would never use to describe myself, but at that moment, I saw a glimpse of it. And I liked it.
Ma came halfway down the stairs before busting out laughing.
“Girl, don’t hurt yourself!”
“Ma!” I screamed, running away.
“And don’t let your daddy catch you dancing like that either. Come on. Let’s get you out the house for a bit.”
We parked at the Giant supermarket, thick with Saturday traffic. I pushed the cart, while Ma checked off her long list. She planned meals out in advance since Daddy could eat a whole chicken on his own, leaving nothing but dry bones for us to pick from. Ma fussed, calling him a Hoover vacuum but only teasing. She loved how he loved her food.
“Not too fatty there, Chris,” Ma said to the butcher behind the counter. “My husband’s old and he don’t need the cholesterol.”
The butcher laughed. “Yes, boss lady. Anything else?”
Ma knew how to flirt with the butcher to pick the best cuts, and they appreciated her love of roast beefs and lamb chops.
“Beef stir-fry,” she said, reading from her list. “Need them strips a little thick, though.”
“I got you.”
I leaned against the cart full of canned goods and fresh vegetables, burying my face in a Seventeen magazine, avoiding Ma’s smirk every time she glanced in my direction.
“Oooh, Ma! Look at this red!” I said, pointing to a nail polish ad.
“Sweet Pea, don’t you have enough reds?”
“It’s not just any red. It’s a blue red! And it’s a gel color! It even comes with a kit.”
Ma shook her head, turning her attention to a stack of turkey butts. “Lawd, only you would see the difference.”
That’s when a sparkle caught my eye. I glanced up and there she was. Monday. Standing near the bread aisle. Even with her back to me, you couldn’t miss her unmistakable denim jacket—the one with the red striped collar and rhinestones. The one I gave her. My knees gave in and I collapsed against the cart.
“Monday?” I breathed.
She didn’t hear me as she made a left down the next aisle. I dropped the magazine in the cart, my sneakers squeaking against the floor as I took off after her.
“Monday!” I called, noticing the relief in my voice, joy bouncing in my chest.
I never ran so fast in my life, chasing a dream after living through a nightmare. I made the corner before my heart crashed into a wall. Up close, the girl in my jacket gliding up the aisle was much taller, but I still gurgled her name.
“Monday?”
The girl flinched as if shot, slowly turning to me.
I gasped, her face almost unrecognizable. “April?”
April’s shoulders sagged, as if the very thought of responding to her own name exhausted her.
“Hey,” I said, my voice falling flat. The hope that had ballooned inside burst, blood rushing to my head.
“What’s up?” she sighed, her voice low and solemn. Monday’s older sister looked . . . older. Her pale skin, big black bags under her eyes, had her looking like somebody’s mother rather than a sixteen-year-old.
“Um, where’s Monday?” I said, staring at my jacket.
April pressed her lips together, staring right into my eyes. “She . . . is visiting my aunt.”
“Your aunt?” Monday had an aunt in Laurel, Maryland. But it had been years since she mentioned her. I peeked inside April’s cart. Three boxes of mac and cheese, a bag of cheese puffs, white bread, fruit punch mix, and a jar of peanut butter. Monday can’t have peanut butter.
“Uh . . . yeah.”
“She’s staying with her or something? She’s already missed a month of school.”
April sucked her teeth. “I don’t know.”
I swallowed, my thoughts not pulling together fast enough.
“Well, you got her number so I can call?”
“My aunt doesn’t have a phone right now,” she said, gripping the cart. “Anyways, I’ve got to go.”
I scrambled, trying to come up with more questions, just so she’d stay with me longer. Even though she acted like a block of ice, she was the closest thing I had to Monday.
“But . . . when do you think Monday will be back home?”
She gave me a dark look, gripping the handle tighter, her knuckles turning white.
“Claudia. Just . . . stay away, okay?” I took a step back as she moved closer to my face. “Just stay away. Don’t do this.”
With that, she sped off, abandoning me in the aisle.
Stay away? She knows I came by the house. If she knew, maybe Monday knew. And if so, why hadn’t she called me?
One Year Before the Before
“No way! There ain’t nobody?”
Monday’s mouth fell as she sat on the floor across from me in the library after school. We hung out in the back, among the magazine aisles, waiting for the church car pool to pick me up for dance class. August, still too little to walk home alone, flipped through books in the kiddie corner, chewing on Fruit Roll-Ups.
“Naw,” I said with a shrug.
“You fake lying. You telling me there ain’t nobody you like? Nobody you find even cute. Not even Tyrell or Demetrius?”
Tapping my pencil on my notebook, I struggled to finish my essay. “I mean, they cute, but I’m not feeling them like that.”
“Then who?” she badgered. “Come on! Tell me!”
I sighed, tired of all our conversation turning to Monday’s new obsession: boys.
“There got to be at least one guy.” She raised an eyebrow with a smirk. “Unless . . . there’s a girl . . . that you, you know, may be feeling.”
I looked up from my notebook sharply. “Don’t.”
She laughed. “Sike, you know I’m just playing with you.”
My face grew hot under her fiery questions. I mean, there wasn’t a boy I liked or even found cute. They all still seemed so nasty and stupid to me.
“Well . . . there is one guy,” I said hesitantly, trying to make my lie believable. “He’s cute but he’s . . . older.”
She laughed. “Of course you’d like them old, old lady!”
“Whatever. Not everyone’s got love at first sight like you.”
She closed her eyes, her smile glowing. “Did I tell you we sit next to each other in history?”
“Yes. For the thousandth time! Dang.”
Grinning, she leaned over and drew on my notebook: Jacob + Monday.
Jacob Miller: hands down the finest boy in our school. Been fine forever. Every girl liked him and he knew it, which made his cockiness ugly to me. His head was so gassed up he could float over the river, walking around lik
e the king of Southeast. But who could deny his almond-shaped eyes, his crooked smiles, his dimples, his big bush of soft, curly brown hair he pushed back with a headband.
Monday had loved him for so long that I couldn’t remember another boy but him. Her eyes would flicker when she talked about him like sparks were caught between her eyelashes.
“I heard him talking with Mr. Ode about applying to Banneker next year.” She pretended to hold back a scream as she lay on the floor. “Wouldn’t that be cool? We end up at the same high school together? Him on the basketball team, us on the dance team? OMG, OMG, OMG! Like, we could be THE couple. That’s why we got to find you a boo, so we can go on double dates and stuff.”
“Ain’t you putting the cart before the horse? Y’all don’t even talk!”
“Only old ladies say stuff like that. I’m working on it, but you’re supposed to be helping me.”
I laughed, opening my binder. “Whatever. Here, read my essay.”
She snatched the loose-leaf paper out of my hand with a mischievous grin. “Only if you help me bag Jacob.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just read it.”
She scanned the paper and my back stiffened at her quickly fading smile. She looked up at me, harshness in her eyes.
“Claudia! What’d I tell you about this?” she snapped, stabbing the sheet with her finger. There could be a number of things wrong with it, so I didn’t bother guessing.
“You’ve got to be careful! We ain’t gonna get into Banneker if they put you in the stupid people class. We’ll have to go to some other high school!”
I reeled back, her anger unhinging.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, holding back tears, playing with a piece of lint on my stockings.
She sighed, her eyes softening. “It’s okay. Here, let me just . . . rewrite it for you.”
Without hesitation, I handed over my notebook. I had secretly hoped she would offer. She wrote my essays better than I could anyways, but it was the first time she ever snapped at me about schoolwork. She normally had a gentle touch. The idea of going to high school with Jacob Miller was driving her to madness.
Monday's Not Coming Page 4
