President of the Whole Sixth Grade_Girl Code

by Sherri Winston

  And we discussed writing and journalism and other careers, too. Like building robots that help make cars!

  “I couldn’t believe how many people were there. And it was so cool how that woman taught us how to build our own robot and said how she went to Cass Tech. Hey, did you know I wanted to go to Cass Tech, too, but that was back when I wanted to be a cupcake baker and a journalist. And journalism is still way cool, but, I don’t know, after today, what if—”

  Mr. McShea laughed so hard, he got ketchup in his hipster beard. Red sat shaking her head. “Oh, Justice!” was all she could say.

  But when all the laughter was over, it was time to get to work. We left and went to the Freep. We had a follow-up story to write.

  Putting it all together was a lot of work. It was much harder to write about the meaning of something than to describe all the different things that happened.

  A young woman named Trina came over to help out, too. She was a page designer and helped us use the photos that a photographer at the event took to help tell the story. When we were finally done, we hit SEND, and the story went flying to the editor for approval.

  We were done.

  And I was exhausted.

  Time to go home and go to bed!

  Reporter’s Notebook

  Wednesday, February 14

  Neptune called. Awkward. We watched a movie together online. Star Wars: The Force Awakens. He applauded every time a Wookiee appeared on screen! Then we talked and talked, making up our own version of the next Star Wars episode. Mine had a legion of kick-butt black women who used their exceptional computer skills to threaten the empire. Good times.

  When you look up “black women in computer science” for research, you get a ton of names. Why did that surprise me???

  MELBA ROY MOUTON, was a NASA mathematician called a computer. In the 1960s, she had this big title—Assistant Chief of Research Programs with their Trajectory and Geodynamic division, Whoa!

  ANNIE J. EASLEY, computer scientist, mathematician, and rocket scientist who worked for the Lewis Research Center of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and its predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) (career started in 1955, as “computer”).

  DR. EVELYN BOYD GRANVILLE was the second black woman to earn a Ph.D. in mathematics from Yale University (1949). She worked as a Computer Scientist for IBM on the Project Vanguard and Project Mercury space programs, and then for the U.S. Space Technologies Laboratories. She became a longtime professor.

  Modern accomplishments by women of color in computer science:

  KIMBERLY BRYANT founded San Francisco-based nonprofit Black Girls Code in 2011. Her organization has been responsible for inspiring more than 1,500 girls to work in technology fields such as robotics, video game design, mobile phone application development and computer programming. In 2013, she received the White House Champions of Change for Tech Inclusion award for work to diversify the tech industry.

  KYLA MCMULLEN was the first African American woman at the University of Michigan to graduate with a doctorate in computer science. She graduated in 2012. She continues to be an inspiration to young women looking to work in that field. Now, she teaches computer science at the University of Florida as an assistant professor and is the leader of the SoundPad Lab at the University of Florida.

  Don’t know if I’m falling in love with computer science, but definitely liking the field more!

  Reporter’s Notebook

  Friday, February 16

  To-Do List:

  • Cheerleading exhibition

  • Church (I’m selling cupcakes)

  • Swimming w/ Neptune

  21

  Presidents’ Day.

  Well, almost. No school on Monday, so the mini-movie tribute Click and I organized had to run on Friday.

  The entire sixth grade met in the auditorium for morning announcements. We normally waited for Principal Striker to do the morning announcements, then he’d announce our movie and its topic.

  Click and I knew that the trick to mini movies was to keep them quick and simple. Kids got the message and laughed. Life went on.

  Today was going to be different.

  We’d spent many, many hours working on the setup, building structures, and taking pictures. Several different groups of kids had helped with everything from making tiny prop sets to taking the photos to keeping Click’s head from exploding during the editing process.

  Not an easy task, I might add.

  “Good morning, everyone,” I said into the mic. “Today we are presenting our movie as a sign of respect and celebration for the lives of all the people who were forced to live in awful conditions because they were being discriminated against. We are celebrating the Fair Housing Act of 1968 and the people who struggled, fought, and even died so that we could live where we want to live.

  “But all we have to do is look around us. Open your eyes. People are still living in areas where no one should have to live. Still forced into awful neighborhoods, and ghettos, that are laughed at and ridiculed. For many, there is no easy way out.”

  I took a breath. Sixth graders quickly get restless, so I didn’t want to go on much longer.

  “Please check out the Blueberry today for my article. Now, without further ado, here is the mini-movie, Gonna Buy Me a House Someday, inspired by an award-winning African American playwright, Lorraine Hansberry, and dedicated to the entire sixth-grade class of Blueberry Hills Middle. Thank you!”

  A few catcalls and whistles, then the movie started.

  We’d done our best to make the pieces look realistic. Since we really couldn’t animate the faces like in real movies, Click and his friends did an excellent job of conveying the emotions with music.

  Tiny figures, a white couple and a black couple, moved through the colorful neighborhood. Time and again, the black couple was denied a place to live, despite being able to prove they could afford it.

  While the movie played and the story became clear, I glanced around the dim auditorium. Several kids’ gazes were glued to the screen. It was cool to see how many of them really seemed to be totally into it, the serious message reaching them despite our playful way of getting it across.

  “Brianna,” Click said, moving up beside me. “You done good, girl!” He leaned down and bumped me playfully with his shoulder. When I looked at his hands, I saw he was holding a LEGO mini-figure. Effortlessly, he removed the figure’s head and clicked it up and down a few times.

  Saturday I awoke to the distinctive odor of wood smoke.

  Sleep had been elusive with worrying about today. The exhibition. Was I prepared enough? Would I wind up face-planting in front of a group of other cheerleaders? Or worse: Would I land on my face in front of Neptune?

  I dressed in our team’s warmup clothes. My body ached in odd places. I was hobbling around like Grandpa after he’d been sitting at the kitchen table too long.

  Once I was dressed, I came into the shadowy kitchen, reached for the Pop-Tart box, then drew my hand back.

  Dad shuffled in, Grandpa behind him.

  “Pop-Tarts? Not from the baking diva herself. Baking chef extraordinaire, Miss Brianna Justice!” Grandpa chuckled.

  I scowled.

  Daddy said, “Hmm… that doesn’t look like a happy cheerleader this morning.”

  They went on with their jokes and I decided to ignore the premade pastry. Suddenly, I had no appetite. What I did have was a humongous case of stage fright.

  I would like to say that after the recent success of the story I wrote with Red, not to mention the positive response the school had to the mini-movie project, my confidence was at an all-time high. And trust me, that’s pretty high.

  However, as my brain churned with dance moves, kicks, flips, turns, stretches, and everything else that went into the exhibition, I couldn’t stop the knocking in my knees and the dryness in my mouth.

  Our team met downtown at the dance school, then we boarded a bus and headed a
cross the state, not stopping until we arrived at the biggest high school I’d ever seen. We were in Ann Arbor, where the University of Michigan was located. The parking lot was a sea of buses.

  I sneaked a glance at Red and she glanced at me and we glanced back and forth at each other.

  Stunt rehearsal turned my empty stomach into a sour, gurgling mess. And what else had my intestines in a knot?

  Two words—LOCKER ROOM!

  Sure, I had changed clothes in front of other girls before. I wasn’t a baby. I had P.E. However, this wasn’t gym class at good ol’ Blueberry Hills Middle. And the girls filling up the enormous space were not shy little sixth and seventh graders, either.

  This was like some huge dressing room area with hundreds of girls. I couldn’t help gawking. Then I turned around because I didn’t want anyone to think, you know, I was checking them out.

  But I am checking them out.

  And it wasn’t just the stranger girls who had me buggin’. It was our girls, too. When they peeled out of their warmups and put on their real uniforms, it was like—BOOM!—above the neck, kid. Below the neck, GROWN-UP WOMAN.

  You know what was below my neck?

  More neck.

  It was horrifying.

  “Psst!” I half hissed, half whispered to Red. When I turned to her, she was bent over, carefully lifting the sparkly silver uniform top over her head. She wore a bra so pale, it was the same nude color as her flesh. Her underpants matched. God, I felt like a third grader. I didn’t even think about that. My non-bra was one of those things you get that have the little spaghetti straps and lies softly across your chest. Mine had butterflies. Isn’t that sweet? BUTTERFLIES! My outward wardrobe had definitely become more serious, befitting an up-and-coming business woman.

  My undies, not so much.

  “No one told me we’d have to change clothes in front of… so many girls,” I said.

  She shrugged. “In dance, you get used to it.”

  If that wasn’t terrifying enough, however, while we practiced, we heard a commotion coming from inside the auditorium.

  One of the girls said, “It’s some kind of celebrity, I think. People are trying to talk to him or something.”

  Now my heart did a kick. Neptune. Had to be. Numbness tingled in my legs and lips and arms and fingers. I wanted to freak out. Say something.

  No time. Too busy working on my balance, body control, flexibility, and squeezing my butt tight.

  “Brianna, come here please,” Coach T. called out before it was time for us to go on. I could feel myself shaking inside.

  Still, my heart thudded to the bam-bam beat. Sweat tickled my hairline. No junior executive bun today. Instead, my hair was gelled and brushed back, held with a tightly wound rubber band. The ponytail was fluffed and sparkled with some sort of hair glitter one of the girls had sprayed on.

  “Yes,” I said, voice cracking. Despite how much fun it was to see her a few weeks ago at the SheCodes event, she still kept yelling at me for two weeks straight about my form, stamina, and intensity.

  “I wanted to let you know how proud Kristy and I are of you,” she said, causing me to about fall over with relief. “I know I challenged you in the beginning, but that was because I see so much potential in you.”

  “T-thanks, Coach T.,” I stammered.

  She went on. “We need strong, smart girls like you in competitive cheer. We need you to know you can be physically fit and scientifically inclined and ready to take on the world. Go get ’em, girl!”

  Inside the gym, the music changed tempo. The beat dropped hard and the rhythm of my heart followed. I reached out, grabbed my coach, and hugged her.

  “Calm down, honey,” she said soothingly with a laugh. “I’m still going to ride you like I do all the other girls. But we just wanted you to know how proud we are.”

  Our team hit the floor. I was set up side by side with teammates, ready to do battle.

  Tracy said with a grudging smile, “Get that scorpion, girl. I got you!”

  Everything happened so fast. Going from one position to the next required so much concentration. We had done this routine over and over and over. I honestly had been doing it in my sleep. But an electric thread of terror coursed through my veins as I feared forgetting a step. While writing our story for the paper, I had been convinced award-winning journalism was much tougher than competitive cheer.

  Now I wasn’t at all sure.

  When it was time to go into the air, I sucked in my breath, tightened the muscles in my belly and butt, and locked my legs. Red, also hoisted into the air, gave me a quick smile. With one fluid motion, I did the scorpion stretch.

  And… then it was over!

  Elation prickled my skin. I felt so happy. So alive. Then, right before we ran off the center mat, I caught a glimpse of a familiar face.

  Neptune!

  All during the performance I’d been afraid to look into the crowd. Now I looked, and when I did, I laughed out loud. Sitting beside him and his Secret Service escorts was my family. Mom was all dressed up in her FBI clothes, which meant she was on duty.

  Part of his protection detail?

  Katy waved enthusiastically and I waved back. When my gaze met Neptune’s, we both smiled shyly. Okay, so we’d agreed beforehand to nod to each other, but not make a big fuss.

  The last thing I wanted was to cause a stir in the press with rumors of dating the POTUS’s nephew. After all, I was in the media now. I had a reputation to protect.

  Sunday.

  A mild snowstorm hit the city overnight. The world turned from slushy dirty snow to frozen white once again.

  Of course, floating on a plastic ring in a pool heated to eighty-five degrees made the winter storm seem far, far away. Neptune was also floating on a colorful inner tube, black swim goggles pulled on top of his head. My hair was parted and plaited down the middle. School was out the next day, Presidents’ Day. I was glad to have the day off. I’d wash my hair tomorrow. Today, well, perhaps Neptune would get the full Wookiee experience!

  I stared up through a glass ceiling that revealed a treacherously pale winter sky. Wind rose and every so often rattled the sides of the hotel. We paid that howling wind almost no attention.

  “So you enjoyed the robotics, huh?” Neptune asked for the fourth or fifth time.

  “Yeah, yeah. I get it. You were right about the conference and—me. Maybe… just maybe, I might want to be a little more open to what I could learn about my future. Don’t go getting ahead of yourself, though!”

  We both laughed.

  Neptune reached out and tugged my inner tube until we were floating side by side.

  “So, Wook, what have you decided? About moving to D.C., I mean?”

  I sighed. Mom and I hadn’t talked about it since that day after school. Still, at home I could feel her and Dad stealing glances my way, like they were trying to look inside my head and read my thoughts. “Well, she says she hasn’t decided yet, but in her heart, I know Mom’s all set to go. It would mean a lot to her.”

  “So…”

  When I looked at him, for one crazy, horrible second I thought for sure I would burst into tears. Instead, I drew a deep breath.

  “So…” I began, “when we leave here today I’m going to insist she take that promotion. A woman has a right to advance in her career, you know?”

  “Oh, I do.” Neptune grinned, then, becoming more serious, he asked, “Are you cool with it? Or are you sad?”

  The donut-shaped floaty pushed lower into the water as I lay back. Red and I had talked about it. Instead of making a bunch of promises about keeping in touch later, we just decided—if Mom takes the job—to do as much stuff as we can while we’re together.

  We even decided maybe we would take Miss Addy up on her offer and travel north to Mackinac Island for the summer.

  Eyes still closed, I said, “Not sad. Well, yes, sad. But more so about what I’ll be leaving behind.”

  I opened my eyes and looked at him. I said,
“But maybe I’m looking forward to new experiences.”

  Neptune’s face was inches from mine as I stared up toward the ceiling. I smiled. He smiled. It felt good knowing I’d have a friend in D.C.

  Still, when he cut his eyes to one side and leaned in for a super-quick smooch, I saw stars for a minute.

  “Time for a snack break!” he declared.

  We raced to the pool’s edge and pulled ourselves up onto the deck. That was when I noticed a silver tray with a bell-shaped lid, like you get for room service.

  “I had a special snack prepared for you!” he said. But the way he said it, it was like he was in first grade or something.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  He went to the table and whipped away the lid. On the tray was a large plate filled with Oreo cookies.

  “You like?” He waved his hand past the plate like we were on a game show and he was the wacky host.

  I punched him right in his arm. “You are NOT funny!” I said, but I was laughing really hard. Of course, after the whole Oreo thing at Price, I had told him about it. He said if he had a dollar for every time someone either in person or on the Internet called him Oreo he’d be a billionaire. He’d said, “Wook, you can’t let nobody steal the goodness of milk’s favorite cookie!”

  He began laughing so hard that he snorted. We each lifted a glass of milk from the tray, grabbed a cookie, then tapped the cookies together in a toast.

  When we reached for our last cookies, instead of dunking them, we both shoved the whole cookie in our mouths and made googly eyes at each other. Then he shoved me into the pool and fell in beside me. I nearly snorked my cookie!

  “You’re silly!” I said, pushing him away.

  “Okay, seriously? You know I’m looking forward to it,” he said. His cookie was gone. Now I couldn’t help noticing how beautiful his eyes were. Especially with flecks of Oreo stuck to his cheek below.

  “Really?” I said. I felt dizzy—excited, nervous, a little weird.

  At least until he said, “Sure! I want to show my friends that I haven’t been making it up. I know a real-live Wookiee from Star Wars!”