She leaned forward. Tapped her manicured nails on the sticky table.
“Yes, of course. But you’ve seen the statistics, haven’t you? Youth in foster care have a much more successful transition to independent living in adulthood if they remain in the system for as long as possible, which in California’s case is twenty-one years old.”
I sighed. I hadn’t truly believed she was different, but a part of me had hoped to be proven wrong.
“With all due respect, Ms. Sienna, I’ve been a statistic my entire life. Adding one more number over my head about how I’m bound to fail won’t make a difference.”
Sienna’s eyes widened in horror.
“Oh! Gosh, I, I didn’t mean to minimize your existence—I just want the best for you.”
“Why? You don’t know me.”
Now it was my turn to wait.
“Well.” She squirmed in her seat. “Prissy says you’re really talented, and I can see just from speaking with you here that you’re intelligent. We’ve got to look after each other and there’s no reason—”
“So you think I’m ‘one of the good ones’? The kids that aren’t too messed up, that you can put on your government website? And what if I wasn’t a good actress, or smart, like you say?” I laughed. My words sounded hollow in my ears. I was giving her a hard time, when all she wanted to do was help. But the thing about helping was that the helpers always got tired. And I got tired of trying to be helped. I had opened my heart to strangers over and over again, felt the love stomped out of it one too many times. All that was left was scar tissue.
“No one ever thinks of me that way. No one thinks of me at all, really,” I said. She opened her mouth to interject, but I shook my head. “Look. Ms. Priscilla is a really nice lady, and her class was my favorite, pretty much the only one I went to consistently. But it was time for me to go. I saved up all my cash from work at the gas station and moved to the place where I could try this acting thing out for real, for real. And when I got here, I remembered quick that the only person I can really depend on is myself. I don’t want to watch my back in group homes or feel unwelcome in people’s houses. My life is hard, but I been knew that. So can I live?”
After lunch, Sienna insisted on driving me back to my neighborhood, and I took her up on the offer. I didn’t want to spend what little money I had on an Uber, and the thought of dealing with LA’s infuriating public transportation system when I didn’t have to made me want to scream. She kept the conversation light for the rest of our time together, and let Janelle Monáe trill in the background between her comments about the traffic and the most popular tourist spots in the city.
“Right here is fine,” I said, pointing to a cluster of tall buildings towering just as high as the patch of palm trees beside it. I could tell the area looked nicer than Sienna had imagined.
“Roommate,” I said simply. No need to go into how I needed a new one fast because my stupid ex-boyfriend left. Just like everybody else.
“Here you go,” she said, stopping so I could get out of the car.
“Well. Thank you for lunch,” I said. “And, uh, you’re a good sister for doing this for Ms. Priscilla.”
She smiled sadly. “It was nice to meet you. I can certainly pull some strings to have you re-enter foster care if you decide that’s what you want to do. We have some great resources in Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office. And—I mean this—please, please reach out if you need anything.”
She handed me her card through the window.
I nodded and waved as she drove off.
Once she was comfortably far away, I kept walking. I actually lived a few blocks down in a crappy studio. The entire downtown area was rapidly gentrifying, and I didn’t know how I was going to afford rent on my own next month. I wasn’t ready to go back to Jackson just yet. I needed to stay on the go, try to outrun my racing thoughts. I’d moved here to start over. Live the life I wanted to live. The first step? Find a job. Any job.
A tourist on a scooter came barreling down the sidewalk. Practically ran my ass over. While I was able to hop out of the way just in time, I still managed to topple backwards, my pivoted body ramming into the bulletin board posted outside of a local recreation center. I yelled after the long-gone man and grumbled from my spot on the ground. I was about to pick myself up when a flyer fluttered into my lap. I reflexively started to crumple it but stopped when I saw the words OPEN CASTING CALL staring back at me. I smoothed out the page and read.
They were looking to create a new show spun as the next generation of Gossip Girl, but grittier. Not too gritty of course. The beautiful, rich teens born of the right families would never face repercussions and would be allowed to make mistakes without fear of ruining their entire lives. Not like someone in real life. Someone like me. When the characters inevitably drank too much, rebelling against what they’d view as the unattainable pressures of living up to their family legacies, and threw up onscreen, even that would be glamorous. Vomit splashing directly into a porcelain toilet. Throats unburned by bile still allowing for perfectly clear delivery of well-rehearsed lines. Hair swooped back to keep from getting sullied by their mess. Eye makeup miraculously still intact. The audience would swoon about how real it was and how they were just kids, growing up and figuring out life.
I was still sitting on the ground when someone stopped in front of me. “What you doin’ down there, girl?” the person asked, reaching to help me up. I took the hand and said thanks.
Her name was Jaz. One moment I was lost, wondering what the hell I was doing with my life and searching unsuccessfully for HELP WANTED signs posted in restaurant windows. Desperate. The next, I’d not only stumbled across a show that I would die to be on but the opportunity to make some real money so I could stick around in LA.
My luck had finally changed.
5
HAPPI
THURSDAY, JULY 26—
3 MONTHS, 9 DAYS SINCE THE ARREST
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS
“Are you sure
That we are awake? It seems to me
That yet we sleep, we dream.”
We dream
We dream
We dream
Sometimes I like to pretend I’m asleep and my life is simply an intricate dream. Depending on my mood, I imagine I’m actually four years old and at any moment, my preschool teacher will wake me up for snack time and I’ll still have my whole life ahead of me. Lately though, I’m just three months younger. That fateful Tuesday in April never comes. I am snuggled in bed, slurping up a warm bowl of my mom’s spicy chili chicken noodle soup because Kezi and I have caught a mean cold and are in no state to go out. Occasionally, we don’t have the sniffles but an overdue case of chickenpox, despite our vaccines. That way, Kezi can’t leave. Kezi and I are cooler than cool. We stay in and slather cold layers of calamine lotion and aloe vera on each other’s backs. I cornrow her hair. She wraps mine. We don’t go to school that day. We don’t argue in the halls. We don’t walk away on terrible terms.
But I keep opening my eyes to this reality.
I am back on my bench outside the theater, not dumb enough to really slumber here, but I need to be where I was during the last moment I had some semblance of peace. Not even peace—uncomfortable neutrality. Before those faces of confusion and surprise were engraved in my memory. Before I walked away from my family, again.
Nevertheless, my mind is operating on high gear, and thoughts ricochet across the edges of my brain and cut into my reverie.
Why did you leave?
What is wrong with you?
Breathe.
Just breathe.
How could you?
I avoid looking at the two guys around my age across the street who are playing music from enormous speakers and engaging in a loud, vibrant conversation over the beats. The slow punctuations of trap music compete with their
words. (The music is losing.)
“Hell naw!” shouts the one in an oversize Bulls jersey.
“What?” snaps his friend in silver basketball shorts.
“You ’bout to get shot down!”
“But I’m smooth, though. My swag so good it makes up for my face.”
I snort in an attempt to stifle my giggle. I put on a good show, usually, but I wish I had a quarter of the confidence of this unfortunately mugged but seemingly charming guy. My dad joked in a sermon once that we all got the saying wrong—it’s not that God don’t like ugly. He don’t like ugly souls. It makes all the difference.
“Aye, girl!”
I groan inwardly but keep my expression detached. While I was admiring their Black Boy Joy convention from afar, I never intended to join it. Aye girls usually end with someone pissed off. The guy feels slighted when a girl keeps walking or says she’s not interested, and the attention-seeking takes a nasty turn. Suddenly, the girl isn’t that cute anymore. And thinks she’s too good to turn around. Uppity.
The boys stroll across the street before I say a word, taking advantage of the stopped traffic at the red light. They’re closer to my bench than I am to the theater. It’s darker than when I was out here earlier, but I don’t want to cause a ruckus by running away. I think of one of Kezi’s YouTube videos I binge-watched after she died, about how Black boys are considered more mature and dangerous when they’re much younger than other kids. Maybe it’s a stupid thing to do in my case, since they’re guys and I’m all alone, but I stay put.
“Don’t be scared,” the one in the Bulls jersey says as he lowers the music’s volume.
“I’m not.” I cross my arms and feign boredom.
“We wanna ask you something... If my boy Titus asked you out, what would you say?” He points to his friend.
“No tha—”
“Lemme clarify, I’m not asking you out,” Titus cuts in. “I’m asking a girl like you out.”
My pulse slows down and I relax. “Oh! And who are ‘girls like me’ exactly?”
“You know.” Oversize Bulls Jersey motions vaguely in my general direction. “Fancy. She contours her face and shit.”
I laugh so hard I cry.
“See? Reagan would wear waterproof mascara too,” Titus says. “She’s smart like that.”
“How do you know her?” I ask.
“Marcus—” Titus points to Bulls jersey “—used to mess around with Reagan’s cousin. When she wanted to get serious and he didn’t, he ghosted her.”
I groan and shake my head. “I know for a fact that this Reagan girl thinks you’re trash now.”
“That’s what I said! But Marcus is the one going around leaving people on ‘Read.’ He’s a fuccboi. Not me,” Titus whines. “All I want is a chance to show her!”
“You have any classes with her?”
He shakes his head sadly. “She goes to a prep school across town. I told you, she’s smart.”
“Hmm. Well, where do you get to see her?”
“I don’t. Only when I’d be chilling at Marcus’s and she’d come over with her cousin.”
“But her birthday pool party is tonight,” Marcus offers. “And you better believe we about to crash that shit.”
Marcus looks at me pointedly and asks, “Where are you from anyway?”
“What do you mean?” I say.
“It’s obvious you ain’t from here.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Well, if you’re not going back to ‘Don’t Worry About It’ anytime soon, you should swing by the Nash Park Pool tonight. Around eleven. Bathing suit optional. Birthday suit encouraged.”
I roll my eyes. “He is a fuccboi, isn’t he?”
Now it’s their turn to laugh.
“Dang. For real, Happi?”
I turn and see Genny storming toward me. She’s pissed.
6
KEZI
MONDAY, APRIL 16—
1 DAY BEFORE THE ARREST
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
Dinner at the Smith house was serious business. Even though Mom and Dad were both full-time pastors, they made it their mission to ensure that our bodies were just as nourished as our souls. Actual words spoken by my cheesy-ass parents.
I inhaled my mom’s world-famous double-crust chicken pot pie as soon as I floated through the front door. I followed the delicious scents of rosemary and turmeric and made a beeline straight to the kitchen like a greedy fish being pulled by a hook. I stood in front of the oven debating whether or not I could sneak a little piece from the bottom of the cast iron skillet without anyone noticing. I grabbed a small spoon from the utensils drawer and, just as I looked over my shoulder to check that the coast was clear, Mom entered the kitchen.
“Mmm hmm. I knew I heard you come in,” she said as she walked to me and plucked the spoon from my fist. She crossed her arms, her face pulled into an exaggerated frown. “If you even think about cutting into that pot pie before it’s done, you’ll never be able to use that hand again. Which would be a shame. You have such nice hands.”
“Aw, come on, Ma. You know it’s one of my favorite things you make. Let me get a tiny bit,” I pleaded. “I won’t even break the pastry.”
“You can save those puppy dog eyes for someone else,” Mom said heartlessly as she took me by the shoulders and led me out of the kitchen, farther and farther from the yummy food. “Now go wash up before dinner.”
I sighed loudly as I made my way upstairs. Cheerful pictures of me, Happi, and Genny lined the wall, leading to the second floor. No one ever mentioned how Happi’s smile had gotten less and less bright through the years, as if the light within her had dimmed. The bathroom was the first door on the right at the top of the landing, but it was firmly shut. I could hear someone having an animated conversation inside so, of course, I pressed my ear to the door.
“Love can transpose to form and dignity:
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;
And therefore is wing’d Cupid painted blind:
Nor hath Love’s mind of any judgement taste;
Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste:
And therefore—”
“Happi!” I banged on the bathroom door. “How many times do I have to tell you that you have to practice your lines in your room? You can’t keep hogging the bathroom like this, girl!”
“And how many times do I have to tell you that the bathroom has the best acoustics in the house and lets me know how I’ll sound onstage?!”
“I. Don’t. Care! Open. Up!” I accentuated each word with a pound on the door for emphasis. “See? We got acoustics out here too!”
Happi swung open the door and rolled her eyes to the heavens as she brushed roughly past me.
“Thanks, sis,” I said as sweet as dripping honey to her retreating figure. She didn’t even turn around to acknowledge me.
I tossed my book bag on the bathroom floor and shut the door behind me. I had only ten minutes to wash up and head downstairs for dinner. Mom was a stickler for us eating together as a family, and we had to be on time. If I arrived a minute after 7:00 p.m. without a good excuse, I’d be in for an earful. And Mom didn’t want to hear anything about Happi hogging the bathroom either.
“Figure it out and keep me out of it!” Mom had said one too many times whenever I complained about my sister’s selfish ways.
At least when Genny was around, I had reinforcements to make Happi get a move on and let the next person handle their business. But Genny had her own place out in downtown LA now. I missed her all the time, especially since it seemed that Happi and I had basically nothing in common anymore. Dinnertime was particularly a point of contention for us because, even though I secretly loved it when we all got together, Happi would rather be doing anything but that. If it wasn’t for our family dinners
, I wouldn’t know what was going on in her life at all, despite us attending the same school.
That was part of the reason Mom had consistently kept up these daily meetups. For as long as I could remember, my parents had gone to pastors’ conferences. One year a long time ago, the conference focus was on the family unit—because if you can’t lead your flock at home how can you be trusted with the Lord’s sheep? From that moment forward, my mom became obsessed with giving us the tools to become the best possible version of our family. One moment she was reading us an excerpt of a popular Christian blogger’s article that highlighted the positive impact of parents and children sharing a daily meal. The next, we were rounded up to sit around the dinner table and recite our Highs, Lows, and Lessons of the day over a plate of shrimp tacos and mango salsa.
“It’s not every day that you get a second chance,” Mom said that first night as we sat around the previously unused walnut dining table. She was always talking about second chances, because it was a value she had been raised with. Her grandfather Joseph was murdered when her own father, Grandpa Riley, was a child, and it had altered the trajectory of Grandpa Riley’s life. When an eight-year-old boy watches his mother fall to her knees as she learns her husband is dead—when that boy grows up in a series of tiny instances after he watches the men involved in his father’s lynching never be held accountable for their crimes—of course it is life-changing.
Grandpa Riley’s voice sharpened into a bitter, ragged edge when he told me once, and only once, that law enforcement hadn’t even bothered to go through with a sham trial that would have undoubtedly resulted in unanimous exoneration for the perpetrators. That kind of shock, heartbreak, injustice, results in a second death—that of innocence, light, and hope. That bright, joyful eight-year-old boy was gone, a shell of a child left in his place. He went down what he called “a dark path,” until he had An Encounter with God as a Young Man and became a pastor. “But the Lord has been so kind as to grant us just that. A second chance. We will not waste it.”
One of the Good Ones Page 4
