by J. Elle
The streets are full of people coming and going. Buses roaring past, construction forever ongoing, and cars with rattling trunks cruising past at ’bout two miles an hour so everyone sees them. No tall suits, strange tattoos, or people on our trail so far.
Keeping my eyes peeled.
Trying to not think about the fact that if someone does spot us, I can’t do shit.
We step off at the bus stop in front of my old high school behind King Patty and Shipley Do-Nuts. Brown sugar and cinnamon swims in the air and my stomach churns. My school building’s still there with the same faded brick and broke gym windows. The detached trailers running along the side of the auditorium where I took Spanish and AP Lit are still there. Funny how they call ’em “temporary buildings,” but they been there as long as I can remember.
Tasha and I cross the street, walking alongside the chain-link fence outside Jameson High. The tar-top track is purple with white stripes, school colors. Saturdays in winter, or Houston’s version of it, with flyaway pants and spikes, flood my memory. I first met Julius freshman year running the hundred-meter dash. He was there “making moves,” as he’d say, and I caught his eye.
Memories of the old building hold me there, staring. Funny how leaving and coming back after so long feels like a lifetime’s passed. I’d expected something to be different, but nothing’s really changed. Same shit, just a different day.
I grab Tasha’s hand as we cross another busy street as if she’s little, like little little. Habit, I guess. But she doesn’t pull away.
“Who was that you called earlier, anyway?” she asks.
“Bri, my girl from Ghizon. She’s gonna come through, help us figure this out.”
“Figure what out?”
Careful. Uhhhh. “This tattoo thing.” I twist the end of my shirt. “She’s on some next-level engineering type shit. Trust me, she’s great to have around. We’ll put our heads together on this.”
She looks at me funny, but she doesn’t say anything else about it.
The green-trimmed row-style buildings I used to call home grow larger in the distance and heaviness moves in like a cloud. Being back here to see T was hard enough, but actually facing Ms. Leola, the last person I saw before being snatched from everything I knew, is…
My heart stutters in my chest.
A lot.
I blow out air and my pulse slows a little.
As we get closer, the steady rhythm of rope thwacking the concrete and chants of double-dutch ring in my ear. Colorful beads dangle from the ends of the girl’s braids, flapping with each jump. The two ropes swish past each other, slapping the pavement. Thwack. Her friend on the side chants between licks on her blue Kool-Cup. Thwack. She keeps hopping, faster each time. She’s pretty good. I smile, smoothing my sweaty palms on my pants.
The numbers on the houses get smaller as we walk past. Until we spot the one that used to be ours. Keep moving. Ms. Leola’s is a few stoops down.
My feet stick to the ground.
Broken steps at the foot of my old home torment me with a flood of memories.
Keep moving, Rue.
I can’t.
It almost feels disrespectful not to stop and sit in the moment. Moms died there. Right there. I can’t just walk by, I can’t just pretend…
A lump rises in my throat. I won’t break. Tasha’s feet don’t move either. Her eyes are glued to the door and her arm to my side. I should leave, stop staring. Stop twisting the dagger, dancing with the pain.
I can’t. I’m fixated on the door, the stoop that used to be mine.
I step closer. Sounds fade and motion slows. My fingers find the rail leading up the step. A step I walked up to come home millions of times. Its chipped paint is coarse against my palm. I rub my hands, expecting to see red. When the paramedics and Ms. Leola pulled us out Moms’s house, I refused to go, and held on to this rail. But my hand slipped because it was slick—slick with Moms’s blood. There was so much, I remember that. My chest is heavy—my tongue, thick.
The door bursts open and a woman I don’t recognize stares at me. “Can I help you?”
“N-no.” I stumble backward. “I-I’m sorry.” My cheeks burn with shame. What was I thinking walking up these steps like it’s still my place? Another step backward and the stranger slams the door of my home shut. Tasha stands there still staring, tears twinkling on her cheeks.
I turn to comfort her and…
“Rue, baby? That you?” Her voice is gentle and aged. I’d know its ring anywhere.
Ms. Leola.
I turn and she gasps, fragile fingers covering her mouth. She looks the absolute same in her flowy house dress—like an African queen. It’s deep green, bright blue, and a rich purpley-pink with a head wrap to match. Dry coils of white hair peek beneath its edge.
Tasha hovers behind me, eyes still glued to Moms’s old door.
I get it, looking away is like saying goodbye all over again.
Ms. Leola makes her way down her stoop with shaky steps.
I rush to help her down, but stop myself. She takes each step careful, trembling that way some older folks do. Ms. Leola kept me every day after school. Once Moms got over Aasim leaving, she hustled hard—three jobs and weekend classes. She was gone a lot. Then Tasha came along, so she worked even more.
Those years Ms. Leola made sure we ate. T was younger so she may not remember as much, but Sesame Street on Ms. Leola’s plastic- covered couch was my every morning till I was old enough for school. And even after that I lived at her house basically every weekend until I was old enough to stay alone.
“I don’t believe my eyes, Che.” Closer now, she reaches to caress my cheek, but I pull my face away. Touch. She can’t touch me. She doesn’t seem to notice because her smile deepens. Scents of gardenia potpourri wrap around me like a blanket.
“These old eyes must be broken. I can’t belie—Rue?”
I nod, grinning. I’m a child again.
Ms. Leola wraps a fragile arm around me and squeezes. My hoodie keeps our skin from touching, so I lean into her comfort, like a fire in the middle of a winter storm. Her hug is strong and everything comes back in a rush.
The lady ripping Tasha from my arms…
Hearing my little sis plead for me to go with her…
Ms. Leola holding me, rocking back and forth, when the pain was so sharp all I could do was scream.
Her arms are walls around me, holding me together. Being here again, seeing that stranger on the stoop where Moms should be, it’s all too much.
I can’t do this. I’m not strong enough.
I’m limp in her arms, so fragile the wind could whoosh and shatter me into pieces.
“It’s alright, child.” She pats my back and I nestle into that nook between her jaw and shoulder, careful to keep our skin from touching.
“Oh baby, just let it all out.”
I do.
Hot tears coat my face, soaking her collar. I weep for Moms. I weep for the friends I left here. For time I can never get back. I weep for Tasha. I weep for Aasim. It’s like someone’s ripped out stitches from a gushing wound.
It hurts.
So bad.
Her brown eyes are cloudy, wrinkled and old like her cocoa skin. “Now, now, Che. It’s gon’ be alright. You’re a survivor. A fighter. The strongest person I know, ya hear?”
I’m supposed to be the strong one, the one who holds it down when Moms is away. I weep and weep some more.
I smooth my cheeks clean.
She pets my head. “My Jelani.”
No one, literally no one but Ms. Leola, calls me by my middle name.
“And besides,” she winks, “I knew you’d be back.”
“Y-you did?”
“These old eyes done seen more than you think. Knew you wouldn’t be ’round them magic folks forever.”
I gasp. Did she say magic? So she knew? I thought…
She laughs and wrinkles hug her eyes. “Been waiting on this day, baby. And I been holdin
g on to something to give you!”
My mouth dangles on its hinges.
She chuckles, ushering me toward her house. “But we got time to talk about all that.” She pats my tummy. “Let’s get inside and get y’all something to eat.”
CHAPTER 13
MS. LEOLA WILL STUFF you if you let her.
I let her.
Not even five minutes after sitting on the couch to finish my plate of greens, oxtails, cornbread, and wayyyy too much cobbler, Tasha and I were out. Food coma like a MF. I stretch my sore neck and the spot where Tasha slept beside me is still warm.
Sunlight floods the living room and I tug the drapes closed. But not before taking a quick peek around. Block’s quiet. Must be early. Notifications from Bri flick on my watch screen.
Bri: Trying to get out of here. Something popped up with the parents. Ugh. Be there soon. Sorry!
Bri: Hello?
Bri: You still want me to come, right?
Bri: What time is it there?
Bri: Rue????
Bri: UHH I’m on my way. Hope that’s still ok?? See you soon.
Bacon and Ms. Leola’s fresh biscuits waft through the air.
“Well, good morning,” Ms. Leola says.
“Ah, you ain’t have to make us breakfast,” I say. “Putting us up was enough.”
She laughs. “Girl, sit down so I can fix you a plate.”
My stomach growls and I thank her as I join Tasha at the table.
Me: Passed out. Sorry. Get here as soon as you can.
Bri: Mhmm. Worried sick over here. Setting up my alibi (Luke). Leaving soon.
Tasha burps and I give her the stank eye. Moms taught us table manners; she better act like it.
“Can I get you another plate, baby?” Ms. Leola asks from the kitchen. She’s sweet and moves like someone generations younger.
“I can’t eat another bite, but thank you,” Tasha says.
I scarf down my food in seven point three seconds. And I’m so full, I’ll puke if I move. I’m sure of it. She’s banging around in the kitchen. I tell myself to go help, but my feet straight up ignore me.
The night’s events replay in my mind like a horror flick. I can’t believe Ms. Leola knows about “those magic folks.” How long has she known? And what does she have to give me? From who? I have so many questions. It’s odd knowing that someone from back home has even the slightest whiff of my life in Ghizon. It’s like my two worlds are crashing together and I don’t know if I need a helmet. And if I do, where to find one.
Tasha’s fork is still scraping her plate as if she can really grab every last crumb if she angles the fork just right.
“Now I know you two got some room for this!” Ms. Leola’s got a plate in each hand with a wedge of pound cake on top dripping with a lemon glaze, her signature dish. Yes, cake… after breakfast.
I don’t know where I’ma put it, but I’ma put it somewhere. Lemon swirls in my mouth as the cake melts on my tongue. So dense, yet so moist.
“Eat on up and there’s plenty more. Now that you rested, I’ma find this box I have for you.” She smiles. “When yo daddy gave it to me he said to make sure I ain’t lose it.”
I choke, coughing. “Aasim? It’s from Aasim?”
“I guess that’s his name. Tall chocolate thang, thin dreads? Good looking, always wore a tailored suit, looking like a young Idris.”
Oh god. “I guess.”
“Look, I don’t know the man. But I did know yo momma. She was like a daughter to me and she loved him and trusted him an—”
“—and she’s dead.”
Ms. Leola exhales and it’s heavy. “I don’t know why things happened the way they did. I’m so sorry, baby, and I know ain’t nothing I can say gon’ make it right. That kind of pain don’t get better. You just sort of learn to live with it. Be stronger because of it.” She wags a finger. “But what I do know is that your momma made me promise if something ever happened to her, I was to find your father, so I did.”
I shove the scraps of food on my plate away, appetite gone. “S-so, it was you?”
“Hear me out, now. Yo momma came in here ’bout a week before she died. Something had her real upset, now. She’d been crying. I could tell, but you know how she is. She acted like she was just fine, like she had it all together. She gave me these coins, look like pure gold. She looked me dead in the eye and told me if anything ever happened to her, to take those two and press ’em together and it would summon yo’ daddy. Now, I ain’t know nothing about no magic or who he was, but you best believe when I saw her body”—her voice cracks—“lying in that doorway like that”—she sniffles—“I came here and did exactly what she asked.”
I don’t know what to say. She’s not lying. She wouldn’t do that. This, I guess, was my mom’s dying wish. That I go to Ghizon, ripped from my sister, taken from everything I know. I hate it. Even now, knowing it’s what she wanted, I still hate it.
“I don’t know what to say.…”
She rests a hand on my shoulder and I go warm all over. This is the closest thing I have to a mom at this point, and even if I don’t get it, she honored Moms’s words. Can’t fault her for that.
“It’s always gon’ be things in this world we just don’t understand. And baby, for me, that was one of ’em.” She walks off into the kitchen and her voice is dimmer. “Now, when yo daddy came and got you that next morning, he told me to make sure I give you this here. Now, I know I put it in here somewhere.”
A chair screeches across the floor.
I dash into the kitchen. “Please don’t climb on nothing, Ms. Leola. Can I help reach something?”
“Child, I got this.” She steps up on the chair and my heart about stops. I hover there spotting the chair like the base in a cheer squad pyramid.
She strains, reaching, and her robe hangs long from her arms, colors swishing in the air like a goddess. She reaches from one too-high shelf to the other. “I had some boys from the neighborhood move y’alls stuff into that back room, but this here was different. Had to go through so much trouble to get it, too. But I gave your daddy my word and I intend to keep it.”
She plants both hands on her hips. “Not up there. Where did I…? If I can’t find it, them boys coming to do some housework for me today. They probably seen it.” She bites her tongue. “Oh, maybe I put it… give me a second.” She steps down from the chair and finally my pulse returns.
She leaves the kitchen, heading down the hall. “Yep. It’s back here.”
Tasha comes in the kitchen and sets her plate by the sink.
“Ahem.”
She looks at me and without a word collects all the dishes and starts washing.
“We ain’t ’bout to start embarrassing Moms just because she ain’t here no more.”
“Yeah, yeah. I’m just so full.” She chuckles. “I just woke up and I already wanna nap.” The cat purrs at her ankles but catches a splash of sudsy water and runs off. Fine by me. The way Ms. Leola is ’bout her furniture, I’m surprised she let Cupcake come inside at all.
The doorbell chimes.
“Tasha, get down the hall in a bedroom,” I say. I don’t know who it is but I ain’t taking no chances. “Shut the door and lock it.”
She goes. I duck into the kitchen, close enough to see but not be seen. Ms. Leola comes back from the hall, dusting off her clothes.
“Now who in creation is ringing my bell this early?” She peeps through the door hole. There stands Bri, glasses pressed to her freckled face, wearing ’bout five pounds of makeup.
“Uhm, hi!” she says before Ms. Leola can get the door open good. She sticks out a hand and the onyx fused to her wrist glistens In the sun. “Oh, uhh…” She jerks it back, blushing. “Sorry! I… uh… forgot to wash my hands. You don’t want to touch these.” She nervous laughs. “I-I’m looking for—”
“Bri!” I rush to help Ms. Leola with the door before they accidentally touch. “It’s fine, she’s a friend.” Closer now, Bri’s cheeks are P
epto pink and her lips are bright red. “Where did you look up your makeup tutorial? Barnum & Bailey?”
“This is me blending in.” She raises her chin, knowingly.
You really can’t tell her nothing sometimes. “I guess. Try YouTube next time.”
“You what?”
“Nothing.”
“Well come on in before y’all let out all my AC,” Ms. Leola says.
It takes only about two and a half minutes for Ms. Leola to sit Bri down to two plates of food and her own wedge of pound cake. Bri has no idea what she’s dealing with, by the looks of it.
“I don’t think I can actually eat all of this.”
“You betta try.” I wink. Nothing ruder than refusing a plate from somebody’s grandma. I catch Bri up on the coffee shop dude, the run-in with the cop, and the snake tattoo. Since we are in front of Tasha, I make a point to not mention reaching for my magic. She isn’t nearly as alarmed as I was, but she’s doubly curious about the tattoo. She also apparently loves cats, which make her and Tasha immediate best friends.
“We’ll bring you over to our side.” Tasha nudges me with her elbow.
“Cupcake’ll win you over.”
“Wouldn’t count on it,” I say. “Dogs? Sure. Cats… nah.”
“So, Ghizon… Rue, things are bad. Like, bad, bad. The Chancellor posted pictures of your face in the dorm halls and told students if anyone hears from you we’re supposed to report it. He even reprimanded your da—Aasim.”
“What do you mean, reprimanded?” I ask.
“I don’t know. That’s just what I heard. Something about his magic is restricted. Like he can’t do anything. He’s a straight up turd—that’s what we call kids who get their magic suspended for a period.”
Why would they do that? He didn’t have anything to do with me leaving. I catch myself: What does it matter anyway? I got ninety-nine problems, but Aasim’s ain’t gon’ be one of ’em. I shrug. “Good luck with that.”