“Ah. A peaceful harpoon. Those must be hard to find.”
She shrugs. “I just hope it’s strong enough. Jamals are a particularly hairy species, you see.”
“Oh, really,” I say, cracking up. I ball up my shirt, toss it into the grass.
“Keep it steady now,” Autumn calls out. “Steady. Steady. Fire!”
Her arms recoil, and I wait a beat, then clutch my chest.
“You’re right, no pain,” I say, grinning. “In fact, this spear kinda tickles.”
Because why worry about your former friend when your person is right in front of you?
“Get over here,” Autumn says, tugging her pretend rope.
And I fall in.
97
* * *
JAUNCY IN THE STREETS
TuberOne
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* * *
Jamal: So, guys, you already know what time it is.
Q: So, we’re just gonna get right to it. Stay tuned for another episode of . . .
Jamal & Q: JAUNCY IN THE STREETS!
CUT TO: a queue outside a movie theater
Q: What movie are you seeing?
Girl with Dreads: Challenger’s Crossing
Q: Oh, nice. So, you like Carla Thomas?
Girl with Dreads: Love her. She’s the best.
Q: Between Yolanda’s Choice, Paper or Plastic . . .
*NOT A REAL MOVIE flashes on the screen*
Q: And Carwash Cliff Gets Down in Idaho . . .
*NOT A REAL MOVIE flashes on the screen*
Q: Which one was your favorite Carla Thomas performance?
Girl with Dreads: Oh, definitely Paper or Plastic.
Q: Yeah, what was it about that one you liked?
Girl with Dreads: She’s so versatile and, like, she just made you feel every scene.
CUT TO: inside a small coffee shop
Jamal: So, this is a segment called “Tables Turned,” where you get to ask us any question you want.
Barista: Hmm. I don’t know.
Jamal: Literally, anything.
Barista: Are you gonna buy coffee?
CUT TO: standing outside a bookstore, with books prominently displayed in the window
J: Name one book.
Middle-Aged Man in Windbreaker: What kind of book?
J: Any book ever written.
Windbreaker: Umm . . . let me think.
J: Could’ve been a book you read as a kid.
Windbreaker (laughing): I was too busy having girlfriends, man. Books are for people who can’t get dates.
*Zoom in on Jamal’s confused face*
J: Okay, but just any book, doesn’t have to be one you read. Literally, any book.
Windbreaker: I don’t know, the Bible?
J: You’re going with the Bible?
Windbreaker: Is that a book? That’s not a book. It’s one of those scroll things, dammit. This is making me look bad.
*A chime plays and CORRECT flashes on the screen*
96
By rule, all Hills parties migrate to the beach.
This party’s easier than normal. At the back of the yard, buttressing the hillside, wind-worn stairs spiral toward the sand.
I dry off inside, small-talking, as kids descend to the shore and squirt too much lighter fluid into a woodpile—a mega bonfire is also a Hills party requirement.
The house clears fast; a few stragglers hug their goodbyes before hiking to their parked cars, but mostly everyone flocks beachward.
Autumn, flanked by her girlfriends, asks if I’m ready to head down. She’s still in her yellow two-piece, except she’s slipped back on her shorts; a thin yellow band peeks out over her denim waist. I tell her I’ll meet her, that I wanna enjoy the view a bit longer. She kisses my cheek, whispers in my ear: “Are you okay?”
I nod, kiss her back.
But the truth is, I’m not.
Because despite my best efforts, my brain’s abuzz with what to do about Q.
So, naturally, a moment later, I plow right into him, knocking him to the ground.
“Yo, Q, my bad, man.” I extend a hand, which he ignores. “I mean, Quincy. Sorry.”
He brushes himself off without a word.
“Look, I’m sorry for barreling into you. And for interfering earlier. I was just trying to . . .” I think about what Dr. Ocean’s always saying at therapy, that I can only control what I say and do, but not the response. I can’t force someone to see it my way, to feel as I do. I shake my head. “Actually, you know what? It’s not important. Have a good night, Quincy.”
I start for the beach, but I don’t get far before spinning around. “You’re not hitting the beach?” I call back.
Q tilts his head. “Nah.”
“You should,” I reply too quickly, triggering an awkward silence as we both contemplate how to proceed. I pretend to wring my mostly dry shorts.
Q clears his throat. “It was ginger ale.”
“Huh?”
“I wasn’t chugging beer, man.”
I laugh. “For real?”
“I’m not an idiot. Or did you forget that, too?”
And I stop laughing.
Because yes, I deserve that.
But also, the thing I didn’t forget is this: Q’s refusal to accept his share of the blame.
To own his mistakes.
He swivels back to me. “Actually, I am gonna hit up the beach.”
And I nod, as the moonlight pushes Q’s shadow into the rocks below.
95
For seven years, we were the Best Kind of Brothers.
We’d lie in our blanket forts, or in my backyard, sleeping bags zipped to our chins, staring at stars. Each time, the sky felt new.
We watched 757s punch into clouds, and we’d brag about how special this was.
We were better than blood because we’d chosen our brotherhood.
Because we kept choosing, time and again.
We started three tree houses that never got further than sketches on notebook paper and a few boards nailed into trees.
We were built to last.
We stretched our jokes for days, years.
We wrestled everywhere—in our living rooms, our moms yelling take that upstairs, take that to the basement, in our yards until our jeans were grass-scuffed, until our T-shirts were torn. We ambushed each other—sneaking up behind the other person when they were carrying milk or a plate of spaghetti, laughing our asses off even as we mopped or peeled noodles from the wall. We lied for each other.
He gave me shit when my mom insisted on cutting my hair—your head looks like a globe, bro. You’ve got patches of islands and a big continent over here, what is that, South America? But then he convinced his cousin Alonzo to come through and shape me up. You think I’m gonna let my boy go to school like that, he said when I’d thanked him. Only person who gets to take shots at you is me, he’d said, thumbing his chest.
We were long-haul friends.
We were old before our time.
We were going to apply to the same colleges.
We’d be roommates, in college and after.
We’d backpack across Africa; we’d laugh at ourselves as we pretended to be clueless adventurers—we’re going on holiday, see, he’d say. And I’d say, yes, yes, mate, on safari, if you will.
There were some things we didn’t have to say.
Some things we just knew, the way you know the sun is out there, the way your body knows to breathe without your help.
We knew we’d always be there for each other. And not the way you usually say it, easy come, like you’re picking lint from a sweater.
We would be there.
Beside.
Next to.
Behind.
We were built for this.
This, forever.
But no one told us nothing lasts.
That forever is just something they print on greeting cards.
Not that we wo
uld’ve believed them.
No one warned us everything crashes.
And that what didn’t break always burned bright, fast.
No, we learned this alone, and hard.
94
I take a long sip to stall.
We’d snared soda from a cooler.
“Someplace quiet,” Q’d said and I followed him past the bonfire, up the ridge.
This was quiet. The party hushed like a closed door.
And somehow, just by sitting here, we’d made it quieter.
This, one of those what would you say if you ever got the chance moments.
I swallow hard, the ginger ale sizzling down my throat, like it’s alive.
“Sooooo,” I say, stall-extending.
We’re barely five feet apart, but if you measured from Point Jamal to Point Q, there are light-years between us.
Q pulls his knees into his chest but they immediately slide back. I’d forgotten this: how it’s like he has zero body control. Like if you got close enough, you’d see strings flailing his arms and jerking his sneakers.
So random, what we remember, and when.
Third grade someone yelled at him, man, yo’ neck so long, your mama’s a swan. A corny crack that would easily roll off Q’s tail feathers today—but back then it sent him spiraling; dude wore turtlenecks for like forty school days straight.
Seventh grade I convinced Q to choreograph a hip-hop dance for winter formal; everyone’s gonna join in, trust me, I’d promised, as we practiced in my basement. Our lives are about to change, I’d assured him, as we stood in the center of the dance floor, waiting for the DJ to play our track.
It’s hard: sifting the past without dredging it up.
Fighting the urge to say how things used to be.
Because what you’re really asking when you say I miss the old days, when you say the old you would’ve done this, or said that, is: Why did you change?
You’re saying this isn’t the you I want.
“I watched a few of our videos the other day,” I say.
Q’s face scrunches like he has no clue what I’m talking about. I get it, though; he’s not gonna make this easy.
“Jauncy? That thing we spent most of our waking hours creating?”
“Oh,” he says in a way that sounds like so what.
“We were pretty funny.”
Q shrugs. “One of us, anyway.”
I laugh. “Don’t be so hard on yourself, man.”
And I see it. The faintest smile. Then nothing. But it’s enough of a flare to keep me searching for the things we lost.
“See what I did there? Number-one rule in comedy . . .”
“The truer a joke, the funnier it is. Surprised you remember that.”
“I know it didn’t always seem like it, but I was listening.”
He shrugs.
“You still tryna be Kendrick Fallon?” I ask.
Q shoots back. “You still rudderless as hell?”
I could return fire, but instead I absorb the blow, quietly.
The moon dips behind a cloud.
I try again. You want vulnerability, you gotta be vulnerable, right? “So, I’m watching our videos and I suddenly realize, man, I haven’t felt funny in a while.”
“If seventeen years is a while, I guess I agree.”
“Damn, Q lands another haymaker. He keeps this up, Jamal’s not gonna last two rounds,” I say in my best boxing-commentator voice. “Any other jabs you wanna throw?”
Q nods. “Oh, trust, I got hella uppercuts I could throw.”
And I should defuse things, but. “Well, let’s get to ’em then. What you waiting for?”
Q, eyes still tracking the moon, snarls, “Dude, I’ve never thrown an actual punch in my life, but don’t push me.”
A few kids run along the edge of the waves, tossing a Frisbee down the shoreline.
“You didn’t have to throw a punch because I was there to throw them for you. I was always th—”
Q tornadoes around. “You were always what? There for me? Is that what you were about to say to me?”
“Oh, so unless I was there for you the way you wanted me to be, then dead everything I did? None of what I did matters, I guess.”
Q throws his hand up. “You still don’t get it. The only way you’re actually there for someone is to be there the way they need, not on your terms.”
I tap my chest. “Oh, I don’t get it? Me? So, what, I guess you’re the expert on showing up for your friends?”
He’s practically spitting now. “Compared to you? Hell yeah.”
“When did you ever ask me what I needed, Q?”
“Hmm.” Q strokes his chin. “Was I supposed to ask you before or after you decided to completely shut me out? I guess before, right, when I was only ninety-seven percent shut out.”
And somehow, I’m standing now, which only infuriates me more, because damn, this dude is nearly my height sitting. “I shut you out? You mean because I didn’t play computer games or make corny videos after my parents died? I’m sooo sorry my pain hurt your feelings, Q. My bad, bro.”
Q shakes his head. “Wait, hold up, was this the pain of your parents dying or the pain of having your whole head jammed up your ass?”
And now I’m staring him down, fists tighter than chromosomes.
“You wanna hit me, J? I wish you would. Man, I wish.”
And my blood’s all fire now, my palms prickling, fingers tingling, teeth grinding, pulse thumping outta my throat.
This is it.
Time slows, the lake blurs.
I cock my arm.
There are moments so inexplicable we call them fate.
Label them destiny.
Hindsight tells us we were always hurtling here.
Whatever forces yoked Q and me together tonight, they’ve decided how it ends.
The waves lunge at us.
Bile churns in my stomach, any minute and it’ll geyser from my lips.
“I should hit you,” I say to Q. I say to myself.
It’s dumb how fast the Universe flips, how happy’s never a tight grip.
“Do it,” he barks. “What are you waiting for?”
And I don’t know what’s more disrespectful: that he’s shit-talking while sitting or grinning like he just won a twenty-dollar scratch-off.
And this is not the Q I know.
But this isn’t the Jamal I know, either.
And the truth is, I don’t know much of anything, except the one thing that matters: He killed them.
Q killed my parents.
My arm fires. My fist cuts through the air, a spaceship navigating the meteorites of historical bullshit between us.
I close my eyes. Brace for impact.
And I don’t know if it’s my eyes clenched too tight, or if my brain’s so hot my vision shorts, but suddenly all’s black, everything heavy.
This moment like an anvil dropped from the sky.
93
“What the hell are you doing?” Autumn says.
She practically tackles me, propelling me into Q, all of us crashing into the sand.
I struggle for breath, stumble to my feet. “No, what are you doing?”
Autumn shakes her head. “I told you, J. I won’t be with a caveman. You wanna be an actual tough guy, try apologizing.”
“Apologizing?” I spit out a tongueful of sand. “For what?”
She makes her you know what I mean face. But I wave her off. “Nah. This dude needs to apologize to me.”
Q brushes off his shorts and laughs. “That ain’t happening.”
Autumn, a human traffic light, steps between us, holds up a palm at Q, a palm at me.
“This is stupid. You both are right and you both are wrong and . . .”
But Q shakes his head, points at Autumn. “Yo, this your bodyguard?”
“Don’t point at her.” I step closer to knock his hand away, but Autumn bumps me back.
Q laughs, holds up his hands in surrender
. “Autumn, you seem cool. Maybe in another life, we’d be friends. But I feel bad for you because you don’t see what’s coming.”
Autumn shakes her head. “What are you talking about?”
Q smiles. “You think Jamal actually likes you? You’re a placeholder, Autumn.”
“Q, I’m warning you, that’s enough.” I try to step in front of Autumn, but she stands her ground.
“People like you and me don’t matter to people like him. We’re just seat fillers. The second someone he likes more comes around, he’ll ball you up.”
“That’s not true,” she says. “I know you think that’s what happened to you but it’s not true.”
“That’s exactly what happened.”
A few kids hear our commotion and post up along the perimeter to watch.
“Q, just stop,” I say.
“Be smart, Autumn. He’ll toss you and not think twice. My advice? Leave him first.”
“Is that what you think? That he tossed you? How can you toss something you never had?”
Q looks confused. “What are you talking about?”
I touch Autumn’s shoulder. “Autumn, please, just . . .”
But she pats my hand, like it’s okay, I got you, her voice already softening. “Look, I honestly don’t want to hurt your feelings, Q. But you were barely friends. Jamal felt sorry for you. Tried to be nice to you. But you . . . you were smothering him, man. He couldn’t breathe. And he had so much going on—”
Q looks incredulous. “Smothering? I was trying to be there!” His voice hot, sharp. “Is that what he told you? That I was some pitiful kid he rescued like Captain Save-a-Loser?” He turns to me. “Barely friends? Really, dude?”
I don’t need to see Autumn’s face to know she’s hurt, but she swivels to show me, anyway. And for a second, they’ve joined forces. A temporary alliance against their common enemy.
“Jamal . . . ,” Autumn says, my name like a hair caught in her throat.
I shrug. “I don’t see how the terminology I used matters . . .”
But Q’s a runaway train. “Everything matters! J, you were my best friend and you were in the worst pain, what was I supposed to do?”
And it’s like, for a moment, the anger isn’t as red, the resentment not so bitter. Because his question is valid. What was he supposed to do?
Early Departures Page 2