by Lamar Giles
I said, “You happy now?”
Because he didn’t look happy. He’d been staring at the page for a while. I didn’t write that much. “Jameer?”
“Your handwriting is terrible. But, yes. Thank you for this.”
“You’re welcome. We had a deal. Kiera. Now what should I do?”
Creasing the sheet, he slipped it into his back pocket, said, “You need to win Purity Pledge.”
“Win it? Like the Hunger Games?”
“Kiera’s betting you’re an opportunistic lowlife who’ll quit if you get too uncomfortable. We have to make her think different. We need to turn you into a wholesome boy. The kind her parents want to invite to dinner, and who will never ever cheat on her. You have to become the best Purity Pledger.”
Gravel crunched under the tires of a polished, scab-colored minivan turning into the church lot. The Burton Brothers hopped from the sliding side doors, gave us an enthusiastic wave, and jogged inside. Right behind them, Shanice and Helena in Helena’s mom’s car. They snuck glances toward me and Jameer, giggled their way to the church steps, where they sat and chatted.
Win Purity Pledge, huh. Weird thinking of it that way. I said, “How?”
Jameer lifted the flap on his satchel, produced a brand-spanking-new Bible. “That’s yours. No more borrowing. I’ll help you read up on appropriate scriptures ahead of time. You’ll use them to be proactive. After tonight, you’re the first to answer at least two of Sister Vanessa’s questions each session. Got it? Should be enough to get you started. Don’t look at me like that.”
Were my teeth showing? Was I snarling? “Like I don’t have enough homework already. I’m taking a lot on faith here.”
He swept a hand toward the church doors. “Great place for it. Have I led you wrong yet?”
“You haven’t led me anywhere.”
“Yet!”
Mya pulled up in her beat-down Subaru, a car as old as us, that had, on more than one occasion, required me, or Tyrell, or Stu the Cook to break out some jumper cables and resurrect her finicky battery in the FISHto’s lot after a shift. It was pine-forest green in the places where the paint wasn’t splotchy and worn down to the gray chassis. A neat row of GCHS Honor Roll Student bumper magnets decorated the back end, and the odor from the exhaust pipe was of environmentally unfriendly scorched oil. She parked beside me, shouldered open her dented door, and emerged looking distraught. Her phone—a modern Android, not a throwback like Jameer’s—was in her hand. She looked at it, to the church doors, back to her phone, frowned. Like she was double-checking the GPS coordinates of somewhere she did not want to be.
She spotted me and Jameer, came over. My immediate thought: What’d I do now?
But this wasn’t about me. Not even close.
“Hey guys,” she began, still flicking glances at the church doors. “Is Kiera here yet?”
“She’s inside,” Jameer said. “You know her. Early is on time, on time is late.”
Another odd glance. “Is she okay?”
Jameer stiffened. I leaned toward Mya like I was having trouble hearing her. “Why wouldn’t she be?”
“I don’t like spreading gossip.”
Video was playing on her phone, obvious flickering movements. I pried it from her hand. “I will relieve you of the burden, Mya.”
She didn’t resist. This was something we’d end up seeing with or without her help. Which kind of made it worse.
It was an IG story from one of our classmates. Blond, freckle-faced Taylor Burkin, who dressed up like Scarlett Johansson’s Major character from Ghost in the Shell last Halloween and immediately got sent home because Vice Principal Terrier wasn’t having any sexy skin-tight suits in his hallways, thank you very much. That outfit didn’t fit her very long because she was also one of the Baby-Getters. Like the rest of them, she’d had her kid over the summer. Taylor had yet to return to school, but she had a pointed message for her GCHS classmates.
“You know what,” she said, staring down at the camera, the puppy filter on so she had a dog’s nose and ears for some reason, “I see all of y’all talking a bunch of mess about me and the other Green Creek ladies who have kids now. ‘The Baby-Getters this’ and ‘The Baby-Getters that’—everybody got an opinion, huh? Well, I got opinions, too.”
The clip jumped to the next video in her story. She was in a different part of her house, that K-Pop band BTS was visible on a poster in the background. She’d switched to an IG filter that gave her a French beret and pouty red lips. “What about the guys? It takes two, folks. Or, I guess, eighteen, since there are nine babies. You know what I mean. I don’t see y’all saying a thing about the daddies. Let me be the one to start that conversation, because I got plenty to say about my baby’s daddy!”
Another jump, another location. Jameer pressed against my shoulder so he could see. Mya remained where she was, obviously familiar with what would surely be the talk of the school tomorrow. Whenever someone snapped and went off on social media—it happened a few times a year—it made the week so much better. This should be a really good one, too. Because I didn’t know who Taylor’s kid’s dad was.
No filter this time, but with a runny-nosed, light brown infant on her hip, Taylor showed us a cluttered kitchen with a row of baby bottles drying on a mat next to the sink. “My baby’s daddy doesn’t want to take any responsibility for what we did together. He wants this all to be a secret, like he’s Drake or something. But I’m tired of all y’all acting like I’m some whore, or I made my son in a lab. So let’s see what kind of judgment you got for your little wrestling golden boy Colossus Turner? Hey Colossus, you watching? I’m going to go feed your son now. Toodles.”
Taylor finger-waved at the camera, and the screen flipped to someone else’s IG story.
Oh. Shit.
Colossus had a kid?! He was a Baby-Getter?
I returned Mya’s phone. Stunned. Silent.
On the steps, the previously giggling Shanice and Helena leaned into one another, attention on a single phone. They looked up, slack-faced, turned toward the church entrance as if afraid. The IG story was spreading.
Jameer said, “We should probably go inside now.”
But I didn’t think anyone wanted to.
The church doors cracked, and a smiling Kiera beckoned Helena and Shanice inside. She spotted us, and said, “We’re starting soon.”
Nobody moved. She didn’t know.
Slow, like a death march, Helena and Shanice peeled themselves off the stairs and trudged inside. Me, Jameer, and Mya followed. When I passed Kiera, she said, “You’re back.”
“Yeah.”
She took a deep breath, as if preparing to light into me again. I probably would’ve let her, all things considered; she had something much worse than my harsh words coming.
What she actually said: “I’m sorry for the way I spoke to you the other night.”
My knee-jerk response: You should be. This wasn’t the time. “Um, I appreciate that.”
Jameer, visible over her left shoulder, lingered.
Kiera said, “Jameer told me I was too hard on you. I prayed about it, and really felt God told me it wasn’t my place to judge anything you’ve done prior to joining the Pledge. That I wasn’t modeling the kind of love that Jesus has for saint and sinner alike. So, if you’re serious, and here for the right reasons, I support you.”
She clasped my shoulder, and her touch was like electricity. It was the first time we’d had actual physical contact since—when? Elementary school during some stupid playground games? Damn, she smelled good now. Like sugar.
Jameer told her she was being too hard. He really was holding up his end of our agreement. But was it going to matter when Taylor Burkin’s bomb hit?
Kiera withdrew her hand, sensed . . . something from everyone around us. “What, guys? You act like you’ve never seen me apologize before. I know it’s rare, but . . .” She let her thought trail off, forced a chuckle in the midst of the strange vibe.
&n
bsp; So, nobody was going to tell her?
Jameer gave a slow head shake. His intuitive ass must’ve sensed me already deviating from his simple Win-the-Pledge strategy. I couldn’t play dumb, though. I wouldn’t want people knowing stuff about me that I didn’t know about myself.
“It’s not about your apology,” I said. “Can we talk over there?”
I motioned to a nearby pew, tried to make my voice even, or sympathetic, or something other than the confrontational tone we’d both had during our last private chat so she knew this wasn’t a fight. She moved with me. When she sat, I opened IG and pulled up Taylor’s story. I passed it to her, then sat, waiting. My phone volume was low, but everyone else had already heard. They flitted toward the Purity Pledge room, Jameer the last to go, his eyes wide and apprehensive.
I don’t know what comes next either, bro.
Taylor’s story reached its thrilling conclusion. Kiera immediately tapped back to the beginning and watched it all again. I stared at the lectern Newsome preached from each Sunday because I didn’t want to look at her face.
She pressed my phone back into my hand, and I dared a glance in her direction. I prepped for whatever. Tears. Rage. Her face gave nothing away.
Kiera stood, brushed phantom lint from her jeans. “We should join the class.”
As she scooted past me into the aisle, I wondered if I’d created a kill-the-messenger situation, completely trashing all her apologetic goodwill. She said, “Thank you for showing me, Del. I wouldn’t have liked finding out everyone but me knew later.”
Those were words I was happy to hear. I hoped she meant them.
In the Purity Pledge classroom, Sister Vanessa asked someone to start with a prayer. Helena volunteered, and we got right into more prompts on why we should remain pure. There was reading, and crafts, and conversation, and though Sister Vanessa often looked to Kiera to jump in, she didn’t utter a word the whole afternoon.
Over the next couple of weeks, though, Green Creek High had a lot to say.
Chapter 9
#BABYGETTERSTOO.
It was a thing, coined by another new Green Creek mom who took Taylor’s lead and called out her baby’s daddy on Snapchat: a freshman at Commonwealth University, where my sister attended. A third Baby-Getter did the same, her kid’s father being a local burnout who’d been a senior at Green Creek last year, but never actually graduated. We all sat back watching the debacle with equal measures of glee and horror, speculating on how bad (exciting) it could get. What if one of the dads was a perv-teacher like at the school where that nosy photographer chick was taking sneak pictures of everyone’s business for her secret blog? Or what if one of the dads was Vice Principal Terrier? (That theory was immediately met with mad vomit emojis and no one wanted to bring it up again.) So far, Colossus was the only guy currently in school with us who’d gotten called out, and he loudly denied even knowing Taylor. Bullshit, basically. Green Creek wasn’t that big.
We waited on more social media blowups. For the two weeks following Taylor’s bombshell, the #BabyGettersToo movement went from three to five to seven baby daddies getting exposed. And there were ripples . . .
First, a decree from Terrier that anyone caught spreading “maternity-related gossip” would face “stiff penalties” (trigger more vomit emojis). Like, was the faculty spying on our social media? It didn’t slow down the ogling, but everyone felt some kind of way about the implication. School was supposed to be school, we got to be free when we were on our own. Right?
Second, Kiera. She’d stopped posting. Stopped talking, really. Mad people came at her like, “Did you know? When did you know? What do you know?” She handled it all like a champ with side-eye and no comments. Even in Purity Pledge she seemed less there, but I think Sister Vanessa knew what was up, and didn’t make a big deal about it. Jameer tried to keep me in the loop on how Kiera was doing with his spotty insight.
“She won’t talk about it,” he said. “Not even to me.”
I was thinking, isn’t it part of our agreement that you get her to talk about it so I can be better prepared for what’s next? Instead, he kept molding me to be the Purity Pledge champ with choice scriptures and observations that I parroted through the next few sessions at church.
Matthew 6:22 was about turning your eyes from worthless things—like hot cars, and IG models in bikinis. It was supposed to make you stronger to focus on worthwhile, pure things. I talked about that.
Exodus 20:14 flat-out said don’t commit adultery—which was pretty much any sex where you’re not married. I became the Exodus 20:14 spokesman.
There were other verses too that Jameer passed me on Post-it Notes that were stuck to my desk at home. From Genesis, and Romans, and 1 Thessalonians (which you said like “First Thessalonians” not “One Thessalonians” even though there was clearly a “1” there—weird, right?).
Sister Vanessa seemed “impressed by my spiritual growth”—her words—but I didn’t think anyone else was. As much as I wanted to, I got it was probably better that we didn’t press Kiera during these trying Baby-Getter times.
Even Qwan agreed. Sorta. One day on the way to school he asked, “None of those other church girls throwing you any vibes, man? I know you been All-Kiera-Everything forever, but there are no unattractive ladies in that Pledge. Got me ready to get some religion.”
“Would Angie be cool with that?”
Annnnd, he shut up. We’d yet to get into how much time he’d been spending with her. It was very un-Qwan-like. Two weekends passed without a single request to chauffeur him to some new girl’s house. I almost wanted to press my hand to his forehead and check his temperature the way Mom did when she thought I wasn’t feeling well.
Speaking of Mom . . .
Third ripple, even my parents and Cressie knew about #BabyGettersToo. Each asking me about it on separate occasions.
Dad’s was a casual, “What’s up at the school with those pregnant girls?” I explained they technically weren’t pregnant anymore. And lied about not paying attention to any of it so he’d leave me alone. He accepted my explanation, went back to work at his computer.
Cressie hit me with a text that was a little strange.
Cressie: Lil’ Bro. #BabyGettersToo. You got details or what?
Me: Or what. Don’t you have college stuff to do?
Cressie: Do you think any of the girls would talk to me about it? Maybe Shianne?
Me: Talk to you? For what?
To which she never responded. Cressie was good for a nonconclusive text, and I wasn’t pressed to keep talking #BabyGettersToo. As far as I knew, we’d both moved on.
Ten days after Taylor Burkin set it all off, on a sleepy Sunday after I’d worked a closing shift at FISHto’s, Mom finally got around to asking. Newsome preached on accountability that day, how God’s natural order meant men and women had different roles and responsibilities during our time on earth. Though sleepy and yawny from work, I paid more attention than usual because the sermon seemed to align with our next Purity Pledge session.
At one point, Newsome said, “In Proverbs 5 we’re told that the lips of a seductive woman are oh so sweet, her soft words are oh so smooth. But it won’t be long before she’s gravel in your mouth, a pain in your gut, a wound in your heart.”
A few folks, Coach Scott among them, shouted loud amens, but all I could think was, wow, that sounded dark. And wrong. Somehow.
Mom squirmed next to me, the lines around her mouth made more pronounced by her new frown. Newsome had more to say on the subject, but she’d closed her eyes, mumbled her secret prayers for the rest of service. I twisted in the pew, checking reactions from my fellow Pledgers, the girls in particular. Mya was stone-faced, unreadable. Helena and Shanice seemed to be in another world. I couldn’t see Kiera’s face because she was a couple of rows up, but her dad nodded vigorously. Her mom, not so much.
Pastor Newsome kept it moving.
During the car ride home, Mom brought up the hashtag. “Is it true som
e of the girls from the pregnancy pact are publicly exposing the boys who were involved?”
“There wasn’t a pact, Mom.”
“Fine. What about the rest?”
My turn to squirm. I hated talking about this stuff with her. “Yeah. A couple have been talking on IG and Snap.”
“Those are internet apps?”
Close enough. “Yeah.”
“Are they being well received?”
“Internet apps” I was able to translate, roughly. I didn’t know what she meant about “well received.”
I said, “A lot of people are paying attention.”
“What are they saying? Are they supportive of the girls?”
“It’s all anyone’s talking about.”
“That’s not the same thing as being supportive, Del. Tell me the ways people are responding.”
Aggravation crept into her voice, and I wasn’t trying to bring on what me and Cressie called a Mom-Storm, so I opened my “internet apps” and scrolled through some of the replies on IG. “It’s mostly laughs and people instigating. Anything to keep it going. Some name-calling. Why you want to know?”
“You’re not saying mean things to those girls, are you?”
“Naw. I mean, no.”
“You better not be.”
“Dang, Mom! Why are you coming at me like that? What I do?”
Her jaw clenched, and she patted my knee. “You didn’t do anything. How’s Purity Pledge going?”
Though her voice softened, the subject change didn’t inspire more comfort. “It’s, you know, pure.”
“Sister Vanessa says you’ve been studying hard. You’ve been a good example for the other kids. Particularly the Burton twins.”
“Have I?” I fought to keep my annoyance in check. I had a theory about that great evaluation from Ralph and Bobby Burton.
We turned onto our street. Mom pressed the button in the ceiling that opened our garage door. We pulled into the driveway while the door clanked up. When it was fully open, she didn’t drive in. Instead, she started talking fast, like we were on a timer. “I want to apologize to you, son. Admittedly, I was shocked when you joined Purity Pledge. I questioned your motives. That was wrong. I’m proud of you for the decision you made, and I’m glad that you’re taking such steps to being a good man.”