Not So Pure and Simple

by Lamar Giles

  “Crap!” she said, reality sinking in. “Where’s your car?”

  I cycled through dumb lies, but we were coming up on the bus bench I’d chained my bike to; lamplight glinted off pedal reflectors. To sell any of my fabricated stories, I’d have to abandon it for however long I was in Kiera’s company tonight. Bikes left unattended too long lost tires, or sometimes got their locks busted and disappeared forever. I conceded and said, “My sister took it.”

  “How’d you get here?”

  Like a magician making his assistant appear from thin air, I flicked my fingers toward my ten-speed with an exaggerated “Ta-DAAA!” gesture. “The preferred mode of transportation for eleven-year-olds across the globe.”

  She laughed. A sound like acid pumping through my ears, dissolving my insides from the heart down.

  Kneeling, I spun the dial on my combination lock. With it unclasped, I freed my bike from the bench, then coiled the lock and chain around the seat post so they wouldn’t impede my escape. Tonight’s mission: total fail. Any hope for making this work in the future, likely gone too.

  Angling the handlebars toward the street, away from Kiera, I said, “I guess I’ll see you later.”

  “I thought you wanted to walk with me.”

  “I—?” That laugh from before left behind an easy smile. “Yeah.”

  “On one condition,” she said. “I want to ride that bike.”

  As soon as Kiera mounted my Schwinn, we got a group text from Jameer.

  Jameer: You two okay?

  I hit him back with a simple Yep.

  Kiera said, “I’ll tell him where we are.”

  His next message came before she finished.

  Jameer: I’ll catch up later. A friend I haven’t seen in a while showed up.

  Jameer: Kiera, don’t go in the house until I’m back. You know why.

  She frowned, so confused. “What friend?”

  I figured my dude was improvising. Still giving me and Kiera the alone time we’d planned for. Though that last text confused me, too. “Why can’t you go in the house until he comes back?”

  The Schwinn’s gears tick-tick-ticked while she pedaled slowly. “Have you met his parents? We left together, so we can’t come back separate. That’s trouble for everyone.”

  “Like how?” There was so little his parents seemed to allow him now, what else could they take away?

  “Like getting Pastor involved.” Kiera twisted the handlebars away from me, then back, making my bike coast in wide, swooping arcs. Close to me, then far, the wind soft-combing her hair with each turn.

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “It means we’re all very careful not to cross the line.”

  “What line? Who’s ‘we’?”

  “Jameer hasn’t told you about baring your soul.”

  A breeze had started pushing our way, strong enough to howl, so I thought I’d misheard her somehow. The words didn’t make any sense.

  She must’ve seen it in my face, so she clarified. “Confessing your sins.”

  “Oh.” I’d seen that a lot on TV, and in movies. “Like in those booths where you talk to a priest behind a screen.”

  Kiera laughed. “You’re thinking about Catholics. That’s not how it’s done at First Missionary.”

  “So, how’s it done?”

  She wasn’t laughing anymore. “Publicly. In front of the whole congregation.”

  I considered that. It seemed kind of extreme, but, “I guess if someone wants to do that, it’s their business, right?”

  “Want has nothing to do with it.”

  “Wait. You don’t mean—? That’s a public shaming, Kiera. That’s some Game of Thrones type sh—stuff.”

  “Like I said, we’re careful. Confession’s important, don’t get me wrong, I talk to God every night about my offenses, and always ask for His forgiveness. But when Pastor makes you do it that way, it’s— I just wouldn’t want to.”

  “So don’t. He doesn’t actually make people do that, right? You can say no.”

  She started those wide loops with the bike again. Changed the subject, and I wasn’t bothered at all. “Look, I apologize on behalf of my ex-boyfriend for making tonight a mess. Doesn’t seem like we’re going to get much planning done.”

  Not that I minded. “I take it there will be no Kee-Lossus reconciliation then.”

  “Ugh! I hated that stupid nickname.”

  “I couldn’t tell.”

  She looped my bike around me. “You got jokes?”

  “Alls I’m saying is, if you had a wedding gown on layaway, it wouldn’t shock me.”

  Kiera smacked my shoulder hard enough to alter her balance. The bike wobbled and she had to plant a foot to keep from dumping it completely.

  “Here.” I seized the moment, and grabbed the handlebars. “Let me hop on.”

  She made as if to climb off. I said, “Naw, stay on. Give me some room.”

  “Wait, what?”

  I got the bike upright with her still on the seat. “Grab my waist and hang on.”

  “This seems dangerous.”

  “Only if you don’t know what you’re doing.” I didn’t totally know what I was doing. I hadn’t ridden a bike double like this since I was ten. “There are pegs on the back tire. Rest your feet on those, and let me do the work.”

  “Del, I don’t know about this.”

  Hush puppies, I thought. Take control.

  I pushed off, had a millisecond of panic where I thought I’d send both of us skidding across the pavement, erasing skin from arms, elbows, and knees. But it really was true what they said about never forgetting how to ride a bike—even double. After three healthy pedal pumps, we were cruising.

  We came to a slight hill, went over, picked up speed. Kiera’s arms squeezed my waist hard enough to hurt. I welcomed that pain. Had been waiting for it so long. She squealed in my ear.

  “What’s your favorite place in Green Creek?” I asked.

  No hesitation whatsoever. “The library.”

  That was less than a mile away. An easy ride. A few minutes later, we came upon the glowing glass atrium of the GCPL. Squeezing the handbrake, I brought us to a smooth and safe stop by the bike rack. Once I got the bike mounted and locked, I checked the time on my phone. “We’ve only got a half hour before they close.”

  Kiera seemed giddy under the sodium lights’ glare. “Then we better hurry up.”

  Door chimes announced our entrance, and a bored-looking librarian with copious tattoos informed us of what we already knew. “We’re closing soon.”

  We kept it moving, me following her lead now. She walked directly to the modest teen section, where signs done in colorful graffiti font identified which chunk of the alphabet each shelf held. A–G. H–P. Q–Z.

  Kiera took us to roughly the last section, of the last shelf, where she skimmed the Ws. She perked up. “Oh! They got it.”

  When she pried a volume free, I saw the “it” was a novel by Jacqueline Woodson, glossy in its newness. Kiera flipped the cover open, skimming the writing on the jacket, then brought the open book to her face like she was going to lick it. She inhaled deeply; eyed me like she’d gotten hold of a strong drug. “New book smell is the best smell.” She blinked. Put the book back. “You think I’m weird now.”

  “I don’t. I promise.”

  “Colossus thought this was weird. We came here a couple of times. All he’d do is sit in the corner and read Sports Illustrated.”

  This . . . was an opening I couldn’t have planned better if I wanted to. “Come here,” I said. “Let me show you something.”

  I walked her to a wall display marked “Graphic Novels and Trades.” Plucked some familiar covers from the rack. The Walking Dead, Black Science, Miles Morales: Spider-Man. “These are great, too. I really like Black Science because—” Her scowl stopped me. “What?”

  “Zombies and stuff?”

  “The Walking Dead’s about zombies. Not Black Science. That’s more lik
e interdimensional travel. You see this family . . .”

  Her eyes were sort of glassy. “I’m sorry. It’s not my thing. I never really got all that stuff. I like reading about real people and places.”

  “Oh. Right.” I put the slim volumes back in the display rack.

  Over the PA, the tattooed librarian’s voice droned, “Please make your final selections now. The library will be closing in twenty minutes.”

  My feet shuffled, and my brain scrambled. Why was there suddenly nothing to talk about? “Umm, you gonna check out that book you were looking at?”

  “No way. My dad dropped me off at a restaurant. I can’t come home with a library book.”

  “Hide it in your bag.” She’d had a big-enough purse slung over her shoulder, and bouncing on her hip, since she left her dad’s car. It would do. Also, I really wanted her to take home something she liked, a good reminder of our night.

  But she was on her phone, texting. “Jameer’s going to meet behind our houses. We better get going then. If me and him get in and convince our parents nothing dumb happened, then we can salvage this jacked-up night.”

  That stung more than her basically calling my taste in books silly. Up until then, I thought we’d both had a good time.

  We walked the two miles from the library to her and Jameer’s neighborhood, and had a really good conversation about college, and everything else after high school. Good enough that I thought the evening might end the way I wanted. With a kiss.

  Both of us wanted to go to schools far away from Green Creek. She talked about Columbia University in New York City. I hadn’t thought about going that far, sort of thought I might stay in state, but hearing her talk about the city made me want to look at New York schools now.

  “I’ve got an aunt in New York so we go every summer,” she said, during that last quarter mile, my bike gears clicking between us. “That energy. The smell. If there’s a total opposite to Green Creek it’s that, you know.”

  I didn’t. I’d never actually been to New York. Still, I said, “Sure. I do.”

  “My mom thinks I’m crazy for wanting to be around all those people, crammed up together. Her words.”

  I grasped for something to say. “There is a lot of space here.”

  “I know. Maybe once I’m away from it, I’ll appreciate it more. All I know is right now, I want something different.”

  “So do I.” I stopped walking. We were still about a hundred yards from where we were supposed to meet up with Jameer, but I felt a now-or-never moment upon us.

  Kiera stopped, too. We stood together. Only the bike between us. She said, “You okay?”

  “When I saw you in that Dorothy costume at Harvest Fest, it reminded me of us in that play when we were little. My lion costume had been super itchy, but it was worth it. You know, to be up there in the light with you.” My heart felt like those springy doorstoppers that you flick, and they twang back and forth real fast. “I’ve had a really good time getting to know you again since we started Purity Pledge. I’ve really seen a different side of you.” I didn’t know if that part was true. She seemed much like the same Kiera I’d always known. Or not known. But I also wanted her to say something like that back to me. That she saw me differently.

  She nodded. “That’s . . . cool.”

  Okay. “Tonight, despite the interruptions, I feel like we really connected. And . . . you know what, this.” I leaned over my bike, one hand reaching for her hip, while my face—my lips—moved closer to hers. No doubts. No hesitation.

  She pulled away. Two big steps back. “Del. No.”

  The now-or-never moment stalled. Screeching halt. Damn near left skid marks. “Oh, um. Sorry. I—”

  “No. It’s fine. I probably . . . maybe I made it seem.” She took another step back.

  “My bad. I felt we connected—”

  She took a couple of deep breaths. “Del, with everything that happened with Colossus, I’m not really interested in something serious. Plus, the Pledge.”

  “I wasn’t talking about doing anything that went against the Pledge.”

  She crossed her arms, hugging herself. “I know. I didn’t mean to imply that. The timing.”

  The timing? Damn! She never needed this much time before.

  She glanced away.

  A car pulled up down the street, sat in shadow; its headlights prevented us from seeing anything but silhouette. We clearly heard a door slam. The car pulled off a three-point turn and drove away, leaving behind a waving figure in the wash of red taillights.

  Kiera waved frantically. “Jameer.”

  “Jameer.”

  He closed the distance between us. While he walked, Kiera said the last words I’d ever wanted to hear from her. “I don’t want things to be awkward between us. We can still be friends, right?”

  “Of course.” Spoken like the words were solid shards of broken glass crunching in my mouth.

  An eternity passed before Jameer reached us, like he’d been walking from California. A goofy grin was plastered on his face when he joined us. “How was your night? What’d I miss?”

  Can you hurt and be numb at the same time? Something like agony mixed with that shot the dentist gives you so you can’t feel your mouth. That’s close to what I felt in my bed, twisted covers around me, and my knees pulled to my chest. The red digits on my alarm clock showed 10:54. I hadn’t been in bed that early on Friday since I was eleven. My phone shook beside me. I nearly ignored it.

  Kiera: Hey, seriously, I don’t want things to be weird between us. You’re a really great guy. I hope you know I know that.

  Kiera: We still have a Pledge project to work out. Can we try again tomorrow? At the library? We can actually check out some books this time. LOL!

  I sprang up, hunched over my phone, typed with superhuman speed.

  Me: Yeah. Let’s do it.

  The light at the end of the tunnel was apparent. This was a second chance.

  Our timing couldn’t be bad forever. We were inevitable. It took her a while to see.

  I could forgive her for that.

  Chapter 16

  IT TOOK ME TEN MINUTES on my bike, my laptop bouncing in my backpack. Ten minutes of imagining us squeezing in one of those tiny study cubicles in a dimly lit back corner. Two chairs wedged together, shoulders touching. Thighs, touching. While we discussed presentation options. She’d taken the lead by texting me, and inviting me here. She’d decide when things would go further. I was happy to be in her company.

  Working my chain through my spokes and frame, I locked my bike down next to a rusted, tire-less ten-speed carcass someone abandoned a hundred years ago. While I did, a familiar minivan turned into the lot, releasing Bobby and Ralph Burton.

  “Hey Del!” they said in unison, bounding past me into the library. Their mom gunned the minivan’s engine, gone.

  Panicky, I snatched my phone from my pocket, sending a quick message.

  Me: Are you here yet?

  Kiera: Yes. We are all inside.

  We?

  Wary, I followed Ralph and Bobby. They led me to a study room packed with my Purity Pledge classmates.

  A round table was covered in books and papers. Extra mismatched chairs had been dragged in. When I pushed through the door, I recognized the space fit the bodies nicely, but may have been too small for the Burton Brothers’ Axe body spray. I struggled to maintain normal breathing in a cloud of aerosol masculinity, and I wasn’t the only one, judging by the way others not-so-discreetly pressed hands to nostrils. The jolly brothers didn’t seem to notice, though.

  Everyone greeted me, Kiera least enthusiastically, merely tossing a nod my way before refocusing on the open book in her lap. Jameer left his seat at the opposite end of the table from Kiera, pulled me into a bro-hug. “You’re confused, right?”

  “Little bit.”

  “Sit.” He pointed to an empty chair next to his. On the opposite end of the table from Kiera. I sat.

  Shanice chirped, “I say a fas
hion show.”

  Mya rocked back in her chair, her phone in a two-hand grip, only halfway with us. “What’s a fashion show got to do with purity?”

  “About as much as a dance number,” Shanice fired back.

  Helena and Ralph and Bobby laughed. I found none of this funny.

  Kiera spoke without looking up. “I’ve been texting with Sister Vanessa and she suggested we be proactive. She’s expecting us to impress. So, whatever we settle on, that’s where the bar is set.”

  Jameer gave a wicked eye roll. “Total freedom to control our message. Y’all got ideas?”

  Everybody spoke at once, and I only caught snippets of phrases. Purity comedy routine. Purity choir concert. The only thing anyone agreed on was purity.

  With everyone trying to talk over everyone else, the competing voices grew into a loud dull roar, a library no-no. The tattooed librarian from last night was back, her eyes dark and bloodshot, giving us a dirty look through the study room window. Jameer clapped his hands together once, a thunder crack that made me jump in my seat.

  “Stop.” He squeezed the word through clenched teeth. The group complied. “We start on paper. We take a half hour, everyone makes a list of ideas they like, then we go through and pick the best ones. Narrow down from there.”

  Kiera tapped her phone. “Excellent plan. I’m setting a timer.”

  Mom and Dad had spoken. Everyone except me, Jameer, and Kiera tugged spiral notebooks or loose-leaf from the garden of school bags planted under the table and got to work.

  Jameer retrieved a fancy-looking brown leather journal from his bag for his own brainstorming. Kiera, though, brought the book she’d been reading from her lap—the Jacqueline Woodson novel she’d gravitated to—and splayed it on the table like she planned to keep her focus there and only participate in this activity at the supervisory level. Essentially, she was Tyrell counting the Cra-Burgers at FISHto’s.

  I signaled her with a hand wave. Her eyebrows arched high, waiting.

  “Talk to you a minute?”

  All the girls looked up, then quickly zeroed in on their papers when they noticed us noticing. Kiera gave me a tight nod, led the way, bringing the book with her, as if she didn’t trust it to be there when she returned.