by Nina Revoyr
One night about a week after they moved in, Raina went out with Toni and was late coming home for dinner. This was unlike her—she usually made it home in time to eat, and the one other time she'd been running late she'd called and told her mother beforehand. We waited for half an hour before finally sitting down at the table. My father loaded my plate with a small mountain of spaghetti, completing his creation with the minor eruption of tomato sauce he poured over the top. The dog watched the proceedings anxiously.
"You need carbohydrates," my father said. He was forty-one then, and still a bear of a man, large and strong but getting soft around the edges. His skin was the color of worn leather and his hair was still mostly black, although there were a few sprinkles of white in it, as if he'd just come in from the snow.
"I know, Dad," I said, imitating the sermons of my high school coach. "Because complex carbohydrates give you energy, and they burn off more easily than fat."
"Right. So you can eat as much as you want without worrying about putting on weight." He served himself a heap of spaghetti about twice the size of mine.
I laughed. "Sure. Like you, right?"
"Exactly."
"Oh, please," said Claudia. She reached over and poked his stomach, which hung out over his belt like a bag of sand.
"Hey," he said, batting her hand away, "see if you get any food tonight." He grinned wickedly at her and she raised her eyebrows, smiling. I laughed, a bit uncomfortably. Before Claudia had moved in, I hadn't been around her and my father very often, and I wasn't used to seeing them interact. Claudia scared me a little. She was shorter than Raina, and slighter, but she had a way of putting her hand on her hip and lifting a skeptical eyebrow that made you instantly forget how small she was. Her face was free of wrinkles, her hair contained no gray, and she appeared younger than her forty years. She had the same serious and focused air as her daughter—even, I saw, when she was amused.
After much discussion about what he was going to do to her for implying that he was fat, my father finally served Claudia some spaghetti. She handed me the Parmesan cheese, then asked, "Would you like some more water?" with the careful politeness of someone who doesn't know you very well and who wishes not to offend. Just then, the front door slammed shut. Ann left her post beside the table and trotted out to the hallway, toenails clicking on the warped linoleum.
"Hello!" Claudia called out, lifting her face toward the doorway. Her skin looked as smooth as her daughter's, although her forehead was a little smaller and her cheeks not quite as broad.
Raina didn't answer, but came straight into the dining room and sat down so hard the dog jumped back in fright. She was wearing normal summer jock attire: Lakers T-shirt, baggy shorts, basketball shoes—an outfit identical to my own except for the print of the T-shirt (mine was a Magic Johnson). She didn't speak a word to any of us.
"Well, nice of you to show up," my father said, not angrily. He must not have looked at her very closely, though, because she was obviously in no mood for humor. Her brow was furrowed, but other than that her face was blank, like the deceptive still surface of deep water. Her entire body was rigid. The thing that struck me most, though, was her eyes—out of that expressionless face, they were burning. Raina's eyes were always alert; they never settled into that passive glaze that other people's did when they weren't focused on something. But just then they were even more alive than usual. Claudia must have noticed this too, because when she spoke her voice was like a gentle hand reaching out to touch her daughter's arm.
"How was your day?" she asked.
"Perfect," Raina said. "Just great." She gripped her fork so tightly I thought the metal might cut into her hand.
"Have some spaghetti," my father said, piling some onto the plate he'd set out for her.
"Thanks," she said, although she didn't look at the food.
I kept my eyes on my half-eaten pasta, stealing glances at her now and then. I'd never seen her upset before, and I wasn't sure what to do—whether to act like I didn't notice and resume talking, or to just sit there and keep my mouth shut. Raina couldn't even pretend to be in a civil mood, and I remembered other times I'd seen her out of step with her surroundings—at a UCLA game the previous winter, where she'd stared at the court, completely absorbed, while Toni and Stacy talked over her head; at a party during the summer, where she'd danced by herself, eyes closed, unself-conscious, while people danced in couples all around her; the week before, in the house, when she'd suddenly started laughing, without trying to hide her amusement, or sharing the reason with anyone.
My father, however, still seemed not to notice that anything was wrong. "Your mother's been complaining about my belly," he said to Raina, "but I keep telling her that I'm a football coach and ex–football player and I'm supposed to have a belly."
No one said anything for several moments. My father wiggled his eyebrows at Raina, and I could tell he was trying to charm her. Claudia was always cautious and polite with me, as if she wanted to assure me that she wasn't a rival, but my father acted like Raina was the head of a committee that had yet to approve her mother's choice of partner.
"I'm going upstairs," said Raina, finally, and off she went so quickly that none of us had a chance to speak.
My father snorted. "Well, I didn't think my belly was that big."
I tried to smile at him but couldn't. Claudia looked after Raina like she wanted to go to her, but didn't move. The three of us ate the rest of our dinner in silence. I remember being very aware of the clink of the silverware against the plates.
After we'd finished, Claudia popped Raina's food into the microwave. "She needs to eat," she said, and then gave me the nuked spaghetti to take to Raina's room, since I was headed in that direction anyway. I mounted the stairs with plate in hand, the dog following close behind in case I dropped something. She found it entertaining that I blocked her when she tried to push past, so with every step I moved sideways to cut her off, taking my time to work my way up because I was in no hurry to get to Raina's room. I had no idea of what to say to her once I got there, beyond, "Hi," and, "Here's your food." Eventually, though, I made it to the top. I knocked lightly, questioningly, on Raina's door. I'd expected no answer, or at least a length of time before she gave one, but almost before I'd finished knocking she said, "Come in."
I pushed the door open and looked around apologetically. Just a week before, my father had graded his students' homework in this room, and lifted weights to old R&B albums. Now all traces of him had vanished, replaced by Raina and her things. There was a new Nerf hoop attached to the closet door, and a pair of basketball shoes in the corner. A line of trophies rose like golden spires from the top of the dresser. I took a step in, feeling self-conscious and strangely, stupidly, flattered to be allowed briefly into her territory. My breaths, I noticed, became short and shallow—the air, because it was inhabited by Raina, suddenly seemed too rich to ingest. Raina sat on her bed cross-legged, slapping a basketball back and forth between her hands.
"I brought you your food," I said, and put the plate down on the desk beside her bed.
"Thanks," she replied. The slapping got louder.
I stood there awkwardly, my eyes alighting everywhere except on her face. On the wall to my left there was a Nike poster of a bunch of women playing basketball in a gym somewhere, so I looked at that instead. All ten bodies were in motion. The two women on the wings were just starting to run, and several players were struggling for position in the middle of the key, while one figure rose up above them all and launched a beautiful arching shot toward the basket. Then the dog thumped her tail behind me. That brought me back, and I started to leave.
"Wait," Raina said, and I turned toward her. "Tell my mom I'm sorry I took off like that."
"Okay."
"Tell her I'll come down later."
"Okay." I hesitated. "I think she's worried about you."
"Yeah, well, you know parents."
With great effort, I lifted my eyes to her face. To
me it was perfect—smooth and strong, as if sculpted out of some dark, luxurious wood. Her jaw was prominent and firm; her lips full and soft; her eyebrows were thick near the center of her face and then tapered toward the sides, as if someone had touched her forehead with a full brush of paint, which had thinned as she finished her stroke. Her skin was unblemished except for the scar, the width of a pencil line, that ran an inch along her rounded left cheek. Her jet-black hair was combed straight back off her forehead into a single braid, and now, as she looked at me, her eyes continued to burn as they had at the table. I almost looked away, but made myself meet her gaze. "Is . . . everything okay?" I asked. It seemed an awfully brave question.
"Sure, everything's great," she said, "except that women suck." Her voice was strained and a little rough.
I nodded sympathetically. "I know."
She raised her eyebrows at me. "I know you know."
I smiled, but just for a moment, since she was so obviously unhappy. She'd heard I was gay, of course, through Stacy, but this was the first time we'd really acknowledged it. I wondered how she felt about living with someone who liked her, but that thought was too frightening, so I buried it. Instead, I repeated, "So women suck."
"Well, maybe not all women, but at least one of them does."
I looked down at my feet. There were rumors that Toni cheated on her, and I wondered if they—or the truth behind them—were the cause of Raina's distress.
"Fuckin shit," she said. "Goddamn fuckin shit." She shoved the ball away from her, and it made a huge crashing sound when it hit the closet door. I wanted to leave, but couldn't. Also, I wasn't sure what she wanted me to do—it seemed like she didn't want me to get too close, but still wanted me around; like she would never tell me what was wrong, but still needed me to ask. What I was sure of was that it made me uncomfortable to be there. I didn't know what exactly Toni had done to her that night, but I could see the results. Raina's fists were clenched on top of her thighs so tightly that the knuckles were purple. Her whole body was like one huge contracted muscle, or like a cocked rifle that might go off at any second.
We stayed there, unmoving, for what felt like an hour. Finally I heard the creak of the staircase, and then the sound of the dog padding out of the room to greet whoever was coming up. A few seconds later Claudia appeared in the doorway. Her hair was shoulder-length and loose, and she looked more relaxed, in her jeans and baggy T-shirt, than her daughter ever did. She glanced from Raina to me and back again. Because she was so thoughtful by nature, she always gave the impression of choosing her words carefully, even when they were perfectly ordinary. "Everything all right?" she asked now.
"Yeah, I guess so," Raina answered, her voice softer. She stood up and walked over to the closet door now, which had a round gray spot on it from the basketball, and pulled out a pair of shoes. "I'm gonna go run around the block a few times," she said, and then fixed a three-second gaze on Claudia, as if to tell her that everything was indeed under control, before pushing past her on her way downstairs.
"Be careful," Claudia said. She watched her daughter go, and then turned back to me. I shrugged my shoulders at her.
CHAPTER 2
In the first week of September, the school year began. I don't know about Raina, but I was even less enthusiastic than usual about the ending of my summer freedom. It was my senior year of high school, the last rung on a ladder where the next step had always been visible. After this final rung, though, I saw nothing, just a huge, frightening void. I knew I'd go to college, but where? I'd have to start thinking about it soon; the letters and phone calls I'd been receiving from coaches for the last two years were no longer just ego boosters, feathers in my cap. It was time to really consider the various cities and states; to start comparing the different programs and schools.
This future-planning was hard, though, with parents in the picture. Sometimes I'd catch my father looking at me when he thought I wasn't paying attention, and it was a look of sadness, and of resignation, like he was about to send me off to war. I began to notice something too, in the downturned eyes and wistful smiles of adults when they talked about their youth, which I know now was a painful mixture of loss and regret. I think that, watching us, they remembered what it was like to have their whole lives in front of them. No one had ever fired us from jobs we needed to support ourselves and our families, nor forced us to humiliate ourselves in order to keep them. No one had ever shattered our hearts with the cruel, complicated methods that adults use in their attempts to destroy each other. We had fought in no war, we had voted in no election; we hadn't yet done anything irrevocable. And yet, they were almost waiting for us to do something irrevocable; they half-expected us to trip up and break their hearts somehow, as countless others had done before. There were so many mistakes we could make, so many ways to abort our futures—crime, pregnancy, gangs, drugs, or simply leaving school and giving up. Adolescence in LA was like Russian roulette, and the game would not be over until we were gone.
Raina went to the same school that year—Leuzinger—as she had for the previous three, although now she had to take a bus or hitch a ride with her mom every day. We had a chuckle about that, because so many players moved around, or pretended to, in order to go to schools with better basketball programs. If you played for a well-known team, that increased your chances of being seen by college scouts. And being seen was important. Some parents went so far as to move their whole families so that their daughters could play on teams that got lots of exposure. Most of the time, though, players just used someone's address—usually that of a relative real or created—in the city of the desired school, so that they could claim to live in that school's official district. Sometimes this practice was taken to extremes. None of the starting five for that year's third-ranked team in the state, for example, actually lived in the district of the school they played for. The California Interscholastic Federation, or CIF, occasionally investigated flagrant cases of creative address listing, but for the most part, players did as they wanted. And now here was Raina—moving, but not to get to a new school, and illegally attending a school in whose district she no longer resided.
By the second week after Claudia and Raina moved in, my father and I had calmed down a little. I was no longer surprised to find Raina's shoes in the bathroom, where she always left them for some inexplicable reason; no longer startled by her quick, padded footsteps outside my door. I was no longer surprised by the velvet smell of Claudia's perfume, or by her presence in the kitchen at breakfast, which had caught me off-guard every morning for the first couple of weeks, as if she hadn't been in the exact same spot the day before. Raina and Claudia, for their part, had also settled down, although Claudia was still too polite to me, and Raina still didn't talk very much. They seemed comfortable, though, choosing the TV shows or raiding the refrigerator; several new paintings appeared on the walls; and Raina had taken such complete possession of her room that it was hard to remember it had once been my father's office. Raina always kept her door open, which I found strange; I always shut my door, even when I was home alone. She wasn't secretive, like me, but it was more than that—she was so centered, so self-contained, that there was always a sense of privacy about her, even in the presence of others.
The thing I remember most about those first few weeks is that I was constantly on edge. It wasn't so much that I was always thinking about Raina—it was that I couldn't think about her, because my thoughts of her were crowded out by her actual presence. When we were both at home, all of my energy was required to deal with the situation at hand, to recover from the last one, or to gear up for whatever was coming next. I was exhausted and overwhelmed, and the situation would have driven me crazy if I hadn't been infatuated with the main person who was invading my space. Still, I couldn't believe that she and Claudia were really there forever—it's hard to accept that any major change is permanent, even one that you're essentially happy about. When I got tense from having too many people around, I took the keys to my f
ather's Mustang and went for a drive. This was usually at night, after dinner, when Raina's proximity (we each did our homework in our own rooms, divided only by that thin but insurmountable wall) made it hard for me to concentrate. I usually drove to the ocean and then up the coast for half an hour, putting a tape on the stereo and letting Marvin Gaye or Luther Vandross give voice to my longing. The sun would be setting as I headed north, and while I liked the pink clouds and orange hue of sunset, I liked the darkness better; I liked the sense of disappearing into something. Finally I parked near the Santa Monica pier and stared out at the blackness of the water. The rhythmic thunder of the ocean and the rough feel of the wind managed to calm what was left of my nerves. When I got back home, two hours after I'd left, nobody asked where I'd gone.
* * *
A few days after school started, my friend Telisa came over to do some homework. Our Trig teacher, Mr. Byers, had given us a long, comprehensive review assignment in order to test our basic algebra, and the entire class had groaned at being saddled—in the very first week of school—with such a heavy and dull load of work. He'd given us strict instructions to do the assignment alone, which Telisa and I were ignoring. We were teammates, we figured—she was our point guard—and teammates should stand together in times of trouble. Besides, I wanted the benefit of her superior skills in math.
Telisa Coles was my oldest friend. We had met when we were seven, about two months after I'd moved to Inglewood, at a time when I was getting into a lot of fights. Because I was the new kid, and Japanese on top of that, all of the local kids felt it was their duty to take a crack at me. I'd had years of practice defending myself against the white bullies in Redondo Beach, so I managed to hold my own; eventually, I won the kids' respect and they didn't bother me anymore. During one of the last of these fights, Telisa had stood to the side and watched as I'd fended off a couple of older girls. When they'd finally stumbled away from me, nursing their wounds, I'd touched the bruise on my cheek where the bigger girl had hit me, and then turned to get ready for Telisa. Instead of attacking me, though, she'd just looked me up and down. Then she'd yawned. And this reaction of sheer indifference, after all the hostility I'd faced, had made me feel grateful and relieved. "You all right, girl," she'd said, and then she'd asked if I wanted to get some ice cream. She had been my best friend ever since.