“Sure,” I finally say. “I mean, okay, you can come.”
As we start down the street, Aubrey pulls his phone out of his pocket. I guess he must’ve gotten a message. He shakes his head while reading and then types in a message and puts his phone away, but we don’t get very far before he pulls his phone out again, and this time he sighs before typing another message. Then instead of putting his phone in his pocket, he drops it in his bag. I want to ask him who is sending him so many messages, but it seems nosy and none of my business.
For the rest of the walk, Aubrey talks about an Astrid Dane episode where she runs across a dark frozen lake and the ice cracks and she goes right into that freezing-cold water. No one’s around, and she gets trapped. It’s sort of tragic and beautiful at the same time. Her hair is swirling all around her, and even though she’s underwater and freezing, her eyes are looking up through that frozen dark sheet like she can still see the stars. And she stays there until the lake melts—which doesn’t happen for like seventy-five years. But when it does, Astrid Dane just walks out like she’s been taking a long bath.
“What was she thinking about for all that time?” Aubrey asks.
“I wondered the same thing,” I say, and it comes out a little shaky and breathless because Aubrey gets Astrid Dane like I do.
Once we’re on my street, I can see Gee’s old dirty Mercedes in the driveway. And although I’m glad Gee’s back, I’m not sure anymore about Aubrey coming over. I’m not sure how Aubrey and Gee would mix. I glance at Aubrey, wondering if there’s a way to tell him he can’t come over after all.
“My grandfather’s home,” I say.
“Oh, sway,” Aubrey says.
“Maybe you should come over some other time?” I hate when I want to say something straight out, and it ends up sounding like a question. Like a choice.
“And miss meeting your grandpa? No way.”
Aubrey walks ahead of me, like he’s walking to his house instead of mine. And even though I can’t see it, I just know his big old smile is spread across his face like honey on bread.
19
Nervous and Sizzling
As soon as I open the front door, jazz spills out of the house. Gee is serious about his music. Mama says that’s where Malcolm gets it from, but jazz and hip-hop don’t seem like the same thing at all to me.
I slide past Aubrey and hustle toward the kitchen. I know Gee’s in there, probably humming to his music and starting something delicious for dinner.
I want to make sure I give Gee a heads-up about Aubrey before Gee says anything rude, but I’m not fast enough; Gee comes out of the kitchen carrying a plate of cheese and crackers.
“Nae-nae! Give me some sugar, girl.” He sets the plate on the dining room table and holds his arms out so he can bury me in a big Gee hug, and I plant a loud smacking kiss on his cheek. Gee always says it’s not a kiss at all if you can’t hear it.
There’s no sign of Malcolm; he’s probably up in his room, drowning out Gee’s music with his own.
“Gee, guess what? They’re changing the name of our school.” Even though I’m sure he’s going to be mad my school won’t be named after the Duke anymore, I’m still excited to tell him.
But before Gee can say anything, Aubrey interrupts. “They’re talking about it.”
Gee releases me and eyes Aubrey. “What have you gone and done to your hair?” he asks, as if he’s known Aubrey forever.
I can feel my cheeks burning even though it’s exactly what I’ve been wondering about.
Aubrey is smiling just as wide as ever, but he starts doing his hair-twisting thing, giving himself a tiny horn. I think it’s what he does when he’s nervous. Then he walks over to Gee and sticks out his hand. “Aubrey Banks, sir. A pleasure to meet you.”
Gee looks at the hand for a moment longer than even I know is right, and then he shakes it, giving it a pretty hard squeeze, I guess, because Aubrey’s smile gets shaky for a quick second.
“Gee, Aubrey is . . .” I lose my way right there. I don’t have a single clue what Aubrey is. I look over at Aubrey for help, but his eyes are shining bright at me like he thinks this is pretty funny.
“Well, what is he?” Gee takes a step back, as if he needs to get a better look at Aubrey. “An alien? A cartoon character? A mythical creature from beyond?”
Aubrey laughs at my grandpa’s ridiculousness. “No, sir. Just a . . .” He glances over at me, his eyes still twinkling. “Classmate of Nae-nae’s.”
I don’t mind Gee’s nickname for me, but I sure don’t want Aubrey to call me that. It’s private.
“Jenae.” I say my name loud enough to be heard right over the horns blowing from the stereo speakers. I don’t know why I didn’t think of the word classmate. And I don’t know why I’m sort of mad that that’s the word Aubrey picked.
“Well, classmate of Jenae’s,” Gee starts. “What’s this about the school?”
I don’t know why he’s asking Aubrey when I was the one who told him the big news, even though technically, Aubrey said it better. So before Aubrey can answer, I say, “People don’t like that it’s named after John Wayne. They want to change it to a girl’s name.” I lose my way a bit because I can’t remember the new name. “Sheila somebody?”
“Sylvia,” Aubrey says. “Sylvia Mendez.”
“What type of foolishness is that?” Gee asks.
“She was a big deal when she was a kid. Her parents sued the state . . . or something.” Aubrey scratches his head, and I’m glad to see that he doesn’t know everything. “But anyway, she got to go to a school that was supposed to be just for white kids. They had to integrate.”
“Now I know that’s plain wrong. Brown versus Board of Education did all that. What are they teaching you kids in that school?”
I’ve heard of that Brown case. Gee told me about it. He says it’s important we know all about African American history. “Everybody knows Brown ended segregation,” I tell Aubrey, and roll my eyes. “Click,” I add, to show him how obvious the fact is.
“But Sylvia Mendez was before that,” Aubrey says. He must see the disbelief in our faces, because he adds, “Honest. You can look it up online.”
Gee narrows his eyes at that, like he thinks maybe Aubrey is being a little too smart.
Then Gee looks Aubrey up and down and asks, “All right, young blood, what exactly is going on with that hair?”
I hope Aubrey didn’t think my grandpa was just going to give him a pass on the hair question. Gee is a dog with a bone when it comes to something he wants to know, and he never forgets.
“I dyed it,” Aubrey says, and shrugs as if that explains everything.
I look back and forth between Aubrey and Gee, wondering if Gee is going to let it go or if he’s going to press. Sometimes when Mama’s family is all over, they’ll start playing cards, and if they’re playing whist, Gee will get a certain look before making his bid. He has the same look going now. But then he starts nodding to the music and snaps his fingers.
“Well, all right,” he says, but I’m not sure if he’s talking to Aubrey or the music.
“Is this Coltrane?” Aubrey asks.
Gee’s eyes light up like a carnival ride. “You know your jazz, young man.”
“My mom won’t listen to anything else.”
“Smart woman.”
I’m not going to lie. I’m a little jealous. Gee is always trying to teach me about jazz, but I can’t tell one artist from another. I know I like some of it. The smooth songs, like what’s playing now. The ones that make you feel like it’s a long summer day, with just the perfect cool breeze gliding over your skin. But some jazz is popcorn, jumping up and down, all nervous and sizzling.
Aubrey is nodding his head to the beat, and I am ready for him to leave. Sharing Astrid Dane is one thing, but sharing Gee is different.
“Is Malcolm upstairs?” I ask, glad that Gee turns back to me.
“Nope. Went to that PT. Grumbling the whole time he was fixing
to go,” Gee answers.
“That’s great,” I say. PT is physical therapy. And it’s not great that Malcolm was grumbling, but it’s good he went. He’s supposed to go regularly, but he doesn’t. Says it’s stupid and hurts and is a waste of time. Something must’ve changed for him to have gone. I get a little tingle in my belly. Could my texts to Rox be working? Malcolm hasn’t admitted to them being back in touch, but maybe she texted him after I told her about him feeling bad about their breakup. I hope he’s not too stubborn to text her back. I want to text her again right now, but I don’t want to do it in front of Aubrey.
“Y’all have homework or something you need to get to?” Gee asks. “Or you want a snack or something?” He gestures to the plate of cheese and crackers.
“Homework,” I say, and head to the stairs.
“Oh, no, I don’t think you young folks need to be upstairs. You can do your homework right here where I can keep an eye on you. Don’t need you up there messing around with each other. I’ll turn the music down.”
I can see that Gee has decided that this should be the most embarrassing day of my life.
20
Early History
Aubrey and I settle at the dining room table and find out even though we have math different periods, we both have Mr. Colson. So we decide to do math together. We zip through the math problems. I don’t want to admit it, but it’s nice having someone ask me how to solve for x. I love how logical math is, and how you get to solve tiny mini mysteries. What is x? How can you figure out y? All while we’ve been working, I heard his phone buzzing in his bag.
When it buzzes again, I give up trying to pretend I’m not curious and ask, “Don’t you need to check your phone?”
“Naw, it’s just my mom,” Aubrey says. “She likes me to check in when she’s at work.” He pauses. “Or when she’s not at work. Basically, all the time. I already answered her. But she keeps texting.” He sounds exasperated.
As if she heard him talking about her, his phone buzzes again. I can’t imagine ignoring Mama like that. “You better answer her,” I say.
Aubrey says, “I did already.”
But he takes his phone out and sends a quick text. “Satisfied?” he asks me.
I shrug. It doesn’t matter to me one way or the other. I close my math book and take a mighty stretch.
Aubrey copies me, and then we both wiggle our arms around all goofy, making us both laugh.
“Can we take a break?” he asks.
The answer I want to say twists around in my mouth. Now that math is done, I think our studying should be over and Aubrey should just go ahead and go home.
At least that’s what I think I want. But then Aubrey’s smile gets smaller and he clears his throat and asks, “Or, um, you want me to leave?”
Instead of saying, Yes, please, my mouth decides on its own and says, “No, that’s okay. Let’s get another snack.” We already plowed through the plate of cheese and crackers Gee laid out for us.
On our way to the kitchen I spy Gee through the French doors lining the back of the dining room. He’s sitting under the fig tree in his “thinking chair.” I hope he’s not smoking. Mama has been after him forever to stop, and he tells her he’s “just about” to quit, but sometimes I catch him having a smoke outside. Right now, though, it looks like he’s just sitting there, pondering life.
“Um, do you like tortilla chips and salsa?” I ask Aubrey, already starting to pull the salsa out of the refrigerator.
“Yep. Maybe this is the moment I should tell you I like pretty much everything! Name something you think I wouldn’t want to eat.”
“Anchovies.”
“Yep.”
“Brussels sprouts.”
“Sautéed in garlic? Yum.”
“Beets.”
“Fresh, pickled, and baked. Yes, yes, yes.”
I rack my brain for the worst possible thing. “Liver!”
But Aubrey nodded. “Oh, yeah, I am so into offal.”
“Offal?”
“Organ meats. Kidneys and livers and tongue and—”
I wave my hands. “Stop! Stop! That’s disgusting. It should be awful, not offal.” I do a pretend gag.
Aubrey laughs at that. “I told you I like everything.”
“You are seriously weird.”
“Yeah, I know. But remember? My mom likes to cook, and the whole reason she’s working in a restaurant is so she can work up to being a chef. That’s why we moved here. She wanted to explore California cuisine.”
“That’s sway your mom wants to be a chef,” I say.
Aubrey gets a goofy grin, and then he nods at me, and I nod back, and for a minute we’re both just nodding and I have no idea what we’re agreeing to.
By the time Gee comes back inside, Aubrey and I have settled at the kitchen island with chips and salsa and we have moved on to the super-boring history homework Mrs. Crawford assigned.
Aubrey is really good at finding where answers hide in textbooks. We have almost all the questions answered, and if I had to do it by myself I would maybe have gotten to question four (List at least two problems with the idea of manifest destiny). Aubrey didn’t even have to check the book for that one.
Gee picks up my history book and starts flipping through it. I know what he’s looking for. A list of American presidents.
“It’s early American history, Gee,” I say. “We don’t get to modern stuff until eighth grade.”
He sucks his teeth at that. Mama said Gee cried when Barack Obama got elected president. He didn’t think he’d live long enough to see a Black person elected president of the United States. Now he likes to check lists of presidents just to see Obama’s name. He sets the book down and heads out to the living room.
Aubrey’s phone buzzes again, and this time after he checks it, he says, “My mom just got off work. I better get home before she does.” He gathers up his books, gives me a little two-finger salute, and then he’s gone.
I really need to talk to him about how to say goodbye to people. Although I totally understand wanting to avoid getting in trouble for not being where you’re supposed to be.
Gee’s in the living room with the television blaring away. Instead of a Western, though, it’s an infomercial selling some big toaster/barbecue/dehydration thing. I can’t imagine Gee has any plans to buy something like that. “Are you watching this, Gee?”
“Huh?” he asks. “What now?”
He looks confused, so I point at the television. “This show. Is your movie over?”
Gee rubs his temples for a moment and then turns off the TV. “You know I’m not watching that silliness,” he says, as if I had suggested he watch it. “Let me get to making something for dinner.” He starts to get up, then sits back down with an oof.
“What’s the matter?” I ask him.
“Just these old legs acting up,” Gee says. “While I’m cooking, you look up that Mendez person on the computer. Man, that thing is smart.”
Gee acts like computers have information tucked right inside them instead of being connected to the internet. He says he’s too old to understand all that malarkey, but I know he’s not too old. My great-uncle Bruce uses the internet all the time to keep up with basketball stats.
“Why don’t we look it up together?” I’m trying to drag Gee into the twenty-first century whether he likes it or not. He doesn’t like it.
He waves his arms at me and pulls himself out of the chair. “I don’t got time for that. You just talk to that computer and see what it has to say.” He points to the desktop computer tucked into a corner of the living room. Mama, Malcolm, and I all used it before my dad got me my laptop. Gee never uses it.
I roll my eyes at him, but I nod too. Gee lets us joke around with him, but at the end of the day, if he says jump, you better say, How high?
“I’ll tell you what I find out,” I say as he heads into the kitchen.
I start a search and quickly find out that Aubrey is right. There really wa
s a case before Brown v. Board of Education. How can such a big deal have happened and I’ve never even heard of it? Especially when it happened in California?
When Sylvia Mendez was in third grade, her parents wanted her to go to the school near their house. Problem was, that school was just for white kids and Sylvia’s family was Mexican and Puerto Rican. Sylvia’s cousins got to go to the school because they were light skinned enough to look white, but Sylvia and her brothers were darker. The school district said they had to go to a school for Mexican kids. But Sylvia’s parents, they wanted their kids to go to the school that was close by in their own neighborhood, and they were willing to make a big deal about it.
Most of the pictures of Sylvia are when she’s a grown-up, but there’s one of her as a kid. She looks nice, but very, very serious. I wonder if she wanted to go to that school for white kids. Can you imagine being only eight and going to school knowing a whole bunch of people didn’t want you there? I’m eleven and I don’t think I could do it. And Sylvia couldn’t make herself invisible—she just had to go to her classes, holding her books and lunch tight, and hope no one did more than name-calling. She must’ve been really brave.
It would be awful knowing people didn’t want you around. That’s how her case was won. The judge said schools shouldn’t make kids feel bad about who they are. And even though the school district appealed and tried to have the ruling overturned, a whole bunch of lawyers said they thought the first ruling should stand. Before he won the Brown v. Board of Education case and before he was a Supreme Court justice, Thurgood Marshall was one of those lawyers who helped make sure the court didn’t change its mind. He said how important it was for Sylvia to be allowed to go to the school her parents wanted her to. He must’ve done a good job writing up his opinion, because another court said the first decision was right: Sylvia, and kids like her, could go to the school near them even if it used to be only for white kids.
I like the idea of people coming together for a good cause. Maybe I should go into the kitchen to help Gee and tell him what I found out, especially since Gee was the one who told me about Thurgood Marshall and how he was the first Black judge to be on the US Supreme Court. But Mama isn’t home yet, and I can probably get away with watching at least one Astrid Dane video.
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