“I’m going to have my life back,” I screamed. “I’m going to be a normal teen again,” I yelled.
Pops walked over and patted me on the back then put me in a bear hug. Next, he opened the door and Nyla got out the Yukon. He reached down, scooped her in his arms, kissed her on each one of her cheeks before he put her down.
“But, Pops. Whose house is this?” I asked as I began to think about what this would mean for me, Pops and Nyla.
“This is Coach Byrd’s mother’s house. She died last year and the house has been vacant ever since, well except for the folks who stayed a few weeks and up and left. Coach said that his sister and brother live out of town and neither of them have any interest in moving in the house, and neither does Coach because he has his own house. The people who were living here moved out without telling him and he’s been looking for some new renters. He said if I wanted to move in, then I could. He’s not even going to charge me rent. Said the house is paid for anyway and he’ll give me six months to get back on my feet. After that, if I decide I want us to keep living here, then that’s when I’ll start paying rent.”
I know my smile was bigger than a basketball as we walked back to the Yukon and got inside.
“It’s got some furniture in there that he said we’re welcome to use. The lights are on too. All I have to do is pay the utility bill every month, and I believe I should be able to manage that, so what do you two have to say? Do y’all want to move in here or do you want to keep living in this here Yukon?” Pops looked at us, his eyes brighter than I’d seen them since before Momz died. Maybe there was hope for us after all.
I looked at him like he was crazy for asking such a dumb question, and then the three of us laughed and said together: “The house, live in the house!” Maybe things were about to turn around for my family. It sure looked like it.
Chapter 16
My life seemed like it was slowly getting back to normal. Thanksgiving had come and gone. We didn’t have a fancy Thanksgiving dinner, but it really didn’t matter. I was just glad to have a place to finally call home.
We had been living in Coach Byrd’s Momma’s house for a little over a month. We got a lot of our stuff out of storage. The furniture Coach’s momma had was really nice and Pops drilled me and Nyla everyday about taking care of everything. He didn’t want Coach Byrd to regret helping us out, and neither did I, so I did my best to keep the house clean and made sure Nyla wasn’t tearing up anything. It felt good having my own space again, with my own room and some of my old things.
I guess Nyla loved having her own room too, because she would spend hours in it playing with her dolls whenever we were at home. Pops got most of her collection of dolls out of storage so Nyla was happy.
Living in Coach Byrd’s Momma’s house was way cool. The house was good and warm. Pops said he signed us up for food stamps and so we had food in the fridge. In the past, I probably would have been ashamed to be on food stamps, but hey, I was sort of glad Pops got ‘em because that meant no more stomach growling everyday all day, no more wondering where, or when, we would get a chance to eat, and no more sneaking inside hotels and eating from off the breakfast bar. Definitely, no more St. Mary’s! Our refrigerator stayed full of food!
I could easily tell that Coach and Pops were becoming friends because they started hanging out together, which I think was good for Pops. After he first got fired, and we moved, I remember that I stopped seeing Pops’ friends coming around. I don’t know if it was Pops’ decision or not. Or maybe, when he fell on hard times, they didn’t have time for him. I don’t know what the deal was, and right now it didn’t make a difference to me because Pops was starting to act like his old self, the Pops that I knew before Momz died. He was laughing more, joking more, and drinking less.
Pops said he had an interview in a few days for a job at some place where somebody Coach knew worked. I was going to say a prayer that he got it. Maybe since God was answering prayers lately, he would answer one more, and that was for Pops to get a good paying, permanent job so we could keep living in this house.
∞
Tonight, we had a game and Pops and Nyla were coming. I was determined to show out on the court too, just for Pops. This was his first time coming to one of my games in a long long time and I wanted to make him proud.
I made good on my promise because I scored a season high twenty-six points, had twelve assists and three key rebounds. We lost again, but hey, I was a winner in my book because I showed Pops that I had the heart for the game.
After we came out of the locker room, I talked to some of the guys on the team and then left to go meet up with Pops and Nyla. We were going to go out for pizza with Coach Byrd and his wife and their two kids who were both closer to Nyla’s age.
Sierra and her crew were walking towards me just as I was about to go out the gym door. I looked past her and saw Daisha. I couldn’t see why I ever liked Sierra. Oh, yeah, I know why I liked her, she was Rihanna’s double. I laughed to myself and then smiled at Daisha.
Sierra rolled her eyes and kept walking. I nodded for Daisha to come over, and she did.
“You had a good game tonight.” Daisha smiled at me. She had the whitest teeth. She may not have been Rihanna but she definitely looked good. “Thanks, Daisha. Hey, you gone let me have your phone number?” I didn’t hesitate in asking her.
“Yes.”
Now that I had a real cell phone again, and didn’t have to use that food stamp phone anymore, I had to make up for lost time. Oh, that was one thing I forgot to mention, a couple of days ago Pops surprised me with a cell phone. It wasn’t a Galaxy or an Iphone, but hey, I was just glad I had a phone of my own again. It was the best thing that I could have gotten besides us moving into the house.
Daisha called off her number so fast I had to have her repeat it a little slower.
“I’ll call you later or text you tonight after I get home,” I told her.
Daisha smiled and said, “Okay.”
I walked away feeling like I was the king of the world.
Chapter 17
Pops and Nyla were having a good time at the pizza joint. They were laughing and Nyla was playing with Coach’s kids.
Coach brought his sister-in-law with them too. She was a pretty woman, not as pretty as Daisha was to me, but she was definitely looking good for an older woman. Pops acted like he was my age. He was all up in her face. Her name was Mariah and she reminded me a lot of Momz because she kept laughing, something Momz used to always do. Momz used to laugh at some silly stuff. Things that weren’t even funny. Her laughter would make me laugh. I missed her a lot.
While I enjoyed eating slice after slice of pizza, Pops and Mariah were talking more at each other and less to the rest of us. I saw Coach when he elbowed his wife and then the two of them looked at Pops and Mariah and smiled.
Mariah seemed like she was bringing out the best in Pops because I hadn’t seen him have this much fun since before Momz died.
Watching Pops and Miss Mariah made me smile on the inside because Pops was smiling on the outside. I know there was never going to be anybody who could take the place of Momz in my book, but maybe for Pops, Miss Mariah was what he needed.
Pops was still laughing and eating pizza while he and Miss Mariah talked about whatever. I couldn’t understand much of what they said, only that she liked basketball and she used to play on her high school girls’ basketball team. When we got ready to leave, I heard Pops ask Miss Mariah for her phone number. They stood in front of each other, and with cell phones in hand, I watched from the sidelines as they added each other’s numbers in their phones.
On the way home, Pops congratulated me some more for the great game I had played. He talked more than ever, all the way up to the house and still talked when we got inside. After he talked about my game, he started talking about Miss Mariah. Miss Mariah this and Miss Mariah that. I smiled because finally Pops had come back to life.
∞
I texted Daisha when I g
ot home.
“U goin 2 c Kanye? Daisha texted.
“Naw, I want 2. No money.”
I didn’t mind telling Daisha the truth. If it had been Sierra, I would have been making up excuse after excuse about why I couldn’t go to the concert. But Daisha was just real. She didn’t put on any fake airs, she was just plain cool.
“Don’t feel bad. I can’t go either. Cost 2 much.”
Me and Daisha texted back and forth, then I picked up the phone and called her. We talked about school, about our classes, and what we wanted to do when we graduated from high school. I told her I wanted to go to college and then get drafted to the NBA and Daisha said she wanted to go to be a journalist. By the time we hung up the phone, I knew I wanted Daisha to be my girlfriend.
Daisha was the kind of girl that I wouldn’t mind getting in trouble about. She was really cool and she seemed like she understood me.
So at school the following Monday, I built up my nerve and during lunchtime, we were outside in the breezeway. It wasn’t as cold as it had been but we were still hugging on each other.
“Daisha,, you gone be my girl?” I asked her while I hugged her warm body.
She pulled back a little and looked at me like I was a school textbook and she was searching for answers.
“Are you serious?” she asked.
“Yeah, I’m serious. I want you to be my girlfriend. Is that cool?”
Daisha smiled and nodded. “Yea, that’s way cool.”
I kissed her and squeezed her in my arms and she laid her head on my shoulder. I was so glad that she had said yes. I wondered what Sierra would say if she knew. Then again, who cares? I’m back on top of the world and nothing or no one is going to pull me down ever again.
Chapter 18
Now that Daisha was my girlfriend, we started talking and texting every evening after school, and we hooked up ever chance we got during school. Sometimes we would study together, and do our homework.
After spending so much time talking to her, I realized that Daisha had it going on. To me, she was prettier than Sierra, in her own way, because she wasn’t all stuck up like Sierra. She didn’t need a whole lotta stuff to make her seem like something she wasn’t. She didn’t even wear makeup like Sierra did and she was pretty without it. I really liked that about Daisha. And come to think about it, she had it going on just like Rihanna. Rihanna had a pretty smile; Daisha did too. Rihanna was fine; so was Daisha. Rihanna seemed like she was just an everyday girl, so did Daisha.
At school, I could tell Sierra hated the fact that me and Daisha had hooked up. Just about every time she saw us walking down the hall together, she would roll her eyes up in her head and walk off. Daisha even said that Sierra had spread lies saying that me and her were having sex, which was not true. I know some of the guys on the team said they were having sex but as much as I hate to admit it, I’m still a virgin. With everything that’s been happening over the past months, sex is the farthest thing from my mind anyway. Plus, Coach warned us that we could get in a bunch of trouble. I didn’t want to even think that I could get a girl pregnant, and I definitely didn’t want to catch some sex disease that I couldn’t get rid of. But Daisha and me, well we did make out, mostly at school but kissing and touching was as far as we had gone. I definitely wanted to do more, but, hey, I knew that time would come sooner or later, so I tried not to worry about it too much.
Daisha didn’t seem to care one way or the other what Sierra tried to say or do. One day, after lunch, Sierra came up to me and Daisha.
“Well, well, well, look at you, Miss Daisha. Finally, you got somebody to pay attention to yo sorry, homely looking self,” Sierra said with her arms folded across her breasts.
“Look, Sierra. You don’t scare me. You think you’re all of that, well you ain’t nothing to me. Your words can’t hurt me. You’re no queen bee in my book. Oh, yeah, you are a B all right.”
I almost bowled off laughing. Daisha was really speaking her mind, telling Sierra exactly how she felt. “And, if I’m so homely, then why do I have your man,” Daisha said and then put her hand around my waist.
I was shocked. Daisha was standing up to Sierra, telling her off. I couldn’t believe it, but I sure was glad.
It was no secret that Sierra’s parents supposedly had plenty of cheese and they lived in a big house behind the gate, as we called it. It was actually a private community called Lion’s Gate where Sierra lived.
Daisha’s parents were more like my parents used to be. They both had jobs but they didn’t have money like everybody said Sierra’s parents had.
After my fourth period class, Sierra stopped me while I was on my way to fifth period. Just so happened I was by myself. Juvaun, who I had started hanging out with, hadn’t come to school that day. He had been out with the flu. A lot of students seemed to have it, but so far, I hadn’t gotten it. I was glad in a way but then I thought if I did get the flu that would give me some free days out of school.
Anyway, here comes Sierra, and she was by herself too. I don’t know where her friends were, but to me it seemed like her circle of friends was getting smaller every time I saw her.
“Whaddaya want?” I asked her before she had time to say anything to me. I wasn’t up for any of her girl drama.
“Nyl, when are you going to forgive me?” Sierra asked and batted her eyes at me like she thought that was going to make me break down and give in to her. No way, and she didn’t even look like Rihanna to me anymore, so I definitely didn’t have anything to say to her.
“What are you talking about?” I answered her question with my own question. I kept on walking down the hallway. Sierra followed.
“Look, girl, if you want me to say that I forgive you then okay, I’ll say it, I forgive you, but forgiving doesn’t mean forgetting, at least not in my book it doesn’t.” Just like I had to tell Zach, well I wanted to make sure that this time Sierra understood that we would never be friends. I felt like I had to say I forgave her because that was what Momz would have told me to do. But if I had my way, I wouldn’t have accepted her apology – not ever.
Sierra looked around, for what, I don’t know but I followed her eyes as she looked around then up and down the hall. There was no one in the hall, except for one boy and a girl I saw standing on the other end. Next thing I know, Sierra grabbed hold of my arm and pulled me underneath the stairwell.
“What the…” I almost cursed but held back. “What is wrong with you, Sierra?”
“You know you still want me? And I still want you. You know you like me betta than Daisha. I mean, look at her and then look at me. There is no comparison.”
This chick was crazy. She had to be, yanking on me like she did and talking all that smack. All of a sudden, Sierra places her bubble gum tasting lips on mine and starts kissing me. I didn’t know what to think; it took me by total surprise but the thing is, at first I was about to push her off me but her lips and tongue tasted so sweet that I just kissed her back.
“What are you doing?” I heard someone say. I turned around and it was, you guessed it: it was Daisha. How did she see me and Sierra under the stairwell? I looked and realized that we weren’t that hidden from sight after all. This time I pushed Sierra off me, and she stumbled back and almost fell. I didn’t take the time to apologize for being so rough. I turned and looked at Daisha. Her eyes were red and I know she was about to cry.
Sierra stood against the wall and I could have sworn she had a smile on her face. This girl was trouble with a capital T and I had fallen for her tricks.
“Daisha, it’s not what you think.”
Daisha looked at me and then at Sierra before she took off running down the hall.
“Don’t you ever in life say another word to me, Sierra. Is this your way of messing up my life again?”
“No, I didn’t mean it, Nyl. How did I know Daisha was going to walk up on us. I’m sorry,” she said like she was about to cry too. Dang, girls are such crybabies. I gave Sierra an evil look and took off
after Daisha.
I caught up with her just before she disappeared into her fifth period class.
“Daisha, hold up, I’m sorry,” I told her as I took hold of her arm and turned her around to face me. “Sierra tricked me.”
“Oh, really? It didn’t look like much of a trick to me? Looks like both of you were enjoying yourselves. I can’t believe you would do this, Nyl. I thought you were different from all the other boys, but you’re just the same. You don’t want a girlfriend, you just want somebody who will do what you want them to do, but that’s not me. I’m not Sierra and I’m not going to give up anything to you or any other boy. If that’s who you think I am, then you got me messed up.”
“Daisha, listen, I’m telling you, Sierra stopped me in the hall and asked me when I was going to forgive her and the next thing I know she’s pulling me under the stairwell and then she kissed me.” I hoped my explanation sounded right; it was the truth, only part I left out was that I kissed her back.
“It didn’t look like you were trying to stop her, not from what I saw,” Daisha shot back, her eyes fixed on me. I could see the hurt all over her face. I hadn’t had a serious girlfriend until Daisha and I didn’t want to mess things up with her.
“I…I’m sorry, Daisha. I didn’t mean it and she tricked me, honest she did. Please, don’t go in class mad at me.”
Daisha looked at me but this time it looked like her eyes had softened and her anger was fading. She stared and then acted like she was about to say something but suddenly Ms. Wright, the Biology teacher, opened the door to her classroom. Ms. Wright looked at me then at Daisha.
“Daisha you better get in here before I mark you absent.” She looked at me again and then back at Daisha. “And you, young man,” Ms. Wright said, “shouldn’t you be in class yourself?”
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