by Ibi Zoboi
Until someone slices through all our laughter with a stupid question: “Is your name Fabulous? You Pri and them’s cousin?”
I don’t answer, because at this point, everyone knows who I am. I don’t even turn to see who this girl is.
“Excuse me, I asked you a question. Do you go by Fabulous?”
I turn to see a regular girl, not tall, not short, not fat or skinny. Just regular. Except for the way she asks me the question, as if it’s an accusation.
“Yes, and you are?” I ask.
“Tonesha. Your cousins know me. You messing with Kasim?”
“Oh, lord. Here we go,” Imani says. I know this feeling. These questions and warnings are an attack. It doesn’t matter if it’s in English or Creole. In Port-au-Prince or Detroit—a bouzin will always be a bouzin. And I remember my cousin’s words: If these girls think you’re scared and that you’re not gonna fight back, they will mess with you.
“Yes, he’s my boyfriend” is all I say.
“Not for long, bitch. My cousin Raquel already claimed Kasim.” Tonesha starts to walk away.
A fire burns in my belly. No girl, no matter how tough and mean she is, is going to scare me away from Kasim. He is mine and I am his. “Tell your cousin to stay away from my boyfriend!” I yell.
“What?” The girl turns around just as the whole cafeteria lets out a series of Oooooohs.
I don’t give her the satisfaction of repeating myself.
Tonesha looks around at everyone in the cafeteria, as if making sure that her audience is in place. She steps closer to me. I don’t move.
“Yo, I don’t care if you’re from Haiti or motherfucking Iraq,” she says, pointing her finger in my face. “You need to back up off Kasim. And that shit is a warning.”
Another series of Ooooohs!
Someone calls her name and tells her to leave me alone. But she doesn’t.
“Get away from me, bitch,” I say, staring right into her eyes.
Imani grabs my shoulder, but I tighten my body. I won’t be the first one to back down. I am like a rock now.
“Tonesha, Pri’s coming!” another person shouts.
“Ay yo, Fab! You all right?” Pri calls out from some other end of the cafeteria.
“Yeah, she’s a’ight!” Tonesha shouts back.
“I wasn’t talking to you!” Pri says.
But before she can step between me and Tonesha, the bell rings and teachers start to make their way to the crowd of kids surrounding us. I relax now, and Pri comes to pull me away.
“Don’t let no bitch get to you,” she whispers into my ear as we leave the cafeteria. “But the next time she tries to pull that shit, I’ma smack that bouzin one time so she won’t step to you like that ever again.”
I laugh because my cousin said something in Creole. I laugh the same way she has laughed at me.
That afternoon, Kasim has his old, ugly car back and it feels like the first day we went out together. I didn’t know he was coming to pick me up after school, so I still have on that ugly weave from Unique Hair Essentials. My lips are chapped and I dig for crust in the corners of my eyes before I get into his car. I want him to wait a little bit in front of the school so Tonesha can see me with him and she can run and tell her cousin.
I glide on some lip gloss before he leans over to kiss me.
“Why you go and do that for?” he asks.
“Because my lips were no good,” I say.
“I want your lips naked, like I want your—” He stops.
“What? Say it. My body?”
“You said it, not me.” He laughs.
I let him kiss me right in front of the school. Then someone bangs on the hood of the car.
“Get a room!” It’s Pri. “No, no, no. I take that back. Keep your hands to yourself, young man.” She points to Kasim and they both laugh.
I watch as Pri and Donna walk down the block. I don’t know where they are going, but I’m glad that they’ve been leaving me alone. I thought they would be babysitting me this whole time, but they have their own lives, and I have mine, thank goodness.
Then I spot that girl named Tonesha walking past the car. “You know her?” I ask.
“Who? Tonesha? Why? She messing with you?”
“She came to my face today.”
He starts the car. It’s noisier now, as if whatever he fixed has gotten worse. “She came to your face? You mean, she was all up in your face?”
“I had to protect you, Kasim,” I say with a smile.
He looks at me as he drives down Vernor Highway, and I don’t even ask where he’s taking me because I’m so glad to be spending time with him. A grin spreads across his face and my insides go warm.
“Damn. Sounds like you held your own, shorty—tellin’ Tonesha ‘he’s my man.’ In fact, you should tell your whole school, the whole west side, east side, all of Detroit that I’m your man.”
“No, you tell Detroit that I’m your girl,” I say.
“A’ight,” he says. He rolls down his window and sticks his head out a little bit. “Ay yo, Detroit! This girl right here, Fabulous, she’s the one! Feel me, Detroit! Fabulous . . .”
“Kasim!” I yell, and try to pull him back in by the sleeve of his coat. “Keep your eyes on the road!” I almost want him to keep yelling it out just so Tonesha and this cousin of hers can hear it.
He laughs. “Wait. I don’t even know your last name and I’m in love with you. You got the same last name as your cousins, right? Fabulous François?”
I laugh while still clutching his sleeve. “My name is not even Fabulous. It’s Fabiola. Fabiola Toussaint!” I say, but it’s the words I’m in love with you that linger in my mind. I want him to say it again—to repeat it over and over so that I’m sure I heard him correctly the first time.
“Yeah, but I like Fabulous François better. It sounds important and shit. Like you’re some movie star.”
“No. My name is my name and you can’t change it. What about you? Are you Broke Carter? You have Dray’s last name?”
“Oh, how you gonna know Dray’s last name before you know mine? Huh, Fabulous?”
I don’t answer, because I’ve only heard Dray’s last name once and it was from the detective. I slipped. I wasn’t supposed to let him know that. “I heard Donna say it,” I lie.
“Well, no. It’s not Carter. It’s Anderson.”
“Broke Anderson. I like Broke Carter instead. Like this broke car.”
He laughs hard and for a long time and I’m afraid that he’s not watching the road. I laugh, too, but I keep my eyes on Livernois Avenue for him.
Finally, he stops laughing and breathes out, “Damn.”
“What happened?” I ask.
“You got me,” he says.
“I got you what?” I ask.
While still holding the steering wheel and keeping his eyes on the road, he takes his free hand and cups it over his chest. He motions as if he’s grabbing something and then gives it over to me. “Here,” he says. “It’s yours.”
Slowly, I take his invisible heart and hold it close to mine. I hug it. I know he sees me do that out of the corner of his eye.
Then he rests his hand on my lap, opening up his palm for me to take. We hold hands until he has to make a left turn down Joy Road.
At home, I have homework, and dinner to make, and dishes to wash. But I could spend the rest of the afternoon, and evening, and night sitting in this car with Kasim.
“I gotta go work the evening shift,” he says as he parks on American Street and turns off the engine. “But you could come do your homework at the café.”
“No,” I almost whisper. “Can we save a little bit of this for tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day after that?”
“A’ight,” he whispers, and leans over to kiss me.
Then I take his hand, the one that gave me his heart, and kiss it.
I don’t let him get out to open the door for me. But he grabs the back of my skirt as I’m getting
out of the car. I gently tug it away. He’s smiling big and I almost don’t want to close the door on him.
“Tomorrow,” I say.
I spot Papa Legba on his bucket, smoking his cigar. I think he tips his hat at me. But I’m not sure. Maybe this is Papa Legba’s way of saying this is good. This is very good.
TWENTY-ONE
SOMEONE IS POUNDING on the front door. It eases into my dreams at first. Chantal steps over my body on the air mattress to get to the door and I’m pulled out of sleep completely. My cousins are whispering to one another at the top of the steps. No one turns on any lights. There’s more banging on the door and I go over to the window to look outside.
“Fab, get away from that window!” Chantal whisper-yells. “Stay in here and mind your business!”
I duck down and let the curtain fall closed, but still I listen, confused.
“Why the fuck would he bring those two goons with him?” Pri says. “The one time Ma goes out is when this nigga decides to show up. Punk ass.”
“Shut up!” Chantal says.
I listen as my cousins open the door. I thought it would be Dray, but it’s not his voice that yells, “What the fuck y’all got me waiting out here for all this time?”
I don’t listen to Chantal. I tiptoe to the top of the stairs, lying down on the floor to make sure I’m invisible. The single streetlight from the corner shines on the three men in the doorway. I don’t recognize any of them—two tall and wide, and the one in the middle is thin and old, older than Matant Jo.
“We didn’t know it was you,” Pri lies.
The older man chuckles. “After you done looked out the window and saw my car, you didn’t know it was me? Get outta here with that bullshit, Pri.”
All three of my cousins back up into the living room as the three men step into the house. They shut the door and someone turns on the lights. I inch back away from the stairs and hope that no one calls me down.
“I’ve been trying to get in contact with you for weeks now. You been ignoring my calls. Same thing you’re doing to Dray, Donna,” the man says.
He sounds calm and smart, like a teacher. He’s wearing a nice long black coat, and I can see dress pants and shiny shoes peeking out from underneath it. The other two men are not dressed up, so they look like bodyguards.
“Q, we just been lying low these past couple of months. That’s all. The news, the cops, all that shit got us hiding out,” Pri says.
Chantal tugs Pri’s arm. Then she says, “We just don’t want anything coming back to us or to you, Uncle Q.”
I’m not sure if I hear correctly, so I turn my ear downstairs.
I search my memory for this Uncle Q’s story—his name has come up several times before but I’ve never met him, never seen him, until now. From Kasim’s story: Uncle Q bought the tickets to that dance show; Uncle is like a father to him; my uncle Phillip took a bullet for this Q. And from Dray’s story: he owns the club with the purple door where there’s a gun and dogs and secrets; Uncle Q threw a party for my aunt’s fortieth birthday. Q is a drug dealer. Q is Dray’s uncle.
“I’m here to collect, ladies. It’s payday. It’s a damn shame I gotta come all the way out here,” Q says, as cool as rainwater.
“We need more time, Uncle Q. We had to toss all of it. We’re not trying to sell some messed-up batch,” Chantal says.
I hold my head up. The wood floor beneath the carpet squeaks under my weight. I freeze. My eyes burn because they’re open so wide. I don’t blink. My heart races and the air around me is not enough, so I breathe slowly, trying to calm down because that older man is Q, and my cousins need more time, and they were supposed to sell something. But what? What?
“Not my fucking problem. Twenty Gs,” Q says.
“Wait a minute,” Chantal says. “We only got fifteen worth. Where’d that extra five come from?”
“Interest. Insurance. To cover my ass for whatever the fuck y’all just did over there in the Pointe to get that white girl killed.”
The words swim in my head. White girl killed. My cousins. My cousins got that white girl killed.
“Q, for real?” Pri asks. “That’s not on us. You sold us bad shit.”
Q reaches into his coat pocket. My cousins shift a little, and he pulls out something that he puts into his mouth—a toothpick. “None of my business how those kids choose to use my products. Everything was fine by the time it got to you.”
“That’s not how it works, Q,” Chantal says as calm as ice. “If word gets around that some girl died from shit she got from us, no more business. That’s the end of our deal.”
I sit up. The floor squeaks again, but I don’t care. Some girl died from shit she got from us echoes in my ears loud and clear, as if it’s the voice of God. Some girl died from shit she got from us. . . . Those words pour down on me like sharp, heavy raindrops. No. Stones. They beat against my head, so I stand to my feet. Some girl died from shit she got from us, I repeat to myself.
The words are so heavy that they make everything sink inside me.
My cousins. My cousins sold drugs. My cousins sold the drugs that killed the white girl. Madison. The girl whose death Detective Stevens is investigating.
I realize the detective is wrong. Dray was not the one who sold the drugs. I can’t just let Dray go to jail for something he didn’t do. My cousins. My cousins are the ones who are responsible. But do I tell that to the detective? No! No way. My cousins will go to jail. And my mother is already in something like jail.
My head spins. There are questions and questions that whirl around my mind like a tornado, and they slowly make their way up to my throat to form one deep, angry wail. I hold on to the banister. I don’t know if I’m going to just fall over, or throw up on everybody downstairs. The floor squeaks again, but they are still talking. I brace myself because I have to hear more. I have to hear the hows and whys and what-ifs.
“Chantal, honey. You’re the smart one.” Uncle Q steps closer to her. “You’re acting like you don’t know how to count money. Your mother didn’t teach you anything?”
“Leave our mother outta this, Q,” she says. “She never pushed for you.”
“Your mother did all she could to keep y’all off the streets, but y’all still wanna play with the big boys. ’Specially you, Pri. You just looking for trouble, ain’t you? I need twenty by the end of the month. Don’t fuck with my money, Three Bees.” He steps over to Pri and taps two fingers on her temple.
Pri pushes his hand away.
He laughs. “Fiery little bitch, ain’t you? Just like your daddy.”
Chantal quickly pulls Pri back before she can do anything. She then grabs Donna’s arm and they all step away from Q and his bodyguards.
The men leave. But my cousins don’t move until they’re sure that Q’s car has turned the corner and driven several blocks out of the neighborhood. And I’m as still as a rock, even as my cousins sit on the couch. They’re quiet for much too long. Finally, they begin to speak again.
“How much you think Ma got?” Donna speaks for the first time since the men left.
“Yo, you shittin’ me right now, D?” Pri hisses.
“What if—” Donna starts to say.
“Nope,” Chantal cuts her off. “Don’t even try it. I already know what you’re gonna say.”
“What am I gonna say?”
“Don’t you even think about bringing Dray into this,” Chantal says.
I sneak partway down the stairs and peek under the banister.
“All this time, did I ever say anything to him? Not once did he even guess what was going on,” Donna says.
Pri starts clapping really slowly, then really fast. She gets up and claps in Donna’s face. “Bra-the-fuck-vo! You didn’t sell out your sisters to your man. You deserve a fucking cookie!”
Donna pushes her hands away. Pri shoves Donna’s head.
“Would y’all stop! And be quiet!” Chantal points to the ceiling and I know it’s because of me.
I ease back up the stairs again. But before I can even rush back into the bedroom, Pri has already leaped up to find me near the banister. Chantal and Donna are right behind her.
“How long you been there, Fab?” Pri asks.
I stand up. I don’t take my eyes away from Pri and I don’t answer her question.
“Handle that, Chant. That’s your girl,” she says.
“No,” Chantal says. “We’re handling this together.”
“Yes,” I say. “Please do. I have a lot of questions.”
“Aw, shit,” Pri says. “Here’s my answer so we can all get back to bed: none of your business!”
“You sell drugs?” I yell. It wasn’t supposed to be that loud, but it just bursts out as if I’m a bottle of Pepsi that my cousins shook really hard and then opened the top, and I yell out again, “You sell drugs?”
“Shut up, Fabiola!” Pri yells in my face. “Shut the fuck up! Chantal, handle that.”
“Don’t tell me to shut up!” I yell back. This time, I’m in Pri’s face. “I live here, too. This is my house, too. You tell me if you are selling drugs. You tell me everything!”
Chantal pulls me away from her. Pri has her head down and is shaking it over and over again.
“What, what, what?” I yell at her again. “You want to fight me, Pri? I will fight you if you don’t tell me the truth.”
“Yo.” She laughs. “Chantal, please calm her the fuck down.”
Chantal grabs both my arms and pushes me against the bathroom door. “Fabiola. Calm down. There’s no reason for you to be getting all hyped for something that has nothing to do with you.”
I inhale and exhale. This has everything to do with me, but they don’t know it. Everything has changed and I will not be able to get my mother back. I cannot give Detective Stevens my cousins. I cannot get my manman home.