by Barry Lyga
Why not?
Marcie held up her phone, showing her the Facebook profile for Peter McKenzie. His profile photo was the same one as on his phone’s lock screen, right down to the adorable newborn baby.
As she panned the phone around the table, Liam coughed gently into his fist, then wiped sauce from his hands with a Wet-Nap. “I guess we’re not going back to school at all, huh?”
1986: JAY
Jay had already read ahead three chapters in the chemistry textbook, so he was bored out of his mind as Mr. Chisholm droned on and on about moles and significant digits. School was just a wall, like in the song. We don’t need no education.… Those little British brats were right: His schooling was interfering with his education. The structures and the strictures of school chafed at him. And when he chafed, everything became an irritant. Especially Jism, who tried too hard to be one of them. He thought being twenty-three made him a peer.
Jay glanced two rows over at Lisa McKenzie, who was drawing something involving wide loops in her chem notebook. From here he couldn’t tell what, but he knew it wasn’t a molecule or an electron shell. More likely a big goofy-looking heart with Mrs. Lisa Chisholm calligraphied into it. With an arrow through it.
Lisa was passably cute. Quiet. She hadn’t always been so. Back in middle school, in a language arts class, Jay had cracked a funny joke right before class started. Lisa had glared at him witheringly and snapped, “Grow up, Jay.”
And he’d replied, instantly, the rejoinder welling up from some dark and perfect pit of revenge, “Grow out, Lisa.” Which had sparked even more laughter, settling the argument perfectly.
She’d had the last laugh, though—flat-chested Lisa McKenzie had grown out, quite impressively, almost as though she’d only needed Jay’s admonition for it to happen. Still, Jay would never give her a second look if it weren’t for the whispered rumors that she and Jism were secretly getting it on. She was six years younger than him, which wasn’t so terrible, he figured. Jay’s mom was five years younger than his dad.
But it nagged at him. Not the age difference. Not really. It was the secrecy that nibbled at the edges of his consciousness. He didn’t like it when people tried to hide things.
Why? Well, he wasn’t going to go there. He had a theory, but he didn’t like what it said about him, so he stuffed it deep down, piled plenty of memories and traces of old thoughts over it, and didn’t allow himself to consider it.
He realized in that moment that the class had gone quiet. Even Jism’s voice had fallen silent. Jay blinked and focused on the world around him, emerging from the hollows of his own thoughts. All eyes were on him, and Jism stood at the head of the class, arms crossed over his chest, the hint of a smirk on that California surfer-boy face.
Jism always had just the right amount of tan. Jism never burned in the sun. Jism was no taller than Jay, but his shoulders were broader, his waist narrower, his chest more expansive, which everyone knew because he wore his collared Canterstown High coaching-staff polo shirts one size too small.
He had a sweep of dirty blond hair that was in a perpetual muss.
“Jay?” Jism said, and from his tone and his deportment, it was obvious that this was the second time he’d said it.
Jay croaked out a polite, “Yes?”
A waterfall of titters spilled out from the class, splashing down the aisles and across the rows. Jay shot a look to his left and down—Dean was shaking his head minutely.
Across the way, Lisa had a hand over her mouth as she giggled. What else do you do with that mouth? Jay thought savagely. And a brief tableau of the possibilities flared before him, flustering him even more as Jism opened his stupid mouth filled with stupid perfect white teeth and said, “Thanks for that, but I was asking you for the answer.”
The answer to what? He flung his gaze from the chalkboard to the opaque projector, seeking some hint as to what the question might be in the first place.
There were sodium ions on the board. Chlorine on the projector. NaCl. Salt?
“Salt,” he said with as much dignity and authority as he could muster.
More laughter. Harder and more aggressive. The leader seemed to be Brad Gimble, who sat two rows down and had turned in his seat for the show. Everyone else was chuckling, but Brad was outright guffawing, doing everything but pointing right at Jay as he laughed.
Why the hell was a dunce like Gimble even in this class? Jay clenched his jaw. The laughter became static. His vision narrowed to the sight of Jism, who now observed him with smarmy, self-satisfied regard.
“Close,” Jism said after a beat to allow the laughter to drop slightly. “But I was looking for ‘Avogadro’s number.’”
The laughter ratcheted up. Jay’s cheeks flamed, and he wanted to rip them off his face.
Jism permitted another few seconds of laughter, then called for quiet with both hands, patting the air downward before him. When he had the class under control again, he nodded briefly to Jay.
“I know you’re smarter than everyone,” Jism said in a tone of voice that belied the sentiment, “but it still helps to pay attention, right?”
The red-hot shame flaming in Jay’s cheeks grew hotter. He said nothing, merely looked down at his notebook. The page for this day was fresh and blank, with only the date written in the corner.
Conscious of every eye in the room on him, he picked up his pen and, with meticulous focus on the page before him, wrote Salt.
Jay slammed his locker shut. The door rebounded, slapping itself open; he slammed it again, this time kicking it for good measure. Dean stood nearby, watching. There was a long list of things Jay hated in the world—school, teachers, Democrats, commies, more—but at the very top of that list was embarrassment.
“Who does he think he is?” Jay hissed at his locker door.
“What’s wrong with him?” Brian asked from the other side of the locker aisle.
“Seriously,” Jay said. “Who the hell does he think he is?”
“You weren’t paying attention,” Dean said lightly. “Forget about it. It’s no big deal. No one cares.”
Jay turned and fired laser bolts from his eyes down the narrow aisle of lockers. At the other end, Brad Gimble was spinning the dial on his combination lock.
“He cared.”
Brian cut his eyes left and snorted. “Gimbo? So what?”
“Totally,” Dean agreed. “I don’t even know what he’s doing in chem with us. He’s a meathead who only knows two words: Foot. Ball.”
No reaction from Jay.
“Take the SAT?” Dean went on. “He can’t even spell SAT.”
That joke wrestled a chortle from Jay, but below the chuckles, he was running calculations.
“You busy tonight?” Jay asked.
Brian licked his lips. “I’m free!”
God, not Brian. Jay shook his head. “Sorry, man. This is a two-man job.”
Dean considered. “Okay.”
1986: MARCUS
Training for the spring track season didn’t start until the ground thawed during second semester, but Black Lightning had always maintained a rigorous regimen even in the off-season. Like the post office, they delivered no matter the weather, practicing sprints and relays in the rain, snow, and blazing heat. One day, they’d chased each other around the track through a phalanx of fog so thick and dense that it felt like needles in their eyes, barely able to see each other in the murk and gray.
Since moving into his own bedroom, Antoine had not joined Marcus for their usual thrice-weekly after-school training. Marcus figured Antoine was running on his own, either over at the junior high school track or out on the road. Maybe that was what he was doing on the nights he disappeared from his bedroom.
If so, fine. He was tired of babying his melancholy twin, of beseeching Antoine to open up and just talk, for God’s sake. Ever since he’d come back from New York City and his visit with cousin Duane in the winter of junior year, Antoine had begun closing off, clamming up. It had hit its n
adir (or its zenith, perhaps, depending on how you assessed it) right after Jay’s birthday party that summer. From that point on, Antoine barely spoke at all, even in private. Even to Marcus.
Well, screw him, then, Marcus thought.
He’d done sprints and a few bounding drills, along with some high knee work for speed. Now, dripping with sweat, he headed to the locker room. School was out, but the football team was still crashing into one another out on the field, and Coach Kline said it was fine for Marcus to use the locker room while football was in practice.
He chuckled to himself as he jogged from the track to the school door, thinking of how easily he could get into the school at any time, with or without Coach Kline’s permission.
The locker room should have been empty, save for the gym bags left behind by the football team. But instead, he was surprised to see Antoine sitting on one of the benches, leaning forward with elbows on knees, his fingers steepled before him.
“What up?” Marcus asked with a little more asperity than he’d intended.
If Antoine noticed, he didn’t show it. “We need to talk.”
Snatching a towel from the shelf to his right, Marcus snapped it open and wiped the sweat from his face. “I’ve been talking. You need to talk.”
Antoine shrugged noncommittally, now staring at the drain set into the floor. “Okay. So I’ll talk. College.”
“Are you worried? How are your grades?” Once upon a time, he wouldn’t have needed to ask. But when midterm progress reports had been handed down, Antoine hadn’t bothered sharing his. “Don’t worry about ’em. Jay’s got that on lockdown. All we have to do is run.”
Pursing his lips, Antoine shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“You been training? Scouts from Houston aren’t gonna like it if one half of the Laird twins is out of shape. They want us both. We have to be ready.”
Shaking his head again, Antoine stood up, still not looking at Marcus. “That’s what I want to talk to you about. I don’t know about running anymore.”
Stated so plainly and so baldly, it could be nothing more than a joke, so Marcus treated it as such, offering a hollow chuckle. “Yeah, right. Because two Black kids from Canterstown have so many options—”
“That’s another thing,” Antoine interrupted. “I’m not just Black. I’m African American. We are.”
“Afro what?” Marcus snort-laughed. “What the hell is that?”
“I heard it when I was in New York. It makes sense.”
“I’m so tired of your crap,” Marcus said with a long-suffering sigh. “You spent one week in New York, and suddenly you think you’re better than everyone.”
“Not better. Just enlightened,” Antoine said, a note of urgency creeping into his voice. “Why should we be defined as the opposite of white people? Why should we be defined by our skin color at all? We’re not our skin, Marcus. We’re people. With a history and a culture.”
Marcus flapped his hand dismissively. “When you start talking like this…”
“What? You’ve been riding me for being quiet all this time. Now you’re riding me for talking?”
“You’re serious, aren’t you?” Marcus felt as though—impossibly—he were seeing his twin for the very first time. It was disorienting and more than a bit horrifying, this familiar face rendered so suddenly and absolutely unfamiliar. “You’re really thinking of quitting track? Are you nuts?”
“I’ve been thinking about a lot of things,” Antoine told him with infuriating calm, as though he considered Marcus a child. “And I’ve decided some things for myself. For myself, for once. Not for us. For the first time in my life, I’m thinking of me. Can’t you get that?”
Marcus leaned in close. “We had a plan, ’Toine. We were going to Houston. Black Lightning. Everyone was on board. Mom and Pops. We had scouts in the stands. They want us. Not you. Not me. Us. Now you’re backing out? Punking out?”
“Not punking out,” Antoine said, almost completely disconnected. “Realigning. Who benefits when we run, Marcus? Think about it.”
“We do!” Marcus yelled, gesticulating wildly. “We win!”
“No.” Still that same placidity. “They win. They benefit. We run, they win.”
“White people,” Marcus said sardonically, now folding his arms over his chest.
“Yeah. And good for them. Fine. But I don’t have to play the game. We run. We get, what, a sponsorship? We’re going to be the Michael Jordan of track and field?”
Marcus bristled, his back teeth coming together tightly. They’d talked about just such a scenario, and goddamn it, Antoine had been excited by the very idea he now mocked, his voice larded with sarcasm.
“Maybe Adidas or Nike pays us to wear their shoes?” Antoine went on. “You think they’re gonna pay us anything more than a pittance compared with what they make from having us show off their shoes? Huh? No. They’ll give us a little bit and take the rest. We put on the shoes and do all the work, and we run our asses off, and young brothers everywhere decide to wear those shoes and be like the Laird twins, be like Black Lightning.”
“Exactly!” Marcus shouted. “You don’t want that?”
“And it’s white people who benefit, man!” Antoine’s facade of cool finally cracked. “They take all the money! They just rent our Black bodies instead of buying ’em outright like they used to.”
Marcus took a step back as Antoine lunged toward him during his outburst. He didn’t fear his twin—they’d never fought physically, had rarely ever fought verbally until recently—but seeing his own face, his own body hurtle toward him like that was off-putting.
He understood Antoine’s point. And it wasn’t a bad one. But as best as Marcus could tell, the game was rigged against them and there was no option not to play. Which, really, is what Antoine was proposing: Fold their hands, put their cards down on the green-felt table, and walk away from the poker game.
But just like the lottery, no matter the odds, if you didn’t play, you could never ever win.
“Where have you been going?” Marcus asked. “I know you leave your room some nights. What are you up to?”
“I… there is something else,” Antoine said, his voice quieter now, the seething notes fading back into calm.
“What?” Marcus asked. Something else? Something else?
Antoine fidgeted for a moment, pulling at his own fingers, gnawing at his lower lips. “Naw,” he said finally. “Nothing. Never mind.”
“Never mind.” Marcus shook his head. “You drop all this on me and you want me to walk away with never mind? Really?”
“Nothing else to say,” Antoine told him.
“You better have something else to say! We had a plan, ’Toine. We were going to Houston together. Run the relays. Make the Olympics. Help out Mom and Pops. You remember that?” He tilted his head as though the new position would dislodge memories stuck somewhere where his twin couldn’t access them. “Pay off the house, maybe. Get Pops out of the factory. And now you just up and decide you’re not doing any of that and you have nothing else to say? For real?”
Antoine pursed his lips and hung his head. But no matter what Marcus said or how he said it, nothing could get his twin to speak again.
THE PRESENT: ELAYAH
She pounded on the door to Lisa De Nardo’s house until her fists went numb. And then Liam took over.
“We know you’re in there!” Elayah yelled. “You work from home!”
“Guess we’ll just start knocking on your neighbors’ doors!” Jorja cried out as loudly as she could.
The door swung open with such force that Liam nearly stumbled in. Lisa De Nardo glared at them. She wore a V-neck sweater with a daring décolletage and was flushed with pink anger all the way down to her cleavage.
“Get off my property!” she hissed, eyes darting up and down the street.
“Not until we’ve spoken,” Elayah told her.
“I don’t have to—”
Marcie pushed between Liam and Ela
yah and held up her phone, with the photo of Peter McKenzie.
Lisa ground her teeth together, threw the door open wide, and stepped aside.
This time she didn’t offer them seats, so they stood in the living room.
“What do you want with Peter?” she asked, folding her arms over her chest. “He’s been through enough.”
“You saw him the other night, didn’t you?” Elayah asked.
“Yes, okay? Peter came here. Out of nowhere. Bleeding.” She sniffed and her face went hard. “I bet you all did that to him. Why would I tell you anything? Why shouldn’t I just call the cops?”
Elayah had nothing there. Fortunately, Liam jumped in. “Maybe because if you call the cops on us, we’ll call the cops on him? And we can prove that he tried to buy incriminating evidence and that he assaulted me in SAMMPark. So, like…” He spread his hands in a whattayagonnado? gesture.
“We’re minors,” Jorja said. “He’s not. If you want to protect your son, tell us what you know.”
Lisa thought this over, pondering, her eyes darting from them to the ceiling as she considered. Elayah’s trust in Lisa De Nardo was attenuated and slight, a filament suspending an anvil. But any information was better than no information. Even a lie, she reasoned, might eventually lead them to the truth.
“I don’t see how I have a choice,” Lisa said finally. “Don’t go to the police, okay? He’s just getting his life together. The baby. Working with his father. Leave him alone. Please.”
“Who’s Peter’s father?” Elayah asked. “Is it Patrick Dearborn? P. J.? Were you ever called Katie for some reason?”
Lisa blinked at each question, jerking her head back as though evading repeated physical blows. “What?” she asked.
“Yeah, what?” Jorja asked.
Elayah felt guilty for springing this on Jorja, but she hadn’t wanted her friend to talk her out of making the accusation. It made sense. They knew “Peej and Katie” had gotten up to something. And Lisa had ended up pregnant in early eighty-seven. Peej had been in Sheppard Pratt, but there were such things as visitations and weekend passes.