I never knew it was possible to feel my heart beat in another place besides my chest. Right now it’s in my throat because Ace is silly enough to believe that another man can make me as crazy as he does. He makes mesocrazy that my beating throat is about to blurt out something else no one would ever care to know about me but him.
“That backpack was Marshall’s.” I swallow. “He wanted to play for the Rockets when he left Lockwood. Marcus always told me that’s what Marshall admired about your daddy the most—the fact that he actually made it and became the guy he dreamed of being. Thank you for not thinking that backpack is childish because it’s the only thing of his that Mama forgot to throw out on his first birthday in Heaven. I didn’t know Marshall, but I know he would’ve loved the way you love on her.”
CHAPTERTWENTY
Ace
I need a bigger dose of Phat before she leaves me.
“Your mama liked chocolate?” she asks, licking the chocolate mousse from my spoon at the island in my kitchen.
“Nah, she didn’t even like cake.”
The giant chocolate mousse cake sits between us with a generic “Happy Birthday, Angie,” scribbled across it. When I opened my mouth to tell the cashier at the bakery to add Mom’s age, my words bubbled up my throat so, “Happy Birthday, Angie” was what the girl kept while I threw up a fifth of 1942 in the parking lot.
Talking about Mom today should be hard, but Phat makes it easy with innocent questions about her like she’s trying to paint her own memories of Mom in her head. She wants to know the important shit—Mom’s “teams,” her favorite color, and if I thought her and CeCe ever beefed about that time Pops crossed Marshall over at the Fondé.
“Hm...” Phat thrusts the spoon back to me. “So why you get chocolate then?”
I shrug, swiping my tongue against it like she wants because she’s not brave enough to tell me to kiss her so she can taste me. “I like chocolate.”
She snickers, hunching her shoulders up and licking the spoon where I did. “The Kidreally likes chocolate. Interesting.”
She wiggles her eyebrows and Ireallyneed a bigger dose of her after a day of drunk texts and fucking crying.
“Already sneak dissing and you only been home for a few hours.” I shake my head, smiling. “Don’t tell me you’re naïve enough to believe everything people say on the internet.”
“I saw the prom picture with the rest of Twitter.” She shrugs, cutting around Mom’s name on the cake. “Remind me to freeze that part before we go to bed.”
All of it makes the aftermath of my crying less embarrassing—her digs, the careful way she preserves Mom in any way she can, the familiar way she says “bed” as if she knows I’m not letting her leave tonight so Marcus will have to face his fear.
“I know Cree told you she’s a lesbian and she ain’t even white—she’s Mexican.”
“If she’s a lesbian, then why she went to prom with you?” She rolls her eyes, twirling the spoon around.
“Don’t be ignorant.” I snicker, leaving out all the sordid details between me, Javier, and Cree. “Friends can go to prom together.”
Her mouth gets wide and her cheeks push up like I’m spilling the juicy gossip she’s been waiting on. “Don’t tell meThe Kidgot curved on prom night.”
I shrug, letting her come up with her own conclusions and fill in the missing pieces of Cree’s coming out story that I’ll never tell.
“Eres un chismoso.”
“Here we go.” She pulls her head back, rolling her eyes. “How many damn languages did Angie make you learn?”
“Enough. How I’m supposed to conquer Earth for us if I’m monolingual?”
“Monolingual? If you’re low-key a nerd, I won’t judge.”
“You wish I was a nerdy ass nigga. I’m sure it would’ve made it easier for you to hate me like you wanted to.”
She shrieks out a loud laugh that fills the condo and makes me lightheaded. “Just answer my question. How many?”
“Enough of ‘em to get us by if you decide you want to globe trot after you leave your soft ass husband and come back home when we get old. I can take you on a gondola in Italy or to the Mekong Delta in Vietnam...”
“Or you can take me to taste the air on the Pacific Coast Highway in the summer.” She leans forward, smirking. “I looked it up.”
I smile and look into her eyes, trying to inhale that night on Pops’ truck. “Wherever you wanna go.”
