“This is my last born, Gus. My baby.”
“Junior did tell me.”
“I hope he told you I’m a gun owner, too.”
“Mama!”
Gus’ smile doesn’t fall.
He reaches out and wraps his fingers around her wrists. “He told me a heap of tings, but the most important ting he told me was that I must always convene with the queen of this castle before I put the likkle lady in my backseat.”
That makes me smile, just like his phone call did.
The wrinkles on Mama’s forehead soften. She pulls her wrists from his hands and pats them. The tiny “fine” she pushes out is her last stamp of approval.
I hurry toward the back door before she changes her mind and when the smell of leather hits me, so do the weird tingles in my stomach.
Gus climbs back inside behind the wheel. “Alright, likkle one, buckle up back there. I don’t want any mishaps.”
“Yes, sir,” I mutter, pulling the seatbelt across my body as Mama waves at us through the tinted window.
It’s quiet inside the truck except for the low hum of jazz music. My body sways with the truck when he swerves to miss another pothole at my neighborhood’s entrance.
He sucks his teeth. “Rassclaat roads.”
I giggle to myself, holding onto the door until he glances at me in the rear-view mirror.
“You got a smile like Angie’s.”
That’s how he breaks the ice between us.
“Oh, yeah? What kinda smile did she have?”
I saw it in pictures, but according to Mama, they didn’t do it justice.
“You haffi see it in person. Meh cyah describe it. She had one uh dem once in a lifetime smiles.”
His accent grows stronger and muddles the words, but that makes riding with him better.
“Are you gassin’ me, Mr. Gus?”
His laughter rises above the jazz. “No, likkle lady. Me ah tell yuh why de bwoy see home inna yuh.”
I laugh off his comment because I don’t know what to make of it. It sounded like a mysterious Jamaican proverb.
“So yuh hangin’ out wit Junior tonight?” He sighs. “Wha yuh tink bout that troublemaker, anyway?”
I don’t have an answer for him because I think a lot about Ace—a lot that I couldn’t say out loud.
“Yuh wan know a secret?” He hisses under his breath and swerves to miss another pothole.
“Uh...” I nod, leaning forward. “Sure.”
“Meh bring him to his first day of basketball practice every season back in Chatsworth.”
My insides flutter at the thought of a little Ace with the first day jitters.
“Where’s Chatsworth?”
