Do you?
The hollowness gets deeper, like there’s an invisible man digging a hole in my stomach.
I study his words, then reply:
The Jack I know wouldn’t do something like that.
The Jack I know swore over his ma’s grave that he’d never go near any of that shit. As they lowered her into the hole, tossed dirt on her wooden casket, he promised her dead body he’d stay away.
Maybe you don’t know me that well.
I’ve known Jack for as long as I’ve known myself. The invisible man in my stomach stops digging and stabs my heart instead.
I look up again, turning to survey the class. A girl looks at me, then covers her mouth and swivels back around in her chair, her shoulders vibrating as she lets out a quiet laugh. I feel eyes on me, and I catch Mr. Taylor staring. He gives me a smile.
My fingers are still wrapped around my phone, a part of me waiting for Jack to say he’s joking, that Aces is wrong about him. The screen dulls, darkens, then locks. The other part of me knows that the text is never coming and that despite how much I want to push the thought away, maybe I don’t know Jack like I thought I did.
I sit and stare at my keyboard. The invisible man whispers in my mind,Even your best friend doesn’t care about you. He doesn’t want you around; no one does.
I’m alone, with no other friends at Niveus to confide in. Every day, I feel Jack pull away from me. It makes me feel like something is wrong with me. If Pa was here, he’d shut my thoughts up. Tell me things will work out with Jack. Or that I’ll get other friends—eventually.
I dream about Pa coming home someday. We go out for pizza and he just tells me a bunch of life lessons. We catch up on missed time. I imagine talking to him about Aces, this anonymous bully who hates me for no reason, and he’ll know the answers because that’s what dads are for. They are meant to know all the stuff you don’t. Idream about Ma not being so busy, having time to just listen, to talk, so I can tell her all the shit I’ve been hiding from her for years.
In my dreams she listens, and still loves me afterward.
But I know dreams are dangerous; they give me too much false hope. I know, I fucking know that even if my pa wasn’t in prison, he wouldn’t be here for me anyway.
I close my eyes, squeezing them shut as my heart spasms. Dreams are toxic.
I know I’d still be alone.
I think about texting Dre, asking him if I can come over tonight or something, but I’m scared about what other things he’s been told about me. What else could get out.
I wipe my eyes quickly and pocket my phone. I need to focus on something else.
I shakily play a note on the keyboard, starting my warm-up, letting the noise block more thoughts from spilling through the cracks.
12
CHIAMAKA
Thursday
“Malarkey.”
“Watch your language, Chi,” Jamie says with a grin.
“Seriously, that is malarkey.”
Jamie bites into his sandwich, shaking his head. “It’s not, trust me. Billy told Maggie, who toldmethat Cecelia Wright and Mr. Peterson are screwing.”
I roll my eyes at him. When I told him I wanted to talk about “anything,” I didn’t mean this. I do question, though, why Aces reports random stuff aboutmeand those boys but not this—which iswaymore interesting, in my opinion.
We are at Lola’s, in an empty classroom near the cafeteria. I came here mostly because I wanted an excuse to be away from everyone else. Especially people like Ruby, who would love to see the beginnings of my downfall play out.
And I wanted to talk about something more pressing—who Jamie thinks Aces is, for example.
I take my phone out, checking it for new alerts.
