Dime (4 page)

I hadn't understood it at all before. But now it seems so obvious, it's embarrassing.

It's a game of the mind, and that's the problem. These young girls, they don't understand anything except false promises, love lies, new clothes, and a meal. Their fathers and uncles and mama's boyfriends and cousins and brothers and boys around the block made these girls confused. So confused they don't know which way is straight.

THE FIRST TIME I stayed there almost two weeks. My fever broke the second night, and even though I still didn't feel too well, I went to school just like always. L.A. and him worked all the time. I thought L.A. worked selling clothes in the day. I thought she worked at a restaurant at night. I thought she switched from being like a friendly big sister to a bitch because she was working so hard. He drove her to work in his gold Honda, but she always took the bus or walked home. So she was tired. That's how ignorant I was. I thought he worked for the phone company. I don't know why I thought that, but I did. That's how even more ignorant I was.

In the beginning I slept on the couch and never noticed when L.A. came in, passed right by me, and went to her room. I slept hard. The blankets and sheets were clean from an old mini-refrigerator box in L.A.'s room. She gave me clean sweatpants and a T-shirt from another box. They were big, but they worked fine. I washed my panties and socks in the sink.

The third night, after he dropped her off at work, he asked me to wash dishes. He sat down to watch TV but looked at his phone every few seconds too. That's what he did every day for about an hour before he went back out.

“Get me a beer,” he called. I put a newly clean fork into the rack and pulled a forty out of the refrigerator. I was nervous in that heart-beating way I had just being near him. He made my head dizzy and my body hot. I'd read enough to know those were signs of being in love, but I was embarrassed in front of myself and didn't want to admit it. He was old. Thirty at least.

He patted the couch next to him. I gave him the beer and sat down. “Want one?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“You got to answer me when I talk to you.”

“I'm sorry.” I didn't want him mad at me. “I don't drink beer.”

“Huh.” He took a swallow, looking at me. I didn't want him to look anywhere else.

“You too good for beer?”

I started to shake my head, but remembered to answer. “No. I'm just too young.”

“You funny is what you is.” He smiled. “I wouldn't let you drink no alcohol anyway. That right there a test. You passed.” He put his forty on the glass coffee table and then pulled a bag out from behind the couch. He must have hidden it there when I wasn't looking. It was fancy, with white tissue paper crinkling out from the top. “Take it,” he said.

I wasn't used to getting presents. I stayed still.

“Go on.” He picked up his beer again. “Look.”

It was two sweaters with vertical ruffles down the center of the back and sleeves that widened, like bells, at the wrist. Three soft T-shirts, two pairs of jeans, and fake-leather black boots. High boots. Four pairs of socks and five pairs of panties in five colors and a hot-pink bra. One sweater was red, like a valentine. One was gray. At the bottom of the bag, puffing up like a pillow, was a coat. Black with gray fake fur lining the hood.

“You got to have clothes.”

“How did you know my size?” I'd almost never been given new clothes before, and not this many all at once. I couldn't believe it.

“I know your body.” He moved closer, laying his arm across my shoulders and kissing my forehead. Nobody ever kissed my forehead. I loved the feel of that kiss. I loved the feel of his arm, too.

“Thank you.”

“What's wrong, Beautiful?” He sipped his beer.

“Nothing.”

He sat back a little to look at me better. “I know your face now,” he told me. “And I know something just then bothering you.”

Nobody had ever looked enough at my face or cared enough to see if I was bothered. It had been a long time since anyone had ever noticed any kind of feeling of mine. Maybe Ms. McClenny from way back in pull-out class.
You feeling okay, honey?
She had touched my cheek with her Murphy Oil Soap–smelling hand. The new baby Janelle had been keeping was sent home after only a few weeks, and I hadn't slept for hearing Janelle cry all night.
You feverish?
Then Ms. McClenny pulled my head to her round hip in a sideways hug before tucking me under a blanket on the square patched rug.
Close your eyes and rest until the bell rings.

“Don't get mad?” I said.

He shook his head. “Nah. Tell me.”

“Maybe L.A. wouldn't like it if she saw you had your arm around me.”

His teeth were so gleaming and perfect. They looked like candy. The gold
D
shone.

Don't laugh,
I wanted to say.

When he smiled, the angled outside corners of his eyes slid down even more. “You priceless,” he told me. “Don't you worry about L.A. She know I like you, and she know it ain't none a her concern.”

He liked me? I wasn't sure what that meant. But his arm was wrapped around me again, and he was looking at me in that way he had, that way that said I was something.

“Matter of fact”—he put his forty back down again and turned me gently so that we were face-to-face—“I don't even want you to leave. That's how much I like you.” He rested his forehead right on the spot where he had kissed me. “You can be one a mine now.” His? “You can stay here long as you want with L.A. and Brandy.”

“Brandy?”

“She moving in real soon,” he explained. “Another one called herself Satin was here awhile, but she just left out.” He lifted his forehead off mine but stayed close. I could feel his breath. “So I told Brandy I'm a help her out. And now I met you.” He looked right into my eyes. “And you something extra special.”

And then he kissed me on my mouth, just a quick brush, just for a second, and I knew I'd never wanted anything more than to be his.

“WE GOING TO lose the apartment,” her Daddy told L.A.

That's how Sex would keep on with the note. He would write L.A.'s part just how Brandy told me what she knew.

L.A. fell for his bullshit. “I got dogged at work. They didn't pay me. Now I owe rent. Not much, but the landlord. You know how he is. He want his coins. You can help. All you got to do is go meet my friend. You go meet my friend, and you do what he want, and you bring me back the money. What? Nah. Just this once. It ain't nothing. You done all that before. You told me so with all them
uncles and them when you was small. Nothing you don't know how
to do. You can do it this time on your own choice. You can do it and earn some money instead of it just getting stole from you for free. I bet you're real good at it too. You had all that experience. You can put it to good use now. What? Us? Nah. Not until you bring me some money. Maybe then I'll let you get with me like that. Nah. He ain't going to ask you to do much. Just go chill with him. Don't give him a hard time. Take his coins and bring it to me. Yeah. Then we good for rent. Think about it, Beautiful. Think about how you can make yourself useful. Make me real proud and bring me my money and then I'll get with you like that. Yeah, you think about it.”

It made sense to me then. Perfect sense. When you're young, you're stupid.

The men. The money. I like my job so much better when it's just young love instead.
That's what Sex would write.

WHAT I KNEW was that right as L.A. was showing up, this one they called Satin was on her way out. She was old. I thought she was twenty-eight or maybe even older than that. She was the Bottom Bitch, but something happened. Brandy said Satin got in a car with the one they called Stone and chose him. Brandy said Satin had made two thousand dollars that day and broke to Stone right there in his car. Just handed him all that cash that was supposed to be for our stable. I heard on the street that Satin was out of pocket somehow: looked Stone or Whippet straight in the eye or didn't step off the curb into the street when she was supposed to. Also I heard somebody else randomly recruited her for his and she said yes and never came back home. Whatever it was, L.A. took Satin's place. And Brandy and I got added a long time before Lollipop arrived. I only ever saw Satin once or twice. She was small and skinny with patchy, ashy skin. Her face was bony, like a skeleton's. L.A. said it was her HIV finally showing up. Brandy said it was smack; maybe even tweak. All I could see was that Satin looked so old.

BRANDY MOVED IN on my fourth day. He gave her the couch and sent me to a sleeping bag in the alcove.
Brandy been talking to me longer,
he whispered.
She got seniority, so she got the couch. But don't you worry, Beautiful. We going to fix up that alcove nice for you.
He gave me a new pillow with a royal-blue pillowcase.

Those first days, I still slept hard. Nothing woke me until seven, and then my eyes popped open as if I had an alarm clock in my head. I didn't want to miss school. I didn't want to miss Trevor and Dawn. Even though I barely ever said anything, they didn't just count on me for homework; they talked to me some too. I didn't worry they would bother me, the way I worried about other kids, sometimes jumping each other in the hallways, pulling out knives. Or disrespecting the weak teachers with language as foul as Janelle at her most drunk. I didn't want to miss Mr. Stewart going off about how bumblebees and dolphins share the same physics or about Hilary Clinton or global warming or whatever topic he thought was okay for world history. I didn't want to miss his class, even though I was only getting Ds in it and he didn't seem to know my name.

I hadn't gotten any As or even Bs for three years—not since English in fifth grade at middle school. But still I didn't want to miss that feeling I got from knowing an answer even though I never raised my hand. That feeling people get in books like Peter must have had during his snowy day when he made footprints and then stick tracks in the snow or Mandy when she lay in the grass and gazed at the pansies she grew herself from seeds. Charlie Bucket when he peeled back the wrapper of that second chocolate bar and saw the flash of golden ticket peeking out. I only got that feeling from school or from books.

And from him when he looked at me or smiled at me or put his arm on me or kissed me. He didn't do any of those things very much. I thought he was trying not to get L.A. or Brandy jealous. Because a few times he'd whispered to me
, You know you my favorite, right? L.A. own her place, and it important. And Brandy reliable. But you. You smart, Beautiful. You special. I got plans for you.
He would be whispering so close to my face.
Big plans.

I spent more and more time thinking about him, wishing he would whisper to me again, touch me.

So I began leaving Trevor and Dawn after the last bell, rushing, hoping he'd already driven L.A. and Brandy to work and come back home. Then he and I would be alone together without the others for about an hour before he left. Maybe we would watch TV. Maybe he would wrap his arm around my shoulder. Sometimes we played games on his phone. Angry Birds. He always laughed when I beat him. Sometimes he would send me into L.A.'s room, or he would go into his because he wanted privacy. I would hear him playing some kind of video game or talking on his phone. Whispering or shouting or just making conversation. When he was whispering or just talking, he would have a way he spoke—a tone—that made me mad. Jealous. It was the same tone he used with me when he told me I was the best. I didn't like hearing that tone for someone invisible on the other end of his phone.

But sometimes he would come out and tell me things. It was always topics and not details. Money or Stress or Business or his Brother Down South and the Russians or if somebody pissed him off at the gym. Until he mentioned that, I didn't even know he went to a gym. I thought his body was just natural.

Sometimes he would wrap his arm around my shoulders, pulling me close and kissing my eyelids, giving me that good feeling.
You the best,
he would say. He would notice my homework spread out on my lap.
You the smartest individual I know. I got big plans for you.
I felt like I was really somebody.

*  *  *

I was carrying a forty and a plate of Doritos and guacamole over to him. I was walking too fast and somehow I tripped, smashing the side of my head into the corner of the glass coffee table.

“Whoa.” He was next to me before I even realized what had happened, lifting me gently onto the couch.

My head throbbed.

“Stay there.” As he disappeared into the kitchen, I saw a streak of rust on his arm. I touched above my left ear and felt stickiness. I sat up fast. He wasn't going to want my blood on that couch.

“Lie down, now,” he said when he came back in.

“But I'm bleeding.”

“Lie down, fool,” he said gently, and I did.

“Hold these.”

I held out my hands to take a box of Band-Aids, a tube of Polysporin, and a tiny white Advil bottle. He shifted me carefully over onto my side and began wiping and pressing. I winced.

“Ain't nothing,” he said. “Heads bleed.” He dabbed some more. “Band-Aid's not going to stick with your pretty hair. Hold still. I'm a press hard a minute.”

I held still, while he pressed hard. It hurt, but not badly. I didn't make a noise.

“You brave beside being smart, huh, Beautiful?” I felt him smearing on the Polysporin, and then I held still again while he checked his work.

“You good now.” He helped me sit up, sliding his warm arms under and around me. I could hardly look at him, what with the beer-soaked carpet and the green mush all over the armchair. Doritos in pale bits where his feet had crushed them, and his gold
D
and angled eyes and scar. With how our bodies were touching and how he was taking care of me.