Ghost (3 page)

“Man, I'm telling you, she ain't gonna say yes.”

“Good enough.” Coach nodded, a sure smirk on his face. “Practice is almost over. Might as well stay, and then I'll drop you off at home. I'll talk to her then. Cool?”

Not cool. Not really. I mean, track? And who was this man? I've seen those weird shows where psychos pose like coaches and stuff and get you caught up and the next thing you know my mother's in jail too for handling this dude. I didn't trust him. But on the other hand, I didn't really have anything else to do, or nowhere else to be, so I figured it was worth scoping
him out and seeing how he acted around all the other kids and their parents. I mean, I could always use the ride home, but I ain't no fool.

After practice was done, everybody met up with the people waiting for them, family and friends or whatever. Coach spent a lot of time talking to all the moms and dads—mostly moms—especially of the vets. They all acted like they really, really knew each other. Like family. Hugs and all that. And that made me feel a little better about him, because moms don't trust nobody around their kids. So I agreed on the ride.

Coach and I walked to his car, which I was surprised to see was a cab.

“You stole a cab?” I asked, while he cleaned a bunch of stuff off the seat. Food bags, shoes, water bottles, sports drinks. The front of his car was a mess. He threw everything in the back.

“No,” Coach said, brushing crumbs on the floor so I could finally get in. “What makes you think that?”

“Because you a coach,” I said, holding my backpack in my lap. “So how you get one?”

“I coach because I love it. But it don't pay the rent. Being a cabdriver does.” He started the car.

“Then why would you love coaching? Seems like if being a cabbie gets you paid, that should be what you
love,” I explained what seemed obvious, looking out the window. Coach backed out of the parking space. “Wait,” I said. “You not gonna make me pay for this ride home, are you? Because if you are, you can just let me out and I can walk.”

“Why would I make—” Coach started, then stopped. Then he sighed. “Just tell me where you live.”

Where I live. Where I live. When anyone ever asks about where I live, I get weird because people always treat you funny when they find out you stay in a certain kind of neighborhood. But I was used to people treating me funny. When your clothes are two sizes too big, and you got on no-name sneakers, and your mother cuts your hair and it looks like your mother cuts your hair, you get used to people treating you funny. So what's one more person?

“Glass Manor,” I said. “You know where that's at?”

Coach didn't blink. “Yeah, I know where that is.”

We didn't really say too much in the car. Just zipped from one side of the neighborhood to the other—from the good side to the “other” side. It was my first time ever in a cab. I was used to walking everywhere, unless I was going somewhere with my mom. Then it was on the bus. Coach talked on the phone most of the trip. Judging by what he was saying, what time he'd
be home, checking to see if somebody named Tyrone had eaten yet, asking what was for dinner, made me think he was talking to his wife. I wonder what she looked like. Probably not too hot, since she married a man who looked like a chipped-tooth turtle. Coach was saying something about gym shoes to the maybe-wife on the phone when I noticed a woman walking in white scrubs, white sneakers, carrying a black leather purse big enough to fit the whole world in it, and her hair was cut like a boy's. I tapped Coach on the arm and told him to pull the cab over.

“Hold on,” he said to the person on the phone. Then to me, “What?”

“Pull over,” I repeated. “That's my mother.”

Coach pulled to the side of the street, and I rolled down the window. “Ma!” I called out, waving to her.

She looked, then looked again, trying to make sure I was who she thought I was.

“Cas?” she said, approaching the cab. “What are you doing in a cab? Matter fact, what are you doing in the front seat of a cab? No, answer the first question. What are you doing in a cab?”

“Hop in,” I said.

“No, you hop out,” she replied.

“Ma.”

“Ma'am.” Coach leaned over so she could see him. “It's fine. Hop in. I'm just giving him a ride home.” Then he added, “On the house.”

Coach swiped everything on the backseat to one side as I reached back and opened the door. My mother stood outside the car for what seemed like minutes before deciding to climb in. And even after she did, she kept the door open, one foot still on the sidewalk, so she could jump back out if she needed to. Her bag, which I knew was full of Styrofoam containers of chicken and gravy, or whatever gross but free meal we were going to be having for dinner, crunched on the seat beside her as she finally pulled her leg in and closed the door.

“How was work?” I asked as Coach pulled back into the street.

“Cas, don't ‘how was work' me. Why are you in a cab? And excuse me, sir, no offense, but who are you?” she asked. Told you. Moms don't trust nobody around their kids.

Coach adjusted the rearview mirror so he could see my mother in the back.

“I'm Coach Brody, but everybody calls me Coach. I run the Defenders city track team.”

“Uh-huh. And?”

“And your son came and, uh, sat in on my practice today.” Coach threw a quick glance at me. “Did you know he could run?”

“Did I know he could run?” She was sitting directly behind me, but I could still feel the heat of her eyes burning through the headrest, scorching the back of my neck.

“Yeah, he can run. Like,
really
run.”

My mother just sort of grunted. I knew better than to say anything, or to even turn around and look back at her. I just said to Coach, “Make this left,” when we got close to my street.

Coach made the left and continued, “And I think he's got potential. With the proper coaching, he could be a serious problem.” I felt like I had seen this in every single sports movie I had ever watched. All of them.
Ma'am, your son has potential.
If this went like the movies, I was either going to score the game-winning touchdown (which is impossible in track) or . . . die.

“Sir, I appreciate that, but let me tell you something. Cas already
is
a serious problem,” my mom explained. “And right now, he needs to focus on school, not sports.”

“Right here,” I murmured to let Coach know where to stop and let us out. I figured there was no reason
to drag the conversation out. It went exactly like I thought it would. So I wasn't really even mad about it. He cut his blinker on, pulled over, and put the car in park.

“Listen”—Coach turned around to look my mother in the face—“I totally get that. But what if I made you a deal,” he went on. “If he messes up in school, one time, he's off the team.”

“One time?!” I squawked.

“One time.” Coach held his hand out to my mother. I kept my eyes forward until I heard her exhale the breath of a long day.

“You're gonna get him home every day?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“What about his homework?”

“It'll be done.” He sounded pretty confident for not even knowing me like that.

Coach gave us both one of his cards. I put mine in my backpack while Ma gazed at hers, making sure everything was legit. Then she let out another big sigh, this time probably the breath of a worried mom.

“Well, at least I'll know where he'll be after school,” she gave in.

And that was it. Just like that. For the first time in my whole life, I was on a team.

WHAT DO THEY
call criminal records? Not criminal records. They call them something else. Rap sheets? Yeah, that's it, rap sheets, which is such a dumb name because it makes me think of rap music, like maybe a rap sheet is what rappers write their rhymes down on. But yeah, rap sheets. I got one of those. Not a real one, though, one that real criminals have, nah. I got a school rap sheet, but in school they call it a “file.” I got a file. And even though I've never actually seen it, it has to be pretty big, because I'm always being sent down to the principal's office, or put in detention, or suspended for shutting people down for talking smack.
Oh, Castle, why your clothes so big? Why your pants so
small? Why your name Castle? Why you always smell like you walked a thousand miles to get here? Why it look like somebody tried to cut your hair with a butter knife?
And my response would be . . . well, let's just use the school-y terms—“not exemplary behavior.” But I'd made a decision that there would be no more entries added to the file. The file would be closed forever, because now my new career in track, which was really my soon-to-be career in basketball, was at stake. All of a sudden I had too much on the line. There would be no more “altercations.” That's the word Principal Marshall always used on the phone with my mother.
Altercations.

And I was altercation free . . . for seventeen hours and two minutes. Two of those hours were spent watching one of those corny, romantic, mushy-mushy movies with my mom. She loves those things, and every night when we're eating dinner, she sits on our couch in the living room and watches one while opening mail and clipping coupons. I always spread all my blankets out on the floor—three or four to make what Ma calls a pallet—which is where I eventually doze off. She takes the couch. We haven't slept in our rooms since . . . Dad. It's too weird for her to try to sleep in the room they slept in, and I got this thing about being
as close to the door as possible, just in case we have to get up and run again. Plus, now that I've gotten older, I just want to make sure I'm near her in case I gotta protect her.

So, yeah . . . that was two hours (9:00 p.m.). Then I was sleep for ten hours. I'm grumpy when I don't get at least eight. Some people would say I'm grumpy even when I do, but they don't know nothing (7:00 a.m.). Snooze (7:05 a.m.). Snooze (7:10 a.m.).
Cas, get your butt up for school. I'm not playing!
(7:20 a.m.). Lay there looking around the living room. Up at the light in the ceiling. The glass thing that covers the bulb has dead bugs in it. Under the couch there are toys that I don't ever remember playing with. Look at the pictures on the wall. Me at nine. And at eight. And at seven when Ma was experimenting with giving me a Mohawk. But no pictures of the
family
. Then, finally, it was time to get up (8:00 a.m.). Ten minutes spent in the shower, ten minutes getting dressed, and ten minutes eating breakfast—toast with peanut butter and honey (8:30 a.m.). Seventeen minutes walking to school (8:47 a.m.). Homeroom dismissed (9:10 a.m.). Forty-five minutes in
English class, where we were reading
Lord of the Flies
, which, by the way, is a crazy book (10:00 a.m.). Then forty-five minutes in math class, which was basically forty-five minutes of Maureen Thorne raising her hand every single time Mr. Granger asked a question so that she could go up to the board and write the answer. Such a show-off. She's like the geeky girl version of Lu. So yeah, that happened (10:50 a.m.). And then there was social studies class, which I usually call nap time because we never study nothing social. Like . . . I don't know, social media. Or social events, like parties. All social studies is is a stupid way to say “history.” It's like the “rap sheet” of history. Or something like that. Anyway, I would usually snooze through it, but it was a new day and I was turning over a new leaf, so I stayed awake. Didn't really focus too much on nothing being said, but my eyes were wide open (11:40 a.m.).

And then lunch. You know who ate lunch the same time I did? Brandon Simmons. Jack from
Lord of the Flies.
A power-hungry dummy and the single most annoying dude in the seventh grade. He owned that record, a record that's really hard to own because there are a lot of annoying dummies in the seventh grade. Trust me, I know. But none like him. Brandon was a year older than everybody, because he stayed back a year. Dude was as dumb as dirt, and that wouldn't have been so bad if he was at least cool, but
he wasn't. Plus he was taller than most of us, so he treated everybody like chumps. Especially me.

Just made it to the cafeteria (11:44 a.m.). Got in line. Brandon came in after me, bumped me, and then, seeing that I ignored him, decided to step in front of me.

“Shack,” he said. Shack was what he called me as his lame way of making fun of the fact that my name is Castle. “You don't mind me butting in front of you, right? I mean, it's not like you haven't had cafeteria food before. You probably had some last night, right?” He shrugged and hit me with another one. “Right?” The only reason Brandon even knew about my mother is back when we were in the fourth grade—yes, I've known him that long—my mother thought it would be a good idea to come speak at Career Day. And Brandon has used it as fuel ever since. He grinned, then looked around to make sure other people had heard him, which was always the most important part of his jerkness. Then a few more. “Right? Right?”

I sat at the table (11:50 a.m.). The same table I sat at every day with my two friends Dre Anderson and Red Griffin. I met Dre this year, and we hit it off because he's a ballplayer too. Plays for the Boys and Girls Club, and he told me I should've played, but I missed the tryouts.
On purpose. Thing is, Boys and Girls Clubs don't ever really cut nobody. Everybody can just sign up and play, but who wants to be on a team with a bunch of pity-players? I didn't wanna bust Dre's bubble because that ain't cool. But for me, I'm too good to play on a team like that. I mean, I didn't really know that, but . . . I knew that, y'know?

And Red, well, I've known him for a long time. We've been cool since fifth grade, mainly because even though we've never really talked about nothing bad, we both kinda knew something bad had happened to us. Like, for me, the best way to describe it is, I got a lot of scream inside. And I could tell Red did too. He was a white boy with red hair who everybody was friends with mainly because people were scared that he was crazy and it's better to be on crazy's good side. Jessica Grant said her mother said the only reason people have red hair is because they're red on the inside. Red like violent. But I got black hair, so does that mean I'm black on the inside? Anyway, Brandon came and sat next to Red at the table. He usually sat farther down by the other gas-mouths, but not today. Today he sat right next to Red, and right across from me and Dre.