Last Summer with Maizon (9 page)

“May-za,” Li'l Jay said.

Margaret didn't look up. “She's coming home today. Her grandmother went to get her. You have to be patient,” she said. The butterflies in her stomach had turned to bats and time had stopped moving four hours ago. It seemed like nearly three years, not three months since she had last seen Maizon. “Bo is even going to drop by tomorrow to say ‘hi'! Imagine! Bo Douglas in my house!”

“May-za!” Li'l Jay said again, running over to Margaret. He patted her on the arm and pointed to the window.

“May-za!”

Margaret looked toward the window.

“You want to see out?”

Li‘l Jay nodded and ran back over to the window. Margaret sighed and laid the pad and pencil on the chair, then lifted Li'l Jay up.

“May-za!” Li'l Jay said, pointing down the street.

Margaret put Li'l Jay down and raised the window. Maizon was pulling her gate closed and heading up the block.

“Maizon!” she yelled. Maizon waved and ran the rest of the way. Margaret rushed into her coat and slammed out the door. When she got to the top of the last flight, she stopped. Li'l Jay had known before he saw her!

“Mama, Maizon's back!” she called over her shoulder, rushing out of the building.

Margaret ran down the street and met her halfway. “Maizon! Li'l Jay is like Ms. Dell! He got her gift!”

T
he moment they sat down under their tree, Margaret knew there was something different about Maizon. It was more than the fact that Maizon had grown even taller or that she had let her Afro get too long. Margaret stared at her. When Maizon looked up, Margaret saw the pain in her eyes. There was something about the look that was familiar but she couldn't remember where she had seen it before.

“I hated it there, Margaret,” Maizon said softly.

Before she could finish, Margaret recognized the look. It was the same one Hattie had—sad and faraway even when she laughed. It was a look that said something had been broken, something that could never be fixed.

“What did they do to you?” Margaret asked, leaning against Maizon's shoulder. It felt as warm and bony as it always had.

“They hated me because I'm black and smart.”

“They said that to you?!” Margaret raised her head and looked at Maizon. “That's the meanest ...”

“They didn't exactly say it, Margaret. They didn't have to. Everything they did showed it. I ate alone, slept in a room by myself, worked by myself, and everything.”

“They were all like that?”

“No.” Maizon looked at her palms. She made a fist and looked up at the sprinkling of leaves left on the tree. “Some of them tried to be nice. There were a couple of other black girls there too. Sometimes we hung out but not much. I don't know why. I guess because I didn't try to talk to them either. I think they thought I was stuck-up. But I wanted to find a friend like you, Margaret, someone I could tell everything to.”

“Why didn't you write me then, Maizon? I was still here in Brooklyn all the time.” Margaret smiled a little, trying to hide the hurt in her voice. The smile stopped before it reached her eyes.

“I'm sorry,” Maizon said, sounding afraid. “I didn't want you to know how hard it was. I wanted you to think everything was okay.”

“You still should have written.”

Maizon sniffed and looked out over the block. “I missed you so much, Margaret. And I missed Ms. Dell and Li'l Jay, even Hattie.”

“Let's walk over to Palmetto Street,” Margaret said, rising and taking Maizon's hand. “The leaves falling off this tree are starting to get to me.”

“Me too.”

They walked in silence.

“I guess I didn't write because I didn't want you to think there was stuff I couldn't do,” Maizon said, sitting on the curb across from the new apartment building. Margaret sat beside her. “When I read your poem I was so happy and so jealous at the same time. I felt like you had everything, Margaret.”

“Everything?”

“You had Madison Street and Ms. Dell and your mother, even my grandmother. All I had was Connecticut and a bunch of strangers.”

“I missed you, Maizon! I didn't have a best friend anymore! I didn't have anyone to tell how much I missed Daddy or to walk home with from school. Li'l Jay can barely make sentences and Ms. Dell, well, she knows stuff, so I can't really tell her anything new.”

Maizon smiled and nodded. “I'm glad I came home, Margaret.”

“Me too. Anyway, Ms. Peazle isn't so bad.”

“I can't go back to 102,” Maizon said. “Not now. Not after Blue Hill and everything.”

“So what are you going to do?” Margaret asked. When Maizon didn't respond, she followed her gaze. Three stories above, in the new apartment building, a blond girl pressed her face against the window, staring down at them.

“Who's she?” Maizon asked.

“I don't know. She just moved in. I can see her staring all the time from my window.”

“Does she go to 102?”

“No,” Margaret said. “A bus picks her up. It says Pace Academy on the side.”

“Probably just like Blue Hill!” Maizon said, frowning at the girl.

“I don't think it is, Maizon. Ms. Dell talked to her mother at the store. The school's for gifted children in New York. It's free for everyone, not just people on scholarship or whatever. Ms. Dell said Mama should sign me up.”

“For real, Margaret?”

Margaret nodded. “It's a new school. Sort of like an experiment or something, to see how kids from different areas act around each other.”

“Maybe I could go there, Margaret.”

“Me too!”

Maizon jumped up. “Maybe it could be just like it was before I went away”—she hesitated—“almost.”

Margaret read her thoughts. “Ms. Dell says people change. Maybe it can't be exactly like it was.”

“I know I changed, Margaret. I changed because Blue Hill was so hard.”

“But, Maizon, you're the smartest girl in Brooklyn....”

“Not book hard,” Maizon cut in. “Those classes were a breeze. Just the people . . .” Her voice trailed off and she looked up toward the window again.

“Not everyone is like that, Maizon.”

“I know,” Maizon said. “A couple of teachers at Blue Hill were nice to me. And the lady who worked in the cafeteria almost cried when I told her I was leaving. Some of the girls looked sad when they saw me packing.”

The blond girl waved and smiled.

Margaret waved back. “She's probably lonely like you were”.

“Yeah,” Maizon said. She took one last look, then turned away.

“Maybe someday we can invite her over and show her the bridge, Maizon.”

Maizon nodded.

They walked slowly down Palmetto Street. A cold wind blew in between them and lifted Maizon's hair. They giggled and chased the brown and gold leaves scattering themselves along the block.

“If you find a gold one with a little yellow in it,” Maizon yelled from across the street, “it means we'll be friends forever!”

“I'm going to find a million gold ones!” Margaret yelled back. She watched Maizon's Afro dance in the wind. In the fading afternoon sun, she twirled and said, “A million, trillion, zillion gold ones!”

JACQUELINE WOODSON
is the recipient of the 2006 Margaret A. Edwards Award honoring her outstanding lifetime contribution to writing for teens, and has received numerous awards for her middle-grade and young adult books, which include the National Book Award Finalist
Hush
and
Miracle's Boys,
winner of the Coretta Scott King Award and the Los
Angeles Times
Book Prize. She is also the author of a number of picture books, including
The Other Side
and the Caldecott Honor Book
Coming on Home Soon,
both illustrated by E. B. Lewis, and the Newbery Honor book
Show Way,
illustrated by Hudson Talbott. Ms. Woodson has one daughter and lives with her partner in Brooklyn, New York. Visit her Web site at
www.jacquelinewoodson.com
.