Skin I'm in, The (14 page)
Momma and me both look at each other. All of a sudden, Momma starts crying. Crying big, fat tears. I don’t have to ask her why. I know. We both wishing Daddy was here for the good stuff and the bad.
MOMMA WENT RIGHT OUT AND BOUGHT
a frame for my congratulations letter. Together we hung the letter up in my room, next to Daddy’s poem, which we also put in a frame. I spend the rest of the day trying to figure out what to do about Char.
Maybe I’ll call Charlese and tell her I’m sorry, but I gotta tell. Or I’ll tell Char that I accidentally told on her. Or I’ll tell her the janitor said he saw her. I stomp my feet. Char ain’t gonna believe none of that. She’s gonna kick my butt if I tell.
You would think after beating those boys off John-John, I wouldn’t be afraid of nothing or nobody. But I’m scared like nobody’s business. I’m sitting here on the bed rocking. Rocking and sucking my thumb like I did when I was five. Like I do when I get in real trouble and can’t figure my way out. I don’t have no choice, I gotta tell. Then the phone rings.
″Hi, girlfriend,″ Charlese says, all sweet. ″How you doing?″
At first she makes some small talk about John-John getting beat up. I’m half listening. My hands are shaking. I’m so scared, I almost drop the phone. I take in a long breath and start to tell Char that I’m gonna admit that she made me do everything.
But then Char says, ″Me and the twins been talking. We will bring a hundred dollars to your house today. That’s the best we can do.″
I suck in my breath and say real fast, ″I’m sorry I got to do this, Char, but y’all don’t leave me no choice. I didn’t mess up the classroom by myself so I shouldn’t be the only one in trouble and the only one suspended from school. So I’m telling it was your idea and that you made me light that fire. I know you’re gonna be mad but that’s how it goes, Char.″
At first Charlese don’t say nothing. She’s just breathing. ″I knew you’d punk out on me,″ she says finally. ″I knew it.″
″ I…I—″
″Shut up,″ Char screams. ″I’m talking.″ Then all of a sudden Char starts laughing. Really laughing. The hard kind of laughing that makes your stomach hurt.
″I knew not to trust you. That’s why I stole Miss Saunders’s watch and slipped it into the slits of your locker,″ Char says, and busts out laughing again. ″And when they searched your locker, guess what?″ She laughs. ″They found the watch. So they really think you did it now.″ She laughs for the longest time. ″Now tell on me, and I will personally kick your skinny black butt, Maleeka Madison,″ Char says. ″And I won’t be by myself, either. You hear me?″
I shake my head yes, like Char can see me. But she knows my answer, because she don’t wait around to even hear what it is. Just laughs some more and hangs up the phone.
I walk over to my bed and start rocking. They’re expelling me from school. They think I’m a thief and a firebug. I close my eyes and rock some more. I rock till my insides are calm and peaceful.
WHEN I’M FEELING BETTER
, I look at the library letter hanging on the wall next to Daddy’s poem and the picture of me and him together. I can’t even keep the money I won. I have to give it to the school to pay for that mess. Char don’t know, and she don’t care. All she wants is for me to keep my mouth quiet about her. She’s standing over me, getting louder and louder.
Then the doorbell rings. Somebody rings three short, quick times like they’re nervous. By the fourth ring, Momma yells for me to get it. She’s got her hands full in the kitchen, she says.
When I open the door, Miss Saunders is standing there.
″Maleeka,″ she says, stretching out her arm and showing me her watch. ″You’ve got some explaining to do.″
My eyes get big and my mouth opens wide. Before Miss Saunders says another word, Momma walks up, holds me close, and tells Miss Saunders to come in.
Momma’s talking a lot. She keeps going back and forth between the living room and the kitchen. Tea. Sugar. Homemade biscuits. Honey. It seems like Momma will never sit down. When she finally does, Miss Saunders brings up me and my situation. Right away Momma finds another reason to head to the kitchen.
Miss Saunders talks anyway. ″Rumors are going around the school,″ she says. ″Everyone is saying you had help—that it was Charlese’s idea to destroy my classroom.″
I let her keep talking. I pick at a scab on my hand.
″I’m here to get the truth from you firsthand, to say no matter what, we can work this out, Maleeka.″
My eyes shift from Miss Saunders to the floor.
″We need to talk about this, Maleeka.″
″Ain’t nothing to talk about,″ I finally say. ″I did it. That’s that.″
″Not alone, you didn’t. Everyone knows that. Who helped you?″
″Listen, Miss Saunders. Some kids dared me to do it. Said they’d pay me twenty-five dollars if I did. I needed the money. That’s all,″ I say, digging at the scab, drawing blood from the dry, hard shell.
″Maleeka, once you told me that you could be trusted to keep a secret. My secret. And you did. I know you did. Now I’m asking
you
to trust
me.″
Miss Saunders turns my way and takes off her jacket. She rolls up the sleeves of her blouse. She reaches her hand out and takes my hand. ″Trust me with the truth and I promise everything will be OK,″ she says softly.
I snatch my hand away. ″I said what happened. Why does everybody keep bothering me? Just leave me alone,″ I say to her.
Miss Saunders sighs and lets my hand drop. She puts her jacket back on and lets herself out.
I GO TO SCHOOL THE NEXT DAY
. Miss Saunders has arranged for me to come back. She asks me to meet her in her classroom before school starts. When I arrive, Char is there. Miss Saunders is not wearing a suit. She’s got on blue jeans. Miss Saunders is saying something, but I can’t make out just what. She and Char are talking at the same time. Char’s going on and on about how she didn’t have nothing to do with messing up Miss Saunders’s room. Miss Saunders is telling me to tell her the whole truth. I want to tell her that the truth will get my butt kicked good. That if I open my big mouth, ain’t nothing she or Momma can do to keep Charlese from getting me back. Only I don’t say nothing, I just keep my mouth shut.
Charlese looks scared, like she’s gonna cry. I never seen that before. I figured that maybe she didn’t have no tears. All the while Char’s eyes are saying I better take the blame, or else. I am so tired of being scared, of doing what other folks want me to.
Char throws mean words at me, words as hard as bricks. ″You better not punk out on me,″ she says.
Tears start to roll from my eyes.
″Maleeka. You know what JuJu will do to me if I get kicked out of school.″
JuJu will kick Char’s butt good. That’s another reason why I can’t tell. I’m rocking and thinking and crying. Miss Saunders is very quiet. She’s listening and watching. She puts a gentle hand on my shoulder.
″If I get in trouble for you, you gonna have to move to another neighborhood,″ Char is saying.
I keep on rocking and crying.
I’m thinking about the boys who tried to kiss me and the ones I whipped when I helped John-John. I start thinking about Akeelma too.
Now Miss Saunders has her arm around me, and it sure feels good to have her here. She’s letting Char speak her mind.
″All I done for you,″ Char says. ″You gonna leave me out to dry like this. Wait till later, you ugly, stupid black thing.″
Call me by my name!
I hear Akeelma say, and I scream it out, too. ″Call me by my name! I am not ugly. I am not stupid. I am Maleeka Madison, and, yeah, I’m black, real black, and if you don’t like me, too bad ’cause black is the skin I’m in!″ I yell. ″No matter what you think, Charlese Jones, you’re ten times worse. I would never force someone to burn down a classroom, or pick on kids weaker than me, or say words so mean they make people bleed inside.″ I’m rocking and crying and rocking. ″You the one who pushed me to mess up Miss Saunders’s room, and you were in on it, too—you and the twins,″ I say, feeling relieved.
Charlese gives me a hard look.
She pushes past Miss Saunders and me and makes her way to the door. ″Look at you two—two ugly-faced losers,″ she says. Miss Saunders don’t even stop Char. She lets her go. Then Miss Saunders hugs me to her, and I feel safe inside.
A WEEK PASSES
. Raina and Raise have been suspended, and nobody’s seen Char. When the twins return, they tell everybody that JuJu sent Char to live with her grandparents in Alabama. Kids are still saying how jive I am for squealing on Char. But I don’t care. Char can’t hurt me now.
Mr. Pajolli says my office job is over, that I’ve paid enough dues by telling the truth about Char. I hunch my shoulders up like I don’t care about the office, but deep down inside I feel kind of bad. I was starting to really like it. And I missed working there when I was suspended. As I’m leaving the office, Caleb is standing by my locker. He turns all red when I ask what he’s doing.
″I was just leaving,″ he says, handing me a purple letter with gold writing on it. ″Wait till I’m gone before you open it, all right?″
I nod, and watch him go to class. I duck into the girls’ room, drop the backpack on the floor, and open the letter real slow. Spearmint. It smells like spearmint gum. I take the gum out and put it in my mouth before I read the letter. It’s a poem. For me.
To Maleeka: My sweet dark chocolate candy girl
Would you be my Almond Joy
My chocolate chip, my Hershey Kiss
My sweet dark chocolate butter crisp?
Hand and hand we’d walk to class
and sit and talk in sweet green grass.
Rollar coaster way up high,
pick moonbeams from out the sky.
Would you be my Almond Joy
My chocolate chip, my Hershey Kiss
My sweet dark chocolate butter crisp?
Caleb’s poem makes me cry. It is so sweet. I look at my face in the mirror and smile. I promise myself to hang Caleb’s poem on the wall with Daddy’s and the one from the library.
On the way to class, I see Caleb. He is still red-faced. Even his ears are red. My heart is beating fast, but I go up to him anyway. ″That is the nicest thing anybody ever did for me,″ I say, with this goofy smile on my face. And we stand there, me twisting a pencil in my hands and him twisting one of his braids over and over again.
″You two supposed to be somewhere?″ Mr. Braxton, the gym teacher, asks.
″Yeah,″ we both say.
″I’m going to Miss Saunders’s class,″ I say.
″And I’m on my way to math class,″ says Caleb.
″Well, get there—now.″ Mr. Braxton’s pointing.
″I’ll walk you to Miss Saunders’s room. It’s on my way,″ Caleb says, still twisting his hair.
I take his letter and put it in my backpack, and we walk down the hall together. I close my eyes for a second, and take a deep breath. Caleb always smells so fresh and clean. That’s another thing I like about him.
When I finally walk into class, everybody’s staring at me like I got two heads. I’m late, but Miss Saunders doesn’t make an issue of it today.
Class is in the detention room, while Miss Saunders’s room is being repaired. Miss Saunders is giving us twenty pages of
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
to read by tomorrow and telling us she’s been easy on us so far, but things are about to heat up.
″Welcome back, Miss Madison,″ Miss Saunders says, giving me a wink. ″Class wouldn’t be the same unless you were late.″
Everybody laughs and turns my way. ″Yeah,″ John-John says, ″welcome back.″
