Every Variable of Us, page 2
Shit! I totally spaced on the assignment. That’s what homeroom is for, which I wasn’t in today thanks to another Britt kleptomaniac special. Homework is the backbone to my glorious C average. If I don’t hold a C average, then I can’t play ball, and if I can’t play ball I can’t get an athletic scholarship and get the hell out of this town.
I approach Mr. Jones’s desk, putting on my best starving-African-
child face. “Uh, Mr. Jones.” He looks up from his lesson plan. Mr. Jones can’t be any older than mid-thirties. He still has all his hair and his waves. Unlike Mr. Fletcher, whose hairline is worse than LeBron’s and his face looks like a pug with all them wrinkles. “I don’t know if you’re aware, but Coach Stevens has been kicking our asses all week at practice to get us ready for our first game tonight. So I’ve been getting home super late and didn’t have a chance to do the paper. It’s number one on my list of things to do, though. No lie.”
He raises his eyebrow and lets out a heavy sigh.
“Alexis, this is that lazy behavior I’m talking about. You’re not applying yourself. Colleges don’t just look at what you do on the court. They look at your grades. God forbid something ever happens to you and you can’t play anymore. What will you do then, huh? You’ll be just like every other girl out here on these streets.” He studies my face, waiting for his words to sink in. He’s wasting his breath. Coach told me Coach Staley from South Carolina is coming tonight. My future’s all but set. “And I gave you the assignment last Tuesday.”
I nod, like, Yeah, I know. I was there.
“Well, it’s two weeks later . . .” I continue looking confused, waiting for him to get to the point. “You don’t think that was enough time to get it done?”
Uh, obviously not.
“I’ll tell you what.” He smirks. “If you can summarize the final chapter in one sentence, I’ll give you an extension.”
“For real?!” I say, a little too excited.
“For real.”
Damn. Now I really wish I’d read the final chapters, or better yet, any chapter.
Let’s see, To Kill a Mockingbird . . . To Kill a Mockingbird. I know Michael Clarke Duncan’s in the film version. Or is that The Green Mile? Shit.
“I got you, Mr. Jones. It’s about a little, country-ass white girl and a Michael Clarke Duncan–looking ol’ head trying to kill a mockingbird that threatens to infect the town with a disease.” Then to really show I know my shit, I add, “It’s like The Walking Dead, but for old white people.”
That was some baller summarization.
He looks at me deadpanned.
“Sooo . . . extension?”
“That’ll be a hard no. Now back to your seat.”
All right. Damn. He didn’t have to be such a dick about it.
I mope back to my seat. I’m actually going to have to put forth some effort to keep my C now. WTF! This day just keeps getting worse. At this point, I won’t be surprised if I miss every shot tonight.
Britt and Krystal die laughing. Sometimes I wonder why I’m even friends with them. But then I remember Britt’s practically my sister. When I was about four my mom went off on one of her more serious benders and child services scooped my ass up quick. When my mom gets high, it’s never the dope Snoop Dogg high, but the fucked up Requiem for a Dream high. And considering no one knows where my dad’s been for the past seventeen years, he wasn’t an option. There’s this middle-aged, Wesley Snipes–looking guy on our block, Marcus Franklin, who runs a foster home. He collects foster kids like Pokémon. I’ve lived there off and on over the years, but Britt’s been there since she was five. We still have dinner pretty much every night together, because both of our parental guardians are terrible at providing anything but ass whippings for when we fuck up or just because they feel like getting some exercise.
Britt’s also been there for the major milestones in my life. She was there in first grade when the shelter gave me my first basketball (we stole a nicer one shortly thereafter); when I got my first period in the middle of a game and she threatened to whoop anyone’s ass that would dare make fun of me (we stole tampons shortly thereafter); and she had my back last year when these Jersey City bitches tried to jump me after I dropped forty on them (I’m not sure what we stole shortly thereafter, but I’m sure it was something).
“Yo, look who it is,” Britt says, tapping me on the shoulder.
I look up to see Muslim Girl from the corner store standing next to Mr. Jones. She’s ditched her blue apron for this extra, teal kaleidoscope-pattern Muslim dress that runs down to her beat-up Chucks. The thing has a fucking sash around the shoulders.
“This bitch goes to our school now?” Britt continues, an evil grin curling at the corners of her mouth. “Ay, Krystal, that’s the snitch from this morning.”
“Oh, for real? The one dressed like she’s going to Muslim prom?” Krystal inquires with a nefarious grin of her own. The back corner is now Grin City.
Mr. Jones takes the girl’s slip. She nervously grabs her backpack straps and stares at the tops of her shoes. “Class,” Mr. Jones begins, staring at our section to lose the grins and STFU, “we have a new student. This is Aamani Chakrabarti. She’s a foreign exchange student.” The new girl says something just above a nervous whisper.
Britt and Krystal cackle. They can smell blood.
Mr. Jones leans in. “I’m sorry, Aamani, I didn’t get that.”
She speaks up. “I said I’m from Jersey.”
Mr. Jones nearly swallows his tongue. “Oh my God, my apologies, Aamani. I just assumed . . . that was poor judgment on my part. Aamani here is from Jersey. Let’s make her feel welcomed. You can have a seat at one of the open chairs in the back.”
Aamani takes the seat in front of Britt. I wince as she sits down. Bad move, girl. She unzips her bag and reaches for her notebook. Britt flinches and nearly jumps out of her chair. The legs of her chair scratch the linoleum and the whole class whips their heads to the back of the room.
“My bad,” Britt scoffs. “I thought you had a bomb in there. Had to bust out the survival moves.” Random chuckles sweep through the room. “And why are you dressed like you’re about to go to Taliban prom?”
Lame. Like, at least come up with your own diss.
“Brittney!” Mr. Jones scolds in his I’m-the-teacher-hear-me-roar voice. “Please disrespect Aamani or any student one more time so I can toss your ass in detention for the rest of the year.” He looks gravely at Britt. “Try me.”
Britt smacks her teeth and rolls her eyes to the ceiling.
As soon as Mr. Jones turns his back, Britt leans in to me and Krystal, our faces huddled. She whispers, “After school this bitch is getting stomped.”
“Bet,” Krystal confirms, immediately. Sometimes I believe she’s a minion Britt created in a lab.
I look over at Aamani, who appears to be unfazed by Britt’s blatant racism. She’s staring ahead, ready to learn. Nerd. But besides being a nerd, she’s done nothing wrong. It wasn’t her fault Tubs pulled his gun on us. Shooting Black folks is what they do. If anyone deserves to be stomped, it’s him. I mean, all Aamani did was protect her family business. We’d have done the same. Well, we wouldn’t have snitched, especially to the cops (because seriously, and I can’t stress this enough, but in the words of the great American poet Tupac: Fuck the police!), but we would’ve definitely given her a beatdown for trying to jack our shit. So I guess we too deserve an ass whooping in all of this.
“Nah, it’s cool,” I say, trying to convince them. “Like, we were actually stealing. We brought this on ourselves.”
“The fuck are you talking about?” Britt’s whispers grow louder and she scrunches her face. “She’s catching this ass whooping. Snitches get stitches.”
Damn.
She has a point. Rule number one on the block: Snitches do indeed get stitches.
I have three more classes with Aamani. Essentially it’s just three more hours for my guilt to build. The girl’s, like, the LeBron James of schoolwork. In math, she enthusiastically raises her hand and answers every question right. I mean, the girl’s only been here for a few hours and she’s already smarter than Lindsay Ross, the smart-ass white girl who thinks she’s the shit because she has
the highest GPA in the school, which isn’t saying much because the second highest is, like, 3.2. Aamani was the same levels of hype for Mrs. Hall’s science class, where she was kind enough to let the rest of the class answer a few questions (and by “rest of the class” I mean everyone not named Alexis Duncan). Mrs. Hall even asked her to stay after class. Probably to thank her for actually giving a shit about science. Aamani also had gym with me. Her math and science skills may be on point, but her ball game is all kinds of trash. She played one pickup game, got clowned after she shot an air ball, and wasn’t picked for a team for the rest of the period.
We finally make it to lunch.
But, before I hit up the caf, I beg Janitor Mike to let me use the auxiliary gym. In the end, after a significant amount of groveling, we broker a deal. I get to use the gym for twenty minutes, and in return I have to come to school early tomorrow to sweep both gyms. I waste no time. I set up three cones just outside the three point line, then I weave between them, cutting in and out, alternating my dribbling pattern—under the legs, behind the back, then under the legs. When I get to the final cone, I combine the moves. I explode left, going under my leg, take two additional dribbles to escape my imaginary defender, then quickly maneuver the ball behind my back and cut the other way. I stop on a dime and shoot a pull-up jump shot.
Swish. Nothing but net.
I sprint and retrieve the ball, and do fifteen more sets.
The gym doors swing open as I set up cones for the next drill. I turn and see Malcolm Bridges, the starting small forward on the boys’ team. He’s six-foot-three, but when they announce him in the starting lineup before games the PA claims he’s six-foot-five because of his big afro. He’s got about eight inches and a hundred pounds of muscle on me.
“Tryin’ to run a quick game?” he asks, all too sure of himself.
I look at him, grinning ear to ear, sweat dripping down my face. I wipe it off with my sleeve. “You sure you want this smoke?”
He cracks a grin of his own and tosses his backpack to the patch of hardwood in front of the bleachers.
“Just check rock, yo.”
He steps to me at the top of the key. I toss him the ball and he tosses it back, signifying we’re checked and ready to play. “I got the gym for ten more minutes. Game to five. All ones.”
“Bet,” he says, sitting down in a defensive stance. He majestic-
ally opens his six-foot wingspan like a hawk gliding above its prey.
I square him up. I give him a little jab with my right pivot foot to see if he reacts. He doesn’t. But he’s forcing me left, so I can exploit that. I jab with my right foot again. This time when he doesn’t react, I attack his left leg that’s ushering me left and blow past him for an uncontested layup.
“One, nothing,” I say, catching the ball out the net.
He does this frustrated brow-knitting thing. “Good move. But you ain’t gettin’ another bucket.”
The corners of my mouth tug upward.
We check rock again.
I jab hard to the right. This time he opens his hips out of respect for my speed, so I go left. He’s able to recover with his long wingspan, so I hit him with an Elena Delle Donne–esque step-back and nail a jumper right in his face.
“Two, nothing,” I update him.
“I know the score. Just check ball,” he mutters in frustration.
What he doesn’t know is he made a huge mistake giving me the ball first. I know I can’t guard him in the post. He’s too big. But he can’t guard me on the perimeter. So what he’s starting to realize is I’m not going to give him a chance to play offense. Because I’m not going to miss.
The next two possessions, he sags way off because he’s petrified of my speed. I easily drain two jumpers. The second one hits the back of the rim and rattles in. I was kind of pissed about that. Should’ve been all net.
He’s fuming now. I can practically see the steam coming off that afro, which he desperately needs to pick, by the way. Hair just nappy. Looks like a bunch of spiders having a meeting up there.
“Game point,” I remind him with a devilish smirk.
He doesn’t say anything. I go to check ball. He puts his hand out rejecting the gesture. “Just fucking play.”
“I’ll tell you what. I’ll let you choose how you take this L. You want a step-back in your face or a layup?” Again, no answer. He just grunts. I see he has a massive vocabulary. Mr. Jones must love him. “I’ll take that as you want a layup, quick and easy. I got you.”
I put the ball on the floor and throw it between my legs two times in quick succession. I watch his eyes follow the ball (wrong move, bruh), then I give him a little hesitation dribble with my left hand. When he doesn’t bite, I shift my body like I’m going left and crossover to my right hand. His first step is to my left. I zoom by him for a layup, but he recovers quickly and is right on my ass. I see him in my peripheral vision, biting his lip in determination of blocking my shot. I soar through the air gracefully for a right-handed layup. As he leaves his feet to block it, I allow my momentum to carry me to the other side of the basket, where I finish with a left-handed reverse layup.
“Fuck!” he yells as the ball bounces off the backboard and through the net.
“Nice move, youngin,” says Janitor Mike, who has appeared mystically in the doorway. “You going places.”
“You better get your boy,” I say to Janitor Mike, pointing at Malcolm. “I tried to tell him he don’t want that smoke. Don’t he know I’m about to get an offer to South Carolina? Coach Staley’s coming to the game tonight.”
“Yeah, I don’t know nothin’ about no Coach Staley. But I know LeBron Stank over here needs to take his butt to class, and you need to come see where I keep the brooms for tomorrow.”
I suck my teeth. “A’ight, ol’ head.” I go and grab my backpack and sling it around my shoulder, cradling my basketball under my right arm. My most prized possession.
“A-yo?” Malcolm calls from the court, still picking up the pieces of his pride. “Good shit.”
“You too,” I reply. “Little tip for the game tonight—don’t watch the ball. Watch the offensive player’s waist.”
“Good lookin’ out.”
I’m eating the strawberry Pop-Tart I grabbed this morning on my way out of the house (Pop-Tarts are the only food my mom keeps in the house; drug addicts love them some Pop-Tarts, I guess) and a bag of Hot Cheetos I stole off some freshman when he wasn’t looking. I can’t eat that nasty-ass free lunch. I mean, it’s “free” for a reason. Britt, Krystal, and Mikayla are playing Fuck, Marry, Kill. I have more important things on my mind, like impressing Coach Staley at the game tonight. I couldn’t care less that Jordan’s fade makes him look like Michael B. Jordan, which earns him the unanimous status of “fuck” every time they play this stupid game.
Right on cue, Jordan and Trey Davis roll up to our table like we should bow in their presence.
“What up, B?” Jordan says to Britt with what I’m sure he thinks is a smooth I-got-game voice. It’s not. Britt nearly melts, though. Sure, he’s already committed to Villanova next year—lucky!—but beyond that, the fade, fresh Js, and solo dimple that makes every girl want to bang him don’t do anything for me. “Y’all hittin’ up Kyle’s party after the game tonight, right?”
Britt smirks as though imagining him naked. “Who’s all going?”
“I’ll be there,” Trey adds for incentive.
Mikayla snorts, Britt rolls her eyes then goes back to eye-fucking Jordan, and Krystal perks up in excitement (Trey’s always her choice of “marry”). I don’t have a problem with Trey. He plays backup shooting guard on the boys’ team. The only thing is he looks like what would happen if a piece of coal fucked Lance Stephenson.
Jordan puts their minds at ease with a flash of his dimple. “The whole team will be there. Kyle said some people from Kensington might show up too. Shit’s gonna be flames.”
Britt fronts like she had no intentions on actually going. “A’ight, I gueeess I’ll make an appearance.”
“What about you, Lex?”
I look up mid-chew.
“Me?” A piece of Cheeto flees my mouth.
“You’re the only Lex here,” Jordan teases.
“Maybe. Depends on how the game goes.”
If I play bad, I don’t want to be around people. And if we lose, I definitely don’t want to be around people.
“She’ll be there,” Britt answers for me.
I give her a stank-eye of my own.
“Say less,” Jordan says. “I’ll holla at y’all tonight then. Good luck tonight, Lex.”
“Thanks, you too.”
He laughs like he doesn’t need it. “Thanks.”
“Peace out, ladies!” Trey says, chucking up the deuce as they go spread the house party news.
We return to our regularly scheduled programs. They talk about boys while I eat the lunch of champions and start getting pumped for my game. Everything is going fine until Aamani walks in. She sits at an empty table by the double doors, pulls out our science textbook that’s the size of three Bibles and a four-tier tower of some metal contraption, and proceeds to mind her own business. She opens the metal casing, folding the long stainless-steel brackets to the side, and then she begins deconstructing the tiers, each one breaking off to make a tiny steel bowl of food.
Somehow all of this pisses Britt off more, like, How dare she read a textbook and eat lunch?
Britt balls her fists and stands. “Fuck this. I’m not waiting until after school.”
