This Side of Home (9 page)

Really? We're at a dance and you want to talk about college applications? He starts telling me about his admissions essay for Morehouse. “I'm almost finished,” he says. “I made the changes your dad suggested. I just need an ending.”

I had thought maybe Devin turned Cynthia down because he wanted to prove his feelings for me, show her he was mine. Thought he wanted to take me back on the dance floor, hold me in his arms all night. But instead he just wants to sit and talk. We never make it back to the dance floor. By the time Devin stops talking, it's time to go.

I guess I was in denial, or maybe I thought I could get Principal Green to reconsider this dumb idea of a multicultural lunch. But it's really happening. There are signs about it all over Richmond.

I've been ranting about it all day to Nikki and Essence. Neither of them seems that interested in what I'm saying. And that's making me even more frustrated.

This is how it was when we were kids:

If Nikki didn't like someone at school, neither did I, neither did Essence.

If Essence was sad about something, so was Nikki, so was I.

If I was excited about something, so was Essence, so was Nikki.

So when I ask them to help me plan a boycott of the Tastes of the World buffet, I'm really not asking, I'm expecting. But neither of them cares.

Nikki says, “A boycott, Maya? Why do you always have to make a big deal out of everything?”

Essence says, “I have more important things to worry about than who's eating what, from where,” she tells me. “I might not even be at school that day. Got someone's hair to do.”

Essence has been skipping school to do people's hair so she can make money to pay for college application fees and other senior costs that keep adding and adding up. I can't even get on her about skipping school; at least this means she's still considering college.

Essence tells us, “I'm braiding this lady's hair and she's paying me $80. I can't pass that up.”

And then Nikki says, “But tell the truth: If you weren't doing hair, would you boycott?”

Essence answers with a laugh.

Dad hasn't been home in time for dinner all week. He called an hour ago saying he'd be here in fifteen minutes. Mom takes three plates out of the cabinet. “Let's just eat. He can warm his up,” Mom says. The cabinet door slams shut. “Nikki, grab some silverware, please.” Mom walks into the dining room.

Nikki gets forks and knives out of the drawer and mumbles to me, “She's going to be so lonely when we leave. Dad's never here.”

I haven't thought about how Mom will feel when we leave. I mean, it's always been this way. Dad has always been off doing something for the community. When Nikki and I were ten years old, Mom enrolled us in a summer dance camp. Dad missed our recital, and Nikki cried the whole way home.

Back then, Mom said we had to share Dad. “He's the only father some of your friends have,” she told us. “They need him.”

She said this as if Nikki and I didn't need him, too.

“Your father is an activist,” she said. She told us about the great things Dad was doing to make a change in the lives of young men and to bring about change in our community.

From that day on, I think Nikki has hated the word
activist
, and I don't think she ever forgave Dad. Mom seems to be over being the wife of a community hero. I think she'd much rather just have her husband home for dinner.

I walk into the dining room and sit at the table.

Mom takes a bite of her meatloaf. She swallows and asks, “How was school today?”

Nikki makes sure she is first to answer. “Well, Maya's trying to start a revolution.” She laughs and wipes the corners of her mouth with her napkin.

Mom looks at me, expecting an answer. When I don't say anything, she says, “Well, somebody tell me what's going on.”

Nikki tells her version of why I'm organizing a boycott. She gets it all wrong. “You know how Maya is, Mom. She has to make a big deal out of everything.”

Mom looks at me. “Maya, are you sure you want to bring this kind of attention on yourself?”

“Dad thinks I'm doing the right thing,” I tell them. I wish he were here. He'd be on my side.

Mom shakes her head. “Lord, Thomas has turned my child into a rebel.”

“You used to be,” I say.

Nikki looks at Mom, then at me.

“Well, she did!” I say. “Remember the letters we wrote to the city about Jackson Park?”

“That was different, Maya,” Mom says.

“I don't even know what you're talking about,” Nikki tells us.

Nikki gets amnesia when it's convenient.

“You don't remember the summer before fifth grade when Mom noticed that whenever we wanted to go to the park, we would ask her to drive us across town?”

Nikki doesn't say anything so I tell the whole story, even though I know she knows what I'm talking about. How could she forget something like that?

We'd pass a dozen parks driving across town. One day, Mom said she was not driving all the way “over there.” That the three of us could walk to the park that was close to our house.

“But Jackson Park has no twisting slide,” Nikki said.

“And the grass is so high it scratches my legs,” I told Mom. “The other park has a pond and we can feed the ducks.”

Mom was angry that we wanted to go to the other side of town for something as simple as playtime. So instead of going to the park that day, we wrote letters to the people in charge of parks. I didn't know there was a person deciding who gets what. But Mom knew, and she took pictures at both parks during the day and at night.

We put those photos in the envelope with our three letters and sent them off. I remember letting go of my envelope into the metal mailbox and how powerful I felt releasing my words into the world.

I remind Nikki of all this. “Do you remember now?”

“A little,” she says. She drinks water from her glass and says, “What I remember most is that Mom asked every mother who had a child old enough to play at the park to write a letter and only, like, what—one or two people did, right, Mom?”

Mom nods.

Nikki continues. “Just like only a few parents show up for the meetings at Richmond, or the community forums at the center.” Nikki rakes through her mashed potatoes with her fork. “I don't understand why Dad insists on standing up for people who
never show up or speak up or do anything for themselves.” Nikki and Mom share a look, and I know that I am not going to get them to see my side—or Dad's side. Nikki gets up from the table but continues to talk. “And Maya, I get it. I mean, I know that the buffet is a pathetic attempt at celebrating culture, but I also know that no one at Richmond really cares. You know what they care about—free food. I just don't want you to be disappointed. No one's going to boycott with you.”

I can hear Nikki moving around in the kitchen—rinsing her dishes and opening the dishwasher. I look at Mom, hoping she'll have the last word, say something a mom is supposed to say, be the activist she was. But she doesn't say anything. We just sit and eat the rest of our food without speaking to each other.

After we go into the kitchen to clean our plates, Nikki starts rummaging in the freezer, looking to see if any more ice cream sandwiches are left; Mom is rearranging the plates in the dishwasher to make more space; I am playing with the magnetic words on the fridge.

Dad comes home. He walks into the kitchen, washes his hands, and immediately goes to the plate on the counter that's covered in foil. “Thanks for setting something aside for me. Sorry I missed dinner.”

Mom mumbles, “Uh-huh.”

Dad kisses Mom on her cheek and warms his food. The microwave beeps, and Dad takes his dinner out. He sits at the kitchen island, takes a bite of his mashed potatoes, and says, “So how was school today?”

Charles and I tried to get students to boycott the buffet, but Nikki was right, free food is hard to turn down. So far, it's just the two of us standing in the hallway watching everyone walk toward the cafeteria. I'm sure we won't even be missed.

The hallway clears out. I see Tony sitting at his locker eating from a bag of chips. Charles and I walk over to him.

Tony moves his books so I can sit beside him and smiles. “Not much of a boycott, but at least we're standing by what we believe,” he says.

We sit next to Tony. He passes his bag of chips like Holy Communion. We eat from the bag. Senior Hall has never been this quiet. Usually there's a crowd huddled around Malachi listening to him
free style, and there are cliques sitting together in front of their lockers eating and swapping gossip. But today, it seems as if every single person is in the cafeteria. A whiff from the buffet teases my nose. My stomach growls. I take a handful of chips.

The only other person in the hallway is the Goth girl with the tattoo. I have never seen her alone, away from her crew. She almost walks past us, but then she stops and stands right in front of me. “Is this the boycott?”

“Yes,” I answer.

She sits down in front of me, crossing her legs. “I'm Star,” she says.

I smile at her. “I'm—”

“I know who you are,” Star says. She looks at Charles and Tony, like she knows them, too. “So what's the plan?” she asks.

“Plan?” Charles asks. His eyes and eyebrows bunch up and tangle in confusion.

Star grabs the bag of chips from Charles and takes a fistful. “Aren't we supposed to be protesting?”

She's got a point. “Guess we were so focused on getting people not to go that we didn't think about what we could do—or eat—instead,” I admit.

Charles and Tony nod.

“So there's nothing planned? No rally, no walkout?” Star doesn't wait for any of us to answer. She
reaches into her pocket and pulls out a wrinkled piece of paper. “I thought there'd be speeches or something, so I came prepared,” she says.

Charles leans back against the lockers, gets comfortable. “There can be speeches. You can read what you wrote to us.”

At first Star just sits there, but once she realizes that we're really waiting to hear what she has to say, she unfolds the piece of paper and begins to read. “It's time for a change at Richmond.” Star clears her throat. Her hands are shaking just a little bit, but her voice is so strong, so passionate, that we have to take her seriously. “I've gone to this high school for four years,” she tells us. “My mom went here, and so did all my aunts and uncles.”

Charles leans forward. Tony closes the bag of chips, quietly though, so the crinkling bag doesn't make too much noise.

Star never looks up from her speech. “My older sister went here, too, and I couldn't wait to be a Richmond Warrior. But our school isn't what it used to be. And I know Mr. Kiss-Up Green is trying to change our image, but he's just a puppet of the system. If things are going to change at Richmond, we've got to initiate that change.”

Star's hands stop trembling, “I am tired of looking at chipped paint on the walls. And why are parts
of our hallways missing tiles? I want to have the same options for electives that other schools have, and we need a computer lab that actually works, that we can print from because there's enough paper for everyone.” Star finishes her list by saying, “And it isn't fair that I am defined by a test score. Why do the people outside of our school misunderstand us? Why does everyone keep talking about change but everything stays the same?”

For the first time, Star looks up at us. She folds the paper and slides it in the back pocket of her black jeans. “Is anyone as angry as I am?” Star asks. “What are we going to do about it?”

None of us has an answer just yet. The four of us sit on the gum-stained linoleum floor under the bright fluorescent lights and share communion until a revelation comes.

December.

Snow falls from the sky like confetti. At first it barely dusts the ground, making everyone go back and forth to the windows to see if it will stick. We watch the sky, wondering whether this will be the winter when we finally have enough snow to make a snowman, to flap our wings on the ground and be angels. Or will we have to drive to Mount Hood for the real winter wonderland?

At the beginning of the month, we pray to be snowed in. How many pleas for school closings does heaven hear? By the middle of the month, we realize God doesn't answer selfish prayers, because no snow has come. But we learn he has a sense of humor
because it falls the day school lets out for winter vacation.

We might be snowed in for the whole break, thawed out just in time for the new year, and dry by the time classes start again.

It's the first night of winter break. Essence is spending the night, and she isn't wasting any time getting to the gossip. “So what's up with you and Devin?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?” Nikki calls out from across the hall. “What do you mean nothing?” She walks over to my room, still changing into her nightclothes. “You two have spent time together every night this week,” she says. Then she looks at Essence and tells her, “They tell my parents they're working on
homework
—can you believe Mom and Dad fall for that?”

“I wish it was a cover-up,” I say. “I mean, I'm all about getting into college, but Devin is too—”

“You're not complaining, are you?” Nikki yells. “I really hope you are not about to say Devin is not a
good boyfriend because he actually has some goals for himself.”

Essence interjects before I can even respond. She is styling her hair in different ways and experimenting with what her hair would look like shorter. She holds it up and looks in the mirror at different angles, then lets her braids fall down her back. “I feel you, Maya. Devin can be a little stiff at times,” she says.