Chapter Thirteen
I step out of the school building and see Esosasitting on the steps, exactly where her text said she would be. She’s with a dark-haired girl, who’s blowing air into a piece of pink bubble gum. After a closer look, I realize it’s Jade from Tech and Techies. They’re sharing a phone screen and laughing at whatever has their attention.
“Hey,” I say.
Esosa looks up from the phone and smiles. “How was rehearsal?”
“Um… okay.” Thanks to the restroom trip I made before coming outside, there’s no evidence of the disastrous rehearsal. My eyes are dry—no trace of the tears that fell as I left the theater. “Ready to go?”
“Yeah.” She stands and shoves the phone into her pocket. “By the way, this is Jade. Jade, my sister. Enore.”
“We’ve met,” Jade says with a straight face. “Is that piece of junk still functioning?” Her lips, coated with black lipstick to match her hair, twist upward. “I would be surprised if it didn’t fall apart on the way home.”
Honestly, I don’t see the appeal of being friends with Jade, but I’ll leave that to my sister.
“Let’s go. Where’s Adrian?”
“He left,” Esosa answers. “He said he had something important to do.”
“How are we supposed to get home?”
She shrugs, and I sigh.
“I guess we’re walking.”
Esosa says bye to Jade, and we start the walk home. Trees line both sides of the small street; their branches curve, creating an arch of leaves that shields us from the sun.
“I signed up to do makeup for the musical,” Esosa says.
“Oh?”
“Yeah. It will be good experience. And I’ll get to do your makeup. And you know you can trust me to make you look amazing.”
I don’t tell her the truth—about today’s terrible rehearsal that confirmed I am not a performer. I’m only fit to sing in a choir.
A minute into our walk, a silver Toyota pulls up to the curb.
“Hey, Enore.” Davi’s face appears in the open car window. “Want a ride?”
“Um…” I’m so caught off guard, I can’t find the words to politely say no.
“Yes!” Esosa answers without a second thought. She attempts to move toward the car, and I grab her wrist.
“No. Thank you. We’re fine.” The smile on my face is strained and I’m sure very unconvincing.
“What are you doing?” Esosa whispers in my ear. “A cute boy is offering us a ride home. What’s the issue?”
“Nothing. I’d just rather walk,” I whisper back.
“Why? Isn’t he your friend? Haven’t you two been sneaking off to have lunch together since school started?”
“Wait. How do you know that?”
“Everyone knows. Everyone also thinks you two are secretly dating.”
“What?” Shocked, I forget to whisper.
Davi frowns, and his eyes shift between my sister and me. “Everything okay?”
“Everything’s perfect,” Esosa answers, then turns to me. Her firm, no-nonsense expression is a little intimidating. “Look. If this is you making shakara, don’t. It’s not the time. I’m wearing wedges, and I’d rather have a ten-minute ride home than a thirty-minute walk.” She pulls her arm from my grip, opens the car door, and enters the backseat.
Both she and Davi look at me, and because I don’t want to look like a complete idiot, I walk to the car. When I try to enter the backseat, Esosa holds the door handle and motions for me to sit in front. I roll my eyes but relent.
“Hi.” I don’t look at Davi while pulling the seat belt over my chest. “Thanks for the ride.”
“Yeah. Sure. Where to?”
I give him the address, and he drives. His grip on the steering wheel is tight, his back erect as he looks straight ahead. If he wasn’t aware of the change between us before, he must be now. There’s tension, heavy like a weighted blanket. In the back, Esosa hums along to the song playing on the radio, blissful and carefree. I, however, look out the window as if the trees we drive past are the most interesting things in the world. I want to speak, start a conversation to lighten the mood, but it seems like too much effort.
The car enters the driveway and stops in front of the main house.
“Thanks for the ride!” Esosa says before rushing out of the car. It’s obvious what she’s trying to do.
“Whoa.” Davi gapes out the window. “This is your house?”
“It’s my uncle’s.”
He nods.
Davi knows nothing about my family situation. I planned on telling him about my dad, but it’s pointless now. I’m trying to put some distance between us, not create intimacy.
“I’ll see you tomorrow. Thank you again.” I step out of the car and breathe in the tension-free air. As I walk toward the path that leads to the guesthouse, Davi steps out of the car.
“Hey.” He jogs toward me, then stuffs his hands in his pockets. “Did I do something?” His eyes shift from my face to the ground and then up again. “’Cause you seem a little off… like I did something. Like you’re mad at me.”
I’m not mad at him. I’m just trying to navigate high school without being sucked into the chaos and the politics, without being overwhelmed by it all. And being with Davi, even as friends, is making that impossible. Because he is more than just the complication I hoped to avoid in high school. He’s the reason I’ve broken four of my rules. But truthfully, that’s my fault. Not his. I should have done exactly what I was supposed to do, exactly what was expected of me.
“You didn’t do anything, Davi. And I’m not angry at you.”
“Okay. Then what is it? You’ve been acting weird all afternoon. Did something happen at lunch? Did Blake say something when I left?”
I shake my head. “No. Blake didn’t say anything. He and everyone else were nice.”
“So what is it?” He takes a step toward me, and then another, until we’re close. “What’s going on?”
Davi and Ara’s conversation plays back in my head—the tense exchange and the bomb dropped right at the end. “You used to date Ara.”
He exhales, and his eyes gradually turn from concerned to apologetic. “I wanted to tell you.”
“I really wish you had.”
“We started dating back in January. We ended things by March. It honestly seems like so long ago now. It doesn’t even matter.”
“But it does,” I say.
I watch his eyes, the striking blend of hazel and green, and warmth bursts in the pit of my stomach. With Davi, my body always reacts in ways it never has before. I have analyzed each reaction and found they’re triggered by infatuation and feelings of a romantic nature. When we first met, it was strictly infatuation—something crazed inside me, fueled by teenage hormones. But lately, the pace of my heart, the moisture that gathers in my palms, and the sensations in my gut are all triggered by romantic feelings.
“I like you, Davi. Not just as a friend.” I’m shocked by my bluntness. If Esosa was here, she would scold me for not making shakara. I really should have… even a little. But I’ve made a mistake and lost grip on my emotions and self-control. I’m so embarrassed but surprised when Davi’s lips expand into a smile.
“I like you too,” he says. “A lot.”
Well, there it is—a confession from both of us. I huff, deeply relieved he reciprocates my feelings.
If things were different, if there wasn’t the complication of an ex-girlfriend or a set of rules that give me a sense of security, we would inch closer. Our heads would tilt slightly—one falling to the right and the other to the left. We would pucker our lips, and just before they touched, just before we kissed, I would warn him. I would tell him I might be bad at it, at kissing just like Jamie said to Landon in A Walk to Remember. But he would kiss me anyway, and it would be sensational. And there would be a moment when our lips stopped moving, but we stayed close, reluctant to step apart.
But none of these things can happen. And while I already know that, Davi realizes it slowly. His wide smile falls, and his brows furrow as he squints and searches my eyes.
“Enore, Ara and I are over. Our breakup was mutual. We realized we were better off as friends. That’s all we are now—friends.”
If there’s any truth to what he says, it doesn’t matter. I can’t let it matter.
“I’m sorry. But it just seems like a lot. I don’t want any drama or issues with anyone, you know? I just want to keep my head down and mind my business. So maybe it’s best we just…” The words that complete that sentence hang in my throat—stuck, resisting release. I exhale, clear my throat, and push them out. “Keep our distance.”
“I’m really confused right now. We went from saying we like each other to… this.” Davi shakes his head. “Honestly, I don’t even know what this is. Are you saying you don’t want to be friends anymore?”
Slowly, I nod. “I think that might be best.”
He laughs lightly. Though it’s missing the element of humor that makes a laugh a laugh. It sounds, instead, empty. “Are you”—another empty chuckle—“joking?”
I say nothing, but there’s a clear answer, even with my lips sealed.
“Oh.” He nods. “Is that really what you want—for us to just stop being friends? Just like that?”
“My life is complicated right now, Davi. It’s a mess.” Tears sting my eyes. I blink, willing them to stay back for a while longer, until I’m alone. “I’m a mess, and I’m trying to survive this country and this town and school. If I can do that—if I can just survive this one year with no issues, with nothing else getting out of my control, I think I’ll be okay.”
He watches me, then takes a tentative step forward. When he reaches out to touch me, I rush down the path that leads to the guesthouse. Thankfully, he doesn’t follow.
At the front door, I rub the tears from my eyes and breathe deeply. I force myself to smile—to put on a mask—before turning the knob and stepping into the house.
Inside, there’s the savory aroma of home cooking. It doesn’t take much guessing to know Mom has made jollof rice. I pull my shoes off on the doormat and drop my bag on the salmon-colored couch that’s topped with white throw pillows. When I step into the kitchen, I’m surprised it’s full. Uncle Davis, Auntie Sara, and Adrian sit at the counter, all with a plate of jollof rice in front of them.
“Hey!” Adrian says while chewing. “Where’ve you been?”
“At school. Where you left us,” I reply, annoyed. “I thought you left because you had something important to do.”
“That’s what he told me,” Esosa says, searching the refrigerator.
“I did have something important to do—eat jollof rice. Dad told me Auntie made some. You guys were taking forever, so I left.”
“And how exactly did you expect us to get home?”
“Didn’t really think that part through. You know, I had j rice on the brain.”
Uncle Davis drops a heavy hand on Adrian’s shoulder. “Stop running your mouth and apologize to your cousins for being inconsiderate.”
“But what’s the big deal? They got home all right.”
“Adrian.”
“Okay. Fine. Sorry. It won’t happen again.”
Uncle Davis shakes his head disapprovingly at his son, then turns to me. “So, how did you guys get home?”
“We got a ride from a… um…” I think for a moment, and the word I land on stings. “Classmate.” That’s what Davi is now. No longer a friend.
“Why don’t you sit down,” Auntie Sara says. “I’ll fix you a plate, and you can tell us about your day.”
“No. That’s fine. I’m not hungry. Where’s my mom?”
“In her room, taking a call.”
I nod and join Esosa by the refrigerator.
“Classmate,” she says to me while pulling out a container of sliced pineapples. “Is that really all Davi is? Are you sure he isn’t something else?”
“What?”
“You know.” She turns to me and wiggles her eyebrows. “A love interest?”
I glance at the packed counter, ensuring no one heard my sister. “Would you please stop?” I whisper back at her. “Davi and I aren’t… you know. Dating.” I grab a bottle of water and twist the lid open. “We aren’t even friends… anymore.”
“Well, the tension I sensed in the car seemed like friends-on-the-verge-of-lovers tension and not friends-on-the-verge-of-enemies tension.”
“Well, I didn’t say we were enemies.”
She shuts the refrigerator and smirks. “Exactly.”
I roll my eyes, and just as I’m about to gulp down the water, I freeze and focus on my mom as she enters the kitchen. After gawking at her for a moment, I turn to my sister, whose shocked expression must mirror mine.
“Well? What do you think?” Mom smiles and spins around. “Do you like it?”
“Your… your hair,” Esosa stammers. “You cut it.”
No, our mother didn’t cut her hair. She shaved it, every strand gone. Our mom has a buzz cut.
The water bottle in my hand suddenly feels heavy. I drop it on the counter and it splatters, but I don’t care about the mess I’ve made or about Adrian’s grumbling. I walk to my mom and get a closer look. “You shaved your hair. Why?”
She runs a hand over her head and shrugs. “I wanted something different.”
“But… Daddy. He loved your hair.”
Whenever she got it braided, he would take his time to oil her scalp, ensuring the blend of peppermint and coconut oil reached each row of plait. And when new growth caused the braids to loosen at their roots, he would help unravel the attachment from her hair. He would wash it whenever she was too lazy to visit the salon. He would comb the tight coils whenever she couldn’t summon the energy to, working a wide-tooth comb through her hair in a way my sister and I never could. And whenever she winced, even the slightest, he would soothe her in a way that made me cringe and also smile. My father loved her hair. He took care of it, and now it’s gone.
“I don’t understand,” I tell my mother. “How could you just…”
“Shave it!” Esosa finishes for me. “All of it. Gone!”
“Don’t be dramatic. I still have a little.”
“Well, I like it,” Adrian says.
“She definitely has the face to pull it off,” Auntie Sara adds.
“She looks fresh,” Uncle Davis says. “Young.”
Their opinions—whether they’re the truth or just a cushion to soften the blow of this situation—do not help.
“You shaved your head.” I can’t stop repeating the words. “You shaved your head. Your head. How could you do that… to Daddy?”
My mother sighs and walks to the sink. She squeezes soap on a sponge and starts washing dishes, fully concentrating on the plate in her hand.
“He loved your hair—just the way it was.”
“Yes. But it’s my hair.” Her tone hardens. She pronounces her words pointedly. “I can do whatever I want with it.”
“I know… but… but he’s—”
“Gone. Dead!” She drops the plate into the sink, and it cracks. “And every time I look in the mirror—every time I see my hair, every time I touch it—I think of him, and I hate it!”
I flinch and shrink back. The room goes quiet. Tears come down Esosa’s eyes. I want to go to her and hold her, but I’m too stunned to move.
I don’t understand. He’s been gone for three months. We left our home and our country—so much of him behind. Why isn’t she trying to hold on to more of him—more of what he loved, more of what he can be remembered by? I wear his watch every day just to hold on. I envision him everywhere I go and play out scenes that could have been. Why is she so quick to let go of him and in such a drastic way? Why doesn’t she want to remember him?
The grief I usually manage so well, the one I wrap up like something breakable and secure in a box, comes undone. I can’t contain it anymore. It’s all too much, and when I release the cry that’s been building in me all day, my body shakes. Uncle Davis wraps his arms around me, rubbing my back, telling me to breathe deep and slow. But I can’t. Breathing suddenly requires too much effort and concentration, and so does standing. My knees wobble, and I push away from Uncle Davis and race down the hall and into my room.
After shutting the door and turning the lock, I open my closet and push hangers aside until I see a series of T-shirts. I drag down a gray one and slip it on. My legs finally give out, and I drop to the floor, curl into a ball, and cling to the cotton fabric that smells like old books and aftershave, inhaling vigorously and trying with all my strength to keep fragments of my father alive.