Chapter Fifteen
Nigerian teenagers live in the clutches oftheir parents and answer to them well into adulthood. For American teenagers, the age of eighteen is a line that separates them from their parents and marks them as adults. But in the movies I’ve seen, before most teenagers hit that milestone, they enjoy the perks of adulthood like having a driver’s license and a car, a privilege the average Nigerian teenager doesn’t have.
Today, I am an American teenager.
I leave school. I get into a boy’s silver Toyota, and we drive down winding roads with the windows down and warm air fanning our faces. We are free, and I bask in it—in this false adulthood.
We are several miles away from school, surrounded by thick, green forestry on either side of the road. Everything that should matter suddenly seems so far away—out of sight and all that. I don’t ask where we’re going. There’s no need because I’m strangely unbothered by our destination. I think Davi likes this—the fact that I don’t ask, that I’m not worried. He might interpret it as trust. As me trusting him. He might be right.
When he glances at me, his stare lingers, and I shove him playfully.
“Pay attention to the road, Ferris Bueller.”
“Huh?” He chuckles and looks ahead. “Ferris who?”
“Bueller. A character. From a movie.”
“Let me guess. One of your teen movies?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Of course,” he says with a smile.
After driving further, Davi pulls into a driveway. The gravel pavement leads to a white two-story cottage that’s surrounded by clusters of trees and shrubs. When I step out of the car, I catch the shimmer of blue water behind the house—a lake that extends in the distance. It’s the kind of setting that draws every source of tension from you like splinters, plucks you free of them until you exhale. I turn to Davi while pushing out a long breath.
“Nice, right?” he asks.
I nod. “Is this your house?” We’re about an hour from school, so I doubt it.
“It’s my family’s summer home… Well, it is for a little while.”
“What do you mean?”
“My dad, the man right there.” He points at the FOR SALE sign wedged in the groomed lawn. The suited man on it is handsome—his dark hair slicked backward, his smile wide, his arms folded in a typical Realtor pose. “He’s selling it.”
I scan the serene setting again, trying to understand why anyone would give it up.
“We need the money,” Davi says. “For my college and…” He clears his throat. “Other stuff.”
Other stuff.It’s obvious those two words are loaded with meaning. His lips part like he’s about to elaborate, but then they flatten to a firm line. He takes my hand and gently nudges me toward the house.
We walk along the cobblestone pathway, and then Davi turns the lock on the door. The entryway is spacious and extends to an all-white living room. It’s a cozy space with an accent of wooden furniture—a table, a dresser, and a rocking chair. The large white couch is topped with a blanket and throw pillows, and the shaggy white rug beneath it has specks of silver.
“Don’t look so impressed,” Davi laughs. “Dad had it staged.”
“Staged?”
“Yeah. Fixed up, so it looks nicer for potential buyers. Trust me, it never looks this put together.”
“Oh.” I look around the room again. “Well. It’s a nice house, either way.” The large window behind the couch reveals the stretch of water in the backyard; a boat drifts in the distance. “I’m sorry you have to sell it.”
“My family has come here for years. We’ve got a lot of memories. As long as we can keep those…” He shrugs. “It’s fine… I guess.” He smiles faintly, then squints and watches me as a moment of silence passes between us. “Enore.” His voice is gentle. “Why didn’t you tell me about your dad?”
“Well… I… um…” I sink into the couch, and I’m greeted by the plush blanket and pillows. “We were just getting to know each other, and…” My fingers fidget. “It wasn’t something I was ready to share yet.”
“Yeah. I get that.” He sits beside me. “I’m really sorry.”
“He was sick,” I explain. “It all happened so fast, and then two months after the funeral, we moved here, and I’m still trying to hold it together. He meant everything to me. My dad. He meant everything.”
Davi takes my hands in his, and I feel comfortable enough to say more.
“He was a professor. He loved teaching. Sometimes, after school, I would take a bus to the university where he worked and sit in on his lesson. Then after, we would go home together. We would talk during the entire ride—talk about nothing and everything.” I smile at the memory, but then my lips tighten to a frown. “My mom isn’t like him. We’ve never been close. She’s always been my mom. A good mom. But just my mom. He was my friend. He understood me, saw me. I could tell him anything. And now he’s gone. And there’s a big hole in my life. In my family.”
Even though I try to fight it, tears fill my eyes. Davi holds me tight as moisture settles into his shirt. He doesn’t let go, doesn’t flinch even when I sob.
I’m not sure how long we stay like this, but then I settle down, soothed by the fresh scent of soap on his T-shirt, the circles he draws slowly on my back, and our proximity. I rub the tears away, then look up and meet his eyes—hazel-green and kind and full of warmth and other emotions that are so clearly directed at me.
I like you too. A lot, he said yesterday, right before I told him we couldn’t be friends anymore. And even with that, with me dismissing his explanation about Ara and ending our friendship so abruptly, he looked at me this morning and knew I wasn’t okay. And he cared enough to bring me here. Whatever fog clouded my judgment yesterday clears.
“I’m sorry,” I tell him. “About yesterday.”
He frowns, though I suspect it’s not because he’s angry but because of the memory of yesterday—the confusion and frustration he must have felt.
I sit up, so our eyes level. “The truth is, I have these rules.”
Davi’s eyebrows dip even lower. A few more words, and I’ll look like a complete fool—the girl who boxes herself in with rules because she’s scared any tiny misstep will make her a little less in control. It’s pathetic, but it’s the truth. And even if my explanation makes me appear completely unhinged, Davi deserves to hear it. After yesterday, I owe it to him.
“Losing my dad and then moving to a new country has been… hard.” I swallow the lump in my throat. “In the past three months, a lot has been out of my control. With school, I thought understanding what I was getting myself into and then controlling the outcome would make things more tolerable. I thought if I could get through this one year with no issues, with nothing else going out of my control, I would be okay. Hence the rules.” I chuckle nervously. “It’s ridiculous. I know.”
“It isn’t,” he says. “How you choose to cope is your choice. It’s not ridiculous, okay?”
There’s no judgment in his eyes, so I push away my initial embarrassment.
“The thing is, I’ve been breaking a lot of my rules because of…” After biting my lip, I release my grip and exhale. “You.”
“Me?” Davi points to himself, confirming what I’ve just said.
“Not intentionally. But yes.”
My answer doesn’t clear the confusion on his face.
“Being with you forces me out of my comfort zone. Like when I auditioned for the musical.”
“What rule did you break by auditioning?”
“Rule number three. Don’t draw attention to yourself. Keep a low profile.”
He laughs. “You would have broken that with or without auditioning. You’re not the hide-in-the-shadows type, Enore. You had my attention the moment I saw you.”
I want to kiss him so badly. How could I not when he says things like that? How could I not when he’s Davi—the first friend I made in America, the boy I fall asleep thinking about, the boy who makes me draw lines through the rules I promised to follow? I inch closer to him, not thinking to warn him first—to tell him I might really be bad at kissing.
He watches the space between us shrink and mimics my movement, shifting toward me.
“What’s your first rule?” he whispers.
“Avoid interacting with or befriending anyone who’s popular. I broke that one on the first day of school or, actually…” I think for a moment and shake my head. “That day at Tech and Techies.”
“I’m not popular.”
“Um… the parade of heys and fist bumps that greet you whenever you walk down the hallway proves otherwise.”
He doesn’t dispute that solid evidence. Instead, he leans closer to my face. “What’s your second rule?”
My heart thumps too fast; I breathe quickly to catch up with the pace. “No crushes,” I say, my voice barely audible. “And absolutely no boyfriends.”
Davi’s eyes sweep over my face. His hand cups my cheek and then slides along the slope of my neck. “Is that why you said those things yesterday—why you pushed me away?”
“Yeah. And because of rule number four.”
He waits for me to elaborate.
“Don’t make any enemies.”
He nods. “Ara.”
“Yeah. She—”
“Isn’t a problem,” he adds. “We’re friends—that’s it. And I…” He sighs, then smiles. “I like you, Enore. A lot.”
“I know. I like you too, Davi. A lot.”
I don’t tell him about the other rules I haven’t broken yet, about my small grasp at control in a world where I have none. I don’t think too much or try to talk myself out of having this moment with him. I don’t include rationality in this equation of emotions and wild teenage hormones. And I don’t warn him about my lack of kissing experience.
I just do it.
I kiss him.
He kisses me.
His lips are soft on mine; they move in a slow, gentle rhythm that I match. Everything comes easy—strangely natural, like we’ve been doing this since the day we met. There isn’t an awkward moment where we shift our bodies or reshape our pursed lips so we fit better.
We just fit.
Seamlessly.
The taste of his mouth—sweet peppermint—laces mine. Everywhere he touches—my lips, my waist, my neck—tingles and heats and pulses and aches. Eager for more, I lean in greedily. I forget to be reserved and patient as my tongue skims over his. I forget to question everything I’m doing—the rightness of my technique. It feels too good to question, and the moment is too heated to interrupt for notes or affirmation. Davi’s lips trail down my neck, then cover my mouth again. He kisses me deeper, and I melt into him as we recline on the couch, my body over his.
I’m not sure how much time passes, but we eventually break apart. Laughing, we sit upright. I straighten my T-shirt, while Davi runs his fingers through his hair.
“Hungry?” he asks.
“A little.”
“I think we’ve got some pizza in the freezer. Don’t worry. It’s not store-bought.” He takes my hand and leads me into the kitchen, a part of the open-concept space. “My grams makes it from scratch and stocks the freezer full of them.”
“I’ll eat anything your grandmother makes.”
He opens the stainless steel door and looks through the freezer. “We’ve got veggie and pepperoni. Got a preference?”
“Pepperoni, please.”
The pizza heats in the oven while I sit on the counter and eat an apple.
“How you doing?” Davi asks, arranging plates and napkins on the dining table.
“Good.” Definitely better than I was at school.
“Happy to hear it.”
“You can take credit for it if you want. For me, being good… being happy.”
He turns to me with napkins in his hands. “Only if you want to give me credit.”
I bite into the apple and smile while chewing. “I’m good because of you.”
“Same,” he says, watching me deeply. “I’m good because of you.”
He says nothing else—doesn’t explain why he wasn’t good to begin with. I want details, but sense he’s guarded and reel in my curiosity. Maybe it’s for the best. Maybe there’s been enough emotions and heaviness today. Maybe we’ve had our fill. Maybe now we only deserve the distraction of each other’s company.
After we eat the pizza, one of the best I’ve ever had, he puts on a movie. We watch halfheartedly, alternating between kissing and talking as it plays. Davi goes on about his little sister, who he’s obviously obsessed with. It’s really adorable.
“Watch any princess movies with her recently?” I ask, giggling.
“Ha ha. Funny.” He rolls his eyes. “For your information, these days she equally appreciates princesses and spies. She’s currently obsessed with watching Totally Spies!”
“I love that show.”
“Yeah… well, she claims to be a Clover, and I think I should be worried.”
We both laugh.
“So,” I say between giggles. “Your grandmother is retired. Your dad’s a Realtor. What about your mom? What does she do?”
“Um…” Slowly, his smile drops. “She’s a teacher.”
“Oh. Cool. Where does she—”
“It’s really not that interesting.” He clears his throat. “Um… how was rehearsal yesterday? We never got a chance to talk about it.”
The abrupt and bumpy subject change basically gives me whiplash. I study Davi, whose eyes are too busy darting around the room to meet mine. What in the world was that? I’m tempted to say something, but I’m not sure what. Instead, I carry on with the subject he brought up.
“Um… rehearsal was… okay. I guess.”
“Enore?” He watches me suspiciously. “What happened?”
“Well, I… I quit.”
“What? You quit? Why?”
“It was overwhelming—more than I expected. I don’t know how to act. And I think, at some point, I’m expected to act and dance and sing. All at the same time. That, my friend, is a recipe for disaster.”
“You don’t think you could have learned during rehearsals?” he asks softly.
“With everyone looking at me, judging me, and laughing at me?” I fear one person doing that more than anyone else, but don’t mention it. I can’t bring up his ex-girlfriend, not when we’ve spent the past few hours kissing. “Also, Mr. Roland is really mean.”
“He’s all bark. Remember, I told you that.”
“Well, could he not bark? I really could do without his bark. I hate his bark. Yesterday, I was very close to whacking him over his head with my script. This close.” I bring two fingers together, leaving a sliver of space between them.
Davi bursts out laughing. “I’m not gonna lie. I would pay to see that.”
“Well, how much are you thinking, and do you think others will pay too? Because for the right price, I would really put on a show.”
He laughs harder, and I can’t help laughing too.
“Seriously, Davi. He’s infuriating and so condescending. As if it’s not hard enough standing up there with everyone looking at me.”
“I know, I know.” He stops laughing and hugs me. “But you have to tolerate him. If you want to be on that stage, forget about everyone else, especially Mr. Roland. Just focus on you, on perfecting your part.”
“But what if…” I pull away from him. “What if I’m not good enough to be up there or to be the lead?”
He holds my face between his hands and stares boldly into my eyes. “You are. Trust me, you are.”
Why does he have more confidence in me than I have in myself? Maybe it will take me time to believe I deserve a place on that stage. Until that day comes, I’m happy I have Davi.
When I kiss him, it’s for a moment, and then he pulls away.
“We should go,” he says.
“Go? Where?”
“Back to school. I have football practice, and you have rehearsals.”
“But I quit.”
“But you still want to be in the play, don’t you?”
I think briefly, then nod.
“Then tell Mr. Roland you’ve changed your mind.”
“What if it doesn’t make a difference?”
“Then convince him. Don’t take no for an answer.”
I sigh. “Okay.”
“Come on. It’s gonna take us an hour to get back.” He extends his hand to me, and I take it.
“You know, you’re really good at the whole tough-love-pep-talk combo,” I say when we’re inside the car.
“Well, I’ve had lots of practice being part of a football team that has never won a championship.”
I laugh. “Well, you might need to put your skill to use with me. A lot.”
He takes my hand and presses it to his lips as he speeds up on the open road.
“Anytime. Just say when. I got you.”