The woman sighs and leans back in her seat. I adjust my headphones around my neck, looking back and forth between the two of them.
“I’m Marva Sheridan,” the girl snaps. “I already voted. My first time. And maybe this would be his first time, too.” She looks at me for confirmation. I nod. “This is his first time, too. You can’t deny him this right.”
I feel bad for laughing. She’s so serious about this, like the girl version of Julian, minus the dreads. I look at her a little closer and realize she’s kind of cute. Even with that hard look on her face. She’s shorter than me. Then again, everyone is shorter than me—I’ve heard enough basketball comments to last about ten lifetimes. But she barely comes up to my shoulder. Her skin is this nice dark shade of brown, and she has black braids hanging down her back with one bright pink one looped over her right ear.
“Hey,” I say softly, glancing at the woman behind the table before I look at her. Marva. “It’s okay. You don’t have to do this.”
“It’s actually not okay.…” She pauses, clearly wanting to use my name but not wanting to ask for it.
With anyone else, I’d probably make them sweat a little because I can kind of be a dick like that when I want to be. People take shit too seriously most of the time, and it’s fun reminding them. But she just looks so damn earnest, and I don’t know why, but I somehow feel like the wrong word could make this entire day crumble for this girl I’ve never met.
“Duke,” I say. Then I add, “Crenshaw.”
I know her first and last name. Only seems fair.
She blinks like she wasn’t expecting that and tugs on the pink braid as she says, “It’s actually not okay, Duke. Have you heard of voter suppression?”
The woman behind the table sighs again, clearly not appreciating the scene unfolding in front of her. We’re backing up the line and it’s not even seven thirty. She does another scan of the voter roll. “Are you sure you’re registered in this jurisdiction?”
I think back to when I registered. Or preregistered, when I was sixteen. The same year we moved here…when we were using Dad’s address for everything.
Shit.
“What?” Marva says, fingers thrumming against her hip. Damn. Can she see all this from my expression?
“I, uh…I might be registered somewhere else.” My eyes sweep from her braids down to her black combat boots. “My dad’s address.”
The woman nods, already looking past us. “Would you mind stepping aside so I can check people in?”
Marva marches out of the church, a dark storm cloud practically appearing above her head. Outside it’s crisp but bright.
“Hey, thanks,” I say, looking toward the parking lot where Ida’s waiting in my car. “I’m just gonna go after school, but I, uh, appreciate you fighting for me like that.” I feel like I need to say something else to give this a proper ending, so I mutter, “Have a good day.”
Jesus. Like she’s working a drive-through or ringing me up at the drugstore.
But before I can take a step, there’s a tight grip on my arm. She may be small, but she’s strong.
“Listen, we have to try to figure this out,” she says, the desperation in her voice damn near palpable. “I didn’t spend months helping people register and educating them on the ballot measures only to see someone throw away their vote.”
I frown. “I’m not throwing it away. There’s nothing to figure out. I told you, I’ll go after school. Got plenty of time before my gig.”
Her eyes narrow at the word gig, but it doesn’t deter her. “How do you know you’ll be registered there? You can’t just wait hours to find out. The lines will be out of control. Don’t you care about democracy?”
Has she been talking to my mom?
“I gotta go,” I say, backing away. “Killer test in Calculus, third period. I’ll figure this out. I promise. Peace.”
I half expect her to tighten the grip on my arm, but she lets me go freely. No doubt glaring, but once I turn around, I don’t dare look back to check.
Ida is waiting in the passenger seat, furiously texting. She glances over as I get in next to her.
“Who was that girl you were talking to?”
I toss my headphones in the backseat and look out the windshield. Marva is still standing there, now focused on her phone. At least she didn’t follow me over here. Except…the more I look at her, the more I wonder if I should’ve just agreed to let her help me. I can’t miss that calc test, but she is really cute. Cuter than any of the girls at my school. And she’s maybe the most intense stranger I’ve ever met, but it’s kind of dope that she cares so much about something when she doesn’t even know how it’s going to turn out.
I shake my head, looking at the clock. I gotta go if I’m going to get us to school on time. I put the key in the ignition and turn. The car stutters like it did this morning and yesterday and the day before that. I’ve been meaning to get it to the shop, but usually, it starts.
Not this time.
I turn that key over and over again, but the car just chokes and stutters until Ida looks at me and says, “I don’t think the sixteenth time is the charm.”
I try once more. Sending up a prayer to anyone who’ll listen. And…nothing.
Shit.
STILL NO TEXTS FROM ALEC.
I look at the last one he sent, as if it will magically turn into something else. Something like Of course I’m voting, Marv. Just messing with you. Or Give me one more reason why I should support this two-party system and I promise I’ll get to the polls.
But I’m starting to wonder if it would even matter if he texted. He hasn’t been himself lately. He’s still the same Alec, sweet and attentive, but something is off. We used to spend all night discussing things like the policies that most resonated with us, and the best way to get the word out about our candidates. Now he changes the subject almost every time I bring up the election. My stomach twists into a knot when I think about the disagreement we had a couple of months ago. I couldn’t believe I was talking to my boyfriend of nearly two and a half years. I still can’t.
“Hey.”
I jump and turn around, almost dropping my phone. It’s the guy who’s probably not going to vote either.
I didn’t even hear anyone come up behind me, which is so not like me. Mom says I have superpowers when it comes to sound. I can hear the trash trucks when they’re blocks away and we forgot to drag the bins out to the curb, and Selma when she’s in a playful mood, slinking around the house so she can pounce on one of us when we walk around a corner. I can even hear my parents murmuring about me in the kitchen when I’m doing homework all the way down the hall in my room. Nothing bad, really. They just think I’m too serious for my age and that I should be “having fun” instead of focusing so much on college applications and raising awareness for the election. I want to tell them this is fun for me, but I don’t want to face that look in their eyes—the one that says they’re way cooler than their own daughter.
I stare at him, clutching my phone by my side. “Hi.”
“Duke,” he reminds me.