The sit down, stand up portion of the service had started. They stood, at the pastor’s command. Sheeda’s phone lit up. Lennie.
The grin on her face was as bright as her phone’s backlight. She had been afraid to hit Lennie up to tell him that Mo had been playing on her phone. Had hoped he’d text her, so she could explain. She was relieved to see his message.
DatBoyEll:
So imma lame?
Rah-Rah:
Mo wrote that. Sorry. She was playing around.
DatBoyEll:
I shoulda known. She on one
DatBoyEll:
U had a brotha low-key pressed in those red shorts
She put a Bible on top of the phone and followed along with the Scripture as the pastor read. As soon as they were allowed to sit again, she balanced her phone on her lap, sitting erect, eyes (never the whole head) cast down as she tapped away.
Rah-Rah:
DatBoyEll:
probly not gonna see u once my sister gone, huh?
Rah-Rah:
My aunt definitely would not be down for me hanging out if Mo
isn’t there
DatBoyEll:
kinda figured. I can still hit u up tho, right?
Rah-Rah:
Yes
DatBoyEll:
Thas whas up
Yola’s head was all in Sheeda’s phone as she stared down. “Who’s that?” she whispered loudly.
“Who?” Kita asked, her eyes but nothing else stretching Sheeda’s way.
“Nobody. My best friend’s brother was asking me something,” Sheeda said, happy when the phone dimmed.
Going to the carnival with them was one thing. And she wasn’t sure she was saying yes to that. She definitely wasn’t ready to have Yola and Kita up in her business. What in the world kind of wacky summer was this going to end up being?
Monique
So, this was college?
The entire campus was stuck in the middle of a forest. At least it felt that way to Mo.
In a way it was like the Cove. Trees enclosed the buildings, making it feel like there was no world beyond it. Except instead of hip-hop and go-go music blaring from cars or houses, the sounds of chirping birds and crickets—definitely, honest to God crickets—filled the air. Everyone she passed seemed to be whispering. As Mr. Jamal was moving their stuff into the room, anytime someone spoke to him it was in a hushed voice like even the outside was under some sort of library inside-voices rule.
Mo wanted to yell out hello to see if it would echo back but had serious worries that the campus police she’d seen in a golf cart would roll up and give her a ticket. Though how fast were they rolling up on anybody in a golf cart? Right then and there she knew there probably wasn’t any crime to speak of. Even if his golf cart got to the crime, all he’d have was a ticket pad and a pen to punish anybody.
Even though their dorm building was one of the newer ones (according to their resident advisor, or RA as she called herself) and made of brick instead of the large gray stones like others she’d seen, it looked like a housing project to Mo. It had fifteen floors and the slowest elevator on earth. Their room was on the sixth floor. Poor Mr. Jamal took the stairs, and by the fourth trip proclaimed that Mo and Mila were plotting to kill him—mostly because they had carried tiny things like a lamp and duffel bags while he beasted suitcases in both hands and comforters under his arms.
Every time Mo went to the truck to get more stuff, she counted. She was stuck at three. She scanned the parking lot, the lobby, the stairs, and people getting in and out of the elevator and was still only on three by the time Mr. Jamal, soaked with sweat, hugged them both and told them to be good and have a good time.
Three Black people. Her, Mila, and Mr Jamal. That was it.
Watching Mila’s father’s taillights as he drove off, she had muttered, defeated, “Well, two, now.”
Lennie was right. Which was bad enough.
It wasn’t that she hadn’t expected it to mostly be White people. But her mind had a hard time with the math. Fifteen floors of rooms, two people per room, sometimes four, and her and Mila were it? She felt surrounded. Even more when she realized that they had to share a bathroom with the two girls in the next room. Their suitemates.
Sometimes the White girls in TAG had asked the stupidest questions—like, why do you need lotion? Lotion. The thing that’s advertised all over TV by a White model. One girl had legit asked her that. Mo wasn’t for it. If somebody asked to touch her hair, she was going off.
While they were still unpacking, a White woman had peeked her head into their room, scaring the daylights out of Mo.
“Oh, hi. I didn’t know anyone was here yet,” she’d said, trying to play off her nosiness. “I’m Brenna’s mom. She’s over there making up her bed. I’ll have to send her over to meet her new suite buddies.”
Mila said hello. Mo didn’t. Like, who just busts into a room they know isn’t theirs?
The woman asked fifty eleven questions, none of which Mo answered.
“Where are you girls from?”
“Are you girls sisters?”
“How far is Del Rio Bay from here?”
“How long have you been dancing?”
If it wasn’t for Mila, it would have been dead silence after every question. Mo went right on unpacking, not even bothering to look up anymore. She was still listening, though. The woman went on nonstop—Brenna was an only child, Brenna had been dancing since she was two, five other girls from Brenna’s ballet school were now with professional companies.
She didn’t seem no ways tired of sharing and probing and probably would have kept on if a man’s voice from the other side of the bathroom hadn’t called out, “Hon, let’s let the girls get to know each other. We have a long drive back.”
Her lips had crimped, like she was mad that he’d blocked her investigation, then spread into a smile as she chirped, “Well, let me get back over and help make up this bed. I’ll send Brenna over to meet you ladies.”
Mo had locked the door behind her. If Brenna was coming over she was going to have to knock.
Mila giggled. “You’re wrong.”
Mo scowled. “This our room. How you just gonna come in uninvited?”
“True.” Mila took her time placing clothes into the dresser across from her bed. “She scared me.”
“Me, too.” Mo had cleared her throat, unsure whether to go on. But decided if she couldn’t be real with Mila, then it was going to be the longest three weeks of her life. “Did you hear her gasp when she stuck her head in?”
Mila frowned in thought. “No. But I guess she was surprised to see us in here.”
Mo sucked her teeth. “Surprised we was Black, maybe.”
“You think so?” Mila asked.
“How she surprised that people in here when everybody checking in?” Mo challenged. “Aren’t all the rooms gonna have people in them eventually?”
Mila didn’t take the bait. She knew Mo and hadn’t earned the unofficial title of peacekeeper for nothing. She kept unpacking as she answered. “Well then, she can give her daughter the heads-up.”
“I know that’s right,” Mo said.
They laughed about it, wondering aloud how many other people would be thrown off to meet them. Mila guessed no one else. Mo figured just about everybody would be. They balanced each other out that way.