The Pact (4 page)

Marcus

With
my back toward the water, and my eyes toward the sky, I bounced…not once, not twice, but three times on the diving board before plunging into the cool water backward. I did the backstroke across the Olympic-size pool, turned a flip and then ended up at the edge of the pool, face-to-face with the lifeguard. I wiped the excess water from my face and focused.

“What’s up?” I asked her, flashing my pearly whites.

“Nothin’,” said Rena, and pretended to look away.

“So you work here, huh?”
That was a stupid question,
I thought after it escaped from my lips. Of course she worked here; any idiot could see that. I tried to redeem myself by asking, “You been a lifeguard long?”

“This is my third summer,” she said.

“Cool,” I said, and then a long period of dreadful silence followed. I stood there, looking kind of stupid.

“You’re a pretty good swimmer,” she said.

“Took lessons at the Y when I was younger.” I smiled again. “What’s your name?”

“Rena. And yours?”

“I’m Marcus Carter,” I told Rena. “You live in the neighborhood, right?”

“In the building across from the tennis courts.” Her dimples were deep and nice, and I found myself staring into her light brown eyes. “You play tennis, Marcus?”

“No.” I frowned. “That’s a game for chumps.”

“And you say that because…”

“Because I’ve never seen anyone cool play tennis.”

“I play tennis…and I’m very cool,” she boasted, “and that’s a pretty narrow-minded thing to say, anyway. Usually when people don’t know anything about something, they put it down. It’s called fear of the unknown.”

She sounded like my mother, like she was scolding me or something.

“Is that right?”

“Yes, it is.” She looked me square in the eyes. “I can show you how to play.”

“Not interested.”

Rena climbed down from her lifeguard chair, removed her whistle from around her neck and stuck it in her pocket. “In case you change your mind, you can meet me at the court at seven o’clock.”

“You mean tonight?”

“I mean in the morning. Before it gets too hot outside.” She removed the clasp that held her ponytail in place and her hair fell to her shoulders. “Will you be there?”

“I doubt it,” I said. It wasn’t often that I was even awake at 7:00 a.m. during summer vacation. “I’ll just be getting my sleep on at seven o’clock in the morning.”

“Suit yourself, Marcus,” Rena said, and then headed toward the gate. “That’s where I’ll be in the morning, just in case you change your mind.”

Before I could say another word, Rena was gone. I watched as she disappeared through the gate of the pool area and into the parking lot. Part of me wanted to chase her—ask her where she was going, and if she had plans for this evening. I wanted to get to know her, find out what she liked to do, what type of music she liked. I wanted to just look into those light brown eyes a little longer. She had the perfect body—round hips and a nice set of legs, pretty brown skin and perfectly white teeth. Her hair was long and sort of curly. She was the best-looking girl I’d ever seen besides Indigo. And this had been the first time in a long time that I hadn’t spent every waking hour thinking of Indigo Summer. Someone had taken my mind off her: Rena was the perfect remedy for a lonely heart.

Suddenly the bass from a bumping 50 Cent song seemed to shake the sidewalk, and I turned to see where the loud music was coming from. A silver Monte Carlo with red leather interior, twenty-twos and tinted windows slowly crept across a speed bump. The driver, sporting braids in his hair and a gold grill at the bottom of his mouth, stuck his head out the window and smiled at Rena. A few words were spoken between them, and then she ran around to the other side, hopped into the passenger’s seat and gave the driver a kiss on the lips. He pumped the music louder, turned the car around and then sped out of the parking lot.

“That’s Cedric.” Michelle was suddenly in my ear again, answering questions, and I hadn’t even heard her walk up. “Rena’s boyfriend.”

“Seems like a nice dude.” I grabbed my towel, dried my face and hair. “It was nice to meet you, Michelle. I’ll see you around.”

I headed toward my mother’s building. Took two steps at a time to the second floor, unlocked the door and went inside. After showering and changing into dry clothes, I fixed myself another bowl of étoufée and a tall glass of Cherry Coke. I grabbed the remote to the television, turned to SportsCenter and caught the latest sports news while I ate. My mother’s Creole cooking was something that I’d missed. Her New Orleans roots put her in a class by herself when it came to cooking. My stepmother, Gloria’s, cooking couldn’t compare to my mother’s.

New Orleans was a place that I visited in the summertime when I was smaller, and sometimes during Mardi Gras. My grandparents still lived there, even though their home was destroyed in Hurricane Katrina. They moved away to Mississippi just until the city was somewhat rebuilt. It still wasn’t complete, in my opinion, but many of the older residents were anxious to get back to the place they considered home. My grandparents refused to call anywhere else their home.

Mom wasn’t so quick to move back, but instead had decided to make Houston her home. Houston—a place where a girl named Rena lived. Unfortunately, she had a boyfriend, Cedric, who didn’t even seem like her type. Yet she was so comfortable with him. He didn’t seem good enough to have a girlfriend so beautiful, but he was the one who drove off with her in the passenger’s seat of his Monte Carlo—a very nice Monte Carlo, with nice wheels and a bumping system, I might add. I didn’t stand a chance with Rena. She was just a beautiful girl who had temporarily taken my mind off Indigo. I should’ve known that she was too good to be true.

Indigo

“Crank
dat Superman Dance!”

Every teenager at the barbecue moved to the music of Soulja Boy, doing the Superman Dance in unison. Sabrina, my cousin Kenny and I were in the front row. Little Keith, Bridgette and Shawntay were in the middle and on the back row were my cousin Anjelica, who had just turned twelve, and Uncle Keith. As the other grown-ups looked on, I was surprised to see that Uncle Keith could actually keep up with the rest of us. He knew how to do the Superman Dance just as well as Sabrina and Kenny, who were the best two in the bunch.

I knew the dance very well, because we had rehearsed it in dance practice and had actually talked Miss Martin, our dance coach, into letting us perform it at halftime at one of our games. Not to mention Jade and I had practiced it a million times on my front porch, even when it was cold outside. Everybody had their own way of doing it and incorporated just a little piece of their own style into it. Some could do it better than others, but everybody was doing it. It was the dance of the century, and if you didn’t learn it, then you had to be from Mars or another country.

With a raised shot glass, Cousin Benny tried to mimic our steps. Cousin Doreen raised her can of Colt 45 into the air and cheered us on. Daddy clapped to the music off beat, and Nana just stood by watching with her head cocked to the side. For a minute, I thought she might join us in the middle of the back lawn, but she didn’t. She just stood there, with a smile on her face—a smile that let me know she was happy at that moment. Nana was always happy when she could bring the family together for a good time and the police didn’t have to come and escort anybody away. I was glad for that, too. Sometimes family gatherings ended in cussing and fighting, or someone drinking too much and causing a scene. But here it was, the sun had gone down—just about dusk, the streetlights were already shining and the crickets were chirping. Lightning bugs were floating through the air, and no one had been arrested. That had to make Nana very happy. I wanted to hug her as I moved my shoulders to the beat.

Later, after everyone had gone home, Sabrina and I moved about the backyard collecting empty beer cans, plastic cups and paper plates and loading them into a huge trash bag. The place was quiet now, except for Daddy and Uncle Keith laughing and talking to each other in lawn chairs on the back patio. They were catching up on old times. It wasn’t often that Daddy got to spend time with his brother, considering we lived in Atlanta and only visited Chicago occasionally. At thirty-nine years old, Uncle Keith still lived with Nana. After his divorce from Aunt Pauline, Little Keith’s mother, Uncle Keith had moved in with Nana and never left. He’d been depressed and had spent several months trying to recover from the divorce. But even after three years, he was still there, claiming that Nana needed him. However, Nana would have preferred that he get his own place. He drove her crazy most of the time, bringing a different woman home every time she turned around. And he never cleaned up after himself, Nana once told me. It was like raising him all over again, and as far as she could tell, Uncle Keith was a grown man.

As Sabrina and I stood in the kitchen and washed dishes by hand, I noticed that the music had changed from hip-hop back to the oldies. Nana didn’t have a dishwasher, only a sink with running water. I covered the huge pan of ribs with aluminum foil and placed the bowl of potato salad into the refrigerator.

“You wanna go out with me tonight, Indi?” Sabrina asked. “I sent Brittany home with my mama and daddy, so I’m as free as a bird.”

“Go out where?” I asked.

“There’s a club on the South Side of town, and it’ll be on and poppin’ at about ten o’clock. I can get you in if you wanna go.” Sabrina dried her hands with a dish towel. “So what’s up?”

“My daddy’s still here. And he’s not leaving to go back to Atlanta until tomorrow morning. I don’t know if he’ll let me go,” I said. “Nana might not let me go, either.”

“Just leave it up to me.” Sabrina stood about five feet eleven inches tall—the perfect height for a model. Her shoulder-length hair brushed her bare shoulders, and her halter top hugged her small breasts. Her short denim shorts revealed her long, smooth vanilla legs, and she wore wedge-heeled sandals. Everyone had always compared Sabrina and me to each other—especially when we were smaller. Said that we could pass for sisters. I had to admit, we did favor each other, but I didn’t have half the body that Sabrina had. And my legs were nowhere near as shapely as hers.

“What you wearing?” I asked.

“I’m wearing what I got on,” she said. “It’s a very relaxed environment. You might wanna wear something a little sexier. Don’t put it on yet, though. I don’t want Nana trippin’ before we leave. You can change at my place.”

“Your place?” I asked with a raised eyebrow. “You got your own place?”

“Shoot, yeah! I thought you knew,” she said. “I’m almost grown now, Indi. I’ll be eighteen in a few months. Plus, I got my own kid, so that makes me grown anyway.”

“I can’t believe you have your own place.” I was in awe of my cousin, who I’d always looked up to.

I wanted to be just like Sabrina, wanted to dress like her and wear my hair the same way. And I’d always wanted to act just like her. She seemed to handle things very well, and was smarter than most, with a high grade-point average all through school. The cute boys always wanted to date her, and everybody wanted to be in her circle. She had her own little following when we were little. Sabrina was popular, smart and pretty—all the things that I wanted to be.

When I found out that she was pregnant, I’d been disappointed. I’d always thought she would grow up to be a doctor or a lawyer, or someone who would make important decisions in the world. But instead, she had let her family down by having a baby at a young age and dropping out of high school. She had let me down, too, because I was the one who had looked up to her. Who would I look up to now? Even though she had gotten her GED, it wasn’t the same. She was the one who was supposed to do big things.

“Of course I have my own place. It’s nothing fancy, just a little apartment. Not much, but it’s mine.” Sabrina stuffed what was left of the baked beans into the fridge and then turned to me. “Go find something to wear. I’ll talk to Cousin Harold and Nana. Don’t worry about a thing.”

Whatever she said to them must’ve worked, because before I knew it, we were in Sabrina’s boyfriend, Dugan’s, fixed-up Caprice Classic. It was tan and had huge wheels and furry seat covers. A big fuzzy pair of dice hung from the rearview mirror.

“This is Dugan’s car. I’m just driving it because my car is in the shop. But he’s about to buy me that new Escalade, anyway.” She smiled as she turned at the stoplight. “He buys me whatever I want. We might be getting married soon.”

“Married? For real?”

“Don’t tell nobody, because I don’t wanna hear their mouths. Everyone will think that I’m too young and that I’m rushing into it.”

“Aren’t you—too young, I mean?”

“I’ll be eighteen soon, Indi. And I won’t even need my parents’ permission. That’s what we’re waiting on—my eighteenth birthday.” She pulled a package of Newports from over the sun visor. Pulled out a cigarette and lit it. “Enough about me. What’s going on with you, girl? I heard you got a little boyfriend down there in Hotlanta.”

“I had a boyfriend. His name was Marcus.”

“Y’all broke up?”

“Just for the summer,” I said. “We made a pact that if we didn’t meet anybody new on summer vacation, we would get back together at the end of the summer.”

“Girl, whatever! What kinda pact is that?” She laughed and took a puff from her cigarette. “That boy is gonna hook up with somebody else, and so are you! That’s the silliest thing I ever heard. Whose crazy idea was that, anyway?”

She turned off the air-conditioning and rolled her window all the way down. I followed her lead and rolled mine down, too, to let the smoke out.

“It was my idea,” I admitted, and immediately wanted to change the subject. Didn’t want to think about Marcus meeting someone new. I hadn’t given much thought to
him
meeting someone new, only the fact that I might. But now, after listening to Sabrina, I realized that there was a good chance Marcus might meet another girl in Houston and actually like her better than me. That thought made my stomach turn flips. I couldn’t believe that I hadn’t thought this through. I’d only thought of myself the whole time. What if I didn’t meet anyone and Marcus ended up with a new girlfriend? Where would that leave me at the end of the summer?

“Earth to Indigo….” Sabrina was trying to get my attention, as I had been lost in thought. She took another drag from her cigarette and then flipped the ashes out the window. “There will be some honeys at the club tonight. You wait and see.”

Sabrina turned into an old apartment complex. People were standing around outside, as if a party were going on right there in the parking lot. There was laughter and loud music as we pulled into an empty space. After we stepped out of the car, I followed Sabrina along the sidewalk and up a flight of wooden stairs. She stopped in front of an apartment door—18 E—and banged on it.

“Dugan, open the door!” she yelled.

Dugan took his time about opening the door, and when he did, he stood there with a towel wrapped around his waist and nothing else. I observed his huge arms and biceps, and his abs were tight like Marcus’s. He was handsome, I thought, as my eyes finally checked out his braids, which were freshly done. The do-rag and fitted cap that he’d worn earlier at Nana’s were gone, and I couldn’t help noticing that his braids hung to his shoulders. I’d been so busy avoiding his stares earlier at the barbecue, I hadn’t noticed that his eyes were hazel colored and his smile was a lot like Chris Brown’s. He wrapped his arms around Sabrina to hug her, but his eyes were steady on mine. And the shower gel that he’d just used was tickling my nose.

“You didn’t get a chance to meet my cousin Indigo earlier,” Sabrina said. “Indigo, this is Dugan—Dugan, Indigo.”

“Nice to meet you, Indigo.” He held his hand out to me and I shook it. “Come on in and have a seat.”

I stepped into the apartment and immediately caught the aroma of some type of berry-smelling incense. Candles burned on the coffee table, and I almost didn’t notice the old stained carpet because the leather furniture was so nice. There was a big-screen TV in the corner of the room, tuned to ESPN. A blond announcer interviewed pro basketball player Dwayne Wade.

“What you drinkin’, Indi?” Sabrina asked. “You want a beer?”

“No. I’m fine,” I said, glancing around at the African art on the stained walls and the beautiful plants that were neatly placed in the corners of the room.

I wondered how my cousin could afford to furnish a place like this, considering she worked at Jewel drugstore part-time. The television alone must’ve cost a fortune. And leather furniture wasn’t cheap. Dugan hit the power on the stereo. I hadn’t even noticed it was there until loud music spilled out of it. As Ne-Yo’s voice rang through the speakers, Dugan switched the channel to BET and
Hell Date
was on. I watched, but couldn’t hear what was being said because the TV was muted. Sabrina was on the phone with one of her girlfriends, describing what the plans were for the evening.

As I sat on the edge of the leather sofa, I wondered what the rest of the night would bring.