I MAKE SPACE IN MY duffel bag so I can pack it tight. Two pairs of basketball shorts, socks, underwear, deodorant and solid cologne, a hairbrush and mouthwash, an unopened pack of playing cards, two pre-paid phones and chargers, dice… and a small plastic bag. I pick up the bag and open it, dumping its contents next to everything else. It hasn’t been opened since I woke up. It’s probably only been touched by the emergency-room staff and me: one wallet, blackened and singed, one school ID, and a rock. But it isn’t a rock. I walk the stone over to the sink and rinse off the soot and ash with antibacterial soap and watch with dread as each language etched upon its surface leaps to life under the rushing water.
I jump at the two knocks at the door and drop the egg-shaped stone into my left pocket before the door swings open.
“Hey, hey, there, soldier. Am I interrupting anything?”
“I… uh… I’m just washing my hands,” I say, and shut off the water.
It’s Mr. Sato, my homebound teacher from the high school. He checks in every week now that we’re nearing the end of May and brings me my last few assignments so I can graduate without repeating the year.
“Good habit. I still wear my mask at the movie theatre. Since the pandemic, it’s just become something I do. I was visiting one of my other students on the maternity ward, so I thought I’d drop in to see how you were adjusting. Huge baby. Cute, though. You’ll be coming home soon, I heard,” he says as he settles himself into one of the only comfortable chairs in the room.
He’s got a full head of gray hair but a young face, which makes it hard to tell just how old he is. But his ubiquitous khaki pants and school-issued polo shirt announce his profession pretty loudly.
“Uh, yes. They’re going to check my bandages soon and then I’ll know.”
“Good. Good,” he adds.
Mr. Sato’s not a very talkative man. He mostly smiles and nods, with the occasional little-known history fact thrown in for good measure.
“I know you don’t remember this, but after our class trip to the Smithsonian, I talked to my buddy at Howard University about your interest in Africana studies and archaeology. Now, I know you were looking for something with a bit more earning potential, but he said that with your test scores there may be a scholarship if you double major. You were thinking physics, right?”
“We were in DC?”
“Sure were. You were obsessed with the Weeksville exhibit. I thought they were gonna close the place down with you in it. Anything jogging your memory?”
“No, uh… I just saw something about it on the internet.”
“Oh yes, it was all over the news for a good while. It’s crazy that we were one of the last groups to ever see the SOTA egg in person.”
“SOTA?”
“Star of the Ages. There are some scholars who say it’s supposed to be called the Goddess Star or God Stone. No one is certain. Ancient cultures are so fascinating. There is some online footage of a Temba tribal elder in Togo retelling the story of the stone and how it chooses to grant its power of invisibility. Apparently, you can’t just hold it. But there are conflicting stories. While a stone egg isn’t mentioned, there is another tale I’ve heard among the matriarchal Bribri people in Costa Rica where a goddess transforms into a bird and is reincarnated by laying her own egg. And then there’s the Ghanaian sankofa bird, the adinkra symbol, which is everywhere. Very, very interesting stuff.”
It feels like the ground has dropped out from below my feet, and I’m about to fall flat on my face. I have to hold it together.
“Reminds me of those mysteries, like The Thomas Crown Affair,” he continues. “Maybe we saw something that day in the museum and we’re not aware of it. We could be material witnesses.”
“What would… the… charges be for something like that?” I try to say as casually as possible. I slowly put my clothes back into my duffel bag just to have something to do while I hide my shaking hands. A glance out the window and I could swear that I saw one of the guys in black suits looking right at me. I blink and he’s chatting with an officer in the parking lot.
Mr. Sato whistles real high, like he’s calling the truth back to him after it’s gotten away. Then he takes his glasses off so he can clean them with the bottom of his shirt. “I dunno, kiddo. It’s a federal crime, so even if the time served isn’t that long, the implications will last forever. You’ll never be able to vote or travel outside the country. If the person who stole it is younger, they can forget financial aid for school and if they’re older, they are pretty much locked out of gainful employment in a ton of fields. It’s really unfair, if you ask me. If you’ve paid your debt, you’ve paid your debt, you know.”
My mouth goes dry and I grab the cup of water resting on my small side table. I drink until it’s empty, then refill it and drink again. “Could the person possibly just return the stone?”
“I mean, they could, but if I were them, I’d do it anonymously. Better yet, I’d return it the same way I stole it. If they didn’t catch him going out, they probably won’t catch him going in. Or her. Or they. I don’t want to be sexist.”
If the room isn’t spinning, it’s definitely off-kilter.
“You okay there?” he asks, looking a bit concerned.
I nod and take a seat on the bed to steady myself. I need to snap out of it.
“Hey, the reason I actually came by was to tell you that I talked to DeAndre, and he said you turned down the Morehouse scholarship. You guys talked about being roommates if you decided to go with the House,” he says, not hiding the disappointment in his voice.
“I don’t remember, but I must have,” I say quickly, eager to get Mr. Sato out of my room.
“It’s not my place, but I need to say something. About you and Tamar.”
Too many thoughts are swimming around in my head; I’ve only been half listening to what Mr. Sato has to say. My priority right now is what I should do to get this thing out of my room. But when Mr. Sato says her name, I stop. He’s got my full attention.
“I know you love her,” he says, and glances at me, gauging my reaction. “Right. You kids don’t like that word, but whatever you call it. You did before the accident, and now that you’re here together, it’s probably just a matter of time before you fall into an entanglement with her again. You were devoted, which is admirable, but you’re both so young. I don’t know if she’s still sick or not, but it doesn’t matter. Some people are masters of focus. You’re like that. You set your mind and make it happen. Your focus used to be on getting a full ride to college, and then it was like you changed the channel and it was all Tamar all the time.
“What I’m trying to say is that you’ll graduate soon, and when you’re as bright as you are, your world is supposed to expand with age, not contract. There is so much to see and experience if you just take the time to look around.”
“Okay,” I say, needing this conversation to be over. I know Mr. Sato has good intentions, or at least I think he does, but he’s making a lot of assumptions, and I’ve got bigger things to think about right now. Tomorrow is as far into the future as I can wrap my head around. The rest of my life can wait a bit.
“Okay? Great. That’s the end of meddling Mr. Sato. Break out those cards I saw you pack away. I’ve got a poker game this weekend and I need to brush up on my poker face,” he says with a big smile.
So much for getting him out of my room.
Later on, in the game room, I struggle to come up with a reason I’ve been cutting my time with Tamar short this week. It’s hard to push all my plans to the side and just focus on the game, focus on her. My brain is filled with scenarios: how to get into the museum to return the stone, what it’s going to take to get the men in suits to stop hanging around, how I explain, and get that person to believe me, if someone finds that I have the stone before I’ve had the chance to return it. All of these what-ifs are swirling around, and the only person I want to talk to about it is her. I’m not sure I can lie, so I figure it’s best to keep my distance.
“Don’t tell me you’re focused on your schoolwork, because I finished a month’s work of assignments in four days,” she says. “And from what Mr. Sato says, your grades were better than mine.”
“You talked to Mr. Sato?” I ask. I should have realized he was checking in on her too.
“He came to see me this week, and I had to pry the information out of him. He mentioned some scholarship you had,” she says.
“That’s not his business to share,” I say quickly, upset that Mr. Sato is meddling not just in my life but hers.
“Why not? That’s fantastic! I have no idea what I’m going to do. The other Tamar—it’s what I’ve decided to call her until we can come to an agreement where she gives up her memories in exchange for my sparkling wit,” she says with a sly smile. “The other Tamar was so sick she didn’t really make any plans for the fall,” she adds sadly.
“She must not have thought she’d be there to see it,” he replies.
“Well, I’m here now, so I have to help her or me make a decision,” she says. There’s a determination in her voice that I haven’t heard yet when Tamar speaks of the future.
“What are you leaning toward?” I ask, trying to keep the desperation out of my voice. The truth is I can’t see a future without her in it, but there is no way to tell if she feels the same way. I already shared too much when I told her about the dreams. Showing your cards too early is a cardinal sin of poker, and if I lose with her, I’ll be out more than a few dollars.
“I want to show you something,” she says while she twists around in her wheelchair to dig into her backpack.
She’s wearing a long dress today, with a black-and-white geometric print that flows down to her ankles and long black leg warmers. Someone painted all her toes dark purple, and they wiggle as she struggles to find what she’s looking for. It’s almost too cute.
“You cut your hair,” I say, glad for something else to talk about other than the thing I’m completely avoiding explaining to her.
“I did! I was just looking in the mirror at this other girl’s face and I asked Nurse Lesli for some clippers and shaved off the side. Auntie O nearly had a heart attack. She called in my cousin Letitia to make it look like something,” she says, and laughs.
“So, you’re telling me she likes it.”
Her smile widens. “Oh, she loves it so much she asked my therapist to come a day early. Ah, found it.”
She raises her new phone above her head like she’s won a prize. “The other Tamar made music. I can access all the old songs in something called the cloud.”
“I know. I found some videos on my phone. There’s also an album of songs. There wasn’t a name on it, but I think it’s you. Her voice sounds like yours,” I say.
“You never said anything,” she says, a questioning look in her eye.
“I didn’t want you to know how much time I spent looking at photos of you and listening to you sing,” I say, hoping this confession won’t dig me further into a hole.
“Well, you don’t ever have to be embarrassed with me,” she says sincerely. I’m sure she notices how awkward I’m getting even though I’m trying as hard as possible to keep my cool. I wish it weren’t so hard to discern what’s too much to share.
Our eyes meet, but she pulls hers away before the moment can deepen. “Well, I thought, if she could make music, so could I, so… I wrote a song,” she says, and clears her throat, a little bashful.
“Let’s hear it, Sniper!” Leo says as he rolls into the room. I told him that I just couldn’t call him P-Nasty to his face so he reluctantly gave up his real name—after I beat him in three rounds of Apocalypse Moon.
“I do have a name,” Tamar chides, but lightly. I think she secretly likes the nickname.
“Yeah, but Sniper’s much cooler than Tamar,” he says with a smile, proud of his nickname for me. “Play the song. I wanna hear.”
“Okay, but you guys can’t be too critical. It’s my first try. I had these lyrics that were just floating around in my brain, and I needed to get them out,” Tamar says.
“Just play the song, already,” Leo groans. “I’m getting older waiting.”
She hits play and the lyrics stab me in my chest.
A blessing to live but a curse to die if only love the heart does find
On the wind of chance does the goddess climb
To turn the many-faced head of time
My entire body goes cold. My head begins to swirl like I’ve fallen backward in a pool and can’t figure out which way leads to the surface. My vision fogs and then it’s all crystal clear.
I remember.