For the next week, while on school suspension, I spent my days alone in the Yukon while Pops went to work and Nyla went to school. Sitting in a cold ride all day was a real bummer. Pops parked on a busy grocery store lot close by his job and walked from there, leaving me to make the best of the six hours he was going to be gone. I laid low to keep from looking suspicious. I didn’t want the cops to have any reason to come up to our Yukon, ask me a bunch of questions about why I wasn’t in school, where my parents were, and next they’ll ride me down to juvenile hall, just because.
I didn’t know what arrangements he had made, if any, for Nyla since I wasn’t going to be there to pick her up after school. All I know is that after he got off work, he picked her up at the library every evening so I guess he had to trust her to walk to the library and wait until we got there.
Thursday came and not soon enough for me. Pops told me he was going to take me to the Board of Education to get my suspension cleared. I was glad that the days were passing by and the weekend was coming up because that meant I would be back at school on Monday and wouldn’t have to sit in a freezing car all day. I could deal with Zach, Sierra, and anybody else who wanted to check me. Anything was better than being all alone to think about how miserable life was.
I wondered what Principal Myers and Coach were doing, if anything, now that they knew my situation. I think I heard Pops talking to Coach a couple of times, but I’m not one hundred percent positive it was Coach. But it sounded like something was going on; maybe something would give. I had been out of school for four days; and now we were at the Board.
After we sat in the office at the Board for an hour or so. Pops and I were finally called back to the office of one of the counselors. I told him everything that had happened. When he asked Pops where we lived, Pops gave him our old address. He didn’t say anything about us being homeless. I guess Principal Myers changed her mind about reporting that we were homeless. Maybe she listened to Coach Byrd after all; who knows. I was just glad this mess was about to be over with and I could get back in school.
Anyway, after the counselor lectured me about the seriousness of what I’d done, he gave Pops the papers I needed to get back into school. I was glad that was over.
“Now that that’s over with, I’m letting ya know, I ain’t coming back down here for no crap like this ever again.” You get your azz in trouble again if you want to, you on your own.”
Okay, does he think I planned this to happen? He talking like I did this on purpose.
“And you think I forgot about that twenty you stole? Don’t you? You think that I forgot about your lying?”
Lying? Me? I know he wasn’t calling me a liar when he’s the one who’s been lying all along. Lying about why we lost the house. Lying about getting a place for us to live. Lying about things getting better. Well, things weren’t getting better. Pops kept on and on. The more he cussed and fussed the more I tuned him out until his voice drifted farther and farther away.
“Okay, you wanna be grown. You think you’re a man, then you gone find out how much of a man you are if you keep on making dumb choices.”
Yea, yea, he may be right but I didn’t wanna hear all that. I was just glad I could go back to school.
“You hear me?”
“Yes, sir. I hear you.” I heard him loud and clear. One thing about Pops, as soon as he says what he has to say, he’s done. It’s like you take it or leave it. I did both, and when we got inside the Yukon, Pops started the truck, turned on the radio, and we drove off.
∞
Monday came and I went back to school. I saw Zach in homeroom. He walked over to me just as I was taking my seat.
“Hey, look, bruh, I’m sorry. I was wrong. Whaddaya say we squash this?”
‘Humph,” I grumbled. “Bruh, you need to step off. I ain’t got nothing to say to you.”
“Come on, Nyl, man. I told you. I really am sorry. The way I acted; it wasn’t cool. I’m really sorry, man.”
My arms were folded across my chest. I stepped back and looked at this fool. He really expected me to forgive him and act like everything was cool. No way. I didn’t want him nowhere near me. I felt like punching him again.
“I said, get the hell away from me, bruh.” I bit on my bottom lip, closed my eyes and started counting to myself. I opened my eyes when I heard my teacher Ms. Madison telling us to take out seats and be quiet. Zach was gone. Good for him. Even better for me.
When I went to my History class, I saw Sierra for the first time since she blabbed her stupid, big mouth to everybody. I couldn’t stand her. I don’t know why I liked her in the first place. I know, maybe it sounds weird, but she didn’t look as pretty as she used to look to me. She looked almost evil, like she was an undercover witch or vampire. I laughed at myself for having that crazy thought. She smiled at me and I looked away and took my seat.
“Nyl,” Sierra called me after class was over. I was on my way to my next class. I kept walking, totally ignoring her. If I had stopped to listen to whatever she had to say I knew I would go off the same way, even worse than I did on Zach.
“Hey, Sierra calling you, bruh,” said Calvin, one of my teammates.
I waved my hand, dismissing her and kept on walking. “Mane, forget her. She’s the reason I got thrown out of school in the first place. That female is nothing but trouble─”
“Nyl, please. Hold up,” Sierra called my name again and I looked around to see her running towards me. “Nyl…”
This time I decided to stop and see what she wanted. If she started talking stupid I was going to walk off and leave her looking like the idiot she was.
“What do you want?” I asked her, and I wasn’t nice about it either. I know I probably looked like I could slap that gum she was chewing out of her mouth, ‘cause that’s how I felt, but I just stood there.
“Nyl, I...I just want to tell you that I’m sorry for what I did. My parents were really upset with me when they found out about it. My mother told me that what I did was not the Christian thing to do.”
Is she seriously calling herself Christian? I burst out laughing in her face. Her mother had to tell her that? I almost fell over laughing at this girl. She had to depend on someone else to tell her that what she did was foul?
“It’s not funny, Nyl. I was grounded and everything. This is my first day off punishment.” She sounded like she was about to cry.
“Punishment? Grounded?” This must be a joke. “You think ‘cause your parents made you stay in your warm, cozy room that’s probably got a big flat screen on the wall, and books on bookshelves to read, and a computer…you call that being on punishment? Being grounded?” I burst out laughing again and started walking off.
“No, what I mean is that I know what I did was wrong, and I don’t know why I did it. But I want you to know that I went on FaceGroup and posted that I was wrong for doing what I did. I told everybody that you were really a great guy and that I made everything up about you being homeless.”
“Look, it’s too late for that. And, really, Sierra, I don’t care what you did. But I hope you feel better about it, because I sure don’t. You were always talking about how much you liked me and then you turned around and did what you did? You’re yesterday to me, girl.”
A couple of her friends walked up. They looked shocked when I told Sierra, “Never say another word to me.” I saw the tears gathering in her eyes and then trickle down her pretty red cheeks, but I didn’t care.
I started walking again and Juvaun and Calvin came up. “Hey, bruh, what’d you say to Sierra? She crying, bruh,” Juvaun said.
I gave him a look that basically said, so what?
I watched as a couple of her friends started laughing. Only this time I wasn’t the focus of their laughter, Sierra was.
I heard one of them. “I guess he told you.”
Another one said, he told you like Taylor Swift said in that song, ‘we are never ever, ever, getting back together,” and then they all broke out laughing, even Calvin broke out laughing.
Sierra ran off crying like a baby, and part of me felt sad for her, but the bigger part of me was glad I had given her a taste of her own medicine. Now she knew how it felt to be talked about and made fun of. Served her right.
When I got to the gym, after school, Coach called me to his office. “How are things going?”
“Cool.”
“Y’all got a place to stay yet?”
“Yep, but it’s not a permanent spot.”
Coach nodded. “Look, when your father gets here, let me know. Tell him I need to talk to him for a minute.”
“Yes, Coach. Is that it?” I wanted to get on the court and start hooping. Whenever I couldn’t shoot ball, it was like a huge part of me was missing.
“Yeah, that’s it, but hey, I expect you to be on your A-game Wednesday night. Now, get out on the floor and show me what you got,” he said.
“Yes, sir.” I jetted out to the court, joined my team, and began to exercise my mad skills on the court. I was in my element. Maybe one day I would make it to the NBA and I would never have to worry about being homeless again.