laurel

YOU’RE THE NEW ONE, aren’t you? T-Boom asked me. You coming with us over to the 7-Eleven?

We had just won against Donnersville, and me and the other cheerleaders were walking out of the gym beside the basketball players. Kaylee’s mother was going to pick us up later, and I was sleeping over at her house. Kaylee’s eyes got big, and she nudged me, whispered, I told you he likes you! Say yes! So I said, Yeah. What else did I know that night but “yeah” for anything T-Boom wanted, anything he asked.

You like to party? he asked.

Yeah.

And there it was, my cheeks burning up, T-Boom smiling down at me, the excitement coming from everywhere.

A counselor at Second Chances said, Go backwards in your life. Start from the place before the first time you ever saw the moon.

Stop!

And I’m smiling now as Kaylee pulls my ponytail. It’s that blond hair, she whispers. Boys go crazy for blondes.

But it’s more white than blond. White like my mother’s and maybe M’lady’s before hers became blue. So white that people ask again and again, Is that your natural hair color?

Black and orange pom-poms bouncing against our legs as we run out of the gym—We are the mighty Tigers!

And when I look back, Jesse Jr. and my daddy are still in the stands, blowing me good-bye kisses. We’ll see you tomorrow and two thumbs up from my daddy, his grin wide. Good job, Laur!

Good job, Laur, Jesse Jr. echoes, sticking his tiny thumbs up into the air.

Go backwards, the counselor said. And don’t stop when it gets painful. Don’t stop when it gets hard.

T-Boom. Co-Captain Cutie wants you! Kaylee says. Crazy, huh? But there is a longing in her voice—her whole life in Galilee, two years on this team, and here I come. Still wet behind the ears, M’lady would say. And the co-captain of the b-ball team wants to know if I like to party.

Yeah, I like to party!

Behind the 7-Eleven, plowed snow was piled high, with more snow coming down on top of it. T-Boom smelled like sweat and cold and a whole lot of familiar things. Smelled like someone I’d known forever. And me finally finding my words, finally finding the question I’d been wanting to ask.

How come you have that gumbo tattoo . . . ?

T-Boom laughed. His laugh was sweet, like somebody younger, somebody surprised by their own laughter.

I’m all mixed up, he said. I’m always all mixed up. Just like the crazy-good gumbo my Louisiana grandma makes.

And the word sounded like a song. Louisiana.

Maybe he played with my hair, shaking snow from it, pulling it out from where I’d tucked it inside my coat. It’ll get all wet, I said. Don’t. But I didn’t want his hand moving too far away from me, so I let the word come quiet, fade quick as it left my mouth.

He kissed me. And his lips were soft and warm and familiar, familiar like this wasn’t my first kiss but my hundredth kiss, my hundredth T-Boom kiss. But it wasn’t. It was my first kiss, spinning inside gumbo and T-Boom and the sound of cheers echoing off the hardwood bleachers and snow whirling around me.

He said, I hear you come from Mississippi. How’d you get so far from home?

I just did, I said. I just dropped from the sky.

Well, I guess I’m lucky if girls like you just be dropping down from the sky.

The sky was gray where I dropped from. Then it was black. Then the land beneath my feet was gone. I didn’t say this. Didn’t tell T-Boom about my before life.

What else does your Louisiana grandma make?

Everything. You sound just like her. Slow-talking Southern drawl. He touched my hair again. I could marry you in a minute.

My face was hot, and the snow falling on it melted quickly. M’lady’s voice shot into my head. Find your husband—somebody you love a lot and loves you more . . . You all right, Laurel?

Yeah.

T-Boom pulled me to him again. He didn’t try to kiss me again, just held me like that, close to his body, until M’lady’s voice faded away and warm air crept up where the cold had been. I breathed deep into his coat and closed my eyes. I could hear Kaylee and some of the other girls laughing on the other side of the 7-Eleven. Way far off, I could hear the train moving through—going on through Missouri to get people down to Louisiana.

T-Boom pulled back away from me and took something out of his coat pocket.

You shivering like crazy, he said.

I looked closer at the clear plastic bag T-Boom was holding. There was something in it that looked like powder that seemed to be glowing in the moonlight. For a moment, I just stood there next to him, staring at that little piece of moon in his hand. Then he rubbed the bag back and forth with his fingers some more, opened it, took a little bit out and sniffed it off his finger. I watched the powder disappear inside T-Boom’s nose. He closed his eyes, let his head fall back and smiled.

What is that?

T-Boom opened his eyes slowly and looked at me.

What’s that you got, T-Boom?

Then he looked at me a minute longer before holding it out. Something that’s gonna take all that shivering far, far away.