Nine a.m. the next morning, Bug sat parked outside the apartment complex Jahlil was trying to move into. “I’m telling you, don’t you think you ought to at least call your old man?” Bug said.
Jahlil had crashed on the futon in Bug’s bedroom last night.
“I ain’t thinking about him or my moms. What I need to do is move up out of there.”
“What the people say? They gonna let you get the place?”
After what happened last night, Jahlil told himself he needed to move now. He figured that his father wouldn’t sign for him to get the place, so he thought about Lewis. The guy seemed pretty cool. Maybe he would understand. Lewis could say that he was Jahlil’s uncle. Jahlil would tell Lewis he didn’t need his credit, just sign, because Jahlil wasn’t old enough. All Jahlil needed was the apartment people to agree to let him have the place even though he was $3,500 short on the year’s rent.
Jahlil sat slump-shouldered in the passenger seat of the car, looking sadly at Bug. “They said I needed the entire year’s rent, if they were even gonna consider letting me in.”
“You ask them about doing a six-month lease?”
“They weren’t hearing it.”
“Just wait then, or move somewhere else.”
“I can’t wait, and I don’t wanna move nowhere else,” Jahlil said, sitting up, angry. “I gotta go now, and this is where I want me and my family to live. I gotta make it happen.”
“How you gonna do that?”
Jahlil’s cell phone rang before he had a chance to answer Bug. He picked up. Shaun was on the other end.
“You gotta come and get me. I gotta go to the hospital.” There was panic in her voice. In the background, Jahlil could hear loud cursing.
“What’s wrong! Is the baby okay?” Jahlil said, motioning for Bug to start the car.
“Just come and get me!” Shaun said.
When Jahlil walked into Shaun’s apartment, he saw her leaning against a table as though she thought she would fall. Sweat covered her brow. She looked nauseated, as though she would drop to her knees and vomit any moment. A small weekend bag sat at her feet. She wore a jacket she was unable to close because of the size of her belly.
Her mother stood in the dining room yelling. When the older woman caught sight of Jahlil, she focused her anger on him.
“You! You the little motherfucker that got my daughter pregnant?” She was a bony, miserable-looking woman, with thinning black hair brushed back and held together with a rubber band. “She’s seventeen. She ain’t raising no baby in this house like she grown.”
“Come on, Jahlil,” Shaun said, grabbing him by the hand.
“Do you hear me? Don’t be bringing that bastard child back in here, ’cause I ain’t letting either of you in,” Shaun’s mother screamed.
Jahlil halted and turned menacing eyes toward the older woman.
“We better go,” Bug said, pulling Jahlil toward the open apartment door.
“You right,” Jahlil said, taking Shaun’s arm, turning her, and heading out.
“Did you hear me?” the mother said, shuffling closer in her slippers, now waving a spatula in her right hand. “The locks gonna be changed, so don’t come back here with that baby. Throw it in a Dumpster where it belong, but don’t bring that bastard back here.”
Shaun and Bug were already in the hallway, but after hearing what was said, Jahlil stepped back inside the apartment and slammed the door behind him. He locked the door and angrily hurried toward Shaun’s mother.
Jahlil heard Bug outside trying to get in, his muffled voice begging, “Jahlil, let’s just go, man!”
He ignored Bug’s pleas and raced toward the woman, stopped just in front of her, snatched her by the front of her robe, jerked her toward him, and reared back his fist.
The woman cowered, raised both her arms, shut her eyes, and cried, “Don’t hurt me!”
Jahlil wanted to strike her, wanted to beat her, he was so angry. Not just at her, but at himself, at his life, at the loss of his friend Toomey and everything he had done to land him in the awful place he was in. Jahlil saw himself throwing Shaun’s mother to the ground, straddling her, pummeling her with his fists, taking all his hate and frustration out on her. But what good would that do him? Jahlil thought, his shaking hand still raised over his head. It would only make things worse, if that were even possible. Jahlil slowly lowered his arm and fought back the curse words he wanted to say to the woman. He spat at her feet, then walked out of the apartment.