Page 5 of The Wright Man

Tina's mouth dropped open. “A circle—?"

"Big circle, though," Kareem added, already turning back to the boxes. "I'll give you that."

She looked like she couldn't decide whether to be offended or impressed. Then the corner of her mouth twitched. Just barely. “Your head is a big circle!”

Kareem glanced back at her over his shoulder, and for the first time all day, he was almost grinning too.

Mama, watching the whole thing from two feet away, just shook her head and followed Mr. Cap into the truck.

Mr. Cap popped his head out of the truck one more time, calling across the yard like we'd all just met up at a block party.

"Angelica Reed! Behave yourself. And don't bother Maleek too much!"

"I won't, Daddy! He's my best friend!" Angelica called after him. I don't know how we went from strangers, to friends, to best friends in the past five minutes, but I wasn't going to question it. I'd never had a best friend before.

Once her father was back out of sight, Angelica turned back to me with that same mischievous little grin from before—the kind of grin that made it seem like she knew a secret and was daring me to ask.

"Wanna see my favorite place in the whole neighborhood?"

I squinted at her. That grin made me nervous. She looked like the kind of kid who touched stuff just to see if it would explode. "I don't know," I muttered, kicking a stray rock with the toe of my sneaker. "What's so great about it?"

Her eyes lit up like I'd just challenged her to a duel.

"Jefferson Park! It's got monkey bars, two slides, the spinny thing that makes you wanna throw up if you go too fast—and a secret path to the creek that nobody knows about but me and Tina. But she doesn't count 'cause she pushed me in once and I almost drowned, so now it's mine."

She said all of that in one breath and was already hopping down the porch steps like she'd forgotten I hadn't said yes.

I blinked. "...You almost drowned?"

She shrugged like it was no big deal. "I didn't die, did I?" She turned to look back at me, one brow raised like the answer to that question was somehow supposed to convince me.

I hesitated. She talked too much. She made decisions too fast. She moved like she was always about to knock something over and somehow didn't care. But for some reason, my feet were already following her.

Maybe it was the way her yellow dress bounced behind her. Maybe it was the way she talked about slides and creeks like they were magic. Maybe it was just that she didn't look at me like I was broken.

I shoved my hands in my pockets and mumbled, "Fine. But I'm not climbing any trees."

She grinned so wide I thought her face might split in half. "Deal. You can be the lookout while I do all the fun stuff."

As we took off down the sidewalk, her skipping over the cracks like she had them memorized, me pretending I wasn't impressed—I felt something loosen in my chest. Like a knot had started to untangle a little.

I followed behind this loud, goofy little girl in a yellow dress bouncing ahead of me like she'd been sent just to make me laugh.

I watched her twirl for no reason, arms stretched wide like she was trying to hug the whole sky, and it hit me—somewhere deep and quiet—that maybe this place didn't suck. Maybe it wasn't all bad. Maybe it wasn't home yet, but... it could be.

She glanced back and caught me watching her, and instead of saying anything, she just smiled like we'd always known each other.

Angelica. Pretty name. But not her.

Too long. Too fancy. Too not-yellow-dress-twirly.

Angel.

Yeah. That fit better.

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Chapter One