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“Your job,” he continues, “is to go to school. Don’t those Powder girls go to school?”
Glumly, I kick my toe against the cement. “They do,” I mumble.
“Then you should go, too. Maybe they have capes there.”
That cheers me up a whole bunch. “Really?”
He hesitates and then shakes his head. “Nah, probably not. But we can make one when you get home.”
He’s a little ahead of me, so he doesn’t see my mouth fall open at the discovery I’ve just made. Leka isn’t going to lie to me. Not ever. I race forward until I’m even with his legs and slip my fingers into his again for my hand hug. His rough palm closes around me.
“I’ll be the best at school,” I declare. “You’ll see.”
“I’ve no doubt that’s true.”
And then he smiles. Suddenly, I don’t miss that stupid bunny slipper at all. Leka’s better than a thousand bunny slippers.
9
Leka
Two years later
“Thank you for coming, Mr. Moore. Please have a seat.” Bitsy’s principal, Ms. “Call Me Annette” Swanson, gestures toward one of the two plastic chairs facing her desk.
“What’s the problem?” The question might’ve come out harsh, but I’d rather be back in Marjory’s basement pulling someone’s fingernails out than be sitting in a principal’s office. Under my borrowed suit coat, I’m sweating like a punk who’s just gotten collared by the cops.
She tries to charm me with a smile. “Please, won’t you sit down?”
I’m unmoved. “Is Bitsy sick? Is she hurt?” My heart’s racing.
“No. Not at all. She’s perfectly fine.” The principal puts an odd emphasis on she.
“I’d like to see her. You said it was urgent.”
“Did I? Well, she’s in art right now and we don’t want to take her from that, do we?” She flutters her hand again. “I can’t sit until you do. It’s one of the rules of my office.”
I want to suggest stepping outside then, but this is Bitsy’s school and I don’t want to make waves. Besides, the sooner I hear her out, the sooner I can get out of this place. It smells like day-old milk and cereal in here, which makes me feel mildly queasy. I was busy this morning chasing down a dealer who Beefer says is skimming product. What an idiot. I was washing away the blood when my cellphone rang and some lady, not the one wearing the pearls in front of me but some other one, was telling me I was needed right away.
I paid for a fucking cab to bring me here. I never do that. It’s public transportation or my feet.
“Why’d you say it was urgent if Bitsy’s not hurt?”
Call Me Annette’s smile becomes strained. “Because we had an incident that we needed to discuss and it was important we do it right away. Now, if you sit, we can take care of business.”
I suppose I can’t threaten this woman like I did the dealer earlier. Blood’s hard to get out of light fabrics, for one, and her sweater is off-white. For another, she probably has family that would notice she was missing. I plop my ass down.
Surprisingly, she takes the seat next to me instead of the big-ass leather one behind the desk. A wave of sweet perfume assaults my nose. I start breathing through my mouth. Someone oughta tell the woman she’s spraying it on a tad thick. She crosses her legs, her nylons making that swishing noise as her thighs rub together.
“Mr. Moore,” she begins. The fake last name sounds weird out loud. I wonder if I should’ve chosen something different, but Bitsy liked it. “I take it your parents are gone and that it’s just you and your sister at home?”
“Sister?”
“Elizabeth,” she clarifies.
“Oh, yeah.” When she said sister, I blanked. What did I put on Bitsy’s school admission records? It takes a moment, but the name comes to me: Elizabeth Jean Moore. I try to remember what questions they asked and how I answered. The key to not tripping on your own lies is to make sure you don’t tell any, which is generally why I let everyone else do the talking. When I enrolled Bitsy, a bird-faced lady out front stuck a few papers in front of me and told me to sign. I did, gave my sad girl’s hand a squeeze, and forced myself to walk out before I picked her up and ran back to the apartment.
I go for vague. “It’s just me and Bitsy, err, Elizabeth.”
“I thought so given that you look so young—”
“I’m twenty-one, ma’am,” I interject with a lie.
“Still young.” She smiles, but it’s a fake one. “I have to say, you and your sister don’t look much alike. Different fathers?”
“Something like that.” I glance at the clock above her head. Class will be out in a couple of hours. I wonder why I had to come over right away. “You said it was some kind of emergency?”
