To Be a Man Page 9

  When Trevor woke up on Wednesday morning, the first thing he thought about was the meet at Lincoln. The day before at school, Marko kept eyeballing Trevor and making silent warning signals. He’d poke Trevor in the arm with his index finger and wink as if to say, “Remember to slow down during the hundred meters, or else.”

  Trevor thought he could possibly run his best at the meet and still not beat Marko. Then Marko would think he’d thrown the race out of fear. Trevor hated that idea. So Trevor made up his mind to run as fast as he could, to outdo himself. He wanted to run better than he had ever run before just to prove to himself that he had the courage. It was a matter of pride.

  At lunchtime, Jaris asked Trevor if he had told his mother about Vanessa yet.

  “No,” Trevor admitted. “We had a wonderful day with Ma on Sunday. We went to church with her, Tommy and I did, and then we took her out to eat at a nice restaurant. I was gonna tell her Sunday afternoon, but I chickened out. I didn’t want to ruin that good day we gave her.”

  Trevor hadn’t told anybody but Kevin Walker what happened on Friday night, how he drove that car for Bo. Although Kevin was eating his sandwich with the others, he didn’t bring it up in front of anybody. He had that much integrity. He respected Trevor’s need for confidentiality.

  After classes ended, Coach Curry pulled up in his van, and the Tubman track team piled in. Kevin sat next to Trevor. Marko was in the back. Kevin leaned over to Trevor and said quietly, “Remember, don’t let the snake scare you.”

  “I hear you,” Trevor replied and nodded.

  When they got to Lincoln, the stands were crowded, mainly with home team supporters, but a lot of Tubman fans were there too. Trevor couldn’t help but notice Marko’s father, wearing fine clothing and loaded down with gold chains, and his friends, just as dressed up with jewelry. Marko’s father wore what looked like a very expensive suit, and one of his friends held a pricey camera to record Marko’s triumph.

  Before the meet was underway, Marko walked over to Trevor. “You know the drill, man,” he whispered with a sinister smile.

  Trevor said nothing.

  “Don’t stonewall me, dude,” Marko commanded. “You’ll be the sorriest boy in the county if you double cross me. Take a look at the man there in the stands—my father. We don’t want him disappointed, do we?”

  Kevin joined Marko and Trevor. He looked Marko in the eye and asked, “You wishing Trevor luck, dude?”

  “You got no dog in this race, man,” Marko snapped. “Bug off.”

  “The race is almost here, man,” Kevin advised Trevor. “We got to focus now. No fear.”

  The runners got set for the 100-meter event. Trevor could hear his heart pounding. Usually when he ran he was thinking only of the race. Now he had Marko’s threat on his mind too. He bitterly regretted not following Jaris’s advice to talk to his mother about Vanessa. But Trevor kept pushing it off until it was finally too late.

  When the runners took off at the gun, Marko grabbed an early lead. Trevor saw him from the corner of his eye. He had a powerful stride. Trevor’s legs felt strange. One of the Lincoln sprinters went by too, and now Trevor was third.

  Then something seemed to switch on inside Trevor’s body. Suddenly everything felt right. It was like the other day during practice. Trevor passed the guy from Lincoln and then he started to overtake Marko. He was running neck in neck with Marko, with Kevin’s voice echoing in his brain, “Don’t let the snake scare you.”

  Trevor flew over the finish line, convincingly beating Marko. It was the first 100-meter event that Trevor ever won.

  Trevor’s friends surged around him, high-fiving him and hugging him. Standing a few yards away was Marko, with a terrible look on his face. His eyes were fiery. His father and friends were already leaving the stands. They wouldn’t stay for the rest of the events even though Marko was running in the relay too. Marko was supposed to win the 100-meter event, and that was all they cared about.

  When Marko could finally get close enough to Trevor to say something, he hissed, “You’ll be sorry, Jenkins. Oh man, will you be sorry.”

  After the track meet, Tommy drove Trevor home. “You were awesome, little brother,” Tommy praised him. “I never saw you run so fast in your life. You were so smooth. You just glided along like some crazy machine, man.”

  Trevor couldn’t think of anything else but how Ma would be when she came home at ten o’clock after getting Marko Lane’s poisonous message. Marko had plenty of opportunity to reach Ma between the time the meet ended and ten at night. Trevor figured Marko could even go to the home where she worked and catch her during her coffee break. He’d do it too.

  All Trevor could do was wait.

  CHAPTER TEN

  When Trevor heard his mother’s old car come to a squeaky stop in the driveway, he clenched his fists. Trevor wasn’t even going to pretend he was asleep. He would face his mother as she came in the door.

  Ma came in, wearily as usual, and sat down in the first chair she saw, the one at the kitchen table.

  Trevor brought her a bottle of the chocolate nutritional drink she usually had at night. “Hard day, Ma?” he asked through his dry mouth. His case of nerves had given him stabbing stomach pains.

  “Yeah,” Ma replied. She looked at Trevor. The look in her eyes told Trevor that she knew. “Here it comes,” he thought. Marko Lane had planted the bomb, and now it would explode, right here in the kitchen.

  “When I come out for my break at three, somebody’d come to see me,” Ma started to say. “Usually nobody there by the bench where we rest, but a boy was standin’ there. Marko Lane. He was waitin’ on me. Said he had somethin’ to tell me, somethin’ important. Trevor, it true you’re datin’ Vanessa Allen?”

  For just a second or two, Trevor considered lying. He thought he might say Marko was lying. That would buy him a little time anyway. He thought he would tell his mother that Marko wanted him to throw the 100-meter race today and if he didn’t, Marko promised to make trouble. But Trevor was done with being afraid.

  Trevor looked at his mother and almost spit out the words he had to say.

  “Yeah, Ma, I’ve seen her a few times. We watched a movie together, and once we sat on the beach and watched the sun go down.”

  “How come you never tol’ me?” Ma asked. The old rage Trevor was so familiar with began to seep into her face like water filling a sponge. Her brows knit. “You oughta have tol’ me, Trevor. I sacrificed a lot for you and you oughtn’t to be doin’ stuff behind my back. Y’hear me, boy?” Ma’s voice was harsh.

  “I should’ve told you, Ma,” Trevor admitted. “I would’ve too, but you’ve made me so scared of you that I can’t talk to you about anything. I can’t come to you with my problems, like Jaris and Derrick go to their parents. I got to keep it all bottled up inside, and it’s killing me, Ma.”

  Trevor was speaking in a soft, calm voice that belied his pounding heart. “Believe me, Ma, there’ve been lots of times I just ached to talk a problem over with you, ’cause I know you love me more than anybody, and your advice would’ve helped me, but I was too afraid to even bring anything up for fear you’d go ballistic on me.”

  “What’re you sayin’, boy, that I’m some ogre?” Mickey Jenkins cried.

  “Ma,” Trevor responded, “I love you, and you’ve done more for me and my brothers than probably half a dozen mothers put together, but I shouldn’t have to be afraid of you like I am. I’m almost a man, Ma. I’m sixteen years old. I want to start doing the things a man does, without fearing that my ma is going to come after me with a belt. Don’t you know how that makes me feel, Ma? You make me ashamed of who I am. I want to be a man, Ma, and I want you to be somebody I love and trust and can talk to.”

  Mickey Jenkins closed her eyes for a few seconds. She seemed to be shaking, but she steadied herself. “I been that bad, boy?” she asked in a hoarse voice.

  “Sometimes,” Trevor answered. “I know you did it out of love, Ma, but that doesn’t make i
t right.” Trevor walked over to the chair his mother was sitting on and knelt beside her, taking her worn, calloused hands into his smooth boy’s hands. “It can’t be like that anymore, Ma. I need to do what a boy does when he’s almost a man. I’m responsible, Ma. I’ve kept all the rules. I don’t do anything against the law and stuff. I respect my teachers. I respect you, Ma, and I always will, but I don’t want to be afraid anymore.”

  Asingle tear ran down Mickey Jenkins’ dark face. She said in a voice that was barely audible. “Baby, I been so afraid too. I’m not an educated person. I come from the backwoods, baby. When your father left me alone, I didn’t think I could raise you all right. I was so afraid the streets would get you one by one. I been so afraid I couldn’t be a mother and a father.”

  “I know, Ma,” Trevor consoled her, squeezing his mother’s hands gently. “Now we’re both going to stop being afraid, okay?”

  Trevor’s mother wiped the tears away with the back of her hand. She smiled a little. “You an awfully good boy, Trevor, bless your heart. When that Marko Lane come to talk to me, he said you and that girl been doin’ crazy things. I know that boy. I know in my heart that he tryin’ his best to hurt you. You a good boy and he’s not. I told that sucka to get off the property of the nursin’ home. I told him I’d call the police on him. Then I got the broom and I run him off, Trevor. He ran so fast I thought he’d be flyin’ like that old black crow in the garden pretty quick.”

  Trevor laughed and then he said, “Ma, we’ll make a deal. We’ll talk about stuff. You promise me that you won’t get mad, and I promise you there won’t be any big secrets, okay?”

  “I’ll go along with that, boy,” Ma said with a twinkle in her eyes. “It gettin’ harder for me to whup you anyway, boy, ’cause you gettin’ so tall! ’Member now, though. You almost a man, but not yet. I’m trustin’ you to do the right thing. When somethin’ come up that you’re not sure about, I’m trustin’ you to do the right thing.”

  “I will, Ma,” Trevor promised. “Oh, and by the way, I finally won the hundred-meter event at Lincoln today.”

  “Oh baby!” Ma declared, throwing her arms around Trevor and giving him a hug that took his breath away.

  The forecast for Saturday was warm and muggy, the perfect kind of a day to go to the beach, swim, sit on the sand, and roast hot dogs. So on Thursday, the day after the track meet, Jaris, Sereeta, Sami, and Trevor were making the plans for a beach party. Sami’s mother said she’d pick them all up in her big van at the Tubman parking lot around two in the afternoon. She’d return to the beach to get them around nine thirty and take them all home. There was room for eight kids in the van.

  Jaris was going over the list. “Me and Sereeta . . . Sami and Matson . . . Oliver and Alonee. And, let’s see, Kevin and Derrick can’t make it. So there’s you, Trevor, and . . .” Jaris looked up at Trevor, waiting for an answer.

  “Vanessa. I want to invite her,” Trevor announced.

  “Your mom know?” Jaris asked.

  Trevor grinned. “Yeah, we had a great talk. I’ll tell you, dude, I owe a lot of it to you and your mom and that strawberry pancake, and Sami’s mom. You guys really came through for me. You broke the ice.”

  Jaris smiled and the boys bumped fists.

  Later that same day, in the afternoon, Trevor called Vanessa. “You know that beach party I’ve been talking about, Vanessa? Well, we got it planned for two on Saturday. We got a van taking us from Tubman about that time, and we can hang at the beach roasting hot dogs and whatever until nine-thirty. I’d like for you to come, Vanessa.”

  “Oh Trevor,” Vanessa responded, “that sounds wonderful. I’ve just been hoping you’d call.”

  “How’s it going with your parents, baby?” Trevor asked. He thought it must be hard to be away from home for such a long time and then be back under parental supervision. He admired Vanessa for making that change in her life.

  “Good,” Vanessa replied, “all good.”

  “You don’t miss hanging out with Dena and Bo?” he asked.

  “No. I’m done with them,” she asserted. “Haven’t seen them in a few days, ever since I left.”

  With the call complete, Trevor headed for Mr. Pippin’s English class, and Marko Lane came along, going in the same direction. He seemed to be still enraged. “You think you got away with something, man, but I won’t forget what you did to me,” Marko snarled.

  “You know what, Marko?” Trevor replied in a pleasant voice. “When you went and told my mother all that stuff, you did me a big favor. Because of that, Ma and me had the best talk we ever had. We got an understanding now. So thanks, Marko. I’m not afraid of Ma anymore, and she’s not afraid of me going bad. It’s just great. And one more thing, Marko. I’m not afraid of you, so don’t waste your breath on threats, okay?”

  Marko stood there staring in stunned disbelief. He couldn’t think of anything to say, so he just stomped into the classroom in silence.

  Trevor tried to concentrate on Mr. Pippin’s class, which was focused on comedy writing, but all he could think about was Saturday. It would be so good to be with Vanessa again. Best of all, their time together could be pure joy because he would be free of the fear in the back of his mind that he was doing something against his mother’s rules.

  Trevor also looked forward to introducing Vanessa to all his friends. She remembered a few of them from her time at Tubman High, but they were different now. She was different. It would be like meeting each other for the first time. If Vanessa was to be Trevor’s girlfriend, he wanted her to be a part of his circle of friends too.

  Early Saturday afternoon, everyone gathered at Harriet Tubman’s statue, including Vanessa. She was the first to arrive. When Jaris and Sereeta came, she was already there. “You must’ve spent the night here,” Jaris remarked, laughing.

  “Yeah, I’m really looking forward to this,” Vanessa replied.

  “Your mom drop you off?” Jaris asked.

  “Yeah,” Vanessa said. “I told her this was my first chance to meet all of Trevor’s friends.”

  When Trevor arrived, Vanessa ran up to him and hugged him. Sami’s mother pulled up with the van, and everybody piled in. “We got sodas on ice in the back, you guys,” Sami’s mother sang out as the van pulled out of the lot. “Hot dog buns, hot dogs, mustard, mayo, pickles, whatever. You kids watch out for each other now. When anybody in the water, everybody else make sure they okay, understand? Some of you good swimmers, some maybe not so much. Sami, she swims like a fish.”

  “I got everybody’s back, Mom,” Sami assured her.

  “Good girl, Sami,” Mattie Archer said.

  By the time they arrived at the beach, the morning clouds were gone, and the sky glowed a radiant blue. Everybody pitched in carrying the food and drinks down to the beach. All the while, Trevor could hardly take his eyes off Vanessa—she was so lovely in red shorts and a black tank top.

  As the van drove away, Jaris, Matson, and Sereeta jumped into the water, followed by Sami. The four of them swam and splashed each other while Alonee, Oliver, and Trevor got the fire ring ready to roast the hot dogs.

  “Look at them bobbing around in the water,” Trevor pointed out. “Like a bunch of little kids. Boy, they’re having a lot of fun. Later on, let’s you and me go in, Vanessa.”

  “I bet the water’s cold,” Vanessa guessed. “I’ve had the sniffles for a couple days, so I think I’ll pass.”

  Later, everybody sat on the big towels and ate hot dogs with pickle relish. The aroma of the roasting wieners blended with the pungent smell of the sea. Seagulls screeched overhead, and a few pelicans patrolled the waters farther out.

  After the feast, Trevor and Vanessa took a walk down the beach, their hands linked.They watched the sandpipers playing in the surf. “Look how they run out when the tide goes out and then scramble back in with the wave behind them,”Vanessa noted, laughing.

  Vanessa picked up a piece of large kelp and playfully tossed it at Trevor, and he caught it and t
ossed it back. Vanessa seemed to be having a great time, but around eight o’clock she said, “I know the van isn’t coming until nine-thirty, and I got a little tickle in my throat from my cold. I think I’ll call Mom to pick me up now.”

  “Okay,” Trevor agreed, a little sadly.

  “I’m ready to go home now,” Vanessa spoke into the cell. “I’ll be at the top of the trail leading from the beach.”

  Vanessa gave Trevor a good-bye kiss and started quickly up the trail to the street. Trevor watched her go, wondering why she didn’t want him to go with her. He suddenly had a strange feeling he couldn’t quite identify. It was dark now, and he followed Vanessa up the trail at a short distance. When she got to the street, she looked back, but she didn’t see him.

  Then Trevor saw the car, Dena’s red Toyota, with Bo leaning against it. Trevor walked the rest of the way up the trail. Before Vanessa got into the car, Trevor called to her, “I thought your mom was picking you up, Vanessa.”

  Vanessa looked stricken. “Uh . . . she couldn’t make it. So I . . . I called Dena,” she stammered.

  Trevor looked at the girl for a long few seconds, painfully realizing how much he’d grown to care about her.

  “You didn’t go home, did you?” he accused her. “You’re still with Dena and Bo. It was all . . . just lies.”

  Vanessa said nothing.

  Trevor remembered Ma’s words: “’Member now, though. You almost a man, but not yet. I’m trustin’ you to do the right thing.”

  “Good-bye,” Trevor called to Vanessa as she climbed into Dena’s car. He wondered for a moment if she thought it meant good night. But he knew it meant goodbye. If she hadn’t said it, he would have had to.

  “I’m trustin’ you to do the right thing,” Ma had told him. Her words echoed in his head. He didn’t do the right thing when he didn’t tell Ma about seeing Vanessa. He didn’t do the right thing by asking his bro to lie for him. And he didn’t do the right thing by not telling the police about Bo. He was so scared of Ma, so scared of getting into trouble, so scared of telling the truth even when it was a hard thing to do.