That Girl

He was also a much better cook than Jane.

As soon as Jane left the next day, Theo parked her rear on the porch swing to wait for Shirlee. Keita came out to investigate.

“I’m waiting on my friend,” Theo said.

“O.K.,” Keita said. “Boyfriend or girlfriend?”

“Girl, duh,” Theo said.

She stayed by the house all day, but Shirlee didn’t show. If Keita remembered, she didn’t mention it. Theo was not only ashamed but stunned, though that didn’t keep her from going back and forth to the porch the next day, too, until Keita shouted at her to quit going in and out. Theo chose to stay out, and by two o’clock she figured it didn’t make no sense for Shirlee to come then. She got on her bike to clear her head.

At dinner, Roger said, “The girl sure is quiet tonight.”

Jane set her fork down. “Something wrong, Pooh? You and Keita getting along all right?”

Theo nodded.

“You probably tired from riding that bike in the high noon,” Jane said. “Gone mess around and be black as a field hand. I remember . . .”

Jane forked the potato salad but didn’t eat it, nor did she continue her train of thought. She had gained weight since she quit smoking and started eating all of Roger’s good cooking. One night, Theo had caught her standing in front of the sink, shovelling a hunk of pound cake into her mouth. She’d frozen like a burglar.

“What were you saying?” Roger asked.

“I forgot,” Jane said.

“You all right, doll?” he asked Theo.

“Right as rain,” she lied.

Around noon that Friday, Shirlee finally switched up the street carrying a large paper bag. She wore jeans well ventilated with holes and a small doughnut on the side of her head, tied with red yarn ribbon.

“Took you long enough,” Theo called out.

“You must’ve missed me,” Shirlee said.

Theo rolled her eyes but was curious about the contents of the bag.

“Whew—can we go inside? It’s hot as hell out here,” Shirlee said.

“Lemme check,” Theo said.

Theo was sure Keita wouldn’t mind, but she didn’t want to chance it, so she stepped into the house, and, finding the front room cool and empty, she motioned for Shirlee. They tiptoed into Theo’s bedroom.

“Girl, you so lucky—got your own room. I don’t even got my own bed sometimes.”

Shirlee unloaded Vitner’s hot-and-sour chips, two pouches of sour pickles, Kool-Aid packets, and peach Faygo onto Theo’s vanity. It was as if she either liked everything Theo liked or had somehow read her appetite.

“Mind if I help myself to these chips?”

“Go ’head, girl,” Shirlee said. She had got on her knees in the closet and seemed more interested in exploring Theo’s stuff than in eating. “All these shoes—ugh—you oughta give me some. What size you wear?”

“Six,” Theo said, but Shirlee was already trying to work her feet into a pair of low red heels that Roger’s grown daughter, Natasha, had sent her.

“Damn,” Shirlee said. “Li’l-ass feet. I wear an eight—my daddy got big feet. I’m, like, how I’m so skinny and my feet so damn long? At least I could have a big booty to balance it off.”

Theo started on one of the pickles. “You still got time to grow one,” she said to encourage her.

“Thank you, friend.”

“I’m your friend?”

Shirlee nodded, sat very close. Theo’s neck was getting hot. For some stupid, embarrassing reason, her eyes filled with water that ran down her face. Shirlee kissed her forehead, her cheeks, then her lips; Theo could double taste her tears. They kissed, then said “Um” before kissing some more. Finally, Shirlee drew back.

“You want me to leave?”

“Not unless you want to,” Theo said.

“You be having bad dreams?”

“Yeah,” Theo said. “Sometimes.”

“Me, too, friend.”

“I got a good book for us,” Theo said the next time she saw Shirlee. She wore a low-rise denim skirt and had a paper bag clenched in her hand.

“Cool. I brought you something.”

Shirlee sat beside Theo on the swing and dropped the package in her lap—lip gloss, bubble gum, chips, Zebra Cakes, mini candy bars, and a hot-pink bottle of bubbles. Theo took the bubbles and shoved the bag back into Shirlee’s hands.

“Friend, I can’t take all this stuff.”

“Yes, you can, friend. I got it for you.”

Theo fished the wand from the bottle and slowly blew a long stream of bubbles up toward the awning. Together and quietly, they watched them fly around and die.

“How ’bout I do something to that head of yours?” Shirlee said. “All that hair and you got them ponytails like a baby.”

Theo nodded, and in a moment they were in her room. Shirlee was sitting on the chair, and Theo on the floor between Shirlee’s knees.

“Whew,” Shirlee said, stretching a piece of hair down past Theo’s bra.

“My cousin’s goes to her waist, plus it don’t nap up like mine do,” Theo said.

Shirlee stopped in the middle of brushing and leaned to one side.

“Girl, you wouldn’t be able to tell me absolutely nothing if my hair went all the way down to my waist. I’d be too busy shaking it.”

“Like this?” Theo said, tossing her head.

Shirlee yanked a scarf from Theo’s dresser and hung it around her own head. “More like this,” she said, and began to whip it from side to side, lifting her leg to make her butt jump. They laughed so hard. Finally, Shirlee picked the brush up again, but she didn’t go back to work on Theo’s hair. Instead, she stared into Theo’s mirror.

“Can I tell you something?”

“O.K.,” Theo said.

“It’s something that happened to me last year. Now, do you really want to hear this?”

“Girl, if you don’t hurry up,” Theo said, hoisting herself from the floor.

“So Mrs. Tyler sent me to the office because she said my shorts was too little, and Mr. Barnes checked them all right. I walked in the office, and he stopped what he was doing and frowned at me. He said, ‘Come here, child. Come round the desk.’

“I went over there, and just like that he stuck his hand between my legs. My breath went out of me. You just don’t expect no man like that to do that to you. But seemed like I blinked and his hand was gone. His face had been regular and everything. He was, like, ‘You don’t want to be walking around with this on. You’ll have them nasty tail boys thinking all kinds of things about you. Now, go ask Mrs. McCaskill to let you call your grandmama, and don’t wear them shorts back.’ ”

“You didn’t say nothing to nobody?” Theo said.

“Who gone believe me? Sometimes I think I made it up ’cause it happened so quick. Other people felt on me before, but they did it with their fingers or wanted me to touch on them. He just touched me like he was checking my temperature down there or something. Do you think that count?”