He always corrects me when I call her by her name. “She’s got enough on her as it is. You gotta learn to ignore people, Bri. Not everything deserves your energy.”
“I know,” I mumble.
He pinches my cheek. “Then act like it.”
“Wait. That’s it?”
“What?” he asks.
“You’re not gonna go off on me?”
He throws back some cereal. “Nope. I’ll let Ma do that when she finds out, because believe me, she’s gonna find out. I’ll have my popcorn ready too.”
I hit his face with a pillow.
The doorbell rings. Trey pulls back the window curtain to look out. “It’s the other parts of the Unholy Trinity.”
I roll my eyes. “Tell them I’m not here.”
Trey answers the door, and of course he says, “Hey, y’all. Bri’s right here.”
He looks back at me with a trollish grin that doesn’t show his teeth. Jerk.
Trey gives them dap as they come in. “Haven’t seen y’all in a minute. How’s it going?”
Malik tells him everything is fine, but you’d think he was telling me since he’s staring at me. I purposely watch the TV.
“ACT and SAT prep are kicking my butt,” Sonny says. I’m so proud of him. He actually managed to get words out to Trey. There was a time he could only stutter around my brother, that’s how big of a crush he had. Sometimes I think he’s still got a crush on Trey. Trey’s always known that Sonny likes him. He just laughs it off. Back when Sonny and I were in fifth grade though, one of Trey’s friends said something about Sonny, using a word I refuse to repeat. After that he was no longer Trey’s friend. At sixteen, my brother was calling toxic masculinity “one hell of a drug.” He’s dope like that.
Trey sits on the arm of the couch. “Ah, don’t sweat it too much, Son’. You can take the tests more than once.”
“Yeah, but it looks good if I nail it the first time.”
“Nah. It looks good if you nail it, period,” says Trey. “Smart as you are, you’ll be all right.”
Sonny’s cheeks get a rosy tint to them. He is so not over his crush.
The TV does all of the talking for a while. The Get Down, to be exact. I watch it, but I can feel Sonny, Malik, and Trey watching me.
“Well?” Trey says. “You’re gonna act like they’re not here?”
I throw back some cereal. “Yep.”
Trey snatches the bowl out of my hands. Then he has the audacity, the audacity, to pull my legs off the couch and make me sit up.
“Um, excuse you?” I say.
“You’re excused. Your friends are here to talk to you, not me.”
“We wanted to hang out with you today,” Malik says. “You know, play video games, chill out.”
“Yeah, like we used to do,” Sonny adds.
I crunch extra hard on my cereal.
“C’mon, Bri, really?” Malik says. “Will you at least talk to us?”
Cruuunch.
“Sorry, fellas,” Trey says. “Looks like she’s made up her mind.”
My brother is evil. Why do I say that? Because he starts to sit next to me, and while his butt is midair, he lets out the loudest, hardest fart I’ve ever heard in my life. Near. My. Face.
“Oh my God!” I scream, and hop up. “I’m going, damn!”
Trey gives an evil laugh and throws his legs across the couch. “That’s what you get for putting them crusty feet in my face.”
Just because I leave with Sonny and Malik doesn’t mean I have to talk to them. We make our way down the sidewalk. There’s silence between us, except for the thump of my dad’s chain knocking against my sweatshirt.
Malik tugs at the strings of his hoodie. “Nice Timbs.”
First time I’ve worn them. Jay was still in her room when I left, and Trey doesn’t pay enough attention to stuff like that to notice. I mean, he’s worn the same Nikes for seven years and counting. “Thanks,” I mumble.
“Where’d you get them?” Malik asks.
“How’d you get them?” says Sonny.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know that was your business.”
“Bri, c’mon,” Sonny says. “You know we didn’t mean anything by the other day, right?”
“Wooow. That is a half-assed attempt at an apology.”
“We’re sorry,” Malik says. “Better?”
“Depends. Sorry for what?”
“For not having your back,” Sonny says.
“And for things being so different,” Malik adds.
“Different how?” Oh, I absolutely know how, but I wanna hear it from them.
“We don’t hang out as much lately,” Malik admits. “But don’t act like this is all on us. You’ve changed on folks, too.”
I stop. Mrs. Carson passes us in her beat-up Cadillac