“Sixth grade?” Imani asks.
“You don’t remember the epic Christmas-tree-decorating incident?”
Uncle Randy chuckles and walks away. “This is my cue to exit stage left.” He walks out of the kitchen.
“Don’t leave now, Dad,” Imani says. The memory must’ve come back. “I know you all think I was overreacting that night, but it really didn’t seem fair that you all did the Christmas decorations without me.”
Uncle Randy calls out from the living room. “You were sick. You had the flu and had finally fallen asleep. Your mom and I were not going to wake you.” He’s said this so many times.
“Well, I was only eleven and it felt like you all were being a family without me. It was our tradition.”
And when she says our I realize for the first time that each time we retell this story it is not funny to Imani, it is not just about the time she had the flu and a fever and missed decorating the tree, missed baking peanut butter blossom cookies, missed making hot cocoa. For Imani, it is about the night her mom and dad took me in as their own daughter, the night when we bonded without her, the night I moved in. Stayed.
I always look back on that rainy day as the day everything changed in my life for the better. Me, dripping wet from the rain, showing up on the doorstep like a lost puppy. I never considered that maybe for Imani it was the beginning of her life changing in ways she didn’t want. On my first night in her home, there I was joining in on a family tradition that wasn’t my own. She cried when she woke up and saw the tree. I remember the look in her eyes when she asked, “But who did the angel?” and Uncle Randy told her I did. She couldn’t even have any of the cookies because her stomach wouldn’t hold water, so she just went to bed having to fall asleep to the laughter of her mom and dad and her cousin-sister-friend celebrating and welcoming in the holiday season without her.
Tye and I meet up at Sugar Hill Creamery. He is there before me and already has a booth for us, in the back. When I get to him he pulls me to him, holds me while he’s talking to me. “You good?”
“I’m okay.”
“Just okay?”
“Let’s get ice cream,” I say.
We walk to the counter and order. Tye, salted caramel. Me, strawberry chocolate chip. Tye pays, grabs napkins for both of us, and we walk back to the booth. One side has a bench connected to the wall, the other side chairs. He pulls a chair out for me, knowing that I’d be more comfortable sitting in the chair than crammed up in the booth. He is like that, knowing what I need when I don’t even ask. Never making a big deal out of my size. As soon as we sit down, he says, “Okay, lay it on me. What’s up?”
I can’t believe this, but all the emotion I held in yesterday is still there. That’s the thing about tears. If you don’t cry them, they come out in other ways or just wait for another time. And here they are.
Tye reaches out for my hand. “What happened?”
“Nothing. I—nothing happened. And I think that’s why I’m so emotional.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing. Just . . . our ice cream is going to melt.” I pick up my spoon, but Tye won’t let it go.
He leaves his side of the booth and comes to sit next to me. “You can tell me anything.”
And I believe him, so I tell him about the brunch and how Imani never came and my mom never came. How things are changing between me and Imani, how they are staying the same between me and my mom. How sometimes I feel like a burden to the people who are supposed to love me, the people who are supposed to be there, always, no matter what. “I don’t want to talk about Imani behind her back. We’re good. I know she loves me. It’s just—things are different.”
“You don’t have to do that,” Tye says.
“Do what?”
“Downplay how frustrated you are. Of course she loves you, but that’s not the point. And that goes for your mom too.” Tye squeezes my hand. “I know all about family drama. Believe me. I get it.”
But it’s not just the family drama. It’s me not being fully honest with him. It’s me not knowing Fredrick Douglass’s Fourth of July speech, it’s knowing that Imani would rather be anywhere but home with me, it’s knowing that every time I spend time with Tye and get to know him better, I like him more and more and I don’t know how to be the real me, or if he’d even like the real me. Yeah, these tears are about all of that.
We finish our ice cream, and then we just sit and talk since it’s not too crowded and no one is waiting for a table. Tye stays next to me, and I love how he keeps my hand in his hand, how even when he is not saying words, he is telling me something.
12
I’ve seen Tye every day for two weeks. Besides having dessert at Sugar Hill Creamery, we’ve been to see two movies, took a walk along the High Line, and sometimes, we pick a neighborhood to explore. So far, we’ve roamed around Washington Heights, Union Square, and the West Village. Summer feels slow because the sun hangs on to the sky as long as it can, like it doesn’t ever want to let go. And this is how I feel holding Tye’s hand. I want him with me always. Tonight, we are sitting on a bench at the West Harlem Park Piers watching the Hudson River swallow the sun. It is cooling down now, and my legs have stopped throbbing from the walk we took to get here.
Tye leans back on the bench, says, “Tell me something about you that I don’t know.” This has become a thing now. Whenever we have run out of things to talk about or if there is an awkward silence, we ask this question.
It takes me a while, and then I say, “I don’t have a favorite color.”
“What do you mean, you don’t have a favorite color? Everyone has a favorite color.”
“Not me.”
“Come on—”
“There are colors I like, but I don’t have one color that I love or that I decorate my room with or wear a lot.”
“I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have a favorite color,” Tye says.
“Well, now you do. What’s yours?” I ask.
“Tan.”
“Tan? Be real, your favorite color is not tan.”
“Are you judging me?”
“Yes, actually. I mean tan being your favorite color is worse than me not having one. Tan is so bland, so boring.”
“Tan is not too bold or bright,” Tye says. “And it matches everything. I like neutral colors,” he tells me. “And I don’t look at neutral colors as bland or boring. I think they’re just laid back. Chill.”
“Like you,” I say.
He smiles.
“I’m serious. That’s a perfect description of you. Laid back and chill. Gets along with everyone. That’s what I like about you.”
“I like that about you too,” Tye says. “You’re just—I love the way you make having fun a priority. Like, you are always thinking of someplace to go, something to see in the city. It’s relaxing to hang out with you.” Tye takes my hand, and how is it that one touch from him sends shock waves through every part of my body? “And I love how you love,” he says.
“What do you mean by that?”