Lovers & Haters (11 page)

I
t was the first Monday in November and the school auditorium was packed with restless students and concerned parents, none of whom wanted their kids to experience what had happened to Samantha Fox. Principal Skinner was trying his best to exert damage control.

Skinner was saying all the right things, but most knew that his job was on the line and the old man was merely tap dancing in a desperate attempt at saving his own hide. Security had been lax in that part of the building for years now. Students had been bullied, robbed, raped, and now one had been attacked.

With Skinner on the microphone, the assistant principal and a few more of his administrative staff stood behind him, looking like they were an old school R&B act that was about to bust out with a Motown hit.

Doug and his security staff tightly patrolled the aisles like they were prison guards in a maximum-security lunchroom, prepped and ready to put down any uprisings. But even he had to put his head down in shame at Principal Skinner opening up with Martin Luther King Jr.'s “I Have a Dream” speech.

A plus-size lady in the audience, with a head scarf tied around her hairdo, disrupted Skinner by standing from her chair and pointing around the auditorium, putting him on blast. “As far as I'm concerned we've arrived at the mountaintop and his name is President Barack Obama!” She put her hands on her hips. “Us parents want to know that our chil'ren are safe when they leave their homes. That speech ain't gonna do our kids no good when they get stuck up.”

Head Scarf's statement was met by thunderous applause.

A bald-headed fellow wearing army fatigues jumped from his seat so quickly that security started walking in his direction.

He looked at Doug and said, “Brother, I'm not here to cause anyone harm. I just want to state my piece.”

Doug waved off his staff.

Army Fatigues continued, “My name is Sergeant Jamie Sheldon. I've just returned from Afghanistan. The things that I saw over there were not fit for human eyes. But in the interest of our country's safety, I was given orders to defend it at all cost. My daughter goes here.” He tapped a little, cute, light-skinned girl on her shoulder to stand up. “This is my precious daughter, Jayla Sheldon. I would go above and beyond this place to keep her safe. If that means coming up here for free and helping out security to assure that what happened to Samantha will never happen again—I will do it.”

Everybody stood on their feet, rendering a deafening applause.

Doug motioned for Jamie and his daughter to follow him. They immediately walked down the worn carpets to cheers, whistles, and applauses, as they left the auditorium.

Xavier was sitting with Romello, Alex, and Tyson, laughing and joking about how if the principal made one quick move his tight suit pants would split up the middle. The other Zulu members, Arson and Go Go, were sitting in the middle of the last row. They were completely uninterested in Skinner, who'd been preaching this safety sermon ever since they had arrived at Coleman. It was all hype for the cameras. As soon as the attention dwindled, things would be back to normal.

Xavier wasn't paying any attention to the woman who was up at the moment and prattling on about what she was going to do to the school board if something ever happened to her daughter, when he received a text from an unknown number.

“Who dat?” Romello wanted to know.

“Man, since when you start paying for my Metro PCS bill?” was Xavier's quick reply.

“I'll remember that when your LL Cool J-looking butt comes asking me to borrow some loot to help you pay on it, sucka.”

Xavier stood up and politely excused himself as he walked over others to get through to the aisle, where he was confronted by a security guard the size of an ogre. The guard questioned him extensively, but when Xavier launched into the pee-pee dance, he was let pass.

Xavier ducked into one of the empty stairwells for a little privacy. He had a feeling the text was from Samantha, but he didn't want to get his heart rate up for nothing. He looked at the screen and read the text again:

Could it be? Did her mother keep the promise and give his phone number to Samantha?

Still not knowing who had texted him, Xavier played it by ear and returned a message: How are you doing?

Xavier thumbed out: It was nothing! I'm just glad you're okay.

Samantha: Thanks to you it wasn't . . . you know?

Xavier replied: You don't have to thank me. I would do it a million times if it meant saving you.

Samantha: Awww, you are such a sweetie.

Xavier responded: I know right . . . BTW your mother is beautiful. I see where her princess received her good looks.

Samantha texted: Blushing.

Xavier: Your father doesn't seem to like me.

Samantha: That's just my father. Sometimes he doesn't even like his own shadow.

Xavier texted: LOL

Samantha: Well, my mother seems to adore you. She passed your number to me right underneath my father's nose.

Xavier really wanted to ask her if she was coming back to Coleman, but he didn't want to push her. She'd had a trying couple of days. He didn't want to add more.

Xavier: Well, get some rest and get better. If you need anything, don't be afraid to text.

Samantha: Once again, thank you!

 

“What did I miss?” Xavier asked Romello, as he took his seat.

“Some dude got escorted out for throwing something at Skinner. Parents threatened to get in Skinner's ass if something is not done to make the school safer. Two fat women almost threw blows, and a clumsy cameraman tripped over his own feet, falling and busting his fancy camera into a thousand tiny, ten-cent pieces of jagged plastic. Besides that, you didn't miss much, homeboy.” Romello knew that his boy was holding back something. And he was aiming to get after it. “So who was that you were texting?”

“Dude, didn't your mother teach you how to mind your own business?”

“Nope. She was too busy minding hers.”

The two boys laughed.

While Principal Skinner was trying to explain his new security plan for the school, Xavier asked Romello, “Remember what you were asking me at the State Theater?”

“Yep. Why, are you ready to come in?”

“I don't know . . . I mean yes in a way, but I also have something else in mind.”

“Well, holler at me after this thing is over.”

“No doubt.”

O
ver the next couple of weeks, Samantha was all Xavier could think about. Since Principal Skinner conducted the safety precaution rally in the auditorium, they had shared two text messages containing nothing more than just a simple hello. Xavier was eating it up. Even though Samantha wasn't back to school yet, Xavier took what he could get. The text messages were all good to him.

Against his sound judgment, Xavier had agreed to join Romello's team. He hated the idea, but what could he do about it? It was a necessary evil for the plans that he had formulated to make sure nobody else at Coleman High suffered the same fate as Samantha. But in the back of his mind his motivation was strictly to keep Samantha safe, if she ever came back to Coleman. Reluctantly, he would become a driver for Romello's team. And even though he didn't have a driver's license, it didn't concern Romello in the least. As long as Xavier could drive, that was the only thing needed. Romello reminded him that he had to go see the man behind Zulu, Slick Eddie. Then everything would be official. The tradeoff was that Zulu would pitch in the muscle to clean up the school's underworld of good-for-nothing thugs, as well as send a powerful message to outsiders looking to come in and pull jack moves.

Between his school work, thoughts of Samantha, and the plan, Xavier hadn't noticed the change in Alfonso's behavior. His little brother had become aloof, staying inside his room most of the time. School behavior reports on him were starting to stack up. A phone call from one of his teachers this morning had alerted Ne Ne, who was at work, that Alfonso wasn't at school. She was freaking out when she relayed the information in a text to Xavier at school. He had been right in the middle of a trigonometry pop quiz, when he had to inform the teacher about the personal emergency. Ms. Crabtree excused him, and Xavier was now stomping through the streets, pissed, searching for his brother.

He hadn't the slightest idea where to start, so he tried the simplest approach. The door of the very first crack house he knocked on was operated by a cat named Ronnie Ray. Ronnie was a couple years older, but he and Xavier shared a mutual respect for each other. The boy was also known for having sensitive ears on whatever went down in the neighborhood.

No such luck.

A fearless nature provided Xavier the heart to knock on the doors of more drug dens, both friendly and hostile. Everybody reported the same thing as Ronnie Ray. Desperate, angry, and worried, Xavier stood his enormous body on the corner of Schoolcraft and St. Mary's. Hands inside his pockets while he studied the cars and pedestrians going by, Xavier prayed that his brother was okay.

Some dude struggling to operate a wheelchair was two blocks away. As he rolled closer Xavier recognized him. Even though the boy was weak and frail, Mitchell Green's signature smile was unfazed by the bullet he'd taken in the gut.

“How you be, X?” Mitchell asked.

“What up doe, Mr. Green?” Xavier dapped his friend and leaned down to hug him. “The question is how the hell are you doing?”

Mitchell was dressed in a green and black checkered lumberjack sweater, jeans, sneakers, with a loose Newport cigarette resting behind his right ear.

He locked the wheels of his chair. “Feeling like half man, half car, you know the deal.”

Xavier didn't really know what to say.

Mitchell saved the awkward moment by breaking the ice. “X, I have to admit that I was a little embarrassed, in your arms, screaming like a little girl.”

“No, brah, don't be embarrassed. Just buy me some new gear. You must've dropped a couple gallons of your blood on my hoodie and jeans.”

They both laughed.

“You mean the same ones you got on now,” Mitchell joked.

“You got jokes. How you gonna try to play me? But yep, Tide washing powder works miracles.”

“You silly, man. But peep this, dog—I know I owe you a solid for helping me that day.”

“Cuz, get out of here. You my people.”

Mitchell looked helplessly at his black wheelchair, with the bag hanging from the back grips. “Look at me: half a man from what I used to be. I'll never be able to get out of this chair and walk again—the bullet grazed my spinal column. I don't really have any more enthusiasm, my girl left me, and on top of that, none of the homeys in the hood have any more respect for me. But I do owe you and I always pay my debts.”

“Mitchell, don't worry about those clowns—”

“Listen, X, your brother is headed for a whole lot of trouble. And that wannabe shot caller, Fathead, and the rest of those Similac-sucking babies are putting him up to rob old man Habib's corner store. I think it's their initiation.”

Xavier's smile was wiped clean off his face, as if it had been painted on and Mitchell's troubling information was a rag soaked in paint thinner.

Xavier's blood was boiling. His little brother was in trouble, and if it wasn't too late, he had to get to him.

“If you hurry up, you can catch them. I just wheeled past them and they were about six blocks from the store. Alfonso is a good kid and I don't want to see anything happen to him.”

Xavier's feet almost took off before he did. He ran fast, as he called on the hundred-meter track and field gods to grant him the speed of Usain Bolt. After running a few blocks he was panting like a horse that had been ridden way past its capability. A block away brought perspiration flowing in rivulets down his face. Xavier realized that this had been the second time he'd had to channel the men's US track team to save a life. It wasn't easy and he earnestly admitted to himself that he needed to get back into the gym.

His efforts paid off when he was a few blocks from the party store. He could see that Alfonso was looking like he wanted to turn back while Fathead whispered something in his ear. All of them surrounded him, almost like leading the proverbial lamb to the slaughter. Xavier had one chance to intervene before it all went down. Giving no thought for his life, he cut up an alley that would head them off. There was a house on the corner. Xavier stood on the lawn, where a tall wall of hedges was enough to conceal his huge frame from the sidewalk of the main street. Xavier knew the twerps were probably packing heat. His aim was to rush them, send them into confusion, and before they knew it, he would have disarmed them all—at least that's how it worked in the action movies.

He couldn't believe how loudly they were talking about what they were going to do with their shares of the loot after the robbery as they neared the opposite side of the bushes. Xavier spotted Apollo. The boy was silent, but he had the most heart of the crew. Xavier could tell. It was always present whenever he connected with the boy's intimidating eyes. Xavier waited, crouched like a lioness blending in with the tall African grass, stalking, anticipating the perfect opportunity to pounce.

Xavier stood there frozen like a statue, allowing them to walk past him. With no hesitation, he reached through the opening in the branches and pulled Apollo back through. Before the boy could understand what was happening Xavier was on him, swinging. The scuffle didn't last too long because of the right cross Xavier threw. It caught Apollo right on the chin and left homeboy sprawled out on the front lawn. When the other boys finally made it around the hedge, Xavier was going through Apollo's pockets. He found a BB gun that looked like the real thing.

He lined up Fathead, Monster and Dusty in front of him. Xavier smacked them all in the back of their heads. Dusty was the only one who broke down in tears like a little punk.

Xavier said in a stern voice, “I'm gonna say this again, just in case you didn't hear me the first time. Leave my little brother alone”—he pointed to Apollo, who was just starting to stir—“or all of you will end up like him.” He shook the barrel of the BB gun in their faces. “Do I make myself clear?”

Xavier could tell he'd made his point. The three little cowards were shaking so badly, it looked like they were about to pee their pants. Xavier and Alfonso left the three of them trying to get Apollo to his feet. The first trash dumpster he spotted, Xavier tossed the BB gun.

 

Back at the crib, after a heart-to-heart talk with Alfonso, Xavier went to his bedroom to knock off some homework. The house was pretty quiet. Ne Ne was at work and Xavier thanked God for Nate's face not creeping about, knowing wherever he was he was undoubtedly bumming off somebody. Personally, Xavier couldn't understand what Ne Ne saw in the man.

Xavier was going through a folder when he came across the paper he'd written in his Advanced English class on the definition of a hero. He'd received an A on the essay. The paper was written from his soul, but in his heart, Xavier didn't feel he could measure up to his description of what the word truly meant. At school he was praised as a hero . . .

Xavier didn't have time to finish the thought because his Metro PCS started ringing. He and Samantha had been texting on and off for the last two weeks, but this time was different. Her number was appearing on his caller ID.

He quickly answered. “Hey, Samantha.”

Samantha said, “Hello, Xavier. How have you been?”

“Forget about me, how have you been?—it's good to hear from you.”

“I'm supposed to be doing homework but you were on my mind, so here I am.”

Xavier was losing the battle in trying to keep his composure. Hearing that Samantha was having thoughts of him left him with a joyful, bubbly feeling in the pit of his stomach.

“That's what's up,” he said, trying his best to sound cool. “I'm always thinking about you.”

“Good thoughts?”

Xavier laughed. “Naw, thoughts of flying monkeys and vampire squirrels—of course good thoughts, silly girl.”

Samantha giggled. “You are crazy—‘vampire squirrels.'”

“But on the real, though. I think about us going to the movies, and then afterwards eating cotton candy and walking along the RiverWalk downtown while holding hands and staring at the waves on the Detroit River.”

She asked, “It has to be the summertime, right?”

“This is my fantasy, stay out of it.” Xavier laughed. “Of course, Samantha, the summertime. What? You think I'm gonna have you freezing your sexy off in the dead of winter while standing in five feet of snow?”

“You just might, Xavier.” Samantha laughed again.

“Man, it's good to hear you laugh. I know I've told you this before, but your mother is pretty cool, and gorgeous, too. I see where you get your looks.”

“Why do I feel like you're silently cracking on my daddy?”

“That's because I am—with his mean self. Your mother needs to stop buying his underwear two sizes too small—that's why he's angry, his booty cheeks are so tight they can't breathe.”

“No, you're not about to have me sitting up here laughing at my father.”

Xavier was cracking up. “And another thing—”

Samantha sounded like she put her hand over the phone speaker and whispered, “I'm not supposed to be on the phone. I think I hear my father coming up the stairs, so I'll call you later.” She ended the call.

Being that she was doing homework was a good thing. It left him with a decent amount of hope that she would probably return to school soon. It almost didn't matter to him, though. As long as he was able to communicate with her, he was all good.

Xavier received a text from Romello. He'd been so blissfully caught up in his phone call with Samantha that he'd almost forgotten about the meeting with Romello's boss Slick Eddie. It was ten minutes to seven and the meeting was set to pop off within the next hour. Romello was on his way over to pick Xavier up and then they would be on their way. This was it. There was no turning back for him. Xavier was sick over his decision, but he had no other choice. It was about safety in numbers. And if he had the numbers he'd forcefully make the hallways of the school safe. Samantha—whenever she returned—would never have to go through what she'd gone through again.

 

Slick Eddie was a greasy slob of an individual of average height. His considerable girth made it obvious that he liked his junk food as much or more than he liked his junk cars. His junkyard was an empire of oily automobile parts, thick, black, smoke-belching, car-crushing machinery, rows of wrecked and crushed autos, and a huge building, located in the center of the yard, that served as headquarters. The place was open twenty-four hours a day, but just in case thieves tried to get cute and sneak onto the property, there were surveillance cameras and enormous German Rottweilers patrolling the premises.

The man sat at a cluttered desk inside a trashed office, smashing a sack of White Castle cheeseburgers, a box of fries, and an extra-large chocolate milkshake. At his elbow, an expensive cigar sat smoking in a small car part of some kind that was serving as an ashtray. There were two gigantic windows behind him that looked out onto the entire yard, which was lit with floodlights that chased away the midnight darkness.

“Bring 'im in,” Slick Eddie yelled through a closed door when Romello knocked.

Romello escorted Xavier in. “Boss,” Romello said to Eddie, “this is the new boy I was telling you about—Xavier.”

Slick Eddie didn't bother getting up. He chewed and swallowed the food inside his mouth before saying, “Xavier, good to meet you. I've heard so much about you, son. Have a seat.”

Xavier sat down in one of two greasy-looking chairs in front of Eddie's crummy desk.

Eddie stuffed a huge portion of a cheeseburger into his mouth and fanned Romello toward the door. “Leave us,” he said to Romello.

The man's jaw was bulging with food as he took a powerful sip of the milkshake. Eddie swallowed hard and belched. “You come highly recommended. Romello tells me that you are a bright kid. I can use bright kids.” He took a napkin from the White Castle bag and wiped his mouth. “Let's get down to it. I'm a fair businessman, and if you are good to me, you will reap the rewards. Become a thorn in my side and I will feed you to my dogs.” Slick Eddie might've been messy, but Xavier got the impression that the fat man wasn't up for playing games. “You work hard and I'll make sure that before you graduate high school, you will be able to comfortably pay your way through college—providing you don't get careless and go to jail.” He picked up his cigar and took a few puffs. “You come on my crew and that means I own you and you will do exactly what I tell you. You'll get your orders from the yard supervisor. You are not to deviate from the list of cars. You are not to lift any junk and you are not allowed to drink, smoke, or do anything else until you fill the list and bring me back my product. Do you have anything to add?”