Sunny September, part nine. Shakira’s house. Christopher.

  We sit beside each other on the brown leather couch as the microwave hums a wall away.

  I look around at the stereo shielded by a glass drawer, the old first generation flatscreen mounted on the leaf patterned wall. I see the framed family photos hanging in the shadow of the long shelves lined with Shakira’s self made toys and middle school trophies. draped across the wood textured floor mat is the crimson rug adorned with patterns that never made sense to me. The thing must be at least a thousand years old by now and I see that they never managed to clean that Chocolate stain I left in it when I was eight. It’s been a year since I’ve last been here and almost nothing’s changed.

  “You know they ask me about you from time to time.” Shakira says, resting her head on my shoulder having calmed down. “They worry y'know. They say they don’t know if you’ve just found better things to do or if you’ve finally fallen off the deep end.”

  “They should worry more about their own kid.” I reply hoping I don’t come off too harsh.

  She sighs before looking at me with uncertainty.

  “Sorry.” I say. “I shouldn’t have said it like that. It’s just that it’s not like I’m their kid.”

  “They can still care about you…”

  “I guess.” I shrug before deciding to change the subject. “Why did you ask to come? You have the modelling club, your friends, your family and all kinds of big dreams to concern yourself with.”

  She hums to herself as she thinks before responding. “I just felt like it. I wanted to see if you were actually that crazy. I guess I got my money’s worth.”

  The microwave rings and she scurries off to get the food.

  I look up at her dolls on the shelves, wandering why she doesn’t sell them, donate them or find some other use for them instead of leaving them like this to collect dust. It’s a shame since she’s refused to make more since sixth grade, deciding that she only wants to make outfits and clothing as that’s more adult apparently.

  “Christopher come here!” She calls out to me from the kitchen.

  I enter and see her dividing up the food into two containers. Getting closer I see that it’s rice with chicken stew. It smells so good that I almost let drool slip from my mouth, me having suddenly remembered that I haven’t eaten at all today.

  “Fuck off!” She curses, fingering some of the food as she holds it up in a spoon.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  “It’s the microwave, it doesn’t warm the food up properly.” She sighs. “You can heat something up for an hour and somehow there’s still a part that’s cold.”

  I look at the Microwave and it’s the same one they’ve had for years. For a moment, I’m reminded of just how unfortunate these people are and guilt starts to churn in my stomach. I should’ve said no but I was scared she’d call the cops if I did that. Why did I think this? Shakira isn’t that kind of person she wouldn’t turn me in. Or maybe she is… I might have known her for years but the only way to truly know someone is to become them. Now she’s an accomplice and the future she has is at stake.

  “Sorry but I’m going to have to mix the rice with the stew to fix the temperature difference.” She says before giggling. “I’m sure dad would cause a ruckus if he saw this and go on and on about how I should just heat it up on the stove and not be so lazy. I’m sure you don’t have a problem with it right?”

  I look at the fridge that still has paper bills from all over the world stamped all over it.

  Shakira continues to fiddle with the food and as if sensing where my eyes went she asks, “do you want something to drink? We have orange juice and apple juice and lemonade as well. Or do you just want some water? There’s a jug of boiled water in the fridge.”

  “Let me guess your grandma still boils it because she thinks it’ll kill the germs and clean out the microplastics?”

  Shakira giggles.

  Within minutes we’re back on the couch, two steaming containers of food on our laps and two glasses of orange juice on the glass table. I remember how much her mom used to whine whenever we’d play within a mile of that damn table. It made me wonder why they’d gone and spent so much money on something so fragile.

  She starts eating I can’t help but comment, “I’m guessing you feel better?”

  “I don’t know if I’d put it that way.” She says with a solum smile. “It’s more like I know there’s nothing I can do anymore. Why stress?”

  Not sure how to interpret that I start to eat, enjoying every second of my meal.

  “How long do you think it’ll be until the police come after us?” She asks after swallowing her food and washing it down.

  “I don’t know. Probably less than twenty four hours.”

  “I think the same.” She admits.

  “I honestly thought you’d have a bit more faith in him, considering how he’s your ex.”

  She shakes her head before continuing to speak, her voice starting to crack again. “They’ll be ruthless, the cops. Y’know how they are with black boys. He’s a kid just like the two of us, it’s only realistic for me to think they’ll break him.”

  She wipes away a tear as she leans forward, reaching past the two drinks to her laptop that rests folded on the table.

  She flips it open and immediately starts browsing YouTube. “I need something to distract me. I’ve already stressed myself out enough worrying about something I have no power over.”

  She clicks on pop the balloon and I’m immediately ripped away from the serious atmosphere as I watch some blinged up carbon copy red pill nigga self-aggrandise in front of a cluster of bimbo’s.

  “Well you certainly know how to kill the tension.” I say shaking my head.

  She kicks her foot against mine before letting out a huff. “It’s funny okay…”

  “Whatever,” I snicker, “I just expected you to be watching documentaries or something of actual substance instead of whatever this is. You always go on and on about social justice so I naturally assume you’d be more conscientious with the media you consume.”

  “Isn’t it smart to learn more about adult relationships?” She asks.

  The carbon copy nigga runs his mouth in the most new money nigga way imaginable, going on and on about his six figure salary, a bunch of the bimbos pop their balloons.

  I shrug. “Do you know what sensationalism is? They take the most unhinged people they can find to rake in views, this isn’t accurate at all, if you want to learn about adult relationships just ask your parents.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Yes elder Christopher I’ll take your advice, after all you’ve been alive for a staggering fourteen years.”

  I pinch a skin fold on her exposed waist causing her to jolt and almost spill her food.

  She kicks my foot again a little harder this time before muttering, “jerk,” adorably. “I’ll lose the extra weight and your fingers will snap against my muscles if you try that in the future.”

  “Well you’ll have plenty of time to get in shape, over a decade even.” I joke darkly.

  “Don’t say things like that.” She giggles before another tear falls from her eye. “You’re making me too emotional.”

  I place the food on the table before hugging her and singing Bob Marley’s, “No woman no cry!” Over and over.

  She laughs and I stop singing to laugh with her. We continue to watch the video and eat, our laughter turning to shock when the boyfriend of one of the bimbos runs out to fight the carbon copy nigga. Apparently she didn’t tell him she’d be on there, god knows how he got past the security.

  We watch a few more episodes while finishing the food.

  She takes the two containers back to the kitchen alongside the now empty glasses.

  Feeling like a fat cunt I lean back while rubbing my stomach. Admiring Shakira’s behind as she recedes from view, I can’t help but ask loudly, “why do you want to lose weight? Your ass is amazing!”

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  I hear her laugh in the kitchen. “It’s not about impressing boys, I also need to fit into more clothes if I want to get into modelling and fashion design.”

  “Oh so it’s to impress girls.” I reply frankly.

  “No it’s to be practical.” She giggles. “I’m five feet eight and my waist is twenty seven inches. My hips are forty nine inches and each thigh thirty inches.”

  “Not you bragging,” I say, my eyes half closed as I smile and shake my head then look back at the next video that auto plays.

  “No Christopher, I’m MOSTLY bragging,” she says teasingly on her way back into the living room. “With measurements like that I struggle to fit into most of what the club has and have to buy my own outfits to compensate, it’s why I’m always broke.”

  “I thought you already knitted your own stuff?” I ask.

  She shakes her head. “It’s harder to make clothes when compared to dolls. I also need to wear clothes from specific brands and I’d become a laughing stock if I showed up in bootleg clothes that I made myself.”

  “You know you can just ask me to buy you what you need.” I say reminding her that both my parents are rich (and evil).

  She stops and gives me an awkward stare. “Really? I never asked you before because I didn’t want you to think I’m a gold digging bitch. Aren’t you scared I’ll just keep asking for more and more.”

  I shake my head. “Not after all the rambling you did about how capitalism is evil and how superficial everyone is. It would make you quite a hypocrite.”

  “That’s true,” she giggles coming back to sit beside me. “I won’t ask for things like that.”

  I raise an eyebrow and ask, “why? It’s not like it would hurt me.”

  “But it will change things,” she says, “it will change how you see me and how I see you. Or maybe I’ll change when I know I can get whatever I want from you. What we have should stay pure.”

  “Pure?” I snicker. “I don’t think pure describes our friendship.”

  “Because we used to have sex all the time before I started dating Markieff?” She asks bluntly, as if god isn’t always watching us, or at least watching her having likely turned his gaze away from me a long time ago.

  Playing it cool I reply, “yeah pretty much.”

  I did say before that she’s more like a sister to me but it’s a bit of a lie. We’re not a couple, never have been and our relationship isn’t quite close enough for it to really feel like we’re siblings. There’s an element of sexuality present. It’s something we aren’t scared of exploring from time to time provided we’re both single at said points in time. I’ve known her almost all my life and in the beginning everyone looked at us going: ‘oh those too will be husband and wife one day, just you wait and see’. Those words found no vindicating in our future actions and now they lie voided alongside the expectations of my career playing basketball. We have become too very different people who care about very different things. She in particular became more concerned with social issues, as she entered the later part of middle school her heart filled with the struggles of a world I only grew to care less about.

  “I think we still have innocence.” She says. “Just because we like to explore each other doesn’t change anything about us. I love my mom my dad and my friends and I love you too. That love is pure and me doing things with you changes nothing.”

  Overcoming my brief awkwardness I say, “you might still be innocent but I’m far from it.”

  She shakes her head. “Not being completely innocent doesn’t mean you don’t still have innocence worth cherishing. Why do you think you have none? Is it because of your parents.”

  I don’t answer. She doesn’t know my dad, only that he’s rich and vaguely dangerous. She knows my mom because of her fame but doesn’t truly ‘know’ her. She never met either of them personally. I never felt comfortable telling her and always made up excuses when she’d ask about them. As the years went on and my lies started to contradict one another she gave up asking altogether, probably realising that I lied for a good reason.

  A silence overwhelms us both, it drowns out the audio from the laptop and fills the entire world.

  Shakira eventually breaks it, insisting, “it’s okay, this might be your last chance to tell me about them.”

  I still don’t say anything.

  “Why won’t you tell me about them?” She continues, hurting us both. “Is it because you don’t think you can trust me? Like how you couldn’t trust me to keep the sign a secret? I understand that the last two years in particular have been hard for you. But you should know that I love you and I’d never even dream of using details about your life to hurt you. It might seem like there’s no one you can trust, especially after seeing Markeiff get betrayed by his own uncle. But not every family is like that. My mom and dad aren’t like that and neither am I.”

  She leans her head on my shoulder again, gently stroking my arm and then my thigh. I feel myself sink into her softness, her warmth threatening to devour me whole. My mind becomes a jumbled mess as I think of anything I can use to change the subject. What exactly can I tell her? I know, “Chica!”

  “Huh?” Shakira gasps. “Chica has something to do with your parents?”

  “W.. what… n… no!” I stutter before recomposing myself. “She’s not human that girl.”

  Shakira raises an eyebrow at me.

  Regardless I continue, “she walked on the ceiling and teleported all over the place. I saw it with my own eyes. She was even able to teleport objects like my g-“

  I stop myself just in time. That was a close one.

  Shakira bursts into laughter. “Are you on drugs? Why would you say that about her?”

  “Forget it.” I sigh not bothering anymore.

  “She’s in your class right?” Shakira asks.

  I nod. “She’s even my desk partner.”

  “Awe that’s so cute.” She gushes. “No wonder she kept on staring at you the whole time me and Sofia were speaking to her earlier. She’s honestly so pretty I couldn’t believe my eyes for a moment. There is this one strange thing about her though.”

  “Her birthmark right?” I assume.

  She nods. “Yes that birthmark is exactly like Okimoto’s. Why’s that do you know?”

  I shake my head. “I never asked, though I doubt I’d get a real answer if I did. I know that Okimoto doesn’t have any family that he’s aware of so it’s possible that she’s a lost relative.”

  “Okimoto’s a foster kid isn’t he? Maybe they’re long lost foster siblings.” She suggests.

  “You mean like twins that were separated at birth?” I ask. “honestly that’s the only explanation I can think up. I don’t know anything about that girl.”

  “I’d say you should get to know her more but… well y'know the cops coming to get us and all.” She says with a self deprecating laugh.

  Having successfully dodged the subject of my parents I let out a relieved sigh before pinching her little side fold again.

  She jerks up and bangs her big toe against the steel leg of the glass table. “You… big lanky bitch!”

  “Oh damn.” I pull her in for a hug, stroking the top of her head as she scowls at me.

  “I’m sorry.” I say rubbing my face against her’s before kissing her forehead multiple times.

  She pouts and folds her arms before asking, “why did you bring Chica up anyway?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you like her?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t get crushes. It’s not my thing.”

  How the hell do I show Shakira that I wasn’t bullshitting? Videos? I don’t have any of Chica and even if I did she’d probably just say they’re edited or ai. I guess it’s understandable since I wouldn’t believe it either had I not seen it myself.

  My eyes widen as an idea pops into my head.

  I retrieve my phone from my pocket and call Chica.

  To my surprise she picks up instantly, as if she was waiting for me to call her.

  “Heyyy Christopherrr,” she purrs in my ear.

  “Is that her?” Shakira asks, her eyes lighting up. “You have her number!”

  I nod and continue to speak on the phone, “hi Chica can you teleport over here please?”

  “Huh?” Shakira looks at me like I’m insane. “Christopher what in gods name are you doing?”

  “Is there someone there with you?” Chica asks.

  “Why don’t you teleport here and find out?” I say, putting on a fake gentle voice.

  Shakira rolls her eyes before yelling, “it’s me Shakira! I’m that one black girl with the big booty.”

  “Oh you’re Shakira!” Chica gasps, “everyone at the modelling club was worried about you… they wanted to know why you’re not responding to any messages and why their calls to you always go to voicemail. They wanna know why you told Lucy to tell them not to come check up on you.”

  “You isolated yourself from everyone?” I ask Shakira. “Why?”

  “I just…” Shakira mumbles, “I didn’t want to get everyone involved. It’s not necessary and would create too much commotion for all of them. I asked you to stay because you’re close to me and you already know about ‘It’.”

  She stops talking and looks at my phone with uncertainty in her eyes. It’s clear that she doesn’t want to go into too much detail with Chica listening.

  “Listen Chica are you going to teleport yourself over here or not.” I ask, growing impatient.

  “What are you talking about?” She asks, playing oblivious while giggling.

  “Oh! So you want to be a little smart ass now.” I reply. “What I’m talking about is all of that crap you were doing on the bridge!” I hiss. “What happened to all that talk about wanting to learn about my kin? This is your chance to do that so teleport here right now.”

  She laughs bitchily. “Again, what are you talking about? Actually screw that, why are you asking me to do anything at all when you didn’t even ask me how I’m doing after saying hi. Tell me Shakira, who does this boy think I am? His little hoe that he gets to boss around?”

  “Fuck off.” I curse hanging up on the bimbo.

  “You could’ve tried to ask a bit more politely.” Shakira says, with a slight smile.

  I groan then stand to stretch and take a few deep breaths.

  Shakira smacks my ass so god damn hard you’d swear it slapped her first and the shock makes me jump nearly shredding my dreads in the ceiling fan.

  I recompose myself and look back at her.

  She fidgets before standing and moving closer until she’s staring right up into my eyes. Biting her bottom lip, She gives me a certain ‘Look’ and I know she needs ‘it’ now.

  Five minutes later I’m at a corner store bricked (I didn’t have any condoms on me and neither did she).

  I slap the Durex pack on the counter expectantly before retrieving some dollar bills from my pocket and shifting to slip my erection in between my thighs to hide it’s impression.

  Some dumbfuck screams out profanities in the back and I focus on what he’s saying to kill the boner by taking my mind off Shakira.

  “Just watch what will happen to you Charles you fucking ass…,” he hisses, “always ratting me out to the managers like a loser. Bastard I’ll make you pay for my reduction in hours.”

  I hear the cry of a fridge door opening followed by the jingle of glass bottles hitting each other and then the bang of the fridge shutting.

  I hear his footsteps come up right behind me where he waits.

  With my erection now thoroughly dead, my eyes rise to the cash register where the jackass shop cashier has yet to return from smoking outside.

  The crackhead behind me grows increasingly irate with each passing moment, going from cursing to a full on plot to kill everyone at his workplace that I now know is Silver Beach Restaurant, a place I took a girl to once on a date (I forgot her name).

  “Molly you fucking slut I’ll slit your throat and throw you into the deep frier once I’m done chopping George’s head off infront of you.”

  Having had enough of this guy’s bullshit I turn to face him, ready to beat him black and blue for ruining my night with his musty presence.

  When I actually see him… I go pale.

  Before any interaction takes place, I hear the front door slam shut, the rustle of a thousand bags of potato chips being brushed up against followed by footsteps that head behind the counter.

  “Hello sir?” A thick Indian accent sounds and I spin around to face the cashier slap a twenty on the counter and grab the Durex condoms before fucking right off out of there.

  I exit the corner store onto the now Lamplit Los Angeles street. I power walk back to Shakira’s place under the night lights while sweating profusely.

  That bastard… they grew from his eyes, his ears, out his mouth and through the rips in his pants and jacket.

  Spider legs… they came from every inch of him.