Of Hustle and Heart (2 page)

CHAPTER 2

ZACARIAS

I
fall asleep thinking about my girlfriend. I haven’t seen her in three weeks. But the last time we were together, she got so angry with me that she punctured the inside of her forearm with a Wusthof carving knife—the kind of knife you buy for piercing large carcasses of meat. My family has a history of deer hunting, so my brother John and I keep such utensils in our kitchen.

“So now you’re listening to me?” she said as I ran toward her. Blood ran down her forearm, pooling in the crevice.

“What the hell, Whit?” I cussed as I grabbed her arm and dragged her into the kitchen. “What are you doing?” I turned on the water and held her arm underneath. In complete disbelief, I wrapped her forearm with old gauze that I found under my bathroom sink. “You could’ve sliced open a vein!”

“I wouldn’t cut that deep. I don’t want to do any damage,” she said, her tone casual. I looked at her and let go of her wrist, as she dismissed the incident. “It’ll be fine. Put some iodine or Neosporin on it so it won’t scar.”

Its dawn now, and my phone trembles beneath my arm, pulling me from my sleep. I assume—or hope, rather—its Whitney calling. My voice is raspy, my brain full of fog, and I don’t think to clear any of it away before I reach for my phone. Whitney and I are going through a bizarre period in our relationship. I have somehow and unwittingly managed to convince her that I can’t support her in all the ways she needs and is accustomed to. I know she’s spoiled. But this can be a good thing.

“Hello?”

“Hey, you awake?” my mother speaks quietly into the phone. I’m shocked to hear her voice.

“What? No,” I grumble.

“I thought you were waking up at four,” she says.

“It’s three thirty. What are you doing?”

“I wanted to catch you before you left for work.”

“Ma, I’m going back to sleep. Please let me.”

“Zacarias, you and John never answer your phones when I call during the day,” she says, yawning into her phone. “What time do you get off from work, hon’?”

Wow
.

At some point in our stiflingly close relationship,
I
made it okay for my mother to call me before I even had a chance to take a morning piss. I’ve never allowed myself to be unavailable to her. It’s how I show my mother I love her beyond anything.

“I don’t know.” I sigh. “I have an event at work, so it’ll probably be late.”

She keeps me on the phone for another thirty minutes, but I can’t talk much with my head buried into the side of my pillow. I hold the phone to my ear, mumbling responses. When she finally lets me go, I hang up, hoping she won’t be upset with me for not happily indulging in her wake-up call. I roll over on my side but can’t fall back asleep. I lie there thinking about how aggravated I am that the wake-up call was not from my Whitney.

Forty-five minutes later, I’m creeping around the apartment, trying not to wake John while I get ready for work. As I stand in the kitchen stirring brown sugar into my travel coffee cup, I hear the doorknob rattling and a key turning in the lock. John stumbles in, looking glassy eyed and exhausted. I watch him in silence from behind the bar, as I take slow slurps from my fresh cup of blond roast. He doesn’t acknowledge me, doesn’t even look my way. I don’t even know if he realizes I’m there as he heads straight through the living room without looking back over his shoulder.

I hear my brother laugh as his bedroom door clicks shut behind him.

Ms. Amanda Billings, a guidance counselor at Chesney High, was so impressed with the catering I did for her family reunion that she called the restaurant last Monday morning and spoke with me personally about catering for Chesney’s senior-class picnic. Of course, the answer was yes, since catering jobs always bring in some nice change. On top of the money, any event Rico’s can get behind is the best type of PR and advertising. If this picnic goes well, Rico’s could position itself for more personal and special-event gigs from the satisfied picnickers. Saying I’m excited is a terrible understatement. I’m up early this morning, preparing for the day, and I’m peeing myself over the importance of it.

I’m a good enough guy, even labeled a sweetheart from time to time, but the whole charm thing escapes me sometimes. I tend to be nervous when I’m out of my element, and I’m too honest to jerk anyone’s chain. I hope to overcome this unstable nature one day. It’s a weakness the women in my life find tiresome.

The catering vans are being loaded out back. We’re expected to check in with the principal of Albert Chesney in twenty minutes, and the school is twelve minutes away. We’re running behind. I intended to have the vans fully loaded with our food and outdoor banquet sets twenty minutes ago. As I’ve grown from a seventeen-year-old busboy into a twenty-four-year-old staff supervisor, I’ve gotten good at keeping my emotions in check with a little bit of prayer. But this morning I feel the stress. I pace in front of Rico’s van with my phone positioned next to my ear. I’m calling Bruno, one of my staff at Rico’s, for the second time, but his voice mail picks up. The taste in my mouth is bitter; I don’t bother to leave a message. And now some of the staff who helped load the van are watching me. They stand behind the van, glancing at each other, their eyes full of questions, but no one dares to ask. Then Whitney comes outside. She sees me sweating and fidgeting with my shirt as my insecurity makes a bitch out of me. She stands behind the staff, annoyed by my emotional status but keeping it cool and professional.

“Excuse me, Zack,” she calls out. I walk toward her, breathing deeply to calm myself. When I get to her, she whispers in my ear that Bruno is not coming. My head spins. She nods stoically, as I glance at my watch; time has run out. The restaurant will be short-staffed because it will take three of my regular servers to fill Bruno’s shoes at the senior picnic. I’m peeing myself for a different reason.

“So…he’s not coming?”

In Rico’s back office, I cock my head, lowering it in defeat as my Whit shakes her head. She walks over to me and taps my foot, signaling me to remove my legs from the desk, and looks at me from the corner of her eye.

“No, baby, he’s not coming.” She hopes I won’t be knocked down by the sudden news and that Bruno’s blatant disregard for the restaurant’s business will not affect me in a negative way. And although I am completely bothered, I attempt to put on a phony sense of clarity and lightheartedness for the sake of my girlfriend’s pride.

“He called in.” She walks around the desk and places her palm down at the corner. She leans in, studying my face, her eyes rolling over mine. She needs to see if I’ve given up. I’m not surprised by Bruno’s decision. He’s been upset with me for a while now, and as a result, his performance at the restaurant has suffered.

“I can fill in for him,” Whitney offers. She’s only a hostess, so I decline, raising my hands in protest of the idea. She could fill in, but I won’t have her do it.

“No.” I sigh. “I need to go. Just stay here.”

CHAPTER 3

ZINA

Should I stay…should I go?

S
hannon is sitting two rows over, staring at me like a big, green-eyed puppy. He looks as if I yanked on his tail and then kicked him out of the way, as if my plan to skip the senior picnic has wounded him in some dehumanizing way.

He’s a biracial baby—a mix of white father and black mother. At first glance he’s white; second glance he’s weird. And on the inside, who knows? Until this year, I never had a real conversation with him. The type of close friendships most kids form in school happen only when you have a class together. We hadn’t been so lucky till now. We share a second period, AP trig class, this semester, and he’s the nicest boy ever. A quiet, insanely popular jock, hanging in the shadow of his obnoxious friends and teammates, who has somehow managed to pick
the
most obnoxious girlfriend in the world. For this, he truly sucks.

Shannon and I write letters to each other, sometimes two or three a day. We started it on accident, initially passing one-line notes to each other, asking to borrow each other’s notes or homework. Those letters soon transgressed into the following:

What are you eating for lunch today? Man, I’m tired. I don’t feel like practicing. Come to my locker after third period.
Shannon’s smart, but he has to work for it. He puts in crazy study time in order to pull the grades I’ve been pulling since kindergarten just from reading the chapter and study text once. He told me in a note that he had taken the AP placement test three times in order to get into AP classes.

Really? Wow, that’s dedication!
I wrote back.

It’s impressive that he didn’t give up but embarrassing as hell that it took him three whole times to pass. Nonetheless, I was shocked on the first day of class when he started talking to me about locker assignments. After the first day, we never stopped talking.

He’s a gorgeous boy—a delicious mix of striking green eyes, pale-white skin, and wavy grayish-brown hair. To me, he’s an ethnic white boy, down as they come with a passionately intense understanding of blackness (because it’s a part of him). And a voice with as much bass as an 808 drum. Damn. From the corner of my eye, I see him hunched over his desk, scribbling something in his notebook. I sigh and shrink down in my seat, reconsidering my plan to fake sick, ditch school, and get back to the southeast. I hadn’t paid my dues to attend the picnic anyway, so it wouldn’t be a good idea to go. I’d asked my mama for the money, but she didn’t have it. I got the same response the next four times I asked, too. Eventually, I gave up and forgot all about it.

My mind is sidetracked these days. All I can think about is money and that my family doesn’t have any. If I don’t leave school early enough today so I can get to the MLK strip center and hustle, I’ll lose an opportunity to make a few dollars. I got kids from my side of Houston waiting on me and my new releases. Special orders for seasons of
True Blood
and K’s new album. I tap my foot on the floor, fumbling my pencil through my fingers. Shit.

Someone drops an eraser on my desk. When I look up, the kid who sits between Shannon and me hands me a folded sheet of paper. When I open it, I see Shannon’s tiny handwriting warning me about how I’m going to miss out on everything. I chuckle at his lame attempt to coerce me into attending day one of senior events. And I feel bad. If Shannon ain’t happy about me ditching senior picnic, then B. de la Vega will not be having it either.

I stare at Shannon’s note and consider the fact that this boy with a crazy girlfriend is really, really trying to get me to stay at school. And Blanca, my bestie, will kick me down the stairs the next time she sees me if I don’t show up. I laugh to myself, but the laughter passes quickly. Shannon’s leaning forward on his desk, but I don’t look his way. His arms are folded, his head propped on top of them, and he’s watching me, waiting for my response. He doesn’t move, doesn’t look around to notice the stragglers walking in well after the tardy bell. Shannon waits for me to make my move.

Making enough money to pay our light and water bills with these bootlegs ain’t likely to happen. And those things will be disconnected within the next ten days or so. Even still, I have to try. Shouldn’t I? Somebody has to do something, right?

Shannon stirs in his desk but maintains a watchful eye. He’s patient—more so than I’ll ever be. I don’t really understand why Shannon cares about what I do. But the fact that he does makes me fond of him in a way I never expected. My eyes sting, and as my face flashes warm, I can’t seem to react fast enough to keep a few teardrops from spilling onto my desk. I shift uncomfortably and rub my hand across the wet spot in front of me. I fight hard to pull rank over my thoughts and emotions.
Stop!
My face turns to stone; I steady my breathing.

Shannon continues to watch. His head shoots up as he straightens, his mouth gaping. He looks terrified. I look at him and grin, scribble on his note, and then crumple it up and toss it a row over. He extends one arm and effortlessly snatches our note from the air. He does this without taking his eyes off me. I bury my head into my arms and lay my head down on my desk, turning away from him. I’m worn out, and Shannon’s sentiments are draining what’s left of my energy. I need a moment for myself. I don’t want to look at him right now.

But then I hear the scuffling of a desk. A long arm extends itself and nudges a crumpled sheet of paper under my elbow. I raise my arm and see Shannon’s tiny words on the flip side of our note.

It hurts my heart to see you cry.