Romiette and Julio (10 page)

People who usually had no time to notice whether the weather had changed, or the homeless person sitting on the corner, would often slow down at the window of the boutique. Lady Brianna Cappelle had a sense of style and drama, and her window displays were delightfully eye-catching. This month the display included three stained-glass windows crafted with intricate flower designs, a fountain from which bubbled clear, cool water, dozens of live tulips blooming two months early, and a sampling of outfits placed artfully among them. Sometimes people just walked in out of curiosity. Most of them left with a purchase or two.

Every time Romi walked into the store, she would stop to enjoy the sensory feast inside. Fountains bubbled, soft music soothed, and mild incense, blended with the smell of new cloth and old stories, made Romi grin with delight. It was here that she learned of all the African tribes—those of the past who established great kingdoms long before European kingdoms began, and those of the present who lived and worked with great dignity and pride. It was here that Romi had heard the wondrous folktales of the storytellers, and it was here that Romi and her mother had become very close. They worked well together, and as Romi got older she had been given more responsibility. She liked being in the store alone too, as she was today. Her mother had run to the
bank for a few minutes, and Romi decided to rearrange the jewelry display since the store was practically empty. The door chimed as it opened, and Malaka Grimes walked in.

Romi and Malaka had been friends when they were much younger and lived near each other. But Malaka’s parents had divorced, Malaka had moved, and she had grown up facing lots of pain and unhappiness. It had changed her from the giggly, cheerful friend Romi remembered to a hard-acting, foulmouthed girl who smoked, drank, and wore her skirts very tight and very short. When they ran into each other at school last year, Romi almost didn’t recognize Malaka. They had exchanged phone numbers, promised to call, but there was very little to say anymore.

“Whassup, Romiette,” Malaka said coolly. She was wearing a body-hugging purple sweater, a short black leather skirt, and purple tights.

“Hey, girl. Not much. Just chillin’ here in my mom’s store.”

“Got any new stuff in?” Malaka fingered the jewelry, then tossed it back onto the counter as if it were junk.

“Yeah, some live Kente cloth dresses over there, and some jewelry to die for in that case over there.” Romi felt uncomfortable. Malaka had not come to shop.

“Doesn’t your mama give you whatever you want out of here?” Malaka asked.

“Give? You must be crazy! My mother is in
business for the money. She pays me for workin’, so she expects me to pay for things I see and like. She takes it out of my check.”

“From what I’ve seen you wear, you must not get a very big check.” Malaka laughed sarcastically.

“Yeah, I had to learn to control myself.” Romi busied herself by dusting the jewelry case. She was trying not to treat Malaka with suspicion, but she couldn’t figure out what she wanted.

Finally Malaka let her purpose be known. “Hey, Romi,” she said innocently, “who was that I saw you eatin’ lunch with?”

Romi knew instantly where the conversation was headed. This she could handle. She paused a minute, looked Malaka up and down slowly, adjusted the water flow from the fountain, then turned to Malaka and said boldly, “That new boy, Julio. What’s it to you?”

“The Puerto Rican?”

“He’s not Puerto Rican, he’s Mexican. Actually, he’s Texan. He’s from Corpus Christi.”

“He’s kinda cute, if you like that type.” Malaka sauntered past Romi as if to look at the candle display.

“What do you mean, ‘that type’?” Romi could feel the anger building.

“Well, you know, Mexican—Hispanic-like.”

“What’s wrong with that?” Romi felt as if she needed to defend Julio. She wasn’t sure why, but she felt protective.

“Nothin’. Hey, why you gettin’ all salty? I just said—” Malaka was enjoying this. She knew she was irritating Romi. That was her purpose.

“You acted like something was wrong with me eating lunch with a Mexican-American.”

“I don’t see why you would want to—you know, you’ve always been heavy into African clothes and jewelry and stuff. It just seemed odd to see you giggling like a third grader with that kid that’s so obviously—let me see how I can put this—Spanish.” Malaka smirked.

“I was
not
giggling. He’s funny and clever and he makes me laugh. What’s it to you, anyway?”

“Ain’t nothin’ to me. Some other folks, now—they might give a care. Do what you want. Can’t even have a conversation with you no more. Catch you later. Peace.” At that, Malaka sauntered out of the store.

Romi stood there shaking and angry. “Peace? Doesn’t look like it. I wonder what that was all about. Something’s going on here.”

Romi lounged on her bed and waited for the phone to ring. She’d finished her homework, taken her shower, talked to Destiny twice, and now, just before sleep took over, she knew that Julio would call. She picked it up on the second ring.
No use letting him think I’m desperate!
she thought.

“Hola,
Romi.” Julio’s voice melted her socks, but she wasn’t going to let him know, at least not yet.

“What’s up, Julio? You dealin’ with that purple warning we got today?”

“So what was that all about? I could tell you knew those thick-lookin’ dudes, but they didn’t seem like they wanted to sit down and share a Coke and a smile.”

Romi sighed. “Julio, we got gangbangers like everybody else. They just never bothered me before.”

“I know. I can smell gangbangers from a distance, and those dudes were stinking with their power and threat. They’ve been hassling me, but you’ve got nothing to do with that.”

“Hassling you? Why?”

“Because they can. At my old school, it got so bad that they’d walk into a hall and everyone would run inside the nearest classroom. Teachers too. One teacher, Mr. Cordero, tried to stand up to them last year. He insisted they take off their colors in his class and he refused to run the other way when they ‘walked the hall,’ as they called it. He would look them straight in the eye and tell them he was not afraid of them. He died in a car accident one weekend. His brakes failed. So they say. No one could prove anything, but the gangbangers walked the halls with more freedom after that. The principal, a timid little man, wrote letters and sent memos, but he would lock his office doors when it was time for ‘gang walk.”’

“Oh, Julio. That’s scary. Did you have a lot of gangs?”

“We had some. There was an all-girl gang who called themselves the Sisterhood—really just a bunch of little wanna-bes who wanted to be bad, and wanted to be noticed, and wanted to be seen with the dudes in the main gangs. The big gangs had organized crime connections from New York. I know because the gangs seemed to show up all of a sudden. We had about five new kids enroll in the school—hard-looking dudes who didn’t look like eleventh graders. They spent a lot of time hanging with the ‘fringe’ kids—you know, the kids who come late or skip school or hang on the corners after midnight. Before we knew it, there were meetings, and colors, and handshakes, and all of a sudden those
kids had money and drugs and clothes and … power, I guess is the best way to say it. And those five transfer kids dropped out—just left. Our school was rough before, but it changed. Instead of fistfights, kids got cut with knives. I knew lots of kids who had guns in their book bags.”

“Guns in their book bags? But I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. I know the same kinds of kids. I bet they look the same. Not much nerve. No real friends. Scary. Like on the news. You got racial gangs? Or mixed, like in
West Side Story?”

“Yeah, I remember
West Side Story.
Our English teacher showed it to us last year when we read
Romeo and Juliet.
That was a good movie. I remember one gang was ‘Americans’—mostly white kids, but I think they threw a couple of black kids in there to make it look good. The other gang was Puerto Rican kids. Their leader was played by an actor who was Greek. So much for Hollywood.”

“Reality is a lot scarier.”

“You got that right. Romi, did you notice that our names are almost like the ones in the play, only backwards? Do you think that means something? Are we destined for doom or romance? Or is it just weird?”

Romi grinned, glad that Julio had noticed too. “Yeah, I recognized our names. It’s impossible not to! I think it’s an awesome coincidence. Who knows what it means for us? I guess time will tell—or maybe fate.”

“Who knows. The kids in that story both ended
up dead, didn’t they? From gang wars, sort of.”

“It was families, not gangs, in Shakespeare. Scary enough and close enough to give me chills, though.”

“We had two rival gangs at my old school. The Ramones were all Mexican-American kids, and they hated everything that wasn’t deep-roasted in Spanish stuff. The other gang was all black kids—they called themselves the Black Daddies, and they were the ones that just appeared overnight, it seems. The Ramones got together when it looked like the Black Daddies were taking over the school. So when they had ‘gang walks’ in the halls, the Daddies would take the third floor, and the Ramones would take the second floor. Only kids that the gang approved of were safe, and no one really knew if they were on the safe list or not. Both gangs would recruit guys to fight and girls to hang with them. The girls liked the gangbangers because they always seemed to have money and cars and expensive clothes.

“What they called ‘wars’ would start on Friday and continue through the weekend. On Monday, the winner would ‘walk’ the first floor, as a sign of dominance for the week. It was a strange system, but we understood it and it worked—until Mr. Cordero. He tried to change things, and he died. Everyone was afraid. No one was learning. No one was teaching. Kids were getting hurt, so we left. Do you think my family is chicken?”

“No way, Julio. I can’t believe it was that bad. I hope it doesn’t get like that here. So far we only have this one gang. You’re either in it or you’re not. Most kids
don’t fool with the gang kids, but those who do are mean and scary, and it seems like they only think with one giant, demented brain cell instead of having any independent thoughts at all.

“The dudes who stopped by our table at lunch were all in the gang. They call themselves The Family or the Devildogs. All the kids in it are African-American, they all wear purple every day, and they carry heavy dog chains in their pockets. They don’t do homework, and they don’t do clubs or activities or any of the normal stuff kids do in school. They spend a lot of their time thinking up ways to intimidate other kids—like me and you today. It’s much easier to give up your table in the cafeteria than get punched and have your food pushed on the floor. I know a girl who got jumped in front of the bus stop last week. She had made the mistake of breaking up with a Devildog. She was out of school for a week healing up.”

“Romi, why do you think they were threatening us? Me, I can understand. Why you? They’re black, you’re black. Makes no sense to me.”

“Well, the only thing I can think of is they don’t like it ’cause you’re
not
black. They don’t know me very well, but they know my mom is big into African culture and I work at her store. But there’s no way I’m gonna let them tell me who I can talk to or eat lunch with! No way!

“You know, now that I think about it, this girl came into the shop today, talking about you and me and why were eating together. I thought it was a
little weird, but she was wearing purple, and I think I’ve seen her hanging around Terrell and his boys.”

“So what do we do if they come back, Romi? There’s no way I’ll let them threaten you or hurt you.”

“You’d protect me, Julio?”

“With my life.”

“Wow. Nobody’s ever told me that before! But maybe we’re jumping the gun. All we had was a couple of idiots stare at us at lunch. Nobody is talking about death threats.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow at lunch. Good night, Romi.”

“G’night, Julio. Bring the hot sauce. We may need it.”

Romi hung up the phone and mused about the day’s events. It was great that Julio seemed to really like her, but why all the hassle from gangbangers? Didn’t they have more important battles to fight? She fell asleep, frowning about the possibilities of the future.

Ben and Julio had just changed for gym class. Julio liked gym. He had a strong upper body, plus he was a fast runner. The girls in the class noticed his muscular arms on his first day of class; the guys were learning he could get the ball where it needed to be. Today they were playing volleyball—lots of noise, whacks, and an amazing amount of excitement over getting a small white ball back and forth over a net. “Hey! My man Julio! Give me a lunch report! This is better than a soap opera or a talk show,” Ben called as he ran across the gym to toss the volleyball into the basketball hoop.

“You’re crazy, Ben. You can’t even make a basket with a volleyball,” said Julio, laughing. “Watch how it’s done!” The ball swooshed smoothly into the net just as the teacher blew the whistle to choose teams. Julio and Ben sat on a bench near the back of the gym. They let the younger kids play first since there was not much challenge playing ninth graders. They’d play in a few minutes when the juniors and seniors took the floor.

“So, tell me, dude. What’s up with you and Romi?”

Julio smiled as he retied his gym shoe. “Romi and I met for lunch again. She looked good—she had on this African dress with a matching scarf. She said it came from Kenya and her mom’s shop. She looked like some kind of queen or something—a queen chomping on french fries.”

“And now we have crowned her queen. You got it bad, Julio. What did you talk about—the crown diamonds?”

“No, stupid. We talked about puppies, and how I’d get to her house to pick one out.”

“Ever been to her house?”

“No, of course not! The thought of going to her house makes me jumpy. I’ve been to lots of girls’ houses, but Romi’s family has money. I know she lives in the nice part of town out beyond London Woods.”