Mr. Brabant’s eyes came to rest on Dee waiting in front of him, and he cleared his throat. “Dee, go and round up the other girls.” He gestured at the Double-Dutch jumpers. “Tell them I’ll take away the ropes if they keep on skipping after the first bell rings.”
He was one of the few male teachers in the school, and though it shouldn’t have mattered, to Dee it made him the kind of teacher you always obeyed, the teacher you impressed if you could—the way she felt about her own father, whom she wanted to please when he came home from work.
She hurried over to the girls jumping Double Dutch; they were using two thick ropes that made a satisfying thwack on the asphalt, and chanting as they turned. She hesitated a moment, for it was Blanca’s go. She was by far the best Double-Dutcher in school, jumping so nimbly as the ropes came around that she could go for minutes without getting tripped up. The other girls preferred chants that would require Blanca to call someone else into the ropes or send herself out. Blanca of course liked to stay in, and this morning had managed to get them to chant:
Ice cream soda, cherry on top
Tell me the name of your sweetheart!
Is it A, B, C, D…
If the jumper didn’t get caught on one of the letters, they went on to numbers up to twenty, then favorite colors. Blanca was going through the colors now, long black curls bouncing, feet nimble even though she was wearing platform sandals. Dee could never jump in such shoes; she preferred her white Converse sneakers, which she kept as clean as she could.
She went over to Mimi, who was turning the ropes.
“This is the second set of colors she’s doing,” her friend muttered. “Show-off.”
“Mr. B said he’d take the ropes away if you don’t stop now,” Dee reported.
“Good.” Mimi let her hands drop and the ropes went slack at one end, while the other turner kept going for a few seconds. Blanca’s feet got caught in them.
“Why’d you stop?” she demanded, pouting. “I could’ve tripped! Besides, I had to get back to the alphabet so I could stop at C!”
Dee and Mimi rolled their eyes as they began coiling the ropes. Blanca was crazy about Casper, the most popular boy in the sixth grade. To be fair, he seemed crazy about her too, though they broke up on a regular basis.
Dee herself had always liked Casper. More than that: they shared an understanding that they had it easier than others, that they didn’t have to work so hard to keep friends or be respected. The year before, she had briefly wondered if she should have a crush on him, or even take it further and go with him. Casper had an appealing, open face and bright blue eyes that put you at ease. But, though it would have been natural to, she did not think of him in that way. He was more like a brother; they were engaged in similar activities, looking forward rather than at each other. It made more sense for Casper to be with someone messy and energetic like Blanca.
“Oh my God, who’s that?” Blanca cried. Though in class she said little, on the playground she was loud and unabashed.
Dee knew without looking that Blanca was referring to the new boy. “He’s from Nigeria,” she said casually, coiling the rope between her elbow and her hand.
“How do you know?” Mimi asked.
“Teachers said.”
“A black boy at our school—I can’t believe it!”
“Shhh…” Dee tried to stifle Blanca, embarrassed that the boy might hear.
She and Mimi and Blanca headed toward the lines of children, the ropes under her arm. They were kept in Mr. Brabant’s room, and Dee was responsible for them—which she knew made Blanca jealous, as did her friendship with Mimi.
“Why do you like her so much when she’s so weird?” Blanca had said once.
“Mimi’s not weird,” Dee had defended her friend. “She’s…sensitive. She feels things.”
Blanca had shrugged and begun to sing “Crocodile Rock,” making clear the conversation was over. Threesomes were a tricky navigation: one person was always feeling left out.
A teacher must have told the new boy where to go, for he was now standing at the end of the line that had formed in front of Mr. Brabant. Blanca came to a dramatic halt, rocking back on her heels. “Now what do we do?” she cried.
Dee hesitated, then stepped up to stand behind him. Blanca joined her and whispered loudly, “Can you believe it? He’s in our class! I dare you to touch him.”
“Shut up!” Dee hissed, hoping he hadn’t heard. She studied his back. The new boy had the most beautifully shaped head, smooth and even and perfectly formed, like a clay pot turned on a potter’s wheel. Dee wanted to reach out and cup it in her hand. His hair was cut short, like a forest of trees dotted in tight clumps over the curves of a mountain—very different from the thick Afros popular at the moment. Not that there were any Afros around to look at. There were no black students at Dee’s school, or black residents in her suburban neighborhood, though by 1974 Washington, DC, itself had a large enough black population to be nicknamed Chocolate City. Sometimes when she went downtown with her family she saw black men and women with big Afros; and on TV when she watched Soul Train at Mimi’s house, dancing to Earth, Wind & Fire or the Jackson Five. She didn’t ever see the show at home: her mother would never let her watch black people singing and dancing on TV. Dee had a crush on Jermaine Jackson, though it was his sly toothy smile she liked rather than his Afro. All of her friends preferred little Michael, who seemed to Dee too obvious a choice. It would be like choosing the cutest boy in school to have a crush on, which was perhaps why she never thought of Casper that way—and why Blanca did. Blanca always went for the obvious.
“Dee, you will look after our new student today.” Mr. Brabant gestured at her from the head of the line. “Show him where the cafeteria is, the music room, the bathroom. Explain things when he doesn’t understand what is going on in class. All right?”
Blanca gasped and nudged Dee, who turned red and nodded. Why had Mr. Brabant chosen her? Was he punishing her for something? Dee never needed punishing. Her mother made sure of that.
Around her, classmates were giggling and whispering.
“Where’d he come from?”
“The jungle!”
“Hoo-hoo-hoo…Ow, that hurt!”
“Don’t be so immature.”
“Poor Dee, having to look after him!”
“Why’d Mr. B choose her? Usually a boy looks after a boy.”
“Maybe none of the boys would be willing to. I wouldn’t.”
“I wouldn’t either!”
“Yeah, but Dee’s Mr. B’s pet—he knows she won’t say no.”
“Smart.”
“Wait a minute—does this mean that that boy is going to sit at our desks?”
“Ha ha! Poor Duncan, stuck with the new boy! Patty too.”
“I’ll move!”
“Mr. B won’t let you.”
“I will.”
“Dream on, buddy boy.”