But O himself was slow to anger, he thought. As his father liked to remind him, anger was the easy option. It was much harder to keep your temper and sort out a problem with measured words and deeds. That was what a diplomat was trained to do, what his father assumed Osei would do too when he grew up—that or become an engineer. Not surprisingly, he never suggested Sisi should train to be a diplomat.
So O was surprised with himself when the anger began to well up in him like water rising steadily in a river. For a while it was hard to see, then suddenly the water was in places it wasn’t meant to be—fields, roads, houses, schools, playgrounds. It was there and you couldn’t get rid of it or make it change direction.
It had begun with Dee feeding Casper strawberries, had risen as she defended Casper to him. But the tipping point, when the water suddenly broke the banks and overflowed, was seeing the strawberry pencil case in Blanca’s hands. Partly it was the incongruity—that a white stranger could be holding something O so strongly associated with his sister, back when she was younger, happier, more communicative, more sisterly. Now it was being passed around the playground, untethered from its personal history, as if it didn’t matter that it had belonged to Sisi—as if Sisi didn’t matter, when actually she mattered to Osei more than anyone. More than Dee, he realized. Dee had not yet earned her place in his heart. Now he was not sure she ever would.
For she had lied to him. Dee had told him the case was at home when clearly it was not. She had given it away, or thrown it away, and somehow it had ended up with Blanca. Casper’s girlfriend. Of course, Casper was connected somewhere. Osei didn’t know how but he sensed it, and Ian had confirmed it. And Dee’s lying and Casper’s involvement were pushing at him, building up a pressure in his head that was sure to blow.
On first base, he had watched Blanca sitting on the pirate ship with the strawberry case in her lap; she was running her fingers over the strawberries just like every other girl did. Then she’d raced over to Casper and he’d had to witness their public display, rammed up against the fence, the pencil case in her hand as they kissed until she dropped it. That brought his rage right to the surface. It only needed someone to set it free.
That someone was Dee. When the bell rang for the end of recess, Blanca and Casper kept kissing, the pencil case remained abandoned on the ground, and Dee came running over to him.
“Osei, what—” But she did not get a chance to finish. He did not want to have to confront her, to have her get in his face, talking to him, telling more lies, treating him like her boyfriend and then like the black boy on the white playground. The black sheep, with a black mark against his name. Blackballed. Blackmailed. Blacklisted. Blackhearted. It was a black day.
The dam holding back his anger broke. “Leave me alone!” he shouted, and shoved her hard—so hard that Dee flailed her arms, circling them like a cartoon character grabbing at the air, before falling backward. The sickening sound of her head cracking against the asphalt made people at last turn from the compelling Blanca-and-Casper show to a new drama.
“Dee!” Mimi cried, racing over to kneel by her friend. Dee was lying flat, eyes closed. “Dee, are you all right?” When Mimi brushed her hair from her face, her eyelids fluttered, and she opened her eyes.
O hovered over them, suddenly ashamed, sickened and helpless.
Dee looked around, confused, until her eyes met Osei’s, and she flinched. “I’m OK.”
Mimi looked up. “What is the matter with you?” she hissed at Osei. “Are you crazy? Why’d you do that?”
Osei shuddered, full of self-disgust. But his anger had not subsided; it stopped his mouth and feet so that he simply stood, silent, hands at his sides.
Hearing footsteps behind him, he knew it would be the teachers. He shut his eyes, just for a moment, though he knew it wouldn’t get him what he wanted, which was to be spirited far away from this playground and these white people, especially these white adults who would be all over him now—telling him off, sending him to the principal, suspending him and calling his parents. He thought of his mother’s face when she heard what he had done and felt ill.
“What’s happened here?” Miss Lode knelt on the other side of Dee. “Are you hurt, Dee?”
“O pushed Dee!” Rod cried, indignant, from the crowd of students who had gathered. “He knocked her over, the black bastard!”
“Language, Rod,” Miss Lode warned.
“But he did!”
“That’s enough. The color of his skin has nothing to do with this. Dee, can you sit up?” She and Mimi helped Dee into a sitting position. She still seemed dazed.
“All right, now, where does it hurt?”
Dee put her hand to the back of her head. “Here.”
“Do you feel dizzy?”
“A little bit.” She did not look at Osei.
Mr. Brabant joined them. “Go to your class lines, everyone,” he commanded, his authority so clear that the spell was broken and students began to move. “Not you,” he added as O made to follow the others heading toward the school entrance. “What did you do, Osei?”
O was silent.
“He didn’t do anything,” Dee answered. “I—I ran up to him and tripped and fell, that’s all.”
Mimi started. “Dee, that’s not—”
“It’s not Osei’s fault. He tried to catch me.”
Mr. Brabant raised his eyebrows. “Really?”
“Really. I was clumsy. You know how clumsy I am.”
“If you tripped you would have fallen forward, wouldn’t you? Not backward. You’ve learned about momentum in class.”
“I tripped,” Dee insisted, struggling to her feet. “I’m fine. Really.” She still did not look at Osei.
Mr. Brabant and Miss Lode glanced at each other. “All right,” Mr. Brabant said. “Go to the nurse’s office so she can check you over and get you an ice pack for that bump on your head. You go with her, Mimi. Look after her. And do something about her hair. Her mother will complain otherwise, and we’ll never hear the end of it.”
Osei kept his eyes on the ground rather than allowing his gaze to follow the girls as they left. He didn’t dare look up. Dee’s covering for him did not make things better, but worse. His anger had not abated, but solidified into a lump in his gut. It was not so much anger at her, but at himself. He had pushed a girl. You did not do that. His mother would be so horrified, she would not even shout or wail; she would turn away from him. Even Sisi, with all her righteous anger at white people, would not condone what Osei had done.
He could feel both sets of teachers’ eyes on him as he stood, head bowed, awaiting their judgment.
“I’ve seen your kind before. You planning to be a troublemaker at this school, boy?” Mr. Brabant muttered.
“No, sir.” The words came out of him like a reflex.
“Because we don’t take kindly to such behavior here.”
“No, sir.”
“You’re lucky you’ve got a girl who likes you enough to lie for you. God knows why.”