FOR TWO DAYS, we were peaceful. Neither one of us left the apartment. Ma was probably too worn-out from worrying, and I didn’t want to chance running into Renelle. Matter fact, I was certain she had told Leroy by now and I had nothing left—no job and no chance in hell for a father for my baby. I wanted to try to go down and talk to Rasul. But after everything I wasn’t trying to start something by asking so much as to go to the Laundromat, though we needed to. Ma and I mostly watched TV in silence, on opposite ends of the couch with bags of junk food separating us. We left the beds unmade, and I washed the dishes without being asked. No hits, no lectures, no spiteful words. I waited for the phone to ring, anticipating Jewel’s voice on the other side, telling Ma about the missing money. She and Hakim had to have discovered it by now, especially when it came time for him to pay for the motel they would stay in in Pennsylvania. I could hear him saying, “Jewel, I know what I had,” and her telling him to get over it. As I had hoped, she would defend me until the end—ultimately blaming it on the entire male species’ carelessness before admitting to him or herself that her runaway niece was a thief as well. As Saturday night droned into yet another weekend of a mediocre, lukewarm Amateur Hour on Showtime at the Apollo, I felt surprisingly calm.