The grasshopper boy from the night before stood in front of the elevator door when it opened at six, still carrying that raggedy basketball. His tank top was red this time. He hesitated when he saw me. I sucked in my breath silently, but then stepped from in front of the door and back into the crook of the car to make room. I folded my arms and waited for him to speak. He grunted “’Sup?”

“You got nerve asking me a question,” I spat. I smiled in spite of myself, shifting my weight toward him. He followed my lead.

“You still on last night? I said I was sorry …”

“You shouldn’t be bouncing balls that late anyway,” I told him. “Makes too much noise. You know people do work around here …”

I was hoping he would tell me where his “around here” had been before it was here.

“I know, that’s why my aunt put me out in the hallway, ’cause I was making so much noise last night.”

“Ain’t that telling you something?”

He whistled air, not music.

“It seems like somebody’s always telling me something.”

The elevator stopped on number three. I stepped to the door before it opened, calling back once I stepped outside, “Maybe you should start listening.”

This time, I looked back at him. He was standing with his mouth open, a slight smile on his face, obviously amused. The next thing I knew he was jumping out of the elevator and following behind me. I really wanted to know what he thought he was doing. I was figuring out, slowly but surely, that grown men weren’t shit. I wasn’t about to get tangled up in a young one’s web.

“Where you live in here?” he asked.

“You really don’t need to know all that,” I told him, stopping so neither one of us could go any farther.

“Damn!” he said. “I ain’t no murderer or nothing. I’m just trying to meet my neighbors. You know, be friendly and all that nice shit.”

I didn’t say a word, only folded my arms.

“I guess you ain’t friendly,” he said.

“It’s not that.” He seemed like one of the dudes at school who was always chasing some girl but never getting her, either because he wasn’t wearing the right sneakers or his fade wasn’t shaped up right. Minor obstacles that he wouldn’t even realize or care he needed to fix. But even those guys didn’t bother to speak to me. I was confused.

“I’m just not trying to make any new friends right now,” I eventually told him.