Cover

Dedication

For Diane and Diane

Epigraph

Two things everybody’s got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin’ fuh theyselves.

—Zora Neale Hurston,

Their Eyes Were Watching God

Prologue

I’d known Precious forever, Stacia a year, and Tonya for just a minute. We were so different, but everybody loved them some double Dutch. Sometimes we made a tight-knit crew; other days we couldn’t get along for nothing.

Our friendships started with “What’s your name?” The answer carried with it looks that I can still see clearly: Stacia’s begged me not to talk to her, and Tonya’s asked, “Is she talking to me?!” We got past those facial expressions and gave our names. Names that sound like heartbeats: Fe Fe, Precious, Stacia, Tonya.

It’s kind of a miracle that we formed those bonds, because our mothers couldn’t stand each other. To this day, I wonder how me and Precious were cool for so long. And Stacia? Everybody had something negative to say about the Buchanan family. I knew there’d be backlash for bringing Tonya around, but I couldn’t know, at twelve, how bad things would get.

That summer, one by one, they dropped out of sight as if we were in a game of All in Together.

When you play All, you get two people to turn the rope, and then a ton of kids, it could be eight of us, we’d all jump in. The people turning sing, All, All, All, All, and repeat the word until there’s no more room in the rope. Precious and I began that song before we could even walk.

Stacia jumped in when we started sixth grade, and Tonya appeared months later, in the middle of June. The song went on, and we jumped, screaming the lyrics, attempting to overpower the sounds of construction vehicles as they dismantled our South Side neighborhood in the Robert Taylor Homes.

All in together, any kind of weather

I see teachers

Looking out the window

Ding, dong, the fire bell

January, February,

March, April, May, June, July . . .

When we played the game, people left the rope one at a time, reliably, when they heard their birthday month. But in real life, their departures were sudden. Tonya got pulled out of the rope, and not long after her disappearance, Stacia vanished too. Precious stuck around until pretty late in the summer, like her birthday was in August, and then she just slid out and rode away in her family’s Camry.

They left me standing there with the rope.