BooksBarbecue
Back Last Summer on State Street
Chapters (43)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. Prologue
  5. OneThe Square
  6. TwoIn War
  7. ThreeLease Compliant
  8. FourTonya from the Ten
  9. FiveSummer School
  10. SixSweeps
  11. SevenMakeovers
  12. EightBombs Bursting in Air
  13. NineProject Kids
  14. TenName-Calling
  15. ElevenCowboy Camp
  16. Twelve1502
  17. ThirteenThe Elevator
  18. Fourteen301
  19. Fifteen304
  20. SixteenSanctuary
  21. SeventeenPlans
  22. EighteenSalvation
  23. NineteenThe Wild
  24. TwentyLivestock
  25. Twenty-OneLast Tag
  26. Twenty-TwoThe Vanishing
  27. Twenty-ThreeAway
  28. Twenty-FourSheeping
  29. Twenty-FiveProject Mentality
  30. Twenty-SixLetter to Meechie
  31. Twenty-SevenA Reunion
  32. Twenty-EightRelocating
  33. Twenty-NineThe Whole Story
  34. ThirtyThe Happiest Place
  35. Thirty-OneEd’s House
  36. Thirty-TwoWhat Mamas Do
  37. Thirty-ThreeThe Living & the Dead
  38. Thirty-FourHaunted
  39. Thirty-FiveSnapshots
  40. Thirty-SixInvitations
  41. Acknowledgments
  42. About the Author
  43. About the Publisher

I was all in her business. This is what I remember: Four missing teeth, one from the top front, three gone at the bottom. A face that looked like she’d been in a few fights with wild cats, the animals taking chunks of her skin with them. And what she wore, a tube top that hugged her rib cage and left her belly exposed, looked like it used to belong to Tonya—when she was much younger.

They didn’t have much furniture. The living room was empty, like a dance floor at the start of a party. The kitchen had this tiny wooden table that didn’t match the three chairs. The fake leather on the chairs was cracked and peeling, cotton popping its head out of the rips. The windows had dingy, holey curtains. My eyes hit blank wall after blank wall and bounced onto the floor, then up the table legs of that rickety table.

My view got cut off when the door started moving without door-closing language. I heard Rochelle say, “Alright,” but didn’t think that would be the last thing. I was used to adults saying too many words and things they didn’t really mean to people they didn’t even like, but this lady, like Mama Pearl and Ms. Pierce, said exactly what she felt, and no more than she needed to.

I planned to tap Tonya for last tag or wave bye, but Rochelle didn’t care about any of our kid rituals. Tonya didn’t smile at me. All I saw was shame for everything we’d just witnessed. Mama and I walked down Tonya’s porch in silence. I looked over at 4946 and the playground and what little equipment remained—the frame of the swing set and a dented sliding board—looked like dollhouse furniture from ten stories up. I was troubled by what had just happened. I guess Mama felt the same, because she hit me with a million questions. In the elevator, before the door could even close, she asked me, “How did you meet Tonya?”

“She walks by the third floor all the time. Today I asked her if she wanted to play rope.” Mama smiled at me. It made me blush, which was more of a feeling than a physical color change because I’m not fair-skinned like Precious. I smiled back.

“What do you know about her mother?”