Little kids buzzed around her porch, a loud, singing swarm. Four girls squared up playing Rockin’ Robin, two kids skated up and down the porch in these blue-and-yellow skates that never glided like skates were supposed to. Both kids pushed, their faces concentrating hard, because they had a skate on one foot, a gym shoe on the other. Some kids stood around eating candy and talking, and three little boys rode around on bikes.

They blocked my way, so as I walked up, the girls broke up their square, right in the middle of “tweet, tweet, tweet.” One of them said, “Ain’t yo’ name Fe Fe?” She was a tall, skinny girl, with her hair pointing every which way, even though it was ten o’clock in the morning. I knew right away that she was the Stacia of this group.

I smiled, and said, “Yeah.”

“You play with Tonya.”

I nodded.

“She ain’t never in the house,” the girl told me. But I kept walking. If she wasn’t there, I planned to tell her mama about the boys. I knocked on the door, soft at first. No one answered. I knocked again, with tight knuckles, nervous about what I was about to say. I heard somebody yelling on the other side, and as they got closer, I could make out the words. The woman was saying, “Alright! Alright! Damn!” Then the door yanked open, and Tonya’s mama, all upset, looked me up and down, and said, “She still ain’t here.”

“She got a boyfriend?” I asked.

She laughed, then said, “Shit, she got boyfriends.” Then the door was closing.

I stuck my foot in before it closed, and asked, “You know where she at?”

“Lil girl, if you don’t move that foot, and get away from this here door,” she said, closing her eyes, emphasizing an unspoken threat.

“These boys took her!” I said.

She laughed again. “Ain’t nobody took her.”

The little kids watched us, their hand games not as interesting anymore. Then, like she a whole different person, she got quiet, her face stopped twisting into ugly, and she asked, “Baby, you got a couple dollars?” I shook my head from side to side and frowned a little. I didn’t know why she wasn’t taking this seriously.

“You ain’t got no money?” she asked, tilting her head to the side, her face going back to scary. I moved my head faster, hoping it would convince her. I had a dollar and thirty cents, but I wasn’t giving it to her. She was like all the other hypes by the corner store, begging. She didn’t like my answer, so she slammed the door in my face.

It startled me, and I stumbled backward and fell to the ground. The little kids looked shocked and all ran over to me. I got up and kept walking, embarrassed and mad.