“Oh,” I said again. I felt stupid but didn’t want to admit it. “I should stop doing that.”

Mel shook her head at me. “Duh. Anyways, you wanna come over later? I should probably take a shower and you should, too.” She pointed at my sweaty armpits.

“Yeah, I’ll be over later,” I told her.

I got to my feet and she stuck her tongue out at me. I stuck mine out at her as well and we both laughed.

Chapter 5 Shine

I stood outside of Mel’s house that evening and knocked on the door. To my surprise, it wasn’t her who answered the door, but an older white man.

“Can I help you?” he asked.

“Uh . . . yeah. I’m here to see Mel,” I replied.

“Oh, Melody. My daughter.”

Melody? Huh, that threw me off. I guessed that was what Mel was short for.

“Dad!” I heard from behind him. “Don’t call me that. It’s just Mel.”

“All right, Mel.” The man let out a gentle laugh as he opened the door wide enough for me to see Mel.

“Hi, Adrian.” She was trying to hide her smile from her dad. “Come on. I’ll show you around.”

It was the first time I had stepped foot in Mel’s house. The place was a lot bigger than it looked on the outside. She hadn’t been kidding when she said her dad was into classical art. There were paintings and sculptures placed all along the entrance hallway. At the end of it I could see a grandfather clock engraved with “WOODS.” Each wall had a painting of some sort, ranging from, “This was made at least two hundred years before I was born,” to “this was made fifty years before I was born.”

“Ignore the paintings and follow me,” Mel said as she grabbed my hand and pulled me along.

She took me down a flight of stairs that led to the basement. There were rock and roll posters all over the walls, a record player sitting at the end of the bed, and I could see the old box of records sitting on the floor outside of her closet.

“This is it.” She spread her arms dramatically. “As you can see, there’s a bit of contrast between my father’s tastes and mine.”

“That was your dad?” I asked, still a bit confused.

“Yes. He’s my dad. And yes, he’s my biological father.”

“Oh,” I said out loud. “It’s just that, he’s —”

“White and I’m brown? I know. My grandparents from my mom’s side are from India, and my dad’s side of the family? England. Why do you think my last name is Woods?

“Yeah, that makes sense.”

“You’re mixed, too. Isn’t one of your parents white?”

“No. Both my parents are mixed,” I explained. “They’re both half black and half white. So I guess that makes me half black and half white.”

“Two halves make a whole, right?” Mel laughed. “Anyways, I was listening to the Iron Beards today. It pisses my dad off sometimes, but he’s too shy to say anything,” she told me as she pulled a record from the box. The album cover was awesome. It had five black men with beards that were made of iron. Music in the 80s was something else. Mel began playing the album and she cranked it really loud no doubt so her dad could hear. She leapt on her bed and started jumping up and down.