Pride(37)

“Small world, huh?” is the first thing Darius says.

“Too small,” I say as I grab my bag without looking directly at him. “Way too small.”

“So small, I’m starting to feel claustrophobic,” Carrie says while shifting in her seat. There’s an empty chair at their table that has Darius’s bag hanging over the back, but I don’t sit down.

“Wow, you all know each other?” the other girl asks. She looks familiar too, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen her. Then I realize that she has the same square jawline as Darius. “Hi, I’m Georgia, and that poem was really good! Girls in the hood. I like that!”

“Zuri” is all I say, pretending to be uninterested because she really looks like Darius and I remember her name from when we were talking about that band at Maria Hernandez Park. She must be his little sister. The third Darcy kid.

Then Darius adds, “And guess what—Zuri lives across the street from us back in Bushwick.”

Georgia gasps. “Oh my god! Wow! What a coincidence! What are you doing in D.C.? You go to Howard?” She sounds like her brothers—not her voice, but her words. No New York twang, no slang, nothing. She pronounces her words perfectly. She enunciates.

“No, I don’t go to Howard. Yet. I’m a senior at Bushwick High. I’m just touring the campus for the day.”

“Cool,” she says.

Carrie doesn’t say a word to me. She just smiles a fake smile and messes with her iced latte or whatever she’s drinking. Another teen poet gets on the mic and yells so loud that I want to cover my ears.

“You’re the last person I expected to run into here.” Darius bends down a bit so that I can hear him. This is the first time I’m seeing him in jeans, I realize, but I don’t stare too long. Our bodies are almost touching, boxed in by the chairs.

I nod, thinking about what Warren just told me about the Darcys. How Darius is shady, and I’m sure his sister is the same. But why does this D.C. Darius seem nicer than the one back in Bushwick? He’s smiling more. His eyes are softer. His whole body language is more laid-back and chill.

“We’ve been wanting to get out of here to get some real food. Wanna come with?” he asks.

“Come with? No, thanks. I kinda wanna see the other poets,” I say.

“No you don’t. Trust me. You’re ten times better than they are,” he says, grinning.

“Totally. I can only take a little bit of that spoken-word stuff,” Georgia says. “But you . . . you were amazing!”

I only smile because I see Carrie rolling her eyes. She catches me watching her, then flips her long straight hair over her shoulder.

“Thank you,” I say to Georgia while keeping my eyes on Carrie.

“You still want those chili dogs, Darius?” Georgia asks.

“Heck yeah!” Darius says. He gently touches my arm. “I’m sure you didn’t get a chance to go to Ben’s Chili Bowl,” he says. “You should really try it. It’s good.”

And I laugh. “Heck yeah?” I repeat, laughing. No one else is. Clearly they don’t get how corny Darius sounds saying Heck yeah. “You eat chili dogs?”

“Let me guess,” Darius says. “You thought those hors d’oeuvres at our party are what we eat for dinner every night?”

I shake my head and try very hard not to laugh again. “No, I didn’t think that at all.”

“Yes, you did, Zuri,” he says. “And do you eat those fried pork chunks for dinner every night?”

“No, of course not,” I say, and let out another laugh because he’s right. And I was wrong. For the first time since meeting him, since hating him, I hear him laugh, too.

Georgia smiles while looking at her brother, then at me, then back at her brother. All the while, Carrie is dead serious.

We leave Busboys and Poets and walk around the corner to a place called Ben’s Chili Bowl. It looks like it’s been there since forever, but the surrounding buildings have been scrubbed clean and polished. It’s a short red-and-white building that has giant yellow signs with red lettering and pictures of a hot dog and a hamburger. Inside feels like my Brooklyn—the familiar black women behind the counter wearing hairnets, plastic gloves, and warm smiles; the smell of food feels like a big hug from Madrina; and smooth R&B playing in the background makes everything seem as if it’s swaying to the music. Whatever they serve here, both Papi and Mama would love this place. I imagine taking them here when they visit me on campus.

I stand back against the wall while Darius orders for his sister, then Carrie, and then he turns to me.

“No, thanks,” I quickly say.

“You sure?” Georgia asks. “’Cause nobody from New York turns down anything from Ben’s Chili Bowl.”

I shake my head no even though I’m hungry as hell. I don’t want to hang out with them longer than I have to. After a few minutes of waiting for the food, small talk, and watching Carrie try to shut me out by making sure she gets in between me and Darius every chance she gets, we end up sitting in a booth in the back. I sit next to Georgia while Carrie sits next to Darius, of course. I want to blurt out that I don’t want her man, but it would be a waste of my breath at this point.

“My brothers told me that our new neighborhood is really loud. Good thing we have central air to keep out all that noise,” Georgia says in between spoonfuls of her chili.