Such a Fun Age(19)

Kelley pulled his phone out. “Wouldn’t it be easier to text you?”

Emira exhaled in a laugh. “You can email me, son.”

“Right, totally.” He put his phone away with an obvious duh expression. “I was gonna say the same thing. Email. Cool.”

Emira said, “Mm-hmm,” and stood by the double exit doors.

Kelley sat in Emira’s previous spot, which looked much too small for him and his frame. He rested his hands between his knees and smiled aggressively at Emira. She raised her eyebrows again and dropped her eyes down to her phone.

“That’s my girlfriend,” he said loudly to the woman sitting next to him. The woman looked up from the book she was reading and said, “Hmm?”

“That’s my girlfriend right there.” Kelley pointed at Emira.

The woman’s face came into curiosity. She looked to Emira, who shook her head and said, “Umm, that’s not true.”

“She does this,” Kelley said, keeping his eyes on the woman to his right. “It’s cute, she plays this game when we’re on the train where she pretends like she doesn’t know me.”

“Ohmygod.” Emira placed three fingers to her forehead.

“When we get home she goes, ‘Wasn’t that funny, babe?’ And then we laugh about it. It’s hilarious.”

The woman laughed and said, “That’s really romantic.”

The train stopped and Emira said, “Bye.”

Kelley called out, “See you at home, honey!” and the doors slid shut behind her.

At Luca’s, Shaunie requested a booth on the balcony and bottle service, to which Zara said, “Excuse me, bish?” and Shaunie replied, “What? It’s on meee.” In a plush booth with white leather seats, the four girls sipped their drinks and bounced to the music. Shaunie ordered a second bottle, and when it arrived, Josefa held up her phone to announce to Snapchat, “We havin’ a blessed motha-fuckin’ night, okay?”

Shaunie’s parents were as rich as Shaunie was generous. Her family’s money came from a southern chain of drive-through Laundromats, and Shaunie’s bigheartedness stemmed from a deep belief in karma, as well as inspirational quotes found online. Ever since they’d met (Zara had come to Emira after class and said, “This light-skinned girl offered to take us to a concert and she might kill us but it also might be dope”), Shaunie was constantly offering up her wardrobe, a first round of drinks, and the other half of her queen-sized bed. When Emira spent the night on Shaunie’s couch, she’d wake up sweating beneath a blanket that Shaunie had applied sometime in the night.

Josefa, Shaunie’s roommate, was as inconsistent as Shaunie was reliable. She either stayed at home, glued to her phone and new memes and videos, speaking to her sister and mother in Spanish via FaceTime, or she wanted to rally and drink until sunrise. Josefa went to Boston University and was now a research assistant and fellow at Drexel. Her parents said they’d support her financially as long as she was in school. She currently was in the process of getting her second master’s, this one in public health.

“I invited this guy here but I don’t think he’ll come.” Emira said this to Zara as they danced in front of their booth, behind the railing that looked down to the first floor. “I met him on the train, but it’s whatever.”

“He got friends?”

“That’s what he said.”

Zara nodded that she’d understood, and then put her leg on the table so she could twerk to the side.

Shaunie leaned her ear in to say, “Boys are coming tonight?”

“No no.” Emira shook her head. “Probably not.”

Zara pushed Shaunie’s shoulder as she danced and said, “It doesn’t matter, ’cause you have a boyfriend.”

Shaunie raised her hands in defense. “I was just asking!”

Josefa announced, “I want a picture.” In the reflection from her phone’s screen, the girls were in order from lightest to dark. Josefa with her thick brown hair and glossed pink lips, Shaunie with her curls and honeyed round face, Zara with her freshly done twists and massive smile, and Emira at the end with her waves on her shoulders. They held on to the railing and looked into the flash.

Emira kept checking her email. As she waited for messages to load, she’d think, Why did you try to be cute with this dumbass email thing? But when she saw that she had no new messages, she’d think, No, it’s good he didn’t come. He’d probably like Shaunie. It would have been weird.

But when she saw him walk onto the second floor of Luca’s, Emira saw why Kelley had not emailed her to get him at the door, and why he did not need her help getting in. Around eleven p.m., Kelley arrived with four friends, and these friends, to Emira’s indisputable surprise, were all black. Kelley looked like he was being filmed for the intro of an extremely problematic music video. One of the men was wearing sunglasses. Two of them were wearing Timberlands.

When Emira went to make introductions, she saw that Josefa had put her phone away. Shaunie had draped her curls over one shoulder, and Zara just squinted hard at her friend. One of Kelley’s friends announced that they were getting drinks, and what did the ladies want. Together, the men went down to the bar, and when the last of their heads disappeared down the stairs, Zara said, “Umm, really bitch?”