Such a Fun Age(39)

“Okay, okay.” She stood and flushed.

As Emira washed her hands in the sink, the scent of Shaunie’s soap, the organic kind she got at a weekend farmer’s market, filtered up to Emira’s face. Behind her, Zara pulled out her phone and leaned her hip against Emira’s, which Emira had come to know as a very Zara way of making sure she hadn’t been too hard on her, and that it came from a good place.

“See, this is why you need Instagram,” Zara said. “You get to be nice to people and you don’t even have to see them. Watch me . . .” Zara tilted the screen for Emira to see. In a monotone whisper, she quoted the words and symbols that she began to type. “‘OMG Shaunie. Slay bitch. Exclamation point, star emoji, black girl emoji, cash bag emoji.’” Zara showed Emira as she clicked the word Comment. Then she liked Shaunie’s photo—the one of her jumping in front of the Sony building—and a tiny heart flashed red. “Done,” Zara said. “See? We have the technology.”

When Emira came out of the bathroom, she grabbed Shaunie’s forearm and said, “Let’s do a shot.” In the kitchen, next to the open window where basil and mint grew on the fire escape, Emira and Shaunie tipped two glasses back and made twisted faces as they sucked on lime wedges Josefa had cut up.

“Shaunie, congratulations,” Emira said. She licked the last bit of salt off her hand. “For real. This is big and you deserve it.”

Shaunie pouted in gratitude. She went in for a hug and said, “Thank you, Emira.”

Emira never really understood hugging someone in the middle of a conversation, but this was Shaunie’s night so she squeezed her back hard. She smelled the creams in Shaunie’s hair, from products that had names like Beautifully Mixed and Half & Half. Shaunie stayed close after Emira backed away.

“And between you and me, well . . .” Shaunie looked toward Josefa’s bedroom door. “You know what, I’m sure she already knows. But I’m probably gonna start looking for a one-bedroom or a studio.”

“Oh, for real?” Emira was shocked, and then she was jealous, and then she wondered, Is that what we’re supposed to be doing right now? ’Cause if it is, I ain’t there.

“I’ve obviously loved living here . . .” Shaunie kept her voice down despite the fact that Josefa could be heard speaking with her sister behind her closed bedroom door. “But yeah,” Shaunie said. “I just think it’s time. But, more importantly, you should take my room. I want it to go to someone who I can come back and see. Besides Josefa obviously.”

Emira currently lived with a classmate from Temple (a graduate student who stayed at her boyfriend’s apartment from Wednesdays to Sundays) in a tiny fifth-floor walk-up where the rent was $760 each, soon to be $850 in 2016. She had a twin bed, and only one of the stove burners worked, but it was just fine for now. Shaunie’s apartment was better on all accounts. There was a coffee shop nearby, the bedroom windows opened up to sky and not concrete walls, and it wasn’t in Kensington, it was in Old City. But there were all these parts of Shaunie’s apartment that made it Shaunie’s apartment regardless of location, and those would all leave with her. The HBO her father paid for. The framed prints on the wall that were painfully commercial (bridges, sunflowers, a New York skyline). A spice rack that was alphabetized, and a flowery oven mitt that hooked onto the fridge. Shaunie had a stereo system in her bedroom and a record player in the living room. When Emira’s roommate wasn’t at her boyfriend’s, the two of them played music in the kitchen from a bowl they called the “phone bowl.” If they put it on top of the refrigerator, it seemed to echo best.

“That’s a really amazing offer,” Emira said. “What’s your rent again?”

“Oh, it’s not bad at all.” Shaunie shook her head. “Only $1150 each. Plus utilities. Total steal. Oh shit, Troy’s calling me. Babe, hi.”

Zara emerged from Shaunie’s room holding a slinky red dress against her shoulders. “I’m trying this on.” Shaunie waved a hand at her and said into her phone, “Boy, I’m not taking no for an answer.” Shaunie started undoing the buttons on her blouse in the living room and held the phone between her ear and her shoulder. “You know what? Imma send you a picture and then I want to hear you tell me no.”

Emira finished the rest of her wine.

“Zara, will you take a photo for me?” Shaunie walked into her own bedroom.

“Girl, why you have to beg him like this?” Zara said. She threw the red dress onto Shaunie’s bed.

“Just lemme change bras real quick, hang on.”

Emira took a breath. She grabbed her phone from her purse, braced her hands against the wall, and crawled out the kitchen window. She hugged her elbows together on top of the fire escape and crossed her legs beneath her, careful not to kick the planted herbs. Kelley answered on the second ring.

“Hey, are you okay? Let me get somewhere quiet, hang on.”

It was cold outside, but she wasn’t about to climb back in for her jacket. In the receiver, Emira heard men’s voices in the background above Earth, Wind & Fire. This was the first time she’d ever called Kelley.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Hi, sorry,” she said. “Sorry, you sound busy over there.”

“No, I’m just at the last event of this conference,” he said. “It’s just a bunch of tech guys drinking Long Island Iced Teas.”