Concrete Rose (The Hate U Give, #0)(16)

Her car ain’t in the driveway. Carlos’s hooptie is, unfortunately. Don’t matter, I gotta do this. I go up the walkway, onto the porch, and I ring the doorbell.

Carlos answer, and lean against the doorway. He got some height on me and bigger, like he lift weights on the regular. He used to be on the Saint Mary’s wrestling team. That don’t scare me. I’ll take him down if I have to.

He fold his arms. “May I help you?” he asks dryly.

Here we go. “Is Lisa here?”

“Maybe.”

“Can you let her know I’m here?”

“Maybe.”

This dude get on my nerves. “Look, Carlton,” I say, ’cause aside from the height and the muscles, his corny ass is Carlton from The Fresh Prince. “Go get Lisa.”

“Oh, somebody’s got jokes,” he says. “Here’s one for you: kiss my—”

“Car-los!” Lisa whine, and shove him aside. She pull me into the house. “You’re always instigating!”

“Excuse me, where are you taking him?” Carlos asks.

“To my room.”

“Like hell you are.”

Lisa whirl on him. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were my father.”

“I’m—”

“Going back to your movie and staying outta my business,” she says. “All right? Mmmkay.”

I smirk at him as she pull me down the hall. Their house smell like potpourri and look like it with all the flowered wallpaper Lisa’s momma got up. Lisa take me to her room and close the door, like she dare Carlos to say something.

I laugh. “He getting on your nerves?”

“That’s always.”

I hold her hips. It’s hard to see them in the FUBU football jersey she got on—it’s too big and covers them li’l shorts she wearing. She stand on her tiptoes and kiss me, and I forget what I’m here to tell her.

Till I start thinking ’bout Tammy. I pull back from Lisa.

Her eyebrows meet. “What’s wrong?”

“Your brother might be listening in. Can’t have him hearing us.”

“You’re probably right.” Lisa lay across her bed. “So, you’re not grounded anymore?”

I move this stuffed Hello Kitty she got and sit beside her. Lisa love that cat. It’s all over her room, along with posters of Usher and Ginuwine, her “boos.” She need to take them shits down, for real. “Yeah. My bad that we couldn’t hang out.”

“It’s okay. Tammy came over and redid my braids. My schedule’s gonna be nuts, and I don’t wanna deal with getting my hair done every week.”

I lie beside her. I know I gotta talk to her, but right now I wanna hear ’bout normal stuff in her normal life. “Why your schedule gon’ be nuts?”

“Besides basketball I have both school paper and the yearbook committee. Momma thinks it’ll look good on my college applications to show that I’m more than an athlete. Going to college means finally getting outta this house, so I am totally on board. Hope I actually get some acceptance letters.”

“Don’t worry. All them schools gon’ love you like I do.” I kiss her cheek.

“You always know what to say.” She trail her fingers along my cornrows. That one little move got me thinking of things we could do if Carlos wasn’t here. I miss what she say.

“Huh?”

“I said you should join some clubs at your school,” Lisa says. “It would look good on your applications.”

“Um . . . college may not be for me, Lisa.”

“I told you, you don’t need perfect grades for college, Mav. Plenty of people get in with Bs and Cs. I can see you now, joining a fraternity and repping it as hard as you rep King Lords.”

It trips me out how she see this version of me that most people don’t. She can actually imagine me at college. Sometimes it’s hard for me to imagine that. Especially now.

I sit up.

“What’s wrong?” Lisa asks.

I’m imagining a life for her. She gon’ be one of the most popular girls on her college campus and gon’ go to all the parties. Somehow she’ll keep her grades in check as she work toward becoming a pediatrician. Some college boy will scoop her up. She’ll marry him and live in a big-ass mansion with a couple of kids. I’ll be a memory from when she was a kid.

She sit up. “Maverick, for real, what’s wrong?”

I need a little more time with her. I kiss her neck and make my way to her lips.

She pull away. “Maverick.”

I get up and fold my hands on top of my head. Shit, I gotta tell her. “I want you to remember that I love you, a’ight? When I did what I did, I wasn’t thinking that way.”

“O . . . kay,” Lisa says slowly. “What did you do?”

“Remember when me and you broke up after Carlos thought he saw me with a girl?”

“Yeah?”

“Well, I was stressed out. I went over to King’s crib to clear my head, and . . . he hooked me up with Iesha one time.”

“Hooked you . . . ?” Her eyes get big. “You had sex with her?”

“Lisa—” I try to take her hand. She move to the other side of the room. “It was only one time. Me and you weren’t together.”