Concrete Rose (The Hate U Give, #0)(63)

“Dammit, boy!” Mr. Wyatt snap. “Pay attention to what you’re doing!”

Oh shit. I dropped a carton of eggs. The yolks and the whites ooze near my kicks.

Mrs. Rooks, one of our neighbors, set her hand on her hip. “Now how the hell I’m gon’ make red velvet cake if all the eggs on the floor?”

“I’m sorry, Elaine,” Mr. Wyatt says. “Maverick, go get her two cartons. They’re coming out of your check. That’ll teach you to pay attention. Then clean up that mess.”

The one part of this job I hate is dealing with his mouth. I bite my tongue every day.

I grab two cartons of eggs for Mrs. Rooks. She pull out her glasses and examine each egg, as if she don’t trust me to get good ones. I guess they fine ’cause she let me bag them.

Mr. Wyatt wait till I finish cleaning the floor and my sneakers to say something to me. “Where in the world is your head at? You’ve been on another planet since you got here.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Wyatt. It’s one of them days.”

He fold his arms. “You keep this up, you’re gonna lose half of your check. What’s more important than your job right now?”

I’d be a fool to tell him any of that Red stuff. “You know how my life is, Mr. Wyatt. I got a lot on my plate.”

Mr. Wyatt take a deep breath. “Yeah, I suppose I understand. You have to keep your eyes on the prize, son. Tackle one thing at a time until you reach your goals.”

“Goals?”

“Yeah, goals,” he says. “Don’t you have some?”

“I mean, I wanna buy a ride soon. Oh, and one of them double strollers that I can use for Seven and the baby.”

“Son, that’s a to-do list. I’m talking about real accomplishments. What do you wanna do with your life?”

I look at him.

Nobody ever asked me that.

A’ight yeah, back in the day when I was little, teachers would ask what I wanted to be when I grew up. I’d say stuff like an astronaut or a doctor or a vet. But at some point, I stopped imagining myself being any of that. Ain’t no astronauts, doctors, or veterinarians around here. Everybody I know just tryna survive, and that’s all I wanna do.

I shrug at Mr. Wyatt.

His forehead wrinkle. “You don’t have any kind of dream?”

“Dreams can’t buy diapers.”

“Maybe not immediately, but they can eventually. When you were a kid, what did you wanna be?”

“Mr. Wyatt, c’mon. This silly.”

“Humor me for a bit,” he says. “What did you want to be?”

I stuff my hands in my pockets. “I wanted to be like my pops.”

“Is that why you’re in that gang?”

“That’s for protection, Mr. Wyatt. These streets can get rough. You gotta claim gray or green to survive.”

“I don’t believe that. There are young men around here who don’t gangbang. My nephew doesn’t. That Montgomery boy, Carlos, he didn’t. Now look at them. Jamal’s at community college and about to head to a university, and Carlos is in college, too.”

Them the worst examples he could give. “No offense, Mr. Wyatt, but your nephew seem like a nerd. As for Carlos, his momma kept him and Lisa in the house. Of course they didn’t need protection. Anyway, I’m Li’l Don. Everybody expected me to join.”

“Because the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree?” Mr. Wyatt asks. “However, it can roll away from the tree. It simply need a little push.”

“Yeah, a’ight.”

Mr. Wyatt shake his head. “It’s going in one ear and out the other. Did you have any other dreams, Maverick?”

I had one when I was a kid that I never told anybody. It was gon’ sound stupid, but it was the only thing I really wanted to be. “A Laker.”

“One of them basketball players?”

“Yeah. I wanted to join the team and convince Magic to come outta retirement and play with me. We were gon’ be better than the Bulls. That ain’t happening. I can’t ball for nothing.”

“Have to agree with you there,” Mr. Wyatt says. “I’ve seen you play, and that’s definitely off the table. What dreams have you had lately?”

I shrug again. “Sometimes I think it might be cool to own a business like you do. You ain’t gotta answer to nobody. That’s dope.”

“An entrepreneur,” he says. “That’s doable. What kinda business do you have in mind?”

“Maybe a clothes store? I could sell jerseys, sneakers, caps, all the fly gear. Or a music store. Everybody love music, and CDs and tapes not going nowhere.” I look at him. “You think that could work?”

He smiles. “I do. You can make it happen, but you have to come up with a plan.”

“What kinda plan?”

“Well first, you need to get your high school diploma or a GED. I have the latter myself. Next, I’d recommend taking some community college courses or going to a trade school.”

“Wait, what for? I’ll be my own boss.”

“You’re gonna need a business loan, son,” Mr. Wyatt says. “As a Black man, you walk into a bank without some type of education, they’re gonna laugh you out of there. Then let’s say the store ends up closing or it’s not bringing in enough money. You’ll need something else to fall back on. Plan for that ahead of time and increase your education.”