Long Division(53)

Shalaya Crump came over near me and helped drag me out of the school. She let me rest a lot of weight on her, but I didn’t wanna put too much weight on her because she’d know how heavy I really was.

“I’m okay,” I told her. “But they got Baize’s computer.”

“We’ll get it later. We gotta get outta here.”

Shalaya Crump didn’t say a word until we got to the hole. I tried to let her get in first but she didn’t want to. “City,” she said, “let me help you.”

I got in the hole and she looked back toward the school. I peeked my head out of the hole and all three of the men had their hoods off, and one of the men was whupping Jewish Evan Altshuler like he was his grandma or something.

“That’s his uncle,” Shalaya Crump said.

“What?”

“It’s hard to explain. They had to do it. He took me to his house and he told me the truth. He showed me.”

I backed away from the mouth of the hole to give her room to get in. “Just come in the hole and tell it to me more when we get home.”

“We can’t leave him, City.”

“Listen to me. I saw a talking cat, Shalaya. For real! And I saw this colored bathroom. We don’t belong in a place like this. We ain’t built for this.” Shalaya Crump looked back toward the school. “Please let’s just go home. Please! I went to 2013 for you just like you asked me. Please.”

I couldn’t see what was happening but I heard Evan screaming and I heard what sounded like wet open palms slamming down on someone’s back. “You’re right,” Shalaya Crump said. “Scoot back and give me room to get in.”

I crouched and made more room for Shalaya Crump. It was the first time I’d been in the hole by myself and I’m not sure why but it seemed bigger and colder than before. I was crouched for a good ten seconds, but Shalaya Crump didn’t get in so I stood up. “Come on, Shalaya. Let’s go.”

She looked me right in the face. “I’m sorry, City,” she said. “It’s for the best.”

Shalaya Crump slammed the door to the hole shut.


I pushed open the door of the hole slowly. Before my eyes could adjust to the light, a pine cone bounced right off my forehead. “I knew you’d be back. Gimme my damn computer, and my book!”

It was Baize.

“Where am I?”

“You know where you are.” She snatched Long Division from my hands. “I want my computer, too! And my damn phone.”

“Oh, I didn’t take a phone. I only borrowed your computer.” Baize was wearing the same outfit she’d had on when I saw her before, but with different shoes. She had on these red, black, green, and yellow hightop Nikes.

“Where they at, Voltron? I’m serious.”

“Umm.” I was trying to decide whether to lie or not. “One of my friends has the phone and someone else has the computer.” I looked at her face and, more than anything, I just wanted her to hug me. Sounds crazy, but after getting your legs stomped to dust by white dudes in sheets, you kinda want someone black to touch you in a way that’s soft. “Okay, look, I’m gonna tell you everything.”

Baize picked up another pine cone and threw it right at my head. “I don’t want to know everything,” she told me. “I don’t even want to know anything from you. I just want my computer back.” She picked up another pine cone and stared at it. “When was the last time knowing everything about something ended up good for you?”

I didn’t know how to answer her question, so I got out of the hole and told Baize how my friend had showed me the hole a few days earlier and took me from 1985 to 2013. I told her about meeting a white boy who said he could take us back to 1964. And I told her that I needed to go back and help my friend get back home alive.

You know what she said after I explained it to her?

“I believe you. I still really need my computer back, though. All my rhymes are in there. And I need it for the Spell-Off.”

“You do?” I stood up and tried stretching out my knees. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are all your rhymes in there?”

“Because it’s my computer.”

“Oh. I’m saying why do you need a computer for a Spell-Off?”

“Because I wanna look at some Spell-Off clips on YouTube. I got this perfect introduction and I wanna make sure they let us introduce ourselves. It’s so dope.”

“Oh. I don’t really know what you talking about. One more question? Well…uh, why do you believe me?”

“Because I know people can disappear.”

“Wait. What?”

“Never mind. Let’s go.”


Baize said that I could come stay at her house until the morning, when her great-grandmother got off work. I told her that I didn’t need to stay that long. Before I limped into her house, she told me to sit down on her porch. My legs were killing me. I just wanted to eat something and come up with a plan to save Shalaya Crump.

“Just tell me,” she said. “Is it us or is it the hole that sends us back in time?”

“You know about the hole?”

“I saw you jump in that hole after you stole my computer,” she told me. “And I got in the hole myself the next day.”