The Hate U Give(14)

I swallow. I wish I could say yes, but I don’t know. On one hand, it’s the cops. It’s not like I’ll be telling just anybody.

On the other hand, it’s the cops. One of them killed Khalil.

But Uncle Carlos is a cop, and he wouldn’t ask me to do something that would hurt me.

“Will it help Khalil get justice?” I ask.

Uncle Carlos nods. “It will.”

“Will One-Fifteen be there?”

“Who?”

“The officer, that’s his badge number,” I say. “I remember it.”

“Oh. No, he won’t be there. I promise. It’ll be okay.”

Uncle Carlos’s promises are guarantees, sometimes even more than my parents’. He never uses that word unless he absolutely means it.

“Okay,” I say. “I’ll do it.”

“Thank you.” Uncle Carlos comes over and gives me two kisses to my forehead, the way he’s done since he used to tuck me in. “Lisa, just bring her after school on Monday. It shouldn’t take too long.”

Momma gets up and hugs him. “Thank you.” She walks him down the hall, toward the front door. “Be safe, okay? And text me when you get home.”

“Yes, ma’am. Sounding like our momma,” he teases.

“Whatever. You just better text me—”

“Okay, okay. Good night.”

Momma comes back to the kitchen, pulling her robe together. “Munch, your father and I are visiting Ms. Rosalie in the morning instead of going to church. You’re welcome to come if you want.”

“Yeah,” Daddy says. “And ain’t no uncle pressuring you to go.”

Momma cuts him a quick glare, then turns to me. “So, you think you’re up for it, Starr?”

Talking to Ms. Rosalie may be harder than talking to the cops, honestly. But I owe it to Khalil to pay his grandmother a visit. She may not even know I was a witness to the shooting. If she somehow does and wants to know what happened, more than anybody she has the right to ask.

“Yeah. I’ll go.”

“We better find her an attorney before she talks to the detectives,” Daddy says.

“Maverick.” Momma sighs. “If Carlos doesn’t think it’s necessary just yet, I trust his judgment. Plus I’ll be with her the entire time.”

“Good thing somebody trusts his judgment,” says Daddy. “And you really been thinking again ’bout moving? We discussed this already.”

“Maverick, I’m not going there with you tonight.”

“How we gon’ change anything around here if we—”

“Mav-rick!” she says through gritted teeth. Whenever Momma breaks a name down like that, you better hope it’s not yours. “I said I’m not going there tonight.” She side-eyes him, waiting for the comeback. There isn’t one. “Try and get some sleep, baby,” she tells me, and kisses my cheek before going to their room.

Daddy goes to the refrigerator. “You want some grapes?”

“Yeah. How come you and Uncle Carlos always fighting?”

“’Cause he a buster.” He joins me at the table with a bowl of white grapes. “But for real, he ain’t never liked me. Thought I was a bad influence on your momma. Lisa was wild when I met her though, like all them other Catholic school girls.”

“I bet he was more protective of Momma than Seven is with me, huh?”

“Oh, yeah,” he says. “Carlos acted like he was Lisa’s daddy. When I got locked up, he moved y’all in with him and blocked my calls. Even took her to a divorce attorney.” He grins. “Still couldn’t get rid of me.”

I was three when Daddy went in prison, six when he got out. A lot of my memories include him, but a lot of my firsts don’t. First day of school, the first time I lost a tooth, the first time I rode a bike without training wheels. In those memories, Uncle Carlos’s face is where Daddy’s should’ve been. I think that’s the real reason they’re always fighting.

Daddy drums the mahogany surface of the dining table, making a thump-thump-thump beat. “The nightmares will go away after a while,” he says. “They’re always the worst right after.”

That’s how it was with Natasha. “How many people have you seen die?”

“Enough. Worst one was my cousin Andre.” His finger seems to instinctively trace the tattoo on his forearm—an A with a crown over it. “A drug deal turned into a robbery, and he got shot in the head twice. Right in front of me. A few months before you were born, in fact. That’s why I named you Starr.” He gives me a small smile. “My light during all that darkness.”

Daddy chomps on some grapes. “Don’t be scared ’bout Monday. Tell the cops the truth, and don’t let them put words in your mouth. God gave you a brain. You don’t need theirs. And remember that you didn’t do nothing wrong—the cop did. Don’t let them make you think otherwise.”

Something’s bugging me. I wanted to ask Uncle Carlos, but I couldn’t for some reason. Daddy’s different though. While Uncle Carlos somehow keeps impossible promises, Daddy keeps it real with me. “You think the cops want Khalil to have justice?” I ask.

Thump-thump-thump. Thump . . . thump . . . thump. The truth casts a shadow over the kitchen—people like us in situations like this become hashtags, but they rarely get justice. I think we all wait for that one time though, that one time when it ends right.