The Other Black Girl(33)

He didn’t call me either of these things, but he was smiling at what must have been a perplexed look on my face. “You don’t gotta be nervous,” he said, sticking his phone in his back pocket. “We ain’t nothing but family here. The second you come inside… well, you’ll see.”

“?‘Family’?” About ten yards away, on the corner of 127th and Frederick Douglass, a car revved its engine in vain. I’d spent the forty-five-minute cab ride over here searching the Internet for information about “Lynn Johnson” and “the Resistance,” and like every other time, I came up short. Yet here I was in the middle of the night in a strange new city at a barbershop that was supposed to be closed.

I shifted to my other foot and reshouldered my tote bag, trying to posture confidence I didn’t feel. “That’s cool and all, although I’m not sure what kind of family meets at three o’clock in the morning.”

That got a laugh out of him. “You’ll see exactly what kind in a little bit. Come on in, Shani,” he said, offering a fist for me to dap. “Will.”

I smiled, eager to enter and get into what I hoped was air-conditioning. But before I could set foot inside, a voice shouted at me to hold up. “Will!” a female voice shouted. “How many times have I told you, cuz: Ask the code question first, before you let anybody inside?”

Will groaned and turned to whisper something inaudible into the blackness behind him. I craned my neck, desperate to see who he was talking to, but the lights were completely off in Joe’s.

“Shit,” the voice said, after a moment. “She’s seen your face, too. Knows your name. If she were an OBG this entire operation would be shut down. The Resistance would be made.”

He sucked a stream of air between his perfect teeth. “?‘Made?’ ‘Code questions?’ This all just feels so—”

“How many times do I have to tell you I don’t care what it feels like to you? I’m in charge of making sure we’re not found, asshole. So just ask her the code question so we can get this shit moving.”

That put a wrench in Will’s amusement. When he finally regarded me again, the softness in his eyes had given way to irritation. “An asteroid is spiraling toward Earth, threatening to destroy all Black folk except for one,” he said flatly. “This lucky motherfucker is either Stacey Dash or Ben Carson. Who do you choose to save?”

Shit. That was the code question? I shook my head and yanked at my sweat-soaked bra strap. “How much time you got?”

“C’mon, just think. What’s your gut saying?”

“My gut’s saying you can’t ask me that question when it’s three—” I checked my watch, annoyed. I hadn’t snuck out of my aunt’s place in Queens in the middle of the night just to play secret clubhouse with a stranger; I didn’t care how cute he was. “Three ten in the morning. I’m hot. Is that you, Lynn?” I called into the space behind him. “I’m here, just like we planned. I left Boston. Why are you making me do all this?”

The voice didn’t reply. Just Will. “I wouldn’t do all that. Probably better if you just answer the question.”

“There are too many logistics for me to think about, though. I can’t just—”

“You see?!” Will cried, his voice thick with vindication as he spun around to appeal to the person behind him. But when the voice didn’t speak, he shrugged, readjusted his sock cap, and grumbled to me, “It’s mandatory.”

Sighing, I tried to weigh who was worse. It was hard to parse out an answer with that rusty car engine still sputtering on and on in the background, but after a moment, I was able to gather my thoughts.

“Ben,” I finally said. “They’re both awful—and he’s said some pretty idiotic things—but at least he can save somebody’s life. I guess.”

“Fair.” Will chuckled, once again chilled out. He turned. “Okay?”

There was a pause.

“Yeah,” the voice said. “Okay.”

My feet started to move forward before my heart had time to go back into flutter mode. “No lights until we’re upstairs,” I heard the woman say, this time louder, more relaxed. “But for now, you should be good with this.”

A flashlight flickered on a few feet ahead of me. “Lynn?” I called again, blinking at the beam of light.

“We talk upstairs. Just c’mon. Follow me.”

I shivered and did as I was told, even as I realized someone—Will, probably—had put his hands on my shoulders to guide me. Everything was dark, pitch-black dark, so I let him pull me forward, straining my eyes to detect chains hanging from the ceiling, or suspicious swaths of dried meat lining the baseboards—anything that would confirm that I was foolish to be there.

But I didn’t need to see to know that. It was more than just foolish. It was crazy.

How did that saying go? Nobody looks for missing little Black girls?

“C’mon, Shani,” Will whispered, his words interrupting my worries, the warmth of his breath in my ear reminding me that I was arm in arm with an attractive man in a strange, cold barbershop at three o’clock in the morning. A kind-lipped Harlemite who smelled heavily of Dial soap and Listerine.

I let him lead me slowly behind the shadow that was lighting our way. “By the way,” he added, his tone suggesting he often took delight in saying what he was about to say, “the correct answer to my question was you don’t save either of them. Use this asteroid as a chance to start over. But pretty much no one ever gets that right, so you’re good.”