It is stupid hot outside. It’s like Mississippi didn’t get the memo that it’s mid-October, and we’ve been left to melt.
On Saturday night, two weeks after my and Hattie’s dinner with Mom, Freddie comes to hang out for the last bit of my shift, and once Tommy leaves, he even helps me bus a few tables.
“Where’s Adam tonight?” I ask.
“His little sister’s birthday party,” he says. “He tried to sneak out, but when his mom caught him, she made him wear the prince costume his cousin was supposed to wear and dance with all his sister’s friends.”
I try not to laugh. “Well, that sounds fair.”
“Yeah. Try telling Adam that.”
After the last customer finally leaves, Saul slams the door and locks it all in one motion. “We’re going swimming, y’all. And not in that dirty-ass ocean.”
“No one has a pool,” I remind him.
He shrugs. “Plenty of people have pools.”
I shake my head at him skeptically.
“I know people, okay?”
“Straight boy,” he says, pointing to Freddie, “you’re invited, too.”
After running through our Saturday closing duties, which are a little more extensive than other nights since it’s the end of the week, we all meet in the parking lot. Agnes dropped Freddie off, so we’re all left to squeeze into Saul’s Jeep.
“I need to run home for my swimsuit,” I say.
“Me too,” says Ruth.
Saul clicks his tongue at me. “Y’all can swim in the suit the good Lord gave you.”
Ruth shrugs. “Whatever. I’m wearing a sports bra anyway.”
I feel myself shrinking a little. I’m not modest really at all, but somehow there’s a difference between swimming in your underwear and swimming in a swimsuit that looks like underwear.
I turn to Freddie. “Agnes won’t mind that you’re out this late?”
“I turn into a pumpkin at midnight,” he says. “I told her I’m crashing at Adam’s anyway.”
“I make a mean pumpkin pie,” says Hattie as she locks the door behind us.
We all pile into Saul’s Jeep, and he drives us down dark, twisting residential roads.
The thick evening heat has my mind wandering back to this summer and the first time Grace and I kissed. It was a Movie on the Green night downtown, where they show a movie on a projector outside city hall. Grace’s family was going, and I told her I’d meet her there after work.
When I showed up, she was waiting for me at the fountain that sits in the center of Eulogy’s only roundabout. Across the street, families were spread out on picnic blankets, watching The Goonies.
We’d held hands the night before, but I couldn’t decide if it was supposed to mean anything. I’d been racking my brain all day, to the point where Hattie could barely tolerate how distracted Grace had me.
“Let’s go for a walk,” she said as she popped up from the edge of the fountain.
She wore a short white dress and mint-green sandals, and she smelled like a perfume of salt water, sunscreen, and bug spray.
As we headed in the opposite direction of the movie, she looped her arm through mine. We walked by darkened shop windows and rows of trees strung with twinkly lights.
She made the first move when she pulled me down a dark alley and kissed my bare shoulder. My eyes searched for hers in the dark. My hand slipped down her arm to intertwine with her fingers, and I kissed her on the lips. She kissed me back in the most ferocious way. For a moment, I was too shocked to even move, but soon our bodies were pressed up against the back door of one of the shops.
“I think Adam’s family lives out this way,” Freddie says, pulling me back into the present.
Saul parks in front of a huge white house with a tall wrought-iron fence lining the perimeter of the property.
“What is this place?” asks Ruth.
“A friend of a friend’s place,” says Saul. “They let me come here and swim whenever I want.”
Hattie’s lips twist into a pout. “Well, then why is this the first time the rest of us have been here?”
“A boy’s gotta keep a secret or two up his sleeve, okay?” Saul says.
We follow him up the driveway, and he squeezes through a gap in the fence, and I follow behind him. “You’re sure we can be here?” I whisper to Saul.
He winks at me once and presses a finger to his lips. I should stop him. I should stop all of us, but my shirt is drenched with sweat, and there’s obviously no one home. It’s not like we’re breaking into the actual house or anything.
“Yeah,” says Hattie, pointing to her belly while she eyes the fence. “Not gonna happen.”
Saul and I share a look, and I know what he’s about to suggest is completely moronic, but I don’t have any other ideas. “What can’t go through,” he says, “must go over.”
Hattie shrugs and turns to Freddie and Ruthie. “Y’all gotta hoist me up.”
Ruthie holds her hands out for Hattie’s foot but shakes her head. “This is the picture of maturity. Helping our pregnant friend jump a fence. Maybe I should put this on my med school applications.”
“Hey,” says Hattie. “If I fall, at least you can be the first responder.”
“Is that supposed to be comforting?” Ruth asks.
Freddie grunts a little as he pushes Hattie over the other side, and thankfully Saul and I are both tall enough that she doesn’t have a long way to go without a safety net below her.
Once she’s safely over, Ruthie squeezes through the fence.
“You’re sure we’re allowed to be here?” asks Freddie with one foot still on the other side of the fence.
“Positive,” calls Saul as he skips up the driveway and around the corner with Ruth and Hattie close behind. Normally Ruth wouldn’t be down for something like this, but if there’s anyone she trusts, it’s Saul. Even if deep down sometimes her intuition says she shouldn’t.
Saul always knows someone who knows someone, so it’s no surprise that he knew about this pool. He’s resourceful, and I don’t know if he was always that way or if it developed out of necessity.
Freddie hesitates, and I hold out my hand. “Come on,” I tell him, swallowing my guilt. “Trust me.”
In the backyard, Saul rustles around in the bushes for a minute, looking for the pool lights.
While it’s still dark, I shimmy out of my shorts and Boucher’s T-shirt and jump into the pool in my pineapple underwear and purple-and-pink-polka-dot bra.
“Found ’em!” Saul calls, illuminating the backyard.
The pool is beautiful and is so much more luxurious than what we normally swim in at the Y. Rocks cluster together to create a fountain that drips into the deep end of the pool.
Saul tears his tank top and shorts off before kicking off his flip-flops and cannonballing into the deep end. He’s not at all shy about his tiny neon-green brief underwear.
Ruthie and Hattie undress without ceremony. Ruthie wears black boy-shorts underwear and a pink sports bra while my sister struts her stuff all the way to the pool in a pink lacy thong and a turquoise push-up bra.
“She’s still got it, y’all!” calls Saul.
If she weren’t pregnant, I might wonder what Freddie thought of her. Hattie’s always been the hot and sexy one, and she would be the first one to say so.
Freddie turns his back to all of us as he pulls off his shorts and T-shirt to reveal a pair of blue boxer briefs. He’s got nothing to be shy about, but I like that he is anyway.
The water is colder than I expected, but my body is quickly adjusting. Hattie floats on her back into the deep end, where she sits behind the waterfall with Saul while Ruthie does handstands in the shallow end.
I lean up against the side of the pool with Freddie, and everything from our chins down is under water, but I still catch him peeking down at my bra and underwear. I write it off as plain old curiosity.
There’s something about the air around us that is absolutely electric. Maybe it’s because I know we’re not supposed to be here.
“Up for an impromptu race?” I ask.
Freddie shakes his head. “I don’t think so. I don’t think my ego can handle the possibility of losing in my underwear.”
I blow a few bubbles in the water. “Hey, it’s a lot more coverage than what you swim in during the week.”
“Yeah,” he admits, “but at least then everything is . . . secure.”
I nod vigorously. “I think I’ve heard enough.”
He grins wickedly. “I’d be up for a cannonball off the waterfall, though.”
I nod. “Let’s do it.”
We run along the side of the pool and up the back side of the rocky waterfall, which I don’t think is meant for climbing. As we stand there a few feet from the edge, Freddie takes my hand. “You ready?”
I squeeze his fingers, and we run, flying into the air before crashing into the deep end.
I let myself sink down to the bottom and open my eyes, even though it burns. Freddy’s blurry figure swims toward me, and his hand brushes my waist as he reaches for my arm, pulling me to the surface with him.
As we emerge, my hair fans out around us like blue lava. “That was fun.”
“You’ve got a mean cannonball.” He grins, displaying the gap in his front teeth. “If only your dive off the blocks was as good.”
I splash him in the face with his mouth wide open and swim away as Ruthie, Saul, and Hattie climb up the rocks.
Freddie chases me to the shallow end and walks through the waterfall to where I’m sitting on a little underwater bench. “Truce?”
I grin from the shadows. “For now.”
He sits down beside me. “Do you ever miss Grace?”
“I do. But it’s not as constant as it used to be. Now I just remember her every once in a while. And it’s weird things that remind me of her. Like, certain canned soups and doughnuts with sprinkles and vampire movies. But it feels manageable all of a sudden. It wasn’t always like that.”
Freddie leans his head back on the rocks. “I just feel stupid all the time. Like, when I remember Viv, I miss her. But I feel sort of embarrassed, too, like I should have known better. Everyone saw this coming except me. Even Viv. I wouldn’t listen, though.”
“I don’t know. I think that’s part of it. Sometimes you’ve got to live through it yourself.” Because the mood has grown so somber so quickly, I splash him.
“I thought we called truce!” he shouts.
“It was temporary, sucker!”
He’s quick to splash me back, and it’s not long before our water war has spread and we’re out from behind the waterfall, using Ruthie, Hattie, and Saul as human shields.
The lights inside the house suddenly flip on and a voice is shouting, growing louder and louder until we can finally make out that it’s a man and he’s angry. “Who’s out there?”
We all freeze, looking to Saul for our cue.
“Uh,” he says. “Run.”
I practically jump out of the pool, forgetting any embarrassment I might have about running around in my underwear, and grab all the clothes and flip-flops I see, constantly checking behind me for Hattie and Freddie.
I hear the back door slide open. “I’ve called the police,” the deep southern voice says. “And this is private property! I could shoot y’all just for steppin’ a toe past that gate.”
“Fuck,” I whisper the moment we get to the gate. I shove Freddie through.
“What’s this guy even talking about?” Freddie’s voice is frantic. “I thought we had permission to be here.”
My face gives me away.
“Are you serious?” Freddie shouts. “You let me trespass without even telling me?”
“I’m sorry,” I squeak.
Saul is already down at the Jeep, pulling it up the driveway for the rest of us.
I feel horrible, but my guilt will have to wait. “Y’all help Hattie out on the other side,” I tell Freddie and Ruthie.
I squat down, letting her use my thigh as a step stool. “We gotta move, Hattie.”
“I’m trying,” she says. “You try doing this with a beach ball in your shirt.”
“Hey!” the man’s voice calls. And this time he’s much closer. “Y’all ain’t going anywhere. I’m done with you kids sneaking in here when no one’s renting the place. And if you have any doubt, you should know I’m carrying a pistol, so don’t you try nothing funny!”
Hattie topples over the other side of the gate, but Freddie catches her.
The four of us pile into the Jeep, and I’m not even fully in the car before Saul is reversing down the driveway, going much faster than any backward-facing car should.
We’re quiet for a few minutes as Saul weaves in and out of streets, going exactly the speed limit. I sort through all our clothes and try to give everyone their stuff, but I can’t find Ruth’s shorts or Freddie’s sandals.
It’s not until we’ve made it out to the coastal highway that Saul breaks out into hysterical laughter.
And maybe it’s the tension, but so does everyone else.
Except Freddie. And me.
I nudge him with my elbow to try to get a read on him, but he rolls his eyes and shakes his head, turning away.
“Whose house was that anyway?” asks Hattie.
“Just a summer rental house that Todd used to clean. He used to do deliveries for Boucher’s, remember? We hooked up there a few times and would sneak into the pool when no one was renting it. I guess that must’ve been the property manager, though.”
“Yeah, well, that was a little too close,” says Ruth over the wind. “I’m applying to colleges right now, Saul! I can’t really afford to get in trouble.”
“What?” He looks to her in the rearview mirror. “You don’t trust your big bro?”
“It’s not that,” she mumbles.
Saul shakes his head. “Whatever. You think that asshole would’ve actually killed a couple of kids on a rental property? I doubt it.”
Freddie sits in the middle with his arms crossed. “Really? You doubt that. Don’t know what world you’re living in.” It’s quiet for a minute before he adds, “I need you to take me to my friend’s house.”
“Sure,” says Saul, his eyes drifting to me in the rearview mirror.
I shake my head discreetly, hoping that he doesn’t press the issue any more.
Freddie dictates directions, and as we pull up to Adam’s house, I’m surprised by how beautiful it is. Adam lives in a large robin’s-egg-blue plantation-style home with a wraparound porch. The house, though, is second to the sprawling live oak with branches so low they crawl across the yard. Deflated balloons dangle from the porch railing, and Adam sits waiting on the steps in black slacks and a blue jacket with a gold epaulet on each shoulder.
I hop out of the back of the Jeep behind Freddie and follow him up the driveway.
“You guys are soaked,” says Adam.
“Yeah, I’m gonna need to borrow some clothes,” says Freddie. “And some shoes if I can.”
“Sure thing.” Adam still hovers between us.
Freddie gives him a tight-lipped smile. “Give us a minute, okay?”
“Oh, right!” he says. “Privacy. Sure. Yeah. I’ll be inside. But hey, don’t ring the bell. My parents are asleep.”
As Adam walks inside, the clouds above shift, so that the moonlight creeping through the branches is reflecting off Freddie’s face now. “You don’t get it, do you?”
To be honest, I don’t. Yeah, the whole thing was irresponsible, but we had a good time and no one got hurt. But more than anything, I hate the feeling of him being mad at me. “I’m sorry,” I tell him. “I really, really am.”
He takes a few deep breaths. “We click,” he says. “And it’s almost easy to forget all the things that set us apart. Maybe sneaking onto private property is just some kind of stupid antic for you, but from where I stand, that’s how black kids get shot.”
I open my mouth to argue but am silenced when I remember the moment I told him to trust me, even though I knew, I knew, I knew that we had no business at that house. “I’m sorry,” I say again.
Freddie massages his forehead, grimacing as he does. “You can’t pretend to be color-blind or some shit when it’s convenient for you, okay? I’m black. This is the skin I wear every damn day. You’re my best friend. You can’t tell me that you don’t see that my black life is not the same as your white life.” He closes his eyes for a moment and shakes his head, like he’s answering his own silent question. “Maybe you haven’t thought about things like this before, because you don’t have to. I get that. But when I tell you I’m uncomfortable, I need you to listen, okay? I know there’s stuff I don’t understand about the gay thing. But you need to understand that my life in this skin is different from yours.”
The guilt I felt earlier is nothing compared to the ignorance I feel now. How could I not know? How could I be so selfish as not to realize that he was hesitant for a reason? My skin crawls with shame. “I understand. God. I can’t believe I was so stupid. I feel awful. I know that doesn’t make it better. I don’t have any excuse.”
All his words ring true. Sure, Freddie has more money and lives in a nicer house, but when someone with a gun catches the two of us on their property, one of us is more likely to be carried out on a stretcher, and it’s not me.
I step toward him and hug him tightly. “I won’t ever put you in a position like that again.”
“Okay.” He hugs me back and whispers, “Good night, Ramona Blue.”
As Saul drives the rest of us home, I let my head fall back and watch the stars drifting by from the open top of the Jeep. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what it means to be gay, especially in the South, but if I’m being honest, I haven’t spent much time thinking about what being black in the South might mean. Or anywhere else for that matter.
Anger and shame weigh heavy on my chest, but this isn’t about how I feel. It’s about Freddie. I hate that this is a reality he has to live with every day, and I wish I had some kind of answer to the bigger problem, but I don’t.