Halfie

Halfie Ana-Maurine Lara (bio) I peel my thigh from the plastic covering his mother’s couch. I let my hair cover my face as I sneak a sideways glance in his direction. Angel’s talking about something, but I mostly focus on his face, the way the golden brown skin has turned a sallow beige. He holds his hands open, like big nets swatting at the air as he speaks. Trying to catch something. Something. The spring light coming in from the window plays on my curls. I shake my head back and forth to study the reds and blonds peeking out through the brown and black threads of hair. “You know what I mean?” He’s asking me a question. I shift again. My bra feels hot and uncomfortable under my sweater. I can feel his eyes scanning my calves—my mom’s thick calves—as he waits for me to answer. I cross my legs and look up. A slow nausea creeps its way up from my stomach into my throat. I gulp so as not to choke on it. I think to myself, why am I here? but I say something else out loud. “Yeah, yeah—that’s crazy.” “What? It’s not crazy. I think I’ll make it big one day. My homedog Nest has got mad connections.” Oh. He’s talking about his music again. Just like the last time we talked on the phone. Right before I decided to come here to hang out with him. Even though I knew that really, we don’t have much in common. Except that our dads are from the same place—but I live with mine. He hasn’t told me about his. I feel my chest getting heavy with boredom. The nausea sinks back to its little cave in my belly. I look at his little afro and dark brown eyes. Don’t get me wrong, I mean, he’s so cute. Especially those thick, pink lips of his. But . . . well, I can talk about music, I listen to the radio. And my girls and I even freestyle from time to time, but it seems like he can only talk about himself. I pull my gaze away from him and look out the window to my right. I can see the buildings across the way. The dirty red brick and steel grey doors, the graffiti tags and R.I.P.s. There’s a big one with a Boricua flag in the shape of Puerto Rico. It reads: Chino a.k.a. Danny Velez, 1975–1990. Shit. He was my age when they popped him. They just shot him, too. An R.I.P. already. I feel my eyes swelling in their sockets and an unfamiliar sadness rising in my throat. “You okay?” I feel his hands, Angel’s hands, his thick fingers on my chin, urging me to look in his direction. Okay, I think, here it comes. “Yeah, I’m okay.” “You get enough to eat?” [End Page 414] Eat? Oh yeah, that’s right. I can sense the Wendy’s fries and salad thick in my stomach. I try not to feel embarrassed as my stomach growls. Almost right after I got here, he had taken me for a walk around his ‘hood, as he called it. We strolled across the field littered with chicken bones and trash. My shoes got sucked down into the spring thaw mud camouflaged by patches of neglected grass. Even though now I’m gonna have to throw my ruined shoes out, I hadn’t said anything. I didn’t want him to think I’m some uppity girl from the suburbs. It’s bad enough he thinks I’m from upstate, even though upstate is much further away from here than he knows. I’m trying not to think about my shoes. About how ugly they were to start with and how much uglier they look now covered with mud. About how my mom’s gonna kill me for ruining them. It was bad enough trying to get here. My mom had a fit when she saw me walking into the kitchen with a miniskirt

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