Rabbit's Lucky Number by Pearson Lee
EXCERPT # 1
I DON’T CURSE.
But on this uncomfortably warm October morning, a muddy stream flows freely from my lips, making a liar out of me. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!
Rodney, or Hot Rod as the press loves to call him, is on the sports page of the New York Daily News, flashing a disarming million dollar smile. The words “Home Sweet Home” are perched atop his invisible horns confirming all that I’d hoped was a nasty rumor.
Contrary to what you may believe, the devil is not red and spike-tailed. His tongue is not black, or forked for that matter, and he does not hiss when he speaks. His disposition is not surly, nor his countenance sour. In fact, when you first meet him, you would never even guess his true identity.
He is the owner of flawless peanut butter colored skin and eyelashes that are long enough to inspire envy. He is intelligent, spirited, and charming: a Mr. Personality, if you will.
At first, I think I’m okay. It’s nothing, Adrienne. Just relax. That’s what I tell myself. But I feel a familiar heaviness swelling in my chest even though I hold out hope that my luck will change with the flip of the newspaper.
Factory workers from Minneapolis cheese about the Mega Money Jackpot that should have been mine. Fuck! I trash the newspaper, mulling over a new plan. A better plan. But I’ve got nothing.
More than splurge on my first pair of Gucci pumps and an MTV Cribs-worthy house for my daughter Angela and myself, I intended to get as far away from New York as I could before Hurricane Rodney made landfall.
I practically trip over my own feet running to the window. I tug and pry and push at the lock without success. My hands, paler than usual, tremble against it. I’m cold and I’m goose-pimpled and I am beginning to panic. I have to get air. I bang one more time with the palm of my hand.
As if it senses my desperation, the lock shifts. I chuck the window open and suck in maple sweet October air as though I’d just broken the water’s surface.
Down below, the children of the country’s elite sit on the lush Crayola green campus lawn, noshing on their celery sticks and granola, hopefully only worrying at the moment about mid-terms and the minutiae I overhear in passing: like how many calories there are in a single sunflower seed.
I imagine myself twenty again and instantly regret it for the shame that rushes back to reclaim its old home...
EXCERPT # 2
Big Rodney’s old raggedy ass Cutlass was parked crookedly in front of my house, blocking the driveway.
Even though I hated his fat-engorged guts, I wondered what he was doing here on a school night. It could only be one thing! I busted through the front door right in time to catch the drama unfolding.
Rodney was having a melt down on the sofa. My mother stayed on the sidelines, but since I walked right into the mix, I was dead center, Wapner-style like how I liked it.
“I don’t know why Coach changed my number! My number is twenty-three, not thirteen!” Big Rodney put his big ham-hock hands on Rodney’s shoulder.
“It shouldn’t make you no damn difference what got-damn number it is! You Rodney Barrus, Jr. You a star no matter what muhfuckin’ number you wearin’!”
“But isn’t thirteen bad luck?” asked Kerri.
“Fuck that,” said Big Rodney. “Wear that shit and wear it proud. You are lucky number thirteen! Anybody ask you, that’s what you say.”
“Dang, you can’t say a sentence without cursin’,” said my mother.
“Yes, the fuck I can.”
“But I don’t wanna wear it. I’m gonna sit out the game.” Rodney’s eyes were red. His voice was shaking. He was really upset and I felt bad for him. Big Rodney quick-jabbed Rodney’s ear. Whap! He boxed him again and slapped his cheek with the back of his hand. I looked away, embarrassed.
“What the fuck is wrong with you, boy?! This the first home game and you playin’ Lincoln High. Best team in the city. You better put that damn shit on and get out there. Don’t nobody got no time to be playin’ wit yo punk-pussy ass. There’s a lotta money ridin’ on this!” Rodney’s bottom lip quivered.
“Rodney Senior, you ain’t learnt ya lesson yet?” asked my mother.
“I know we in yo’ house, Rhona. But this between Rodney Junior and me.” My mother sucked her teeth and went to the kitchen.
“So put on that got-damn jersey. And make it happen.” He clapped Rodney on the back and snapped his suspenders.
And then he was gone. Rodney sat with the jersey in his hand, bottom lip quivering, stewing in punk-pussy soup.
“You don’t have to wear it, Roddy. You’re the star.”
“What you think, Rabbit?” asked Rodney. Kerri crossed her arms.
“Yeah, Rabbit. What do you think?”
“I think your Dad’s right. It’s just a number. Maybe, you can get you a lucky rabbit’s foot and then that’ll definitely make you lucky number thirteen. Or maybe I’ll just come to the games and be the lucky Rabbit!” Kerri’s face contorted like she’d sucked on a lemon. Rodney’s was blank.
“Ummm, that was a joke, guys.”
“You know what, Rabbit? You’re right,” said Rodney. Kerri’s face was pure confusion. Her sneer was partly there, but she suddenly was trying to hide it.
“I’m lucky number thirteen,” said Rodney.
“Yeah Roddy. You lucky number thirteen. That sounds real good.”
EXCERPT # 3
I stood in front of the bathroom mirror examining my body for any changes. I’d done ‘it’, but my breasts looked the exact same. My hips, my stomach: same. I turned sideways to look at my profile. Booty: same. Those girls didn’t know what they were talking about. The mirror clouded with steam.
It’s not until the water sprayed my head that I remembered my shower cap. I could feel my hair contracting into the thickest of locks. But the water felt so good cascading over me that I couldn’t pull away. I lathered and rinsed the suds off my body until the bar of soap melted away and I felt that some of the dirty had washed off. I stepped out of the tub just as the bathroom door was opening. I charged toward it screaming.
“What in the hell?! Adrienne, you scared the hell out of me! And what the hell happened to your hair? You don’t see Miss Lewis for another week. Sometimes you smart as all hell and other times I ain’t so sure.”
“Will you please close the door? It’s cold.” She rolled her eyes and left.
As I put my pajamas back on, she peeked into my bedroom, clad in her long black church coat over a washed out navy sweat suit.
“Why ain’t you dressed for school?”
“I don’t feel good.”
“If you don’t go back to school tomorrow, we goin’ to the HIP center to find out what’s wrong with you.”
I jumped up and went to the mirror. My afro was a huge knotted mess. There was no way I could go to school like that. I wet my hair in the bathroom sink and dug my finger into the Dax. I rubbed it between my hands and smoothed the glob onto my hair, praying for a miracle. There was no telling what a doctor would dig up.
I climbed back in bed, afraid. Afraid to go downstairs. Afraid my mother was gonna know what happened. Afraid she would blame me. Mostly, I was afraid I was going to be lonely like this forever.
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