At the Crossroads by Travis Hunter Page A

of those things he could never get used to. His heart ached for his little friend because he knew exactly how he was feeling. He was hurting as well because he really liked Mrs. Bertha. She was always so kind to him and his cousins.
    “What’s wrong?” Khadija asked, taking a seat beside himat the raggedy card table that they used for their dinette set.
    Franky held up a finger to her and allowed his little friend to grieve.
    “If I be good, will God bring her back? I’ll be good, Franky. I’ll be good. I won’t talk back no more. I want do nuttin’ wrong. I want my grandma,” Jason said, crying harder now. “Why she have to leave me? You said she was strong, Franky. You told me that she was coming home and now she gone. Tell God I’ll be good.”
    Franky listened to his little friend and couldn’t help but feel his pain. If there was a magic stick he could wave to stop the pain he was hearing over the phone, he would do it. And as much death and destruction he’d dealt with in his own short life, he didn’t know what to say to Jason. He hated it when people came up to him after his mother and father died with lame lines like Your daddy’s in a better place or Your mother isn’t suffering anymore. Those people, although they meant well, really pissed him off. How was his father in a better place when the best place for a father to be was with his child? And how did they know if his mother had been suffering? All of these thoughts ran through his mind as he held the phone to his ear listening to how Mr. Death had broken his young friend’s little heart.
    “Hello?” a female’s voice said into Franky’s ear.
    “Yes,” he answered.
    “Who is this?”
    “This is Franky. I live across the street from Jason.”
    “Oh, I see,” she said calmly. “Well, Jason is upset right now, so I think he needs to get some rest.”
    “I understand,” Franky said. “Tell him I’ve been there, and he can call me anytime he likes.”
    “I don’t think he’ll be doing that. Have a good day,” she said, and the phone went dead.
    Franky pulled the phone away from his ear and looked at. “What was that all about?” he said, hanging up.
    He told Khadija the details of his conversation with Jason, and she held her hand to her heart. “Aww, no,” she said. “That’s the little boy you’re always telling me about?”
    “Yeah,” Franky said. “But then this lady got on the phone and basically told me he had to go and wouldn’t be calling me anymore.”
    “I wouldn’t take that too personal. Maybe she’s grieving in her own little way. Some people lash out while others withdraw, and then you have some who stay in denial forever. Like me. I still don’t believe my grandmother is dead. I just can’t bring myself to believe that.”
    “Yeah,” Franky said. “Whatever gets you through your day.”
    “It’s kind of hard to study after hearing that,” Khadija said.
    “Yeah,” he said. “But I need to get off on the right track, so I gotta stay focused.”
    There was a knock on the door, and Franky jumped up to answer it.
    “Is Rico here?” asked a weird-looking girl whom Franky had never seen before.
    “Who’s asking?” Franky said, always on guard.
    “I’m just a friend of his from Nawlins,” the girl said in a low and thick Louisiana drawl. She had platinum hair that shot straight up in spikes, silver contact lenses—or maybe those were her real eyes—and African tribal scars on both cheeks. Two earrings dangled from her nostrils and at least twenty more from each earlobe. She wore a tight-fitting shirt that showed off her ample breasts and wore even tighter jeans. If she didn’t look so crazy, she would be sexy. But the weirdest thing of all was the fact that she was wearing a trench coat, in the humid and hot Georgia summer.
    “He’s here sometimes but rarely,” Franky said. “What’s your name?”
    “You just tell him his call got true, respect,” the girl said. “I’ll leave a