Chapter 28

I sat up, as did Zoë. All of the other girls were out of bed. It was baggy eyes and bedhead all around. Warmer, fuller, pajamas covered most of the tank tops and shorts I’d come to expect on any given morning. Pat, her bruises had grown more purple (that made my heart sink, ) was twisting a skipping rope. I don’t know what she intended to do with it, but I was intimidated. Connie had her barbell. Marin held the other 10 kg weight. Renée and Andrea each held 5’s. Elizabeth and Laurie stayed back a ways, they had large hard cover books. Hannah whirled around a tied off shirt sleeve with something heavy in it. I approved of her ingenuity. We didn’t have access to socks.

Suzi was sitting at the edge of the lockers, crying her eyes out. Her controlled silence of her sobs wounded me. Xiomara was hugging her and holding her hair. I disentangled my fingers from Zoë’s. We got out of bed from opposite sides.

“It’s Kia, but she brought Dashawn with her,” Connie alerted me. “After Reggie we--”

I put up my hand. “You girls looked after each other, after our family, after me. I owe you all so much.” I hugged Connie and she melted as if all of the tension in her bones was an illusion. I still needed her strong. “Should I help Suzi or greet our guests?”

“You have to open the cabinets to help Suzi.” Connie rallied. I nodded. I knelt down and knocked on the cabinet doors.

“Motherfucking Christ! Dean!” Kia’s voice screamed through. I felt a big mix of relief and anger. She was back! Who was she to just come back! “Open the door, I’ve got Wanda’s fist hooking up an umbilical cord!”

“She’s been using that joke for four hours now. It was almost funny her first try.” Hannah sighed. She tapped the cabinet next to mine. “Dashawn, he woke up, how’s--”

“Dean! Open the door!” Wanda yelled. “I need to see you.”

“I didn’t know you and Wanda actually knew each other,” Hannah laughed. Her desperation and exhaustion showed. She gestured to my militia, “Girls, be ready.”

“We are.” Andrea assured me. She toed me above the hip bone. I opened the door.

Four people were in two of our cabinets. I offered my hands to Wanda. Hannah helped out an Asian girl, Yuming. Mrs Lan. Suzi’s mother. She rushed out, saw Suzi by the lockers and dashed across the room. The papers in her hand crinkled and beat the still air. Her path took her straight through my cheerleader blonde. Renée was not prepared to defend herself with that barbell. Andrea dropped her weight to catch Renée. Marin jumped back to save her toes.

“You made it,” I slapped Wanda’s thighs before I dragged her out. She climbed to her feet with my shoulders as her handholds. I still knelt to help Kia. Wanda, like Dashawn, Kia, and Yuming, was dressed in green, gold, and/or black. They were caked in orange flakes. Her legs were thick, the good kind of thick, I think I’m supposed to be using more c’s. She was taller too. Her tits were fighting against the front of her tank top. She was hugging me around the head.

“Dean, look who I found!” Kia came out with a smug grin on her face. Connie had squatted down to help out Dashawn. My emotions rumbled in my guts. She was back home! She had left! She hadn’t said a word! I knew her to be a social climber but she had come over when I was sick. I knuckled tears from my eyes. She cricked every joint and they all went pop.

“It’s orange?” Dashawn picked the flakes from his hair and rubbed them off of his fingers. He openly leered at Andrea and turned with a bright smile towards me. I didn’t have time to catch his aggressive handshake. I had flinched. He smirked and we connected on the second reach. “You son of a bitch! Wow! Look at these girls, man. How do I get to be you?”

“You need a really hot mom and a hotter dad.” Zoë answered. I gave her a glare but she was cracking up, as was Dashawn. I took a deep breath.

“Then one down,” He smiled. “You been picking on my boy to prevent him from getting too big a head?”

Struck by jealousy, I slapped Dashawn on the back of the shoulder. I gestured to the table. “Sit down. Kia and Wanda too. I have to check on Suzi.”

“Your house, your rules,” Wanda grinned and rushed to my go to chair. I bet Zoë had told her about it. Dashawn sat down where Renée usually did. He slapped his hands in a drumroll. Kia scowled, crossed her arms under her tits, and leaned back against the edge of the cabinets.

“Is this orange shit safe? It’s not like space-asbestos or something?” Dashawn picked the flakes from his hair.

“We think they’re used to track us if we escape,” Suzi only hiccuped once as she inched forward. Her mom had taken a washcloth, or had been given one, and was rubbing away Suzi’s eyes. Suzi looked a red raccooned mess. Xiomara stayed close.

Yuming and Suzi, mother and daughter, both had fit eighteen year old bodies. I’d have refused to guess they were sisters if I had met them on the street, afraid I’d be called racist for saying two Asian girls looked the same. Yuming had longer, wilder hair. Suzi had her neat chin length cut. Yuming was slender and petite but a few inches taller. Suzi was slender and petite but more than a cup size larger. Yuming was rubbing her daughter’s back. Suzi’s hands shook with the paper in her hands.

“Hi, Mrs Lan--”

“Fuck no!” Shouted my math teacher. “I am never getting called Mrs Lan again. It’s Yuming, Julie, or something cheesy and flirtatious. I got my teenaged body again, I’m going to put good use to it.”

“Mom!” Suzi weaseled out. “What the hell?”

“Don’t you moralize,” She snapped her finger into the pale blue page. Suzi burned red.

“What the hell is that?” I would’ve asked if Pat hadn’t scurried up behind me and spoke first.

“It’s a health notice,” Yuming pulled her daughter into a hug.

“Don’t get that orange shit on me!”

“It’s already all over you.” Yuming snorted. “Why does the father of my grandkid look as beat up as his slut?”

“I’m not a slut!” Pat growled. I wrapped my arm around her. I think her words rushed right out my other ear. I didn’t understand Zoë. I wouldn’t comprehend why she was looking that smug. That proud.

“No, I suppose not, Dean’s the slut.” Yuming grinned.

“More importantly. Why the shiner, brother?” Dashawn asked me. I turned. My stomach roiled, how could I tell him that--

“I didn’t want to be with Reggie. He chased me here.” Zoë explained. “Dean’ll fight for his girls.”

“He just wanted someone who loved him,” Laurie murmured. Dashawn gave me a cocked eyebrow. I shook my head, tabling that discussion. Yuming clapped for our attention.

“Let’s sit down, eat breakfast, and discuss this. I’m guessing it’s the first one?” Yuming picked the sheet out of her daughter’s hands. “Damn, you’ve only got eight stools too.”

“Plenty of room on my lap, Yuming.” Dashawn inched out.

“Would that--” She stopped herself and lifted her daughter’s chin. “It’s going to embarrass you. I’m developing feelings for Dashawn. While we’re visiting, we’re going to have to risk embarrassment. It’s not like you have a leg to stand on right now.”

“He’s your student, you’re his teacher!” Suzi breathed. She extricated herself. Her sister grinned. Her mother dammit! They just looked the same age. I frowned.

“I’m not teaching. He’s not in school.” Yuming shrugged. “We’re going to an alien world, Shu. I expect you to meet the challenges we’re facing.”

“I will mom.” Suzi declared. She raised her chin, marched forward, grabbed my hand and walked me to the seat next to Wanda. This was Suzi’s normal seat. A corner turn from my seat. I was pushed onto the stool. Suzi dumped herself onto my lap.

“I’m not taking food out with that orange shit everywhere.” Renée stopped the rest of my girls from finding places. “Get cleaned up first. Or starve.”

“Practical girl.” Yuming nodded. She ran her fingers through her thick black hair and scowled at the fistful of orange flakes. “At least they don’t adhere like glitter.”

“Um, I’ll take the left shower,” Dashawn decided, “Would you be offended if I invited some of your girls to join me?”

“I don’t think I’d be offended...” I got glares from Marin, Pat, and Yuming. “I think you’ll offend a number of them based who you choose to ask and which order you do it in. And you’ll be offended by how quick the no’s come.”

“You’d let us go with him?” Pat sneered.

“I don’t permit you to do anything. Or forbid it. I just like it or I don’t.” I grabbed her hand. “You can’t ask Pat, she’s got a date with me.”

“It’s gotten as bad as your room, Dashawn,” Kia murmured.

“Can I go with Dean?” Wanda cheerfully looked at Dashawn as she asked. Yuming flattened her already disappointed gaze.

“Um ... No...” Dashawn sighed. “I’m sorry, Dean. I was getting walked on over and over again in our box and--”

“Is it more important that you explain yourself or that she listens to you?” Zoë sniped. Connie stepped forward.

“Everyone with orange take the left. Everyone without take the right.” She smiled at me. By putting me in the same shower as Dashawn the fight quelled. I nodded. “Suzi, Dean, you’ve gotten covered too. You’re not going to freak out about--”

“We finally have two boys in the room. We don’t have to shower with them.” Kia erupted. “We can--”