Page 92 of You've Got a Place Here, Too
Being on a college campus, with the likelihood of seeing Assad many times over, also doesn’t help. Like a fleeting momentat a pep rally, or spotting him at the Quad’s talent show, or even a brief instance grabbing lunch at the Punchout. Trying to squash down and stomp on all the emotions that kept trying to rise every time I’d have a thought of him, or a glimpse of him in passing. He’s obviously handsome, with his medium skin and square jaw, those beautiful teeth and majestic mane that caught my attention at Greene Stadium, but he’s also an intellectual. It’s like every time I see him he’s moving with a purpose. And just like the first time we met, his face always greets mine with the same level of spark and intrigue, but never an occasion to speak more than a few minutes at a time, always being pulled away by our crew. Never time for just…us.
Now, second semester of sophomore year, all I want is to lay the crush to rest, but as I sit on the wall in front of the Harriet Tubman Quadrangle aka The Quad, reading a book I’d just got from the bookstore and enjoying the abnormally warm March weather, I spot him once again.
“Assad!” I yell against my better judgment just as he’s about to cut through The Valley. He turns and grins. Suddenly his whole demeanor changes as he slows his pace and crosses 4th Street in my direction.
“Lynetta,” he says, when he’s right in front of me. It’s the way he says my name, like he’s been waiting to say it all semester.
“Been a while since I’ve seen you,” I reply, feeling bold. My high school sweetheart, Keith, convinced me in our second semester freshman year that he was ready to be serious, and I was the best thing he ever had, then stood me up one too many times while we were both home for spring break. I’m over the false promises.
Seeing Assad is a bright spot in my day.
“I’ve been working,” he responds somewhat bashfully, hishands in his pockets. “What you doing hanging at The Quad? We’re not freshmen anymore.”
“They just opened the bookstore here. I thought you were big into reading. You haven’t been yet?”
He shrugs and I laugh. “I usually buy used textbooks from our classmates. But if you go to any library in the DMV you’ll see my name on like every checkout card.” I giggle, and he comes closer, peering at the cover of my book. “Do you mind?” he asks, and I shake my head. He goes to grab the paperback and our fingers touch briefly, sending me back to freshman year. Assad eyes the cover, with Toni Morrison’s name planted brazenly in green. “Tar Baby,” he reads. “I love this cover.” Then he looks back at me. “I’m surprised you’re not reading on The Yard.”
“You know how it gets on a warm day. Everybody’s out there. It’s a little too packed for me.”
“No catwalk on the runway?” he asks, sitting next to me, his brown bell-bottoms brushing a bit of my pleated skirt and exposed thigh. “Sorry,” he quickly says.
“It’s quite alright,” I reply, then regret my word choice, nervously messing with my knee socks. “…And not today. I like to read in peace. What about you?”
“Nah,” he says, looking me in the eye. “Being here with you is so much better.” His gaze feels like he can see through my skull, telepath right into my thoughts. But luckily, he brings us back, telling me how little time he has to hang on campus since he works at the Martin Luther King Jr. branch of the D.C. Public Library, and also a record store on U Street.
“Two jobs, huh? You must clock a lot of hours.”
“Yeah, I’m damn near full time. I wish I could enjoy college a bit more but my student account ain’t gonna pay itself,” he responds.
Hmm, he’s got a strong work ethic, in addition to an interest in books. Again, I’m trying to remind myself most guys on campus have these qualities, so don’t get too charmed.
“You?”
“Tuition is paid for. But I’m currently writing for the school’s newspaper. I’m trying to keep my schedule free so that I can finally become a staff writer atThe Hilltopsoon.”
“Continue the legacy of our newspaper’s founder, Ms. Zora Neale Hurston?” he asks.
“I take back everything I said about you not being a reader,” I say a bit too overzealously, and he laughs.
“That would definitely be a job.” Time slips away as we watch others strolling up the hill to the iron gates that open to The Yard, students we both know passing by, saying hellos and offering probing looks at Assad and me as we keep to ourselves.
We share our semester highlights and woes—what we like about Howard, adjusting to life in D.C., chatting about the political unrest just around the corner from our school. I explain an article I’m currently working on and where I’m stuck and he offers a few notes on ways I can go with the story. When I tell him he should consider writing or editing forThe Hilltop,he blushes but tells me journalism isn’t for him.
The three-hour conversation abruptly ends when a friend stops to ask him what he’s doing on campus and Assad realizes not only did he miss two classes, but he’s almost an hour late for his shift at the record shop.
“I can make up my assignments, but I can’t get fired.” And he dashes off, with a promise we’ll meet again.
Junior Year, Fall Semester
“You read that article on the back-pocket theory inThe Hilltoptoday?” Tammy asks as we’re strutting up 6th Street, rushing to get from the bottom of the hill to the top with five minutes to spare. The leaves blanket the campus’s streets, an earth-tone landscape emulating the Black faces spread across Howard. Beautiful shades of brown with warm and neutral undertones walk across campus and wait in line at the administration building.
“Of course I read it, I edited it,” I half mumble and half huff, trying to catch my breath, in the heels I had to wear for an interview I’m covering after class.
I came here pursuing a position as a writer at our campus paper, only to discover I loved editing too. So when the story came across our newsroom desk, it almost felt therapeutic editing the piece on the back-pocket theory; when a guy keeps a “good girl” on reserve until he’s ready to make her his Mrs. The One. The girl he takes home to Mama.
Last homecoming, Keith and I got in an epic fight duringmyhomecoming, then he went missing during Hampton’s homecoming weekend. All signs pointed to him running the same game this year.
“You-know-who just keeps stringing me along and I’m tired.”
