Chapter Six

Dante sighed and wondered if he should've even been surprised at this point. At this rate, he was just going to have to accept the fact that this stranger he'd met less than a week ago was going to be popping up in all corners of his life. It would be decided later if that was a good or bad thing. Dante dropped his tools to the side and tilted his head to the side, "What?"

Naya walked her backpack to the corner of her room and sat on the dusty unfinished floor across the open bathroom door, her long loose braid whipping around her neck. She took a deep breath before answering, "My parents aren't giving me the keys to my car back, but I really wanted to keep working with Manny because I think there's a huge chance he's eligible for a full ride scholarship if he scores high enough on his SATs. When I told your mom that, she got a little, for lack of a better word, hysterical. She told me to get rides from you from now on, but if you're not comfortable with that just let me know." Naya paused, "Now that I think about it, I probably should have taken an Uber or something. Maybe next time."

Dante shook his head, "No, don't do that. Just come here after school and chill for an hour and a half." Dante was going to do it anyway, but he didn't like that he didn't have a choice now. Besides, he wasn't comfortable with the idea of a newly legal woman getting in some rando's car. Dante returned to carefully placing the tiles on the bathroom floor when a thought occurred to him, "What do your parents think about all this?" he asked.

"They think I'm at the library right now. Not like it'd matter though- they're both out of town. I didn't know when you got off work so I took my bike and rode here as fast as I could so I didn't miss you. That's why I look like this," Naya said, addressing her disheveled appearance. Her outfit was fine, a crisp orange cardigan that matched her shorts, but she was breathing a bit too heavy and her frizzy baby hairs had risen into a little black halo around her head. Naya rummaged through her backpack and pulled out an orange inhaler, taking two pumps.

"Why'd they take your car in the first place?" Dante asked. Surely if they could afford this house, then they could afford to replace her tires.

Naya rifled through her backpack, "They think I'm getting myself into trouble again," Naya let the sentence trail off, hoping Dante wouldn't focus on the last word of the sentence too much. Lucky for her, Dante was too busy directing his attention at being offended by the first half of that sentence. "So the hood was trouble now?" Dante thought. Then again, they'd sent their daughter off in an expensive car and she returned it missing four wheels.

"Dammit," Naya muttered under her breath. Dante looked at her perplexed. "Left my pens in my locker," Naya explained. Now instead of being productive and using the next hour and a half to work on her homework, Naya would now have to waste the time watching cat videos and internet drama she didn't really care about.

"Go downstairs and ask for Freddie. He probably has one in his toolbox," Dante offered.

Naya took the advice and walked out to the upstairs balcony, calling out to a group of workers in the living room space, "Is one of you Freddie?"

Freddie, who was working in the powder room downstairs, raised his hand and met Naya halfway at the bottom of the stairs. "Dante told me to ask you if you have a pen," Naya said, posing the question as Dante's request.

"Sure," Freddie said, casually opening his toolbox and rifling through it. Naya caught a glimpse of the inside and saw a seemingly random assortment of items cluttered within. Within seconds, Freddie summoned a blue pen from the disarray and shut the lid close.

"Looks like a lot of stuff," Naya pointed out. She took the pen from Freddie and lightly scribbled it on the palm of her hand.

"Yeah, but I've always got everything people need when they need it," Freddie said in a big smile. He loved any opportunity he got to talk about his beloved toolbox.

"Well obviously not everything," Naya said logically.

"No, everything," Freddie began listing off examples, "Last week, my barber, Trevon, was putting up fliers for his new location when he ran out of tape. Luckily I was there with a fresh roll and helped him put up the rest. And the week before, Father Mike's microphone ran out a battery just when he got the whole church riled up. Good thing I hadn't left my toolbox in the car like my mama asked. A month before that, my boy was with his lady friend and-" Freddie's voice faltered as his eyes made contact with Alex, who was currently shooting daggers at Freddie with his own eyes. Alex knew how the anecdote ended and it wasn't exactly the kind of story he wanted this girl repeating to her parents, the people funding his and his entire crew's paycheck. "Nevermind," Freddie said nervously, "I better get back to work."

Naya chuckled lightly as she walked back up the spiral staircase. How naive did they think she was? She plopped down on the floor of her future bedroom and quietly worked on her homework, careful not to disturb Dante at his work.

Their peace was left undisturbed for only a few minutes when Alex knocked on the door of the room. "Can I talk to you outside?" Alex asked, the same way teachers asked mischievous children to meet them in the hallway so the other students didn't have to see the tongue-lashing that was about to happen.

"About what?" Dante questioned, even though he had a hunch about the answer.

Alex confirmed Dante's suspicions from the quick, subconscious glance he made at Naya before answering vaguely, "I'll tell you outside." Dante shot Naya a weak smile in an effort to ease her obviously displayed worry and followed Alex to the next door room.

Dante knew exactly what Alex wanted to talk about, and it wasn't exactly a potential pay raise.