Chapter 1

“One two skip a few, ninety-nine one-hundred! Ready or not, here I come!” Chanice took her hands off her face and turned away from the tree to find her best friend. She’d been inseparable from Justin since birth…well before that. Their moms often said that the two of them have been bonded since the womb when they met in their Lamaze class.

“I found you Jay!” Chanice exclaimed using her nickname for him when she spotted him hiding on the side of his house.

“You can’t catch me though!” he replied before sticking his tongue out at her and running towards the tree that she was just at. Chanice was right on his tail and almost had him but he reached the tree a millisecond before she touched him.

“Safe! Haha! I’m still faster than you!”

“Naw uh! I almost had you!” Chanice replied.

“You’ll never be faster than me ‘cause you’re a girl! Girls are slow and stupid and they’ll never be as fast as a boy!” Chanice’s feelings were hurt.

“Take it back!”

“No, it’s true! I saw it on TV.”

“No it’s not. Take it back!” she said again, this time shoving him.

“No!” He shoved her back.

“Yes!”

“No!”

“I said take it back!”

“And I said no!” Chanice shoved him again and Justin fell back on the ground. He growled. He was hurt and wanted to hit her back but was taught not to hit a girl. But she wasn’t a girl to him, she was just one of the boys. Justin grabbed her ankle and pulled her down. Before long the two of them were rolling around pushing each other. Another neighborhood kid they were playing with heard the commotion ran over to break them up.

“Stop it! Don’t hit him! Don’t push her!” Trace exclaimed, pulling the two apart. When he finally managed to separate them Chanice’s pants were torn, Justin’s lip was bleeding and both of them were breathing hard.

“Stupid girl,” Justin spat.

“You’re the stupid one. Stupid-head!” Chanice yelled before running home. She couldn’t cry in front of them. She didn’t want them to think that she was weaker than them because she was a girl. She wanted to show them that she could roll with the punches like everyone else. She raced upstairs to her bedroom and threw herself on her bed and cried. Justin had hurt her feelings and made her scrape her knee when he pulled her down.

“I hate him!” she yelled.

“First of all, you don’t hate anyone. Hate is a strong word, and we don’t use it in this house.” Chanice looked up and saw her mom standing in her doorway.

“Yes ma’am.” Deborah walked over and sat down next to her daughter on the bed.

“Now who were you talking about?”

“Stupid-head Justin.”

“Chanice…” her mom said in a threatening tone.

“Sorry. Justin; he said that girls aren’t as good as boys and we got into a fight and I never wanna see him again.” Deborah chuckled.

“What’s funny? I’m serious Mommy.”

“Sweetheart, you know how many times I’ve heard you say that out of the 8 years you’ve known him?”

“Iono, a thousand?”

“Probably.”

“And we’re still friends?” Chanice asked.

“Yes. Ya’ll argue and fight all the time, but the next day ya’ll are back out there running around like nothing happened. You watch, tomorrow morning he’s gonna knock on the door and you’re gonna race downstairs and outside with him.”

“No, I’m not,” Chanice huffed, “I mean it this time. We’re not friends anymore.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Yes I do; boys are…” Chanice was cut off when the doorbell rang. Deborah got up and walked downstairs to open the door and smiled when she saw Justin and his mom on the doorstep.

“Hey Lynn, hey Justin.”

“Hey Debbie.”

“Hey Auntie Debbie.”

“Come in,” Deborah said, opening the door wider.

“No, we don’t have time; Paul’s taking us out tonight. I just wanted to bring Justin by to apologize to Chanice, the two of them got into it today.”

“Yeah, she was just telling me about it. Let me call her down. Chanice!” Chanice jumped up when she heard her name and walked downstairs to the front door where everyone was. She stood next to her mother and held onto her skirt.

“Hey Auntie Lynn…Justin,” Chanice said with a mean look on her face.

“Chanice,” he replied with the same look. Both got pinched by their mothers.

“Justin, don’t you have something to say to Chanice?” Lynn asked her son.

“Sorry,” he mumbled in a barely audible tone.

“I didn’t hear you,” Lynn said in a stern voice.

“I said I’m sorry,” he repeated louder.

“Chanice has something to say too,” Deborah stated.

“I do?” Chanice asked, looking up at her mom’s face.

“Yes, you do.”

“I’m sorry Justin, do you forgive me?”

“Do you forgive me?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“Well yeah! You wanna finish playing? Everybody’s still outside,” he asked excitedly.

“No, it’s getting dark and Paul’s taking ya’ll out to eat,” Deborah told him, “Ya’ll can play tomorrow.”

“Alright. Bye Auntie Debbie, bye Chanice.” Justin and Lynn waved and Deborah closed the door. She turned to say something to her daughter and saw Chanice skipping upstairs.

“Those two,” Deborah chuckled.