Chapter 2

Nate sat at home, in his bedroom, and listened to some slow songs on his phone. It was already dark outside, and daylight savings time ended a week earlier. He had a picture of Vera on his computer screen; it was taken by JJ when all of them went to the zoo. She looked like a nun: black dress, white shirt, black scarf over her head, and no makeup. To him, she was the perfect specimen of God. He couldn't be like JJ and act all atheistic, dark, and without religion. He was the coolest person in the whole school, but he often wondered if JJ had a soul.

Since Halloween, he tried to spend as much time with Vera as possible. He often went over her house, sat with her family during dinner, and held her as she fell asleep in his arms, but JJ and Peppermint were always there. On Halloween night, he came up to her on the dance floor, and asked,"So, will you be my girlfriend?"

She smiled, pressed her head against his chest, and then said, "Hell yes."

But every time he tried to have a one on one with Vera, JJ made sure he showed his face. He popped up out of nowhere and made sure Nate wasn't accosting her in any kind of way. If JJ wasn't standing in the way of him and Vera, then it was Peppermint, and she was much more direct about it than JJ.

He texted Vera in the hopes she would meander her way to his house while his Momma traveled to Star City with her church group. Every time she went away with the church, it gave him an opportunity to have free reign of the house. He ate what he wanted to eat when he wanted to eat it. His Momma was from India, but his father grew up in National City, and he was a tenebrous, black man from the streets who tried to do better with his life. He worked on the National City Police Department but died in the line of duty. A nascent street gang who called themselves the Jokers took him out with a bullet to the back of the head, and it nearly killed his Momma in the process. After that event, her only solace was in the arms of Jesus.

He recalled JJ saying on several occasions, and loud enough for his Momma to hear, "Fiction can't cure reality." He basically called the Bible fiction, and his Momma kicked him out of their house. Now, she scowled every time he dropped by the house.

He laughed for a moment. His Momma didn't care too much for Vera either, and they had several fights about her. She was a dark-skinned woman from India, and she didn't necessarily like her son being involved with a Caucasian girl. She explained to him that she had no culture, and she was nothing more than a spectator. This all happened right before she went on her church trip.

"Listen, son, as soon she acquires some money, she'll move out of this area, and forget about all this," she said with a grimace. "She doesn't have the ability to love Little Africa. It's not in her DNA."

"She's a nice girl, Momma," he said with a grimace. "It's just high school."

She smirked at him for a moment and folded her arms. "I've tried to find the positives in you dating her," she said with a grimace. "It's hard when thinking about the racism in this society. It will always be an uphill battle for you, son."

Vera's Text:

Come by and get me. That's the only way I'm coming over.

End Text

Nate's Text

Okay!

End Text

When he arrived at her house, she answered the door with her hair in ringlets. Her face shined with a regal grace, and she had on just a smidgen of makeup. It almost seemed like Peppermint dressed her. She had on her Gothic dress but looked like an innocent vampire. Stepping out onto the porch, she sat on the porch swing and looked up at the beautiful moon. "There's nothing more beautiful than a good looking moon."

"It's nice," he said with a smile. He reached over, placed his hand on the back of her neck, and kissed her gently.

"So, do you want to hang, go out to eat, or what?" She asked.

"Eat," he said. "Maybe stop by my house later."

Running over to the door, she opened it, and said, "Let's go, Y'all."

"Fine," JJ and Peppermint said.

He paused for a moment, and in the back of his mind, he said, "Dammit!" He didn't realize JJ was over at her house, and everybody looked like vampires except for him. He had on some casual clothes that a normal person would wear, and everybody else looked like creatures of the night. They all had on their Gothic wear with black collars around their necks.

JJ walked up to him while Peppermint and Vera were way back in the rear, opened up the black backpack hanging off his shoulders, and pulled out a box of rubbers. "Don't think I don't know what you had planned, Nate. As soon as she said you wanted her to come over, I stopped everything, and ran over to her house." He placed the condoms in his hands, and said, "I swear to nature that if you get her pregnant you'll regret it."

He shook his head for a brief moment, and said, "So, you're being a hypocrite!"

"You really think this thing you have with Vera is comparable to Peppermint and me? You're mad!" He paused for a moment. "It's too much to explain, Nate," he said, "But don't do anything with her you'll regret."

Mickey created a dinner special called the Big Kryptonian, a dinner special with a Mickey Burger, fried green tomatoes, and a large soda pop for nine dollars and ninety-nine cents, and Nate ordered two of them. JJ and Peppermint didn't have to say what they wanted, but Mickey brought out a Mickey Burger, large fries, and a large drink, and the two shared the meal with each other. The sparsely crowded restaurant had all the familiar faces, and Cindy X walked into the eatery and gave Nate a nasty look, and he knew exactly why: she had been running a website and radio show opposed to interracial relationships.

"So, what do you like to do?" Nate asked of Vera. She sat across from him while JJ sat across from Peppermint. "Do you like to swim?"

She smiled. "Haven't been. Ever."

He gave her a good stare because he didn't know why she hadn't ever been swimming. "Usually, I just swim at the local Boys Club, but I've dipped my feet in National City's Lake a few times."

JJ looked over at him, smirked, and then said, "You shouldn't even be alive. I've seen you jump off the bridge into the lake twice."

"Okay. Okay," he said, "I just don't want to brag."

Vera smiled. "You can brag to me."

Peppermint smirked while looking down at her phone for a second, and then showed the screen to JJ, but Nate couldn't see what was happening.

"I'm not braggadocio," he said.

"Me either," she said. She laughed for a moment, and then said, "JJ, on the other hand…"

"What?" He asked.

"It's true," Peppermint said. "JJ loves bragging."

He stood up, walked over to the window, and peered outside. "What's up with JJ?" Nate asked Peppermint.

"Oh! He's looking for an old friend of the family," she said. "His aunt Pearl is in the area."

JJ walked over to the table, sat down, and Mickey brought out all the food. As soon as the food came to the table, Johnny walked into the eatery, and almost walked past the crew.

"Johnny, have a seat?" JJ asked. "Just pull up a chair to the table."

"Oh! I didn't see you guys," he said. "I'm famished." He looked over his right shoulder, and asked, "Mickey, can I get a cheeseburger, fries, and a soda pop?"

"When are you going to find a lady?" Peppermint asked Johnny. "There's like a school full of girls."

He looked over at Cindy X in the booth across the way, and she said, "Don't even look this way. I don't play that."

"See. That's why," he said. "A white boy like me is having a helluva time pulling some tail."

"Cindy! You can't sit with us?" JJ asked. "We used to all be friends until last year."

"I need time to work on me," she said in a serious tone. "I don't have time for all this." She pointed to Nate and Vera.

At Nates…

Nate and Vera sat on the couch in his home and JJ and Peppermint went home, and now it was well past twelve o'clock in the morning. He thought of JJ as a colossal time waster, and he did it on purpose to stand in his way.

"What's the deal with you and JJ?" He asked. "It's like he doesn't want you to have a boyfriend."

She smiled while she sat on the couch, and said, "He wants to ensure I'm safe."

"I want to be your man," he said.

She paused for a moment, and replied, "He's like a brother to me, and no matter what, I'm not willing to change that for anybody. I went through a lot of things over the years. JJ and Peppermint were like the only solid friends in my life."

"I see," he said. "I'm just trying to understand."

Nate turned on the television, placed it on some horror movies, and then grabbed some blankets from his bedroom. He moved the mahogany coffee table out the way, and they laid down on the floor, watched television, and snuggled. She had on her Gothic dress, and in the front of his mind, he wanted her to take it off. She lay next to him, buttocks facing him, and watched television.

The lights of the living room shined brighter than ever on the young couple as they lay in the middle of the floor. Nate made an inept attempt to watch television as Vera's butt pressed against his lower abdomen. He felt the warmth from her body, and it aroused him. Gently, he turned her mouth towards him and softly kissed her on the lips. The curvature of her soft kissers fit perfectly with his, and their tongues swirled with harmony. After only a few minutes, Nate and Vera morph into an entangled web of human flesh: white and black body parts fighting for a comfortable place to rest. He hadn't known the taste of a woman or had breast pressed against his chest in his life. He lived for his music but didn't have a body like JJ: strong and fit—and muscular. He stared at her face—directly into her eyes—to ascertain her comfort level. He felt her heart racing and hoped their journey into a sexual relationship moved at an acceptable pace.

When he looked in the mirror at himself earlier in the day, he saw his flabby, tenebrous skin, wavy black hair, and brown eyes as a curse. His large belly protruded outwardly further than he liked, but he had no desire to exercise it off. He cupped her right breast with his right hand; it felt like soft cushions—heavenly. Her nipples fought to be noticed through her black dress, and he couldn't help himself when it came to tracing them with his right index finger. He pressed lightly but heavy enough to arouse them and to feel every part of her well-built chest. Sliding his right hand down the back of her dress, he traced her panties and wanted to remove them badly. Her ankle length skirt crept up to her calves, and he slid his right hand all the way down to her calves, gently moved the skirt in an upwards direction until he exposed her black panties. Since she didn't demonstrate any signs of resisting, he continued to bring the dress over her head until she sat in front of him with only her bra and panties.

"Turn the lights off," Vera said softly. He hopped to his feet, ran over to the light switch, and turned it off. He then took off his pants and stood in front of her in his underwear. His erection stuck pretty much straight into the air, and he didn't seem to have any control over it. He reached into his right pants pocket, pulled out a condom, and then laid it on the ground next to her. She picked it up for a moment, and then set it back down on the ground. The television was the only light in the living room. Immediately, he noticed her flawless stomach and began kissing it slowly. Laying back on the ground, he worked his way up to her breast, and quickly unhooked her bra from the front. He suspected that she would have attractive and ample breast, but her's were miraculously generous. Her nipples, prominent and strong, stared him in the face, and he suckled the left one and then the right one, and then he realized he didn't know what he was doing, but he acted like he did.

When he removed her panties, he realized she prepared for the evening just as much as he did because she trimmed her lady parts. His manhood was like a steel beam, and he felt so much pressure that he thought he'd release just from brushing up against her. His bulge protruded outwardly, and he stood on his knees with his left thumb in the waistband of his underwear. Pulling down his underwear, he moved it out and over his phallus, past his thighs, and off his feet. He wrestled with the condom for a moment, slid it over his erection, and once he had it on, he crawled on top of her. Placing his hand around his shaft, he guided it between her legs until it slid into her, and her entire body tensed up. She wouldn't let him go past the tip. Softly, he kissed her on the lips, but she didn't let him move forward for almost five minutes. "Okay," she said in his right ear, and then he lunged his penis deep into her vulva, and she held on to him tightly as he worked his man business around and around. He didn't have more than fifteen strokes before he unloaded and filled up the condom.

"Was that it?" She asked.

"No," he said. "It's just that I wanted you so badly that I couldn't contain myself." He pulled off the rubber full of semen, tied it in a knot, and then placed it in the trash. Immediately, he put on another condom, and Vera continued to lay on the floor, and he climbed on her again. They rolled around on the floor until she ended up on top, and she wasn't able to push down on him too hard because it hurt her too badly. He kept pushing upwards, and every time he did, she looked like it hurt her. He turned her over onto her stomach and entered her doggy style—and then back to the missionary position. He felt her finally climax underneath him, and then he did the same right after her. The whole event lasted a little over an hour.

Vera lay next to him—bare and beautiful—but when she reached for her underwear, he said, "Is it okay to sleep like this? I just want to lay here nude with you." She placed her underwear on the ground and laid in his arms the entire night.