Makayla shot a puzzled glance Chandler’s way, but to Jack she just said, “I’ve heard a lot about you.” Her words had an odd hesitation to them.
“Don’t believe a word of it.” Jack shook her hand and then sat.
Makayla leaned closer to Chandler and whispered, “That’s not your brother.”
“Yes it is. Jack’s my brother.”
Makayla folded her arms and lifted her eyebrows.
“What?” Chandler shrugged.
“Clearly he is not your brother,” Makayla stated emphatically. “He’s—he’s—”
“He’s what?”
“He’s white!”
Jack opened his eyes wide in a look of comic surprise, then frantically patted at his arms. He jumped up and squeaked, “I’m white?”
The mostly African-American spectators turned around to look at him.
Chandler pulled Jack back down and said to Makayla in a mock whisper, “We never told him that.”
“So you’re… adopted?” Makayla asked.
Now Jack’s mouth fell open. “Chandler? Is this true?”
“We never told him that either,” Chandler said with a straight face. “Leave it to my Aunt Haddie. We must be the only poor black family that goes and adopts a white kid.”
“Shut the front door. You’re playing me.” Makayla gave Chandler a hard push.
Jack smiled at Chandler. Since they were seven, they’d pulled this joke a dozen times. “Technically, I’m his foster brother. I lived with Chandler and Aunt Haddie for four years before a nice couple adopted me and I moved out.”
“But in my mind, Jack’s blood,” Chandler added. “I hate foster labels or any of that junk,” Chandler said. “Jack’s as much family to me as Michelle. Not a foster or anything else.”
Jack put his arm around his friend’s massive shoulders and made a goofy face. “Can’t you see the resemblance?”
Makayla laughed. “Now I can. Even though you two are as black and white as yin and yang.”
“Yeah, and don’t forget the weight difference. I’m the skinny one.” Jack patted Chandler’s stomach. “Chandler here needs to jog.”
Chandler knocked his hand away. “Funny.”
“I’m not kidding.” Jack raised an eyebrow. “Did you run this morning?”
“Sort of.”
“Sort of? Come on, Chandler. You’re supposed to be running every day.”
“Who’s being the mother now?”
Jack playfully scoffed.
“I thought you were going to stop by and we’d both go for a run.” Chandler draped his big arm across Makayla’s shoulders.
“I had to get my passport. You should still have gone.”
“I’ll go running tonight.”
“When are you going to have time? We’re all going out tonight.”
“I’ll go right after this game.”
“You were going to take me for an ice cream.” Makayla pouted.
Chandler rubbed his buzz cut. “I can’t win.”
“Sure you can.” Jack crossed his arms. “Take her for an ice cream at Wilbur’s. It’s right near the school. Don’t get one for yourself. She can eat the ice cream while she watches you run laps at the track.”
“Works for me.” Makayla smiled.
“I don’t have my jogging sneakers.”
“We’re going to be running in boots soon. It’ll be good for you.”
Chandler sighed, then reluctantly nodded.
Makayla waved at a girl on the other side of the bleachers. “My sister’s here. I’ll be right back.” She stood and added, “Nice meeting you, Jack.”
“Nice to meet you too.”
“So,” Chandler stretched his legs out, “who’s your date tonight?”
“Kelly.”
“Is that the cheerleader you met at the galleria?”
“Yes. The really cute one.”
“So it’s your first date?”
“Yeah.”
Chandler made the sound of a bomb falling and then blowing up.
“What? You’ve never even met her.” Jack kicked a bottle cap off the bleachers.
“It’s just… you’ve talked about her enough, and—”
“I’ve never said a bad thing about her.”
“She just doesn’t seem like your type.”
“My ‘type’?” Jack’s shoulders rose. “I don’t have a type. But if I did, blond cheerleader with a great bod is a good ‘type’ to have.”
“I’m talking the rich part: drives Daddy’s BMW, lives in Knob Hill—that type.”
“So you don’t like her because her family has money?”