Walking Out of Stride

Chapter Two

The weather that morning was clear, if a little grey, and it was just warm enough to eat outside near the planters. Caleb sat on the concrete with one arm lifted over his head as Kirelle drew on and colored it with temporary marker tattoos. Her fingers moved smooth and sure. She was a small and thin and pretty Black girl, made of angles and flat lines where other girls had curves. Her black hair was pulled back in a kinky, puffy ponytail -- she'd given her perm-damaged hair the big chop last year and was letting it grow out natural. Her dark brown eyes were squinted in focus and thought as she turned Caleb's arm this way and that. Caleb let her handle him as he ate his sandwich with his other hand.

"S'how's the first day back going?" she asked around the marker cap in her mouth.

"Try that again in a language I understand?" Caleb teased. Kirelle spit out the cap on his head, where it immediately tangled itself up in his curls.

"The first day back, you dork. How's it going? You guys ready for school again?"

"I will never be ready for school," Chailyn groaned. Her frayed jeans were a stark contrast with the immaculately kept pink hijab and loose peasant shirt. She dropped her head into her hands and closed her eyes. Her long eyelashes brushed her warm brown cheek. "Kirelle, take me home." It was a playful, but whiny, demand.

Kirelle laughed and shook her head. Caleb looked up at her and grinned.

"You're done," Kirelle said. She dropped his arm.

Caleb eyed Kirelle's marker work, turning his arm this way and that, admiring the color and smooth lines.

"When I finally have the money to get my sleeves for real, will you design them for me?"

"Will you pay me?" It was only a half-joke. Chailyn laughed and took a bite of her pizza.

"Don't laugh," Kirelle said. "Art is serious business."

Caleb smirked and glanced over at Chailyn, then back up at Kirelle. "Of course. Whatever the going rate for tattoo design is at the time. It won't be for years, though. I want to have started hormones and been on them for a while first so my body can figure out what shape it wants to be."

"I don't know that it will change that drastically, that that's something to worry about?" Kirelle said.

Caleb shrugged. "If I'm finally able to gain some bulk when I work out I just don't want anything to get stretched, that's all."

"I admire you, Caleb," Chailyn said. "I wish I had the drive to work out."

"You skateboard everywhere all the time," Caleb said.

"Yeah, well, that's different."

"Not really."

Chailyn shrugged. "I'm just saying, if I tried really hard I might be able to be skinny someday. But I just don't care. Oops!"

Caleb laughed.

"You're fine like this," Kirelle said. "You're cute chubby. You'd look weird if you were thin. You'd look emaciated."

Caleb chuckled and pulled his phone out of his pocket. He shuffled through his text messages until he found Elijah's and added him to his contacts. He hesitated, staring at the text from earlier, the blank box waiting for him to start typing.

I could just say 'hi', he thought. Tell him he's in my phone book, now. Is that weird?

Caleb and Elijah didn't run in the same circles, and while the school had never had a caste system like TV schools always did, there were still clear lines dicing up who did what and where and with whom. Elijah was in JROTC and hung out with all the kids in the culinary classes -- at least, that's what Caleb had overheard -- and he always had his nose in a fantasy novel. That wasn't even a circle. That was a Venn Diagram. Caleb was mostly in the arts with his friends -- art classes, Art Club, fundraisers for putting on the annual student art exhibit -- which could sort of mesh with culinary, if he tilted his head and squinted a little bit. And that didn't even touch his... extracurricular activities. Only Kirelle and Chailyn knew about that, because even though the lines separating the classes were blurry, people like him and his friends were firmly at the bottom. None of them were either popular or unpopular, but if their after school projects made their way out to the rest of the school?