Emako Blue Read Online Free PDF

week she was at my house or I was at hers, and we always ate lunch together.
    The day before Thanksgiving, I was standing at my locker when Emako grabbed my arm.
    “You comin’ with me!” she said. It was a statement, not a question.
    “Where?”
    “To Melrose.”
    “On the bus?”
    “Yeah, on the bus.”
    “I havta call my daddy,” I said, loading my backpack with books.
    “I’ll be outside,” she said, and began to walk away. She stopped and turned around. “It’s vacation, Monterey. What’s with all the books?”
    “I gotta study.”
    “Ain’t it a shame,” she said, waving her empty backpack.
    I stopped at the pay phone and called my daddy to tell him, really to ask him.
    “Yes, I have enough money for a taxi if it gets too dark. . . . Yes, it would be a good idea if I had my own cell phone for emergencies. . . . Yes, I remembered to bring home my books to study.” He was getting on my nerves.
    We got off the bus and strolled down Melrose, passing shops where they sell see-through bell-bottoms and thong bikinis, and my eyes were wide open like a tourist’s. A transvestite passed us wearing six-inch silver heels, a skintight lime-green spandex dress, a waist-length red wig, and rhinestone earrings. We laughed ourselves into a small jewelry shop.
    I picked up a bracelet with little dangling moons and stars. “This is dope, huh?”
    “Yeah, it’s kinda sweet,” Emako said, looking at the tiny price tag. “Thirty-five dollars,” she said, squinting.
    I put down the bracelet, opened my wallet, and counted my money. “I only have twenty dollars,” I said.
    Emako counted her money. “I only have nine dollars.”
    I looked at the bracelet once more. “Maybe it’ll still be here the next time we come.”
    “Yeah, maybe,” she replied.
    We went back onto the street just as two tattooed men went by, both wearing leather vests and spiked blue hair.
    “Freaky, huh?” Emako said.
    “Yeah,” I replied.
    We kept going down Melrose until Emako stopped in front of Johnny Rockets. “You ever eat in there?” Emako asked.
    “No,” I replied. “You?”
    “No,” she answered. “You hungry?”
    I looked at her and smiled. “Yeah.”
    We strutted in, sat down in a window booth, and I felt like I was grown.

    That Saturday, Emako and I were sitting in my room, listening to CDs.
    My daddy knocked on the door. “What kind of pizza do you kids want?”
    I looked over at Emako, who shrugged her shoulders.
    I replied, “Thin crust, pepperoni and sausage, no tomatoes, and some Mountain Dew . . . and we’re not kids, Daddy,” I added.
    “Sorry,” he said through the cracked-open door.
    Emako picked up a copy of Vibe magazine. She held it up in front of me and pointed to a picture of a handsome brother. “He kinda looks like Jamal, huh?”
    “Kinda,” I said, and turned on the TV. “So, what’s up with you and Jamal anyway?”
    Emako fixed her eyes on me and hesitated, as if there were a right or wrong answer.
    “I know you are not tryin’ to get in my bizness, Monterey,” she replied.
    “I sure am,” I said.
    “That’s only becuz you don’t have no bizness of your own to be in.” Emako laughed.
    “You ain’t funny. That’s okay, Emako, go ahead and laugh, but it’s Saturday night and here you are, sittin’ up in here with me, getting ready to eat take-out pizza. So, like I said, what’s up with you and Jamal?”
    “Ain’t nuthin’ ro-man-tic. Besides, he has this girlfriend who goes to private school and lives in the hills and, according to Savannah, him and . . . Gina—that’s her name—are wrapped up too tight. At least that’s what Savannah tells me. She says she doesn’t want my feelin’s hurt.”
    “Why is Savannah all up in your life?”
    “She said she was just tryin’ to be nice.”
    “Savannah ain’t nice. Even I know that,” I replied.
    “I know, but I kinda feel sorry for her,” Emako said.
    “Why?”
    “Savannah don’t seem very happy. You know . . .