Nigeria Jones by Ibi Zoboi

Author:Ibi Zoboi
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2023-02-27T00:00:00+00:00

Grievance 6

“It’s like you’re the spook who’ll be sitting by the door,” Chris says when he drops me off. I thought he was on my side, but he’s bringing up what my father said yesterday, thinking that I was actually listening to him.

“Yeah,” I lie. “A spook by the door.” But being at this school is not some secret spy mission for the Movement. So I turn off my phone and walk through Philly Friends’s red double doors without looking back at my mother’s car and the Youth Group members.

Kamau and Sage are not around to greet me. So I do as I was told and head straight to the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion office. The letters DEI are on the door beneath Diane Hutchinson’s name. If the last two letters are flipped, it spells “die,” and I wonder which part of me is dying by coming to this school, by adding to the diversity and being included.

“Do you need another T-shirt?” Diane asks. “It’s supposed to rain all week, so if you’ll be coming in wet, should I keep a few here for you if you come back?”

I nod because my own T-shirt is wet and ice cold against my skin. I also don’t want anybody to know who I am and where I come from—with the Movement’s logo on my chest and all.

In the bathroom near Diane’s office, I change out of the Movement’s T-shirt into the Philly Friends one. I’m swapping one brand for another, one skin for another—as if I’m switching allegiances.

Diane makes me sit at a round table in her office. A tray of cold cereal, a sesame bagel and cream cheese, a banana, yogurt, and tea were already waiting for me when I got here. It’s served on real ceramic plates with the school’s logo in the middle and with silverware, as if this is somebody’s house. All this special treatment is making me feel like a charity case. In this school, maybe I am.

“Nigeria, I’m so glad you’re back. Listen, I know a lot about your father. I’d spoken to your mother about all the things you learned at home and how naturally brilliant you are, and this is the kind of self-guided, independent learner we want here at Philly Friends,” Diane says in almost one breath. “But we really need your father’s permission. When we deferred your acceptance and offered you a seat as an incoming junior, we weren’t aware that your mother—”

“My mother already did everything,” I say, cutting her off. “You told me she filled out all the papers, I’m registered for classes, I got a scholarship, and I already have family here. That should be enough.” I leave the breakfast untouched and get up from the table wearing my second Philly Friends T-shirt. “I don’t want to be late for my first class. Can I go now?”

“Wait,” she exhales, and motions for me to come over to her desktop computer. “I want you to read this so that you know what we’re up against.

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