Free All of the Above by Shelley Pearsall

out, on its own, as if it knows something is wrong with those pieces being in the yard.
    I come around the side of the house with my heart pounding watch out, and that's when I see the dark shape of somebody sitting on the back porch steps. The shape is huddled over, curled up, on the steps. I don't even check to see who the somebody is; I just go slipping, running, flying down the driveway to get Aunt Asia.

MARCEL
    “What's up with you?” Willy Q asks me.
    “Nothing.”
    He crosses his arms and gives me the five-minute Willy Q Army stare. “Don't lie to me. Something's wrong,” he says. “I can read your face like a book.”
    “Nothing's wrong.”
    “Fights? Grades? School? Girl trouble? What's up?”
    “Nothing.”
    “We'll see about that,” Willy Q says. He walks over to the counter where we keep the cakes and pies. Goes right to the chocolate cake in the middle. Lifts the round plastic cover. Cuts a slab the size of a sidewalk, plops it on a plate, and pushes it in front of me. Sets a fork next to my hand. “Have some cake,” he tells me.
    I know better than to eat Willy Q's Chocolate Truth Cake.
Sweet enough to make tongues start talking
—that's what it says on the menu. Willy Q always insists if he coulda made his Chocolate Truth Cake in Vietnam, even the enemy would have talked.
    You can see the look in people's faces after they take the first bite. They try the first mouthful of cake kinda fast, and then everything goes into slow motion. Their eyes close. They lick the sweet frosting and cake off one side of their fork. Then, they turn it over and get every last crumb and speck on the other side. “My, that is good. That is REAL good,” they say.
    And then they start talking.
    They tell us about their family. Where they grew up. Who made the best cake, and who didn't. What's going wrong in their life now. Money problems. Health problems. No job. But how a bite of this good cake has made them feel better. Sugar does wonders, they declare. Me and Willy Q just nod our heads. Chocolate Truth Cake, we say, works wonders every time.
    But it ain't gonna work for me. I push the cake to the side. Go back to thinking about what happened at school again. How it felt to see all that work torn apart. How it meant that none of us would have a chance at getting our names in the news. Probably be working at Willy Q's Barbecue the rest of my life. Giving folks my big I-Shoulda-Been-in-Hollywood-But-Instead-I'm-Working-Here smile.
    Willy Q pushes the cake back in front of me.
    “Talked to my friend Joe at your school today,” he says slowly. “You remember Joe, right? The one who was in Vietnam with me?”
    I nod.
    Willy Q leans closer, giving me his Army-interrogator look. “Joe told me some vandals broke into your school and ruined a big project some of the seventh grade kids were working on with their math teacher. He said it was a real sad sight. Don't suppose you know anything about that project, do you, Marcel?”
    I shake my head no. Not much, I say.
    Willy Q points his finger about two inches from my face. “Don't you keep secrets from Sergeant Willy Q. Williams. I know everything that goes on around here, Marcel. I got eyes and ears in places you don't even know about. That was the project you were working on with those kids, wasn't it?”
    “Don't matter now, does it?” I answer.
    Willy Q goes over to the Chocolate Truth Cake and cuts another sidewalk slab for himself. He slides it onto the counter and sits down next to me.
    “Joe told me you were staying after school and working on that project with those other kids,” he says, taking a big bite of cake. “Don't think I didn't know what you were doing. Joe checked it out for me a while ago.…”
    Willy Q points at my plate.
    “Keep eating cake,” he says. “Then we'll talk.”
     
     
    W ILLY Q' S C HOCOLATE T RUTH C AKE
    1 cup all-purpose flour
    1 cup sugar
    ¼ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
    1 teaspoon baking powder
    ¼ teaspoon baking soda
    ¼