Free When I Was the Greatest by Jason Reynolds

in. “Ain’t nobody gonna be worried about none of us. Period.”
    Noodles clearly wanted to talk to me alone about the whole situation, so he made up an excuse to go inside, telling Needles that we were just going up to their apartment to get something to drink, while giving me the signal to play along.
    â€œYeah, man, you want me to bring you something out? It’s hot,” I said, trying to act normal.
    Needles said he was fine, and then I realized that he had to have known we were lying because, long as I’ve known them, they’ve never had anything to drink in their house. Never. Except water. New York City’s finest. And Needles knows Noodles don’t drink water.
    Their place was nothing like mine. There was no Jazz yapping on the phone to her girlfriends, convincing them not to have crushes on her older brother—me. No Doris at the kitchen sink covered in hard work. No pictures of old times and kids, bucktoothed cheesing. No boxing trophies (just for participating in Malloy’s training, not for actually fighting and winning). None of that. Noodles and Needles’s apartment was cold. Not cold like the temperature cold, but cold like the feeling cold. Like there was no life there. Like there was just a sad vibe all around. The air was thick and musty.It was hard to breathe in there sometimes, especially on a hot day like that one. The paint was peeling off the wall. It kinda reminded me of a snake shedding its skin, but there wasn’t nothing new underneath.
    Whenever I came over, we never went to their room. We just stayed in the front and sat at an old card table they had set up in the middle of the living room. It was just big enough to fit a small TV on it and a few plates, but their apartment didn’t exactly seem like a “sit at the table and eat” kind of place. The TV was connected to an orange extension cord that was plugged in on the other side of the room. It was on when we came in. A snowy Channel 1 News talked about something bad that they were being overdramatic about.
    I’ve only seen Noodles and Needles’s mother a few times. I don’t really know what to say about her—plus, I don’t like talking about folks’ moms. All I know is, most of the time she’s not there.
    I assumed she was gone as usual, but then I started smelling smoke coming from the back.
    â€œRoland, somebody here with you?” Her voice, rough but still sweet, came down the hall. It’s always weird when I hear anyone call Noodles by his government name, Roland.
    â€œYeah, it’s just Ali,” Noodles mumbled, shaking his head.
    â€œOh. Hi, Ali.”
    â€œHi, Ms. Janice.” She made me call her Ms. Janice. Actually, she’d prefer just Janice, but I always called her “Ms.” just because you never know when Doris might pop up, and she ain’t play calling elders just by their first names. Ms. Janicedidn’t seem to mind the “Ms.” as long as I didn’t call her Ms. James, which was her last name, or “ma’am.”
    â€œRoland, come close my door,” she said, coughing. Noodles disappeared into the smoky hallway. I peeked around the corner. I could see a mattress on the floor and brown skin, but I couldn’t make out what part of her body it was. Then I sat down on a fold-up chair with the plastic torn off the seat part, so the yellow foam stuffing was out. The foam had gotten pretty nasty from all the butts that had sat on it.
    I heard Noodles’s mother’s bedroom door click shut. Then I heard another door open. Noodles was digging around for something. A few seconds later I heard that door shut, and Noodles reappeared from the hallway. I don’t even know how he could breathe with all the smoke back there, but I guess he was just used to it. He was holding a loose page of a comic book. Just like the first day I’d seen him. The colors were bright, and the edges were raggedy