"Keenan books a lot of things."
Mason walked over. He was six inches taller and eighty pounds heavier, and he took his time crossing the mat.
"What's this?" He caught the tail of her belt between two fingers and lifted it into the light. "Boys, come read this."
Jake Dawson and Luke Riley came off the wall. Conversation stopped in pieces across the floor. Heads turned toward the cage rail, one row at a time.
"L. Archer." Mason held the tail up over his head so the back row could see the red thread. "Gianna, right? So who's L?"
"My grandfather."
"Your grandfather." He said it slowly, tasting it. "So this isn't your belt."
"It's mine now. He gave it to me."
"Gave it to you." Mason let go of the tail and turned to the floor, arms open. "Everybody hear that? A little Black girl in a black belt because grandpa gave it to her."
Sixty people laughed. Not all of them—enough.
"Tell you what," Mason said. "My nephew's got a black belt, too. Came in a plastic sleeve. Twenty-two dollars."
"That's not what this is."
"Then what is it? Because from here, it looks like a costume with a dead man's name on it."
Tanya Burke stood up from the bench. "She's the instructor," Tanya said. "For our class. We've been waiting six weeks."