Ace of Spades

After finishing detention, Devon is surprised to find Terrell outside waiting for him. The two boys walk to a nearby playground. Devon tells Terrell more about what is happening to him and Chiamaka, and Terrell suggests that Aces’s attacks are motivated by racism. Devon wants to dismiss this theory. He tells Terrell that he does not believe that every white person is bad and asserts that people at Niveus have been nice enough to him over the years. Terrell reminds Devon that racism is not about being nice or mean; it is structural and influenced by history. Devon tells Terrell that he should go to college, but Terrell says that the world is not ideal, so he does not want to “poison [his] mind with thoughts that don’t make a difference” (172). Privately, Devon agrees that dreaming is dangerous. The two boys kiss in a purple tube on the playground, but Devon panics and runs away.

The next day, Mr. Taylor asks Devon about a rumor that he has heard that Devon is dealing drugs. Devon assures Mr. Taylor that the rumor is not true, although it is. After school, Terrell is waiting for Devon again. Devon admits that he just went through a breakup with Andre, which is why he ran away after they kissed. Terrell walks him home, and Devon reflects how nice it feels to have a friend who “doesn’t treat [him] like a burden” (183). The next day at school, Jack confronts Devon. He is furious that Devon has been hanging out with Terrell, whom he calls “a fucking weirdo” (184). Devon realizes that despite how close they were, Jack never accepted his sexuality.

During detention, Chiamaka tells Devon her plan to get a tech savvy Niveus student, Peter, to fix the USBs so that they can stop Aces from sharing the information on them. Devon is unsure of the plan, but Chiamaka is determined not to let Aces stop her.

After school, Chiamaka invites Belle over to watch Pretty in Pink. Her parents are making efo riro, a Nigerian dish. She asks if she can order pizza, not wanting to “make Belle uncomfortable” (191) with the food. Her mother insists that Belle try the efo riro. Belle ends up enjoying the food, and she and Chiamaka continue to bond.

Devon meets Chiamaka in a science lab at school. A tech-savvy student named Peter is also there. He tells them that the USBs are impossible to fix, but that he will try to find out where the texts from Aces are being sent from. Chiamaka asks him to have the results by the following morning; he agrees.

When Devon gets home from school, he finds his mom looking at an electricity bill that she is unable to pay. He promises her that he will get the money to help, despite her protests. Devon goes to Andre’s apartment, intending to ask for a few small jobs to earn enough money to help his mother, but when he sees Andre, the two have sex, and Devon does not ask for the jobs.

The next day, Chiamaka and Devon meet Peter again in the science lab. Peter tells them that he has figured out that all the messages from Aces are being sent from a school computer (computer # 17 in the Morgan Library), and that on “Sundays and Mondays, at around ten o’clock, the details are entered and the messages scheduled to be sent out at specific moments during the week” (207-208). Peter has also learned that the account that Aces uses to send the messages is not attached to a specific student or staff member at the school. Chiamaka and Devon decide to stake out the library on Sunday night to finally learn who Aces is.

In chemistry class, Jamie tells Chiamaka that Belle broke up with him. He tries to apologize to Chiamaka for his previous lack of support and asks if she wants to hang out after school. She tells him that she is busy and realizes that she is “finally seeing through the cracks in Jamie’s seemingly perfect demeanor” (211).

When Chiamaka gets home, she prints out all the information from Peter about Aces’ messages. She realizes that the text about her stealing candy was scheduled to be sent on a Sunday night, two days before the incident at the candy store actually occurred.

Chiamaka tells Devon about her revelation about the timing of the messages, and they realize that the incident at the candy store was a set-up. Chiamaka tells Devon that Jamie was the only person there from Niveus. She asserts that he would never have set her up, though she does not sound convinced of her own words. Devon wants to tell her about Terrell’s theory that Aces is targeting them because they are Black, but he refrains because he does not want to consider it as a possibility.

Devon decides to say that he feels sick so that he can leave school early and go to Terrell’s house; he has never skipped school like this before. When he gets to Terrell’s house, Terrell tells him that it is a bad time because his sister, who is very ill, is staying with him. Devon leaves and returns to the playground. He realizes that someone is following him and taking photos. The person is wearing a mask that covers their whole face. Devon tries to chase the person, but they get away.

Chiamaka is in detention scrubbing tables with a toothbrush. Belle comes into the classroom to say hi and asks why Chiamaka got such a long detention sentence. Chiamaka tells her about Headmaster Ward’s belief that she and Devon are Aces. Belle asks her who she thinks it is. The two discuss why Chiamaka and Devon are being targeted, and then Chiamaka tells Belle that she likes her in “a non-friend way” (225). Belle kisses her.

The next day at lunch, Devon and Chiamaka find a crowd of students gathered around the senior lockers. All of the lockers have been plastered with posters. The posters feature a photo of an unconscious and disheveled Chiamaka wearing party clothes. She is surrounded by tiny blond dolls, and the words “Bitch” or “Slut” (228) have been written on some of the posters. Someone dressed all in black and wearing a Guy Fawkes mask runs through the crowd and tosses a bundle of flyers into the air. The flyers have photos of Devon and Chiamaka’s junior yearbook photos. Their eyes have been scratched out. Devon rips down some of the posters and watches the Headmaster Ward take a poster, crumple it up, and throw it in the garbage. The headmaster takes no other action. Mr. Taylor tells Devon that he is sorry that the incident with the posters happened and that he is going to try and figure out who did it.

Later, Devon goes over to Terrell’s house and plays his music piece for Terrell, who tells him that it is missing drums. Devon agrees, but he is preoccupied with his worry over Aces’s latest actions. Terrell asks Devon if he has considered that Aces might be a teacher. Devon thinks back to Headmaster Ward’s reaction to the poster and admits that it might be a possibility, but that they need concrete proof. The next day at school, there is another text from Aces. The text implies that Chiamaka is a murderer and promises that there are more details to come. Chiamaka finds Devon and tells him that she thinks “something bad is going to happen to [her]” (238).

A few minutes before the chronological end of the previous chapter, Chiamaka is talking to Jamie. People are acting strange around her, including Jamie. She asks him about the photo of her that is on the posters because it was taken during the party in junior year that she cannot fully remember. Jamie claims not to know what happened that night. Chiamaka asks why everyone is acting so weird, and Jamie tells her that people are talking about her and the car accident. Chiamaka is terrified and asks why people are not also talking about Jamie as well, since he was the driver. Jamie tells her calmly that he was not there, and that it was Chiamaka who hit the girl, not him. Chiamaka realizes that Jamie must be Aces, but Jamie denies it, saying, “Would I have touched you if I hated Black chicks?” (242). He then touches her hair in a way that makes her feel like “a science experiment” (243). Chiamaka runs to find Devon and tells him that she thinks something bad is going to happen to her.

Belle and Chiamaka walk home together; Belle comforts Chi. Chiamaka worries that no one will believe that Jamie was directly involved in the car accident. The two commiserate over how awful Jamie is and how they cannot believe that either of them ever liked him. When they arrive at Belle’s house, Belle tells Chiamaka that she is bisexual and that she wants to kiss her again. They kiss and say goodbye, and then Chiamaka walks home.

On her way, she notices a black car following her. She tries to run, but the car speeds up and follows her all the way home. The driver approaches the front door. Neither of her parents is home, and she is terrified. The driver is wearing the same Guy Fawkes mask as the person in the school hallway. They start pushing Polaroid photos through the mail slot in the front door. All the photos are of Chiamaka in her bedroom, in various states of undress. There is a note on the last photo stating, “All will be revealed […] I’m ready to have a ball, are you?—Aces” (249). Then, Chiamaka gets a text from Aces with a photo of Devon and Terrell kissing.

Devon and Terrell are spending time together. Terrell asks Devon if he thinks that Chiamaka actually killed someone. Devon is unsure, because while all the secrets that Aces has leaked have technically been true, he also knows that Aces twists the truth considerably. Suddenly, Devon gets a call from Chiamaka, who tells him that Aces followed her home and that their stakeout on Sunday has to work. Terrell tells Devon to be careful.

Chiamaka and her mother are watching TV together. Her mother is braiding Chiamaka’s hair into cornrows. When she finishes, Chiamaka looks at herself in the mirror. Normally, she does not braid her hair; she straightens it so that she can fit in better with the girls at school. However, now she sees herself as her mother’s daughter and knows that her mother loves her hair “more than [Chiamaka] ever could” (256). Chiamaka and her mother talk about her mother’s family, and Chiamaka learns that her father never met her mother’s parents. She wonders if her grandparents were “as disappointed in her for marrying Dad as Dad’s family was when he married Mom” (257).

Later, Chiamaka goes over to Belle’s house. Chiamaka sees a family photo and wants to get a closer look at what Belle looked like when she was younger, but Belle will not let her see it. She brings Chiamaka to her bedroom, and the two kiss and then have sex.

On Sunday, Devon and Chiamaka break into the school. They find hiding places in the Morgan Library with a good view of computer 17 and wait for Aces to arrive. Eventually, they see “a person dressed in black, an oversized hoodie covering their small frame, with black jeans and shiny Docs” (265) walk over to the computer. Chiamaka pushes the person to the floor and pulls the mask off the person, revealing a blond girl, and then freezes. The girl gets away and Devon tries to run after her, but she disappears. He goes back to the library, angry that Chiamaka let her get away. Chiamaka is in shock and “looks like she’s seen a ghost” (267). Before Devon can say anything, Chiamaka rushes out of the library.

Devon looks at the computer that the girl was using. She had logged into a page titled “ACE OF SPADES SECRET SOCIETY” (268). At the top of the page are the school values: “Generosity, Grace, Determination, Integrity, Idealism, Nobility, Excellence, Respectfulness, and Eloquence” (268). An animation appears on the screen that rearranges the letters of the nine values, leaving the first letter of each word and rearranging them to form a racial slur. The text also states “Die” (268). Devon is horrified. He continues to explore the page and finds folders with names of Niveus students who have been assigned specific tasks. He sees the name Jack McConnel next to the task, “Distribution of DR’s messages” (268), and realizes that Jack was the one behind all the texts about him. He realizes that many students at Niveus are complicit in the Aces attacks. Devon finds a folder labeled “Checkmate” with information about Black students at Niveus going back to the 1960s. There is a folder for one Black boy student and one Black girl student every 10 years. Devon opens a folder titled “Dianna Walker” from 1965 and sees a picture of a naked girl sprawled on a bed with her eyes closed. Devon feels sick. Before he can get more information, the computer screen fades. Devon takes photos of as much as he can before the screen dies completely, realizing the magnitude of the plot that he has uncovered.