by Ni-Ni Simone
“Yeah,” she said dryly. “I guess. I mean I love him and everything, but it gets difficult being with a dude that is so popular.”
Toi rolled her eyes to the ceiling. “He only has eyes for this chick and she is acting like he is Kobe Bryant or something. Look just roll with it.”
“So what’s good with you and Harlem?” I asked Toi.
“Oh, that’s my boo.” Toi grinned from ear to ear. “I am not complaining.”
“I hope you come to Spelman for college,” Seven said to me, “so we can have a ball together in school.”
“I might. But I’ve been thinking about Morgan State. Malachi may go to Howard and I don’t wanna be too far.”
“And who is Malachi? What happen to Ameen?” Seven asked.
“Can you say loser?” I frowned. “He calls like every day though.” I picked up my cell phone and showed them the fifty missed calls I had since this morning, all from Ameen.
“Is he a stalker?” Seven asked.
“No, he’s only stupid,” I said, and we fell out laughing.
“Anyway,” Toi said, “back to Malachi.”
“That’s my sweetie.” I was blushing so hard that my cheeks hurt.
“Is this the same Malachi that you used to go to school with?” Toi asked.
“Yeah, that’s him.”
“I thought he moved,” Toi said.
“They moved back this year.”
“And y’all started kicking it again?” Seven asked. “When?”
“We just celebrated our two-month anniversary yesterday.”
“Oh.” Seven held her chest. “How romantic.”
“I know,” I said, picking up my ringing cell phone. “Malachi is romantic.”
“Who’s on your phone?” Toi asked.
“This fool, Ameen.” I twisted my lips.
“Let me answer it.” Toi took the phone from my hand and pressed the intercom button. “Hello, stalkers anonymous, may I help you?”
“Yeah,” Ameen said, “I’m looking for this chick named Zsa-Zsa.”
We started laughing so hard Toi couldn’t even respond to that. “Zsa,” Ameen screamed on the phone, “is that you? Are you laughing at me?”
We were still laughing.
“Oh, you think I’ma joke?” Ameen said, and I could tell by the sound of his voice that he was furious. “When I catch you, I’ma smack you again! Trick wanna play Ameen?”
Instantly we stopped laughing, and for some reason I felt like I was back in the club and he was cussing me out in front of his random chick again. “You don’t be calling her no damn trick,” Toi spat. “You the trick, bum-wanna-be-down-stalking behind. Your boys know you over here chasing? And I wish you would put your hands on her and see what the hell you get!” She hung up, threw the phone across the bed, and within a matter of seconds it had rung again.
“Don’t talk to him.” Seven reached for the phone and cut it off. “He’s crazy.”
“For real,” Toi said. “I thought he was just an ordinary nut but I don’t like that slickness he was talking, and what does he mean slap you again?”
“He’s crazy,” I said. “We had it out one time and now all of a sudden he’s threatening me. It’s nothing. You know I fight back.”
“But you cannot beat a man,” Seven said sternly. “Zsa, you know how you felt when we were little and your mother and father used to bump—”
“Do we have to go there?”
“Alright,” Seven said, “I’m just saying.”
“Umm-hmm, well, I’m going to take me a shower, I’ll catch you in a minute.” I grabbed my clothes and went into the bathroom.
By the time I was out of the bathroom and was fully dressed, Cousin Shake and Uncle Easy were back home, looking as if they had been to war.
“Let’s go hook up the grill,” Cousin Shake said to Uncle Easy.
“The grill?” I frowned. “For what?”
“For what?” Cousin Shake squinted his eyes. “Don’t you go embarrassing me. Seven, Toi, you better tell her how Cousin Shake do it.”
“He likes to cook his Thanksgiving dinner on the grill,” Toi said.
“He would roast a pig with an apple in his mouth if he could,” Seven said.
“Don’t test me, Fat Mama,” Cousin Shake warned Seven, “’cause you know I will put it down on you.”
“And where are we going to eat?” I frowned.
“Outside. Where the hell else do you eat barbeque?” Cousin Shake snapped and Uncle Easy laughed.
“Oh, no, I’m not eating my Thanksgiving dinner off no nasty-behind grill or outside in nobody’s yard,” Aunt Nona said. “Heck, no.”
“Well, don’t eat then.” Uncle Easy looked Aunt Nona up and down. “You could stand to ignore a few calls to dinner.”
“You don’t talk to me like that!” Aunt Nona snapped.
“And you just don’t talk to me. Keep messin’ with me, you’ll be running down the highway to Georgia.”
“I don’t need you!”
“You need somebody,” Cousin Shake said, “’cause you ain’t got to go home but come tomorrow morning you got to get the hell outta here.”
“Okay, everyone,” my mother interjected, “I have already prepared most of the meal so why don’t you put a few steaks on the grill if you want, and afterward we bring it inside and eat it with the rest of the dinner I cooked, at the dining room table.”
“Exactly,” Aunt Nona said, “have some class for once. Instead of acting like the wet side of a pigeon’s behind.”
“I’m ’bout sick of you, Nona.” Uncle Easy frowned.
“Join the club, fishy drawls!” Aunt Nona snarled.
“His drawls are not fishy,” Aunt Easter said.
“Ain’t nobody talking to you, Memorial Day!”
“You don’t talk to my wife like that!”
“I don’t give a hoot about your wife or your five overgrown chil’ren.”
My mother walked over to me and said, “You, Seven, and Toi go and set the table and leave these four to themselves.”
“Now you see what I put up with,” Aunty Grier said to my mother. “They’ll be like that until we leave in the morning.”
“Cousin Shake,” my mother said, handing him a pack of steaks, “you need to go and grill these now because dinner will be served shortly.”
While we set the table, me and my cousins kicked it about everything from boys, to love, to college, to what we liked and didn’t like. I really missed them being in Jersey. I looked at the clock and realized I hadn’t spoken to my baby all day, so I excused myself into the other room and called him.
“Hey, sweetie,” I said as he answered the phone, sounding sexy as ever.
“Wassup, ma?”
“Are you coming over?”
“Nah,” he said, “not today.”
Instantly my heart sank. “I thought you would stop by for a minute.”
“Oh, look at you missing me.”
“I want to see you,” I whined.
“Really?”
“Yes,” I admitted.
“Well, then open the door, I’m outside.”
“I don’t believe you!” I said while hanging up the phone. I ran to the front door, opened it, and there was my boo. “Don’t be playing with me like that,” I said, giving him a hug.
“I can’t stay long.” He kissed me on my forehead. “But I wanted to stop by to see you and to bring your mother this cake my mother baked.” He looked around my living room. “Where’s your mother?”
“In the kitchen, follow me.”
Once we were in the kitchen I introduced Malachi to my aunts and cousins. “Ma,” I said, “Ms. Karen sent you a cake for Thanksgiving.”
My mother smiled. “Tell her I said thank you, Malachi. Karen knows she can bake some cakes. Are you staying for dinner?”
“No,” Malachi said, “I just stopped by to see Zsa and to bring you this.”
“Nice to meet you, young man,” Aunt Nona said, “
and if you have any uncles let an old bird know.”
“You more than a bird,” Uncle Easy said as he and Cousin Shake returned from outside. “You mo’ like a vulture. A flying creature that can’t nobody recognize.”
“And what are you,” she said, “a walking piece of Viagra?”
“Okay.” I ushered Malachi out of the kitchen. “Don’t you need to get going?”
“Nah, baby, this is funny.”
“Malachi,” I said.
“Ai’ight.” He waved at everyone, but they were so entrenched in their argument they didn’t pay him any attention. He kissed me before he left and already I missed him.
“Dang, he was cute,” Seven said.
“He sure was,” Toi followed up.
“Fall back now,” I joked. “Fall all the way back.”
“Whatever.” Toi laughed as we headed into the dining room, and my mother walked over to Aunt Nona, Uncle Easy, and Cousin Shake who were still exchanging words.
“Can we please stop arguing,” my mother said, “long enough to eat dinner?”
“Sure, we can.” Cousin Shake nodded. “Y’all be quiet and let’s go in the dining room.”
“You don’t tell me what to do, Shake,” Aunt Nona said as she grabbed the bowl of cranberry sauce. “Don’t get it confused. I ain’t Minnie.”
“Oh, you don’t want none of me,” Ms. Minnie said. “Take Minnie’s name outcha mouth.”
We all took our seats. “Hold it,” Cousin Shake said. “Did anybody forget that we need to pray?”
“If anybody forgot,” Aunt Nona said, “it would be you, Shake.”
“I’m just gon’ ignore you, Nona.”
“Yeah, you do that.”
“Let’s just pray,” Cousin Shake said, as we stood around the table and held hands. “Dear Bruh-Man Father.”
“Hmm, tell it!” Aunt Nona said.
“We come before You thanking You for this day.”
“Thank ya!” Aunt Nona followed up.
“Thanking You for a day we’ve never seen before—”
“Never seen,” Aunt Nona said, “never seen.”
“And day we’ll never see again—”
“’Cause we all gon’ be dead one day and it’ll be a lot of funerals to attend.”
“You gon’ lose all control then,” Uncle Easy said. “It’ll be more dead people than you can stand.”
“Help him, Lawd,” Aunt Nona said. “Continue on, Shake.”
“Lawd, I just wanna thank You for Margarite’s baby, Julio.”
“What are you talking about Shake?” Aunt Nona interrupted. “Margarite was the prostitute that used to live down the street from us. She had that baby and didn’t know who the daddy was. Was that your baby, Shake?”
“Baby?” Ms. Minnie said, opening her eyes. “Who the hell is Margarite, and since we’re on this, who is this Julio you keep calling on every time you say a prayer? You been cheating on me, Shake?”
“Heck, no, Minnie. You know I love you. Don’t listen to Nona.”
“Don’t listen to me,” Aunt Nona said. “You’re the one who brought up Margarite.”
Cousin shake twisted his lips. “I was talkin’ about Jesus’ mama.”
“Oh, you mean Saint Millie?” Aunt Nona asked for clarification.
“Yeah,” Cousin Shake said. “Mildred, that’s her.”
“That’s who it better be to, Shake,” Ms. Minnie said. “’Cause I don’t play that. Now say Amen and let’s end this prayer. It’s gone on long enough.”
“Amen,” everyone said in unison.
As the night went on we ate, laughed, and recapped memories. By the time we woke up the next morning came and I hated to see my family go.
“Oh, sweetie,” my aunty Grier said to me, “you have to come down and stay with us for a few weeks this summer.”
“Yeah,” Seven said. “We miss you.”
“I miss you too.”
“I love you.” Aunty Grier hugged my mother. “Call me.”
“I will.”
“Well, Shake, it was good seeing you,” Uncle Easy said. “Maybe next time you come down to Manchester and we play some dominos.”
“You mean have me beat you at dominos.” Cousin Shake grinned.
“You can’t beat me at dominos, Shake.”
“There y’all go,” Aunt Nona said. “Acting like a gorilla’s rotten teeth.”
“You ought to know about rotten teeth,” Uncle Easy said as he walked outside toward the bus.
“Oh, it’s on now,” Aunt Nona said as she boarded the bus behind Uncle Easy and his family.
We watched them from the door and within a matter of minutes they were all gone. “I don’t know about you,” I said to my mother, “but I’m tired.”
“And I’m sore,” Cousin Shake complained. “Minnie, I need you to come and rub me down in some Bengay. Jazmyn.” He turned to my mother. “Next Thanksgiving, they can’t come back.”
.
14
…. now you have no interest in anything that I have to say…
Does she want you with the pain that I do
I smell you in my dreams…
—MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO, “FOOL OF ME”
For two hours Ameen had been calling my phone like crazy, and all I could do was lay in the center of my bed and wonder what it was going to take to make him stop. Ignoring him hadn’t worked, cussing him out at my school a month ago only seemed to rev him up even more, so I didn’t know what to do, what to think, or where I needed to go from here.
All I knew is that I needed this cat to bug off, yet no matter what I tried he was not falling back.
I looked at my ringing phone and could only imagine the message he was about to leave.
“Zsa,” he began into my answering machine, “you mean to tell me you hate me so much that you can’t even talk to me for two minutes?” He sounded so pathetic. “I know I wasn’t the perfect boyfriend.”
Wait a minute, is he crying?
“And maybe I didn’t do everything right.” He sniffed.
This fool is really in tears.
“But you of all people know that I was going through some things.”
What “things” was he going through?
“I was going through changes with my son’s mother and everything. You know people always trying to kick my back in and I thought, if nobody else, even if we weren’t together, I would always be able to kick it with you.”
The machine cut his message off but of course he gave me the courtesy of calling right back to finish. “It’s cool, Zsa. You hate me. Everybody hates me. Maybe I should just kill myself since I’m so evil. I don’t believe this cat got you so sewed up that you can’t even give me five minutes of your time for me to apologize to you. Ai’ight, I’m out, and if you don’t hear from me again, just know that I probably put a gun to my head.”
Suddenly I felt guilty. Not about our relationship being over but about leaving Ameen hanging like this. He had been there for me…sometimes…and I didn’t exactly hate him. I just didn’t want to be with him anymore.
I wondered if I needed to call Ameen back and hear his gripes for no longer than a minute or if I needed to continue ignoring him. But—then—what if he actually killed himself simply because I wouldn’t talk to him? Then I would feel guilty forever.
I thought about calling Malachi but I knew he would flip if he thought I was going anywhere near Ameen. And then I thought about calling Asha but quickly changed my mind, I could do without the preaching. And Courtney’s advice was not even an option.
Heck with it. I quickly dialed Ameen’s number. He didn’t answer so I figured forget it, I’d done my charitable duty for the day. I walked over to my television, turned it on, and the phone rang. I looked at the caller ID. Ameen.
“Hello?” I said in a serious tone.
“Speak to Zsa-Zsa?”
“Wassup, Ameen?”
“You. Like damn, you hate me so much you can’t even accept my
calls?”
“I never said I hated you. It’s just that I think we don’t—”
“Zsa, listen,” he cut me off, “can I see you?”
“No,” I said. “You can’t.”
“So you mean to tell me that what we had was nothing? Even if we don’t have it anymore, what we had doesn’t mean a thing to you now?”
“I never said that.”
“So what you saying?”
“I’m saying that I don’t want to see you.”
“How could you be so cold? What do I have to do, jump off a bridge, die or something to get your attention?”
“Why are you so dramatic?”
“Because I love you.”
“I’m sorry that you love me but I’m—”
“Zsa,” he interrupted me again, “five minutes of your time, that’s it. Five minutes. Just swing by, let me come see you, something.”
“I’m not coming to your house and you’re not coming here,” I said.
“Can you meet me somewhere? How about the park? Drive over there and I’ll meet you in the parking lot. I just want to see you for a minute. That’s it. Please.”
I sighed. I knew that Ameen had turned out to be a pest, but he wasn’t always like that. He had some good things about him. He was just…just…misunderstood. It’s not as if he had the easiest life, which is how we related to each other in the beginning. He understood where I was coming from with my mom and my home life. I mean, he didn’t know about my dad or anything, but he did understand me. Maybe we’re meant to be…and maybe I did owe him five minutes. Right? Right? Yeah, I did. “Five minutes and that’s it.” I hung up.
I got in my car and it took me less than ten minutes to drive to the park. “Five minutes,” I said to myself while parking near the entrance. “And I’ll set my cell phone alarm to make sure that I don’t stay any longer than that.” I reached in my purse for the phone and I couldn’t find it. I don’t believe this. I shook my bag and nothing. Dang, I must’ve left it at home.
Bang!
My heart jumped. I looked up and saw that it was Ameen pounding on my window. He scared the mess out of me. Ameen stood there smiling and looked as if he hadn’t shaved or maybe even bathed in days.
