For the Love of Money

by Omar Tyree

  She had stepped on my fire button, and I was breathing like a dragon. I wasn’t afraid of her, and if she wanted a challenge that morning, we could get on the air and go word for word for it!

  “Well, when I get Will Smith on my show, I’m gonna ask him the same question.”

  She seemed to soften up a bit with that, right before her phone rang.

  “Excuse me,” she said. Her young producer showed me back out and to the studio room.

  “Is she always like that?” I asked her.

  She chuckled and said, “She can be worse than that. And don’t believe what she says about Will Smith. She loves him. If you represent yourself well and keep your cool, she’ll love you too. I wouldn’t even worry about it. You just can’t let her scare you or get under your skin. Just stay relaxed and make a joke out of it. Mary likes to laugh, trust me.”

  It sure didn’t seem like she liked to laugh, but I had nothing to lose, so if push came to shove, I figured I would make it light. It beat getting into a generational argument. That’s all that it would boil down to in the end if we didn’t hit it off with each other.

  I sat down in my guest chair in front of the microphone at eight o’clock on the nose. The earlier guest and host were both leaving and commercials were still being played. Mary Mason slipped into the room and into the host chair right in time to kick off the show.

  “How many of us are sick and tired of these same-old black movies and the stupid roles that some of our people play. I know I am. I’m so sick and tired of it that I don’t know what to do anymore but keep talking about how sick and tired I am. So I brought on a local actress this morning who played in a recent Hollywood movie called Led Astray, where the poor black girl plots to get back at all of these producers and directors who fooled around with her and promised her things that never came true.

  “If you happened to see this movie called Led Astray, that came out in February, then please call us up this morning at WHAT-AM and let us know what you think. We have the young star, Tracy Ellison Grant, in the studio to talk to us about the business of Hollywood.”

  She looked down at her notes and said, “Tracy Ellison Grant is a graduate of Germantown High School and an English major from Hampton University in Virginia with a master’s degree.

  “Now, Tracy, what I want to know is what do your professors at Hampton think about this movie you starred in? I thought an education was supposed to elevate us past the down-on-your-luck whore roles.”

  “Well, my character spoke good grammar in the movie, so I believe that my instructors would have been fairly pleased with it,” I joked. What the hell else could I do?

  “Your character spoke good grammar? Well, that’s about the only good thing your character did.”

  “Well, she didn’t allow herself to continue being a victim of falsehoods,” I responded. “She did what very few people in Hollywood, or even people at WHAT, are able to do, and that’s get even with their bosses.”

  Mary gave me a look that could kill, but she couldn’t deny that I was working it, so she kept right on plugging away at me.

  “So what did your daddy say about the naked sex scenes?”

  “He said, ‘I couldn’t look at all of it, but I’m sure proud of your body, girl. You wear it well,’” I lied.

  “Your father did not say that,” Mary snapped at me.

  “Okay, he didn’t,” I admitted. “But what do mothers say to their boys when they do their things in their sex roles? I think it’s all hypocritical myself. Humans are humans. Why should it make that much of a difference that the woman is naked if the guy is naked right along with her?”

  “Well, in your movie, it wasn’t as if the girl was in love with any of these men that she was with.”

  “Nor were the men in love with her. That’s just my point. How come no one ever talks about how terrible it was for the men to do what they do? Why is the woman always at fault, when she’s no more than the victim?

  “I think that a lot of women could relate to the movie in some form or another,” I said. “Even you, Mary. Haven’t you been led astray by a man before when you were younger? If you haven’t, then you happen to be a very lucky woman.”

  She ignored me with a knowing grin and went to our first caller. That was fast.

  “I saw the movie, and I loved it,” an older sister from West Philadelphia commented.

  “What did you love about it?” Mary asked her.

  “I loved the fact that she took her life back from these guys.”

  “How, by sleeping with them and blackmailing them for money?”

  “Whatever it takes. Like Tracy said, it wasn’t as if these guys were saints. If they were, then the girl wouldn’t have been after them in the first place.”

  Mary took the second caller, an older brother from South Philly.

  “I wasn’t particularly thrilled with seeing such a beautiful young sister on-screen with these white men, but I did get the point. The only thing that I’m concerned about was how she became led astray in the first place.”

  “Exactly,” Mary huffed in agreement with him.

  I said, “You’re right. I don’t know how women fall for men and the American dream either. It must be something in the water that only affects us, the same water that makes so many men want to sleep with every woman they see.

  “Like you, sir,” I addressed him. “I bet that your wife was the only woman you ever had, and you have never led a woman astray in your thirty-something years of dating.”

  Mary began to laugh at that one herself. She knew damn well what the truth was. Everybody was led astray, even men.

  “Well, I wouldn’t say that,” the older brother responded. “We all make our mistakes in life, and I have made a few of them.”

  “Exactly,” I mocked them both.

  After that, I didn’t have a problem with Mary Mason for the rest of that hour-long show. She realized that I could hold my own, so she kept it professional and stopped trying to deliberately set me off.

  The young producer said, “See, I told you you could do it. Now she’ll have you back again.”

  “I bet she will,” I responded with a grin. I actually enjoyed the show with Mary. She gave me a chance to practice my sharp wit and poise, something I had failed to do with Wendy Williams on Power 99.

  I had a huge gap between nine o’clock and two-thirty (the time I planned to pick up my cousin Vanessa from school at Engineering & Science that afternoon), so I drove out to Springfield Mall to try and do some more shopping. Since I arrived there before ten o’clock, I sat inside the car and listened to more of Power 99’s Dream Team with Wendy. This girl was forever trying to get the juicy info on celebrity gossip. I guess we all have to make a living some way, but Wendy seemed to take things to the extreme. I guess someone else could say the same thing about me. However, was reporting the sleaze any better than being involved with it? I didn’t think so. It was all hypocritical, even for the people who loved to listen to it and help spread the damn gossip!

  I walked inside Springfield Mall at ten o’clock, right as the doors were opening and strolled past a shoe store. The next thing I knew, a young sister had run out of the store and asked me for my autograph.

  “I loved your movie,” she said. “I heard you on the Wendy Williams Show yesterday and I saw you on the news this morning. Is it tough in Hollywood?”

  She was a pretty dark brown sister with a short hairstyle. I don’t know why, but it looked as if she could sing. Maybe she reminded me of Anita Baker.

  I said, “Everything that’s worthwhile is tough. Do you go to school?” I asked her. She looked young and studious. What the hell was she doing working at a shoe store instead of going to college?! She looked roughly around twenty.

  “I go to school. I go to Community College. I’m taking media courses right now, but I plan to take courses in computer science soon. I hear there’s a lot of job openings in the computer information business to give me something to fall back
on.”

  “Something to fall back on? So what do you really want to do?” I asked her.

  She said, “I want to be a singer. I’d like to act too, if I had the chance.”

  Bingo! She could sing. I thought about Kiwana.

  “Have you ever thought about performing in musical plays?”

  “I have been in plays before, but not in musicals. I used to perform at the Freedom Theater in North Philly.”

  I smiled. “I used to go there.”

  “Oh my God! You performed there, too?!” She seemed really excited by that, as if we were connected in some way. I felt sorry to let her down.

  “No, I was just watching back then, but it did inspire me,” I told her.

  “You’re a writer too, right?” she asked me. I could see where she was going with that before she even started.

  “It’s very hard for writers to choose people to play different parts, even when we write things with certain people in mind,” I told her. I was assuming that she would ask me if I could get her a small part in a television series or something.

  “I meant poetry and books,” she corrected me.

  “Oh,that kind of writing.” She caught me off guard.

  She said, “I write poetry too, and my own songs. Do you mind if I say one of my poems to you right now? I mean, I know you’re busy and all, so if not, then I understand.”

  “Only if you tell me your name first,” I said with a grin.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. My name is Staci Madison. Staci with an i.”

  “That’s a good name,” I told her. “It sounds famous.”

  “Okay, here’s my poem.”

  She went ahead and did a performance poem right there in the middle of the mall about her “Dark Beauty.” I was impressed. Really!

  She finished it and said, “I never had a problem with being dark in my life.”

  “I wouldn’t either as pretty as you look.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Do guys have a problem with it?”

  “No.” She said that with confidence.

  I laughed out loud, imagining how many guys would fall for her.

  “But you know what I hate though?” she asked me.

  “What?”

  “When guys walk up to me and say, ‘Damn, you look good to be dark,’ as if that’s supposed to be a compliment. When they say that nonsense, they have no chance at all of getting with me.”

  “Do you have a boyfriend now?” I was slightly envious of her. I scared a lot of the guys that I met into acting like complete idiots.

  “I just broke up with him,” she answered. “He started hanging out with the wrong crowd and getting lazy, so I told him that it was time for me to go. And he cried like a big baby, talking about, ‘I thought we loved each other.’ But I don’t have time for anybody who doesn’t have a plan for their future.”

  I was liking this young sister more by the minute. She even reminded me of Kendra a little bit with her can-do spirit.

  I said, “Would you like to trade phone numbers? I don’t want to get you fired or anything.”

  “Oh, yeah,” she said excitedly. I planned to help her out in any way that I could.

  We traded phone numbers and I told the young sister that I would be in touch, and I meant it too. That’s the quality I liked about my Philadelphian roots the most. No matter how large we get, we’re always down with our people.

  “Hey, sis’, you passing out phone numbers like that? Can I get one?” this tall, lanky brother wearing FUBU gear asked me. He looked like a college basketball player, and Springfield Mall was Villanova territory.

  I asked, “Do I look like one of your groupies to you?”

  “No, you look like Tracy Ellison Grant, the big-time movie star.” He had sarcastic confidence written all over his face. I could tell that he was used to getting his way with women. If I had nothing better to do, I would string his ass along just to teach him a lesson.

  “I’ll give you my phone number when you earn your degree,” I shot at him.

  He said, “What are you trying to say?”

  “Do you play basketball?” I asked him.

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you passing?”

  “Yeah, I’m passing.”

  “I’m not talking about passing just enough to play, I’m talking about moving on toward a degree in something.”

  He hesitated too long with his answer. “Yeah.”

  “Sure you are,” I told him and headed on my merry way.

  There was no way for me to shop in peace that morning. It seemed that too many people recognized me. Since the mall was fairly empty, I guess that gave each person the idea that it was the perfect opportunity to hold my attention longer then they could have hoped for inside of a crowded mall. So I left earlier than I expected and went back home to take a nap and to write another poem, “Prisoners of Fame,” because that was what I felt like. No wonder so many celebrities had chosen to become reclusive.

  $ $ $

  When I arrived to pick up my cousin Vanessa (on time) from school, I must have stepped into thirty percent of the student population. They were waiting for me out in front of the school. Girls and boys, screaming at me:

  “Tracy Ellison Grant!”

  “HERE SHE IS, Y’ALL!”

  “HEY, TRACY!”

  “TRAAAY-SAAAY!”

  “Dag! Calm your behind down, boy! You all up in my ear!”

  “Can I have an autograph?!”

  “Can I have a date?!”

  “When is Flyy Girl the movie coming out!”

  “Can I play a part in the movie?”

  “Can you just sign my notebook right quick?!”

  “Excuse me, but I do believe that I was standing here first!”

  “Can we go half on a baby?!”

  “You got a little sister my age or something?!”

  “Older women and younger men are in now. Have you seen How Stella Got Her Groove Back?!”

  “Can you give me a hickey on my neck?!”

  “Shut your mouth, boy! God! Y’all are so embarrassing!”

  “Would you get off of my damn foot, please?! Stop being so pressed!”

  “Can I be ‘Carmen’ in your movie?!”

  “Yeah, ’cause you a hoe anyway!”

  “Who said that?! You’re the hoe!”

  “DON’T CROWD HER, Y’ALL! GIVE THE LADY SOME BREATHING ROOM!”

  “VANESSA’S YOUR COUSIN FOR REAL?! I THOUGHT SHE WAS LYING!”

  I thought that smart kids were supposed to be more reserved and have better manners. I guess I thought wrong. Those damn E&S kids were acting like lunatics out there! So when I got Vanessa in my father’s Buick I just stared at her.

  “YOU CAN’T AFFORD A BETTER CAR THAN THAT?!” another silly guy yelled at me as we drove off.

  Vanessa chuckled and said, “I did not do that. A lot of people saw you on the news this morning, and the rumor got around that you were gonna be up here today to pick me up after school. If you would have come late again, most of the people would have left, but you came right on time.”

  “Obviously so,” I told her. I still couldn’t believe all of the attention that they were showing me. “So, I guess that you’ll be a celebrity in school now,” I said.

  Vanessa sucked her teeth and responded, “Not really. A lot of people are hating me now, like I’m supposed to be friends with everybody. I wasn’t friends with everyone before. I just minded my own business, but now they act like I have a chip on my shoulder or something. And it’s not even like that.”

  I smiled at her, knowing exactly what it felt like. I put my hand on her shoulder as I drove and said, “Trust me, I know the feeling.”

  A Nursery Rhyme

  Hollywood, Hollywood,

  let me in!

  Not by the hair of my

  pink and white skin.

  Well, I’ll huff

  and I’ll puff

  and I’ll blow your house in!

 
Hollywood, Hollywood,

  let me in!

  Sorry black girl

  your résumé is too thin.

  Well, I’ll write

  and I’ll fight

  and I’ll blow your house in!

  Hollywood, Hollywood,

  let me in!

  “Was it you we told no

  or do you have a damn twin?”

  I don’t have a damn twin,

  but I’m at the door again,

  so I took a sledgehammer

  and I broke the bitch in!

  But then I got arrested,

  so I need a lawyer friend.

  Copyright © 1996 by Tracy Ellison

  November 1996

  When November rolled around, I finally received my share of the advanced payment for Flyy Girl, and I could breathe a little deeper, but I still didn’t plan on buying any furniture yet. I mailed out a few signed copies of my book to friends and family members, including Raheema, who was soon to be married before me. That smart-ass girl! I still couldn’t believe it! Her colors were white and gold, in all-African attire. I had to have my measurements done and send them to her for my dress to be made by a sister from Ghana, who lived close by to Raheema and her fiancé in New Jersey.

  Out in California, just like Kendra predicted, when the vote came up for the affirmative action bill, nonwhite Americans lost out big time! Latinos and Asians were included in the mix. However, I do not believe that Asians had as much of a problem with it as blacks and Latinos had, because Asians were kicking ass in the books like it was nobody’s business! Were we really inferior to them? Were we just lazy? Were we that undereducated? Or was it all of the above? Something was amiss, and Kendra was hurt to her heart over it.

  “You watch what happens over the next three years or so out here in California,” she warned me over the telephone. “See how many of us get turned away from higher education. This is a crime, and nobody seems to care.”

  “You care,” I told her.

  “Yeah, and like President George Bush used to say, ‘I’m just one lonely person out here.’”