Tyrell

by Coe Booth

  Wayne come over to the table. “You need anything, man?”

  “Yeah, another beer,” I tell him. That’s what I like to see. A dude that’s working hard for his money.

  Then, after I get my beer, I look over to see if Leon is still there, and he is. He still with his back against the wall. And right then, one of the freaky girls come off the bus with some guy, and I see her hand Leon some money. The girl turn ‘round and now I know where I seen her before. She the girl from McDonald’s. The one that was serving Leon. The one he said looked too good to be working there. And I musta been the stupidest brotha on the planet, ‘cause all this time I ain’t know what Leon was up to. But now I finally get it. Leon a pimp. Straight up.

  That’s why he wanted me to have the party here. He was eyeing them buses and knew he was gonna use them to make some money. It’s so fucking obvious now. He wasn’t helping me for no $350. He was helping me so he could really get paid.

  I’m just ‘bout to go up to him and throw his ass out, but I see Novisha friends on the dance floor surround her, and they screaming at some guy, trying to get him away from her. And I can tell by how mad her friends look and how scared she look, that the guy they yelling at is Jamal. The stalker.

  THIRTY-NINE

  It don’t take me a second to run up on that nigga. He ain’t even looking my way when I bum-rush him and knock him down on the floor. Then, before he even know what hit him I’m on top of him punching him over and over in his face. Blood shoot out his nose, and my fists is covered in it, but that don’t stop me none. I ain’t thinking ‘bout nothing ‘cept killing that dude.

  And I am yelling at him too. “You put your fuckin’ hands on my girl? And now you following her?”

  Jamal ain’t get one punch off me. He looking up at me in shock. “Who the fuck is you?” he ask me.

  “Her man, what you think?”

  He turn his head to block my next punch, so my fist connect with his ear. But that don’t stop me. It’s like I ain’t even there no more, like I’m somebody else. Or a animal protecting what’s his.

  And just like my last fight, Wayne is there trying to get me to stop. “Ty, you gonna kill him, yo.” I feel Wayne grabbing me from behind, trying to lift me up off the dude. But he can’t move me. “C’mon, man.”

  “Fuck you,” I tell Wayne.

  It take Regg to get me off Jamal. By then, all the boys is ‘round me, Wayne, Rafael, and even Patrick. The music been stopped, and everybody at the party is watching us fight, cheering us on.

  Jamal get up and wipe the blood from his nose. Shit is thick and nasty. He take that same bloody hand and point to Novisha who crying while all her friends is hugging her. “That bitch is your girl?” he ask me.

  I try to get away from Regg, but he holding me back with one hand on my arm. No matter what I do, ain’t no way I’ma get outta his grip. “You calling my girl a bitch?” I yell.

  He laugh at me. “Nigga, she got you believing all that virgin bullshit, man? ‘Cause I hit that so many times. Busted her out.”

  That’s it. I get away from Regg and I’m back on Jamal, punching him dead in the eye. I feel the pain in my own hand, the punch is so hard. But Regg is back, dragging me away, and Wayne and Rafael is pushing Jamal over to the door. Throwing him outta there.

  Everybody eyes is on me, and my heart is pumping. I’m outta my mind. I break through Novisha little circle of friends, grab her wrist and pull her outta the room, down the hall to one of them empty offices. She crying the whole time, saying, “You’re hurting me, Tyrell. Ow, you’re hurting me.” But I don’t give a fuck.

  I turn the lights on and kick the door closed. Then I take Novisha and slam her up against the wall. Hard. For a second she don’t say nothing, and I know I probably knocked the wind outta her. I get up in her face. “Is it true?”

  She cover her face with her hands and cry.

  “Is it true?” I ask again.

  This time, she nod. “Yes.”

  And man, it’s like the wind is knocked outta me now. That pain hit my stomach like a fist. It take me a couple seconds to catch my breath, and when it come back, I’m breathing hard.

  When I look at Novisha, she still up against the wall with tears rolling down her face. I grab both her shoulders and hold her there in place. “I can’t believe you played me like this,” I say, pressing her against the wall real hard. “I can’t believe this.”

  And I know I could hurt her. I could beat the shit outta her right here. And I’m so fucking pissed at her right now, it’s like my body is revving me up to do something to her. Make her feel some pain. The only thing that stop me is the look on her face. She scared. Scared of me. She look the way my moms did right before my pops beat her. Like she waiting for what she know gonna happen.

  Damn.

  “I didn’t play you,” Novisha say. She look me in the eyes for a second, then down at the floor.

  “You let that guy—” I can’t even say them words. But in my mind, I see the whole thing, him on top of my girl, and that thought hurt. It kill me.

  I take my hands off of her, and she move away from me fast. Then she start rubbing her shoulders like she in pain. And I just look at her standing there crying, but I don’t even know what to think or feel.

  From the other room I hear the music start up again. Patrick even on the mic saying something, probably trying to get the party going again. He picking up my slack.

  “Let me explain it to you, Ty,” Novisha say after a while. She crying like a child now. “It happened before you and I started going out. At that stupid Bible camp my mother made me go to.” She stop talking so she can cry some more.

  Meanwhile, I’m just watching her, waiting to hear the rest of the bullshit. Bible camp was a year and a half ago. She was only thirteen years old. She really expect me to believe all this went on back then, and it ain’t happened again?

  “You remember how I was back then, after my father left? I didn’t even wanna go to that camp. Six weeks away from home. Jamal was there. He was a little bit older than me, and he acted like he understood me and cared about me.” She look up at me. “I’m sorry, Ty. I made a mistake.”

  “Just one mistake?”

  She shake her head.

  Damn.

  “I didn’t think I would ever see that jerk again,” she say. “Then he transferred to my school after Christmas break.”

  “Then why you ain’t tell me ‘bout it? You coulda told me what happened. I’m s’posed to be your man.”

  “You are my man.”

  “Fuck you,” I tell her. It’s probably the first time she ever heard me curse, but I don’t give a shit. “I mean, I’m here thinking you waiting for the right guy, and when me and you get married, I’ma be the only guy you was ever with, but now, come to find out you was lying from day one. So what I’m s’posed to think? That you can give it up to some asshole like that in a couple weeks at camp, but me, the guy you say you love and all that, you put on hold for a fuckin’ year and a half? What up with that?”

  “I changed after camp, Ty. I wanted to forget all about what happened. And I didn’t wanna make the same mistake with you. So what I did was recommit myself to God and reclaim my virginity.”

  The shit coming out her mouth is so stupid, all I can do is look at her and shake my head. “It don’t work that way,” I tell her. “You only get to lose it one time, baby. You lying to me and yourself if you think you could keep on being a virgin over and over.”

  Novisha sit down on a metal folding chair and for a long time she just cry and tell me that she sorry, she sorry.

  But sorry ain’t cutting it this time. ‘Cause, the truth is, I don’t even know who she is no more, this fucked up girl crying like she got no sense. This ain’t the same person I thought I was going out with. She fake.

  Someone knock on the door. “Yo, Ty, we need you, man.” It’s Wayne. He open the door a crack and stick his head in. “Something about to jump off out there.”

 
; What the fuck else could happen tonight? “A’ight. I’ma be there in a second.”

  I turn back to Novisha. “Stay here.” That’s all I tell her. Then I just leave her there.

  Novisha friends is in the hallway looking all worried and shit. I tell them to get in the office and don’t leave ‘til I tell them it’s safe. Then I go over to the door where Regg is at ‘cause I see something going on over there.

  Regg is standing there blocking four thugs from coming in. And the way they looking at him, I can tell they musta got into something with Regg before I got there. Them four dudes is trying to look hardcore too, but Regg ain’t blinking. If they think Regg is gonna back down and let them in, they out they mind.

  I come up behind Regg. When the dude standing in the front see me, he say, “We lookin’ for Cal. Where he at?” Nigga got a gold tooth right in the front.

  “I don’t know no Cal,” I tell him.

  “You gonna be like that?” he ask me. “We know Cal here. We was just over at his building and seen his brother out there. And everybody know if he ain’t there, he here.”

  “So what y’all want then?”

  “We just wanna give Cal a message. Tell him and his brothers to keep they business in Bronxwood. That’s all.”

  “Then why you ain’t tell that to Greg if you seen him out there? Why you only wanna see Cal? ‘Cause he the youngest and your pussy-ass is scared of Andre and Greg?”

  The guys behind him start saying shit like “He ain’t scared of nobody.” Assholes.

  “Okay,” Regg say. “Y’all little niggas through. Get up outta here now.”

  Right before they turn ‘round to leave, the guy with the gold tooth open his jacket a little so we could see that he packin’. Like he the man or something.

  After they gone, I know if Cal was here, that shit woulda got outta control ‘cause them guys was looking to hurt him. I go down the hall, back to the office where Novisha and her friends is at. All of them is still surrounding her and taking care of her like she the victim or something. Like she ain’t do nothing wrong.

  I take out my cell phone and call Cal, but it go straight to voicemail. “Cal, watch your back, man. Some dudes with guns and shit was looking for you, and—” I’m just ‘bout to give him the message they left for him and his brothers when my fuckin’ cell die on me. I’m outta minutes.

  I leave the office and I’m ‘bout to go back over to where Patrick is DJing, but I see Leon still standing there and figure I might as well throw his ass out first.

  I get close to him and say, “Get your two hundred dollars from Regg and get the fuck outta here.”

  Leon fold his arms in front of him. “What your problem, Little Tyrone?”

  “I ain’t Tyrone. I’m Tyrell. And I know what you doing, and I don’t want that at my party.”

  “Shit. I’m just doing what your pops used to do. How you think he made so much money at his parties?”

  “He wasn’t no pimp,” I say.

  “That what he tell you?”

  “Get your money and get out.”

  “I ain’t going nowhere,” he say. “You think I set this whole thing up for you? I’m a businessman, Tyrell. I ain’t leaving ‘til I make my money. You understand that, right? You look like a smart boy.”

  I stare at him for a while, but I know he ain’t gonna leave. And Regg ain’t gonna make him neither. Regg knew what Leon was up to. That’s why he told me to call him. I was the only one in the fuckin’ dark.

  So, alright, I ain’t gonna sweat it. I leave Leon standing there and walk ‘cross the dance floor. Patrick doing a okay job at the DJ table. The music sound good, and a lot of kids is dancing. But he doing my job.

  So I do what I gotta do. I put everything that just happened out my mind. ‘Cause thinking ‘bout Novisha and Leon and them drug dealers ain’t gonna help me make this party off the hook. And yeah, people is dancing and everything now, but the music me and Patrick been playing ain’t me. And ain’t this s’posed to be my party?

  FORTY

  I get back to the table, lean over, and ask Patrick if he can drive Novisha and her friends over to Shanice house. He don’t ask no questions. He just grab his jacket and he gone just like that. Man, me and Patrick wasn’t never real friends before, but he my boy now.

  I flip through my pops vinyl records and find the one I want. Then I put the headphones back on, lower the music volume, and get on the mic. “A’ight. A’ight. I’m back, and I ain’t got a scratch on me.” Everybody cheer when I say that. Ain’t nothing like kicking a nigga ass to get people to like you. “Now I’ma hafta change shit up on y’all. ‘Cause, me, I’m kinda old skool, ya know what I mean? So, I’ma turn this shit out now and make this a real DJ Ty party. Y’all ready?”

  People start clapping a little, like they kinda into it, but ain’t so sure yet. So it’s gonna be up to me to school them, make them understand this music. I fade out the rap song that’s playing, and bring up the volume on “The Message.”

  The music fill the room and some of the kids keep dancing like ain’t nothing changed, but some of them is looking ‘round like, what the fuck is this? But ‘bout a minute into the song, more people start dancing and kinda getting into it. And even the ones that ain’t dancing is listening and moving to the beat. Man, ain’t no way you could listen to this song and not see where the man coming from. Them lyrics is deep.

  Don’t push me ’cause I’m close to the edge,

  I’m trying not to lose my head.

  It’s like a jungle sometimes,

  It makes me wonder how I keep from going under.

  And the way Melly Mel say them words, man, you know he feeling them. He talking ‘bout life on the streets and how you don’t hardly get to have no kinda childhood when you grow up in the hood. The song is mad real.

  From there I start playing all kinds of old-skool rap. Whodini, Sugarhill Gang, Run-D.M.C., 2 Live Crew, Public Enemy. I mean, how somebody not gonna feel a song as raw as “Rebel Without a Pause”?

  Meanwhile I’m working both turntables, pulling my own records, and trying to put them back in the order my pops had them in. ‘Cause if something outta place, he gonna know it. The thing is, though, no matter how cool Patrick CD deck is, man, it ain’t nothing like my pops 1200s. Them turntables is smooth, and it’s nice moving them records back and forth with my hand, trying to find the right beat before I let them play. You ask me, scratching with vinyl is the only way to do it.

  Another good thing is, after the first couple songs, the dance floor is packed. Only the people screwing on the buses ain’t dancing. I mean, yeah, I know it could just be that these kids paid they money and they looking to have fun no matter what I play, but it do look like they into the music.

  Jasmine out there too. She still dancing with her friends, both guys and girls. She smiling a little more now, but I can tell she ain’t all that into it. It’s like she forcing herself to have a good time tonight.

  Patrick come back and give me a nod, like everything okay. Novisha and them is safe. Right away he start helping me out with the records ‘til we working together like we been doing this forever. We having fun too. It’s like we both high or something even though I only had two beers. That’s how good I feel.

  The party go on and on, and I’m playing every song I like from the seventies, eighties, and the early nineties, everything from Afrika Bambaattaa to Curtis Blow to Notorious B.I.G. And more people is still coming in too. It’s like 1:30 in the morning and folks is now getting here. This girl come up to the table while I’m playing Digital Underground. She lean over to me so I can hear her.

  “You play private parties?” she ask.

  “Yeah.”

  “Good, because in March I’m gonna have a big sweet-sixteen birthday party at a community center in Mount Vernon. You think you gonna be available?”

  “You got the date? ‘Cause March is tight.” Yeah, I’m frontin’ like I be playing parties all the time, but sometimes a brotha gott
a play the game.

  She tell me the date and, course, I tell her I’m free that night. I get some paper from Patrick and she give me her name and phone number, and I give her mines.

  “And you can play some of this old stuff if you want,” she say, folding up the paper. “Because my parents and their friends are gonna be there too, and they gonna love what you playing!”

  When she leave, Patrick like, “You going legit on me?”

  “You like playing at bus depots?” I ask him. “I mean, yeah, we pro’ly the first people that ever had a party in a place like this, but ain’t nothing wrong with a community center party, you know, with people parents and aunts and grandmothers and shit. I mean, every now and then.”

  Patrick reach in his pocket and throw his lighter at me, and it hit me in the chest. “Shut the fuck up.”

  I laugh and put my headphones back on. I mix into “Wild, Wild West” by Kool Moe Dee real smooth. Then I look out and see Jasmine dancing with some guy, but she ain’t even looking at him or nothing. She just going through the motions. So when that song end, I get on the mic and tell everybody I’ma slow things down a little bit. I put on “Fire and Desire” by Rick James and Teena Marie and take off my headphones. Then I go out on the floor and just take Jasmine away from the dude she dancing with.

  Man, slow dancing with Jasmine feel good, but I ain’t danced like this with nobody besides Novisha in a while. We got our arms wrapped ‘round each other real tight, and we into the music.

  You turned on my fire

  And you burn me up within your flame

  Fire and desire

  And we’re both to blame, both to blame

  The weird thing is that, yeah, I’m feeling bad ‘bout what happened with Novisha and how ain’t no way we can be together no more the way we was. Still, I’m feeling mad comfortable with Jasmine.

  “You okay?” I whisper in her ear.

  She shake her head. “Not really. You?”