by Ni-Ni Simone
“Seven, don’t go there. Don’t. You know we are not supposed to make fun of the afflicted. Johnny wouldn’t like that.”
Johnny? “Who is Johnny?”
“I meant Jesus. He wouldn’t like that. And everybody needs love. And who else is Courtney gon’ give it to? He’s so confused, he probably thinks he’s dating Janet Jackson.”
“Or Randy Jackson.”
“Exactly. And when Shae asked you to hang out with her and Country, why did you tell her you didn’t do Rick Ross or his country boys? That really hurt Shae’s feelings. And you were so wrong for that. You know and I know that Big Country doesn’t even compare to big daddy Rick. Rick is sexy, minus his double D’s. And he’s a thug. You’re the one dating the thug, Seven. That’s your man. How you gon’ put that on Country?”
I rolled my eyes. “Zaire is not a thug. And anyhoo, I just didn’t feel like being bothered.”
Khya twisted her lips. “It’s more to it and you know it—” Suddenly Khya paused and her eyes grew wider with every word she spoke. “Hold up. Hold up. Hold. Up. The other day at Skate Paradise did you drop down and getcha old-skool, old-boo groove on with Josiah?”
“I—”
“I knew it!” Khya squealed. “I knew it!” She pressed her hand against my forehead as if she were checking for a fever. “This is guilt. That’s why you’re acting crazy! Guilt. Girl, listen to me. Don’t even sweat that.” She flicked invisible dust from my right shoulder and then my left. “Let that go. Guilt only lasts about twenty-four to forty-eight hours, and then it’s over with. You can’t help it if your old boo is still in your presence, looking and smelling good, and smiling all sexy. You can’t help that. The gods of romance know that’s your weakness. They know that. Don’t let guilt getchu—”
“You. Have. Lost. It. I didn’t do anything with Josiah.”
“Then what is your problem?” Khya said as we reached the gymnasium and she held the door open for me. I walked in and she walked in behind me.
We stood next to the trophy case that covered an entire wall. I leaned against the edge of it and said, “If I tell you, you can’t tell a soul.”
“Who I’ma tell? Shae? Shae doesn’t count.”
“You can’t even tell Shae.”
“Whew, this must be bust-a-gut-have-mercy-tear-the-wall-down-good! Chile, scandalous! Are we gon’ have to run up on somebody? Did you catch Zaire with some hooker ho-down, who was toe down to the floor down? ’Cause you know I stay greased up and gris-gris ready.”
“Down, Queen Voodoo-Hood. Down. Relax. Nothing like that. The other night, when we all had it out—”
“You mean when you cussed us out.”
“Khya, you gon’ let me tell the story or you got it from here?”
“Get that ghetto outcha throat. That’s that Brick City coming through.”
“Khya—”
“I’m listening.” She ran her an index finger across her lips as if she were zipping it. “My mother always told me I talk too much sometimes. She be like, Khya, let people tell you. So I got you, Seven. I understand. Go on. Tell me.”
It took everything in me not to walk away. “Look, the other night when I showed up at Skate Paradise, it was because . . . because . . . Zaire fell asleep on me.”
Slowly a smile crept across Khya’s face and she slammed me a high five. “Straight freak! It was like that? You wore homeboy out! Told you, you had that bomb—”
“Khya! Boys and doing the nasty take up way too much of your time. He didn’t fall asleep on me like a we-tore-the-sheets-up reward. I was talking to him and he fell asleep. Like tired. And I left him asleep. On the couch. No good-bye. Nothing. I just left and met up with y’all at the rink.”
“And that’s why you’re mad?” Khya looked at me like I was crazy. “The man has to sleep. He works eight days a week. Three hundred and ninety-seven days of the year.”
Eight days? Three hundred and ninety-seven? “Whatever. I’m tired of him working all the time. And I’m tired of always being in his spot, like that’s just the move. All the time. I don’t want to do that anymore.”
“Then you need to tell him that. You can’t get hella mad at him because he’s just doing what y’all been doing, which is staying in the house.”
“We never stayed in the house this much. This is hella cray.”
“You were in his house all summer, Seven.”
“That was different. It was the summer and I wanted to be with him. We’d broken up for months and I wanted to make up for lost time. That’s the whole reason why I lied to my mother about the fake internship, so that I could get back down here and spend at least a month with him.”
“Too bad your scheme of the summer backfired.”
“Exactly.”
“But before it did, you know you were booed up in the house peacefully and now you’re back in school, seeing your old boo.”
“Josiah has nothing to do with this.”
“Okay, if you say so.”
“I say so. This is about me and Zaire. And him trippin’.”
“Then call him and tell him that.”
“I can’t. He won’t answer the phone.”
“Go to his house.”
“I’m not stalking him. I’m not doing that. I just wrote a blog that clearly said Ni-Ni Girlz don’t stalk.”
“Well, you need to change that blog, ’cause sometimes if you love and want a dude enough, a lil stalking goes a long way. My big ma used to always say, don’t make room for some hoochie to lay her heels next to your man’s sneakers. ’Cause then you gon’ have to put a gris on both of ’em. So to eliminate all of that, just talk to Zaire and tell him how you feel about the situation. Okay?”
I shrugged. “Okay. I guess you’re right.”
“Straight.” She smiled. “Now come on. We need to head into the locker room. Bling is waiting for us.”
“The locker room? And Bling? That sounds a lil nasty. Why are we going into the dirty and stank locker room behind Bling?”
A smile lit up Khya’s face. “Well, umm, remember the charity work I volunteered us to do?”
“Umm-hmm,” I said reluctantly.
“Well, what had happened was . . . ummm, I promised Bling that I would bring you to the locker room.”
“For what? What kind of charity work you trying to bust out?”
“Would you relax? It’s simple. You need to interview him for your blog.”
“What?”
“And part of your interview would be you mentioning how he does charity work at the Boys and Girls Club.”
Khya. Has. Lost. Her. Mind. “What? And why would I want to do that? You said charity!”
“This is charity. You’re doing it for free. And besides, Bling is new to the scene at Stiles University, so I figured you would want first dibs on interviewing him.”
“I don’t want to interview him.”
“And why not?”
“Because . . . he doesn’t know if he wants to be a basketball player or a rap star. He’s on the court one night and rapping at Dandridge Theater the next night. And then he missed practice the other night to be in a rap battle. Who does that? That’s like so . . . so . . . confusingly whack!”
“Would you lower your voice?” Khya said, tight-lipped, as she pointed to the closed double doors that led to the locker room.
“Would you stop volunteering me to do things?”
“Look, I need you to do this for me.”
“Why?”
“Because if you don’t, I’ma have to dump him.”
“What?”
“And I don’t want to dump him. He’s so cute. And so sweet. But I need his recognition to be kicked up a notch, ’cause he’s not as well-known as I need him to be. That lil rap-battle stunt he pulled was not a good look. Did you see how they dissed him in the school paper? I didn’t think I’d be able to get out of bed for days.”
“Khya—”
“Not that I’m a groupie or anything. And lov
e means more than fame. And, umm”—she snapped her fingers—“yeah, all of that. But if he doesn’t become more of a university name, like Josiah, and surpass that last dis, where they called him ‘the basketball rap star struggling to make a three pointer and spit a rhyme,’ me and Bling will officially be black history.”
“Khya—”
“So I need you to save my relationship.”
“Are you crazy?”
“Well . . . there was this one time that I thought I might’ve been a little tetched. It was after I caught Chakalacka and Jamil doing the bust-bust in the bathroom, in high school, and I concocted a spell to make ’em both disappear. And, umm, about a week later, my mama called a family meeting and said my granddaddy and his new bride had vanished into thin air. That was two years ago and nobody’s seen ’em since.”
Pause. What? And no, I’m not scared. I’m scurred. I gasped. “Did you take those people out?”
Khya looked at me completely puzzled. “Take ’em out where? I don’t do that. If you go out with me, either you’re treating or we’re going Dutch. So no, I didn’t take ’em anywhere. It was my big ma. She told my mama that she put her foot in that gris and that Paw-Paw and his twenty-three-year-old skeezer bride would be gone for a long time.”
“And what happened after that?”
“Nothing really. My mama started to cry and Grandmama told her to be quiet. That Paw-Paw wasn’t her real daddy anyway. It was his brother, Uncle John. So it wasn’t a big deal. Needless to say I found out I wasn’t crazy, but Big Ma on the other hand . . . let’s just say her middle name is Cray-Cray.”
No words . . .
Khya carried on. “Now come on, Seven. I need you to do this for me. I promised Bling. And he’s so sweet. And so cute. And I need you to hook this up for me. He had his uniform pressed for this. And he got a new grill.”
“Khya—”
“Seven, please,” she begged, and I wanted to choke her. The last thing I wanted to do was go into the locker room and interview an athlete. And not just any athlete, but a basketball player. Because I knew that Josiah would be somewhere around, watching me. And I’d had enough drama with him creeping up on me that I didn’t need to be entering his domain.
Yet here I was. Following my roomie and going along with her master plan to have a star athlete as her man. Ugh! Besties! “You owe me.”
“I got you, girl,” she squealed, hugging me. “I got you.”
13
It usually doesn’t rain . . .
Rihanna’s “Birthday Cake,” which I’d downloaded as Zaire’s special ringtone, blared from my phone, three times in a row, as I lay in bed and watched the phone ring. Go to voice mail. And ring all over again.
Don’t look now. Why? ’Cause I couldn’t stop cheesin’.
I knew he wouldn’t be able to hold out for much longer. Especially since it was now three days, two hours, and twenty-two seconds that I hadn’t spoken to him.
Now I’ll give him two days to hold out and not talk to me. But three? Please. He would die first.
It’s not even my birthday...
I snuggled deeper into my pillow, smiled, and closed my eyes.
“I tell you what!” Courtney stormed into my room and flicked the lights on. “If you don’t answer that freakin’ phone the next time it rings, I’ma two-snap and you won’t see another birthday!”
“What?” I couldn’t believe this. I sat up and I didn’t know what shocked me more: that he flung my door open—without knocking or me inviting him in—or that he was dressed in a furry pink robe and matching do-rag.
WTH!
His rant continued. “Look-a-here, I’m on Skype with Slowreeka, trying to get my romance on, and every time my lips make it an inch toward the screen and Slowreeka calls me go-daddy, your phone starts ringing and singing, ‘Cake,’ she starts looking for something to eat. Slowreeka can’t have too many distractions—she can only focus on one thing at a time! Now answer that freakin’ phone!”
This mofo had tripped and bumped his dang head! “You need to mind your business!” I said.
“This became my business the moment you interfered with me and my love life. And from the moment Khya walked in here and swore me to secrecy.”
“Secrecy?”
“Yes. Khya said you made her promise she wouldn’t tell Shae, but that my name never came up. So she told me how you rocked Zaire to sleep. And how you had a flower bomb in your panties. Straight killah!”
Oh. My. God! “Where is Khya?”
“With Bling, making diamonds. And Shae is with Country making sandwiches.”
My phone was ringing again.
“Now answer that phone because if you interrupt me and my cyber freak again, babeeeeee, you gon’ have a fruit-loopin’, mothersuckin’ situation on your hands!”
“Get. Out!”
He pointed from his eyes to mine, and back again. “Don’t try me.” He squinted and slammed my door as he walked out backward.
“Fool!”
I looked at my ringing cell phone.
This is ridiculous.
“Hello?”
Zaire took a deep breath and I could tell by the way he called my name, “Seven!” that he was pissed. “Yo, how long you gon’ play this game?”
I swear the only time I hated the word play was when it poured from Zaire’s lips. “Whatchu mean, play? I’m not playing! That’s your problem—you always think I have a game going on!”
“Because you do. And lower your voice.”
“You don’t tell me what to do! You’re not my father! You’re my boyfriend! And that is not a dual role and I’m tired of you acting like it is!”
“Boyfriend? Oh, really, I still hold that title? Word? So this is what girlfriends do? Roll out when you’re sleeping—”
“You’re always sleeping! You’re always tired. You’re always—”
“I work. I don’t have time to play!”
“If I’m playing anything it’s an old maid, effen with you! And I’m tired of that! Sick. Of. It! I don’t want to be in the house with you, all day. Every. Day. Like everything is cool. Like looking out the window and watching you parade around in a UPS uniform is the move. Like I’ve waited all my life to watch you fall asleep! For real, for real, that is so . . . so . . . played! UGH!”
“Oh, really? Me having a job is played? But I betchu when I was runnin’ the streets and sliding you money and buying you things, you were straight then, right? That wasn’t played. But now that I want to work and do things the right way, that’s a problem for you!”
“I never said that!”
“You didn’t have to say it!”
“Look—”
“No, you look and make this the last time I tell you this. I don’t know what you expect from me, but every day that I have to work, that’s what I’m gon’ do. Now you’re either riding with me or you’re staying on the curb with your whack friends. ’Cause I have to hustle and do me. I don’t have time to write blogs and tweet stars and ish. That ain’t for me. I don’t have a mother or a father that I can lie to and they still give me everything. My parents are lost at sea somedamnwhere!”
I felt like I’d just been sliced across the throat, which is exactly why I spat out all of this in practically one breath. “You can’t be serious, talking to me crazy? Oh word? Really? Let me slide this to you real quick. Don’t ever try and read me, ’cause going off on me will never be one of your options! And since you keep missing the point, let me help you. I don’t do smothering rides and I don’t do curbs. You were the one who used to sling, so the curb is for you and your whack crew. That’s yo spot. And another thing, ’cause it seems you forgot, when you were out in the street gettin’ your hustle on, you never told me that. And how did I find out? By me and one of my whack friends getting arrested with you, player. So stop trying to be Mr. Self-righteous. And maybe if you had a blog and tweeted some stars, you’d act like you were nineteen instead of ninety. And as far as lying to my mother to b
e with you, trust me, it was pointless, ’cause she still doesn’t like you!” I hesitated. That was something I never wanted to flat out admit to him. But I did. And then I went further. “Oh, and as far as your parents being lost at sea, my name isn’t Katrina, so you can’t rap that ish to me. What you can do is either join them or shut the eff up about it!”
Pause.
Silence.
Dead silence.
Everything I’d just said replayed in my head and caught me in the throat like an iron fist. “Baby, I didn’t . . .” I swallowed. God, why did I go that far? I knew I was going too far when I said it. “Zaire, I’m sorry.”
Silence.
“Zaire?”
“Yo, I’ma let you go.”
Let me go? “What does that mean? You gon’ hang up? Don’t. Look, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“It’s cool.” He paused.
“No, it’s not.”
“Maybe we should just . . . you know—”
I couldn’t let him finish that. “Zaire, listen to me. I know I shouldn’t have left you asleep the way I did the other night. I know that. But I’m just starting to feel closed in.”
“I get that, Seven. And I’m not trying to hold you back. So whatever you wanna do is cool. I love you, Seven. I do. And I don’t wanna lose you, but—”
“I don’t want to lose you either. I just want you to loosen up. A little.”
“I can’t promise you that, love. You’re not coming from where I’m coming from. I have to do what I have to do. And that’s going to school full-time and working full-time. Helping my grandmother out, and trying to take care of me is busting my azz. All I need you to do is hang in there with me. It won’t be like this always. I promise. But for right now, this is what I have to do. Because if I go back to slingin’ and hangin’ out in the streets, I’ma either go to prison or get killed. So I don’t have but one choice.”
“I don’t want you to do that.”
“So then whatchu want? Tell me. And if you want me to step off, I’ll do that. But I need you to say that to me straight up.”
I took a deep breath and did all I could to hold back the tears I felt sneaking into my eyes. This was crazy. Insane. I loved Zaire. And being with him was like heaven, but heaven felt like it had fallen from the sky.
