Dirty Jersey

by Phillip Thomas Duck

  “Take you to bed, bed, bed.”

  Pretty as can be. But she can’t hold a tune. A fact I won’t hold against her. She’s probably better than I’m giving her credit for. But then, I compare everyone’s singing to my sister’s, and Kenya can’t be touched in that department. As much as we butt heads, that I can’t take away from her.

  “Take you to bed…bed…bed,” Pretty Young Thang sings.

  Her audience, other than me, is the poor sales associate scheduled to work today. The sales associate is so pale I want to donate a couple pints of blood to her. Short black hair frames her face. Not sure who snipped her locks, but whoever it was, they were either blind or aspiring to be. Her hair is a zigzagging, uneven mess. Her fingernails are just as black as her hair. I think she’s going for the goth look. She missed. She says, “And you say it’s called ‘Take You to Bed’?”

  Pretty Young Thang says, “Don’t know what it’s called. I’m asking you. That’s how the chorus goes, though.”

  “Sing it again.”

  I want to say Please don’t. But I don’t. I just continue to stare at Pretty Young Thang.

  Pretty Young Thang sighs. Sings it again.

  “And who’s the artist?” asks the sales associate.

  Pretty Young Thang looks like she’s about to turn into a Southern preacher and lay hands on the sales associate.

  I clear my throat, move away from the bin of CDs I’ve been going through. Leave behind the MIMS CD I’ve been mulling over. In my mind MIMS is providing a sound track of courage for what I’m about to do. I keep telling myself This is why I’m hot.

  I move tentatively, stop next to Pretty Young Thang, say, “‘Bed.’ J. Holiday.”

  She turns, eyes me. The wrinkle girls always seem to get in their noses when I come around doesn’t appear. She says, “Excuse me? What?”

  My voice cracks as I say, “That song you were singing. I heard you. Sorry I eavesdropped. It’s called ‘Bed.’ The artist’s name is J. Holiday.”

  “Shut up.” She touches my arm. “Are you for real? You know it?” “Yep.”

  I try to stay calm. I can still feel the spot where she touched my arm. It scorched me. This girl is hotter than the sun.

  She smiles. “Fell in love with it the first time I heard it. Always seem to catch it on the radio at the end, never got the title or the artist.”

  The sales associate drifts away. Back to the bat cave, I suppose.

  I nod at Pretty Young Thang. “It’s a hot song. It’ll be rotational before you know it. Twenty or thirty times a day you’ll be hearing it on the radio.”

  Pretty Young Thang asks, “What stations you listen to?”

  “Hot 97. Power 105.1. But Hot 97 mostly.”

  She nods herself, smiles. Her smile is a sunrise, a sunset, any-and everything beautiful that God created. She says, “I love Hot 97. Angie Martinez is my girl.”

  I volley, “Don’t forget Funkmaster Flex.”

  “Mornings aren’t mornings without Miss Jones.”

  “DJ Envy…Envy.”

  “Ed Lover down the dial,” she says. Down the dial is Power 105.1.

  “DJ Clue.”

  I could go on naming radio personalities with her for the rest of my days.

  She pauses, says, “Endia Patton.”

  I frown. “Don’t know her. Is she on Hot or Power?”

  Pretty Young Thang laughs, flips her hair. “That’s me, silly. My name’s Endia.”

  “Oh.” I regroup. “Oh, okay.”

  Silence settles between us.

  She says, “And you are…?”

  “I am…” Drawing a complete and utter blank.

  She raises her eyebrows as if to say And?

  “Eric Posey,” I manage. I’ve only lived with the name for fifteen years; forgetting it is understandable. Right?

  She says, “I just realized something. EP. Our initials match, Eric. How cool is that?” She touches my arm again. I’m feeling light-headed. I need a dose of oxygen.

  I say, “Thought you said your name was India?”

  “It is. With an E, though. Don’t ask. My mother is a creative soul.”

  “I like that. Endia with an E.”

  She asks where I go to school. I ask the same of her. She asks what grade I’m in. I ask the same of her. Basically she is driving the conversation. I’m worse than our president. Bushwhacked by Endia’s beauty. Not one original thought do I have.

  Endia says, “So where do you be at, Eric?”

  “Where do I be at?”

  “Where do you hang out? What do you do?”

  I stop and think about Crash and all the other popular boys at school, how they’d answer. Come up with, “Blockbuster used to be my joint, but Moms shut that down, went and got Netflix.”

  Endia looks puzzled for a moment, but then a smile spreads across her gorgeous face. “You’re funny bad, Eric.”

  Funny.

  I was trying for suave.

  Missed that like the entire season of I Love New York.

  Endia says, “So I won’t see you anywhere unless I camp out by the post office?”

  “The post office?”

  She says, “When you mail back those Netflix videos.”

  “Oh.” I laugh. Regroup for the ninety-ninth time. Unlike Jay-Z, I’ve got ninety-nine problems. And a girl is one. I add, “I come through the mall a couple times a week.”

  Come through. I’ve heard Crash say that enough that I know I must get that in.

  Endia says, “Me, too. I’m either up in the food court at Chik-Fil-A, at Loews playing video games or seeing a movie, or over at the Verizon store fussing with them about some problem or other with my cell phone.” She takes out her cell phone. It’s an LG Chocolate. But pink.

  I say, “Nice phone.”

  She hands it to me, says, “It’s real sensitive. Go ahead and type in your number and see for yourself.”

  I take it, type in my number, then quickly slide it closed and hand it back to her. “You’re right. It is sensitive. But it’s a cool phone.”

  Endia looks at me again with that puzzled look.

  Then I see it.

  Her nose wrinkles.

  I’m like the opposite of a Botox injection.

  Instead of making wrinkles go away, I make them appear.

  Endia says, “It was nice meeting you, Eric. I’ve got to get going…Maybe I’ll see you around.”

  “I’ll look for you.”

  She frowns, nods, says, “Thanks again.”

  “For?”

  “‘Bed.’ J. Holiday. I’ve been going crazy trying to figure out who sings that.”

  “You would have found out eventually, Endia. It’s gonna get a lot of burn on the radio.”

  Burn. Something else I’ve heard from Crash.

  Endia says, “Yeah. That’s what’s up.”

  “Yep. So I wasn’t that big of a help.”

  She cocks her head to the side, studies me briefly, then says, “Guess you weren’t, then, Eric.”

  She moves away without another word. I watch her go. Her walk is like that Tony Yayo song: so seductive. There was so much I wanted to ask her, but didn’t. It all comes to me now. There were traces of something exotic in her look, something more than black, and I wanted to ask her about it. She smelled like heaven. I wanted to ask her what perfume she was wearing, too. What type of music did she like? Just R & B? Was she into rap? Who were her favorite artists?

  A full minute after she’s gone I’m standing in the same place, looking in the same direction. The direction she disappeared into.

  A hand touches my shoulder, interrupts my reverie, a baritone voice says, “That was painful to watch, son.”

  It isn’t my father.

  So son must be cool-speak.

  I say, “How you figure, son?”

  “You gotta ask?”

  I turn to place a face with the voice.

  Black guy. Late twenties, I’d guess, maybe younger. His lopsided beard p
robably makes him look older than he actually is. He dresses like the dudes in my school. Baggy gray jeans, Timbs, a Howard U sweatshirt, real Louis Vuitton sunglasses, fitted baseball cap he’s got on in the fashion of T.I., Jay-Z and all the other rappers who sport baseball caps in their videos. You know, cocked at a severe angle on their head.

  I say, “I gotta ask.”

  He shakes his head. “Shorty was practically throwin’ you the panties. And you fumbled. Fumbled bad. You was like Tiki Barber them first coupla years.”

  He has a rich baritone, a familiar voice that sets me at ease like chicken soup. I want to talk to him even though Mama burned it into my brain to never ever talk to strangers.

  I ask, “How I fumble?”

  “How you didn’t?”

  “School me.” Maybe he can impart something to me that Lark couldn’t.

  He laughs. “See, that right there. You didn’t say nothin’ even close to that cool the whole time shorty was over here.” He shakes his head in disappointment.

  I repeat, “School me.”

  He says, “Swagger, son.”

  “What about it?”

  “You gots to get you some.”

  “How?”

  “Wish I could direct you to eBay or Amazon.com. But alas…” And he laughs at his choice of words, a phrase I want to tell him isn’t cool enough for someone with his obvious swagger. “But seriously. I feel you, though, son. I was somewhat lacking at your age, too. Can it be that it was oh so simple then?”

  I say, “Wu-Tang.”

  “What?”

  “‘Can it be that it was oh so simple then?’ Reminds me of Wu-Tang.”

  He says, “You’re young. You remember the Wu?”

  I nod. “Are you kidding me? I loved those cats. Meth. Ghostface. Raekwon. Masta Killa. U-God. Inspectah Deck. RZA. Ol’ Dirty, RIP.”

  “So you a hip-hop head?”

  “Yep. I consider rappers to be our modern-day poets.”

  He nods, says, “Twentieth-century Paul Laurence Dunbars.”

  That stuns me into silence for a moment.

  After a moment I say, “You know Paul Laurence Dunbar?”

  “I do.” He says that matter-of-factly. As if everyone should know him. And everyone should, I agree, but few do.

  “I’ve never met anyone who did.”

  “You haven’t gotten around much.”

  “I guess.”

  “You remember Arsenio Hall?”

  “Who?”

  He smiles. “Dating myself. Anyway, Arsenio had the hottest show on late-night television. Maya Angelou was on once. She recited a Paul Laurence Dunbar poem. Performed it like a rap. She was great. Coolest older woman you ever saw. She had Arsenio’s young audience eating out of the palm of her hand.”

  “Wow!”

  “But enough of that. We need to talk about that shorty.”

  “So what I do wrong with Endia? Tell me exactly.”

  He starts ticking off offenses with his fingers. Runs out of fingers and starts again at finger one. “Your first opportunity to impress was when she asked your name. It took you a minute to even remember it. Not good. And, son, you need to have a nickname or something to liven that up, too. My name’s Eric, but everyone calls me E-double. You got it?”

  I nod.

  He goes on. “She thought the fact your initials matched hers was the new Apple iPhone, son. You should have played that up. The moon, sun and stars are aligned with us, ma. You got it?”

  Another nod from me.

  “She gave you her phone to save your number in. You didn’t. You typed it in and then just shut her phone without saving the number. I almost shitted my pants on that one, son. I kid you not.”

  I say, “That’s why she gave me that funny look?”

  “Yeah, son.”

  “Dang.”

  “And,” he continues, “she acted like you threw down your coat over a puddle because you knew the name of that song. Then you played yourself by acting like it was no big deal. Humble is good, son, but I would have played that to my favor. For real. Acted like I came up with a plan for us to pull out of Iraq or somethin’. Said something like, You know I got you, ma.”

  I roll that off my tongue. “You know I got you, ma.”

  “That’s it.”

  “Okay. I think I understand.”

  He says, “So you like hip-hop?” The redirection in the conversation is abrupt, but I move right along with him.

  “Definitely,” I acknowledge.

  He asks, “Who you feelin’?”

  I say, “Eclectic taste.”

  “School me,” he says, smiling.

  “Nas. Common. When I want to be fed.”

  He nods. “That’s what’s up.”

  “LL manages to stay relevant. My mother was rocking him back in the day and he’s still at it.”

  “Word. Word. LL means Living Legend, you ask me. I feel that.”

  I say, “Fifty gets a lot of criticism, but I think a lot of what he does is entertaining. And I admire his hustle.”

  “Okay.”

  “Lil’ Wayne is ridiculous right now. He said it best himself. ‘I am a beast.’”

  “He’s on his grind. I ain’t mad at him.”

  I say, “T.I. Young Jeezy. Young Dro. Young whoever. The South is blazing.”

  He nods. “You couldn’t hold ’em down with a Master Lock and chains.”

  I’ve heard that before. I flip through my mental Rolodex. Then recollection takes shape. Heard that line in a rhyme. “My style is long-range. You couldn’t hold it down with a Master Lock and chains.”

  I say, “Fiasco. He’s got a line like that in one of his songs.”

  He smiles deeper than ever. “You like that cat?”

  “Fiasco’s underrated. I heard a leak of this new song he has coming out on the Internet. Can’t tell you how many people have it on their MySpace pages. It’s a hit, for sure. He’s going to be so large when it hits radio. One of the best lyricists in the game. He sounds so comfortable on his records, like he’s at peace with the beats.”

  He says, “Swagger, son. Swagger.”

  I’m about to agree when I realize something. The baritone. The familiarity of his voice. I say, “Could you remove your shades for a moment? I want to see your eyes. This is so impersonal.”

  “What?” he says through a deep frown. That lopsided beard becomes even more lopsided when he frowns.

  I repeat a Dipset line to set him at ease. “No homo.”

  He pauses, removes the shades quickly and puts them back on just as quickly.

  I’m stunned.

  So much I missed in this encounter.

  Most notably the tattoo inked on his neck. You can see the edges of it over the collar of his shirt. It’s in the shape of the state of New Jersey, with a microphone cord wrapped around it like a snake. The Dirty Jersey clique’s official tattoo. That clique is rapper Fiasco’s famous entourage.

  I’m so stunned I can’t move, speak or get my thoughts together.

  I’m standing next to Fiasco.

  He sees the realization set in my eyes.

  Nods.

  Holds out his hand.

  I grip it weakly.

  He grabs mine tighter, pulls me into a ghetto shoulder hug.

  I come out of the hug with something in my hand.

  A small square of paper.

  I look at it, befuddled.

  He says, “My business card. That number is my own private and personal line. You can get me at any time with that number. Just don’t abuse it. And it’s for your eyes only. I don’t need a bunch of little 106 and Park–watching young heads blowing me up.”

  I look him in the eyes. “Why?”

  He pats my shoulder. “You aiight, Eric. And I like to keep up with what’s happening with the young heads. Young heads drive hip-hop.” He pauses, looks at me. “If you’ve got your finger on the pulse, Eric, you can help me.”

  “How?”

  “Keep me
relevant…like you said about LL. Let me know what’s popping off with the young heads. What clothes is the shit. What songs they feeling. The newest slang. Et cetera, et cetera. You can do that? You got your finger on the pulse?”

  I couldn’t feel the pulse if it were beating with the arrhythmia of a heart attack.

  But I know Crash and others who do. So I say, “I got you, Fiasco.”

  “Cool. That’s what’s up.”

  He turns to leave. I call after him. He turns back.

  He says, “Yo?”

  “One bit of advice from me.”

  “Shoot.”

  I point to his chin. “You need a better disguise. That beard is terrible.”

  He smiles, and then laughs. The beard dances as he laughs. “Good looking. Hit me up,” he says, and then he’s gone.

  Kenya

  I’d tried Monique’s number several times. All it did was ring endlessly. It didn’t even cycle over to voice mail. I was beyond frustrated. The universe didn’t want me to find answers, I guessed. I was left with nothing but questions. And only one person I knew of who truly had the answers to those questions: Ricky. And he wasn’t about to help me out.

  What next?

  I hadn’t spoken more than a few strained words to Ricky in a couple days. He was being as difficult as a so-called boyfriend could be. I was wounded by his disses. I didn’t want to be, but I was. And something had to give. I had to find out some truths and then take it from there. Maybe my suspicions about Ricky and Monique were wrong. If that was the case, then I’d apologize to Ricky until I turned blue in the face, and yes, I’d gladly give him the goodies.

  But there I was, stuck.

  And then I remembered, stupid me, that I had a second number attached to Monique.

  I searched my phone contacts and found it. MoniquesCuz.

  I dialed.

  It rang.

  I crossed my fingers.

  And on the fourth ring I heard, “Who dis?”

  I cleared my throat. “Yo. Where Monique at?”

  “Who dis?” again.

  “This Kenya. Where Monique?”

  “Y’all need to stop blowing up my phone trying to get at my cousin. I ain’t even talked to her my own self. Not since all the drama went down.”