Dorinda Gets a Groove

by Deborah Gregory

  But I can tell that Galleria is angling for some info about our situation. And just like I thought would happen, Galleria asks Tiffany how she found out she was adopted!

  “I found the key to my parents’ safe-deposit box!” Tiffany squeals with delight. “It took me two Saturday afternoons.”

  “You work fast, girlina,” Galleria squeals back. “I’ll make sure to keep you away from the jewel vault when I get one!”

  I should have known those two would hit it off. Tiffany tells Bubbles every last detail, and Galleria just pries it out of her, like clues to an unsolved mystery.

  “Dorinda, you know I’ve been hearing melodies all day to that song I wrote about you—’Do’ Re Mi on the Q.T.”’

  Why would Galleria bring that song up now? That’s the one she wrote when she found out Tiffany was my sister. See, at first, I didn’t tell my crew about Tiffany coming to find me. But when she showed up at the Apollo Theatre with her parents, to watch us compete in the Battle of the Divettes, I was busted—cold!

  Afterward, Galleria wrote a song about it, because she said I’m the most secretive person she’s ever met. Now she wants to sing the song in front of Tiffany! Where’s the Sandman from the Apollo when you need him to drag her away, huh?

  “Tiffany, why don’t we all sing the song together?” Galleria says, popping a track into the cassette.

  “This is a master jammy whammy,” Galleria explains. “See, Ms. Dorothea gets these phat club tapes made by some deejay, and we use them for rehearsing and performing.”

  “I know what this song is!” Tiffany says, excited. “It’s from Mariah Carey’s Rainbow album.”

  “Yeah, you’re right,” Aqua says, then looks at Tiffany. “Dorinda said you’ve got a real nice keyboard. How’d you learn to play?”

  “I taught myself,” Tiffany says proudly.

  “You didn’t know how to play the piano or anything?” Aqua asks, impressed. The twins go to LaGuardia Performing Arts High School, and even though they don’t play any instruments, there are a lot of music majors in the mix at their school.

  “No,” Tiffany says proudly. “I didn’t.”

  “Well, we’ve gotta come over sometime, and see your magic keyboard!” Angle jokes.

  Tiffany takes her seriously, and says, “When do you wanna come?”

  “Girlinas, we have to get back to the beat,” Galleria cuts in. We all go stand next to Chanel, so she doesn’t have to move her chair, and get ready to harmonize. This is what I love most about being in a singing group—just riffing together in rehearsal. When you’re onstage, it’s a lot more scary.

  “Okay, let’s sing the part, right after the lead, in C minor, and the chorus in B flat.”

  “Okay!” Tiffany says excitedly.

  Galleria hands us each a copy of the song, then starts the intro. Chanel joins in, and then we’re all supposed to sing the rest of the lead together:

  “This is Galleria

  and this is Chanel

  coming to you live

  From Cheetah Girls Central.

  Where we process data that matters

  And even mad chatter

  But today we’re here to tell you

  About our friend, Do’ Re Mi

  (That’s Miss Dorinda to you)

  Kats and Kittys, the drama

  Has gotten so radikkio

  Just when we thought we knew our crew

  Bam! The scandal was told!”

  Finally, Galleria makes the motion for us to stop singing.

  I know exactly why, too. Tiffany sings like a daffy dolphin—you know, Flipper, under water! Galleria looks at her and says, “Tiffany, sing the lead by yourself.”

  Tiffany gets all shy, and says, “I don’t want to.”

  “Come on, Tiffany, we’re just flowing!” Galleria says, prodding her along.

  “Okay,” Tiffany finally agrees, then giggles some more. “’But today we’re here to tell you/About our friend, Do’ Re Mi/That’s Miss Dorinda to you!”’ Tiffany sings, but then stops.

  I take back what I said earlier—Tiffany sings worse than Flipper.

  “Tiffany—you’re um, gonna need a lot of vocal training to be able to sing with us,” Galleria says slowly.

  All of a sudden, I feel protective toward Tiffany. Please don’t let Galleria go off on my sister!

  “Um, yeah, I know,” Tiffany says, smiling in that innocent way that she does. “But maybe I could play the keyboard in the group?”

  Tiffany just won’t quit.

  “Tiffany, the Cheetah Girls are all singers,” Galleria says. “I mean, Chanel, Dorinda, and I don’t sing as well as Aqua and Angle do, but we’ve still had a lot of training.” I can’t believe how nice she’s being to Tiffany! “I mean, we could play the keyboard together sometimes, for fun and stuff. That would be cool, right?” Galleria looks around at all of us for approval.

  “Yeah, maybe that would help our rehearsals and stuff,” I say, sticking up for Tiffany.

  “Yeah,” Chanel pipes up. “I wanna learn it, too!”

  “But I wanna be in the Cheetah Girls,” Tiffany says, pouting.

  “Well, let’s just wait and see,” Galleria says finally.

  Tiffany beams, like she’s accepting an award or something. Then she lets out that hyena snarkle that makes everybody giggle, and we goof around for a while before Mrs. Simmons comes inside the studio and tells us it’s time to go home.

  We all burst into another round of giggles before we wiggle our separate ways home. Thank God for my crew—and Tiffany, too. I can’t believe they found such a dope way out of this sticky situation! Letting Tiffany hang and play keyboard with us at rehearsals without letting her be in the group is a stroke of genius!

  Chapter

  9

  I sneak into my apartment like a mouse on the nibble tip, because it’s really late, and I don’t want to wake my foster mother or my brothers and sisters, who are usually snoozing by this time. Mr. Bosco has probably already left. He usually stops by the Lenox Café before he heads up to the Bronx to his job and begins his graveyard shift at the stroke of midnight.

  My heart starts pounding when I open the door—and see Mrs. Bosco and most of my foster brothers and sisters, all sitting in the living room! They’re obviously waiting for me—everybody except for Arba, who is probably sleeping.

  “What are y’all doing up?” I ask, trying to act supa cool, even though my voice is squeaking even more than the front door.

  Something must be wrong. I look over at Gaye, to see if I can peep this situation, but she is sitting quietly on the couch next to Mrs. Bosco, sucking her thumb. Maybe they found Gaye’s mother, and she’s gonna be leaving us pretty soon or something.

  Twinkie runs over to me and gives me a supa-dupa hug. “We’re gonna see the Butterfly lady tomorrow!” she squeals.

  “Really?” I say, humoring Twinkie. Next she’ll be telling me that Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz called and invited us to a picnic over the rainbow, you know what I’m saying?

  “We’re all going to see her!” Twinkie adds adamantly.

  “Now, Rita, why you telling Dorinda that?” Mrs. Bosco says. Then she stops abruptly, because she’s gonna break into one of her coughing spells. Her bronchitis is acting up again, now that it’s getting cold outside. “I told you, we’re gonna let Dorinda de—”

  Finally, a cough catches up with Mrs. Bosco and she starts hacking. Then she tries to finish her sentence before it subsides—”decide how we gonna split up the t-t-t-t-ickets.”

  Did I hear her right?

  Mrs. Bosco reaches over to the end table—but Nestor yells, “I got it, Mrs. Bosco!” He hops off the living room floor where he was perched, grabs the newspaper off the end table, and hands it to her with a big smile. He seems really excited, too, just like Twinkie.

  Mrs. Bosco rests the newspaper on her lap, then takes out her wrinkled handkerchief—the one she always keeps in her dress pocket. I feel stupid standing there in the middle of
the living room floor—like I’ve been called down to detention or something in school. I just can’t wait until someone tells me what’s going on! Finally, Mrs. Bosco opens up the newspaper, and points to a photo that I can’t make out from where I’m standing.

  “Go ahead and read it yourself, Dorinda,” Mrs. Bosco says, handing me the newspaper. “It’s too dark in here for me to read it to you, even with my glasses on.”

  “Okay.” I move closer, and take the newspaper from her hand. This is one of the games we play—see, I know she’s illiterate, even though I pretend I don’t.

  I stand next to the lamp by the end table and look at the photo Mrs. Bosco pointed to. It’s a head shot of Mariah Carey, just sorta smiling. Then I read the small caption below her picture: “Top star Mariah Carey, a longtime spokesperson for New York City foster children, was so moved by the Eyewitness News report on the abandoned child found in Coney Island, that she has provided tickets to her Madison Square Concert tomorrow night for the foster family that took in the toddler. Ms. Carey could not be reached at press time, but her spokesperson says the Administration of Children’s Services will be handling arrangements for the family to attend the sold-out concert.”’

  “Are they talking about us?” I ask in disbelief.

  “I guess so,” Mrs. Bosco says with a satisfied smile, shifting her weight on the couch. Gaye peers up at me quickly with her intense black eyes, then quickly hides her face behind Mrs. Bosco’s ample arm.

  “Ms. Keisha saw the paper first—and by the time she came into the laundry room and told me, she’d already told everybody in the building about it. She wouldn’t even let me keep her paper!” Mrs. Bosco says, shaking her head.

  I can feel my cheeks burning. How come nobody told me about the article in the newspaper?

  “Of course, Skip didn’t have any more newspapers left,” Mrs. Bosco says, rubbing her legs. “’Cuz those knuckleheads on the corner done stole half of them from him at the crack of dawn. So I had to go all the way over to the Korean place on Malcolm X Boulevard and buy one. You’d think Ms. Keisha coulda bothered to tell me that before I went all the way over to Skip’s, but she’s too busy acting like she is the newspaper!”

  “How—?” I start to ask, but Mrs. Bosco is just getting started.

  “Of course, Manty Clarke was over there buying a Lotto ticket, and he had the nerve to invite himself to the concert,” Mrs. Bosco says, sounding pleased with herself. “I told that toothless fool he’d have more luck striking a deal with the tooth fairy to get tickets—and he just might get some new front teeth in the bargain!”

  Khalil cracks up at Mrs. Bosco’s joke, which snaps me out of my daze. I don’t know why I’m upset, anyway. It figures that nosy Ms. Keisha—and everybody in the building—already knew about this before I found out. Nobody cares enough to tell me anything first.

  “And then Mrs. Tattle called here after you had already left for school,” Mrs. Bosco says, yawning. She’s probably been telling this story all day. “She sounded real pleased with herself, that’s for sure. She said everybody down at the agency was real excited. I figured they would be—anything that gets their names in the papers when they ain’t been accused of doing something wrong, like they always do.”

  “I wish somebody had told me before now,” I say, disappointed that I wasn’t here when the whole thing jumped off.

  “Ain’t you glad we’re going to see Mariah Carey?” Khalil blurts out, making me feel embarrassed again.

  “Of course I am,” I say, trying to sound more excited about the whole situation. “What did Mrs. Tattle say when she called?”

  “Just what it says there in the newspaper,” Mrs. Bosco says, scratching her wig. “What’s that you call her, Rita?”

  “The Butterfly lady!” Twinkie says proudly, twirling herself on the couch.

  “That’s right—she said that the Butterfly lady gave us some tickets to go to her concert— free tickets—otherwise I woulda told Mrs. Tattle she could keep them, ’cuz Mariah ain’t paying no bills around here,” Mrs. Bosco says, nodding her head.

  I guess Mrs. Bosco sees the confused look on my face, because she adds, “I told her I was gonna put you in charge of the situation, ’cause you’re the musical one around here. So I said to leave those tickets in an envelope at the box office with your name on it. Don’t worry, ain’t nobody can touch those tickets but you. I figured you’d wanna invite your friends.”

  “Oh, okay!” I say, my face lighting up. This is gonna be so dope—me, finally doing something for my crew! Now I feel stupid for getting upset. I guess Mrs. Bosco couldn’t call me at school, because I don’t have a cell phone or beeper, like Galleria and Chanel have. I wish I did have one—then I would know about things right when they’re jumping off, like they do. But I’m just so excited—for the first time in my life, I’ve got something nobody else has! Finally, I get to be the lucky one!

  “You know, it would be nice if you invited your sister, too,” Mrs. Bosco says. She turns to Chantelle, who is sitting by the edge of the end table, fiddling with something. “Stop playing with the coasters—they’re already raggedy enough as it is.”

  I wonder which sister she’s talking about. I don’t want to be sitting at a Mariah Carey concert with Monie the Meanie, acting like she’s not having a good time, the way she always does. She thinks everything is corny—including me being in the Cheetah Girls.

  “Um, you mean Monie?” I ask, waiting for the response.

  “No, Dorinda. I mean that child Tiffany,” Mrs. Bosco says, peering at me over her bifocals as if she’s wondering why I’m being so dimwitty or something.

  Why should I invite Tiffany? Mrs. Bosco must realize that I’ve gotta invite my whole crew before I invite anyone else. It’s not like Mariah Carey’s peeps have given us a dozen tickets or something like that, you know what I’m saying?

  “But I should invite Twinkie—um, Rita, and—” I start in, getting defensive.

  “I wanna go!” Nestor blurts out, cutting me off.

  “I wanna go, too,” says Khalil, sulking.

  “How you divide the twenty-five tickets, Dorinda, is your business,” Mrs. Bosco says matter-of-factly.

  “Did you say twenty-five tickets?” I ask, dumbfounded.

  “That’s what I been trying to tell you this whole time. Mrs. Tattle says they left twenty-five tickets for you at the box office,” Mrs. Bosco says, like I should get with the program.

  “That’s so dope!” I say, finally getting excited. I plop down my backpack and take out my notebook and a pencil, so I can make a list of everyone I’m going to invite. “O-kay,” I say out loud, flipping to an empty page.

  Nestor, Khalil, and Kenya are pushing at each other, trying to get a look, but then I stop and look down at Mrs. Bosco. “Are you sure they said twenty-five tickets?”

  “Dorinda, if you ask me again, I’m gonna tell Mrs. Tattle to give those tickets to somebody else, ’cuz you don’t want ’em,” Mrs. Bosco says, chuckling. “As a matter of fact, I’m gonna tell her to give them to Ms. Keisha!”

  “Awright!” I say, jumping up and down. Twinkie grabs my waist and jumps up and down, too. “Okay!” I say again, looking around at all my foster brothers and sisters. “Who wants to go see Mariah Carey?”

  “Me!” screams Twinkie.

  At the top of the list, I write: Twinkie, Galleria. Chanel. Aqua. Angie. Tiffany. Me. That makes seven. I can’t believe I still have eighteen tickets left! “Do you wanna go?” I ask Mrs. Bosco, embarrassed because I didn’t even think of asking her first.

  “Oh, no, that’s for you younguns’—first fool that stepped on my foot, or pushed into me, and I’d be outta there,” Mrs. Bosco says.

  “But you’re the one they gave the tickets to,” I protest. If it wasn’t for Mrs. Bosco taking in Gaye, we wouldn’t be getting to go see Mariah Carey, you know what I’m saying? Suddenly I feel bad. I’ll bet Mrs. Bosco doesn’t want to come because she’s not feeling well.

 
“No, Dorinda. I’m not going to be sitting up there with all those screaming fools. Now you know I can’t let you go without an adult chaper-one, so I figured you’d invite Galleria’s mother. She is you girls’ manager, after all,” Mrs. Bosco says proudly. For the first time, I realize Mrs. Bosco really is proud that I’m in a singing group.

  “You sure you don’t want to go?” I ask her again, ignoring Khalil, Nestor, and now Kenya’s whining.

  “Dorinda,” Mrs. Bosco starts in, but I already know what she’s gonna say, so I cut her off before she finishes.

  “I know, if I ask you one more time,” I say, finishing her sentence.

  “That’s right.”

  “Okay. Ms. Dorothea and Mr. Garibaldi will be our chaperones, and maybe Ms. Simmons, too.” I write down their names, and then I think maybe I should invite Pucci, too. I’ll ask Chanel. She may not want her mom hanging out with us, ’cuz now that she’s been cooped up in the house with a sprained ankle, Chanel wants to get away from her.

  This whole thing is so dope, I can’t believe it’s happening! Wait till I get online and talk to my crew! I feel so excited that I look over at Gaye and smile, even though I think she is probably scared of me. I wonder if I should bring her, too? Maybe not. What if she throws a fit in public? She would probably be frightened by all those people anyway.

  As if reading my mind, Mrs. Bosco says, “I don’t think it would be a good idea to bring Gaye. You go on and have a good time.”

  “Okay,” I say, writing down Pucci’s name next.

  “I wanna come!” Twinkie says for the fiftieth time.

  “Rita, you’re going—now go on to bed,” Mrs. Bosco says, yawning. “I let you stay up so we could tell Dorinda, but it’s time for all of y’all to go to bed.”

  Twinkie kisses me good night, and Mrs. Bosco takes Gaye by the arm to bring her into her bedroom. I say good-bye to Gaye, but she doesn’t answer. I feel so bad for her. I know how mad she’s gonna be when she’s old enough to figure out what happened to her. Just like I was.