Ashley poked a fork in the last two chops frying in the grease. They were white all the way through, so she took them out of the pan and placed them on a napkin to catch the oil. As she stirred the macaroni to the beat of the song, something red dropped into the water. Before she could bring her hands to her nose, a steady stream of blood fell into the pot, turning the water and the macaroni pink.
She took her hand away from her nose, hoping the blood had stopped, but it still gushed like a waterfall. The flow created a pool of blood in the palm of her hand. She reached for a dish towel, but a sharp pain shot through her head. The feeling was so intense it took her breath away and made her knees buckle. She grabbed the counter to stop her fall while fireworks danced behind her eyelids. When she opened her eyes, she saw streaks of blood on the counter, but vibrant lights were still playing havoc with her sight.
She tried to call out to Ebony, but no sound escaped her lips. Jodeci singing about getting to know her suddenly felt like the theme song for her death. "Ebony," she managed to say, just as another explosion of pain sent her to the floor, turning everything into nothing.
3
Andre
Hair is the first thing. And teeth the second. Hair and teeth. A man got those two things he's got it all. - James Brown
Andre picked his high-top fade three times before he patted it down, making sure the top was good and flat.
He put the black hair pick on the back of the bathroom counter and studied his reflection. Smudges of toothpaste and specks of brown hair gel were splattered on the mirror. He hurriedly wiped the stains with a wet piece of tissue, threw the paper into the toilet and looked in the mirror again.
Andre bit his lip and nodded. His hair looked damn good.
He stared at his black basketball shorts and his freshly starched white t-shirt. Last night, he'd spent thirty minutes ironing and starching the shirt while he watched music videos on BET in the living room.
His clothes looked damn good.
He peered into the mirror again to makes sure there was no crust in the creases of his eyelids and no boogers in his nose.
He blew his breath into his hand. It smelled good and minty.
"Get out of the bathroom, Andre!" His brother screamed.
"I just got in here," Andre shouted in return.
"You been in there for thirty minutes. Hurry the hell up."
"I just got in here!" he said absently, while he stared in the mirror and patted the top of his box.
"Hurry up!"
"Damn." Andre stepped over his dirty pajamas and opened the bathroom door.
Malik, Andre's older brother, stood on the other side. "You gonna make me late for work."
"You got a job. You need to move out," Andre said.
Malik took his hands and pressed down on Andre's hair. "I ain't going nowhere. I'm going to stay here to mess with you for the rest of your life."
"I hate you," Andre said, ducking and trying to get away to protect his hair.
"Whatever." Malik laughed and slammed the bathroom door.
Andre bucked up to the closed door for one last show of dominance before he walked into the living room.
Koko and Kali, his two little sisters, were sitting in front of the television watching cartoons and eating cereal. They giggled as two lab rats planned to take over the world. While they laughed, large drops of milk and cereal fell out of their mouths and onto the carpet.
"Where is Momma? She's gonna get y'all for eating in the front room." Andre imagined the bugs that would pounce on the area once the girls were gone and the lights were out.
"She went to see Uncle Teddy. And you need to mind your own business," said Koko or Kali, Andre couldn't tell them apart most days.
They were born eleven months apart. One was seven, and the other eight, but they had the same brown skin tone, and they were almost the same height. To make it worse, their mother dressed them alike and did their hair exactly the same. Since he couldn't tell them apart, he just called them the worsesome twins.
"I would come over there and whoop yo' ass, but I ain't got time for y'all." Neither he nor Sam had been allowed to eat in the front room when they were their age.
Deciding to ignore them, he went to the kitchen to make a bowl of cereal. He took the box of Rice Krispies from the counter, opened the fridge, and his heart sank. "Y'all drunk all the milk!" he yelled.
The girls replied with more giggling and probably more food falling onto the floor.
"Ugh. I don't even know why Momma had to go and have any more kids. Damn brats."
"I'm telling Momma you cussed," both Koko and Kali shouted.
Stomach growling, he searched the fridge for more food, but he knew it was useless. It was the end of the month, and it would be two more days until they got more food stamps. Until then, he was straight out of luck. He slammed the refrigerator closed. The force sent glass jars of miracle whip, grape jelly, and salad dressing rattling against each other.
"Ooh... I'm telling Momma you broke the icebox!" one of them shouted.
"Shut up!" Andre walked into the living room. It smelled of clothes detergent and dryer sheets. His mother had washed last week's laundry two days ago. The clothes were never folded, so they were piled on the couch. He'd hidden his basketball in the mess of clothes, towels, and underwear so his sisters wouldn't find it. He dug through the clothes, grabbed his ball, and left the apartment.
It was only eleven o'clock, and the heat hadn't picked up yet. He needed to get to the court before all the other wanna-be ballers came out, but damn. He knew from experience he couldn't kick ass without eating. Andre sighed and surveyed Vista Apartments. He had homies all through here, but most of them had empty fridges at the end of the month too. Sean was the only person he knew with parents that were not on food stamps or weren't just flat broke. But every time Andre stepped into their house, Mr. Accra, Sean's dad, looked at Andre like he had crap on his face.
He sprinted towards the parking lot, and a smile crept across his face. Mr. Accra's tan Toyota Camry was nowhere in sight. That meant his evil ass was gone. Good.
He walked the few feet to Sean's apartment and knocked.
"Why you knocking on my door like the police?" Sean wiped the sleep from his eyes. He wore baggy, red boxers and no shirt. He was a few shades lighter than Andre with small eyes like the supermodel Tyson Bedford, and all the damn girls loved him for it.
Andre shoved past Sean. "Wake up. It's almost eleven."
Sean's apartment was not meant for the living. All of their furniture was white and wrapped in plastic. There were no specks of dust on the furniture or bookshelves. There were no clothes out of place. Mr. Accra was a male nurse, and their apartment always felt like a sterile hospital.
"It's Saturday," Sean said as if that was an excuse to still be in bed.
"What you got to eat?" Andre placed his basketball near the front door before he went to the kitchen and opened the refrigerator.
"I don't know. Take what you want. I'm going to get dressed."
While Sean disappeared into the back of the apartment, Andre dug through the fridge. Jackpot! He pulled out eggs, bread, and the butter and put them on the counter next to the stove. "You want a fried egg sandwich?" he shouted.
"Hell naw!" Sean screamed from the back.
"Whatever." Andre rummaged through the cabinets until he found a frying pan.
Just as Andre sat at the kitchen table with his finished sandwich and a glass of water, Sean returned smelling of toothpaste and Irish Spring soap. He sat across from Andre at the dining room table. He had changed out of his boxer shorts and into a pair of black jeans with no crease down the middle and a wrinkled black t-shirt. How he got so much attention from the girls, Andre had no idea.
"Your dad at work?" Andre asked.
"Yeah. You already know."
"I heard your two girlfriends got into it yesterday." Andre bit into his sandwich. The yolk, salty and delicious, burst into his mouth.
Sean rolled his eyes and leaned back. "Don't remind me. That was crazy."
Andre laughed and a piece of egg shot across the table. "Man, you got the finest light-skinned girl in the school and you messing it up for Shemeya."
"It ain't like that. Besides. Shemeya is fine. You just think every girl got to be white or light-skinned."
"Anyway, can I ask Latreece out now?" Andre asked in between a bite of his sandwich.
"Hell no," he sneered. "We haven't broke up. She'll calm down in a few days."
"That's not what I heard," Andre said, thinking of lines that might work on Latreece.
Andre finished the last of the sandwich and drank his glass of water in one gulp.
"You coming to the basketball court?"
"No, I got stuff to take care of," Sean said.
"Since when do you do anything on Saturdays except play ball?"
He lifted his shoulders and ignored the question.
"Your loss." Andre picked up his ball from the floor, opened the front door but stopped abruptly. A woman with long hair and a voluptuous ass headed towards the parking lot. Her hair flowed past her shoulders in a black cascade. She wore a leather jacket and tight stonewashed jeans. "Damn, Sean, is that Ashley? My brother's ex is looking good." It must be her. Ashley was the only light-skinned chick with class around here. But she usually wore a ponytail to hide her nappy hair.
Sean ran to the door in less than a second, looking at Ashley's ass right next to Andre. But then she turned, and they both jumped back.
"Damn." Andre's stomach twisted with fear and shock. He'd been correct. It was Ashley. She looked good from the back, but when she turned, her face was a different story. Her eyes were sunken into her face, and they were surrounded by black-blue circles that contrasted sharply with her pale skin.
"Has she been doing crack?" Andre asked, half-joking and half-serious.
Andre looked at Sean. His eyes were unreadable.
Ashley turned back towards the parking lot and walked away. As she disappeared, the twisting in his belly began to unwind. "I'm about to go play ball. You coming?"
Sean sighed and looked from the spot Ashley had been. "No. Like I said. I'm staying in today."
How the hell did someone go from fine-as-hell to crack-head so fast? Andre wondered. She must've been doing that for years without anyone knowing. He shook his head in pity while he dribbled his ball past the swimming pool to the basketball court.
A silver boom box sat on the grass and belted out Tupac's "Brenda's Got A Baby" while Andre surveyed his competition. There were six guys on the court playing 3 on 3 with no one on the sidelines waiting to get tagged in. While he waited, he noticed two girls sitting near the playground. They sat on the picnic tables watching a kid in red overalls climbing on the jungle gym. They must have been new because he'd never seen them before. One of the girls had pale blotchy skin and strawberry-blonde hair. The other was a blond with smooth tanned skin.
"You playing or what?" Raymond asked. Sweat clung to his dark skin and glistened off the bald spot on the top of his head.
"Take your old ass home." Andre placed his ball on the grass and stepped onto the court.
"You can talk noise now, but I'll kick your ass when I get back," Raymond said with a labored breath.
"Whatever," Andre said.
During the game, the girls smiled, giggled, and turned away every time he looked over. He wondered if they were from the neighborhood or new to the apartments. The longer he played, the more curious he became. He was relieved when he saw Benita, Latreece's cousin, talking to them. She gave him an excuse to walk over.
"You're up," Andre said to Raymond, who had been drinking grape Kool-Aid and talking noise from the sidelines.
"You scared? Why you leaving?" Raymond asked, setting his drink on the grass.
"Man, I'll be back." Andre dismissed the insult with the wave of his hand.
As he approached, the two girls laughed and looked away; trying to pretend they didn't see him coming, but Benita eyed him coldly, scowling as he approached.
"What's up, Benita?" he asked.
"What's up, Andre?"
"Who are your friends?"
"None of your damn business," Benita said.
He turned from her, still feeling her gaze on the side of his face. "Where y'all from?" he asked the shorter girl with the tan.
"We just moved in," she replied.
She was even prettier up close, Andre realized. "What's your name?" he asked, deepening his voice.
She glanced away for a moment, but then she looked at him and smiled. "I'm Julia."
He couldn't remember the last time a girl made him feel this good just by smiling. "I'm Dre. Like Doctor Dre." His heart pounded, but he kept his face straight.
"It's Andre," Benita said, "not Dre. Why are you over here anyway? They don't care what your name is." She sneered and looked him up and down as if to say she knew exactly why he was here, and she wasn't going to make it easy for him. Benita was dark but pretty. She usually wore her hair down, but she'd gotten it braided a few weeks ago, and it hung down her back making her look like Janet Jackson in Poetic Justice.
"Man, I'm just trying to be friendly." Damn. He should have come over when Benita had left. He had forgotten the girl tried to get with him when Sean and Latreece first hooked up. He had turned her down. She was nice and all, but he hadn't been interested.
"Take your skinny, slanky ass back to the basketball court 'cause nobody wants you over here," Benita said, her braids swinging as she rolled her neck.
From the corner of his vision, he saw Julia and the other girl giggled.
"You're just jealous cause nobody wants your ass," he said, acting fast to save face.
"Forget you. Why is it whenever the white girls come our here your fake ass be all over 'em?" Rage flashed in Benita's eyes.
"Cause y'all black girls is loud and look like cockroaches," Andre said, matching Benita's anger with his own.
Her mouth fell open, and she turned gray. She looked as if she'd just swallowed a fly.
Andre looked around. It seemed like the entire apartment complex had gone quiet as he realized what he'd just said.
He hadn't noticed before, but Crazy Jade and her son were a few feet away. Her son sat on the swing uselessly kicking his legs. Jade mother held the metal chain preventing him from moving while she stared at Andre.
"I'm telling your momma," Benita said, jabbing her finger into his chest, her moment of speechlessness gone. The entire complex came alive again with the squeaking sneakers on the basketball court and grunts from the ballers. Crazy Jade to push her son again, but she still stared at Andre.
"I was just kidding," he said to Benita, but she had already stalked away, anger rolling off her in waves.
The other girls had left, too. They knew better than to get in between an argument with two black folks. He should have run after Benita to try to get her to stay quiet, but he knew a lost battle when he saw one. But he could salvage his conversation with Julia. He started after her, but something, someone, grabbed his arm.
He looked down to see Crazy Jade. She'd just been at the swings. How did she get here so quickly?
He tried to pull his arm away, but her grip was as strong as a vice. "Excuse me," he said, pulling his arm away and attempting to be polite. He was in enough trouble already. The last thing he needed was for his mother to find out he was rude to an adult, also.
She held on, refusing to loosen her grip. "All black woman look like cockroaches?" she asked.
"No, I was . . ."
"Isn't your mother black?"
"I'm sorry, Miss Jade," Andre laughed nervously. "I was just talking noise. I didn't mean it."
"If all black girls look like cockroaches, and your mother is black, then that makes you a cockroach." Her face was twisted like she was trying to do a difficult math problem in her head.
"I was just kidding," he said. "Benita was talking smack to me first."
She n
arrowed her eyes and said something in a language he couldn't understand.
But he knew enough to be scared. He tried again to pull his arm away, but her grip was too strong. Panic bubbled in his belly. Just as he was about to scream, she let go. He fell to the ground, landing hard on his butt.
Jade's copper eyes glared down at him before she turned to her son, who still sat on the swing pumping his legs up and down.
"Come on, baby," she said. "Let's get inside. There are one too many cockroaches out here."
Andre's heart pounded as he sat on his ass and watched Crazy Jade and her son walk away. What the hell just happened?
He closed his eyes and willed himself to relax. Had she cursed him? Everyone said she was a witch, but witches don't exist. She was only trying to scare him. Why would an evil witch walk around the hood with a kid? If she was a witch, why was she broke just like everyone else? A real witch would have enough power to have money. If she lived here, there must not be anything magical or special about her.
Raymond walked over with a grin on his face and a cup in his hand. The smell of the liquor reached Andre before Raymond did.
"What did Crazy Jade do to you?" Raymond asked laughing.
"Man, she crazy." Andre stood and patted the dirt and grass from the back of his shorts. "You see where those girls went?"
Raymond shook his head and grimaced. "Them white girls?
"Yeah."
"Them girls are gonna get your ass in some serious trouble one day."
"It ain't the 1950s. Lots of black dudes in school got white girls and ain't nobody been lynched." Andre remembered the hurt on Benita's face and the crazy way Jade spoke to him. He shook his head, deciding to concentrate on more important issues. "Whatever. Did you see where they went?"
"I saw them hanging around there yesterday." Raymond pointed to the far end of the complex, past the playground.
Legends of the Damned: A Collection of Edgy Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance Novels Page 170
