“You’re a Delta?” I ask.
Tammy nods and looks over at Carolina.
Together, they break out in a chant.
A DELTA is
What an Ah-ka ain’t
What a Zeta wants to be
What a Sigma can’t
What an Alpha likes
And a Kappa luvs and what a QUE PSI PHI can’t get enough of…
OOO-OOP!!! OOO-OOP!!!!! OOOO-OOP OOO-OOP OOO-OOOP!!!!!!
Tammy and Carolina finish with a flourish. All smiles. “That’s what’s up,” Lark says.
Tammy high-fives Lark as Carolina looks on with pride.
“A party, huh?” I say.
Carolina touches my arm. “That’s right. It will be pretty nice. You’ll enjoy yourselves.” She looks me in the eyes. “And you’ll find something to take your mind off that situation in New Jersey that has you with the long face.”
“Maybe,” I say.
“Ain’t no maybes when the Deltas throw down,” Tammy says. “Definitely.”
It’s nine.
The Delta event starts any minute.
And Carolina is freaking.
“Strep throat. This is sooo messed up. How could she get strep throat, Tammy? She’s our lead.”
Tammy shakes her head, sighs. “A three-woman song-and-dance troupe and only one of us can actually sing. Now that’s trifling. We definitely weren’t thinking.”
“I knew we should have changed the dynamics of the group,” cries Carolina. “This is a catastrophe. We won’t be able to show our faces on campus after this debacle.”
I can’t help but think how happy Mama would be about my decision to come to school here, just by listening to Carolina speak. Mama’s a sucker for articulate peeps.
“You and I can shake our rumps better than Katrina ever could, and I can hum my ass off,” Tammy says. “Maybe the day isn’t lost, Car.”
“Hum your ass off.” Carolina throws her hands up in the air.
She’s the diva of the two, I’ve learned. She looks fierce in her crimson-and-cream outfit, though. And Tammy does, too. Maybe a hum-and-dance routine will work for them.
“We can’t go on without a singer,” Carolina says. “We’re about to look ridiculous. I can’t afford to look ridiculous. I have two more years to be concerned with. Oh, well, guess I’m transferring.” She looks at Tammy. “Guess you’ll be moving your 100 and 200 track-running booty somewhere else, too.”
“Speak for yourself,” Tammy says. “I’m incapable of looking ridiculous.”
Carolina sneers. “That’s right. You can hum really well.”
“See what I’m saying,” Tammy says.
Lark clears her throat. I have a bad feeling almost immediately. “I don’t know if it matters, but Kenya can sing. In fact, she’s very good. Best I’ve heard.”
Carolina’s and Tammy’s heads snap around as if propelled by rocket force.
They look at me like Oprah has agreed to adopt them.
“Oh, boy,” I say.
Carolina’s on me, hand grabbing my shoulders in a death grip. “That true? No lie? Please resuscitate all of my hope. Please.”
“With the proper warmup, and under the right mood, yeah….”
“I know this is somewhat impromptu, but could you give us a couple of lines?”
“Like what?”
“Anything,” Tammy snaps. “Before my girl’s blood pressure sends her to the E.R.”
Her voice means business. I skip the warmup, jump right in.
I sing about being held like it was the last time.
Being touched like it was the last time.
Not wanting to forget the present is a gift.
An Alicia Keys ballad.
I end on a perfectly executed high note, and then stand quiet. Wait for their response.
Other than Lark’s slight applause, quiet is queen.
Then Carolina breaks the silence. “I’m about to cry. I’m seriously about to ruin my dress. You’ve been sent from Heaven, I’m sure of it.”
“Sent from Heaven,” Tammy says. “That’s Keyshia Cole.”
“Sometimes life gives you lemons,” Carolina says. “Sometimes it gives you joy, unspeakable joy.”
I want to say, And you write for the campus paper? But I don’t.
“You’re gonna look great in crimson and cream, Kenya,” says Tammy.
Carolina nods in agreement. “At least I have that heifer’s dress. Just have to run out to my car and get it.”
“Say what?” I manage to ask.
Tammy grabs my left arm, Carolina my right. They usher me off. “We’ve only got a few minutes before we perform,” Carolina says. “We’ve got to get you up to speed quick.”
I gulp, swallow. Look back over my shoulder. Lark shrugs, offers me a smile.
Friends.
The things they get you into.
Students are packed into Beltran Hall like sardines. Every year represented. I see doe-eyed freshmen and confident upperclassmen. Crimson and cream streamers hang from the ceiling. Delta colors. A DJ, boxed in by two five-foot-tall speakers, spins the hottest records. Lights flash. Punch they swear isn’t spiked fills several of the largest punch bowls I’ve ever seen. Females are dressed to impress, mucho cleavage, booties that make Kim Kardashian look anorexic. Dudes represent in grown and sexy attire, button-ups, slacks and footwear without a swoosh on the side. I don’t think one of the dudes is less than six feet tall. Everybody’s bunched up by the stage. I’m at the back of the auditorium. I scan the crowd for Lark. Can’t find her. I silently cuss her out.
Carolina moves close to my right ear. “You’re going to be fabulous. Speak it into existence.”
“I’m going to be fabulous,” I respond.
Tammy’s in my left ear. “Don’t mean to put pressure on you, Kenya, but it’s all on you, homegirl. If we have to fall back on my humming, it ain’t gonna be pretty.”
“You can count on me,” I say.
“The stage is your home,” Carolina says. “You’re comfortable and without fright on it. Speak it into existence.”
“The stage is my home. I’m comfortable and without fright on it.”
“Y’all ready for some more fiyah?”
That’s the MC. A dude that’s cuter than cute. Tall enough for the Lakers.
The crowd roars.
“Fuego,” he says.
They roar some more.
Our music is cued. Carolina leads, then Tammy, me at the rear. We Destiny’s Child-strut down an aisle carved down the center of the hall. As we reach the stage, shouts and screams fill the hall. I like the attention. My nerves disappear.
I move forward aggressively, grab the mic, shake my hips and swing my head.
And sing.
Better than I ever have before.
“‘If I Were Your Girlfriend’.”
Nicole Wray.
“What’s your name?”
I look around, and then realize he’s talking to me. It’s the MC that warmed up the crowd, introduced Carolina, Tammy and me. He is about six-four. Dark chocolate, muscles for days, hair in waves. He looks like he belongs on the cover of a magazine. Jet. Essence. Ebony.
“Ebony,” I find myself saying.
“Nice to meet you, Ebony,” he says. “I enjoyed your singing. You’ve got a mean voice.”
I shake away cobwebs. “I’m sorry, my name isn’t Ebony. It’s Kenya.”
He narrows his eyes, studies me a bit and then smiles. He has dimples, perfect teeth. “Kenya…like the country?”
“Exactly.”
He licks his lips. “I always did want to experience the motherland.”
His voice is pure sex. “And your name?”
“JaMarcus.”
“What year are you, JaMarcus?”
“Junior. You?”
“Freshman. Studying?”
“Premed.”
Dr. JaMarcus.
Dayum.
I can just imagine opening up to him and
saying ahhh.
“What are you thinking on, Kenya?” JaMarcus asks.
“What you mean?”
“You just got a look on your face. As if your favorite song just came on.”
“Did I?”
“Yessir,” he says in a singsong tone.
I don’t have a reply. So I don’t say anything.
“I’m wondering, so I might as well ask. You have a man, Kenya?”
The million dollar question.
I think on it for a bit.
Five seconds turns to ten turns to twenty.
“I don’t know,” I say at last. “I think so. Back home. It’s complicated.”
JaMarcus shakes his head thoughtfully. “You have a cell, Kenya?”
“Yeah.”
“May I see it?” He holds out his hand.
Confident.
No doubt in his mind I’ll give it to him.
I eye his muscles. He has running-back biceps. I bet he did play for his high school team. I hand my cell to him without any more thought. Watch as he types.
Same cell I haven’t received any text messages or calls from Donnell on, I remind myself.
JaMarcus hands it back. “Saved my number in there. Hit me up sometime.”
I gulp. “I’ll see.”
“Saved my number under the N’s. Not the J’s. Just so you know.”
“The N’s?”
He smiles, dimples on display. All kinds of foolish thoughts run through my head. “Yeah. N for ‘not complicated.’ Unlike your situation with your n----back home.”
He turns and walks away.
Suave, smooth.
If this is how it’s gonna be with the college boys, or men as Carolina says, I’m not sure I can make it through one semester without finding myself on the Maury show after all.
The conversation with Mr. Fuego makes me realize all the more why I broke up with Donnell. Temptation is fire, and I didn’t want either one of us to get burned.
Last night’s Delta party is a memory. Happily, it’s a good one.
It’s right back to business, which is fine with me.
We’re crowded in the room the school provided for Lark and me.
A cozy li’l joint in the Tomlinson Building.
Tammy tosses a bottle of Dasani water my way. I bobble the toss, almost drop the bottle but somehow hold on. “Don’t drink that, Kenya,” she says. “Just hold it for now.”
I roll the bottle over in my fingers. It is ice-cold to the touch, covered in a cool sweat. “And what am I holding this for?”
“It’s hot out,” she says.
I glance at Lark, send my best friend a telepathic message: What’s up with Tammy? Lark shrugs. I try my luck with Carolina. There’s nothing there, either. She doesn’t even make eye contact with me, busy thumbing through a paperback novel I brought along for the flight from Jersey. Only You, a Francis Ray romance. I love happily ever after endings.
Back to Tammy.
“So,” I say, “according to the itinerary the school sent us, you guys are gonna show us what buildings our classes are located in. Then there are some workshops later.”
“No,” Tammy says.
“There’s been a change?”
“You’re gonna be with me, Kenya.”
“We’re splitting up?”
Tammy doesn’t answer. She starts stretching, warming up her quadriceps and hamstrings. Dressed in tight biker shorts, a green 7UP T-shirt and Reeboks with fluorescent laces, Tammy’s in a no-nonsense mood today. Absent is the sassy homegirl with all the sharp remarks. I’ve only known her a short while, but long enough to miss her true self. Or, maybe this is her real self. If so, I prefer the other Tammy. This version is straight-up business. Not at all talkative. Introverted as opposed to extroverted. Stretching and whatnot. Like she’s training for the Summer Olympics or something.
Whatever.
Do you.
As long as she understands I don’t run unless I’m being chased.
I’ll break it down for homegirl if it comes to that.
“Thought we were all sticking together,” I say.
“We were.” Tammy unscrews the cap on her own bottle of Dasani, takes a hard gulp, replaces the cap. She rolls her neck, stretches her arms overhead. She looks up, catches me eyeing her. “You ready to hit it, Kenya?”
Against my better judgment, I don’t ask what exactly we’re gonna be hitting.
But I do risk another glance at Lark. Get another shrug from my best friend. She’s so helpful today. Carolina’s still busy reading. She doesn’t look up from the pages of the book.
“Aight, Kenya,” Tammy says. “Let’s hit it.”
She doesn’t give me a chance to question, to probe, to rebut.
She’s out the door.
I look at Lark, Carolina. “Well, later, I guess.”
“I guess,” Lark says.
Carolina’s too caught up in the romance of Sierra Grayson and Blade Navarone to pay me any mind.
I leave those two. Head outside to catch up with Tammy.
She’s way up the walkway. Gliding like she’s on skates.
I need rollerblades.
She makes a left turn. Passes two buildings, right turn, down a hill. I’m on her heels, breathing through my mouth and nose, trying to keep up. Finally, she comes to a stop. At a chain-link fence probably twenty feet high. Beyond the fence is a track with freshly painted lines for the running lanes. Several athletes are moving around, foreheads lined in concentration. A mixture of men and women. Lots of camaraderie from what I can gather. The smell of grass is heavy in the air. A crew of Latino maintenance workers is on mowers, tightening up the landscape around the entire perimeter of the track.
Tammy leans against the fence, does some more stretching.
I sidle up next to her, breathing heavily. “I’m not trying to be out here wheezing, Tammy. I’m sweating just from walking. I’m not down for a workout.”
“I understand, Kenya. This is not for you. But I’ve gotta get some laps in.”
“And I’m supposed to just sit around in this baking sun watching you?”
She smiles, the first I’ve seen from her all day. “Watching can be fun.”
I narrow my eyes. “What’s going on, Tammy?”
“What you mean?”
“Something’s…not right. Something’s been off all morning.”
“Oh, oh.” She nods thoughtfully. “Yeah, Kenya. I feel what you’re saying. Sorry ’bout that in there. It couldn’t be helped, though. I tried to just stay in my lane, you know? But it’s tough. Carolina’s in one of her funky moods.”
“That’s the pot calling the kettle black,” my mama would say.
But I’m not my mama. “True dat.” I pause. “What’s up with her?”
And you?
“I love her to death. Carolina is the sister I never had.” Tammy smiles again, raising her daily tally to two. She goes on. “All brothers. That probably explains why I’m such a tomboy. But like I said, I love Car. But she’s by the book.” Tammy taps her lips, squints her eyes. “What word would she use? Think, think. She hates um…deviation. Carolina doesn’t like to deviate from plans.”
“And why exactly have we deviated?” I ask.
“Life ain’t no fun if you keep it color-by-numbers, Kenya.”
I put my hands on my hips. “So last night wasn’t the end of our fun?”
Tammy smirks. “End of mine. Yes.”
Why do I feel like I’m talking to Laurence Fishburne in The Matrix?
“Which means?” I ask.
“Which means, hopefully your fun has just begun, Kenya.”
Deep voice, one I recognize.
I turn. Slowly.
JaMarcus.
Six-foot-four and covered in sweat.
In shorts and a wifebeater, his percentage of body fat must be in the single digits, judging by the lean muscles all over his body. He’s like a statue, carved to perfection in stone by a careful, dedicated sculp
tor. He belongs in a museum somewhere. My legs turn to water. My mouth goes dry. My heart is running laps of its own. I wonder if he can see how affected I am by seeing him half-naked.
“Cool,” he says. “That’s love, Kenya. You brought my water.”
“Tammy is good peoples. We mad cool. I’m the best on the men’s side as far as track, and Tammy holds down the women’s side. Matter of fact, she’s probably better than I am. Olympics ain’t just a dream for her. I can definitely see her representing in 2012. She trains like a beast. I’m trying to get that work ethic.”
Modesty will get you far.
“Now, Carolina,” he goes on. “She’s a hater.”
“So, let me get this right. You’re the cause of all this…deviation?”
“Yeah, I guess. I asked Tammy if she’d swing by with you.”
I suck my teeth. “I’m supposed to tour the buildings so I’ll know where my classes are. Dang, JaMarcus. You’ve messed me up, boy.”
I’m not really mad.
“I got you on that,” he says. “Don’t worry. I’ll show you where everything is.”
“All sweaty and icky…”
He hands me the bottle of Dasani. I think about his lips being on it just moments before. “I’m hitting the showers now,” he says. “I won’t be but a minute, I promise you. Meantime, you can peep Tammy out until I get back out here. Cool?”
“Yeah. I guess.”
“That’s what’s up.”
I settle into a spot in the bleachers.
Out on the track, Tammy is taking a turn better than my Acura.
She’s fast.
The muscles in her legs don’t take away from her beauty; they enhance it.
Five laps turns into ten, which turns into fifteen, then moves past twenty.
Damn! You go, girl!
She comes to a stop finally, breathing lightly, hands on her hips.
She pounds her chest, makes a peace sign, holds that gesture to the sky.
“Her mother passed last year.”
I turn to JaMarcus. “What?”
He nods toward the track. “Tammy. Her mother passed last year.”
“Damn. I didn’t know that.”
He nods. “Yeah, Kenya. She missed a little school, but got right back into it. Said that’s what her mother would want. I have so much respect for her. She’s my hero, for real.”
Dirty South Page 5
