A Girl Like Me (13 page)

“Because we have kids behind that door.”

“So?”

“Haneef, I cannot have them see me kissing you.”

“You act too old for your age. You know that, right?”

“Whatever.” I sat down in one of the recliners and crossed my legs. “So tell me, why were you always with your brothers?”

“Because my mother was always working.” He sat down on my lap but I pushed him in his back. “Get your big butt off me!” I cracked up laughing and he began tickling me. “Oh, I can't sit on you?” He tickled my stomach. “Oh, what—say it—”

I was laughing so hard, tears were pouring from my eyes. “Would you get up?”

“I'm buggin', Li'l Ma,” he said, sitting in the recliner beside me, and pulling me onto his lap.

“Haneef.”

“Wassup?”

“How did you get your start in music?”

“Remember how I said my mother was always working?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, that's how I met P-Fifty and got into music. He and my oldest brother went to school together. We went to his house one day, and it was on from there.”

“Wow,” I smiled. “I betchu your mother doesn't work that much now,” I laughed.

“Yeah, something like that. Now, tell me again what your mother does.”

“She's…a waitress…I mean, a bus—nurse.”

“A who?”

“A nurse.”

Haneef shook his head and kissed me again. “Ai'ight.” He shrugged his shoulders.

“You know you can tell me anything,” he said.

“Okay.” I nodded my head.

“And you know,” he continued, “I've been thinking about how we've been chillin'.”

“Really?”

“Yeah and true story, everywhere I go, I'm always thinking about you.”

“You're making me blush.” I laid my head against his chest.

“I'm dead serious.”

He stood up and pulled me closer on his lap.

“Do you think about me?” he asked.

“All the time,” I said without hesitation. “And when I'm not around you, I miss you like crazy.”

“Me, too, Li'l Ma. I wanna show you the world.”

“You wanna show me the world?” I lifted my head from his chest and looked into his face in disbelief.

“Man, Elite, nothing is too good for you.”

I swallowed and didn't know why, but tears rushed to my eyes and I felt like I was gonna break down and cry. It was stupid, and I needed to be stronger than that. “Yeah?” I said so low I don't know whether he heard me or not.

“I mean,” he went on, “you're real special. And I was thinking that I needed to ask you to be my girl.”

Holding back the tears were a done deal; they were rolling freely down my cheeks. “What?” He wiped them away. “You don't wanna be my girl?”

I shook my head up and down.

“Then tell me.” He cupped my chin.

“I just never had anyone…” I couldn't even speak I was crying so hard. “I just…”

“Just what, Li'l Ma?”

“I don't know…” I wiped my eyes. I felt so dumb.

“You don't know if you wanna be with me?”

I looked at him as if he was crazy. “Of course I wanna be with you. Yes. Yes. I'll be your girl. I am your girl. Yes.”

He smiled. “Good, and you know, it's no secrets between us. I'll never lie to you, and you don't have to lie to me.”

I nodded my head, though I realized much of what he knew about me was a lie.

He took his platinum chain with the diamond microphone that hung around his neck and placed it on me. “This way, everybody'll know that you're my girl.”

Tears filled my eyes again, but this time they were tears of joy. I drew my face into his and we kissed like no tomorrow. It was official; it was the best day of my life.

“Ooooole…” Mica, Sydney, and Aniyah said as if they were a soprano chorus.

“I'm tellin'…” Aniyah sang. “Mediatakeout. com….”

 

The first face we saw when we arrived in Disney World was Mickey Mouse's and of course the ghetto hoods, better known as Mica, Aniyah, and Sydney, bum-rushed him.

“Mickey,” Mica said, “how come I don't see you around my way?”

“Cause he ain't tryna get jacked,” Sydney snapped. “A name like Mickey Mouse, he'd be played out.”

“Fa' real,” Aniyah nodded her head. “And with all that red and black he got on,” she said as she looked him up and down, “best believe whenever he step foot in Brick City, it's gon' be a situation.”

Oh…my…God…I was embarrassed. “Stop actin' like y'all ain't never been nowhere.”

“Block parties don't count.” Sydney rolled her eyes at me as they proceeded toward a group of water rides.

“Hey y'all!” Haneef said. “Wanna race?!”

“Haneef—”

“Man, loosen up.” He smiled at me and then back at Mica. “You game?”

“Haneef, maybe some people think you can sing,” Mica said with confidence, “but I really don't think you tryna get humiliated out here.”

We all fell out laughing. “Oh, so what you sayin'? You got some skills?”

“I'm not one to brag,” Mica said as he popped his collar, “but since you asked.”

“Ai'ight, so let go!”

“Haneef, you really don't have to,” I said tight-lipped as I watched his security team shake their heads. “Look sweetie, Mica's a sore loser, and I really don't feel like hearing him cry.”

Haneef ignored me. “Come on, man.” He and Mica squatted in racing positions, “On your mark…get set…go…!” And Mica took off so fast, Haneef didn't even see him leave the start line.

“How in the heck—?” Haneef half shielded his eyes.

“Tried to warn you. You cannot outrun a kid from the hood.”

He hooked me playfully around my neck. “Whatever!” and we laughed all the way through the series of water rides we took for the next hour. Afterwards, we played all sorts of games, won prizes, rode every roller-coaster you could image, and when it was all over and time to go, we were exhausted.

By the time we boarded the plane, we all fell asleep and didn't wake up until we were back in New York, where we got in Haneef's Hummer, and he brought us home.

“Thanks for everything,” I said to Haneef as we pulled up in front of Naja's.

“Anytime. I had fun.” He kissed me.

“Me, too.” I kissed him back. “Well,” I said sadly, “I need to get in the house.”

“Alright, call me.” He hopped in his Hummer and as he turned the corner, we walked home, stepped over the crackheads, went in the apartment, where I cried myself to sleep.

Track 17

“S
o you and Jahaad not together no more?” Samantha caught me and Naja as we grabbed our food and headed toward the lunch table.

“Why?” We sat down and before long, Mecca was on our heels. Samantha passed us as we sat our food down, and she rolled her eyes so hard at me I thought she was going to trip over 'em. Whatever.

“Who she looking at crazy?” Naja snapped.

“I don't know,” I retorted. “But as long as she keeps my name out of her mouth, then we straight. Otherwise—”

“It's gon' be a situation.”

“Exactly.” I turned back to Samantha. “Now, what you say?”

“She said,” Mecca butted in, “are you and Jahaad over with?”

“How y'all know?”

“The whole school knows, “Samantha replied.

“Ciera walking around here blasting it!” Mecca exclaimed. “She was all loud in homeroom, making a major announcement about it like somebody really cared.”

“What she say?” Naja asked.

I sucked my teeth. I couldn't believe this.

“She said—” a smirk ran across Samantha's face—“that they been bone'n and on the creep since sometime early last year.”

“Uhmmm,” Mecca said. “That's what she said. You know they wrong. But I heard that Ciera had been pregnant…twice, had a miscarriage, and the whole nine.”

“I heard that, too,” Samantha said in awe, as if she were surprised they'd heard the same things.

I was pissed, especially because ever since we picked up this clique and they somehow inducted themselves into our crew, they'd been in my business. “You think I care? Please,” I laughed it off, “what…the…hell…ever!”

“Oh,” Naja said, taken aback. “But me, I'm pissed off!”

“Well then,” Mecca went on, “get ready for this, since you don't care.”

“I know what you about to say,” Samantha chimed in.

“What?” Mecca asked.

“That Ciera said Jahaad told her that Elite's mother was a crackhead.”

I almost fell on the floor.

“What?!” Naja screeched.

“And I heard,” Mecca said, “that he had to pay their rent for the last year. That he was giving your mother money, and that you, Elite, were just using him and that's why you hooked up with Haneef, because you are usin' him, too!”

I didn't know if anyone saw me, but I passed the hell out. I felt like barging in Jahaad's classroom, or squattin' on him in the cafeteria and kicking his ass. I swallowed and prayed like hell that I played this off. “Like I said before, what…the…hell…ever. Please, if anything, his grandmother's on crack and she sell her ass!”

“Boom!” Naja snapped. “There it is!”

“Now run and take that back.”

Mecca and Samantha fell out laughing.

And I did, too. Cept the thing behind the upward curl of my lips and the sound coming out of my mouth was my chest burning and my heart skipping a thousand beats at the threat of being exposed. And yeah, there were a thousand girls like me with mothers on drugs and all of that—but that was not what I really wanted people to see. Regardless of the rest of the world, I was very protective of my family.

As the girls continued to laugh and chat amongst themselves, only Naja noticed I'd stopped smiling. Samantha and Mecca were carrying on and gossiping about everybody who came our way.

When the bell rang and we gathered our trays and headed back to class, Naja pulled me to the side.

“You think Jahaad really did that?”

“How else would they know?”

“Well, we just have to spread some rumors about him and Ciera.”

“Yeah…” I said reluctantly, knowing that would only lead to more trouble. “We just might.”

Track 18

H
aneef and I had been kickin' it strong for the last month, and I felt like maybe…I could really be happy. The only thing was, Haneef still didn't know the real deal about my life. He thought I lived a ghettohood fairy tale, when all the while it was a nightmare.

Long gone were the days of paying Ny'eem to stay home; I couldn't find him long enough to even make him the offer. So, I started going out in the early evening or right after work, so it didn't look so bad to the twins and Mica that I wasn't home as much as I used to be.

Ny'eem had been staying out later and later. His teachers were calling the house nonstop and my mother was too high to see what it was all about. But I'd reached the point where I had to let go of my worries about losing Ny'eem to the streets, and deal with the kids I still had to care for. But somehow in the quiet of night, I worried about how I was gonna get Ny'eem to see what was right.

 

I turned over to sleep and moved Sydney's feet out of my face when I heard a loud banging on the front door, followed by my bedroom door flying open. “Elite!” I jumped up. It was my mother, crying and in a panic.

“What? What's wrong?!”

“They just locked up Ny'eem. Put your clothes on. We got to go.”

“They what? Who is they?”

“The police just locked him up. We need to go get him!”

“Where'd they arrest him?”

“In front of the building,” she said as she wiped tears from her eyes. “When I told them he was my son and asked what the problem was, they said he was selling drugs.”

“Selling what?” I couldn't believe this, but then again, I could. “When did this happen?”

“Just a second ago. Now put on your clothes. We got to go and get my boy!”

“Ma, calm down.”

Tears were flying from her eyes and she was shaking. “I can't do it,” she shook her head. “I can't have y'all be like me.”

“Then you need to be a better you!” I snapped.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. Dang, Ma. Ny'eem is in jail and you're coming to get me like I'm the mother. You have to go down there. Even if they release him, he can only be released into an adult's custody.”

“Say you eighteen.”

“Ma! They ask for ID. Why can't you go down there?”

“Because I'm scared,” she cried. “I'm scared.”

I stood silent. I didn't know what to do, what to say, or how to feel. Here was my mother crying like she was the child, and I was the adult. The only problem was there was no way we could reverse roles, at least not in this situation.

“Ma, just try. Try to go down there and see what happens.”

“I don't want anything to happen to my boy.”

“Ma, go and see.”

She wiped her eyes, arched her back, and left the room.

I paced the living room for three hours, hoping and praying that things turned around. And just as a steel lump filled my throat, a key jingled in the lock and the knob twisted. It was my mother. “Where is Ny'eem?”

“In jail.”

My heart stopped. “What? Why? Why didn't they let him go?”

“They said he had too many charges.”

“Charges?”

“Something about a stolen car…” She broke down again. “I can't believe this. This is all my fault. All my fault.”

“You're right,” I said coldly. “It is.”