Flyy Girl (11 page)

A black Mustang convertible pulled up to the curb as Tracy walked back to her steps. Out jumped Mercedes. Tracy had not seen Mercedes since she had left home, more than two years ago.

“Look, I'm just going in to see my mother for a few minutes,” she said to the young man sitting behind the wheel in sunglasses.

“Aw'ight, I'll be back,” he said. He pumped up the volume on his car's radio and speeded up the street.

Mercedes walked to the steps and spotted Tracy smiling at her. “Hey, girlfriend, how you been doin'?” she asked. She hugged Tracy and backed away to see how tall she was getting. “Damn, you're getting big, girl. You gon' be able to hang out with the old-heads soon.”

Tracy blushed as she looked Mercedes over. Mercedes wore black designer shoes with a matching pocketbook and a blue leather skirt with a multi-colored sweater. Her neck was dripping with gold, and she wore huge gold earrings that shone in the dark. Her hair was fabulous and asymmetric. Mercedes looked gorgeous, like a teenage movie star who had returned for a visit home.

“Where you get those earrings?” Tracy asked her.

“My boyfriend bought them for me. But how you been, Tracy?”

Tracy was stunned. She practically forgot everything that she wanted to tell Mercedes. She was too wrapped up in Mercedes' outfit, the car, the boyfriend and the glamour. “That was a decent car he had,” she commented, impressed.

Mercedes responded with a smile, “I know. Ain't that car smooth, girl? Well, look, my old man ain't in the house, is he?”

“No. Mr. Keith works overtime now, just like my father.”

“Good, 'cause I came to see my mother right quick.”

Tracy was astounded as she continued to observe. Mercedes entered her house with her old key. Her mother was watching television when she walked in.

“Hey, mom, how's life been treating you?” Mercedes perked.

Beth was shocked. “Girl, it's about time you came up here to see your mother! It's so dag-gone far, going all the way down South Philly.”

They hugged each other and took a seat. Mercedes immediately pulled out a pack of Newports from the Gucci purse inside of her pocketbook. She lit one up and started to smoke without even asking her mother if she would mind.

Raheema came down from her room, saw Mercedes and frowned. She didn't see what Tracy saw. Raheema's idea of success was totally different. Mercedes was still just a teenager to Raheema, a teenager trying to be a grown-up.

Mercedes ignored her sister's glare.

“When you start smoking?” Beth asked her.

Mercedes lied, “Like last year, sometime.”

“That stuff leads to cancer,” her mother told her as she fanned the smoke from in front of her.

Mercedes took another puff. “Look, mom, I ain't come over here to be lectured.”

“Well, leave then. Nobody wants you back here anyway!” Raheema shouted at her. She headed back up the steps and went to her room. “She got some nerve!” she mumbled to herself as she slammed her bedroom door. “She just thinks she can come back here and do what she wants. I hate her! She ain't nobody.”

Mercedes felt slightly annoyed by this. She decided that she would leave sooner than she had expected.
Raheema's still acting like a big-
ass kid!
she snapped to herself.
She needs to grow the hell up! This is
my God-damned life, and I'll live the way I wanna fuckin' live!

“Where you goin'?” Beth asked, as her oldest daughter stood up in haste.

“I'm gettin' up out of here, mom. I see I'm not welcome anymore.”

Beth said, “Let me tell you a few things before you leave. Now you may think you got them streets and all, but that's a life for losers. So please screw your head back on and do the right thing.”

“And what's the right thing, mom, to move back in here with y'all?” Mercedes asked, sourly.

Her mother was speechless.
That's what you need to do,
Beth thought to herself. But it was no use in trying to advise Mercedes. It would have been a waste of breath.

Mercedes walked out the door. The young man wearing sunglasses was parked and drinking a soda. “Come on, let's get out of here,” she told him.

Mercedes threw her head back against the black leather interior. Her friend then revved up his sporty black Mustang. They left listening to Kurtis Blow as her mother shut the door.

Two teenaged girls went to sleep that night with different thoughts on Mercedes. To Raheema, her older sister was still a monster, but to Tracy, Mercedes had become a star. Raheema vowed that she would never be anything like her, while Tracy planned to try her best to emulate Mercedes' glamorous style.

“Did you quit her yet?” Tracy asked Steve before practice.

“Yeah, I told her last night.”

“Well, how come you didn't call me?”

“Because, you didn't give me your phone number yet.”

“Oh, well, I'll give it to you one day,” Tracy said, walking away from him.

“Did you wash my jersey?” Steve asked her, following close behind.

“Yup. I'm gonna wear it to school tomorrow,” she told him.

Tracy walked over to where a few of the cheerleaders had gathered and heard Steve's ex-girlfriend, Treasure, talking about her.

“Tracy thinks she's
it,
and I didn't want Steve
anyway.”

“If you got somethin' to say, then say it to my face, girl,” Tracy challenged her.

“I didn't say nothin' to you,” Treasure responded, backing down.

“Yes you did. I heard you. I'm not
deaf.
How you gon' sit up here and lie to me?”

The girls gathered around, expecting a fight.

Treasure said, “Well, you can have Steve if you want him, because I don't.”

Steve hunched his shoulders.
What did I do?
he thought to himself in a panic.

“Yeah, you just mad because I took him,” Tracy commented.

Treasured stepped away, still mouthing, “Like I said, you can have him. He ain't nobody.”

The heat cooled off when the cheering coach started them off practicing their drills. Tracy thought about what Treasure had said during practice, and felt cheated, like she had bought a loaf of stale bread. She debated Treasure's comments. Was Treasure simply jealous, or was Steve just a flunky?

Tracy began to mess up her cheers as the other girls snickered at her. They didn't seem to care much that she “went with” the most popular player on the team. Then again, Steve was not popular on the streets like other boys were; he was only a running back. No one paid any attention to him after the game was over. Everyone would shake Steve's hand and talk about him during the game, but after that, Steve was pretty much a loner.

With the confusion over Steve on her mind, practice became much longer and harder for Tracy. After a team meeting, the boys were excused from practice earlier than the cheerleading team, so they all walked over to watch the girls. For the first time that season, Tracy could see who the best-looking players were while their helmets were off.

Steve was not all that cute compared to some other boys. It was up in the air as to whether or not Tracy should drop him.
A lot of players
look better than him,
she told herself. Nevertheless, Tracy decided to hold on to him for a while. Steve still scored the most touchdowns.

“Ay, Carmen, that's not the right way to do it!” a boy wearing a blocked haircut yelled.

“Shet up, Amir!” Carmen hollered back, smiling at him.

“I know, he always got something smart to say,” Jantel commented.

“He need to leave people alone,” Carmen added.

The block-haired boy sucked his teeth and spun around to show them his backside. “Y'all can all kiss my—”

“You get out of here before I tell the coach,” the tall cheerleading instructor interjected.

Amir curved his mouth after spotting her.

Tracy was excited for a second, wondering who he was. Amir looked
as if he could be her twin. His skin tone matched hers perfectly, and only the coolest boys wore blocked haircuts.

Amir was the middle linebacker on defense, and he made most of the tackles. He had an obvious muscular build, Tracy could tell by his broad shoulders.
He could tackle Steve,
she thought. She couldn't wait until after practice to ask more about him.

“Ay Jantel, give me the juicy fruit on Amir. You know, who does he go with, how old is he, where does he live? Girl, tell me everything,” Tracy piped.

Jantel broke into laughter. “Unt unh, girl, you don't wanna talk to him.”

“Why not?”

“Because, he's fresh. He be squeezing on girls' butts and feeling all on them and stuff. That boy is freaky. I wouldn't talk to him. But he talks to Carmen anyway.”

“Does Carmen know that he's nasty?” Tracy asked.

“Yeah, but she don't care.”

“She
don't?”

“Nope,” Jantel responded. Then she whispered to Tracy. “I think she be
‘doin' it'
to him. I heard she fresh, too.”

“Oh my God. For real?” Tracy asked with a grin.

Jantel nodded. “Yeah. That's what I heard.”

Tracy went home thinking about Amir. She didn't want to be nasty with him, but she thought about him anyway. Steve had not been Tracy's boyfriend for a week, and already she was planning on dumping him. Steve wasn't any fun. Tracy needed to chase just as much as boys did. It was a game of choosing and chasing and dumping.

Tracy walked into her house and noticed her little brother smiling at her. Jason stared at her with his dark almond eyes as though Tracy was a ghost. Then he began to laugh. Tracy walked over to him, wondering what was going on.

Dave jumped out of the closet on her. “I GOTCHA!”

Tracy screamed as her father grabbed her from behind, “OOOWWW!”

He let her go and started to laugh himself. “I didn't know I could scare a big old girl like you all that bad.”

“Yeah, dad, you surprised me,” Tracy told him while she caught her breath.

Jason dashed and jumped on his father's legs.

“Dad-dy,” he yelped.

“Yeah, what's up, little man?”

“He talks a lot, now,” Tracy said.

“I know. I talked to him while you were at practice. How's the team turning out?”

“We 3–0, dad.”

“Yeah, that's pretty good. Your mother told me you had one of them sitting on the step for three hours,” he said to her.

Tracy started to giggle, embarrassingly. “Aw, dad, why mom telling you my business?”

“Because you don't have no business yet. And if you
think
you got some business, then I plan to
stay
in your business,” Dave told his daughter with a grin.

Tracy smiled back at him and decided to tell him her business. “Well, that was this running back named Steve. He makes most of the touchdowns.”

Her father nodded and started to reminisce. “Yeah, I remember when I played little league. I was the middle linebacker, crushin' kids.”

“You played on defense, hunh, dad?” Tracy asked him, curious. Amir was middle linebacker, too.

“That's right. I liked to hit. Them cats on offense were the soft guys.”

“Did you have a girlfriend?”

Dave smiled with boyish charm. “Well, I don't think I wanna tell you about that.”

Tracy laughed, assuming that her father had had plenty. “Did the running backs have a lot of girls?” she asked him.

Dave answered, “Yeah. They had the most. All the girls were into the touchdown thing. They weren't really into the hitting. They all liked the quarterback, too.”

“So what type of girls did you get?” Tracy pressed him.

Dave smiled again, knowing that he was planting some bad seeds in his daughter's head. “I ended up with the girls who ran around chasin' boys. I always got them rough tomboy girls. We had a bunch of fun though,” he answered her. “Your mother was a tomboy.”

Dave left back out that night, as usual, after filling Tracy's head with his memories. Tracy was no tomboy, but she was more aggressive than most girls her age. She never planned on sitting around being prissy, and waiting for boys to talk to her. Tracy was a boy-chaser indeed.

Tracy observed Amir for the rest of that week. It became clear to her that he was known around the neighborhood as a bad kid. He had been run off of many neighborhood streets by angry parents. Amir was always into something.

Tracy watched Amir making tackles more than she watched Steve run hand-offs during their fourth game. It became exciting to hear those hard, cracking hits. Every time Amir would get someone good, the crowd would moan, “WHEW! Damn, that boy can hit!”

Amir knocked two opposing players out of the game. He had done it before, yet Tracy had paid the defense little attention before her father's comments.

The fans talked about Amir's brutal hits more than the touchdowns that fourth game. What a coincidence it was for Steve to be overshadowed right when Tracy was thinking about dropping him for Amir.

After the game, Tracy and Steve went to the movies along with Jantel and a few of Tracy's other girlfriends. She wanted to leave Steve at home, but when Carmen hugged Amir after the game, Tracy decided that it was better to have something than nothing.

The movie line at the Cheltenham Twin Theater was long, filled with teens and a few adults. They all had to wait in line a half hour to see a
new Chuck Norris film. Several boys from other teams were there. They all walked up and shook Steve's hand as they talked about the upcoming games. That cheered Tracy up a bit, but it was not enough to keep her satisfied with him.

Steve bought her popcorn and found good seats. They sat quietly as Tracy's girlfriends ran their mouths about who was who and who was cute and who was not while watching boys walking up, down and through the aisles. Tracy was bored. All she could think about was Amir and Carmen. She then asked for some candy. Steve gave her a dollar out of his allowance money for her to go and get what she wanted from the refreshment stand. Tracy then faked going to the bathroom several times before the movie started to look at other young couples, noticing how happy they seemed.