Flyy Girl (45 page)

Kiwana said, “I know. Girlfriend just up and disappeared on us.”

Lisa and Kiwana both wore African Kente outfits. Raheema and Tracy wore matching Nike sweat suits, looking like twins.

“So I guess you know what your name means, right?” Kiwana asked Raheema.

“Unt unh,” Raheema responded shyly, especially around Kiwana. Kiwana looked so healthy. Her skin was clear and as smooth as a baby's.

“It's a Muslim name, meaning kindhearted and good,” she told Raheema.

Raheema nodded, embarrassed by her acne-prone skin, wishing she could have Kiwana's.

“I'm gonna get you some vitamins, and some aloe vera products to heal your blemishes. You have to stop eating oil-producing foods, too.”

Raheema was all ears and no complaints, with advice coming from someone as beautiful as Kiwana.

Lisa interjected, “Yeah, remember? Joanne had acne real bad when we first got to school.”

“Yup. And we got her on a vegetarian diet and eating the right foods, and it straightened her right out,” Kiwana said. “But the key is not to damage your skin. Acne can be taken care of. It's the scars that do the real damage.”

“Yeah, and you just gotta start feeling positive about
you
as a person,” Lisa added. She could tell that Raheema was guarded.

Tracy said, “I didn't know that Joanne had acne.”

“Yeah, when we were freshmen,” Lisa answered, as if it was years ago. They were only sophomores.

Kiwana asked Raheema, “What's your sister's name?”

“Mercedes.”

“God. Why did your parents name her that?”

Raheema smiled. “Because my father wanted one.”

They all roared with laughter inside of the small car.

Kiwana shook her head. “That's a shame.”

Lisa asked, “So who named you?”

Raheema answered, “My mom did. She said that she knew this Muslim girl in high school, and she told me that she had always liked her name.” She was beginning to open up to them.

“Oh,” Lisa said. “So your mom and her are still good friends?”

“No. They didn't hang out or anything. My mom just liked her name, and she said that she moved to Washington years ago.”

“Washington, D.C.?” Kiwana asked.

“Yeah,” Raheema answered.

They pulled up to Fairmount Park and found a parking spot. Black men wearing black suits and bow ties were yelling and waving newspapers. “FINAL CALL! GET YOUR FINAL CALL . . . FINAL CALL! GET YOUR FINAL CALL!”

They were sharply dressed, clean-looking and masculine. Tracy heard her college girlfriends talk about “The Nation of Islam” before, but she had never seen any up close. They looked strong and upright.

“Hi are you sisters doin' today?” one asked.

“We're doing fine,” Lisa answered for all of them.

“All right, now. Y'all have a good time,” he said. He continued
waving his papers as they passed. “FINAL CALL! GET YOUR FINAL CALL!”

Tracy said, “They look like they can kick some ass.”

“Yeah, but I'll take an Afrocentric man, myself,” Lisa retorted.

“Here you go with that again,” Kiwana responded to her. “We gotta stop separating ourselves like that. I'll take any black man who has his head screwed on straight, and who is willing to go to battle culturally, religiously, economically, academically and spiritually. I'll take a Muslim brother any day.”

Lisa contested, “Yeah, you talk that stuff, Kiwana, but all the guys at school say that you think you're
all that,
with your nose all up in the air.”

“Well, if any of them start knowing how to act on our campus, then just maybe they would find out that I'm trying to become a queen first, by getting to know who I am and my strongest aspects. And then I'll look for my king, who knows who he is and what his strongest aspects are. And that may take years,” Kiwana announced.

Tracy and Raheema were thinking that Kiwana was already “a queen.” Tracy figured that she had found her king, but he was behind bars, awaiting trial.

Tracy had never seen so many bright and cheerful colors in her life. African descendants definitely had a way with using attractive colors. Bright oranges, blues, yellows, purples, greens and earth browns were everywhere, as they sold their handmade Kente outfits, clothes, hats, and shirts, along with carved art, paintings and ethnic foods. The girls were having a good time, and Fairmount Park was packed, vibrating with the sounds of celebration and the drum.

The sun was out with a vengeance that afternoon, heating things up. The African Cultural Festival lasted until seven o'clock. They then planned to go see the Spike Lee Joint,
School Daze,
but first Kiwana wanted Tracy and Raheema to listen to a lecture being given by African, Caribbean and African-American poets.

An older black man with graying dreadlocks held the stage. He wore a long, earth-tone cloth from his neck to his ankles. He looked to be
sixty or more, and had the strong and steady eyes of wisdom, as if he could see through walls. And he spoke with a Caribbean accent.

“Our wi-mon in Ameri-ca, on de Islands and on de mainlands of Afri-ca must a-gain be the tea-chas of our chil'ren. We cannot raise any proper nay-shun without our sistuhs knowing exactly who dey are and what dey should be do-eng. Dey must know how to feed themselves propa-lee to be able to give propa nurturing to our future generay-shuns.

“Our wi-mon of old, have been our Nandi, raising Shaka, our Candice, fighting de white barbarians in Ethiopia, our Nefertiti, Hat-shepsut, Cleopatra, Harriet Tub-mon here on de mainland, sistuh Rita Marley in de Islands, and our mother goddesses, O-shun and Isis.

“Our wi-mon must know dare past to be able to plan for our future. Any nay-shun with mothas who do not know dare past to teach dare chil'ren can not possibly rise. So I say to de wi-mon on dees day that you must know your desti-nee. You must know your divini-tee. And you must know, dat through you, all nay-shuns live, all nay-shuns die.”

“Well, you got one more year, Tracy, and then you're on your own,” Patti said, getting Jason ready for his last week of first grade. It was also Tracy's last week as a high school junior. “I see you went back to that old ‘natural look' again,” Patti added with a chuckle.

Tracy smiled and looked into her mirror. Her hair was twisted-up again. She had stopped working at Jeans & Shirts after the first two months. She was turning down a lot of money, but she was tired of being exploited for her looks. For her last day of school, she was wearing a collage t-shirt, sunglasses, blue-jean shorts and no socks with her tan Dockside shoes.

“What is that?” Patti asked, noticing the small wood carving of a naked black woman hanging from her daughter's neck on a black leather string.

Tracy eyed the naked black woman, bouncing against her chest and held it in her hand. “It's a fertility symbol, mom.” She smiled, feeling
bashful. Kiwana had given it to her a couple of days ago. “Raheema got one, too.”

“Well, what's with all this African stuff, all of a sudden?” Patti asked. She was curious, noticing the books that Tracy was reading.

“I don't know. I'm getting it from Kiwana.”

“Tracy goin' to Africa, mom?” Jason asked.

“I don't know. Are you going to Africa, Tracy?” Patti said sarcastically.

Tracy grinned. “One day.”

They then headed downstairs to the kitchen.

“And what's with this health-nut stuff you been getting into? Is that from Kiwana too?”

Tracy laughed. “Mom, I don't believe you.”

Patti didn't know much about things outside of Philadelphia. But she wasn't stupid.

“I'm sorry, mom. I love you,” Tracy said, realizing her careless thoughts.

Patti looked at her as if she was crazy. “I love you too, honey, but you're starting to act a little loony on me now. I'm gonna have to take you to a mental health clinic soon,” she joked.

Tracy asked her mother while pouring some orange juice, “Did they teach you much about African health methods and whatnot when you were in that nutrition program, mom?”

“No,” Patti said curiously. Tracy may have been learning some things that she didn't know. “Well, go ahead, ‘Ms. Africa.' Teach me something,” she responded. Patti smiled and sat down. And she was serious.

“Don't you have to be at work soon, mom?” Tracy asked, backing down from her mother's challenge. She was embarrassed.

Patti joked, “Oh, naw, Ms. Africa, ma'am. I ain't gotta be t' workin' for 'da massa till tin 'dis here mornin'.”

Tracy giggled. Then she got serious. “Well, I was reading this book that Kiwana gave me, and it said that women only bleed with periods because of their appetites, and that the chauvinistic environment in America is stopping women from developing their full feminine capa
bilities. And Kiwana said that white women are not really developing power with their feminist movement, they're just getting to be as aggressive and destructive as men are, like Margaret Thatcher in Britain.”

“Go on, girl, teach me,” Patti said excitedly. She was proud that Tracy was using her mind and exploring things.

Tracy asked, “You ever notice that African women look a lot fuller than us, mom?”

“Yeah, I've always been saying that. And they don't be fat either, just healthy-bodied. But I got a nice shape though,” Patti said, standing up to check herself out.

“Yeah, well that's because we lack proper nutrients and vitamins in urban areas with all this fast-food stuff and canned foods. You notice how women down South and out in the country are shaped more like African women? That's because their food supply is healthier.”

“Go 'head, girl,” Patti cheered her on. “Well, I've been feeding you the right foods in here, and I
do
know the proper food groups,” she responded.

“But mom, I don't know if them white doctors are teaching us the right stuff, 'cause they're still experimenting with different foods and all. Africans mastered what and what not to eat thousands of years ago. But see, black people think that white people know everything and that we don't. But we've had vegetarian and fruit diets before the white man even came out of his caves. And they didn't have any fertile land to learn from, until the turn of the century when they started attacking everybody.”

“GO 'HEAD, GIRL! THAT'S MY DAUGHTER!” Patti shouted.

Jason ran into the kitchen to find out what was going on. “What she doin', mom?” he asked.

“Dag, mom,” Tracy responded, surprised by her mother's excitement. “I mean, I got a lot more to learn, but I'm getting there,” she proudly added.

“Well, we all have to get a move on,” Patti said, squeezing Jason's head as she walked toward the door. “Jason, turn that TV off.”

Tracy and Jason followed their mother out.

Tracy said, out the door, “Yeah, I'm gonna have to buy Jason some books to read, so he won't get wrapped up into little white-boy fantasies.”

Although he didn't understand what his sister was talking about yet, Jason nodded and said, “Okay.”

“I am so proud of you,” Patti announced, driving them to school. “My little baby's gonna be one of those sistas who puts the white man in his place. She's gonna be like Angela Davis and Assata Shakur. Yup, my daughter gon' be another Sojourner Truth.”

Patti did know something. But Kiwana called Tracy “Camara,” one who teaches from experience.

Throughout the summer, Tracy and Raheema enjoyed each other's company. It was the most inactive summer Tracy had had in her life. Mr. Keith was finally giving himself and his family room to breathe, and Raheema seemed a lot more cheerful. Both girls struggled to hold on to the vegetarian diet Kiwana had strongly suggested, and Raheema's acne slacked off with its use.

The girls laughed about all of the arguments they had and all the boys that had been on their block, trying to talk to either one of them.

Their futures looked bright. They argued about what colleges they would go to and the types of black men who would chase after them. “Probably some perverted professors,” Tracy joked. But finding “the perfect man” was a mystery to them both.

“Do you still think about Victor?” Raheema asked Tracy while they enjoyed the moonlight and the cool nighttime breeze. They were not serious about boys anymore, unless anyone would ask Tracy about Victor.

“Yeah,” she admitted, hesitantly. “I've never met anybody like him. . . . Remember Mercedes used to talk to Kevin?” Tracy asked, viewing the house across the street from them, where Kevin used to live.

Raheema nodded. “Yeah. That was her first boyfriend.”

Tracy paused. “You know, sometimes I wish I could have one of those voodoo dolls, and just make guys act right.”

Raheema laughed. “Me, too. But then again, girls don't really like guys they can control.”

Tracy gave her a hi-five. “Ain't it the truth.”

Raheema then got quiet, too quiet for Tracy.

Tracy quizzed her, “What are you thinkin' about?”

Raheema rubbed her long ponytail. “I was just wondering how your little brother is gonna treat girls.”

“Oh. Girl, he ain't thinkin' 'bout nothin' but that damn television. But I've been trying to get him to read books though.”

“Why do you think you like Victor so much?” Raheema wanted to know.

“Well, to begin with, you know that he was my first, just like Kevin was probably Mercedes' first. And that shit just does something to you if you liked the boy at all. You'll find out soon enough,” Tracy assured her with a grin. “But outside of that, I see Victor as a black butterfly. And you watch him fly and land, and then you sit and admire him for a while, knowing that he gon' fly back away before you can grab him. And now his ass is in jail, just when I was getting close to him again with my net.”