A Girl Like Me Read online

  And yes, they looked a hot mess, considering I was five foot five and a size ten, and they were just eight years old. So, I stood guard while they slipped on their jeans, cute li’l Bobby Jack shirts, and some pink and white kicks.

  Their hair was shoulder-length and easy to maintain because for ten dollars, every other week the girl across the hall put it in cornrows and beads. An hour after me acting like Jerome the flashlight cop, everybody was ready to roll.

  We took one bus but got off at different stops for our respective schools. The twins, Mica, and Nyeem got off at the first stop and mine was last.

  As soon as the city bus doors opened and I stepped foot in front of the school, I knew right away that everyone had heard me get played on the radio. Especially since they all looked at me and either smiled too wide or laughed in my face.

  But it was all good, ’cause I was too ready to read these ghetto birds like they stole somethin’. Besides, just because I had a jacked-up home life, didn’t mean I wasn’t fly—because I was. Honey colored skin, flat-ironed straight hair that draped past my shoulders, Asian eyes, full lips, thick hips, and a cover girl smile.

  Just when my boost mobile vibrated through my purse, I saw Naja run toward me. I twisted my MAC-covered lips and ignored her. Yes, I was still pissed.

  I flipped my phone open. “Who dis?”

  “Elite?” It was a male voice.

  “Yeah.”

  “Wassup, girl?”

  “Terrance? Boy, didn’t I tell you to lose yourself?!” Terrance was a boy who pushed up on me once at the bus stop. I called myself tryin’ to creep, but every time I turned around he was on my line. Can you say stalker?

  “This isn’t Terrance. This is DJ Twan from Hot 102.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Didn’t you call us this morning for the singing contest?”

  “Oh, now you got jokes, Terrance? Look, I’m down to my last twenty minutes on my phone, so I don’t have time to waste with you on my line. Now bounce!”

  “Elite, this is Haneef. Your friend, Naja, called the station when we announced that despite your mother playing us both out, you won the contest. Front row seats to the concert and a chance to be onstage with me!”

  I tapped my foot and looked around at the sea of students going into the school. Then I looked at Naja, who was standing here grinnin’, mushed her dead in the head, and poked my finger in the center of the bubble she was prepared to pop.

  “Do I sound impressed? I know you don’t think I’m going to believe that this is Haneef, and you all cared about me so much that you gon’ track me down, for what? Puleeze, this is Terrance. And since you playing so many games, I’ma be sure to tell all your boys on the basketball team that you ain’t never had no booty, punk ass!”

  “This is the last time,” a deep male voice said, “before we hang up—”

  “Do you—if this is really Haneef, then sing something.”

  Suddenly the phone turned into a personal serenade: “If I don’t have you baby, I’ma go crazy…need you in my life.”

  It was at that moment I knew it was Haneef. “Jesus!” I screamed, right before I looked at Naja, who was jumping up and down.

  “This is Haneef!” I screamed at the top of my lungs.

  “Yes,” he said. “You won the contest, and your friend Naja is the one to thank! So, do you want the tickets? There’re two of them, so you can bring her with you!”

  “Boy,” I said seriously. “Don’t play with me.”

  “Come to the station by tomorrow and pick them up,” the DJ said.

  Naja and I hugged tightly as we jumped up and down.

  “Haneef!” Naja yelled, smushing her cheek against mine and trying to speak into the phone. “My cousin’s baby mother, god sister, aunt’s brother, and li’l sister, Tasia said they know you, and to tell you wassup! I love you, Haneef!”

  I shot Naja the eye and mouthed, “You’re going to make them hang up again!”

  “Elite!” the DJ seemed to be ignoring Naja. “Tell us the best station in Jersey!”

  “Hot 102! Where my baby daddy lives! Holllaaaah!”

  Once we were off the line, Naja and I started screaming again. “Okay, okay,” I said. “We need to calm down.”

  We took a deep breath, looked around, and every li’l pigeon out there was staring in our direction. It was obvious they were sweatin’ us. Naja and I started smiling in their direction while giving them our famous Miss America waves. I saw just by the green oozing from their hater type glare that they were dying to be fly with us. After the phone call I just had, we were officially groupie royalty.

  After a few minutes of pleasing our court, we sauntered into Arts High, side by side, both of us throwing our right shoulders forward and strutting down the hall. There was no mistaking that we had arrived…

  “Oh, you just gon’ play me on the radio,” halted me in my spot. I closed my eyes and I knew by the voice it was Jahaad. I was so high off Haneef that I’d almost forgotten this dude existed.

  “Get over here!” he said as he turned me around and pulled me toward him. It was written all over his face that he was pissed. He was mean, muggin’ the heck outta me, and the look alone almost made me promise to behave.

  Jahaad was the spitting image of Usher: the color of pecan, chestnut brown eyes, five eleven, and athletically built.

  He was looking at me with disdain—he was still cute—but obviously pissed. He was dressed like a rock star with slightly baggy jeans, a thin silver link chain hanging from his belt to his back pocket, a black short sleeve Korn tee, and an off-white thermal underneath.

  We’d been together since ninth grade but since we’d been in the eleventh grade, I had gotten tired of him. But he had been my first, and I didn’t exactly know what life would have been like without him. He nagged the heck outta me, always accused me of cheating, complained all the time, always had something smart to say, and argued all day if he could have…but other than that…he’d always had a way of being there when I needed him.

  I snatched away from him. “What I tell you about pulling on me?!”

  “We need to handle this, Elite?” Naja asked, looking Jahaad up and down.

  “No, Naja, we’re straight,” I assured her.

  “Ai’ight.” She pointed down the hall, where a group of our girls were. “Hollah if you need me.” Naja walked backwards down the hall, eyeing Jahaad the entire way.

  “What I tell you about grabbing me?!” I snapped.

  “And what I tell you about not listening?! I see I’ve been too nice to you.”

  Too nice. I gave him the screw face, and it was obvious by that comment that he’d been listening to some chick. “Ciera been in your face again?” I said more as an accusation than a question.

  “Don’t worry about Ciera!” he snapped. “Worry about you. All on the radio, being a groupie ass ho!”

  “What? Who you callin’ a ho?” I screeched. I may have been a groupie, but I wasn’t no ho. “You a ho, as a matter of fact. You come from a long line of skeezers!”

  “You talkin’ about my mama?”

  “Well, I wasn’t gon’ call no name, but if the spandex fits!”

  “Are you crazy, talking to me like this?”

  “Boy, if you don’t get yo’ wannabe Billy bad ass outta my way…!”

  “Are you crazy, playing me for some punk ass cat who wouldn’t even know you if you sat next to him? He must’ve heard you were easy and that’s the real reason why he tracked you down.”

  Easy? He called me easy? “If I was easy, I’d be givin’ you some booty, Mr. I-don’t-wear-condoms. Easy? Last I checked, you were ridin’ the pole.”

  “And you wonder why other chicks be checkin’ me—because you don’t know how to treat me.”

  “So, what you sayin’? You tryna get with one of them? What, Ciera tryna ride yo’ impacted ass sack. I wish you would leave me and try and get with that dog ass chick!”

  I was so pissed, I could’ve s
macked him upside his head. There had been rumors about this pigeon, Ciera, trying to kick it with Jahaad on the low. And word was that she was checkin’ for him mad hard, and that occasionally—on the D.L.—this fool was trickin’ all his li’l Burger King money on her bama ass.

  Needless to say, I had to secure my place, regardless of how I really felt about staying in a relationship with this dude. But the mere thought of this chick being in my man’s face drove me crazy.

  So, I had to let her know to stay outta my way before I laid her ass out cold. Point blank, period. It didn’t matter that I didn’t want him anymore. What mattered was that as long as I knew she wanted him, I wasn’t gon’ leave him.

  And this wasn’t because I was selfish; I was so not above sharing the wealth. And usually I wasn’t a hater, and uhmmm…maybe, if someone other than my archenemy had come along, then I would’ve put Jahaad on the block. But with Ciera on the loose, it wasn’t gon’ happen.

  “Now, I don’t know about anybody else, but Jahaad’s girl,” Jahaad spat while pointing his finger in my face, “don’t be acting like this! Now, unless you want some other chick to take your spot, you’ll get your act together. Feel me?”

  “I really don’t appreciate the way you’re talking to me!” I pointed my finger back in his face.

  “Well, you should get your act together.”

  “So what you sayin’? I ain’t your girl no more?”

  “You my girl, but if you keep acting like this…”

  “Acting like this, and what? As long as we’ve been together, you don’t think any more of me than to be spittin’ whatever your boys or some bum bitch done told you to say to me?! Yeah, maybe you’re right. Maybe I don’t need to be your girl.” I turned to storm away but he snatched me back around.

  “Don’t be like that, Elite. I’m sorry.” He stroked my cheek. “I know I’m buggin’, but when I think about losing you, I just don’t know what to do. It’s like you think it’s alright to play me or something.”

  “You know it wasn’t even like that,” I said, thinking now was really as good a time as ever to dump him. “I was just…just excited.”

  “Yeah, over another dude. And you know he doesn’t love you like me. Nobody will ever love you like I do.”

  “I know,” I said in my best sorrow-filled voice.

  “So then you ain’t going to the concert, right?”

  “What?” I quickly snapped. “Boy, don’t play with me.”

  Jahaad looked at me as if he could see right through me. “You better not go to that concert! You better not try me.”

  “Excuse you?”

  “So you gon’ just disrespect me?”

  “I’m not disrespecting you! I’m just going to a concert!”

  “So what you sayin’, to hell with me?!”

  I sighed.

  “Oh,” he snapped. He was so mad I swore I saw smoke coming from his nose. “Seems your mind is made up. Ai’ight, deuce-deuce. I’m out, and don’t call me, either!” He pounded two fingers on his chest and walked away. Something he’d never done, despite how many arguments we’d had.

  I felt like a mannequin. I swear I couldn’t move from my spot. I couldn’t believe he’d actually left me standing here and had walked off, disappearing like thin vapor into a sea of students.

  Suddenly the bell rang and people started rushing past me, saying, “Elite! I heard you on the radio. I can’t believe you really won those tickets!”

  A few more said, “Wish I could go.”

  “Well, ya can’t!” Naja slipped over to me, grabbed me by the arm, and practically dragged me down the hall to class.

  SPIN IT…

  Track 3

  Okay, so Jahaad had left me in the middle of the hallway, and unless I planned on not going to the concert, my relationship was going to be over. This might have been the easy way out…letting him dump me and not the other way around.

  And maybe a week before, I would’ve seized the moment, but then again maybe I wouldn’t have, especially since this was the first time I faced the real possibility that he might actually leave me. So I had no choice but to figure out how I was going to keep Jahaad and go to the concert at the same time.

  Not able to come up with a clear and concise plan, I shook my head. I was at work, just starting my shift. I checked my work schedule and saw that I had the night of the concert off. Not that I thought that would be a problem, considering my manager, Thelma, was cool. Last year she made me assistant manager and once I saw the jump in my paycheck, I told her I would forever be grateful and do whatever she wanted me to. Which I did. I always closed up, and every other weekend I opened, did extra hours, and always made the schedule so she wouldn’t have to.

  I had been working at bebe in the Mall at Short Hills every other day after school and on the weekends since I forged my mother’s signature (at fourteen) on my working papers. I was tired of rockin’ the crackhead kid’s look: dingy and too big clothes, no frill kicks, and a smirk on my face that screamed this was the best I could do. Hell, there was no need for the truth to be that obvious when I could work and lie about it.

  Anywho, I already explained to Ny’eem that if he wanted me to get those Air Force Ones he’d been eyeing, then he had to be home on time tomorrow night to keep the kids. Otherwise, his dreams of being sneaker king would be a wrap. Especially since I’m going back on my word of not getting him anything, since he refuses to get a J.O.B.

  I had to admit I was worried I was gonna lose Ny’eem to the streets. All he wanted to do was hang out on the corner with his boys and chase behind them. Everybody, except Ny’eem of course, saw they were up to no good.

  My mother even told him that if she caught him hanging on the corner again, she was going to wreck shop on the block. And if she did, that would have been on him. And I tried to tell him not to sleep on Cassie—between her lovemaking sessions with the pipe, she did try to be somebody’s mama. Not mine though, because ever since I had to mother my sisters and brothers, I told her to be clear: I was grown.

  “Okay, Naja.” I looked toward Naja, who’s worked with me since last summer. “We’re not on the schedule tomorrow, but we have extra hours next week to make up for it.” We walked over to the counter and I stood behind the cash register while she leaned up against the front of the counter.

  “That’s if I’m not married,” Naja said with ease.

  This chick was crazy, and the way I was looking at her told her that I thought so. “What are you talking about?!” I couldn’t help but laugh.

  “Girl, please. I heard Rick Ross is going to be there, and if so, I’m stripping on site.” She started throwing her arms in the air and dropping down low. “‘Drop down and sweep the floor wit’ it’—hey’yayyy!” She popped back up. “I am nothing,” she popped her gums and snapped her fingers in a Z-motion, “to play with.”

  “You so crazy,” I giggled. “But look, what we gon’ wear?”

  “Girl, I got this fly Juicy Couture outfit. And let me tell you it makes my boobs look like hey’yay, my ass look like holl’laaaah! And my stilettos look like they sing, ‘Here comes Miss America…’” Naja strutted like Naomi Campbell from one side of the boutique to the other as if she were working a Paris runway, did a pose, and came back again. “I’m puttin’ er’body to sleep. Except my girl, of course. We can be on the same level of flyness. What you buy?”

  I sighed. I hated admitting this…even to Naja. “I don’t have any extra money this week. I had to pay for the twins’ school pictures, Mica’s school trip, and I had to buy Ny’eem a bus card. I’m broke. And all I have left is like fifty dollars.”

  “Dang, that ain’t hardly enough and you need five dollars added to that just to get your nails and feet done. We can make arrangements with Tamara down the hall from you to do your hair. What about the booster, Lisa?”

  “She got locked up last week.”

  “Damn, and you know you definitely can’t wear no old gear.”

  “Maybe tho
ugh,” I said hopeful, “no one we know will be there.”

  “Elite, this is the biggest concert of the year. Everybody and their stepmama will be there.”

  “I know…maybe…you know…I shouldn’t—”

  “Girl, I know you ain’t about to trip like maybe you shouldn’t go?” She sighed. “Damn, Elite, so what we gon’ do?” She placed both elbows on the counter and put her chin in her palms. “I got it,” she popped her head up and said as if a lightbulb had just gone off. “Maybe…you know, hmph.”

  “Would you just tell me!”

  She popped her gums, “Why don’t—nah, you won’t do it.”

  “What?” I said, aggravated.

  “Nah, you won’t do it.”

  “What?!”

  “Nah.”

  “Would you say it! I hate when people do that!”

  “Okay, since you beggin’ and everything.” She laughed. “Why don’t you know, you borrow a li’l sumthin’-sumthin’ from the store?”

  “What store? This store?”

  “Uhmm hmm.”

  I waved my hand—it was obvious she’d lost her mind. “You crazy as hell. And who gon’ come bail me out when I go to jail? My mother is a crack-head—she done smoked all the bail money away. Girl please, you buggin’.”

  “Look, you’re the assistant manager. You can delete the tape, take the gear, and bring it back after the concert if you’d like. It’s nothin’. That’s why I said borrow, and if it’ll make you feel better, I’ll borrow something, too.”

  “I’m not—” I was interrupted by my cell phone ringing. It was Jahaad and I sent his ass straight to voicemail. I didn’t feel like being aggravated with an argument. And besides, he knew my minutes were low. “Now, Naja, back to you—”

  “Oh look,” a female voice interrupted me. “I do believe we know the hired help.” When we looked toward the door, it was Ciera.

  “Is this the part where I punch her in the face,” Naja said, more as a statement than a question.