The Other Black Girl(66)
“This one’s supposed to make you less anxious,” said the girl with all the metal in her mouth, whose black cabbie hat and box braids were a clear homage to Janet circa Poetic Justice. “Maybe this’ll help me with the SAT?”
“Nahhh,” her friend replied. “Go with the Serenity Spray instead. My sister swears by it. And you know she got into Fordham Law.”
Nella held back a knowing chuckle at the idea of a spray that promised serenity in a world doomed by horrific school shootings and senseless church bombings and irreversible global warming. But as she and Malaika turned a corner, her amusement at their earnest exchange deepened to envy as she thought of all those youthful years of hair she’d lost out on thanks to chemical relaxers. How big her fro would be now if she hadn’t hated her roots so much then.
She couldn’t dwell too hard on this, though, because Malaika suddenly stopped and let out one loud, ear-piercing shriek.
“Sweet lord. It’s even better than I imagined it would be!”
Nella moved forward to see what Malaika was freaking out about. The squeal had been well earned. Standing tall in front of them, showered in a bright beam of white light, was a laminated, life-sized cardboard cutout of Miss Iesha B. herself. Atop each side of her head were two honey-colored buns that were the size of Cinnabon rolls. Her lips were freckled with rose-gold glitter lipstick, and she had one gloved hand on her hip while the other held a blow-dryer with its nose pointed up, Blaxploitation-style. If not for the Kente-cloth-patterned smock that was tightly tied around her waist, or the speech bubble coming out of her mouth that said “I’M HAIR TO HELP,” Nella would have assumed this woman was not Miss Iesha B. at all, but a heroine from a graphic novel.
“What in the…” Nella said, trying to keep her giggles contained.
Malaika started to cackle with reckless abandon. “Shit, do we think they sell this apron here? I’d rather spend forty bucks on that instead of the book.”
Nella’s shoulders were shaking. “Shhh. One of them might hear us.”
“?‘I’m hair to help.’ What else do you think they came up with? ‘I’ll be hair for you’? ‘Iesha B. here, your friendly neighborhood psycho-hair-apist’?”
“Mal!”
“I’m sorry. This is just too funny. I’m sorry,” she repeated, her voice still at full volume. She turned around so she could position herself for a selfie. “I gotta send this to my cousin. She’s studying cosmetology.”
Embarrassed, but not quite enough to shush her friend again, Nella picked up a copy of Black Hairapy: Ten Ways to Key into the Power of Your Locs, skimming its pages for the kernels of truth that the copy on the Curl Central website had promised Miss Iesha B. would deliver. The writing wasn’t bad, but judging by the font—three times too big in her opinion—it was pretty obvious that the book had been made in someone’s basement. She turned it around to study its spine. It was a Wagner-inspired habit that drove Owen just a little bit bonkers every time she did it, especially when they were in someone else’s home, and she felt a touch of relief that he hadn’t arrived at Curl Central just yet.
Nella put the book down, ready to hop into the photo with Malaika and Miss Iesha B., when a voice trilled, “Remember, all proceeds go to the school!”
They turned around quickly, busted. It was Juanita Morejón in the flesh, looking just as she had in the photo Nella had seen of her online, high-waisted skirt and crop top and all—except this time, her ensemble was decorated with black-and-white horizontal stripes. “And all purchases come with a half-priced drink!”
“Yes, I’ve heard,” Nella said, smiling brightly and holding out a hand. “That’s awesome. Juanita, right? Nella. I work with Hazel at Wagner Books.”
“Oh! You’re Nella. It’s so nice to meet you! I’ve heard so much about you,” Juanita said. Before Nella could prepare herself, Juanita was pulling her into an unexpectedly tight embrace that she didn’t think she’d earned. The hug was soft and smelled a lot like cocoa butter, and the familiarity of the scent put Nella a little more at ease. “Hazel isn’t here yet. I think she was taking the Young, Black ’n’ Lit girls out for dinner before they read tonight. Isn’t that sweet?”
She hesitated far too long, prompting Nella to contribute a reluctant “cool.”
“But we are both so glad you could make it. She mentioned that tonight you had an important meeting with an agent?” To accentuate this last word, Juanita held up her long, pointy fake fingernails, which glittered and twitched in full spirit-finger mode.
“We ended up rescheduling. Turned out the person I was supposed to meet with couldn’t do any other time today, and I didn’t want to miss this.”
Malaika coughed beside her—not because she was uncomfortable with not having been formally introduced to Juanita, but because she’d been particularly vocal about Nella’s sacrifice.
For a bunch of high school girls you’ve never met? Malaika had asked.
For the culture! Nella had repeated.
“This is my friend Malaika. She didn’t want to miss this, either. She’s a huge fan of poetry.”
Two out of three of these statements were untruths, but in the dimmed lighting, Nella knew Juanita couldn’t see the treacherous look Malaika was throwing her way. “Welcome, welcome, welcome! So glad you could come, too,” Juanita said, pushing back one of her long curly tendrils with her razor of a pinky nail. For whatever reason, Malaika did not receive a bone-crushing hug; it was better this way for the both of them, Nella knew. “Please—if you have any questions about any of our products, let me know. If this is your first time here, though, I highly recommend scheduling an appointment with Miss Iesha B. before doing anything else. She’ll happily tell you which products you might try in order to get through your hair ups and downs.”