On the Come Up(12)

Deon nods at me from his seat in the very back, his saxophone case propped up beside him. Deon’s a junior too, but since he’s in the music program, I only ever see him on the bus. “Hey, Bri. Let me get a Snickers.”

I sit a couple of rows ahead of him. “You got Snickers money?”

He tosses me a balled-up dollar. I toss the candy bar back to him.

“Thanks. You killed it in the Ring.”

“You know about that?”

“Yeah. Saw the battle on YouTube. My cousin texted it to me. He said you got next.”

Dang, I got folks talking like that? I definitely had the Ring talking. I could barely get out of there last night without somebody telling me how dope I was. It was the first time I realized I can do this.

I mean, it’s one thing to wanna do something. It’s another to think it’s possible. Rapping has been my dream forever, but dreams aren’t real. You wake up from them or reality makes them seem stupid. Trust, every time my fridge is almost empty, all of my dreams seem stupid. But between my win and Dee-Nice’s deal, anything feels possible right now. Or I’m that desperate for things to change.

The Garden passes by my window. Older folks water their flowers or bring out their trash cans. A couple of cars blast music on high. Seems normal, but things haven’t been the same since the riots. The neighborhood doesn’t feel nearly as safe. Not that the Garden was ever a utopia, hell no, but before I only worried about GDs and Crowns. Now I gotta worry about the cops too? Yeah, people get killed around here, and nah, it’s not always by the police, but Jay says this was like having a stranger come in your house, steal one of your kids, and blame you for it because your family was dysfunctional, while the whole world judges you for being upset.

Zane, a senior with a nose ring, gets on the bus. He’s stuck-up as hell. Sonny says Zane thinks he’s fine, but Sonny and I also agree that he is fine. It’s an internal struggle, being annoyed by his ass and being mesmerized by his face.

And if I’m real, being mesmerized by his ass. Boy’s got a donk.

He never speaks to me, but today he goes, “Your battle was fire, ma!”

Well, goddamn. “Thanks.”

How many people have seen it?

Aja the freshman saw it. She gives me props soon as she gets on. So do Keyona, Nevaeh, and Jabari, the sophomores. Before I know it, I’m the talk of the short bus.

“You got skills, Bri!”

“I was geeking the whole time!”

“Bet she couldn’t beat me in a battle. On God, bruh.”

That little dig is from Curtis Brinkley, this short, wavy-haired, brown-skinned boy who puts a lot of lies on God, bruh. In fifth grade, he claimed that Rihanna was his cousin and that his mom was on the road with her, working as her hairstylist. In sixth grade, he said his mom was on tour with Beyoncé as her hairstylist. Really, his mom was in prison. She still is.

Mr. Watson pulls up at Sonny’s and Malik’s houses. They live next door to each other, but they both come out of Malik’s front door.

I take off my snapback. My edges still need help, but I laid them as best as I could earlier. I put on some lip gloss, too. It’s stupid as hell, but I’m hoping Malik notices.

I notice way too much about him. Like the way his eyes sometimes get this glint about them that makes me think he knows every secret there is about me, and he’s cool with them all. Like the fact that he’s fine, and the fact that he doesn’t realize he’s fine, which somehow makes him even finer. Like the way my heart speeds up every time he says “Breezy.” He’s the only one who calls me that, and when he says it, he stretches it slightly, in a way that nobody else can really imitate. Like he wants the name to only belong to him.

All these feelings started when we were ten. I have this real clear memory of us wrestling in Malik’s front yard. I was the Rock and he was John Cena. We were obsessed with wrestling videos on YouTube. I pinned Malik down, and while sitting on top of him in his front yard, I suddenly wanted to kiss him.

It. Freaked. Me. Out.

So I punched him and said in my best the Rock voice, “I’m laying the smackdown on your candy ass!”

Basically, I tried to ignore my sexual awakening by imitating the Rock.

I was so weirded out by the whole thing. Those feelings didn’t go away either. But I told myself over and over again that he’s Malik. Best friend extraordinaire, Luke to my Leia.

Yet here I am, using my phone to check my Pink Pursuit lip gloss (who comes up with these names?), hoping he’ll see me some kinda way, too. Pathetic.

“Why won’t you admit I whooped that ass?” Sonny asks him as they climb on board.

“Like I said, my controller was acting funny,” Malik claims. “We gotta rematch.”

“Fine. I’ll still whoop your—Briiii!”

Sonny dances down the aisle to a beat nobody hears. When he gets close, he bows like he’s worshipping me. “All hail the Ring queen.”

I laugh. “Queen I am not.”

“Well, you killed it, Yoda.” We slap palms and end with the Wakanda salute. Wakanda forever.

Malik shrugs. “I won’t say I told you so. But I won’t won’t say I didn’t tell you so, either.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” I tell him.

Sonny sits on the seat in front of me. “Nope!”