On the Come Up(9)

Rule number two of battling—use the circumstances to your advantage. Supreme doesn’t look too worried, but trust: He should be.

That goes in my arsenal.

Rule number three—if there’s a beat, make sure your flow fits it like a glove. Flow is the rhythm of the rhymes, and every word, every syllable, affects it. Even the way a word is pronounced can change the flow. While most people know Snoop and Dre for “Deep Cover,” one time I found a remake of it by this rapper named Big Pun on YouTube. His flow on this song was one of the best I’ve ever heard in my life.

Maybe I can mimic it.

Maybe I can wipe that dumb smirk off Milez’s face.

Maybe I can actually win.

Milez stops, and the beat fades off. He gets a couple of cheers, but not many. The Ring loves punch lines, not weak lines about yourself.

“Okay, I hear you,” Hype says. “Bri, your go!”

My ideas are spread out like puzzle pieces. Now I gotta put them all together into something that makes sense.

The beat starts again. I nod along. There’s nothing but me, the music, and Milez.

The words have strung themselves together into rhymes and into a flow, and I let it all come tumbling out.

Ready for war, Milez? Nah, you fucked up this time.

Should address this cipher to the writer, The biter, who really wrote them rhymes.

Come at Brianna, you wanna get buried?

Spit like a legend, feminine weapon, I reckon your own father’s worried.

Bow down, baby, get down on your knees.

You got paper, but I’m greater.

Ask your clique, and while you at it ask Supreme.

Straight from the Garden where people dearly departin’.

Screw a pardon, I’m hardened, And Milez’s heart is on back of milk cartons.

It’s MIA, and this is judgment— I stop. The crowd is going bananas. B-a-n-a-n-a-s.

“What?” Hype shouts. “What?”

Even the rough-and-tough-looking dudes bounce up and down with their fists at their mouths going, “Ohhhh!”

“What?” Hype shouts again, and he plays a siren. The siren. The one he uses when an MC spits something dope.

I, Brianna Marie Jackson, got the siren.

Holy shit.

“She came with the pun flow!” Hype says. “Somebody get a water hose! We can’t handle the heat! We can’t handle it!”

This is magical. I thought the reactions I’d get when I freestyled for Aunt Pooh’s friends were something. This is a new level, like when Luke went from being just Luke to Jedi-ass Luke.

“Milez, I’m sorry, but she murdered you in a couple of bars,” Hype says. “Call the DA! This is a homicide scene! Judges, what y’all think?”

All of them lift signs with my name on it.

The crowd goes wilder.

“Bri wins it!” Hype says.

Milez nervously rubs the peach fuzz on his chin.

I grin. Got him.

“Let’s get to the final round,” Hype says. “We’re at a tie, and whoever wins this one wins it all. Bri, who goes first?”

“Him,” I say. “Let him get his garbage out the way.”

A bunch of oohs echo around us. Yeah, I said it.

“Milez, you better come correct,” Hype says. “Let’s get it!”

The beat starts—“Shook Ones,” by Mobb Deep. It’s slower than “Deep Cover,” but it’s perfect for freestyling. In every YouTube battle I watched, shit got real whenever that beat dropped.

Milez glares at me as he raps. Something about how much money he has, how many girls like him, his clothes, his jewelry, the gangster life he’s living. Repetitive. Stale. Prewritten.

I gotta go for the kill.

Here I am, going at him as if I don’t have any manners. Manners. A lot of words rhyme with that if I deliver them right. Cameras. Rappers. Pamper. Hammer—MC Hammer. Vanilla Ice. Hip-hop heads consider them pop stars, not real rappers. I can compare him to them.

I gotta get my signature line in there—you can only spell “brilliant” by first spelling Bri. Aunt Pooh once pointed that out right before teasing me about being such a perfectionist.

Perfection. I can use that. Perfection, protection, election. Election—presidents. Presidents are leaders. Leader. Either. Ether, like that song where Nas went in on Jay-Z.

I need to get something in there about his name too. Milez. Miles per hour. Speed. Light speed. Then I need to end with something about myself.

Milez lowers the mic. There are a couple of cheers. Supreme claps, yet his face is hard.

“Okay, I see you, Milez!” Hype says. “Bri, you better bring the heat!”

The instrumental starts up again. Aunt Pooh said I only get one chance to let everybody and their momma know who I am.

So I take it.

My apologies, see, I forgot my manners.

I get on the mic ’cause it’s my life. You show off for girls and cameras.

You a pop star, not a rapper. A Vanilla Ice or a Hammer.

Y’all hear this crap he dumping out? Somebody get him a Pamper.

And a crown for me. The best have heard about me.

You can only spell “brilliant” by first spelling Bri.

You see, naturally, I do my shit with perfection.

Better call a bodyguard ’cause you gon’ need some protection, And on this here election, the people crown a new leader.