Role Play

by Tu-Shonda L. Whitaker

  Brooklyn couldn’t answer. Instead she picked up the pot, and quietly placed noodles into each of their bowls.

  Chapter 6

  Elle

  She didn’t want to be a man.

  She.

  Did.

  Not.

  Want.

  To.

  Be.

  A.

  Man.

  She didn’t want to piss standing up. She didn’t want to smell like Old Spice, sandalwood, or aftershave. Or trade in her lace panties for boxers or briefs. She didn’t yearn to wear men’s clothing. She didn’t feel like there was a man buried within, dying to come alive.

  She didn’t want to have sex with every girl she saw. She had a type—Sheila.

  And yes, she liked boys . . . a little . . . well enough . . .

  And yes, she wanted to get married.

  And no, she didn’t want to have babies . . . but that didn’t mean she was a panty-lovin’ freak . . . she didn’t think . . . or maybe she was. But still. She didn’t want to be a goddamn man, and she was tired of being forced to prostrate herself before God every morning at the easing in of dawn, and beg to be healed.

  She just wanted to be Elle. A tall, slim, and deep maple–skinned girl who loved poetry, ballet, Jodeci, rap music, pink lipstick, miniskirts, dresses, stilettoes, pearls, and a girl—Sheila . . . whom she hadn’t seen—in a month—when their love was stomped on and tossed out of the house. Which was why, after this morning’s prostration, Elle slipped away from her mother long enough to call and ask Sheila to please meet her at the beach so they could figure out how to be together and happy again.

  Elle blushed as she soaked in Sheila sauntering toward her, the mid-morning sun glistening with every step she took. Her white tank top clung to her chest, highlighting her breasts. Her lavender basketball shorts swayed with the breeze as her bare feet eased through the sinking grains of white sand. And the way her crisp white Jordans hung, one sneaker on each side of her neck—dangling by their shoestrings—made Elle remember the first day she spotted Sheila on the school’s basketball court. She’d boldly walked over to her and said, “Damn, girl, you are soooo freakin’ fly.”

  The butterflies in Elle’s stomach shivered as she ran up to Sheila and squeezed her, wrapping her arms around her.

  Sheila stood stiff, lifting her arms just enough to lightly pat Elle on the back.

  Elle’s butterflies fell flat, and the bottom of her stomach dropped. She forced her lips to stay posed into a smile. It was obvious that Sheila was upset . . . and she had a right to be. But, shit, Elle had been in hell.

  God was obviously pissed off, and didn’t fuck with her anymore.

  Her parents didn’t trust her.

  Her father barely looked at her.

  Her mother measured her every move. And if it wasn’t for a pastors- and politicians-only prayer breakfast, she wouldn’t have been able to slip away today.

  Her car and cell phone were on a time restriction.

  And she was embarrassed and couldn’t think of what to say to Sheila, until now.

  “I missed you,” Elle said, nervously twisting her right foot into the sand. She reached for Sheila’s hand.

  Sheila snatched her hand back and looked Elle over, from her straight black hair that hung off her shoulders to her white, spaghetti-strap minidress. Sheila scoffed. “I can’t tell. I haven’t heard from you in a month.”

  Elle switched from twisting her right foot to her left. She sighed. “I know . . . I know . . . but . . . it’s been rough for me. It’s crazy at home. I’ve been on punishment. My mother barely gives me a moment to breathe. My father doesn’t talk to me.” Her lips trembled.

  Sheila held a blank stare.

  Elle continued, “That night . . . I just didn’t expect my parents to come home . . . and I was—I was embarrassed, and I didn’t know what to say to you.”

  Sheila quipped, “You were embarrassed?! Your father tossed me out of your house by my bare ass and into the street! If it wasn’t for your neighbor who saw me and hurried out of her house with a robe and took me home, it’s no telling what would’ve happened to me! And you mean to tell me that you—my girlfriend—someone I love and who I thought loved me—couldn’t call me to see how I was doing? To see how I made it in? To say, ‘I’m fucking sorry, Sheila!’ And now, today—thirty days later—you have the nerve to call me here, for what? To kiss and make up? You must be crazy.”

  An invisible kick landed in Elle’s chest. She felt herself shrinking. She’d come here to fix things . . . not deal with this. She bit into her bottom lip. “I’m sorry . . . I guess I didn’t think it through . . . but I do love you. A lot. And since you love me too. Can’t we . . . can’t we fix this?”

  “We? Unless you’re speaking French, there’s no we in this.”

  “What are you trying to say?”

  “I’m saying that I won’t be disrespected by your parents. And hidden away by you, like I’m dirty all because you’re confused and your parents refuse to accept you for who you are. No—” She shook her head. “I’ve known since I was ten years old that I liked girls. I am real clear on how I feel and who I am.”

  “And I’m clear on wanting to be with you!” Elle stepped in close to Sheila and pressed her forehead against hers.

  “And I want to be with you too,” Sheila said softly, before taking a step back. “But if we can’t be a couple, out and in the open, being confused and tucked away in the closet with you is not a role I’m willing to play.”

  “You know I can’t come out like that right now. Sheila, I’ve been going through it the last month. And yes, I know I didn’t call you, but I told you why. Just please understand the position that I’m in. I miss you soooo much. Not only as my girlfriend, but as my best friend. I can’t stop thinking about you, and I just . . . want us to be together like we used to be . . . and I know you’re mad . . . and I guess you have a right to be. But don’t be mad at me . . . please.”

  Silence.

  Elle paused. Her eyes scanned the beach, before looking back to Sheila. “Can’t we find a way to get through this? Maybe we can sit down and just come up with a plan. This is our last year in high school. We’ll both be eighteen soon enough, and once we graduate . . . we could both get jobs, get an apartment, and just be together.”

  “Be together . . . like a couple?”

  “Yes, exactly.”

  “And you really think it will be that easy? What about school? I want to go into the marines.”

  “And I want to go college.” Elle forced a smile. “We can do both. We can still get our apartment. You can join the reserves, I can commute to go to school, and we can both work.”

  “No. That’s not what I want.”

  Blood pounded in Elle’s ears. Her heart raced. She needed to say something, anything, to get this back on track. Sheila was the only person she could be herself with. The softest place to fall. The one she could tell everything and anything to. She needed Sheila, and she couldn’t let this end, because if it did, then what would she do? “Dammit, Sheila, what the fuck! I don’t know what to say. I’m looking for the words . . . you know that I love you!” Tears filled Elle’s eyes and eased down her cheeks.

  Sheila walked in closer to Elle and wiped her tears with the backs of her thumbs. “I love you too. I really do.”

  Elle continued, “And you have to see how much I’m trying to make this all up to you. But my life is not easy like yours, it’s hard and too complicated for me to be out like you want me to be! I can’t give you that.”

  “Then I can’t give you me.”

  Silence.

  Sheila wiped more of Elle’s tears. “I feel so sorry for you.”

  “S-sorry for me?” Elle stammered, surprised. Her heavy and tear-filled eyelids made it hard for her to blink. “Sorry for me,” she said more to herself than to Sheila.

  “I do. Because you will always have to pretend to be someone else.”

  Elle couldn’t believe
this was really happening. After all, she’d come here in search of something mystic . . . and this should’ve been the moment when the love ballad swelled, like the dramatic symphony at the end of a romantic movie.

  But it hadn’t.

  And here Elle stood.

  With the girl she loved offering her sympathy, like she was some pathetic loser. Forcing Elle to see that maybe, just maybe, she didn’t have the fairy-tale magic it would take to remake the beast into something sweet.

  Elle felt her chest caving in and her windpipe collapsing.

  What now? What now? What now? What should I say now?

  “There’s nothing more to say.” Sheila shrugged. “Maybe one day we’ll be friends again . . . but not today. Because this. Us. Me and you. We’re through.”

  The sun left.

  The days ran out.

  No more breathing.

  No more moving.

  No more smiling.

  No more possibilities.

  What now?

  Elle stood silent and watched Sheila disappear into the distance.

  Chapter 7

  Brooklyn

  “When is he leavin’?” Brooklyn pushed open the bathroom door, revealing a surprised Bev, who sat crouched on the toilet, her panties pulled down and dangling between her thighs. One end of a short rubber tube was wrapped around her left bicep and the other end was clamped between her front teeth. She looked over to Brooklyn, and they both hesitated.

  Bev dropped the tube from her mouth.

  Brooklyn’s gaze took in the edge of the sink; her eyes skipped from the Bic lighter, the scorched spoon holding a pebble of dope, to the syringe. She turned and looked back to her mother.

  Bev’s dark red hair sprang like wild grass in the front and lay matted in the back. Clear snot eased from her nose and over her cracked lips. Her skin was an ash gray with an array of dark dope sores peppered about. She snorted and her half-mast eyelids fluttered while she blinked her daughter into view. The caked corners of her mouth pulled apart like chewing gum as she said, “I-I done told you ’bout bustin’ in on me! The-the-the hell is wrong with you?” Her words slurred. Her eyes fluttered again.

  Brooklyn stood in the middle of the doorway with her hands shoved up on her hips and a thick Afro ponytail that was gathered at the nape of her neck and bounced as she spoke. “When is he leavin’? He gotta go.”

  Bev wiped her runny nose with the back of her hand. “I’m-I’m warnin’ you. I’m tryna get my mind together.” She licked at the corners of her mouth. “I-I don’t need you in here wearin’ my nerves down . . . and fuckin’ wit’ me . . .” Her voice trailed off.

  “You said he was stayin’ for a night,” Brooklyn insisted.

  Their eyes met.

  Brooklyn continued, “But it’s been a year—and a full run of him stealing our shit and kicking yo’ ass too many times to count—later. Night’s over. He gotta go. And when he’s finally gone, don’t go back down to the Red Lounge, Mama. Now, when is he leaving?” Brooklyn paused, giving Bev the space to answer.

  She didn’t.

  Brooklyn carried on, “He’s in the bed asleep, Mama. And before he wakes up, me and Meechie can throw what little he got here out of the window. What do you think about that?”

  Still nothing.

  “Would you say something?” Brooklyn snapped.

  Slop dribbled down Bev’s chin as she spoke, “I-I think you have lost yo’ damn mind. You-you don’t run up on me, ’specially this early in da mornin’ when you know this is the time that I’m sick. Now I’m wa-warnin’ you, get outta my face. And go on and get you and yo’ sisters ready for school, so I can take my medicine in peace.” She carefully picked up the spoon with one hand and flicked the lighter with the other. “Close the door behind you.”

  “Medicine? That ain’t no medicine. That’s poison. I ain’t stupid. And since we on poison, back to Stony.”

  She eyed Brooklyn. “Str-strike one was you bustin’ up in this here bathroom. Strike two was you up in my face. Now, don’t get to strike three—”

  “When. Is. He. Leavinnnnnnnggg!” Brooklyn stomped her feet.

  Bev placed her works back on the sink. “You-you must be smellin’ yo’self this morning. ’Cause who da fuck is you to question me about anybody I bring up in here, le-let alone my man? I keep tellin’ you, you ain’t nobody’s mama around here, I am!”

  “I can’t tell! ’Cause you don’t do nothin’ for me, or these kids! I do everything!”

  “And what exactly do you do, Brooklyn? ’Cause you don’t pay no rent. You don’t bring no money up in here! You don’t pay no bills, put no clothes on nobody’s back. You just a fresh ass, and the only thing you bring up in here is a goddamn problem!” She paused. Took in a breath and pushed it out. “I-I tell ya what, though, one day you gon’ catch me wrong and find yo’self on the street! ’Cause I swear ’fore God, I am just sick and tired of you!”

  “You sick and tired of me?” Brooklyn eyes bugged as she stepped farther into the bathroom and stood before the toilet. Had this been someone on the street, she would’ve kicked her ass. But this was her mother, so she decided against throwing the first blow and instead said, “Well, I’m tired of you too! Tired of these kids you keep havin’! Tired of all my friends havin’ regular mamas while I got a junkie in the bathroom! Who stay bringing one homeless and dog-ass nigga after the next, after the next, after the next, through here! Tired of you always lyin’ about how they only stayin’ for a night, knowin’ they done moved in! Tired of Stony whisperin’ in my ear and touchin’ me! And fuckin’ me! Tired of you being too doped up and confused to ever do shit! TIREDDDDDDDD!”

  “Strike three!” Bev grabbed the edge of the sink and pushed herself up and into Brooklyn’s face, her panties dropping to her ankles. She balled Brooklyn’s white T-shirt collar in her hand and spat, “You lyin’ li’l bitch! You ain’t nothin’ but a li’l whore! More of a rotten and fucked-up seed than I ever could have imagined would come from me. How could you tell such vicious lies? What kind of child does this? You hate me this much that you don’t wanna see me happy! You gon’ lie on my man—and you know how much he means to me?”

  Brooklyn was paralyzed. Everything in her knotted up. A round of invisible punches landed to her gut, and the only reason she was still standing up was the grip Bev had on her throat. She opened her mouth to say something—anything—but before she could even release a scream, Stony’s voice played in her head, “Who you think she gonna believe?”

  Chapter 8

  Elle

  “Ellaina-Marie!”

  Mother.

  Heat flooded Elle’s face, as she lay on her full-size canopy bed, in a semi-prone positon, leaning on one arm, and staring at Polaroids of Sheila.

  Shit!

  She slid the pictures beneath her pillow.

  Now, roll over. Wait. Not too fast. She’ll suspect something.

  “Elle?”

  Slow-ly . . .

  Elle rolled over and eased her way into sitting up.

  Violet stood a hair away, holding a black-and-white sleeveless dress and black heels in her hands. She studied Elle’s face. “What were you doing?” she asked.

  Think.

  “I was praying, Mother. Asking Jesus to order my steps.”

  Violet stared. Her scowl revealed that she knew Elle had lied. She pointed from the dress to the heels. “These are for you.”

  “Why?”

  “Is that a thank-you?” Violet quipped.

  Elle hesitated. “Well . . . yes . . . but . . . I’m just surprised.”

  Violet patted the space on the bed next to her daughter. “You need to get out of the house.”

  “And go where? It’s not like I have any friends,” Elle said, releasing a flash of frustration.

  “And whose fault is that?”

  Silence.

  Violet continued. “Now, there’s a young people’s social, sponsored by the prayer group. Invitation only. And I’ve arranged for you
to attend.”

  Shocked, and without much thought, Elle let out an irritated cackle. “Psst, please, I’m not going to that.” She shooed the air.

  Violet blinked in disbelief. “Oh, you will go, and you will be happy about it.”

  Elle sucked her teeth. It had been on her mind for some time to take a stand and remind her mother that she was eighteen now. Legally grown. Capable of making decisions on her own. And what better way to start than by refusing to go to this social group–young people’s bullshit.

  Violet continued, “One day you will understand that the reverend and I have only done what is best for you.”

  Lies.

  “Stand up,” Violet said as she reached for Elle’s hand.

  Reluctantly, Elle stood up and Violet guided her to the closet, opened it, and pointed to the full-length mirror that hung on the back of the door. “Look at yourself and tell me what you see.”

  Elle glanced, then shifted her gaze to the pink carpeted floor.

  “See that?”

  “What?

  “The way you couldn’t even look at yourself. That is shame. And shame will never serve you.”

  Elle turned away from the mirror and faced her mother. Her temper sparked. “What will never serve me is always being told what to do by you. I’m eighteen now. I can make decisions for myself.”

  Violet took a step back. “And what decisions would those be, Ellaina-Marie? To be a panty-grabbing harlot—”

  “I am not—!”

  “You couldn’t even look at yourself in the mirror and tell me who you are, and now suddenly you’re capable of telling me who you are not. Little girl, please.”

  Before Elle could respond, Violet continued, “Hear me and hear me well. You will not be groveling behind some woman in the street, or the beach—”

  Elle gasped. “You’ve been following me?!”

  “I don’t have to follow you, I have eyes everywhere.”

  “So you’re having me followed!”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Why are you doing that?!”

  “Because. I. Can. Now, watch your tone.” Violet paused, giving Elle a moment to heed the warning. She continued, “If you know like I know, what you had better do is lay your wickedness down at the cross and ask my God, my forgiving Lord and Savior”—she waved her hands to the heavens—“to heal your wretched soul.”