by Ni-Ni Simone
“My homegirl, Isis, gave me that name ’cause I’m always munchin’ on somethin’.” She rattled a bag of Crunchy Cheese Doodles that she had in her hand. “Want some?”
I hesitated. “Umm. Yeah, I’ll take a little.” I held out my hand, and she poured a few into my palm.
“So what’s your name?” she asked.
“Yvette. Isis is my cousin.”
“Oh word? Well any cousin of Isis is automatically my homegirl.” We gave each other a pound. “So welcome to Da Bricks.”
After that, we became the Get Fresh clique: Me, Isis, Munch, and Cali, Munch’s foster sister.
We took our first forty to the head together.
Hid out on the rooftop and hit our first blunt.
Told the same lie about sex being da bomb the first time.
Licked the bodega for jelly bracelets and candy every day after school.
Got mad at the same birds and smacked up any ho that came at us crazy.
We cried together.
Laughed together.
Swore to be best friends forever.
But then things changed.
Last year, Isis got a new boyfriend, named Fresh, who convinced her, Cali, and Munch to run weed for him in school. They asked me to slang wit’ ’em too, but I told ’em no, boostin’ was my thang. Shortly after that, they started chillin’ without me. Movin’ like I was no longer relevant. It hurt, but I tried not to sweat it. Besides, after my mother left, I was used to being alone. So I for sure wasn’t about to chase no hoes and beg ’em to hang with me. Therefore, I let ’em go their way and I went mine.
At least until today.
’Cause today, somebody was gon’ pay.
And since Cali and Isis was nowhere around to catch their own beatdowns, then Munch was gon’ have to take this round for her crew and get tore up for the old and the new.
I guess those few minutes of me drifting into thought gave Munch some balls ’cause she said, “You lookin’ real ridiculous right now. Is you high or somethin’? Asking me did I call you a snitch? And if I did, it’s ’cause that what you is: a snitch!”
Wham! Was the sound of me hookin’ Munch dead in the mouth, causing her bottom lip to bust open and blood to skeet e’rywhere! I gripped a scalp full of her blonde micro-braids and dragged her onto the sidewalk.
Munch’s fists flew through the air like loose windmills, but mine were more controlled and deliberate than that. I swung like I was in the ring.
Two of Munch’s wild fists caught me in the face. One uppercut. One bang to the left eye.
I sailed a right elbow and landed it in the center of her nose. Blood gushed from it and rained over her lips. Then I yanked her down to the ground and did all I could to stomp her guts out.
I heard her screamin’. Gurglin’. Coughin’ somethin’ out.
I heard the crowd buzzin’, and I felt somebody tryna get in between us. I just couldn’t see ’em. All I saw was me spittin’ out my blade and peelin’ the side of this bitch’s face open.
3
Cover Girl
Noon
“Maaaaaaa, here she go!” was my aunt Stick’s version of hello the moment I hit the doorway. “Umm-hmm, look at her. Eye all swollen. Clothes all torn up. This why the cops lookin’ for her.”
Cops?
My heart dropped.
My stomach bubbled.
I needed to use the toilet.
Then jump out the window.
Cops?
Stick looked at me and scrunched her upper lip. “You got too many problems. Is somethin’ wrong witchu?”
Nana’s wide feet slapped the living room floor with each step she took as she rushed from the kitchen towards me. She shoved a pissy and wet-eyed Kamari, who licked snot off her plump pink lips, into my arms.
Nana dusted her hands. “Let me tell yo’ fast li’l behind somethin’, Strumpet. I don’t care where you been. But one thang you don’t do is have the cops comin’ to my door ’cause you doin’ somethin’ dumb out there in the street! Probably on the corner whorin’ for some old man, tryna get pregnant again.”
“Or she gettin’ high, like everybody is sayin’ she doin’, and Scotty got her trippin’,” was Stick’s two cents.
Nana carried on. “Keep it up and you gon’ turn into yo’ mama. And I swear fo’ God”—she waved a fist to the heavens—“I will put yo’ ass out!”
Breathe.
Chill.
Five...
Four...
Three...
Don’t say nothin’.
Just go to your room and think...
I shifted Kamari over to my left hip so I could walk to my room without her soggy Pamper pressin’ into my shirt and soakin’ my skin. Plus Kamari was heavy, and I wasn’t about to stand here strugglin’ to hold her and arguin’ wit’ these two, knowin’ wit’ Kamari in my arms I had no win if one of ’em stole on me.
I took a step toward my room, and Stick blocked my path. “I know you ain’t walkin’ away and Mama is still talkin’ to you?! You ain’t grown! You just an ingrate. Real disrespectful!”
I sucked in a breath. Pushed it out. “Move.”
“And if I don’t? What you gon’ do, huh?” Stick took two steps closer to me. “Mess around and catch a beatdown. I ain’t Munch.”
I blinked. Cleared my throat. And did my best to erase the shock written on my face.
Stick bent over and locked eyes with me. She continued. “That’s right. You ain’t slick, and I know what your li’l snitchin’ behind was out there doin’. Two minutes after you dragged Munch off the bus, people was runnin’ up to me. And an hour after that, the cops was at the door.”
“Whatever.” I ain’t know what else to say.
“Yeah, I know whatever.” She stood up straight and looked over my shoulder at Nana. “Mama, I keep tellin’ you, you need to stop threatenin’ to put her and this baby out and just do it. That li’l money you get for them ain’t even worth the aggravation.”
“Don’t tell me what to do, Stick,” Nana replied.
“I’m just sayin’. You too busy trying to be like Jesus. Well, I got one thing to say: ‘Jesus, meet Judas.’” She pointed into my face.
I wanted to slap Stick so bad my fingertips stung and my palms burned. The only thing stoppin’ me was that I didn’t have a pot to piss in, so I couldn’t take the chance of me and my baby bein’ thrown out.
I stared at Stick, my eyes lettin’ her know the first opportunity I got to knock her out I was gon’ go for broke.
But now was not the time.
Right now, I was tired, had a headache, and needed to catch my breath. After I’d sliced Munch’s face, I’d scuffled with some man tryna hold me down. And just when I thought I couldn’t escape his embrace, I managed to kick him in the sack. He jumped back, and I took off. I cut through two alleyways, a playground, jumped a fence, and ran the long way back to Da Bricks, only to find out that the cops was lookin’ for me.
I just needed some peace so I could get my thoughts straight. Not deal wit’ these two retards.
Especially Nana, who only cared about her liquor, her man, and Jesus. And on occasion, she cared about Stick. I guess ’cause her other five children was either in jail, strung out, or had AIDS, and she was stuck raisin’ they kids.
Stick was Nana’s youngest, fresh outta drug rehab, and maybe Nana saw herself in Stick.
I know I did.
They was both mean, miserable, and hated theyselves, probably just as much as I hated them.
And it didn’t help any that they wasn’t really my family. They was, more or less, like play cousins. My mother’s boyfriend’s family. Nana was really my little brothers’ and sister’s grandmother, and Stick was they aunt, not mine.
Who was I?
The never-ending stranger in the house.
Mother on a drug run.
Father a question mark.
Dumped in this apartment with this fake, sanctified, and nasty old woman, who didn’t
love me, like me, or really want me around. But she kept me here because I added $326.00 to her welfare grant.
Plain and simple.
I bum-rushed past Stick; the edge of my shoulder pushed her outta my way. A few seconds later, I heard Nana say, “Stick! Don’t you touch that girl and she got that baby in her arms! And besides, I don’t want no fightin’ in here! Just let it go! She hardheaded. We try and tell her somethin’ for her own good, and she gives us her backside to kiss. Just g’on and sit down. She ain’t gon’ be nothin’ no way.”
I didn’t even turn around and acknowledge that. I just snatched my room door open and my little cousins, brothers, and sister all tumbled to the floor from being stacked up against the door listening.
“Y’all nosey as I don’t know what.” I shook my head.
They all looked at me in delight before they burst into giggles and scattered into the living room.
I slammed the door behind them, laid Kamari down, and did my best to think of an escape outta here before the cops came back.
4
Lemme Hear You Say . . .
“Y’all know y’all violatin’ me. Y’all know I have the right to remain silent,” I said to the two cops, a Puerto Rican one named Officer Sanchez, who was leanin’ against the door, and a black one, named Officer Thomas, sittin’ on the edge of the metal table I was handcuffed to.
Officer Sanchez smirked. “We only brought you down here for questioning. You’re not under arrest. When we arrest you, then you have the right to remain silent.”
I sat back in my chair and refused to say another word. Maybe they would be quiet and I could get my thoughts together. Figure out how I was gon’ get back to my baby. Otherwise, I was gon’ lose it in here. Tears welled up. But I refused to cry. Instead, I swallowed the wet fire filling my eyes and let it ease into my chest.
I knew I shouldn’t have sliced the side of Munch’s face.
The moment I pushed the edge of my blade into her cheek, I knew I’d made a mistake.
I should’ve gutted her throat.
That woulda shut her up.
Now, I’m sittin’ here, being treated like I’m Ted Bundy, the Cocaine Godmother, or some other off-the-meat-rack maniac.
Ain’t nothin’ crazy or outta control about me.
I’m not no criminal.
All I did was handle my bissness.
Munch knew what time it was.
She knew the rules: If thou cometh for thee, then thee cometh back, ten times harder, for thou.
It’s in the Bible. The Book of Streetlations, verse 101, that starts off with “An eye for an eye.”
Sooo . . . I don’t see the problem.
It is what it is.
But all this was uncalled for—the police bustin’ in Nana’s door around midnight, throwin’ me up against the wall in front of my baby, Nana poppin’ ying-yang ’bout how she ain’t sign up for this. She tired of that. How she ’bout to clean house. Kamari cryin’ ’cause they carryin’ me out kickin’ and screamin’ in handcuffs.
All ’cause Munch wanna bring the ruckus by runnin’ her mouth and ruinin’ my rep. But then can’t take her beatdown like a woman?
Alllll of a sudden she’s some soft li’l girl. I’da had more respect and understandin’ if she had shown up at Nana’s door for another round. Not send the pigs after me. How played is that? Actin’ like she’s some victim. When she’s the one who did me dirty.
Gon’ tell the pigs my name and where me and my daughter lay our heads? When she know all I got is Kamari and all Kamari got is me. Yet, she gon’ spit on that and come after my life? Violate all the codes? Disrespect e’rything?
Oh, hell no.
Now I gotta make her mama scream.
Now I gotta wash her. Completely.
“Yvette, we need to ask you some questions.” Officer Sanchez interrupted my thoughts. “So tell us what happened.”
I looked at him like he was stupid. “So what happened? Psst, please. You can’t be serious. You the one who came to my crib, yanked me outta my bed, had my baby hollerin’ and cryin’, disturbin’ us. And you got the balls to be askin’ me to tell you what happened? You bugged out. How about this: Why don’t you tell me what happened. ’Cause I damn sure wanna know.”
Officer Sanchez snorted while Officer Thomas lit a cigarette and said, “If you wanna play games, we got all night.”
I needed to get back to my baby. I didn’t have another second. Let alone all night. “Whatever.” I tried to swallow the lump in my throat.
“How about this?” Officer Sanchez suggested. “How about I tell you a little of what I know and you fill in the rest? Munch, your friend . . .”
I huffed. “That’s not my friend.”
He hesitated. “Okay. Your ex-friend. Well, seems she pissed you off to the point where you dragged her off the bus, in front of a busload of witnesses, and sliced her face.”
“Lies.”
Officer Thomas arched a brow, blew a string of smoke into the air, and then said, “Lies? Really? What part?”
“All of it. ’Cause, first of all, you see how big that girl is?” I paused and let that sink in. Then I continued, “Now how I’ma drag her off the bus? Second of all, I ain’t slice her face.”
“You admit you were at the bus stop?” Officer Sanchez jumped in, walking over toward the table.
“Yeah. And? So what? Being at the bus stop is a crime now?”
“No.” He stopped walking, folded his arms, and stared at me.
I sucked my teeth. “Then whatchu bringin’ it up for? Don’t y’all have something else to do? Like look for rapists, killers, drug dealers? Pigs kill me. E’rywhere you don’t need ’em to be. Y’all shoulda been over there in Central Park protectin’ that jogger instead of comin’ for me!”
“Back to the matter at hand,” Officer Thomas said, flick-in’ cigarette ashes onto the floor. “When you dragged Munch off the bus and . . .”
“I didn’t drag her big ass off the bus!”
“Then how did she end up on the ground?” Officer Sanchez asked, pacing from one side of the room to the next.
I shrugged.
He stopped pacing. “We have five witnesses, including the bus driver, who all said you did it.”
“Well, if you got all them witnesses, includin’ the bus driver, then what is you sweatin’ me for?” I said.
“Did you slice her face?” Officer Thomas asked.
“I ain’t slice nobody’s face.”
“We have five witnesses . . .”
“Who obviously you don’t believe, because if you did, you wouldn’t be grillin’ me.”
“We’re trying to give you a chance to defend yourself,” Officer Thomas said, mashin’ his cigarette into an ashtray.
“No.” I leaned up as far as I could. “What you doin’ is tryna work my freakin’ nerves. It’s two o’clock in the morning. And I wanna go back home to my baby.”
“Home?” Officer Thomas chuckled, leaning into my ear. “And where is home? According to your grandmother, you can’t go back to her house. And that pretty little baby of yours is getting put out too.”
My throat clogged up and tears kicked their way outta my eyes.
Officer Thomas stood up straight and continued. “Don’t worry; while you sit in here with us, the state will find a nice little foster home for your princess.” He snatched a Kleenex from his side pocket and tried to hand it to me.
I left him hangin’ and pointed into his face, tears fallin’. “My baby ain’t goin’ to no foster home! That’s my baby! And she ain’t livin’ wit’ nobody but me.”
Officer Thomas nodded. “Mmph. Well, young lady, with the route you seem to be taking, you’re pretty much on your way to jail, and they don’t have daycares in there.” He got up from the table, sat down in the chair across from me, and folded his arms; his words hung in the air like a noose.
“Look, I need to get outta here.” More tears fell.
“Tell us what happened and
maybe we can help you get out of here. Did you and Munch have a fight?” said Officer Sanchez.
“I already told you that we did! And she deserved it ’cause she talks too much.”
Officer Thomas interjected, “And you sliced her face to shut her up.”
“I didn’t slice her face!”
“Then where did this blade come from?” He flicked my blade on the table.
The nerves in my stomach balled up and cramps filled my belly. “Maybe that’s Munch’s blade or maybe it’s yours. I don’t know who it belongs to, but I know it don’t belong to me and that’s a fact. Now, from where I’m sittin’, you don’t have no reason to be holdin’ me.”
“We have plenty of reason,” Officer Sanchez said. “The fight alone is enough to charge you with assault.”
My heart dropped. Wasn’t no way I could stay in here. “Charge me? Over a fight? This got to be a joke. You ain’t never had no fight before? I mean, maybe Munch is embarrassed ’cause she caught a beatdown. But, oh well, those are the breaks. Now she’ll learn to shut the hell up! But y’all wantin’ to lock me up is crazy! Tryna say I yanked her off the bus. What I look like, Superfly Snuka? That girl makes two of me!”
“Did you slice her face?” Officer Thomas pressed.
“If I did, she needed it! Munch came for me. Telling people I’ma snitch. That I’m the reason they all got locked up when I ain’t have nothin’ to do wit’ that! I got my own shit goin’ on; what I need to rat on them for? Gon’ ruin my rep and dog me! I can’t even walk the block without e’ry-body lookin’ at me funny! And I should what? Just take that? Let that go? Nah. So, yeah, I beat her ass ’cause she deserved it. But y’all takin’ this too far. Talkin’ to me all crazy like I’m snatchin’ old ladies’ bags or somethin’! Now I already told you, I need to get outta here to go and get my baby!”
Officer Sanchez grimaced. “You should’ve thought about your baby when you yanked your friend off the bus, beat her up, and sliced her face.” He grabbed me by my shoulder and forced me to stand up, while Officer Thomas twisted my arms behind my back and said, “Yvette Simmons, you have the right to remain silent . . .”