Well to Vanessa she was tough. She lived at the bottom of the hill in the projects of Winton Terrace and she always told stories about the dope men that hung out on the corner by the store, or some kid getting snatched and then turning up later only to be taken by 2-4-1 KIDS. If 2-4-1 KIDS took you then you had to live in a foster home—which was the most horrible fate that can befall you. In a foster home you were treated just like some grown ups slave.
Van admired her cousin. She knew everything. She forgave her bossiness because they were blood and even if the younger girl sometimes punched her in the arm too hard she didn’t complain. Jalissa was her only friend. And that was no joke. Her mama didn’t allow her to go to the sleepovers at her classmate’s homes and she wasn’t allowed to go to the park or even to someone’s house after school unless it was to Jalissa’s.
But that was not a place that Vanessa ever wanted to go. And since Jalissa loved coming to the top of the hill that is where they mostly hung out.
“Lets listen to Richard Pryor,” Jalissa exclaimed as if she hadn’t just been completely obnoxious. Vanessa ignored her as she concentrated on not spilling a drop of the wine. It would be her getting a whupping and not Jalissa—and her mother would know if it was watered down, she wasn’t dumb.
Jalissa sighed. “Okay I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. Pleeeeeeeease? We can listen to Sparkle and you can be Sparkle this time.” Jalissa had her palms pressed together as if in prayer and Vanessa relented and smiled. She already knew that Jalissa really preferred being Sister from the movie but because Van preferred being Sparkle, Jalissa would always take that role. Once Van had made the mistake of saying that she should be Sparkle because her hair was longer and Jalissa had punched her in the face and called her stuck-up!
Jalissa’s hair was hopeless. She couldn’t even pull it into a ponytail and sometimes she plastered DAX in it just to make ‘baby hair’. Jalissa was short and pudgy but she had dimples that Vanessa secretly wished she had—not knowing that Jalissa secretly wished that she was tall and lanky with long ‘Indian’ hair like Vanessa’s.
The two friends went to the stereo and listened to Richard Pryor for a while before putting on the well-used album from their favorite movie. They had gone to the Regal Theater to watch it no less than five times; sneaking in on two occasions one Saturday when mama was out all day.
The two girls began to shimmy and shake mimicking the dance steps perfectly. Jalissa belted out the lyrics to Giving Him Something He Can Feel but when Look Into Your Heart began to play, Vanessa sang much more quietly but with an intense fervor. Next they played the soundtrack to Lady sings the Blues and pretended to be Billie Holiday. By that time it was getting dark and time for dinner.
“Is your mama coming home to cook dinner?”
Vanessa shrugged. Her mama said one thing but that didn’t mean she would do it. She would say that she was going to pick her up after school and sometimes Vanessa would wait for half and hour before walking home all the way to the top of the hill—and by that time all of the other kids would have already left and she would have to walk by herself past ‘the building’…and then when she got home she would pray that the key would be under the mat. Most times it was…but when it wasn’t then it got scary.
Her mama had moved them out of the projects of Winton Terrace when she was four years old, but only to the top of the hill in new townhomes called Garden Hilltop. Everyone thought that you had to be rich to live there and Jalissa certainly thought that she was rich. Vanessa had her own bedroom with Princess furniture and dolls and her own record player. She even had an easy bake oven--which was broken, and a tea set that she never played with because there was no one to have tea with.
Vanessa decided that they probably were rich. Her mama had the coolest clothes and drove a Cadillac. When they went places she would put a tape in the deck and they would start singing; ‘Diamond in the back, sunroof top, digging the scene with a gangsta lean oooh ooh.’
After dinner of pork and beans and wieners the girls retreated to Vanessa’s bedroom. The streetlights had come on and all the kids that played hide and seek and basketball in the large front parking lot had gone home. Vanessa sat in her window seat while Jalissa played with her Barbie dolls. She wasn’t allowed outside when her mama wasn’t home—which was most of the times, so she watched from the window. Sometimes the kids would spot her and beg her to come out with her toys and in embarrassment she would hide behind the curtains and watch them secretly.
Jalissa handed her a Barbie doll and joined her on the window seat. Vanessa accepted the doll but at twelve she had long ago lost interest in playing dolls.
“If you had binoculars I bet we could see straight down the hill and into my house.” She stated although she didn’t live in a house. She lived in an apartment where it smelled like pee in the hallway.
Vanessa thought that it was strange to look out her bedroom window and be able to see straight down the hill into Winton Terrace. She squinted and saw the distant figure of a boy riding his bike up the hill. He did it most every evening. She knew because she was always in the window watching when he made his circuit up the hill, around their parking lot, up the second hill and then back down to Winton Terrace.
A lot of boys did this but she noticed him specifically because he was white. There were barely any white people in her neighborhood…unless you counted that lady from India but she was blacker than regular black people even if she had white people’s hair.
“Here comes that white boy on his bike,” she said.
Jalissa squinted. And as the figure grew closer and reached the front parking lot Jalissa scowled.
“That’s Scotty. I bet he stole that bike.”
Vanessa looked at her in surprise. “You know him?”
“No!” She hollered in outrage. “He is white trash. They say his mama sale her coochie on Vine Street!” She hid behind the curtains and yelled out the partially opened window. “Whiteboy! Whatchu doing up here?!”
Vanessa gasped and hid behind the curtains too. She peeked out but the boy didn’t appear to have heard them. Jalissa continued to yell at him calling him whitey, honky, cracker as the boy continued up the second hill. He wasn’t really a boy in the sense that he was older than them; probably already a teenager.
Vanessa’s heart was pounding. She had never called anyone names like that and her face felt hot. She knew it was wrong but it was exciting listening to Jalissa cussing.
Soon Scotty came back down the second hill and Vanessa called out trying to think of something to say. “I see you Scotty but you don’t see me! Haha!”
Jalissa slapped her arm and hard. “Why did you say his name?!” She hissed.
Scotty turned his head in the direction of their parking lot for the first time acknowledging their calls.
He never stopped pedaling but she heard him clear as day, “You better turn out your light. Your mama’s coming,” and then he was on his way back down the hill to Winton Terrace.
Vanessa’s eyes widened when she saw Her mama’s Cadillac heading up the hill.
“Oh my God!” Vanessa scampered away from the window seat and hurried to turn out the light.
“He saw us!” Jalissa squealed.
“No we were behind the curtain-” Vanessa stated.
“But the light was on, so he could probably see us!” The girls quickly scampered into bed. There was school tomorrow and they were supposed to be in bed by nine—regardless of whether or not her mama was home.
“Scotty is going to beat me up…” Jalissa whined.
Vanessa was scared. That boy knew who her mama was. That meant he also knew who she was.
~***~
The next day at school Vanessa stayed on her Ps and Qs. If Scotty was going to beat her up then it would happen at school which is the only opportunity that she got to spend any real time out in the open. Vanessa looked forward to a time when she was old enough to enter the big building for more than just lunch and library. But for to
day she felt lucky that the older kids had class in the main building while her schooling occurred in one of the many trailers made to accommodate all of the children that crowded the ghetto. Next year she would be in the seventh grade and would finally move into that building which held a type of mystique for her. For now the drafty trailers with their window fans in summer and space heaters in winter was all she knew about school.
Vanessa listened to Mrs. Broachcamp talking about apartheid which she knew was like slave times. She knew about slavery because her and mama had watched that show Roots on TV a few months ago. She felt guilty that she had made fun of a person just for being white. People used to make fun of her for having long hair and not looking black enough even though she wasn’t light skinned at all.
‘Your Daddy white?’
‘No. My Daddy’s black!’
Her mother had told her that her father had Indian in his blood but that he was black and beautiful—only he died when she was still a baby. Black was beautiful. Everybody talked about how proud you should be of being black and how they had come from King’s. But when you didn’t quite fit into that mold you were left feeling not quite as beautiful.
She should never have made fun of that boy because he was different. He probably got it worse than she did. She never liked the way it felt when people pointed out her ‘white people hair’ and her narrow nose. For a while she had stuffed tissues into her nostrils hoping to stretch them but when her nose began to hurt and she sneezed blood she was forced to stop.
At recess she hurried to the girl’s clubhouse, which was under the stairs of one of the abandoned trailers. It was one of the few times during the day that she got to hang out with Jalissa who had been held back one year so she was in the fifth instead of the sixth grade.
There was a girl’s ‘gang’ and they were eight strong. Girls needed to band together for protection against the boys so all of the girls kept together during recess. Otherwise something bad could happen like what the boys had done to the new girl that had joined her class.
Donald Miller had caught her alone behind the trailer and had made her pull her dress up and her panties down and then all of the boys had got a look at her. Girls didn’t even wear dresses to school just for that reason. Why didn’t she know that even is she did come from a different school?
The girl never came back to school and none of the boys had gotten into trouble over it because no one could say which boys had been involved. For that reason the girls stuck together because now the boys were even bolder. Now the boys wanted to play tag and instead of hitting you they grabbed your booty or pinched your chest.
“Hey cuz,” Jalissa said while popping Fruit Stripe gum. She must have had the entire huge package in her mouth because all you could smell under the trailer was sugary fruit.
Vanessa ducked beneath the trailer and found a place to sit between her cousin and Carmella Green.
“Hey. You seen him?”
“Nope.”
“Seen who?” A girl with neatly braided hair asked. Her name was Sally but everyone called her Sal since they had to sing that song in music class that went; I had a mule, her name was Sal; fifteen miles on the Erie Canal…
“Scotty Tremont,” Vanessa said while trying to avoid the loose dirt by her feet so they wouldn’t get her white sneakers dirty.
Jalissa glared at her and rolled her eyes.
“Nobody. Mind your business, Sal.” Jalissa said.
Sally gave her cousin a narrowed eyed look. “Who you showing off for, girl?” She then turned her attention back to Vanessa. “Why you looking for Scotty?”
Vanessa looked from Sal to Jalissa who silently threatened to cream her if she talked. Vanessa tried to think of a way to change the subject.
“We ain’t looking for him,” she muttered. “I just want to avoid him.”
“Ha, he steal something from you?”
“Aww!” Another girl hollered. “He stole money out of the teacher’s purse one time and then he got kicked out of school for a week!”
“He’s just trying to be like Tino.” Malinda said while spitting sunflower seed shells onto the ground.
Vanessa scowled in disapproval. “Why do you say that? Just because they’re both white?” She was about to declare that all white people weren’t dope boys and criminals like Tino—because if her suspicions were right Tino was more than just bad news, he was a killer. Malinda continued before she could.
“Nah, girl, because Tino and Scotty are brothers.”
Vanessa sank into misery at that news. Her heart began to thump painfully in her chest. She wanted to cry. Tino was real bad news. He was sixteen or seventeen and had dropped out of school long ago. All he did was shoot dope, steal and beat people up. He would do just about anything for money. He would snatch a chain off your neck or stick you up for your shoes. He’d been in and out of juvie and they said the next time he got busted he was going to jail.
They had to be wrong about that. The two boys couldn’t be brothers because Tino was a Puerto Rican and Scotty was white. Well she guessed that looks didn’t always mean anything. After all she looked like she was mixed and she wasn’t.
Vanessa thought the most frightening thing about Tino is that he was as gorgeous as he was bad. He looked like Epstein from Welcome Back Kotter. He even sported an Afro and sideburns that looked as good as any of the black guys that he hung with.
This time it was her turn to glare at Jalissa. “Did you know about this?”
Her cousin’s mouth popped open. “Well you should have never said his name, dummy!” Her eyes began to fill with tears.
“You two are cousins, don’t fight.” Theresa said. She was twelve like Vanessa but already had breasts the size of a grown lady. This only made her think that she should be the unofficial leader of the gang, which everyone pretty much agreed with. “Nobody’s going to get you while you’re in school. We’re gonna have y’all backs.” Both cousins suddenly looked relieved. “What did you do to him anyways?”
Vanessa glared at her cousin again. “Jalissa called him a honky.”
There were several ooohs and aahhs. “Damn J. You got guts.” Theresa cussed in admiration.
Suddenly Jalissa didn’t look like she wanted to cry but puffed out her chest. She resumed popping her gum, “I was like ‘Whatchu doing up here whiteboy!’”
The girls oohed and aahed again, impressed by the gutsy eleven-year old. From there the conversation moved to how cute Tino was. She’d seen Tino do two things that would never allow her see him as anything but someone to run from.
The first thing is that she saw him throw a match into someone’s car. He was just casually walking down the street and lighting a cigarette. As he walked he tossed the lit match into the open window of the car…and just kept walking. Later she heard that the car had caught on fire and people said that it could have blown up. What she found most unnerving about it is that Tino hadn’t been with anyone. He’d done something like that and it wasn’t to impress his friends.
The second reason she was terrified of Tino—and by far the worst thing is that she suspected something very bad about him, something that he didn’t know she suspected.
There were many things that scared her about being in the ghetto; boys that might catch you and do something bad to you, the dope man…and the vacant building where they had found the dead little girl.
Chapter 2
Mama was waiting for her when she came out of the trailer after school. A smile crossed her face when she saw the white Cadillac with its red interior. Mama was wearing sunglasses and she looked hip like Pam Greer from the movie Coffy. They had seen it at the drive-in even though it showed women with their shirts off. But she didn’t care about that. They always showed that kind of movie at the drive-in and at the Regal Theater and she’d always watched them.
People said that her mother was beautiful and she agreed but was more impressed with just how cool she was. Her mother had to be the best-dressed person at
Cincinnati Bell Telephone where she worked in collections. Some nights she also worked at a club where she tended bar whenever they needed the extra help. That meant a lot of times she was gone at night and on the weekends, which is when Vanessa missed her most.
“Hi baby,” Leelah White greeted her daughter with a big smile as Vanessa climbed into the driver’s seat.
“Hi.” She slammed the door and then threw her jacket into the backseat. Leelah slipped a tape into the deck and Sly and The Family Stone’s If You Want Me To Stay began playing. “You hungry? Let’s go to Tico Taco for dinner. How’s that sound?”
“Yeah!”
As they drove Leelah began to sing and then Vanessa joined her, both mimicking Sly’s screams and shouts and laughing as they did so.
That night while her mother soaked in the bathtub Vanessa watched for the streetlights to go out. Once all of the kids had gone in for the night Vanessa turned off the lamp in her bedroom and stood just behind the curtain. She waited there until she saw the glint of spokes on the hill heading out of the ghetto and toward the hilltop.
Her heart began to hammer in her chest and she stepped back from the curtain. She stood in the shadows but could still see out. A moment later a lone figure could be seen pedaling a bike towards the townhomes of Garden Hilltop.
Scotty Tremont pedaled fast as if the hounds of hell were at his heels. He never stopped to rest but once he got to the parking lot right outside her complex he stood and coasted expertly balancing on the ten-speed. As he ended his circuit, he began pedaling rapidly again, climbing to the second level parking lot where he disappeared from sight long enough to complete the second circuit. She didn’t realize that she was holding her breath until he reappeared and it came out in a gush.
Blonde hair flowed in the air behind him as he pedaled down the steep incline. If she was riding her bike down that hill she would have applied breaks but he didn’t. It seemed as if he wanted to break a speed limit, that maybe he was trying to fly…
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