by Ibi Zoboi
The bell buzzes again, followed by hard pounding. “Open the door, Ebony-Grace!” Bianca shouts.
I start to dial 1-2-5-6, but a flood of voices suddenly pours into the brownstone. Uncle Rich let them in.
“Come on, Ice Cream Sandwich!”
“You can’t ignore us, we ignore you!”
“Don’t act like you can’t hear us, Outer Space Ebony-Grace!”
Uncle Rich walks up behind the 9 Flavas standing in the kitchen’s doorway. “You can hang up now, Ebony. Your friends are here to bring you outside. Go along.”
But I keep dialing Granddaddy’s. If Momma picks up, I’ll just insist that she put Granddaddy on the phone, just like how Momma insists that I do or don’t do this or that. I don’t care about these not-friends. They wouldn’t know what to do with the Genesis Device if it hit them in the head.
“Get your friend, Butter Pecan!” Monique says. “’Cause I’m about to smack her upside her head for being disrespectful!”
“Nuh-uh! You’re the one being disrespectful while I’m trying to call my granddaddy!” I say.
“That’s enough, now, Ebony! Hang up the phone!” Uncle Rich shouts back.
I keep dialing until someone touches my shoulder. It’s Bianca.
“We need you,” she says. “We need you to help us fight the Sonic Boom.”
Everyone’s quiet, including Uncle Rich, who’s looking at me as if I had two heads.
“The Sonic Boom?” I ask just to make sure that I heard it right, and I slowly put the receiver down.
“Yep,” Monique says nodding. “The Sonic Boom!”
“Uh-huh,” adds Rhonda. “The Boom is gonna get us.”
Someone snorts and I can’t tell who it is, but I don’t care. Bianca’s eyes are looking at me as if she really does need my help.
“Please,” she says with a quiet voice.
“Yeah,” Monique says. “Pretty please.”
“More like ugly please,” someone else says.
But I don’t care.
I inhale deep and smile big and bright. I don’t care anymore about the no-laughing rule in No Joke City because it’s time to save the day! “I’m coming for you, Bianca Pluto!” I shout as loud as I can, even while Bianca is standing right there in my face. “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few!”
I say those last few words from Mr. Spock as I push past Monique and Bianca, make my way to the front door, step out onto the stoop, put my hands on my hips, and stare up at the big blue sky here in Planet No Joke City. “I’m ready for you, Sonic Boom!” I shout.
CHAPTER
28
“We didn’t take a vote on her,” Rum Raisin Rhonda says, looking me up and down.
We’re standing at the edge of the open lot down the block. Four torn and dirty mattresses are stacked on top of one another in the middle of dry grass, empty plastic bags, and a bunch of old tires. A group of nefarious minions are lined up in the distance. One minion speeds toward the stack of mattresses and tries to jump over all of them. He misses and lands on the edge, almost falling to the ground. Another minion tries and he makes it to the other side of the mattresses. They all cheer.
“Well, who else we gonna use?” Monique says. “The girls from 1-2-7 got their own thing going. And they might even wanna battle.”
Rum Raisin Rhonda rolls her eyes. “Who made up that stupid rule anyway?”
“It’s math,” Mango Megan says. “Ten for ten. That’s how we battle. Even on both sides. They got ten, we got ten.”
“But they got ten good ones!” Monique says. “We got nine fly ones and . . . a chicken wing.” She glances over at me and rolls her eyes.
“Chicken wing?” Bianca says, coming to my defense.
I push out my chest and fold my arms. I’m here to help her, not those other ice cream cones.
“Yeah. Chicken wing. That’s what she’ll look like when she tries to break-dance.” Monique flaps her arms like a chicken. The ice cream cones laugh, including Bianca.
I roll my eyes hard, just like I’ve seen them all do, putting my neck into it and everything.
“Oh! There go that flava!” Monique says. “I know you can’t be that black and not have some flava in you.”
The cones all cheer as if I’d done something brand-new.
“But she can’t be chilling with us looking like that,” Coconut Collette says with her deep, raspy voice and steps closer to me. She looks me up and down as if I were an alien. And I am!
Monique comes closer to me, too, and stares down at the top of my head. “Your hair looks like the inside of Central Park where the bums don’t even go. Bushy!”
“Ooooooooh!” everybody says at the same time. The boys from the middle of the lot hear Monique’s big mouth and run toward us because even I can recognize a signifying monkey when it’s standing right in front of me.
So I say, “Oh yeah? Well, with that bumpy forehead, you look like Valkris and Commander Kluge’s first baby!” I put my hands on my hips and roll my whole body with the words, just like they do.
“What are you talking about? That’s not a diss. You don’t make no kinda sense,” Monique says.
Bianca pulls me away from her. “She basically said you look like you a Klingon. Now, can we please get on with it? Calvin and them are already practicing, and I bet they got their moves down already. We need this money. And when we get it, we can fix her clothes and her hair later. We’ll have enough to fix all our hair and clothes.”
A sound blasts from across the street, and we all turn to see Stone-Cold Calvin holding a boom box on his shoulder. Behind him are the rest of the nefarious minions coming toward the lot. They don’t walk. They flow like river water, like swaying trees in the breeze, like iridescent sound waves to the beat of the music.
“Where do they think they’re going?” Mango Megan says. “This is our practice spot. They need to go to the junkyard.”
Monique gasps. “Bianca! Look! It’s him. In the green shirt.” She points with her chin and we all stare at the boys.
I spot a boy in the green shirt with a head full of outer-space black curly hair. Then I look at Bianca. Her cheeks are Mars red. Her eyes and whole face look funny. I can’t tell if she wants to smile big and bright, or run away. She looks excited and embarrassed at the same time.
“Who?” I ask.
“I can’t believe he’s with Calvin and them now,” Monique says. “They’re definitely gonna beat us in that contest.”
“Who are you talking about?” I demand. “Who is he?”
“It’s none other than Pablo Jones,” Monique answers, with her eyes and smile as wide as the galaxy. Pablo Jones must be as famous as Michael Jackson.
Vanilla Fudge Vanessa, who’d been sucking her thumb all this time, steps closer to Bianca and starts singing, “Bianca and Pablo sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g.”
“Shut up, Vanessa!” Monique shouts. “Leave her alone! Bianca, don’t lose your cool. You gotta focus.”
Bianca just nods slowly. I stare at her trying to figure her out. So I step closer. “Let me have your thoughts. May I join your mind?” I ask.
But Monique steps in between us. “Child, if you don’t stop with all that craziness, I’ll knock you right back to Alabama. We gotta get ourselves together because those boys will beat us and win that fifty bucks from the block party. Now, keep your mouth shut, Ice Cream Sandwich!”
“No, you . . . ,” I start to say, but Calvin and the minions reach the spot where we’re standing, and they all strike a pose as if someone were about to take their photo. Five of them crouch to the ground and the other five stand back with their arms crossed over their chests. Calvin, still with the boom box on his shoulder, tilts his head back, looks down at us, and rubs his chin as if he were a six-feet-tall Gargamel and we’re all just little blue Smurfs.
The five minions who were crouching down get up and pose with their arms folded, and the five who were standing crouch down in perfect unison. They must’ve practiced for a long time to get that right.
“Lucky Lionel, gimme a beat!” Calvin says, while putting down the boom box and turning off the music.
Another boy puts his hands to his mouth and starts making a sound. A beat. A rhythm. A boom. A bip. A bap. All with his mouth! It’s a teeny-tiny Sonic Boom coming from inside a boy!
Calvin clears his throat and starts, “I’m Cold-Crush Calvin and I’m here to say . . . ” He sways to the beat of the boy’s Sonic Boom mouth. His words move around the rhythm like the sound of piano keys or guitar strings. No. It’s the sound of a whole other drum set! Another boom, bip, bap, ratatatat.
“I rock it to the beat every single day.
On 1-2-5 we’re staying alive,
Breakin’ and rappin’, talkin’ all that jive.
Harlem is the greatest,
Rockin’ all the latest.
My man Dapper Dan
Got us all lookin’ famous!”
Calvin stops with his Sonic Boom words and another boy—Pablo Jones, with the green shirt—is about to begin, but Coconut Collette shouts, “Y’all not no Run-DMC!”
“Uh-huh,” Rum Raisin Rhonda says. “Y’all wanna be the Furious Five, but y’all more like the Tedious Ten!”
“And plus,” Monique adds, “the contest is not for rapping. It’s for the best crew—breaking . . . and double-Dutch!”
“Double-Dutch?” Calvin’s voice cracks, and he laughs. “It ain’t no double-Dutch contest, Nine Flavas. This game is for men, so y’all can get on with your little jump-rope games.”
“Nuh-uh,” Monique says. “You must’ve never heard of the original Roxanne Shanté. My homegirl Butter Pecan Bianca can rap better than both Roxannes and is a fresher B-girl than Baby Love, too. Ain’t that right, Butter Pecan?”
“I’m not better than Baby Love,” Bianca quickly adds. “She’s my idol. I’m not even gonna try to be better than her.”
“You can’t be better than her,” Calvin says. “And I don’t even know why the Rock Steady Crew let a girl in, anyway. That’s why Genesis Ten will never have any . . . what do they call ’em, PJ? B-girls?”
“Genesis?” I ask, but no one is paying attention to me now.
“Oh, is that y’all’s name now? Genesis Ten?” Rhonda asks with her hand on her hip and her face all screwed up.
“That’s right,” Calvin says, cocking his head back again. “Genesis Ten. My main man PJ, tell ’em what time it is.”
PJ in the green shirt steps up and stands just like Calvin with his head tilted back and his arms crossed over his chest, except he does it in a way that makes it look like he’s hugging himself ’cause he’s cold.
“Pablo Jones!” Collette calls out. “You ain’t no rapper. Why you faking it and trying to stand like a B-boy. Your momma will smack you upside your head.” But the minions ignore her.
“Lucky Lionel,” Pablo says with a much softer voice than Calvin’s. “Drop the bass.”
Lionel doesn’t make the beats with his mouth this time. Instead, he presses a button on the boom box, and out comes the bass, the rhythm, the boom, the bip, the bap, the ratatatat.
“I’m Pablo Jupiter,
And your rhymes get stupider.
You mess with me,
and I’ll burn you like Lucifer.
Ashes to stardust, we’re the survivors,
Genesis Ten will destroy all the rivals.”
Calvin stops the music, and the minionettes are as still as the quiet moon. I’m frozen and speechless, too, because I recognize something in his words—Jupiter and Genesis and survivors and rivals. These are the things Star Trek is all about—other planets and new beginnings and war and enemies!
“Genesis Ten, as in . . . the Genesis Device?” I ask, louder this time.
“No, stupid,” Collette says in my face. Spit comes out of her mouth and lands on my forehead. “Genesis as in the first book of the Holy Bible. Pablo Jones is a shepherd for the Lord. I bet that name was his idea.”
Pablo Jones shakes his head. “Yeah, it was my idea. But no, it’s not from the Bible. That weird girl is right. We’re Genesis Ten ’cause we’re like the Genesis Device when we rhyme and dance. With our flow and with our moves, we make everything around come back to life!”
“That’s right, Pablo Jupiter!” Calvin says.
“Jupiter? Like the planet?”
“Shut up, Ice Cream Sandwich!” four of the 9 Flavas yell at the same time.
But I gotta hear what he has to say. Both the minions and minionettes talk over him with their gibberish words that fly as fast as shooting stars, but not with a beat or rhythm, just plain ol’ gibberish.
“Then what’s your name, Calvin?”
“I already told y’all. Cold-Crush Calvin. I will crush you with my rhymes and leave you out in the cold!”
“Y’all sound like Run-DMC wannabes.”
“Y’all got all that mouth, then lemme see what y’all got!” Calvin says.
“Show ’em what time it is, Butter Pecan Bianca.”
My eyes widen and I gasp because Bianca licks both her hands and smooths down her curls as if she were about to do something outta sight. Collette drags a big piece of cardboard and puts it down right in front of us. Bianca steps right to Cold-Crush Calvin and Pablo Jupiter, folds her arms across her chest, cocks her head back, and says, “I don’t need no boom box or a beatbox!”
Monique grabs my arm so I can stand next to her and the other minionettes, and before I know it, they’re doing a two-step, side-to-side dance while clapping and stomping the beat to Bianca’s rap.
“I’m Bianca Pluto and I run the show.
Smooth like butter ’cause I got the flow.
We’re the 9 Flavas kicking the beat,
Fellas step back as I move my feet.
I don’t need no mic ’cause I’m dynamite,
I blow up in your face rocking to this bass.
Gucci. Louis V.
Lee jeans, fresh and clean—
Check my Alligators,
Turn my back, see ya later.”
She kisses two of her fingers and points them in Calvin’s face.
I’m supposed to be clapping to the beat, too, but instead, I watch as Bianca’s words dance right out of her mouth, out of her body, out of her soulglow—her soulshine. And she called herself Bianca Pluto! Pluto like the planet. And that boy in the green shirt called himself Jupiter. And the minions call themselves Genesis Ten like the device. And they’re survivors, with rivals, and space, and bass. This is the Sonic Boom fully activated—pulsing and pounding through words and radios and kids just like me. The 9 Flavas don’t stop clapping even as Bianca gets down to the ground and moves her body like an asteroid. She kicks and spins and dips and dives as if she has no bones. So this can’t be the breaking-bones dance. It’s not even a dance, really. She’s a spinning planet. She’s Saturn’s rings. She’s a shooting star. She’s the universe expanding and contracting.
And it all explodes in a big bang when Pablo Jupiter joins her and they battle on the cardboard with their kicks and spins and headstands and handstands and poses. The Sonic King was right. The Sonic Boom makes you lose all control. It takes over your whole soul.
“You ain’t got no ’Gators!” Calvin shouts when it’s all over. “And you wish you had Gucci and Louis V. You can’t even get no Lees! And y’all not rapping, y’all cheering. Cheerleaders can’t be MCs.”
“Shut up, Calvin!�
� Monique shouts back in his face. He just waves her away.
I guess Pablo Jupiter won that dance battle because he stood on his head the longest. But nobody will tell me.
“Bianca, you need more practice,” Monique says.
“No, I don’t,” Bianca says as the Genesis Ten walk away, cheering and carrying Pablo Jupiter on their shoulders. “I was just saving my best moves for later. Why would I show them my secret moves now, anyway?”
“Good idea,” Monique says. “Now they could go back to the junkyard thinking that they got this in the bag. And we didn’t even show them what we could do with the double-Dutch rope.”
“But, still,” Vanessa says. “Pablo Jupiter is good.”
“Uh-huh. He’s better than Whodini!” Monique adds.
Then, they all talk at the same time.
“Nah, he’s better than Kool Moe Dee, Whodini, and Run-DMC put together!”
“Girl, you crazy. He is not better than no Run-DMC. There’s three of them and PJ is only one person.”
“Well, his flow is better than Roxanne Shanté’s!”
“Everybody’s better than Roxanne Shanté.”
“You shouldn’t say that. She’s a girl MC and we should have her back.”
“Well, Pablo Jupiter needs to hurry and be famous so he can blow Kurtis Blow out the competition ’cause he’s getting played out.”
“You think he’s gonna be on the radio or on TV?”
“Sure is. Watch. He’s gonna be rich.”
“Uh-huh. PJ’s gonna be walking ’round here with the fat gold chain and medallion.”
“And a Dapper Dan Gucci suit.”
“Yep. And a fur coat, too.”
“He’s that good.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, I’m gonna be better!” Bianca shouts over all the gibberish.
I believe her. I will help her, and she will help me.
So when Bianca steps away from the minionettes to tie her shoelaces, I say, “You called yourself Bianca Pluto. Does that mean you’re ready to help me with the Uhura and save Captain Fleet?”