Who You Wit'?

by Paula Chase

  “So that’s what I said to her?” He cocked his right eyebrow. “That I was coming to DC to see her?”

  “You may as well have said it, Brian.” Mina wanted to stay angry, but the fear returned, making her feel cold. She walked toward the warmth of the family room, and Brian caught her by the elbow.

  “Did I tell her in the IM that I was coming to see her?”

  He held her elbow gently, his gaze intent, not letting go. It forced her to look back.

  “No,” she answered meekly.

  “You knew I was going to DC next weekend. My aunt asked me to help her paint her house. And JZ and Todd are going with me. Remember?” Brian said. He sat atop one of the stools at the counter and pulled Mina toward him. “So what part of the IM are you so hot about?”

  Mina blinked, and the tears rolled again. If this was what it was going to be like when he went off to college, she might as well check herself into the nearest mental facility. She was already a basket case.

  She forced the IM from her mind. All she wanted was for Brian to hold her until August fifteenth, the dreaded day he’d hit the road to Durham.

  The words to answer him wouldn’t come.

  Instead, she wept quietly and let herself be pulled into his embrace.

  He kissed her ear, then whispered, “You were ready head to DC and drop them bows on her, weren’t you, toughie?”

  Mina chuckled through the tears, sniffling as she nodded.

  She lifted her face to Brian’s, and they kissed…and kissed, and this time when it went beyond the kissing, she didn’t stop.

  Virginity Pact

  “Time may change me, But I can’t trace time.”

  —David Bowie, “Changes”

  Lizzie knew something was wrong when Mina and Brian stepped through the door.

  No, not wrong. Different, she thought, watching Mina and Brian weave through the crowded tables of the Ria. Brian stopped to give pounds or handshakes to people, and Mina waited patiently behind him each time until they moved on.

  Normally, Mina would be running her mouth, chatting it up with everyone they passed, or she’d say quick hellos and make a beeline for the clique. As they got closer, Lizzie could see Mina’s eyes were rimmed in red.

  They had probably had a fight. Then again, Lizzie couldn’t say that for sure.

  With the countdown to Brian’s departure imminent, Mina had been moody lately. One minute, happy and soaring, babbling nonstop about prom; the next, sad and sullen, thinking about life without Brian. She was testy with everyone. It wasn’t far-fetched to think Mina had burst into tears spontaneously thinking about him leaving.

  Lizzie was still trying to get used to her best friend’s seesawing emotions.

  Once the couple reached the table, JZ greeted them with a reprimand. “It’s about time. We starving, waiting on y’all.” He and Brian exchanged a pound before Brian made the rounds to Todd and Michael. JZ scowled at Mina. “What’s wrong with you?”

  Mina rolled her eyes at him. “Now, since when you wait on anybody to order food?” She took the open seat next to Kelly. “Sorry, Lizzie, Cinny, Michael, Kelly, and Todd, that we took so long. Brian had to clean out the pool first.”

  Lizzie watched as Mina’s sullen demeanor slowly slipped away.

  Minutes later, she was her old self, deep in several conversations, talking across the table to Michael about her prom dress, asking Lizzie about her upcoming driver’s license test, and fending off a sleeper hold from JZ, who found a reason to pick at Mina like a big brother unable to resist tripping up his younger one.

  The two of them exchanged playful barbs, going at it with their usual lusty verve.

  JZ flexed his muscle and patted his arm, bragging about his sculpted frame.

  Mina rolled her eyes, cutting him with a swift, “Man, nobody want feel those guns, except Cinny.”

  Jacinta’s mouth dropped open. “How did I get in this?”

  There was a raucous round of snickering. Jacinta and JZ’s mutual flirting was a thing of urban legend among the clique—something they knew was taking place, yet played down or outright ignored.

  “Let’s see what those guns do for you if Raheem bust up in here and see you and Cinny all cozy,” Mina said. Her eyes gleamed playfully.

  “Ay, no disrespect to your man, Cinny, but you know I can handle mine if he start tripping,” JZ said.

  “Mina, why you starting stuff?” Jacinta’s rolled her eyes. “Y’all know me and JZ…”

  The entire table chorused, “Just friends,” breaking them all up again, even Jacinta.

  Lizzie rode the energy of her friends, feeding off their banter and dissing. She loved the nights they all hung out.

  Nights that she and Todd hooked up with Mina and Brian to watch movies or play games at one of their homes were great, too, except inevitably they turned into make-out sessions—either Mina and Brian off in one corner, or if they were home alone, them in the family room, she and Todd in the living room, or sometimes, Mina and Brian left and went to his house. As much as Lizzie enjoyed it, preventing the make-outs from going twenty minutes or beyond was exhausting. It was the group outings she truly loved.

  By the time the pizzas arrived, the Ria was on full blast, and the clique’s banter mixed in with the general chaos of the restaurant. Soon, the musical chairs began, everyone hopping from their own table to their classmates’, catching up on life, talking about the upcoming prom and summer plans. By ten-thirty, Lizzie had forgotten about Mina’s red-rimmed eyes. And if Mina had been mad at Brian earlier, she wasn’t by then. Whenever the two of them were at the table together, they were touching, holding hands, and smiling at one another.

  Watching them, Lizzie knew this was the weekend she’d better bring up the pact, before it was too late.

  But she didn’t think about it again until the next morning as she and the girls lounged in Mina’s room.

  Kelly and Lizzie lay stretched out on Mina’s bed. Mina sat atop her desk, cross-legged, staring at the posters on her wall, and Jacinta was stretched out on the floor reading a magazine. Having exhausted the topic of last night, they lazily debated if they wanted breakfast as music buzzed quietly in the background. No one was motivated to move beyond the bedroom, except Jacinta, who had gone to the bathroom a record four times since they’d woken up a half hour before.

  With a lull in the debate, Lizzie popped up abruptly, the bed bouncing her like a trampoline. The girls eyed her sudden movement with idle curiosity.

  Lizzie held up two fingers. “Okay, two words, guys…virginity pact.” She beamed, smiling into her friends’ confused faces as if she’d just invented the cure for cancer.

  Mina’s eyebrows jumped as if startled before settling back down. She picked up a blue and gold stress ball and stretched and pulled at its rubbery, dangling tentacles. She glanced at Lizzie before gazing over her head at the wall, the tentacles expanding as her fingers worked it overtime.

  Jacinta looked up from the floor, her face caught between amusement and boredom, dropped the magazine she was flipping through, and pushed herself to a standing position. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. But obviously, I’m out.” Before ducking out of the room she said, “Talk amongst yourselves about this new wild idea Lizzie has.”

  Kelly and Mina teetered. No one had to ask Jacinta what she meant. She and Raheem were going on nearly four years together, if you didn’t count the time off during breakups, two and counting since the December of their freshman year. It was no secret their relationship was well past any sort of pact of abstinence.

  “I’ll bite,” Kelly said. Her usual caramel complexion had a tawny glow from a recent trip to Hawaii with her mom, step-dad, and younger brother. With her thick chestnut hair, newly highlighted with dirty blond streaks, pulled back, she looked like she’d just stepped off a Seventeen mag photo shoot. She sat up, too, pushing her back against the wall, pressing Liz for more details. “I mean, I know what a virginity pact is but…”

&
nbsp; “Okay, before you guys shoot me down, listen,” Lizzie interrupted. She hugged Mina’s body pillow to her, crushing it as she squeezed. Her eyes went a brilliant green, something that happened whenever she was excited. “Now that Mina and I have officially been able to date…”

  “You want to take half the fun out of it by pledging to not have sex?” Cinny deadpanned, popping back into the room.

  “I thought you were in the bathroom.” Lizzie scowled, not hiding her annoyance with Jacinta’s flippant attitude toward her idea.

  “False alarm.” Jacinta took a seat in the chair next to the desk. “But my bad…go ahead, Liz. This sounds like a fascinating idea,” she said in a voice that sounded as thrilled as someone doing a play-by-play of paint drying.

  Mina swatted at her to hush.

  “No harm, Mina, but this is Brian’s senior year. Y’all have what…” Jacinta furrowed her brows in concentration as she calculated. “Four months before he goes off to school? I can’t see you wanting to make this pact right when he’s ready to have even more chicks to choose from…college girls at that.”

  Lizzie cut her eyes at Jacinta. She wasn’t going to let Jacinta win this one with her “I’m the relationship expert” bravado. This time last year, the girls were on collective lockdown, thanks to a secret road trip to O.C. to watch Mina and the Select Varsity team compete at Nationals. Not that she was blaming Jacinta for it. Lizzie had gone along willingly enough. But the trip, one part thrill, two parts disaster, had made Lizzie realize that she wasn’t ready to go from zero to sixty with her relationship with Todd—no matter how good it felt to spend time with him.

  “Cinny, are you saying that Mina’s going to have to have sex with Brian just because he’s ready to leave?” Lizzie rolled her eyes. The pillow caved in more as she dug into it. “That’s crazy…and if anything, the fact that he’s leaving is all the more reason she may as well not.” She made sympathetic eyes at Mina. “Don’t take this wrong, Mina, but…look, you’re already down about him leaving. I think if you guys get any closer, it will be even harder in August.” She took the challenge back to Jacinta. “Besides, they’ve held off all this long. What’s the big deal?”

  “Shoot, you just made my point for me. They’ve been together a year and a half.” Jacinta’s eyebrow rose to a skeptical steeple. “I can’t believe Brian’s been so patient. But I know he’s expecting some sort of early graduation present on prom night.”

  She nudged Mina, smiling.

  Mina’s brown sugar face remained expressionless. Lizzie took her lack of smile or laughter at Jacinta’s sarcastic hint as a small victory. She broke out in a toothy grin. But the poor rubber ball’s tentacles were stretched to their limits as Mina stretched and pulled, stretched and pulled them methodically. Lizzie knew something was bothering her. She silently chastised herself. In her excitement about the pact, she’d broken an unspoken friend rule. She and Mina were the alpha friends of the quartet—she should have talked this over with Mina before presenting it to the whole group.

  Having been best friends since fourth grade, by all rights, they could discuss serious friend stuff outside of the group without it being sneaky. They should have been presenting this as, “Hey, look what me and Mina are going to do.”

  But friend protocol was Mina’s department, not Lizzie’s. The pact had been on her mind so much lately, she’d been excited about finally sharing it.

  Before she had a chance to analyze it further, Mina’s voice, heavy with distraction, prompted her on. “Go ahead, Liz. Tell us about the pact.”

  Relieved, Lizzie threw a pillow at Jacinta’s head to signal her annoyance had passed and that they were cool again. This wasn’t the first time they’d been on the extreme ends of this topic. Truth be told, Lizzie always felt there was a silent tug-of-war between them for Mina’s “vote” whenever they disagreed—a light air of friction that surfaced anytime she and Jacinta didn’t see eye-to-eye.

  Lizzie wondered if Jacinta felt it, too. Her eyes fell on Jacinta, sitting in the chair next to Mina’s desk, her elbow on Mina’s lap, her other hand cuffing the pillow Lizzie had just thrown at her. She didn’t seem annoyed, bothered, or upset in the least.

  The tension was very real to Lizzie. Whenever she and Jacinta were at odds, a tiny pebble lodged itself in her chest, a hard, cold feeling that spread as she worried whose side Mina would pick.

  This isn’t a competition, she told herself. But as soon as she thought it, she immediately went into overdrive, working to get Mina on her side.

  Cinny wasn’t going to win this one.

  Lizzie cleared her throat.

  “Look, I’m serious. We all have boyfriends now…”

  “Not me,” Kelly said. She groaned at Lizzie’s open sympathy. “Okay, don’t give me that look. Am I that pathetic?”

  “No,” Mina spoke up. “And if I have anything to do with it, you won’t be single long anyway.”

  “And you know, once she sets her Cupid’s bow and arrow on you, it’s as good as done,” Lizzie said, making the girls laugh and getting a tiny smile out of Mina.

  Everyone was aware that the second Mina found out that Greg Canon, a quiet, but friendly chocolate cutie from her Spanish class needed tutoring, she’d known just the tutor to send him to. She’d slipped Kelly’s number to Greg, a junior and the only black dude on the lacrosse team, and practically demanded that he call Kelly to arrange a tutoring session. Kelly had tutored him for two weeks before heading to Hawaii. Their sessions started up again Monday to ensure he passed the upcoming Spanish final. Lizzie knew Mina had been working behind the scenes to make sure the tutoring turned into a date soon.

  “Well, you can still take the pact for when you do get a boyfriend,” Lizzie said, giving Kelly one more sorry look. “If we take the pact together, it makes it easier to stick to it. You know?”

  Her neck slow craned as she looked from Mina to Kelly for confirmation.

  Kelly nodded, but Mina remained oddly detached.

  Lizzie paid it no mind. When she had Mina to herself, she’d go all best friend on her and get them on the same page. For now, Lizzie focused the pact on herself.

  “I’m just not ready to take it there with Todd,” she admitted.

  “I wasn’t with Angel, either,” Kelly said.

  “Mi?” Lizzie said. Her eyes asked her best friend what her mouth didn’t—“how about you?” But Mina was silent. Lizzie couldn’t read her face. She pressed more than she had intended.

  “I think it would take the pressure off with Brian.” She smiled weakly. “No more ninety-nine percent nights.”

  They’d all had them—nights where make-out sessions went that-close to something more before they pulled back.

  Lizzie chuckled and continued, “I think a pact is easier. But you could always try the Lizzie O’ Reilly method for abstinence.”

  “I gotta hear this. What is it?” Jacinta asked, near laughing already.

  They exchanged a childish second, sticking their tongues out at one another before Lizzie went on and sheepishly admitted to the girls about her alarm system.

  Jacinta’s eyes widened. “Lizzie, un-ah. And Todd hasn’t called you on why your phone always goes off?”

  “Nope. But when it goes off, I pull back and either start a new conversation or ask him to drop me home or whatever.” Lizzie’s shoulders popped. “It works for me.”

  Jacinta shook her head in wonder. “Seriously, y’all bobblehead ’burb girls got a plan for everything. Timed make-out sessions? I think I’ve heard it all.”

  “Why fifteen minutes?” Kelly asked.

  Lizzie’s shoulders shook as she laughed to herself. “Because usually, by fifteen minutes, he’s completely in the zone and moving to unbuttoning, and it’s when I’m really, really close to letting him.” She shrugged. “The alarm literally wakes me up from how good making out feels.”

  “Okay, I’m not sure I want to stop that badly,” Mina said with an apologetic smile.

  Lizzi
e smiled back, but it was plastic. She wanted Mina to agree that there were ways to not do it, not shoot down her suggestions.

  “See, that’s what I don’t get.” Jacinta frowned. “If you want to do it…just do it.”

  “But I don’t,” Lizzie said. She fixed her eyes on Mina. “I mean, I really, really like Todd.”

  “You left some reallys out, didn’t you?” Mina teased.

  They giggled. “Okay, really, really, really, really like Todd.” Lizzie sat up straight. “I admit I like him a lot. But that’s my point. I like him so much he’s distracting. Remember my B on my Chem test?”

  Jacinta laughed, not unkindly. “First of all, in our world, there’s nothing wrong with getting a B, Miss Liz.”

  “I know that’s right,” Mina said. She unfolded her legs and leaned back on her hands, warming up to the conversation.

  “Second,” Jacinta continued, “if you’re doing all that, setting alarms and whatnot, just tell the boy you not down and save him the trouble of trying so hard.” She snorted. “You are going to tell him you’re officially refusing to do the nasty, right?”

  “First of all, I wouldn’t call it that,” Lizzie said. She flipped her hair primly. “Second, it’s totally my decision to do this. I’m not trying to be funny, but what does Todd have to do with something I’m choosing to do?”

  “Hmm…let me think…” Jacinta looked to the ceiling. She rolled her eyes. “Because he’s your boyfriend, Lizzie. How you goin’ take a pact not to have sex and not let the boy know?” She raised her eyebrow. “You plan on the alarm thing working every time? Just how dumb is Todd?”

  “He is not dumb, Cinny,” Lizzie snapped, glaring.

  “Liz, you know Jacinta was just trying to be funny,” Mina said. She kneed Jacinta in the elbow.

  “You know I love T, Lizzie,” Jacinta said, taking the hint. “But real talk, you’re treating him like he’s stupid by going through all this. Just tell the boy…or are you afraid he gonna break up with you once you do?”