The Other Black Girl

by Zakiya Dalila Harris

  A year earlier, when Owen and Nella had found themselves strolling through Clinton Hill arm in arm, more than a little buzzed off overpriced apple juice spritzers, she had jokingly asked him how many app downloads it would take for them to be able to afford to buy in that neighborhood. “Let’s just say we’d need to make a YouTube channel, and I’d need to learn how to braid,” Owen had replied. Nella had laughed and squeezed his arm, admittedly giddy with delight—partly from the overpriced spritzers, but also from the realization that Owen was in fact watching those cheesy interracial couple videos she sent him. They were intended as gags, but they were also ways of saying Hey, look at this—aren’t you glad we’re not these people?

  But now, as Nella made her way up the steep steps of Hazel’s Huxtable-inspired brownstone, hoisting her long, flowing skirt above her ankles so that she didn’t trip, fall, and bust her face on the way up, she remembered why people wanted to become “those people” in the first place. She wanted a vestibule to put a coat rack and a bike in. Neither of these things were something she particularly needed to own, but she liked the notion of at least having the option.

  “Well, what are you waiting for?” Malaika leaned against the railing. “The sooner we get up in here, the sooner we can confirm this bitch’s real name, pull out her fake dreadlocks, and then get the fuck out.”

  “The abridged version of the plan. I like it,” Nella joked, even though she was starting to wonder if bringing her friend had been a mistake. It had taken her much longer to convince Malaika to come along to this natural hair party than it had taken to drag her to the Young, Black ’n’ Lit Girls reading, and her resistance was palpable. When they’d met up for a quick dinner beforehand, a Puerto Rican kid no older than eight had entered the burrito spot wearing a navy-blue Adidas tracksuit and a gold chain; Malaika hadn’t said one word about it when she normally would’ve given him a high five for his outfit. And when a white guy passed by them on the street rapping “99 Problems,” Malaika hadn’t lingered to see if he rapped the n-word, either.

  Nella nudged her playfully. “He-ey. You owe me for all that Pitbull, remember?”

  “Pretty sure you’d already owed me at that point. Which means now you’re going to owe me again. But this is going to count double, I think. Yeah. So, now you double-owe me.”

  “This is going to suck as much for me as it will for you. But just remember what we discussed: We pretend we don’t have any problems with Hazel, so we can get rid of the problem that is Hazel.”

  “That’s exactly what I just said, but fine.”

  “Right. Whatever. Okay.” Nella reached up and pressed both buzzers. Hazel materialized in front of them, locs posted high atop her head.

  The muscles in the back of Nella’s neck slackened. She didn’t know what she would’ve done if a maid had answered. Probably gone home and cried into yet another sad meal of cheap Chinese takeout. “Haze! Hey.”

  “Nell! You made it!” Hazel rushed to hug her, as though they hadn’t been seated across from each other a mere three hours earlier. Meanwhile, Nella could feel the chill coming off her friend a few feet away as she waited to be greeted. Even still, she made an effort to grab Malaika’s arm and tell Hazel how excited they were to be in this very vestibule.

  “It’s lovely,” Malaika added flatly.

  “Thank you! Melanie, right?”

  “Close, but a little Blacker. Malaika.”

  “Right. You work for that big exercise guy, right?”

  “Igor Ivanov.”

  “Right. I just love his IG,” Hazel said, straightening the hem of her black T-shirt. It was the most casual Nella had ever seen her dressed, she realized, taking in the girl’s purple leggings and her lime-green pair of fuzzy socks. She felt overdressed. It had been silly, really, for her to have worn the same cream-colored lacy blouse that she’d worn to work to a natural hair party, where she would most likely be shedding bits of hair and hair grease all over it. But it was too late to worry about that now.

  “It’s a shame we couldn’t properly meet at Curl Central a few weeks back,” Hazel added.

  “Yeah. Well.” Malaika cleared her throat. Nella did, too, feeling a bit like a child who had stupidly rounded up her divorced parents for a dreaded school function. She craned her neck over Hazel’s shoulder. At the end of the hallway, she saw a sheer yellow curtain that seemed to serve as a door for another room. “That must be where the party is. And where Anita Baker is, it sounds like?”

  Hazel perked up. “Mm-hmm. That’s the foyer. I’ve told Manny this has to be one of the first songs we play at our wedding,” she said, starting toward the music.

  Nella practically felt the air change as Malaika sucked her teeth. “Such a good choice. Is Manny going to be here tonight?” she asked, hopeful.

  “Nah, I told him girls only. He’s out with the boys.”

  Damn. Manny was supposed to be her way in. She considered excusing herself to the bathroom and texting the person she’d spoken to on the phone to say that things were already taking a turn from the plan. But she didn’t trust that Malaika wouldn’t get into trouble without her.

  Plus, it wasn’t like Nella wouldn’t be meeting a handful of other women that she could size up. She could already hear bits of their laughter bubbling beneath Anita’s crooning. “Girls’ nights are what I’m all about,” she said.

  “He was disappointed, of course,” Hazel added, leading them first past a huge rubber tree plant, then past a small vintage wooden table that was home to three framed photos. Nella peered closely at the largest one: a six-by-nine black-and-white picture of four smiling Black folks who appeared to be no older than twenty-five or so. She was able to steal only a brief glance at the other two photos, although it was obvious from their faded condition that those, too, had been captured in another time. Hazel was in neither of them. “He has long, curly hair that he takes really great care of. Better care than I do of mine, actually.”

  “Better care than you do? Now, I find that hard to believe,” Malaika piped up from somewhere behind them.

  Nella froze. There it was: nudge-nudge number one. It had been stupid of her to show that photo of non-dreadlocked Hazel to Malaika, she decided, but it was too late to change that. Once she was positive Hazel was too busy leading them toward the living room to notice, Nella turned and shot Malaika a look. Stop it, she mouthed.

  Malaika pretended not to see, feigning interest in an antique-looking mirror that was hanging on the left side of the hallway.

  “What was that?”

  Nella felt a touch of whiplash as she spun to look forward once more. Hazel had paused and was looking back at the two of them curiously. Anita finished and a livelier En Vogue song started up.

  “I was just admiring this intricate bronze frame. This mirror is so lovely.”

  “Oh, that old thing? Thanks, Mal. That was Manny’s grandma’s. This was her home since the seventies; her daughter gave us this place when she passed.”

  Malaika nodded solemnly. “How nice. ‘Malaika,’ please. Not ‘Mal.’ Thanks.”

  “Um, wow—look at that! Are these Manny’s grandparents here?” Nella practically shouted, pointing at the old black-and-white photo of the smiling couple she’d been eyeing a few seconds before.

  “No, those are mine,” she said. “This was taken the day before they rode down to Washington for King’s march. All four of my grandparents marched together, which I think is pretty cool.”

  For just a split second, Nella forgot to breathe. “Very cool.”

  Hazel cocked her head slightly. Nella could practically see the gears turning in the girl’s head as they turned in her own. What year had Hazel said her grandfather died protesting busing when they were at Nico’s all those months ago? 1961?

  And the year of the march… 1963. Her father had quizzed her on such facts when she was a teenager, around the same time he’d given her that copy of Burning Heart.

  “My grandmother remarried,” Hazel said, almost in
stantly. “He’s my stepgrandfather, but the word ‘step’ gets so messy…”

  But it was too late. “Yes,” Nella said, nodding satisfactorily. “It’s so admirable that she was able to move on.”

  Malaika looked from her friend to the enemy, confused. But Hazel ignored her and continued walking.

  Nella exhaled a puff of air she hadn’t realized that she’d been holding in. “So, how many are you expecting tonight?”

  “There’ll be seven of us, total.”

  “Great. Friends from college, or—?”

  “A real mix,” said Hazel. “I know them from all over the place. You know how you pick up friends along the way—at college, different jobs, different places in life… all that.”

  “Mmm. It’s really something that you still keep in touch with them all, even after you’ve moved around so much.”

  “Yeah, it is. You know, I prefer when the number for these things is a bit lower, at about three,” said Hazel, at last leading them through a prewar awning. “It means everybody can get a little more attention. But when I put out the bait, everybody bit. And speaking of everybody…” She paused in the doorway so she could make an announcement to the women who were already sitting in the yellow-orange glow of the living room. “Ladies, I’d like you to meet Nella and Malaika. Nell, Mal—” She moved out of the way so they could enter the foyer, too. “This is everybody.”

  “It’s Malaika,” she said sternly. At the same time, Nella heard a cackle come from the green paisley armchair in the right corner of the room, which was all but swallowing a brown girl with an Elaine Brown–sized afro who had been flipping through a magazine before they walked in. On the floor, a curvier Black girl with skin the color of Nella’s palms rolled her eyes and nudged Juanita, who was sitting behind her on the big sofa, hands in her hair. Juanita just shook her head and continued to grease the girl’s scalp.

  Nella bit her lip anxiously. She put up her hand and flicked her wrist in that awkward, beauty pageant way that she always did when she felt out of place and didn’t know what to do with her appendages. “Hi, everybody.”

  The girl in the paisley armchair was still snickering when Juanita spoke. “Dang, Hazel. We don’t even get names? Sheesh.”

  “She said, ‘There go everybody,’ ” the girl on the floor added, before gently pulling away from Juanita so she could stand up and shake Nella’s hand, then Malaika’s. “I’m Ebonee.”

  “Kiara,” Elaine Brown’s hair heir said, waving her magazine. That it was an issue of Harper’s didn’t escape Nella, nor did the fact that she had a pen in her hand, as though she were marking it up.

  “And you remember Juanita, right?”

  “Of course. Good to see you again,” said Nella. Malaika bobbed her head and managed a weak hello.

  Hazel looked around the room as Nella and Malaika moved to take seats on the two empty cushions that had been placed on either side of Ebonee. “Where’s Camille?”

  “She had to step out,” said Juanita. “Something about having to call her boo because he was getting off work and he likes to talk to her for at least half of his commute home.”

  Malaika helped herself to a handful of blue corn tortilla chips that were sitting on what appeared to be a small square IKEA-looking table in the middle of the room—the only piece of furniture, Nella noted with interest, that actually seemed to be from IKEA. Everything else around them looked like it had been owned and cherished for some time. The green-and-beige cushion she’d chosen to sit on was just as squishy as Kiara’s armchair looked, and the artwork on the walls—lots of black figures that were supposed to represent humans in various states of joy painted against miscellaneous bright backdrops—were reminiscent of another time. Between two of these paintings, standing tall at maybe six feet or so, was a dusty yet obstinate money tree plant that had to have been around when Bush was in office. Maybe even the first Bush.

  “Camille’s boyfriend gets off work at eight thirty p.m.?” asked Malaika, incredulous, as though she’d known Camille her entire life. “What does he do?”

  “He works at an insurance company.” Hazel lowered herself onto the open seat next to Manny’s sister. “But he lives in… where does he live again, Eb?”

  “Somewhere out West. Colorado, I think.”

  “Doesn’t he live in Montana?” asked Juanita.

  Ebonee snorted. “Like I remember. Aren’t they basically the same?”

  “He lives in Missoula,” Kiara interjected, flipping a page in her magazine.

  Nella nearly choked on her potato chip. “Missoula?”

  “Uh-huh. At least, that fine snack she was showing me pictures of on her phone lives in Missoula. And he looked fresh out of a Patagonia ad, so.” Kiara shrugged her bare shoulders, two muscular knobs beneath a periwinkle wifebeater.

  “You been there?” Hazel asked Nella, surprised.

  Nella shook her head. “No, I just—is that where Camille is from, too?”

  “Believe it or not, yes. She’s part of that small point-five percent of Black people who grew up there.”

  “Now that’s something,” Malaika said.

  Nella regarded her friend, who appeared at ease now that she’d seen Hazel’s friends really did have mouths instead of the multiple rows of leech teeth she’d presumed before arriving. But when Malaika caught her eye, that ease quickly transformed into concern. She wrinkled her eyebrow, as though to ask, You good?

  Nella wasn’t good. Far from it.

  She swallowed and glanced over at Hazel, who had grabbed a satchel from behind the couch and was now starting to take out long, vibrant pieces of fabric. “I picked up a bunch of these last weekend—you know, from that African fabric store I got India’s scarf at,” Hazel said, holding up a black scarf with rows and rows of tiny white and red diamonds. “They were having a sale, two for twenty-five. Take a look and see which one you want?”

  “Those are gorgeous,” said Malaika, taking the satchel from Hazel so she could pass it to Nella. “Nell, that black-and-red one would look great on you.”

  Nella accepted the bag awkwardly, still hung up on Missoula, and still getting weird eyes from Malaika. She considered pulling her friend aside to tell her that maybe coming here wasn’t such a good idea after all, but she knew how it would look for the two of them to go off and have a private conversation at an intimate party such as this one: rude at best; suspicious at worst.

  Nella plucked the scarf Malaika had pointed out and held it up to the light. “I think this one’s the winner,” she said, setting the satchel on the ground between her feet.

  “Nice choice. Wanna slide on over here? I can try a few different scarf styles on you and then you can pick which ones you want to learn how to do.”

  “Sounds great.” Nella removed the large black elastic from her hair and slid her cushion over so that her shoulders rested against Hazel’s knees. The act alone sent a jolt of memory up her back muscles. As Hazel stuck her hands in Nella’s hair, giving it a superficial feel and then roaming her way around, Nella couldn’t help but recall how many times she’d done this exact same thing with her mother back when she was a kid, and her grandmother, too, whenever her father took her out there to visit and she wanted her grandbaby girl to have freshly done braids. In almost every instance, she’d hated it: when she was getting cornrows; when she was getting DIY relaxers (the year that Nella’s mother said they needed to start “cutting back”); when she had to sit through her mother’s tedious soap operas; when her grandmother insisted on pressing the curler so close to her forehead that she could feel her skin sizzling, even if “it’s not touching!” like Grandma always promised. Nella was tender-headed; always had been. Restless, too.

  But there’d also been something profound in those moments. Something intangible. This something was in the look that her friends gave her when she told them how many hours she’d spent sitting between her mother’s legs watching the 227 marathon that had been on TV One that weekend (then, explaining what
227 was); it was in the nature of this elongated physical contact that most non-Black teenagers didn’t have with their mothers, but she did. And it was in the little things such contact—however many hours of time she’d spent with hands in her hair—taught her about the women in her family. Hair-care regimens, passed down from both sides. Patience, until the fine line of impatience settled over the whole scene like a bad odor. Perfectionism.

  Nella had adapted and incorporated a few of these elements into her own hair-care routines as she’d gotten older. But the one that she didn’t consciously remember holding on to was the one that drew her to getting her hair done in the first place. Wasn’t that part of what had attracted her to the idea of going natural, anyway? Being able to do it herself?

  Even still, she relaxed her shoulders as she felt the poking of a comb, and when she felt a few bobby pins here and there, she let every hint of apprehension go. She forgot about being mistaken for the other Black girl in the office. She forgot about that girl who’d gotten shoved into the backseat of a car. And she forgot about that awful pickaninny cover. She relaxed so much, really, that she didn’t flinch when she felt the shocking coolness of something creamy touch her scalp. In fact, she leaned into it, welcomed it, as though the substance had been a part of her body all along.

  “What’s that?”

  Nella jumped at the sound of Malaika’s voice so close to her ear. Opening her eyes—had she closed them? She didn’t recall doing so—she watched wordlessly as her friend dipped her nose close to her scalp so she could smell it.

  “Just some hair grease that I’ve been using for a while. It’s called Smooth’d Out. I think I gave Nella a jar of this back when you guys came to Curl Central.”