Just Make Him Beautiful (7 page)

“See that guy over there with the red shorts on?” she said
,
pointing to one of the guys playing basketball with my brother.

“Yeah
,
g
irl
.
W
hew
,
c
hile,” I said
,
fanning myself.

“That’s the guy I was telling you about earlier.”

I watched him run up and down the court.
“Hmmm
.
G
irl
,
he is
fine
,
but don’t you think he’s a little too old for you?”

“N
o
,” she replied with attitude.

“Well, he looks to be around
seventeen
or
eighteen,
and you’re only
thirteen
.
Ms. Thang,
what he gonna do wit
h
you?”

“Humph
.
A
nything he wants
.
”

W
e both broke out laughing.

“Girl, I’m skurd of you,” I responded
,
rolling
my neck from side to side.

I d
id
n’t know what it
wa
s
,
but when
ever
I
was
around Robin, the girl in me just
came
out. I think that’s because I
could be
myself around her
,
and that’s what she expect
ed
from me. I
didn’t
dare act this way around my mother
.
S
he would
’ve
knock
ed
the cowboy shit outta me
,
as she would say.

Robin whispered in my ear
,
“Now
,
all we have to do is get you a boyfriend too
.
”

“
Chile
,
b
oo,” I said
,
rolling my eyes.

“Hmmm
.”
She pointed at
Ray
.
“
I think he would be your type
.
”

I so wanted to tell
Ms. Thang
he was my brother
,
that we sle
pt
in the same bed each and every night
,
that he let me jerk him off from time to time
, b
ut I was afraid she might tell somebody
,
and word would get back to my brother.

The older girls got up from the bleachers and form
ed
a line
.
They
started chanting the name of one of the basketball
players,
saying, “Junior
,
Junior
,
he’s our man
.
I
f he can’t do it
,
nobody can. Junior
,
Junior
,
he’s so great, if you make this basket, I
’
ll be your date.
”

Eventually, Robin got up and started chanting along with the other girls.
“Come on
,
Cameron, join in,”
she
said
,
waving her hand at me to come join them.

I hopped my little fast
yella
ass down
off the bleachers
and joined right in and didn’t give it a second thought. After chanting a few times, I began adding some dance steps along with
the chanting.

“Junior
,
Junior
,
he’s our man
.
I
f he can’t do it
,
nobody can. Junior
,
Junior
,
he’s so great, if you make this basket, I’ll be your date. Y
eah!
” I yelled
,
kicking my legs
high
in the air.
Chile
, I just knew I was the shit. None of them bitches had anything on me.

N
ext thing I kn
e
w, Junior came over
to where I stood and began cussing me out
,
calling me
,
“
faggot this
,”
and
“
faggot that
,”
and then punched me dead in the mouth. My little
yella
ass fell to the ground so hard
,
I swore I heard my ass bone crack. I was in so much pain; I didn’t know what hurt more, my ass or my mouth. All I could do was lay there and cry.

Suddenly, there was a lot of yelling
,
and everyone started to gather over
b
y the basketball court
. I tried to get up but couldn’t. Robin saw that I was having a hard time
,
and she came over to help.

Once I got up, we got closer to the court
,
where
I saw my brother beat Junior’s ass so bad
.
 
I
f
Junior’s
homeboys didn’t stop
Ray
,
he
would have killed
him
right then and there.

“Come on
,
Ray, you made your point
,
bruh. Go inside before you get locked up
,
man,” his boy said
.

Just then
we heard the sound of police sirens coming from all directions.

“You betta run
,
nigga
,” Junior said, as he lay on the ground. He spat blood.  “
I’ma
kill
yo
’
ass
.
”

*

That evening
before
dinner,
Mother
wanted to know what happened to my
lips
, swollen from
Junior
punch
ing
me
in the mouth. I told her I got in a fight at school. But my sister
,
with
her big mouth
,
told my mother that I didn’t get in no fight at school and that I went outside when I wasn’t suppose
d
to and got in a fight
on the basketball court
.

M
other sent me to my room without dinner and told me she was gonna slap the cowboy shit outta me.

Whateva.

I didn’t mind being sent to my room
,
because Ray
had stayed in our room since the fight earlier that day. Don’t get it twisted, he wasn’t hiding out or scared to go outside because of Junior
.
 
H
is boys thought it was best that he stayed in
,
so five-
0
wouldn’t find him out on the street and lock him up.

Besides,
I
was glad he had stayed in, because I
wanted to thank
him
in whatever way
I could
for standing up for me. 
He told me whenever I was ready for some dick
,
to come to him
first,
right
?

Chapter
4

As I entered our bedroom
,
Ray was laying across his bunk listening to rap music on his stereo.
Personally, I d
id
n’t like rap music
,
but Ray seem
ed
to love it.
I climbed up on my bunk without saying a word
,
because once Ray
was
into his music
,
he d
id
n’t like to be disturbed.

After thirty minutes or so, Ray turned off his rap music, turned
on
T
he Quiet Storm
,
and began conversation.

“Hey
,
b
aby
boy.”

“Yeah.”

“What you doin
’
?”

“Nuf’n.”

“
Cool, cool.”

“Hey
,
Ray.”

“
What?
”

“Thanks for standing up for me today.”

“No
p
roblem
,
b
aby
boy
.
A
h, c
an I ask you a question?”

“Yeah.”

“Why do
b
itches get upset wit
h
a nigga when other
b
itches come on to them?”

I
never
kn
e
w why Ray ask
ed
me these kinda questions
about the
relationship between a man and a woman. I guess he
thought
that since I only h
u
ng around females, I
was
close to a being a female without being one
. . .
if that makes sense
.

Lately
,
he’d
been talking to me about his relationship with his girlfriend Jasmine
,
s
ome hoochie he
’d
met at some party about six months ago. I call her a hoochie because she barely w
ore
any clothes
,
wore
these big
-
ass hoop earrings
,
and
was
ghetto as hell. I will give her credit for having a nice body. She
was
about my height, brown skin, small waist
,
and nice little bubble ass
, but o
f course
,
her body
wasn’t
as shapely as mine
. A
nyways, she
thought
she
was
all that because her father
wa
s a doctor and they live
d
in a well
-
to
-
do neighborhood.

“Yo
,
b
aby
boy, you fall asleep or sumf’n?”

“No
.
I was just thinking about your question. So what happened
?
W
hat did you do?” I
knew
my ladies
’
man
-
brother done probably hit on some other hoochie right in front of Jasmine.

“I ain’t do nuf’n. Last weekend I took
her
to this nice restaurant
,
and the waitress, a short
,
sexy honey
,
started coming on to me
,
and
she
got mad at me. And I don’t understand that shit. Why do females do that?”

“
I guess she thinks you might like her better.”

“Like her better? I don’t even know her,” Ray replied
,
sounding frustrated.

“I don’t know
,
Ray
.
M
aybe Jasmine thought the waitress was better
-
looking than
her
.”