A Black Girl (Book 1)

Stupid Young Girl

Here's what I think of high school right now, it sucks. It's like the pettiest stuff happens here and it continues in a cycle until it's passed on to everyone in sight. It's a disease, high school I mean.

Perfectly on cue, a tiny red bone girl with Asiatic features and wavy hair walks past our table with her posse of plastics surrounding her. It's Josselyn, and boy is she happy about something.

I'm not one to play the 'typical angry black woman' and stomp off before I've gotten the deets, so I bite the tip of my tongue to ward off the nasty words and calm myself. Jamals grown rigid once again behind me, but I swear I can hear his heart beating--ready to pounce out of his chest.

"When was this Jamal?"

DJ and Cameron look elsewhere, they find interest in every little thing. DJ, digs in his backpack, even though I know for a fact that it contains nothing except for a bare notebook and one pencil. Cameron, pretends to be engrossed in his phone, but all the while he's sneaking peeks at me and Jamal.

"Bae," Jamal laughs and wraps his arms tight around my waist, "You gonna listen to these two assholes?"

His voice, it's a contradiction, the proper him and the hood him are battling it out. His fear is leaking through, his sweat penetrates the air, salty.

"Jamal," I bite my tongue harder and swallow down all the rage that's building up. Why won't he give me a direct answer, "When did you do it?"

"Rosh--Babe--bae? Can we talk about this later?"

He won't answer me. This mofo is really not going to answer me.

And the sad thing is that I know he did it. I know Jamal, I've been friends with Jamal, I know him. I know when he's trying to keep something hidden and I know when he's desperately clinging on to something.

I can smell his desperation in the air.

But I don't pity him. There's no pity for a man...no excuse me a boy, who won't tell his girlfriend the truth.

"I can't believe you," I shake my head and wrap my hands around his tight hold, I use my fingers like claws to wrench his hands away, he struggles.

"Bae," He pleads, his voice warbles, his voice softens, "Bae," he whispers, "Don't go."

It usually works in the movies, the guy pleads and he sounds so sincere that the girl's heart is pricked. She believes that he has to be sorry, that he loves her and that he would never mean to hurt her. And she usually stays, until something else happens and she tells herself that she's an idiot for waiting it out.

I don't want to be that idiot.

I dig my fingernails into his flesh like a savage woman seeking blood, a maenad, Dionysus' frenzied maiden. With a yelp and a curse he releases me, rubs his hands while I clumsily climb over the seat attached to the cafeteria table and readjust the strap of my satchel bag between my breast.

"Damnit Ni, why you gotta be so vicious?"

Josselyn and her cronies are not too far away. She sits upon her throne, the cafeteria table that she owns right now with her perfect little ass, slender crossed legs and her long wavy hair. She's just like Jamals ex, she flips her hair over one shoulder and she smiles at me.

She's been waiting. Why didn't I see it before? How long has it been since she messed with him? Did she do it more than once? Is she still doing it? Is she laughing at me?

A hot pool of tears gather behind my eyes and I blink them away as I stand there immobilized. I'm trying to grasp the severity of this situation, something else is about to happen, this isn't the end of it. I can feel it, war is near.

But I don't want to fight it, I'm not going to fight for Jamal.

"Why you gotta be such a whore Jamal?" I snap back.

Normal black girls from the hood would have said something not so dignified, or proper for that manner. Choice words would have been exchanged, but I'm not in the mood to be a stereotypical black girl and I'm also not in the mood to cry in front of two hundred or so vulturous black students.

I back away from the table and I can see jamals eyes widening with each back step I take. He whispers his pleas, he's too afraid to say them out loud, he doesn't want other people to hear him.

That's fine.

I roll my eyes and shake my head with a sour laugh.

"Roshni," he whispers with his eyes darting from me to the rest of the cafeteria, "we can talk about this later babe."

"No," I fold my arms, "we can't." and walk out of the cafeteria.

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I don't have a way home after school. Usually Jamal takes me home, or I ride the bus, but I don't want to do either. I skip seventh period and start walking home on foot, it's ok, I could use the exercise.

The walk is long and it's hot, by the end of the first twenty minutes I'm sweating profusely and my cell phone is vibrating in my pocket. Jamal.

I'm hurt. Honestly. And I don't want to cry, but I do. The tears won't stop either, but it's not just from the cafeteria incident, it's from what I heard after.

I'm hearing it every where now. Everyone around me has been looking at me with strange eyes. There's rumors about Jamal every where, and it doesn't end with Josselyn. There's Sephira, Aqua and Dejone.

He even messed with a white girl. He said he would never do that.

I don't know which rumors are true and which ones are lies, but I know one thing, one of them has to be true.

I wipe at my eyes and will myself not to cry anymore, but a sob wracks my chest and I feel my jaw muscles forcing my mouth open to wail. I'm the wailing woman, the black banshee crying out in the hot sun for a love that's soon to be lost.

That's the problem. I love him. Stupid young girl. I love him.

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A/N: Sorry for the uber short chapter. The next one will be MUCH longer.

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