Lighter Shade of Brown (Urban Fiction) BWHM

Chapter 1 Part 2

The inside of the old school Chevy was covered in golden-bronze velvet. She'd never seen anything like it so close up before. Sure, the dope boys in the Ninth put bass in their rides and maybe even threw on a paint job to jazz the car up a bit, but that was about as far as they would go. Nobody in the projects had that type of money to put into a car. Even if they did, something like C's car would not make it through the night. The only thing that would be left in the morning would be the car frame.

A moment later the car backed out of the lot, taking with it her last chance to change her mind about rolling with them. On edge and a little out of sorts, she planted her fist on both sides of her in the plush velvet of the seat. She kept both eyes laser focused on the back of their heads. Ant leaned forward to hit a button on what looked like the radio. Cleo braced herself, expecting boom to come thumping out of the speakers. Instead a miniature sized t.v. flipped open from the console. "What kinds of music you like..."Ant cut an eye at her over his shoulder. "Damn, what's your name?"

"Cleo."

"What?" C's asked, eyeing her in the rear-view.

"My name," Cleo settled back in her seat. "It's Cleo, and I listen to anything that sounds good."

"Is Cleo short for Cleopatra?" Ant asked.

"Cleo's short for nothing." Cleo leaned forward and lifted her chin. "Why?"

"Damn calm down, trouble." C's laughed as he turned on Martin Luther King Avenue. He pressed a button on the tiny t.v. screen and the car erupted in hammering thunder. Cleo couldn't make out any of the words coming from the speakers. Rhythmic vibrations echoed through her chest. At first she found the new sensation weird. Soon though, the violation began to relax her. After a few minutes of riding, the tension drained from her muscles. Her body melted into the plushness of the seat. Not long after that C's pulled the Chevy into a drive way in Latin Paradise, Diego Circle.

Diego Circle was a ghetto Cul-de-Sac that housed a block of two story town houses. Most of the houses in the Circle had overgrown lawns and patio doors with holy screens. A few yards even had cars sitting on bricks. People of Latino descent dominated the neighborhood. If you weren't from there you didn't go there. And she, a dark skin black chick, definitely was not from there.

Chica negras, rarely found themselves mixing it up with hombres from that side of the track. If Latino dudes wanted to step outside their race, they normally did it with a white chick not a sistah. Especially not a sistah from the Ninth. They usually thought chickens from the projects were beneath them. She'd admit it, the Circle was a step up from the Ninth...but not by much.

As soon as C's cut the engine he climbed out of the car and Ant followed. Cleo looked around before getting out. There were a group of Latino boys across the street bench pressing weights in the yard. The guys greeted C's and Ant in a fluent string of Spanish that she didn't understand. They talked to the group of boys for a minute, and then turned to go into the house. She watched Ant go in but C's stopped on the porch and turned around to frown. Shaking his head, he walked to the car and yanked open the backseat door.

"I didn't invite you to my house to sit in the car." C's leaned against the door and folded his arms across his chest.

"Is it cool for me to be here?" Cleo asked looking over her shoulder to eye the group of guys across the streets.

"Yeah," C's held out a hand to her, "if I say it's cool, then it's cool. You with me now. I dare a mother fucker to try and fuck with you."

Cleo held eye contact with C's for a moment. She had learned at an early age not to put her trust in people, but something about the way he stared at her let her know his word was bond. She'd bet dollars to no money that he walked it like he talked it. For the second time that day she placed her hand in his. With little effort, he pulled her from the car. As she stood, they came chest to chest. The small buds at the tips of her breast pebbled. Embarrassment burned her like a flame. Oh God! Please don't let him feel them. She cut her eyes up at him in time to see a lopsided grin settle on his face. Unable to hold eye contact, she lowered her gaze. The one day she decided not to wear a trainy, is the one day she had to shove her ta-ta's into a dude she barely knew. And why in the world were they standing up anyway? It wasn't even cold out. Truth be sold, she was burning the hell up.