The View's Around Me
All my friends had the same feelings on interracial relationships, except for Amber, but I've never encountered someone whose view was quite like my dad's. I remember one time at a sleepover Bridgette was having, we got into a discussion about the boys we would date.
It was when we were about in the eight grade, I was always the one giving advice and I was the one with the shoulder to lean on. I read the most books, so it was decided among our group that I was the one to go to. Every problem they had, I had a solution, or options and consequences for those options. That's why it took my by surprise, that night, when they started to discuss my love life.
"Do you like anyone?" Bridgette asked me. I wasn't expecting to be asked that, so I dropped the popcorn that I was bring to my lips. I shrugged at the comment hoping it would blow over soon, and grabbed a bottle of nail polish.
"Of course, she doesn't like anyone," Rebecca said, "There's no one for her to like." She said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. She was a part of our group until she moved in the middle of the ninth grade. Lydia tried to be her replacement, but she never fit into the group properly.
"What do you mean?" I knew what she meant, so I didn't say anything, it was Amber. I didn't want to know what she meant; it was just drilled into my brain so much by my dad that I had to know what it meant.
"Well, you know," Rebecca, insisted. It shouldn't have shocked me. Rebecca had old fashion parents. If they wouldn't let her date until she was a senior in high school, then why should their views on interracial couples be different from the olden days?
"No. I don't know." Amber was persistent. Her blonde hair was up in a ponytail so you could see her eyes slightly narrow.
Rebecca sighed like she was talking to a moron, "Terry would you please explain it to her, I'm getting annoyed." She didn't want to say it directly. No matter how tough and direct she thought she was and made everyone else think she was, I knew she didn't like confrontation just as much as I didn't like it.
Terry, however, had no problem with spitting out the truth with rather harsh reality. "What she means is, there aren't any popular black boys for her to like," she said without hesitation. I was getting uncomfortable at that point but I didn't show it, I just kept painting my toenail.
"Why does she have to like a black boy?" Amber knew their reasoning, but she was ready for an argument. Her lips were pursed and she raised her legs to her chest sort of, as a shield for whatever she knew was coming.
"Come on, Amber. What's the point in her liking a white boy? She can't have him anyway. Mia has more sense than that. White guys need white girls, and black guys need black girls. Sometimes people mix it up, but we all know that's wrong." I chalked it up to Terry's stupid fourteen-year-old knowledge of the world; I didn't think she actually held those beliefs to heart. I guess I underestimated her thinking.
Bridgette was silent throughout the whole thing, once in a while I'd sneak glances at her she was just calmly shaving her legs, like the conversation wasn't going on at all. I didn't need her participation in the conversation to know she agreed with them. After all, their parents all belonged to the same country club, and attended local function together, why would their opinions be different? I shouldn't have clumped all those people together. Later on in my teenage years, I'd find out not everyone in the society I am in believed all those things.
"That's just stupid, Terry. Shut up. Mia can like whoever the hell she wants to like." Amber might be one for arguments, but she didn't take crap from anyone. I saw her eyes return to their normal state and I knew she didn't think Terry was worth getting into an argument with.
