Hood Life and Love: It Is What It Is (Sample)

Chapter 8 (E and P)

 We were settling in great, and I liked the neighborhood. There were some girls that lived across the street from me. Stacy and Charmaine, they were pretty cool, so if I got tired of the boys, I hung out with them. They were about my age, but they were always on bullshit, too. So my time with them was limited. Stacy was the party type. She was sixteen like me, but she smoked weed like a champ. She also drank a lot, while I didn't really touch the stuff. Her mom was like sixty and she was sickly so she got away with a lot.

Charmaine was just angry most days. We had never had issues, thank god. However, she argued and fought all the time with everyone else. She even fought Stacy last week. She didn't fight fair either. She was always trying to bust somebody's head or something. She was skinny, but she was strong and crazy. Like a female Leo, her motto was 'anybody can get it'. She made me nervous only because I didn't want beef where I lived anymore and she was probably the baddest scrapper over here besides me.

I had finally straightened out my new room and was ready to invite my cousins over. Yeah, it had taken me damned near three months to straighten up. Mostly because I had been hanging out with the guys. It was now a favorite pastime. They were always doing something. It felt different from my bond with people where I used to live.

The first cousin to every visit and spend the night was Niecy. We had grown up in the same house. We were second cousins. My mom was her mom's auntie, but her mom was older than mine. So when my grandma had my mom, she already had grown children, who were having their own babies. My mom is the youngest of twelve. So they had grown up more like sisters. As a result, Niecy and I were sister cousins.

Niecy was tall and skinny. She was from the east side, which is basically Illinois, but everyone just calls it East St. Louis. She was sixteen too, and fast. According to her, she has already had sex, with multiple people. I had no problem letting her know I had not been with anyone. She had looked at me strange then, like I was the weird one. Peer pressure was not something that bothered me, though, and I let her know she was the strange one.

*****

Neicy didn't know it yet, and neither did I, but she would be the second straw in my slippery slope into chaos. One particular weekend, she came over and we went to get Chinese food. On the way back, we ran into some boys trying to talk to us. They were flirting, but I didn't feel it. My cousin Niecy was all for talking to them, causing my anxiety to rise. It was like a sixth sense knocking on head. I wanted them gone, not that I was hating or nothing. She just did not know how my dudes would react to seeing me walking down the street with these dudes. Last time Christian stomped the dude out, and I felt bad since I knew dude from school. He had just been a friend. In moments like that, the guys never listened to me.

To appease her, I agreed they could walk us to the corner of my street and that's it, and only for my cousin's fast ass. So for two blocks, I was paranoid. I kept looking over my shoulder and I tried walking ahead of them so hopefully I could duck off if need be. I was praying and hoping that we didn't run into any of the boys, especially Christian. While I was bugging out, Neicy was acting like a dumb hoe. Twirling her hair and giggling like crazy. I had nothing against her for being a hoe. That's her business, but I just hated dumb hoes. She was also totally disregarding my eye contact and body language. Her eyes told me she thought I was overreacting. I knew she just didn't understand.

When we got to my street, I stopped and looked down it to my house. Not a soul in sight. I finally let out the breath I wasn't aware I had been holding. If they made a quick getaway, we would be good.

"Niecy, say bye to your lil friend, get his number or something, seriously we need to shake out." I said, keeping my eyes on my house. I sucked my teeth when one boy came to talk to me.