No Boyz Allowed Read Free Page B

waking up and smelling like rotten orange juice.” I rolled my eyes at the night.
    “Could you stop talking so loud?” Malik said, agitated.
    “I’m not talking loud.”
    “Yes you are.”
    “Whatever, Malik.” I turned over. “I’m going to sleep.”
    “Wait, I need you to wake me up extra early in the morning.”
    “Why?” I frowned.
    “So everybody can think I slept all night in my bed. I don’t want anybody thinking that Baby-Tot-Tot is a punk.” He popped the collar of his Power Rangers pajamas. “Baby-Tot-Tot got heart.”
    “Baby-Tot-Tot is a mess. That whole deal is sooo whack.com.”
    “No it’s not and why you hatin’?”
    “Hatin’?” I said, surprised.
    “Hater to the fullest.”
    Oh, no he didn’t. “Oh, you getting tough?” I tickled Malik in the center of his stomach. “Don’t you ever call me a hater!”
    Malik laughed until he cried. “Okay, okay,” he chuckled. “I won’t call you a hater again.”
    “You better not.” I chuckled and fluffed my pillow under my head. “Now, let’s go to sleep.”
    “Okay,” Malik said as I closed my eyes and drifted into my dream world.
    I could see Drake clearly. He walked toward me and . . .
    “Hey, Gem,” Malik tapped me on the shoulder.
    My eyes popped open. “What?!” I screamed in aggravation.
    “Why are you screaming?”
    “Because I’m trying to get my dream on and you keep messing it up!”
    “Oh,” he said unfazed. “Well, I wanted to tell you that when you ran away I was so scared.”
    I hesitated. I was all set to tell Malik to shut da eff up and go to sleep, but now I couldn’t. “Why were you scared?”
    “I thought I would never see you again. I didn’t want anybody to hurt you.”
    “I’m fine, okay?”
    “Are you going to run away again?”
    “No,” I said, unsure.
    “Okay.” I could hear him smiling.
    “Now can we please go back to sleep?” I practically begged.
    “Yeah,” Malik said as he curled up against me.
    “Move over,” I said. But instead of Malik moving away, he moved closer.
    Whatever. I closed my eyes and drifted back into my lovely dream. “Yo, Gem,” I dreamed Drake saying. “You’re the love of my life.”
    “I know,” I answered back.
    “And there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you.” Drake dropped to one knee. “Will you—”
    “Gem!”
    Oh... hell... no...
    “Gem,” Malik called my name again and I could’ve strangled him.
    “What!” I screamed.
    “Calm down, you don’t have to yell at me.”
    Shoot me. . . . “What . . . do . . . you . . . want . . .?”
    “I don’t want you to be mad at me, okay?”
    “I’m not mad at you.”
    “I mean, mad at me after I tell you something.”
    “Tell me something like what?”
    “First say you won’t be mad. Promise.”
    “Malik—”
    “Promise,” he pressed.
    “All right, I won’t be mad. I promise.”
    “From now on I want you to behave and be nice.”
    “From now on? Behave? Be nice? To who?” I was caught completely off guard.
    “To Ms. Grier, Mr. Khalil, M.C. Ole-G—”
    “Who is M.C. Ole-G?”
    “Cousin Shake.”
    “You want me to be nice to Cousin Shake? Oh, you can forget that,” I said.
    “You have to be nice to Cousin Shake, Ms. Minnie, Man-Man, Toi, and baby Noah.”
    “And why do I have to be nice to them?”
    “Because I kind of like these people,” he said.
    “You don’t even know these people. And I told you about getting attached.”
    “I do know them . . .” Malik insisted.
    “We just met them the other day.”
    “Well, I know them a little bit . . .”
    “Just like you knew the people we lived with before we moved here, and the family before that. And before that. And each one of them still made us leave.” I hated to burst his bubble, but he needed to understand our circumstances.
    “That’s because you were mean to them.”
    What did he say? “ I was mean? So it was my fault?” I couldn’t believe he blamed me. “Are you even serious with