The Chaos Read Free Page B

turned into such a bitch over this dance battle thing! More softly, I said to Jarmilah, “Sorry.”
    “Don’t sweat it. Just get off me, okay?” My legs were lying across hers. I moved them, and we both got to our feet. “What’s up with you?” she asked. “You’re usually the first one to pick up the moves.”
    Ayumi, who was standing behind us, muttered something. Her friends Jen and Leah snickered. Gloria called out, “What’d you say, Ayumi?” It was her warning voice. Give Glory that; even though she and I weren’t being friends anymore, she was on my side when it came to people bad-talking me just ’cause they felt like it.
    Ayumi looked to Jen and Leah for support. They’d been smirking at her remark. They wiped the smirks off their faces the minute they saw me looking at them, but Ayumi hadn’t noticed. That’s probably what gave her the courage to pipe up with, “Maybe those batty riders are cutting off circulation to her brain.” The whole team fell out laughing at her joke.
    Oh, no, she didn’t just say that. There was nothing wrong with my short shorts. She couldn’t even say it right. Made it sound like “baddy riders.” I bellied up to tiny little Ayumi till my chest was so close to her chin she had to back up or get a sweaty faceful of my girls. She backed up. I followed, my hands on my hips. I wasn’t going to touch her. I didn’t need to fight, not in this school. “You have something to say to me?” I tried not to listen to my own voice, to how off my accent sounded. Half Jamaican. Pretend Creole. If I didn’t watch myself, I turned “batty” into “baddy,” too.
    Ayumi held her ground, but she didn’t answer. She was ’fraid to glare full on at me, but she didn’t want to take her eyes off me either, so she did this silly mixture of both, kinda staring upat me with her head lowered and off to one side a little. “You have a problem with the way I dress?” I asked her. Ben had taught me this. If someone’s trying to step to you, you just tromp all over them first. With words and out loud, where everyone could hear.
    Gloria pushed in between the two of us. “Scotch! Leave her alone!”
    “Is she start it! Besides, I’m not doing anything to her.”
    Jen and Leah pulled Ayumi away. “C’mon girl,” said Leah. “It’s not worth it.”
    But I wasn’t done with her. “You just jealous ’cause your skinny little legs would look like two dry-up sticks in shorts like these. Chuh. Little piece of half-grown pickney best lef’ me alone.”
    Panama giggled. All right, so my accent wasn’t the best. Even Ben and Glory sounded more comfortable than I did when they spoke like their Caribbean parents.
    Gloria glared at me, her two eyes meeting mine, making four with my own. “Scotch, stop it now, or you’re off the team! For real!”
    Everybody fell silent with shock, even me. “But I—I” I stammered. I was the best dancer they had. I looked around. I was surrounded by angry faces. Mocking faces. Girls’ faces. And suddenly I was that scared little eleven-year-old again, sitting alone in a crowded assembly while the whisper was passed from mouth to cupped ear, from one sneering student to another: Sojourner masturbates! Pass it on! I was back hearing the exclamations of disgust, the hateful laughter as more and more and more kids passed the story on and on, and I just sat there getting more and more alone with my pale brown face going redder and redder and thinking, But I’ve never even tried it yet!
    So I backed way off. “All right, all right. Ayumi, I’m really sorry.” The other thing Ben had taught me—always be betterthan the haters, even if that means apologizing to them when you’re in the wrong. “I didn’t sleep well last night,” I told Ayumi. “Bad dreams.”
    Ayumi’s face softened into sympathy. “That’s so sad!” she said. “Is it because of Tafari?”
    I looked sad, let her think that was it. I mean, it kinda was. I was really down