The Blackbirds (3 page)

“Private-school girl, you know your butt can't fight. Best you can do is give him a vicious cursing out in two languages, send him whimpering to a corner, and give him a time-out.”

“He's down in my parents' zip code parading some can't-speak-Spanish skank around. And stop giving me the side-eye, Indigo. Don't act like you wouldn't have done the same thing.”

“Where are we going now that you have ruined this part of my birthday month?”

“We're going
shopping
. Retail therapy at Victoria's Secret, Pink, T.J.Maxx, Walmart, and then drinks, drinks, drinks. Right, Indigo? It's all about you, so we do what you want to do.”

On the down escalator, Indigo snapped, “Don't mess up the remainder of my birthday.”

Kwanzaa retorted, “Go to hell. It's not your birthday yet.
Every
day is not your birthday.”

Kwanzaa and Indigo exited the escalator walking fast, moving around the crowd, heels clicking, words flying back and forth, and arguing like the best of friends or the worst of enemies.

Ericka bumped into a few people, caught up, and asked, “Are we okay, Kwanzaa?”

Kwanzaa said, “All I need to do is hit Post and Beam, do a few shots, and I'll be cool.”

Indigo asked, “Would that be penicillin or vodka shots?”

Kwanzaa cursed in Spanish, laughed a little, then cried in unrecognizable English.

Indigo said, “Here we go again. Must you continue to pout for that asshole? Every time you say his name I feel like I need to submerge my soul in calamine lotion.”

Kwanzaa said, “I hate you, Indigo. I hope someone gives you a drink
that makes you pass out and you wake up a slave, chained to some white man's wall in Alligator, Mississippi.”

“When we get home we'll trace your slave name back to a plantation in Bumfuck, Mississippi, and send you there to pick cotton and sit under a tree and drink sarsaparilla. Don't forget to enter the plantation through the back door, if you're allowed to leave the fields at all.”

“That was mean. So damn mean.”

“In your history books, you'd be a field hand.”

“You're not even a real African.”

“
Weave-erella
, I have dual citizenship. What do you have,
African
American? I can trace my ancestry back ten generations of
free
Africans born in or around Nigeria, and they still practice their own religion. You can't trace yours back to an English-made slave ship used by Christians.”

“Brixton always said you were nothing but a fake-ass African.”

“Your rent just went up fifty dollars.”

“Brixton never liked your uppity ass.”

“And every time you say Brixton's name, another fifty.”

“Brixton, Brixton, Brixton, Brixton, Brixton.”

It was almost dawn on Indigo Abdulrahaman's date of birth.

Indigo was born at 9:34
P.M.
, and despite partying most of the month, she planned to have fun from the crack of dawn up through the exact moment her mother had evicted her only child from her Nigerian-born womb at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. Indigo wanted to start her birthday being physical, so she told Kwanzaa to make sure she had the day off from slinging caffeine at her part-time gig at Starbucks, had told Ericka there would not be a sixth-grade schoolteacher for twenty-four hours, and told Destiny Jones that she would have to skip her forty-eleven jobs, but any collegiate-level studying or grading of sixth-grade papers would be understood and forgiven. For this quartet of Afrocentric millennials, as they tried to find their place in the world, as they navigated the choppy waters of life and love, it was education and career first. Education and career were about one day being fiscally powerful; money was independence, and independence was power, and once empowered they would be able to make their own choices.

Always build each other up. No crabs, no barrel, never pull each other down.

They lived one gas station shy of Crenshaw and West Century, in the city of Inglewood where the negative-yet-embraced motto said the people were
always up to no good
. Most of the single-family stucco houses and apartments were built between the '40s and the '70s, and the average two-bedroom crib cost 400K. The average rental in the area was over twelve hundred dollars, but where they lived, Little Lagos, the
building was outstanding, had better security, a pool, and palm trees, so the rent was a little above average. Most of the properties were renter occupied. Less than four percent of the locals had a degree from a four-year college. Over forty percent were born in some other part of the world. Almost fifty percent were Mexican, and over seventy percent spoke Spanish. It was a bustling area with a Home Depot, Costco, Target, Red Lobster, Chili's, and a gazillion more places to shop and buy artery-clogging food. It was a working-class strip mall zone.

The area was about as L.A. as L.A. could get.

Ericka rented the upstairs two-bedroom closest to Century Boulevard, so she spent many nights wearing earplugs to block out the sound of police and ambulance sirens, urban screams that sang the loudest after midnight. She also had issue with the late-night barking dogs and the early-morning crow of roosters coming from a few of the immigrant neighbors' backyards. Plus every car that passed seemed to be driven by the deaf because they all bumped music at Coachella level. Ericka lived above Kwanzaa, so Kwanzaa also had access to the same hullabaloo, but lately Kwanzaa had been making her own noise at night.

Indigo lived in the rear upstairs unit, away from the noise and above Destiny.

They had the same floor plans, kitchens over kitchens, and bedrooms over bedrooms.

Indigo was up dancing and playing Nigerian music, the songs “Johnny” by Yemi Alade and Lil Kesh jamming “Shoki” on repeat. She texted Olamilekan a third reminder to come to her party, then showered. She began knocking on the doors of Ericka's and Kwanzaa's apartments before 5
A.M
. She told them to get up, use the bathroom, shower, and get dressed so they could go meet the sunrise. Indigo didn't see Destiny's colorful CBR in their stalls, and figured she was still working at FedEx near LAX. But the gate opened and Destiny cruised in on her motorcycle. The antisocial pessimist had been getting home three hours later a couple of nights a week.

Destiny made it upstairs wearing her FedEx uniform and lugging her USC backpack filled with a change of clothes and textbooks thicker than a porn star's cock. Indigo was waiting outside her door, dressed in
yoga pants and a black tee that had a tree with the American flag as its leaves, the words
AMERICAN GROWN WITH
NIGERIAN ROOTS
above its green and white roots.

“Destiny Jones, I know you're not about to go to bed, so don't even think about it.”

Destiny yawned. “Good morning to you too, Indigo. I'm fine, and how are you?”

“Don't make me raise your rent. Shower and clean from where the Nile runs and the muddy Mississippi flows, slap cocoa butter on your elbows, knees, and please don't overlook the butt crack, then put on some fashionable workout clothes. Smell good and look cute.”

She hugged Indigo, kissed her cheek. “Your music is loud, Indigo. It's too early for all that noise. Ericka and Kwanzaa cussed you out for being self-centered and inconsiderate yet?”

Indigo whispered, “Kwanzaa was up all night. That poor child was
restless
again.”

Destiny lowered her voice, “You heard her?”

“She needs to get over Brixton so we can sleep.”

“Has he been by here trying to see her? I will lose all respect for her if she's seeing him.”

“If he had been by here, there would be a chalk outline where I left that ass's dead body.”

Destiny dug in her pocket to get her keys, and something fell out.

It was a loose condom.

Indigo picked it up, waggled it, and asked, “What's going on, Miss Jones?”

Destiny took the condom from her hand, then winked. “Let me shower and get dressed.”

“That's a regular-sized Trojan, not an extra-large Magnum.”

“And?”

“I'm not stupid. I know what that means.”

“What exactly?”

“It means you're creeping and sleeping with a white man.”

Before daybreak had touched the eighty-eight cities in Los Angeles County, they'd dressed in sports bras, T-shirts, colorful yoga pants, and collegiate hoodies, yawned and climbed on crotch rockets, then zoomed from Inglewood toward Culver City, doing over seventy in a forty-five zone. They slowed at Baldwin Hills Scenic Overlook, what the locals called the Culver City stairs. Workout warriors were there, parking, heading for the lopsided stone stairs in the mountain.

As soon as they parked, men took note.

Indigo said, “See? Aren't you glad we all look cute? We're women of a certain kind and we have to represent beauty, intellect, grace, and strength at all times.”

Destiny said, “Whatever. I thought we were going to work out to keep the core strong and booty tight. I didn't know you were taking us
penis
shopping.”

Ericka said, “African, Canadian, or European, Indigo loves sausages for breakfast.”

Indigo said, “
Chineke mee.
No you did not say that, Ericka.
Otula
.”

Kwanzaa said, “Y'all are sad. All this education between us, all that's going on in the world, the destruction of humans in Yemen, Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Mexico, and you choose to talk about
penis for breakfast
. I could've had a shallow conversation at work.”

Indigo said, “The way the men are looking this way, I'm sure they're not talking about physics or social change or wondering if black lives
matter. They're looking at us like we're four shades of delicious and are trying to figure out where they want to fall to their knees and eat first.”

Backpack in hand, Destiny shook her head. “Well, your hole-in-the-wall might be open for new business, but the restaurant called Legs of Destiny is closed. I'll pass on new customers.”

“And Coochie of Kwanzaa is not accepting another customer before her wedding night.”

Ericka handed her helmet to Indigo. “Mine has
never
been open to the public.”

Destiny said, “If Indigo was a place to eat she would be called Fresh N Easy.”

Indigo laughed. “Always fresh, never easy.”

Being silly, yawning, teasing each other, they locked their helmets to the CBRs, stretched a few moments, headed toward the snaking trail with the rest of the early risers, and became four queen warriors.

*   *   *

With Destiny Jones leading the charge up the 282 uneven steps made of recycled concrete carved into the rolling hills, they hiked at a smooth pace. They were four of at least one hundred people, the crowd growing, most of them strong-legged buppies, yuppies, and muppies.

The girls inhaled, cursed in three languages, muscles burning, yet begging for more.

Halfway up their third effort, they stopped where one of the dirt trails intersected with the rise of the harsh stairs. Ericka was drenched in sweat, moving like she was tired. They always worried about her energy level, even though she had been in remission over a year.

Indigo asked, “Miss opening at Starbucks this morning, Kwanzaa?”

Kwanzaa slapped the side of her own head two dozen times, tried to calm an itch, then pulled her expensive hair into a better ponytail. “The only thing I miss seeing is how the Latinas get all hot and bothered when Mr. Iced Coffee comes in the joint in the morning.”

“You've mentioned him a time or two hundred. Is he really that fine?”

“It's like a crowd of women wait for him to show up, then just stare at him.”

“You said the handsome man dresses nice?”

“Wears nice shoes, and head to toe, he's always decked out in Hugo Boss.”

“He's either successful or a criminal.”

“Or a successful criminal. He has some serious swag.”

“What does he look like?”

“Tall, fit, broad shoulders.”

“Sounds like Olamilekan. The body that man has is ridiculous, and he knows it.”

“This one has long, wavy hair. Mixed with something, maybe swirled with everything.”

“You talk to him? Is he single? Is the metrosexual man straight?”

“Joint's too busy to talk to anyone but customers experiencing caffeine withdrawal. The Latinas always talk about how hot he looks when he comes in. They break their necks to wait on him, so I rarely do. When he comes in, they start giggling, switch and whisper to each other in Spanish.
Guapo
this,
guapo
that. They all want him to go south of their border and put some special sauce on their tacos. I'm engaged . . . was . . . so I stayed out of it.”

Ericka finally caught up and they resumed hiking the stairs. But she paused after a few steps, looked out at the land, and the areas that looked like patches of brown weeds. California was in a severe drought and most of the state had set irrigation and water restrictions.

She felt just as dry as the rest of the state. Last week she had felt stronger.

Kwanzaa asked, “How's your energy?”

Ericka nodded. “I'm fine. Don't wait on me. Meet you at the top.”

“Why do you keep stopping if you're not tired?”

“Enjoying the view. I'm not in a hurry to get to the apex. I don't want to rush.”

Indigo sent a text to Olamilekan, another reminder, then resumed taking the stairs in pace with Kwanzaa. Indigo wondered why Olamilekan hadn't been available all night.

She wished she had spent the night with him. Then she would be sure he would show up for her birthday party and not leave her humiliated in front of her parents, especially her mother.

At the top of the Culver City stairs for the fourth and last time, they panted with their hands on waists, bent over as they sweated, caught their breath, then leaned against the metal railing on the concrete landing. They toasted the new sunrise with infused bottled water.

Destiny's cellular rang. The girls applauded, Kwanzaa and Ericka applauding the loudest.

Whoever's phone rang first, excluding Indigo on this day, had to pay for breakfast.

Still panting, Destiny answered, “Kismet Kellogg, how may I help? Yes, I stand by my work and will refund if you're not happy. What? Yeah, all sports channels. What? Yeah, hundreds of live channels. HBO, Cinemax, Showtime, everything plus Sky UK channels. What? UK means Great Britain. London. Porn channels? Yeah, lots of porn. Porn from all over the world. I wouldn't know. I don't watch porn. Another twenty-five to do in-home setup. We can meet tomorrow.”

Destiny ended the too-early-in-the-morning call, took a deep breath, weariness in her eyes. Three jobs. School. Now her dad had cancer. Plus the weight of being Kismet Kellogg.

As if she had read the fears in Destiny's mind, Ericka asked, “Who is Kismet Kellogg?”

“Some people hear my real name and get real ugly. Especially women. They like to remind me I did some bad things, say the most disgusting things, try and slut-shame and ridicule, but forget people did horrible things to me. Been using a synonym for Destiny plus my
Jamaican family name as my sobriquet. When I'm out alone it's easier to say I'm Kismet Kellogg.”

Indigo smoothed her hands over her frohawk. “You're still hawking Amazon Fire Sticks?”

Destiny nodded. “Selling three or four upgraded with Kodi almost every day.”

“How are you meeting these clients who know you as Kismet Kellogg?”

“Craigslist. That's the best way to make tax-free money.”

Indigo asked, “Can the government trace the signal to my apartment and arrest me?”

“Indigo, it's not illegal. I wouldn't put anything criminal in your cribs.”

“We're looking at movies and programs from all over the world for free.”

“They sell them basically jailbroken, and knowing how to program them to get all TV and movies around the world for free is a loophole.”

“Don't get me arrested over watching
Being Mary Jane
and
Chewing Gum
.”

“Indigo, if it is an issue, it's their issue, the manufacturer's, not the consumer's.”

“Just to let you know, if the police or feds come, I will snitch on you so fast.”

“You claim you're Nigerian. You should be used to corruption.”

Indigo became dramatic, splayed her fingers, and cursed Destiny in Yorùbá.

Destiny mimicked her landlord, threw the curse back at Indigo.

Ericka barked, “Squats. Let's keep the jam from jiggling like jelly in an earthquake.”

Indigo groaned. “Let's get these over with so we can go eat some pancakes.”

Kwanzaa said, “My birthday's next. We won't be hiking. Wow. It just hit me. This'll be my first birthday in six years without Brixton.”

Destiny asked, “How are you holding up this week? Were you up crying last night?”

Kwanzaa paused. “Didn't cry. I studied, but most of the night I was up thinking, making a list, trying to be positive, writing down the plus side of being suddenly single again.”

Indigo said, “There's a plus side to being single?”

“I can do what I want, when I want, and as long as I want.”

Indigo said, “We don't care what you do, but when you're drinking, reminiscing, and playing Spanish porn in the middle of the night, you need to turn the volume down and close the windows. Not only do we hear you playing the fiddle at two in the morning, but also the Mexicans in the building behind us are in the backyard listening and masturbating. And that's the women.”

Kwanzaa became snippy. “Why are you hating on me when I am down and out?”

Ericka said, “No one's hating on you. A person has the right to satisfy intellectual and emotional needs inside the privacy of their own apartment. But you don't hear Destiny moaning and speaking in tongues. You don't hear Indigo calling out her exes' names all through the night, although that would be more names than in the phone book. We hear you down there listening to your
bow chicka wow wow
and sounding like a dying cat in between their vulgarities and moans.”

Indigo ranted, “And let's talk about you and your habits, Ericka. We smell you up there with the windows open smoking Purple Martian Kush from Afghanistan, or that Hindu Kush from Northern Pakistan like it's going out of style. You're sitting in the window blowing clouds from Inglewood to San Bernardino and we're all getting contact highs in the middle of the night.”

“I had
cancer
and I have a medical card and I am
not doing anything illegal
. When I smoke some Kush the only thing you're going to hear is me munching on a bag of kale chips.”

Indigo said, “Oh, please. I hear that humming coming through my walls and I know it's not an electric toothbrush. Weed makes you horny. I've smoked enough Kush to know. You're probably up there smoking and munching and using a sex toy to do some late-night fracking.”

Ericka showed her the middle fingers. “Go fap your mud flaps.”

“You could at least buy brownies or gummy bears or lollipops with a
weed blend. And if you want to make it yourself, all you have to do is mix the Kush in the butter, and if you can't make decent brownies, bring me the Kush and I'll make them for you, you know that.”

“I smoke because last time I had gummy bears and lollipops I accidently put a couple in the kids' bags on Halloween. I'm glad they didn't trace that back to me. I was so damn scared.”

Echoes of their risibility moved across the summit and out into the City of Angels.

Then Kwanzaa sighed, and once again she was serious, in pain, still heartbroken.

Destiny said, “You need to get over Brixton, Kwanzaa.”

“I know. It's not easy. I'm trying.”

Indigo snapped, “Do better. Never cry over a man who ain't crying over you.”

Kwanzaa said, “And Indigo, you are the expert at that, if nothing else.”

“Don't make me accidentally-on-purpose shove you down these stairs.”

Ericka said, “Kwanzaa, be glad you weren't married. Take my advice and date for decades. Dating only takes up part of the day. A marriage is twenty-four seven, three hundred and sixty-five, and has another level of responsibilities, predictable and unpredictable, plus emotional and financial obligations. When you're dating you can invest as little as possible and get the specific benefits you need. If it's just a date, you just go out. If it's sex, you can get the sex, then disappear until you feel like
clocking
in again. You can
clock
in, and
clock
out, as much as you want, just do it responsibly. Fuck marriage. Date.”

Indigo said, “That trifling message is brought to you by the Preacher's Wife.”

Ericka snapped, “Former preacher's wife. Never leave out the word
former.”

Kwanzaa shook her head. “I don't want a damn Walk-of-Shame lifestyle. Half the girls who live in the dorms are doing the Walk of Shame every Saturday and Sunday morning.”

Destiny asked Kwanzaa, “Have you heard from Brixton since the mall fiasco?”

Kwanzaa's nostrils flared. “Brixton has sent me a dozen text messages.”

“And?”

“He apologized profusely and wants to meet at a restaurant so we can talk.”

“Don't fall for it. He wants to separate you from the pack and devour you.”

Indigo snapped, “Must all roads lead back to Brixton, Kwanzaa? Must they? Now your rent has gone up two hundred dollars. It will be three hundred if you say his blasted name again.”

Destiny snapped back, “Indigo, as much as you talk about the footballer Olamilekan and Yaba the Laker, you need to raise your own damn rent. Brixton slept with his side chick until he ended up contaminated, then slept with Kwanzaa, and if not for the infection it would have gone on and on. If he had done that to me, you know I would not have been as nice as Kwan.”

Ericka said, “Kwanzaa, it could've been worse. Take that as a sign to move on.”

Kwanzaa said, “I could've been patient zero for some new incurable ish. And when you're the first person to get a new disease, they want to name the ish after you. They would've called the new STD the
Kwanzaas
just to mess up black folks' holiday season.”

The girls laughed. Despite the grin and the light words, despite the joke and a moment of self-deprecating humor, tears rolled down Kwanzaa's cheeks, to her lips, to her chin and neck.

Kwanzaa said, “I guess liars and their games are part of my heritage. We are our parents' problems, victories, and history united by the blending of egg and sperm, brought to life by God.”

Indigo said, “Heifer, don't even try to get deep and philosophical over Brixton.”

Exhausted men filed up the stairs and stared at Ericka's, Indigo's, Kwanzaa's, and Destiny's bodies, ogling a tad bit too long. A few became entranced. Destiny became self-conscious of not only the eyes on her body, but also the eyes that lingered on her face. A sweaty Idris of a guy stared at her, smiled, nodded his head, and waited on reciprocation. She turned, walked away.

In the delicate and concerned tone of a den mother, Ericka asked, “You okay, Destiny?”

Destiny said, “I'm fine. Was just creeped out. One guy kept looking at me. He realized who I was. I could tell. When they left, he started whispering to his friend. He said my name.”

Kwanzaa said, “More men have arrived. Looks like a few more eyes are on us.”

Indigo said, “Because we're four bad-ass black bitches breaking the stereotype.”

Destiny said, “Okay, Indigo, we need a better word than
bitches
.”

Ericka agreed with a nod. “You're right. We have to do better, even when we're joking.”

Destiny shook her head. “The
B
-word is just the
N
-word for women.”

Indigo nodded. “We're too smart and
amazing
to use such a lowbrow term. I mean, unless we're listening to music, or describing other women whom we despise. Some bitches are bitches and there is no other word on reserve to call those bitches except
bitches
, unless we come up with a bitching word for those bitches, especially aggravating bitches who keep sending those bitching
Candy Crush
requests.”

Kwanzaa Browne laughed. “What are we going to call ourselves when we powwow?”

Everyone shrugged.

Indigo said, “Pillow Queens?”

Everyone laughed and Destiny and Kwanzaa shook their heads.

Ericka wagged a finger. “You three might be passive, but that's not the way I roll.”

Kwanzaa said, “The only thing I use a pillow for is to put under my butt or my belly so we can get the angle right. I turn a man into a pillow king. I had Brixton crying like a three-year-old.”

Indigo hummed. “Black Pussycat Dolls?”

They laughed again.

Ericka ran her hands over her pink hair. She saw everyone was already doing squats. She joined in. Three minutes of squats later, they stopped, sweat dripping from them all.

Indigo said, “Ericka, did you know that you're missing an earring?”

Ericka nodded, touched her left ear. “I guess it loosened and fell off somewhere.”

Destiny looked at the earring in Ericka's right ear. It was a sterling-silver post with a rose crystal ribbon, the symbol for cancer awareness, for fighting that unrelenting beast.

Indigo said, “We'll look around the apartments.”

Kwanzaa said, “No one dumps the trash or vacuums until we find Ericka's earring.”

Ericka shivered. “Vacuum cleaners.”

Destiny said, “We know, Ericka. We know your phobias.”

“Can't stand the sound. Brings back bad memories.”

Kwanzaa said, “That's why I vacuum your apartment when you're not home.”

Indigo said, “Dest and Kwan, check the bags on your vacuum, just in case.”