The Awesome Girl's Guide to Dating Extraordinary Men (51 page)

And maybe this would be a case of me running down someone who wasn’t who I thought he was, like in the movies, but I had to try. I pushed through the crowd, getting closer and closer to him. But the closer I got, the thicker the crowd got, and I realized that this was because he was Mike Barker, a movie star. Apparently, he had been swarmed, and he was signing autographs.

Everybody was shouting his name. “Mike! Mike! Sign mine!”

But my voice rang out above all of theirs when I yelled at the top of my lungs, “Okay, okay, I’ll marry you!”

The crowd went still, then parted. And when it did, there was Mike. Looking at me, with someone’s notepad in one hand and a pen in the other. He was smiling at me.

And I smiled back at him, before saying it again. “I’ll marry you.”

My editor begged me not to put this in here, but I feel like it’s got to be said. I slept with my husband on our first date. I lied to him, and we darn near drove each other crazy. I wish I had followed all these rules, but I didn’t. These rules work for most people, but they might not work for you. And if that’s the case, I invite you to forget everything I have written here, and settle for aggressively being yourself. I trust that you’ll figure out the rest. Because the truth is you’re a grown woman, and at the end of the day, you probably don’t need my advice.

—The Awesome Girl’s Guide to Dating Extraordinary Men
by Davie Farrell

RISA, SHARITA, AND THURSDAY

A
Spice Girls song played on speakers set up near the podium toward the front of the room, and Sharita found herself dancing a little as she and her new friend, Thursday, tried to find a table with two seats available at the closing banquet for Smith College’s weeklong BRIDGE orientation program for students of color.

Though Sharita had warned Thursday several times that they were going to be late, Thursday had wanted to catch the end of a Rick T concert, streaming live from Belgium. And Sharita, feeling privileged to have met and befriended the daughter of one of her favorite rappers in her very first week at the elite women’s college, had been too intimidated to speak up. Thursday was by far the most glamorous black person she had ever met. She had traveled all over Europe, Africa, South America, and the United States. She had even gone to Japan. Unlike Sharita, she shrugged off the beauty of Smith College’s campus, saying that all the rich white institutions looked the same. She’d had dreadlocks since the age of ten and had never “been subjected to a perm.” As far as Sharita could tell, she wasn’t here on scholarship and she had only agreed to attend the pre-orientation for students of
color because it beat sitting around the house with her sister and mother while her father was touring in Europe.

Unlike most of the other black women (not girls—Sharita had already been corrected on this several times) at BRIDGE, Thursday seemed to consider college a predestined right as opposed to a privilege. She had introduced herself to Sharita with a raised eyebrow and a sideways smile that mightily resembled a smirk. “You seem like one of those salt-of-the-earth black folk that my parents are always wanting me to get to know. Let’s do them a boon and become friends.”

Having never met a black girl—woman—who dressed like a hippie and talked like a rich white girl, a stunned Sharita agreed to this proposal of friendship, and they’d become inseparable by the end of the week. She would find out from older students of color in the coming year that just about every student of color that attended BRIDGE had the same “I met my best friend there” story.

But in Sharita’s case, her new best friend had caused them to come in late to the end-of-program banquet. They had missed the speaker and were now having trouble finding two seats together at any of the round tables, which were all occupied by woman of color having passionate and intelligent conversations about matters both important and trivial.

Sharita was about to suggest that maybe they stand with their plates, when Thursday pointed to a table in the far corner. “There’s a couple of seats next to Lisa Whatever-Her-Hard-To-Pronounce-Last-Name-Is.”

“Um …” Sharita said. The truth was that she had never spoken directly with Lisa, but she could already tell she didn’t like her. Sharita had nothing per se against lesbians. She filed it under the same situation as sex before marriage. The Bible didn’t like it, but she didn’t think it was something that would keep folks out of heaven or anything.

But Lisa wasn’t like the other lesbians of color at BRIDGE. She wore men’s cologne, she swaggered as opposed to walking like a normal girl—woman!
During the short introductions on the first day of the program, she stood up and said, “My name is Lisa Amoakohene. I’m from Cali. I have two plans in life: to be a rock star and to have kissed ten of you hot bitches by the end of the week.”

To Sharita’s astonishment, everyone, including the student BRIDGE leaders, who should have known better, laughed.

Lisa had concluded with, “Oh, and I have a tattoo my parents don’t know about.” Then she’d lifted her shirt and showed it to them.

Over the week, Lisa had gained a notoriety that had kept Sharita and most of the other black women in the BRIDGE program talking about but not befriending her. Thursday had been one of the few exceptions, shutting down one conversation about Lisa’s copious application of Polo cologne with a sleepy-eyed smirk and a “Oh, I was raised not to judge, but I guess you all weren’t brought up that way.”

And now Thursday seemed eager for the excuse to meet the upstart Lisa, who, if the gossip was true, actually
had
kissed over ten of her fellow Bridgees during their short time there. She grabbed Sharita’s hand and said, “C’mon, she seems like so much fun.”

“I don’t know …” Sharita said. “She’ll like you, but I don’t think I’m her kind of people.”

“Like my mom always says, nothing beats a failure like a try. And for all you know, she’ll love us and we’ll all become lifelong friends.”

Sharita very much doubted that, but before she could fully protest, they were at the table and Thursday was saying, “Hey, we haven’t formally met. I’m Thursday, and this is Sharita. Mind if we sit here?”

Lisa regarded them both with slitted eyes for the longest time before finally saying, “Yeah okay, why not?”

So many people to thank …

My agent, Victoria Sanders, whose fierce passion inspires the heck out of me.

Melody Guy, who I suspected would be a real pleasure to work with—I suspected right.

Kelli Martin, whose enthusiasm for this novel made working with Amazon Publishing a delight.

My sister, Elizabeth Carter, my first reader and most steadfast “fan.”

Gudrun Cram-Drach, who patiently reads draft after draft of everything I write and then gives me feedback that actually makes me enthusiastic to go even harder on the next draft.

Tara Armov, the Derby Doll who inspired me to put Risa on a motorcycle, and then walked me through how to do so.

Paul Ryan, who inspired me to put Risa on a surfboard, and then walked me through how to do so.

Dr. Patricia Perry, who originally told me the Bob Marley story and was kind enough to answer all my questions about the condition he and Tammy shared.

Brian Viehland, one of my oldest, dearest friends. You not only married my best friend, but you also never complain about the many architecture questions I send your way.

Georgie and Anika. I won’t say why. I think you know.

My husband, Christian Hibbard, who makes it easy to not only write about, but also give thanks at the altar of true love.

My mother-in-law, Mary Zimmerman, who I’m lucky to live with and even luckier to know and love.

My fellow Smithies. I’m so grateful to be a part of your rank.

And last but not least …

Thank
you
for reading this book. I super-hope you liked it.

So Much Love,

etc

ERNESSA T. CARTER

E
rnessa T. Carter has worked as an ESL teacher in Japan, a music journalist in Pittsburgh, a payroll administrator in Burbank, and a radio writer for American Top 40 with Ryan Seacrest in Hollywood. Carter’s also a retired L.A. Derby Doll (roller derby). A graduate of Smith College and Carnegie Mellon University’s MFA program, Carter is the author of
32 Candles
and
The Awesome Girl’s Guide to Dating Extraordinary Men.

MISS MISSY

L
ittle befores Miss Missy was born, two other slave women been died giving birth. One mama den took the baby with her into the afterlife. The other mama done push for eight hours and whisper the name Elijah to Martha before dying from the all the blood coming out of her down there.

Martha be giving Elijah to Peter and his woman, Harriet. They other child been sold, so Martha say to them you take this one. Harriet don’t give him back when Martha been put him in her arms.

Why Martha don’t keep Elijah herself? Because Martha belly be full with her own baby. Her man, Thomas, been sold off for winter provisions. She say she tired. She say she can’t be a mammy to her own and this dead slave’s poor child. So she give Elijah to Peter and Harriet, and they take that there child.

“It gon’ to be a boy,” Martha be saying to them that ask after her own baby. She say he turn over and over whenever she lay down and he be swimming all around her stomach when she be getting the good word on Sundays. “The Lord done told me in a dream he be something special, like Mary been told of Jesus.” That what Martha be telling us.

She ask us to say some dem prayers for her, because every slave know that a special baby be a difficult birth. We been already lost two mamas in the winter, and if Martha go on to the Lord, the slaves ain’t going to have nobody to birth the babies no more.

But Martha be wrong. The birth ain’t difficult and the baby ain’t a boy. She be on the birth bed only a short time pushing, when a dark little thing slip out of her. And the baby ain’t crying. She be laughing!

Martha take the baby from the woman that done caught it. “Dis baby girl be laughing,” Martha say, eyes wide.

Yes’m, the baby got her eyes squeezed shut and her mouth curve up, with a sound coming out of her mouth that be happy. Even though she be black. Even though she be slave.

The two other slave women be nodding. “Dat’s what it sound like,” one them say.

“She laughing! She laughing!” the other one say.

They all be staring at the baby, fighting off the notion to laugh they own self.

Martha name the baby Miss Missy, because she be laughing when she come out and what name be funnier than that?

Slaves ain’t got no reason to laugh. They lives be hard and they lives be getting took away, at any time, at any moment. There be some dancing in meadows on Sundays when we together to give praise to the New Lord for all He do and make, but even on that day, nobody be laughing.

Massa Green done give us this God who not going to introduce Himself proper-like until we done entered the afterlife, but we suspect the Massa can also be taking Him away if there be too much laughing with the praising, if it look like the slaves having too good a time. After service, we be putting our hats and head scarves and dark cloud faces back on, and we go on back to them tobacco and cotton fields—Massa Green grow both.

Even the touched slaves know not to laugh. They know not to get the overseer thinking they be having too much fun, not working hard enough. They don’t want him to get to fingering his whip.

So how you going to explain Miss Missy? All she do is laugh.

Which be why we, the slaves of Green Plantation, done declared that child simple as simple can be. She start that mess when she be a baby and not one day go by we don’t hear her laughing coming out the shack she be sharing with her mama. That laugh of hers be ringing out across the
cotton fields, cuz she laugh every time she prick herself on the cotton’s burly black stem. And heaven forbid she draw blood. She just’bout fall over laughing, telling anybody that be standing near, “Look at what I’s done. Lookatit!”

When her poor mama pinch her to keep quiet, cuz slave children ain’t got no business being heard, Miss Missy be about laughing even louder. She say, “Mama, stooo-ooop.”

Yes, she talk back to Martha. A few of the other mama slaves be fixed to slap that child for Martha. Martha too soft with her. She got three childrens took from her before Miss Missy, and she don’t got the heart to train the girl to act right like she supposed to. So Miss Missy keep laughing and running and skipping like the world be a good place and she ain’t a slave and like she got some reason for carrying on like she do.

Nobody be thinking she simple no more. We
know
she got to be simple. Not just simple. Simple and touched.

And maybe Martha be sending up a prayer for that. The only young slaves that don’t get sold off when the Green Plantation full-up be the simple ones.

Miss Missy don’t be getting sold when she eight, or when she nine, or when she ten, or when she eleven, or when she twelve, or when she thirteen, or when she fourteen—and now Miss Missy fifteen. FIFTEEN and she still be here.