The Chaos (3 page)

But pretty soon the other girls’ bodies had caught up to mine, and I didn’t stand out so much anymore. And Ben had taught me how to stand up for myself. All of us kids, our bodies had filled out and changed, and we were dying to try them out. Take Michel Beaulieu, who’d been short and zitty with that funny, squeaky voice; now he had a sharp trimmed goatee and his voice was all deep and shivery, and his hands had become the size of shovels (I had a thing for hands), and he walked with a swing in his step that he hadn’t had before. He was the first boy I ever necked with, no matter what Nancy Poretta at LeBrun had said. Michel had wanted to date me. We did for a while, until I’d figured out that that first taste of Michel had only made me even more curious about other boys. Me and Glory and some of the other girls talked about it all the time. How would it be to sit on chubby Walter Herron’s strong, sturdy lap? How would the plumpness of his skin feel under my hands? What did Sanjay Harsha’s breath taste like? What would it feel like to run my hands through his hair? Ever since then, I’d been exploring. I wasn’t the only one, either. Finally, I was normal. My parents would completely lose it if they ever found out. They wanted me to be good little Sojourner Smith, who always did her homework
and came home on time and who was all meek and shit. They wouldn’t like to find out that their daughter’s school friends called her Scotch Bonnet, the name of a super hot Jamaican pepper, because her moves on her dance team were so hot. My folks wanted me to be safe. They didn’t really understand what I’d learned at LeBrun High; being good didn’t make me safe. Being popular kinda did, sometimes.

But I didn’t tell Ben any of that. Instead I said, “I am sad that Taf and I broke up. Way sad. I think about him every day. But this . . . thing that I do—”

“Thrill of the hunt?” Ben said doubtfully. That’s how I’d described it to him once. It had sort of been a joke. Only sort of not.

I smiled. “Yeah, that. I couldn’t do it while I was dating Tafari, and I gotta be honest with you; I really wanted to.”

Ben drew back. “You’re joking, right? You had one of the hottest guys in school, and your eyes were wandering?”

“Uh-huh.”

Ben made a
titch
sound. “Well, I guess Mr. Liliefeldt just wasn’t doing his job right.”

“Oh, he was.” I got that sick, lurching feeling in my tummy that I got when I thought about me and Tafari, broken up. “I miss him so much.”

He shook his head with an unbelieving smile. “Not hating on you, girl. Just not understanding you. I mean, if a guy’s hot, I can totally understand you wanting to get with him. But Jimmy Tidwell?”

The bell rang. Last period. Glory glanced briefly my way, no expression on her face, before heading inside with her friends. Ben stood with a sigh, brushed the seat of his jeans off. “History class. Oh, yay.”

“Hey! I like history!” I followed him in as we argued about
whether we were going to ever need history again once we’d graduated. Me, I had geography. I said to Ben, “Come and see me in the gym after dance practice, okay? You gonna be around?”

“You know it. Can’t miss our Friday afternoon ritual. Be nice if Glory could be part of it again.”

I snapped, “Over my dead body.”

“Okay, okay. Just saying.”

So I jumped in too early again, which meant that Jarmilah swept my legs out from under me again, which meant that I tripped her when I stumbled. Again. And we both fell heavily to the school’s gym floor. Over the music, I couldn’t hear the sound of Jarmilah’s breath escaping on impact, but if the thud of landing had been as bad for her as it had been for me, she probably hated me. Hell, I hated me right now. Gloria was probably gloating to see me make another mistake.

A few of the others on our after-school dance team saw what had happened and stopped dancing. The rest kept on going, doggedly. Only five days to the dance-off, and we still didn’t quite have that section of our routine down. And I was the one who kept messing us up.

Gloria ran over to the boom box and stopped the music. She was yelling before she even turned around; “God damn it, Scotch, you jump in on the one, not on ‘and one’! How many times I have to tell you?”

“I know, I know!” I yelled back. “On the one. I know.” Christ, she’d 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 up
at 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 better
than 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 about Tafari. And the part about the nightmare was even true. But breakup blues and bad sleep weren’t what had thrown me off just now. One of those things was around. It’d startled me when it had just appeared on top of the gym clock like that, grinning as though it had just discovered teleportation. Made me lose my step. I wasn’t even angry at Ayumi, but blowing up at her had helped me let a little bit of the fear go.

Ayumi and I hugged and made up, and I could breathe again. I checked that the sleeve of my sweatshirt was covering my arm all the way down to the wrist, and then took my place beside Jarmilah.

Gloria said, “Okay. Let’s try it once more.”

Everybody groaned. The thing swooped down and dive-bombed Gloria’s head. I flinched, grimacing. Gloria hadn’t seen it diving for her. Nobody saw them but me. She noticed me grimace, though. She narrowed her eyes at me. She probably figured I’d made a face at her to give her attitude for threatening to kick me off the team. Whatever. ’Cause I would’ve done it anyway if I’d thought of it.

The thing went and perched on one of the bleachers, looking from one to the other of us. Our expectant audience. Why didn’t they have any bloody legs, or wings, or even bodies? Why were they just tiny, horselike heads, with big, square-toothed, horsey grins?

We were all in place again by the time Gloria had found the beginning of the song. She ran back to her place beside Panama.

The music started. Beat. One. Yes! Sorta got it right this time. Close enough that Jarmilah and I didn’t collide.

The rest was like flying. When I’m dancing, the world just feels right, you know? I forgot about the dream, forgot about me and Tafari breaking up. Forgot about feuding with Glory, and the marks on my skin that gave me nightmares every time a new one was about to pop up. Forgot about the skin-teeth grin of the Horseless Head Man on the bleachers. It was like I could feel the rhythm of the world, play with its beats. I was there dead on my mark when Glory had to roll over my back. She stood, turned to me, and pop; our fists brandished, our bodies so close to each other and driving so hard that it looked like we were going to punch each other out. We’d planned it that way together before, when we were still talking to each other. Now, it almost felt like we could do it for real, have it out right there. Instead, scowling, we linked wrists, in time for Sigourney to do her backward flying dive in between us, her arms stretched out above her head. Big trust move, that one. If we weren’t going to catch her, she wouldn’t see it until her back slammed down onto the floor. We caught her, flipped her back up. She stumbled as she came down. Gloria snapped, “Too high, Scotch!” as she, Jarmilah, and Zoe went down on all fours to make like the wheels of a car. Chuh. Not my fault if Sigourney was so little-bit that I just kept powering her too high out of her dive. Panama and I swung out in front of the people car. Little bit of stripper dance, some attitude, down into the splits like everyone else, bounce, head roll, down flat on our backs, then hit; chest pop so that all our bodies jerked on the final beat.

Gloria leapt up and ran to turn the boom box off. Man, I was winded. Maybe that nasty-tasting medicine from the weird little shop I’d found up on Bathurst was making me short of breath. I lay on the gym floor panting, my arms spread wide,
resisting the urge to feel with one hand under the cuff of my hoodie, just to see if the mark was still there. It hadn’t gone away in two months of visits to the allergist, of antibiotic skin cream, of whatever treatment I could think of. In fact, it had grown, especially since last night. I knew that when I’d woken up in the morning. I always felt the new marks coming in, even though I might be asleep and dreaming. It wouldn’t just magically disappear now.

The others were getting to their feet. Sigourney stood on one foot and experimentally rolled the other foot around at the ankle. She winced. Damn. Gloria went over to her. “You okay?” she asked.

Sigourney nodded. “Little twinge, is all. It’ll be fine.”

“Ice it when you go home.”

Sigourney smiled. “Yes, Mama Glory.”

“For reals, girl. Don’t want you getting busted up on my watch.”

Like hell. She just didn’t want to lose one of her dancers five days before the battle. Though I guess it would suck if one of us got too injured to dance.

Then Gloria was towering over me where I was still lying flat. “See how short of breath you are?” she said.

Yeah. Too winded to give her any backchat, in fact. I took in little sips of air and prepared not to listen to her.

“You’ve missed the last four practices. Miss tomorrow’s, and you’re off the team.”

As if. I’d recovered enough for, “Right. You know you need me.” Without me the team was only average, and they all knew it.

The barest flicker of hesitation passed across Gloria’s face. Someone who didn’t know her wouldn’t have seen it. “Yeah, well,” she said. “I’ll tell you after tomorrow if you’re still part of Raw Gyals or not.”

Damn, she looked serious. I needed to be at this battle. “Fine, fine. Whatever.” I needed my chance at the prize money from the individuals’ dance-off. I pushed myself up to a sitting position. “I’ll be good, okay?”

“You’d better. And stop throwing Sigourney so high out of the dive.”

Leah said, teasingly, “You’re just too strong, Scotch.”

My heart started pounding. Was she trying to start something? I checked her face. She was smiling indulgently at me. Shakily, I laughed. “Right. And you can’t do a simple one-two step.”

Panama sucked air through her teeth, mock disgusted. She was grinning, though. It was all right. We were all just kidding around, like we did every practice. “Koo the pot a-backchat to the kettle. After you always missing that one move.”

I groaned to my feet. Had I really missed that many practices? “Pot and kettle, huh? You mean you agree with me that Leah have two left foot?”

“Well, now that you mention it—”

Gloria called out, “Okay, people. I have something cool for everyone!” She shone one of her sunshine smiles at us. Leah and Panama stuck their tongues out at me. I stuck mine back out at them. We laughed.