too hot to play chess
by Kristiana Colón
blackjack sells drugs i know cuz i see him when he's posed to be watchin me and lucky he's puttin little pinches of weed in teeny weeny plastic bags with yellow and green smiley faces or red spiders or dollar signs on em drugs are posed to be bad but blackjack ain't really bad he's real smart and gets good grades on his report cards and likes school a whole lot and reads a bunch a books he's nice to me and lucky and let's us watch grown up movies with him and explains em the whole way through he tried to show us how to skateboard in the back but there wasn't enough space and i tripped and bust open my elbow and he took real good care of it we don't really have a whole lotta backyard just a little bit of concrete and a picnic bench and the landlord's old rusty bbq grill
lucky's mommies both work a whole lot so after school she comes home with me and blackjack watches us until my mom gets home sometimes lucky's mommies work so late they don't want to wake her up if she's fallen asleep already so she just spends the night and rides to school with me and blackjack the next morning lucky really is my best friend she's the prettiest girl in the third grade and it's not cuz she's white either some of the other girls say mean things to her cuz she acts black and talks black even though she is a white girl with long pretty hair and they say mean things to me too for being her friend i think it's probably cuz her mommies are black but when i said that in the kitchen one day my mama popped me in the lip with the back of the wooden spoon she was about to stir spaghetti with There is no such thing as 'talkin black' she said You either speak proper English or you don't Good grammar ain't white you said ain't mama i said and she popped me in the lip again and it started bleeding so i went to my room and cried
when lucky came over the next day i told her what my mama said i told her i didn't mean no offense by sayin she talked black or that her english wasn't good i told her i just meant she didn't sound all corny and high pitched like the white girls on all the little television shows we watch she said It's okay, I sound black cuz I am black and i just looked at her for a long time cuz clearly her arms were white white white and her eyes were hazel green and her hair was long and almost touched her butt and even though it was dark brown and real curly i ain't never seen no black girl with long soft hair like that she said my daddy was italian and there used to be a whole lotta africans in italy so i'm just as black as you i told her she was a liar there wasn't no africans in italy and how could she know her daddy was italian she never met him or even knew who he was and even if it was true that don't make her as black as me cuz her great great grandparents wasn't never slaves so she was stupid and a liar and i wouldn't be her friend anymore if she didn't take it back she said black folk in america wasn't one hundred percent african anyway cuz slaves had babies with their masters and with indians and with all kindsa different folk and so she had just as much right to claim being black as i did cuz wasn't neither one of us one hundred percent anyway i pushed her off the couch and said she didn't know everything she hit me back and said her mommies told her and they were right i said her nasty gay mommies were stupid too and didn't know what they were talking about and that's why i was her only friend and i shouldnta said that but it was too late she grabbed me by the hair and hit me in the mouth and it was still sore from gettin popped with the spoon the night before so i screamed and got even madder and tried to rip out all that pretty brown hair on her head but somehow i got my fingers caught in the necklace she wears with the little crystal ball on it and it broke and the little crystal ball charm went flyin off under the tv cabinet which weighs like a thousand pounds so i knew we wouldn't get it until me mama and blackjack moved to a new apartment and by then me and lucky wouldn't even be friends no more and mama would just sweep it into the dustpan along with broke crayons dead spiders and all kindsa dust and throw it away
but just like that she let go of me and started lookin not so mad anymore but real sad like she would just bust up cryin any second now and she ran in the kitchen and got the broom outta the pantry and laid flat on her stomach and started pushin the broom up under the tv cabinet but the thing is so big and heavy she could barely fit the broom up under there so she was startin to get real worked up and was cryin but not sayin nothing finally she popped the broom back and the little crystal ball came rollin out from under the tv cabinet she put it in her pocket and looked at me real ugly and then ran out the back door i didn't know where she thought she was going her mommies wouldn't be home for a whole lot more hours and she didn't have keys to her apartment
but i wasn't bout to chase after her so i just turned on disney channel and tried to watch tv but alla sudden i started cryin too and i tried to ignore that i was cryin and just focus on the tv but then it was gettin hard to see cuz i had tears all in my eyes and the cable was messin up too so there was lines all across the screen blackjack heard me cryin when he went to the kitchen to pour hisself some lucky charms he still eats kid cereal even though he's in the eighth grade and he came in the front room B B You cryin? Nope. i said as serious as i could You're not going to lie to your brother he said soundin like a nerd as usual Turn off the television Brooklyn you can't make me you're not my daddy
No but I am the man of this house and I said turn off the television and i didn't wanna make him mad so i got up and turned it off What happened?
and then i told him that lucky said she was black and she not and it made me mad so i called her mommies nasty stupid and gay and i told him i didn't mean to say it but-
Yes you did. You wanted to hurt her feelings, didn't you B? well yeah but
but he wouldn't let me finish Lucky is your friend and you know she's different. Roscoe may not ever come around here, but we know he's our daddy and we know he's alive. Lucky's mama and daddy are both dead. She never even met them. Imagine what that must feel like. If she says she's black, silver, or aquamarine and it makes her feel like she belongs somewhere, it shouldn't bother you at all. And what you said about her mommies? Don't even get me started.
he went back upstairs chewin his cereal real loud and i rolled my eyes and went outside
Brooklyn Hawkins got no hair! Brooklyn Hawkins skin ain't fair!
Brooklyn Hawkins big and fat! Brooklyn Hawkins ashy black!
shut up toby that's why yo breath stank toby was sittin on his front stoop pullin dandelions out the sidewalk and throwin em at the car parked in front and you failed fourth grade three times so shut up talkin to me that's cuz i'm all about money and hos i ain't got time for no damn school toby is retarded and everybody knows it so i just ignored him and kept walkin n if you lookin for that high yellow bougie friend of yours she's probably at subline it's sublime you idiot i said but i guess i shoulda said thank you
when i walked in the coffee shop i saw her long pretty ponytail right away and i felt better she was playin chess with mr giraffe mr giraffe lives two doors down from toby which is three doors down from me we call him mr giraffe cuz he's the tallest man in the world and for little kids that are small that could be scary but we know he's also the nicest man in the world God only made me this tall so He could fit alllllll the love I would need for beautiful boys and girls like you he would say stuff like that when he bought us ice cream or gave us five dollars on our birthdays he sat in sublime cafe playin chess almost everyday lucky was the only little girl in the neighborhood that knew how to play chess mr giraffe always offered to teach the rest of us he said it would sharpen our minds but most kids on our block thought chess was pretty lame
when mr giraffe saw me his big white eyebrows went up he moved his queen and said checkmate and then grabbed his walkin stick to help him stand up aren't we gonna play again mr giraffe? lucky said I think you have more important business to take care of this afternoon, Miss Lucy aww mr giraffe i told you you could call me luck-- she turned around and saw me and her face got real ugly again what do you want
i sat down and said i was sorry for callin her mommies nasty and gay and for sayin she wasn't black she just looked down at the shiny black pawns she had taken from mr giraffe
will you teach me how to play chess one day? okay she said
i don't feel like it right now though it's too hot outside
wanna play in the sprinklers in my backyard? i said
i don't have a swim suit she said still lookin at the black pawns
you can use one a mine and some aqua shoes so we don't cut our feet
okay she said
we went back to my house and i pulled one blue and one yellow swim suit from the corner of the drawer where i keep all my underwear she said she wanted the blue one we went to the bathroom to change cuz my bedroom door don't have a lock and we didn't want blackjack to accidently walk in
is it weird havin two mommies? i asked no
do they kiss? yes
they kiss like men and women kiss? yes
we were quiet for a long time while we scrunched our jeans down around our ankles and pulled off socks
you ever kissed a girl? i asked no why're you askin me all these questions?
just curious
we got quiet and pulled off our t shirts
i looked at her skinny white legs while i stooped down to pick up my swim suit
you think i could kiss you? i asked why? she said her face looked weird like she was confused
i dunno just wanna know what it feels like i guess
um okay
i kissed her real soft on the lips and we both had our eyes closed and it was kinda nice so i kissed her again but this time closer so our bodies were touching and that was nice too so i kissed her again but this time she opened her mouth a little so i dropped my swim suit and grabbed her behind like i seen blackjack do with his girlfriends
i stepped back and blinked i guess we should stop huh i said i don't know i guess she said
i looked down at her fruit cup and then she looked down at mine
i kinda liked that she said yeah me too
BANG BANG BANG
Hey I need to pee what are yall doing in there! blackjack knocked on the door all loud and crazy like he was bout to wet his pants
we're changing! leave us alone! we'll be out in a minute!
we squeezed into the little swim suits and went outside
it musta been a hundred degrees we played in the sprinkler till our fingers got all wrinkly
it was like that all summer like a hundred million degrees every day
mr giraffe bought us lots of popsicles but nobody hardly ever played chess