Curvy and thick

Everything the typical Black man wants

That's who she was taught to be

Street smart and handy in the kitchen because "You know, my woman gotta know how to cook"

Intelligent but not too smart, rough enough for sex but weak enough for their control

A sassy woman who knows when to shut up and listen to her man

Brings his food at his demand

Questions no command

And for sure, follows the 10 Commandments

Because aside from her husband, black women must obey their God

You can wear weave but please don't let your tracks show

Speaking of tracks, if you're wearing a bra, cover that shit up

I don't want to know when you're on your period,

As a matter-of-fact, keep all signs that you are female under wraps -please and thank you

Be accessible to men but don't be a hoe

My mother must like you

My friends must want to sleep with you

You must be a worthy trophy

Above all things you must bare me children

And when you go through that 9 months of discomfort

You must accept the fact that I will probably leave before it comes.

__________________________________

I take a deep breath as I stand outside Trisha's front door, literally swallowing my pride. It stings as it goes down, pushing against the abnormal path and struggling to come back up. Pride is something that we all struggled with in the hood, some more than others. I often chose to defeat mine by letting it go. I was still teaching myself that. Maybe by 40, I would have it all down.

A tall black man with a short afro and a wife beater with jeans opens the door. Trisha's Father, Carmine always had a cigarette in his mouth.

"Hello, Carmine." I say respectfully. He ignores the greetings as he often does and goes back to sit on the ripped up and worn couch, right in front of the TV. I stood in the dimly lit living room awkwardly.

"Trisha home?" I ask. He motioned his head to Trisha's room, right across from the living room couch. There was a sheet of beads hanging where the door should be. I part the beads to Trisha's room that was mostly taken up by a large mattress on the floor. A small TV is in the corner and her closet is to the side of her bed. I remember Carmine had broken down Trisha's door a few months back when he found out there had been boys over. She got a beating that day, it didn't matter that she was 17 years old.

Trisha lays on the bed pretending to watch TV and refuses to acknowledge my presence.

I let out a heavy breath. "Trisha?"

"Mhm?" She answers, anger still evident.

"I know you been bored out ya mind since you left me." I say sitting on her bed.

"So?" She responds with the thickest attitude. Her room always carries the scent of cinnamon incense. I grew to love it. Her pink walls with pictures of us and her many little brothers and sisters are scattered around and connected by white Christmas lights. She really makes the crappy house look clean and comfortable.

"So, you should stop actin funny." I finish. " Cause I miss you." I mumble barely audible.

She pokes her neck out, turning her ear to me.

"What was that?" She asks with a little smirk.

"I said-" I begin loudly, but still mumble the end of the sentence.

"I miss you." .

She laughs but then gets serious with me again. " I'm not the one acting funny, Chan."

She's right. I've been lying up and down the block, and I shouldn't be.

"You're right and I'm sorry." My apology was sincere. She looks at me a few moments, reading me as she often did then sits up in her bed.

"Iight." She says accepting the apology. "Now what happened? Because you don't just swallow your pride and come over to apologize for nothin."

"Trevon kissed me yesterday." My voice sounds uneasy.

Trisha jumps up. "Guuuuuuurrrlll, you lyin. Oh-Ma-Gawd. You know how long I been waitin for this shit?" She turns off the TV and sits with her legs crossed on her bed.

"I been waitin since Elementary for this shit. Y'all took a few years but-"

I was smiling but she could tell I wasn't completely happy.

"Why do I sound more excited than you do about this?"

I shrug and fix my eyes on the wall at nothing in particular. "I just feel like he has mad girls on him... Like i'm just an added prize."

"Trev hasn't been with a girl in mad long because he probably been plottin on how to get you. The last girl I remember him with is that ghetto bitch, Princess. That was what? Last year?"

"Yea but I be hearing mad rumors about him sleeping with other girls whenever he feels like it. I just hear a lot of stuff. Then I'm like, what am I? A number in Trevon's black book? I'm not tryna be some hoe he can hit up or some 3 month relationship. I do like him, and I am happy he kissed me, shit was dope, but I'm not one to be played." I say putting my hands up in surrender.

Trisha's face settles and she presses her lips into a hard line seeming to understand but ready to attempt to change my mind.

"The thing is, you talkin bout these hoes on the street and these other girls that ain't nothing like you. You not a hoe and no man can make you into some hoe. You smart and pretty, you be writing deep ass poems. You got a lot going for you and you always have. That's what Trev sees and that's what he's been trying to get to for years now."

Trisha sis up in her bed now, really trying to sell her point of view. She was partially right, I guess I was different than a lot of the girls Trev ever dated, but once a player always a player. Even if we were together for a little bit, what's to say he wont revert back to his natural hoeish ways. I do have a lot going for me and it's because I'm focused. I didn't want him messing that up. I didn't want anyone messing that up.

A man will take a good girl and ruin her, I've seen it happen. My face must be blank because Trisha continues to sway me.

"I feel like you don't know how important you are. You know after that talk we had, I went out and started looking at different colleges? Ima need your help with the scholarship stuff, but you right." She took a deep breath and let it out. " I don't have to end up like Carmine. I want to have my own boutique store like those girls in SoHo. I wanna do fashion. It wasn't till you yelled at me that I saw that."

I had the biggest smile on my face now. "You don't know how hype you just made me. We can do the applications and essays Monday after school. You gotta do good the rest of the year though. Your grades can't be slippin. But I gotchu girl. I'm so proud of you." I say unable to contain my excitement.

She extends her arms out towards me and I jump into them until she is pressed into the bed with my full body weight. I hug her tightly and as she is laughing I playfully begin humping her leg like a puppy.

" Get ya dumbass off me." She yells.

"I love you, I'm sorry for yellin." I say not moving.

"I love you too, but you dumb stubborn. That boy likes you. Let him get to that lil heart you got locked away. I don't know why you so guarded when you neva had a boyfriend in your life. You been curvin niggas since the third grade." She laughs.

"You know why I'm guarded though." I say as I roll off of her and lay on my back, looking at the ceiling. There were small stars up there. They've been there for years. I remember watching her put them up in like 4th grade.

"You are not your Mother, Chan." She says it and it catches me off guard so much so that I freeze unable to move or speak. I've never related my fear of loving a man back to my Mother, I don't think that was the reason for my fear at all. I mean, it taught me a lot and it showed me pain but that couldn't be it.

"You are not your Mother, boo." She says it again in a softer voice and I quickly want to change the subject before I think too deep in it and depress myself. She begins playing with my hair in an effort to comfort me.

"I lied about the classes." I blurt out. I feel her hands stop moving.

" I know." She answers.

"When I realized something was up, I asked Trev if he knew where you were disappearing to and he told me you guys have been going to a studio in the Bronx. I knew before I asked, I just wanted to see if you would tell me. And that is part of the reason why I willingly did not speak to you for a week. Why would you hide something like that from me?" The hurt in her voice makes my heart ache. She knew this entire time.

"I don't know." I sit up on my response. She continues playing in my hair, parting it with her fingers.

"I don't know why I would lie about it. I guess I didn't want to get your hopes up and I liked the time alone with Trev." I admit in honesty. She begin to chuckle.

"Aint nobody comin all the way to Bronx everyday and I would have gotten my hopes up, you know why?" She asks turning my face to hers.

I already knew what she was gonna say. I roll my eyes and respond to her question.

"Because I'm the shit." I say lazily.

"Nah, you gotta say it how I say it." She exclaims.

I stand up and puff up my chest, my resting bitch face on.

"I'm the shit!" I say again.

"Nah, you sound frail. You the what?" She screams.

"I'm the shit!" I yell. I flip my hair and put my hands on my hips.

"Yea, what else?" She asks hyping me up.

"And a bag of chips!" I yell loudly.

Trisha breaks out into hysterical laughter and I join her.

"What? That wasn't what I was suppose to say?" I ask confused.

We hear the beads pull away and both turn to the door frame of Trisha's room. Carmine stands there with his eyebrows pointing down, breathing heavy like it took all the energy in the world to walk from the couch to us.

"Will y'all stop the damn noise!" He asks annoyed.

"Sorry, Carmine." I apologize attempting to hide my smile.

"N this is my house!" He adds taking his cigarette out his mouth. "You ain't the shit! If anybody the shit in my house, it's me!"

Trisha and I begin chuckling an Carmine turns to walk out, still mumbling to himself.

_______________________________________________

I look back to the people who made me what I am today and realize

True friendship has gotten me this far

Friendship with my mother is rooted deep in her core,

I am a part of her body, a segment that was once inside of her, growing

The friendship began there

I suckled at her breasts and I allowed her to keep me alive while I was still learning the ways of this world

My Mother was my first friend before I knew what friends were

And though many friends were

I still have friends that are

Though many friends...were

I still have friends that... are

Looking out for me, though they need to be looked out for

They rub my back even when their hands are sore

Motivation seeps through every darting glance because they know what I am

And who I can be

I can breathe with only the air they have breathed into me when the air has been pressed out of me by this world that looks down on me

In the midst of my down they are up

In the midst of my worry, they are sure

In the midst of my vanity, they are humbling

In the midst of my heart, they are pumping

True friendship will keep you alive

Many nights I stay up past five, worried about the future of the ones who worry about my future

Knowing if there was any threat to my future, they would willingly ignore their own

Knowing that I am the one that needs to pull us out because they have fed me food to grow and pull them up

Knowing that I am growing because they keep me grounded, rooted in my purpose in this life

True friendship will give your life meaning

I love you Trish and Trev