Getting to the Good Part Read online

  “I’m just saying it for the record. I bednot feel your yellow hand creepin’ round my room tonight, you horny hoe!”

  The cabbie was obviously disturbed. Brother had the hot foot. All of a sudden, the cab shot forward, bolting down the avenue in a mad rush to Fourteenth Street.

  Misty slapped my thigh, her hand covering her mouth to keep from giggling out loud.

  “Brother’s probably got a stick of granite between his legs up there,” I whispered. “We better quit talkin’ ’bout dicks and shit ‘fore he mess around and kill us!”

  Misty was laughing so hard, tears were coming out of her eyes.

  “Stop it!” she squealed. “I have to pee!”

  I looked at her over there, squeezing her legs together, trying her best to keep her cool.

  I burst out laughing again.

  As the cab sped on, slinging us around the backseat like rag dolls every time he turned a corner, we laughed and laughed until our eyes were red.

  When we finally got to Nell’s, we were still squealing like fools.

  We rolled up inside the club, all drunk and silly, and cut it up on the dance floor with every strange man who asked (and some who didn’t), until the crack of the crack of dawn.

  NEVER NO TIME TO PLAY

  Higher! Higher! Come on, Reesy, kick it higher!”

  The music was blaring, and I was dancing across the empty stage, side by side with the other dancers, sweating my ass off.

  Julian screamed at me, his face all brown, beaded, and balled up. His mouth was so close to my head, I swear, I could see his tonsils, or uvula, or whatever the fuck that thing was, dangling down at the back of his throat.

  “Show me some goddamn ass! Shake that shit! This ain’t no damn Miss America pageant!”

  “Grrrrrrr!” I snarled at him, wanting to snatch him out the frame for being in my face, screaming at me like that.

  Julian was the show’s choreographer, and, goodness, he sure didn’t believe in cutting you any slack.

  His reputation was as long as 125th Street, and he had danced with some of the best of the best. I knew it was an honor to be working with him, but right now, I was hating him with a passion that knew no bounds.

  He wore one of those spandex bodysuits that was really a tank top connected to some shorts. You know. A unitard, I believe it’s called. The kind that wrestlers and weight lifters wear. It grabbed his crotch vulgarly, in a manner that gave me waaaay more information than I was interested in receiving.

  Especially from Julian. ’Cause, as fine as he was, he had absolutely no interest in sharing with a sistah none of what that spandex was clinging to.

  He hovered around me like a mosquito in a blood bank. I wanted desperately to swat him away. My vengeance was the salty sweat that flew all over him from my overtaxed body. Every now and then, one of my braids would fly free and crack him in the face.

  I glared at him. I was kicking as high as I could, and I knew for damn sure that I was, at the very least, up to par with what the other dancers were doing.

  The muscles in my legs were screaming bloody murder. My heart was about to burst.

  “Work it, you bitch! How’d you get in this show anyway? You must know somebody. Who’d you fuck?”

  Oh, hell no! That was the last straw. I stopped and tried to catch my breath. I was gonna need all the wind I could muster to kick his natural ass.

  “All right, everybody!” Julian shouted, moving away from me. “Enough!! Take five, and I mean no more than five, then have your asses back in place! Gotta make moves!”

  I bent down, my hands resting on my knees. My breathing was so thick, I thought my chest was gonna explode.

  Julian passed close to me, just enough so that only I could hear him.

  “You need to get it right,” he whispered, his tone harsh. “The show starts in a few weeks.”

  I angled my head up to look his way, my eyes piercing him like lasers.

  “I’m giving you a thousand percent!” I hissed. “You can’t get more than I got inside me!”

  He stood there, his hand on his hip, covered from head to toe with a trough of my sweat.

  “If that’s all you got, then you can take that shit somewhere else. We don’t half-step here. Either bring it on, or take it off!”

  My heart skipped a beat, in a moment of panic.

  “What do you mean, take it off? My clothes? Ain’t nobody said nothing to me about having to do that!”

  “That’s not what I meant, Miss Thang. But I guess that’s a phrase you’re pretty used to hearing, huh?”

  Julian stared me square in the eye, trying to make me uncomfortable. I gave him back the same stare. Did he know about my exotic dancing days?

  “I meant take it off our stage and out the door. Either come correct, or get to steppin’!”

  He snapped his finger, high over his head in the air, in a grand gesture of dismissal.

  I glared at him, sizzling mad.

  “What’s it gon’ be?” he challenged. “Can you bring it on?”

  I stood up, got as close to his face as I could, enough to make him uncomfortable, and whispered,

  “You just watch me.”

  I turned around abruptly, and located my bottle of Evian.

  “Now, that’s what I’m talkin’ ’bout!!” I heard him utter behind me.

  Gordon Stock, the brother who had called me up and told me I had gotten the job in the show, was sitting out in the audience watching the whole thing. He beckoned to me.

  I guzzled the water and walked off the stage toward him.

  He patted one of the seats next to him, gesturing for me to sit down.

  I slid into the seat, relieved to get a moment of real rest.

  “You looked fantastic up there,” he said in that booming, chocolate-thick voice of his.

  I looked into his face. A rich Hershey brown, it was a series of squares and blocks. Square eyes, square jaw, square nose, block head. But I saw genuine kindness and honesty there. Also a good dose of open admiration.

  I sighed heavily, overjoyed to get a little praise from somebody, anybody.

  “Thank you, Gordon. I needed to hear that. You’d never know it, from listening to Mr. Man up there.”

  I glanced toward the stage. Julian paced the floor, every now and then shooting an accusing look at me and Gordon.

  “Do you know he had the nerve to ask me if I fucked my way onto the show?!”

  Gordon chuckled that pea-soupy laugh of his.

  “You think that’s funny?” I asked.

  “No, no!” he interjected quickly, shaking his head. “That’s not why I’m laughing. I’m tickled because I love the way you just spit things out. There’s a crudeness there that’s so endearing.”

  “I am NOT crude!!”

  “I didn’t mean that in a negative way,” he said, trying desperately to dig himself out of what he knew was a rapidly widening hole. “In fact, it was a compliment of the highest order.”

  “Oh.”

  “Stop being so defensive, Reesy.”

  “Can’t help it around here,” I replied, wiping my brow, noticing that the thumping in my heart was beginning to slow down a little.

  Gordon smiled at me.

  “I can’t believe you haven’t figured Julian out yet. It’s been three months now. He’s done this to you every day.”

  “I’ve figured him out, all right,” I said. “He’s a mean muthafucka with an ax to grind. And I’m the one he’s laying it into.”

  “Then you haven’t figured him out,” Gordon said. “You haven’t figured him out in the slightest.”

  I studied Gordon closely, trying to make sense out of his words.

  “Five minutes up, everybody!” Julian shouted, clapping his hands together loudly. He was staring at me in particular. “Let’s get this show on the road! Gotta make mooooves!”

  “See what I mean?” I said. “He can’t even let us get a good rest. An extra minute wouldn’t have hurt nobody.”
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  “He thinks you’re the best,” Gordon said matter-of-factly.

  “Get the fuck outta here! He treats me like shit.”

  “That’s how he treats the ones he has the most hope for. You see him doing what he’s doing to you to anybody else?”

  “Not nearly as much. I just thought the brother couldn’t stand me.”

  “On stagey Miss Thang!” Julian demanded, snapping his fingers like I was a dog being called in for dinner. “Now!! Ain’t no monkeys gon’ stop my show!”

  “Watch him,” Gordon whispered, pushing me up and out of my seat. “You’ll see what I mean. Everybody else is working hard, and you’re doing much better than the whole lot. But still he dogs you. He sees your talent. He’s just testing your mettle.”

  “Well, I hope he figures out what I’m made of, before I have to bust out and do a little ass-kickin’ up in here. I’m’on get black on his ass the next time he calls me out my name.”

  “What’d he call you?” Gordon asked, amused.

  “A bitch!” I replied, and scampered back up toward the stage.

  “Oh hell!” Gordon laughed. “He definitely loves you, girl!”

  The other dancers huddled on the stage, waiting for me. Reveling in the extra seconds of rest I was making it possible for them to take.

  Julian stood there, staring at me, his leg cocked to the side, clapping his hands to the staccato rhythm of his voice.

  “Chop… chop… chop, bitch! Gotta… make… mooooves!”

  I rushed up on stage and took my place.

  In typical fashion, he came alongside me and stood as close to me as he possibly could.

  “No special favors,” Julian hissed with venom. “Five minutes up means five minutes up! I will not have you standing in the way of my show!”

  “I’m back, ain’t I?” I sneered with just as much venom.

  I saw his left brow raise in surprise.

  Uncontrollably, the left corner of my lip curled up in a smile.

  Julian studied me, amazed at the fact that I was giving him back some of what he was dishing out. His eyes flashed, and his lips pressed tightly together.

  Slowly, he stepped out toward the front of me and the other dancers.

  “All right! One more time! Let’s take this shit from the top!”

  He waved his hand in the air, beckoning for the music.

  It began, and I started my boogie all over again.

  Julian walked around the group of us, checking out the flow and the rhythm of our moves.

  He stopped in front of me. I locked my eyes onto his, as I swayed my head and body to the music.

  He stood there, tapping his feet in time, cutting his eyes at me.

  I flashed him a wide-mouthed, toothy grin.

  Slowly, reluctantly, his eyes began to soften. And to my surprise, as he stood there, watching me, Julian’s lips began to form into a smile.

  I sat at my little section in the dressing area, my legs propped up on the makeup table.

  The dressing area was very spartan, very bare. The makeup counter was a weather-beaten, cracked, and faded beige Formica, with bright bulbs lining a long horizontal mirror that ran all the way across the top.

  I had magazine clippings of makeup tips stuck in my section of the mirror. I also had two little pictures stuck there—one of me and my grandma taken at my college graduation, and one of me and Misty from our high school grad night at Disney World.

  I was sitting there, my eyes were closed, and I had a headset on, grooving to “The Lady Suite” on Maxwell’s Unplugged CD.

  “It’s been so long since I’ve seen you,” I sang, bobbing my head to the music.

  My body was beginning to relax and wind down from that electrifying rehearsal. My man Maxy was strokin’ my ears and soothing my spirit with his heavenly voice.

  I felt a tap on my shoulder.

  I opened my eyes.

  I saw Julian standing over me, working his mouth.

  I pulled down my headphones and hit pause on my Walkman.

  “Not bad out there today,” he said.

  “Thanks,” I replied flatly.

  “I hope you don’t think I’m being too hard on you.”

  Julian looked at me, resting his hand on the back of my chair.

  “Well, you damn shole ain’t makin’ it easy,” I smirked.

  “And I never will,” he said, kneeling down and moving closer to my face.

  For the first time, I noticed the calibration of his voice. It was very masculine and strong. Not too deep, but not effeminate in any way. He was about five-ten, and his body was tight, lean, muscular mass.

  “You got something, Miss Thang. It’s in the early stages, but it’s there. And I see it. I want to make sure you see it, too, and don’t take it for granted. The time to bring it out is now.”

  “So you think by cutting me down and calling me a bitch, you’re bringing it out?”

  “Got your juices flowing and kept your ass moving, didn’t it?” he grinned.

  “You never lied about that,” I mumbled.

  “See!” He smiled, touching me on the shoulder. “Sometimes you can get more flies with salt than sugar.”

  “Hmph!”

  Julian pushed up with his hand and stood.

  “Keep up the good work,” he said, patting me on the back. “When the show opens, I want to have the best possible of everything falling into place.”

  He walked away, just as quietly as he’d arrived.

  Before he disappeared into the shadows backstage, I called out to him.

  “Julian!”

  “What’s up?” he asked, turning around.

  I tried not to look at that innocuous but eye-popping bulge between his legs. Wasn’t nothing a sistah could do with it but show it to another man.

  “Did Gordon talk to you?”

  He shook his head.

  “No. Why? What’s up?”

  “Nothing,” I said, relieved.

  I guess Julian was just being nice to me on his own. Maybe Gordon was right about him really liking me and my potential.

  Julian’s eyes narrowed, and his mouth broke into a bit of a grin.

  “You are fucking him, aren’t you?!”

  I looked around abruptly to see who might have heard him. There were dancers and stagehands coming and going all around us.

  Nobody seemed to notice.

  “No!!” I hissed. “Stop saying that!”

  “Well,” he said, coming closer, “y’all are mighty chummy.”

  “He’s just a cool person. We have a little theater chitchat every now and then.”

  “Mmmm-hmmm,” Julian muttered suspiciously. “Well, you have to earn your breaks with me, Miss Thang. Can’t fuck your way to the top in my camp. Not unless you grow a dick.”

  “Dannnnnnng!” I exclaimed, both alarmed and impressed by his candor. “That is soooo nasty!”

  “Just telling it like it is.”

  “All right,” I laughed, putting up my hand.

  “We finished?” he asked.

  “I’m through.”

  “All right,” he said, “I’m outta here. I’ll check you tomorrow.”

  “Cool,” I said, taking my Walkman off pause and getting ready to slip my headset back on.

  “He’s straight,” Julian said, lingering, pointing at my CD case.

  “Yeah,” I replied. “He’s my favorite.”

  “Mine, too,” Julian smiled.

  “For real?”

  “For real.”

  He and I kind of just smiled at each other quietly for a moment. Then Julian turned, gave me a quick wave, and rushed away.

  I guess he didn’t hate me after all.

  Maybe things weren’t going to be as bad as I thought they might.

  I put my headset back on, grinning to myself as I sang along to the music.

  I couldn’t believe Julian and I actually had something in common.

  I put my feet up on the makeup table, closed my eyes, and
let myself slip into a Maxwell reverie.

  Three weeks later, I was sitting on stage, doing stretching exercises.

  No one else was in the theater. I had deliberately come early just to give myself some time alone to tone.

  I had my legs stretched apart, and my head was facedown on my left knee, my right hand gripping my left ankle.

  “You know he’s coming to Radio City in two weeks?” a happy voice broke out.

  I knew who it was talking, and I knew what he was talking about.

  “Yep,” I breathed, not lifting up my head. “Can you believe it? He’s actually coming here to New York! His own backyard, at last!”

  “I already got tickets.”

  “Really?!” Now, that made me look up. “I couldn’t get any! It was sold out in a matter of hours!”

  Julian was standing there in gray tights, bulge a-bustin’, right in front of my face. He was grinning like a kid.

  “Wanna go?” he asked.

  My heart did a double thump.

  “What?!”

  “What I said!” he replied, his hand on his hip in mock indignation. “Do you want to go? You can go with me.”

  “But I thought… ,” I began.

  “I didn’t say as my date. We can go as fellow Maxheads. My friend Tonio has been tripping anyway. I think I’m gon’ leave his tired ass at home.”

  “I’d love to go,” I mumbled, completely astonished at this outrageous turn of events.

  “All right,” he said. “We’ll talk about it.”

  “Cool,” I replied.

  Julian turned and walked away, waving at me over his shoulder without looking back.

  “Later, Miss Thang. I’ll holler.”

  “Peace out, Scout,” I replied, still reeling from what had just occurred.

  Hot damn! I thought to myself. I’m going to see my Maxy!! Wait’ll I tell Misty. Life don’t get no better than this!!

  “Come on, shake that ass! Shake it, shake it, shake it!”

  Julian was in his usual form, and all of us dancers were working it out on that stage.

  I was shaking it fiercely, on that I couldn’t lie.

  But, let me tell you… a sistah was in a little pain while she was doing so.

  See, um. It was that time of the month. And I was like crazy. I was miserable.