Ivy Woods - Chapters 3, & 4,

Chapter 3

To show his disapproval of Kyla’s friends, Jamel went a couple days without speaking to her. If he wanted to be that way over nothing, that was up to him. She didn’t have time to argue over nothing, which happened all too often. Fresh out of the shower, Kyla heard the phone screaming upon opening the door. Goose bumps spread across her skin as she rushed to pick up the receiver, still clutching her towel.

“Hello?” Kyla managed trying to hear through the towel wrapped around her head.

“Long time no see! Where ya bin gal?” a voice boomed into her ear.

Only one person had a voice that loud, with a thick ‘Miss Cleo’ accent to match; her best friend Riana. They had been on that rollercoaster friendship of theirs since kindergarten. Riana was a beautiful 5’6 volleyball player known for her long sienna legs and waist length dreads but lived up to the ‘crazy Jamaican’ reputation. Over all, she was a sweet person, yet had a shameless temper. Riana was her only female friend, and was incredibly protective therefore, many run-ins with those hateful school girls resulted in Kyla hearing about Riana going behind her back to fight them.

~*~

“Man, so much has happened these last couple of days!” she huffed.

“Like what?” Riana asked, turning down the reggae music in the background.

“Well for one, Tray and Ashton came by yesterday when Jamel was here and I think he heard us laughing in the kitchen, so he just left.” Kyla said.

“Da boy ain’t even say nuttin to ya?” she asked.

“No, we just heard the door slam and that’s all. When I went to go chase him down, he just disappeared. I don’t know where he went.”

“Me don know why you even deal wit da batty boy” Riana picked. Kyla smiled at the fact that she just called him gay. She never liked Jamel, and many times if she was around, he would leave. Riana made it known that she wouldn’t hesitate to blacken his eye and “not tink twice ‘bout it.”

“I don’t think we’ll be together much longer at the rate were going. He gets mad too easily.” Kyla admitted.

“You got ya eye on another man don’t ya gal?!” Riana giggled.

“I was at Tray’s house a while back and ran into a dude named Rasheed.” She blurted out before Riana had even finished her sentence. As Kyla relayed all the details about that day to her friend, she wracked her brain trying to figure out why someone that had never once spoken to her leaked into her everyday life so easily. She was curious about everything when it came to him, and just wanted to know what role he’d play in her life, like she does with everyone she’s ever met. Just when Kyla and Riana’s conversation was coming to an end, call waiting came in.

“Hey RI, can you hold on? I got a beep.”

“Just call me back, I gotta take a shower.” Riana sighed.

“No wait, the boys might be calling to ask what I’m doing, and I know you don’t wanna spend the whole day in the house.” Kyla explained.

“Go on gal!” Riana said, turning the water on in the background.

“Man I know this girl better pick up this phone!” someone said after Kyla clicked over.

“I JUST DID! Who is this?” Kyla boomed, trying to recognize the number on the caller I.D.

“Dang girl calm down! It’s Rell. What’chu doin?”

“Oh, nothing. I was about to get dressed. Why, what you doin?”

“Well everybody went home to take a shower cuz' we just finished ballin, but we might do something when they get back.” Rell informed her.
“Who exactly are you talking about?” Kyla asked timidly.

“All of us, and that new dude Rasheed. I just met him the other day, he just moved here from up north. He’s cool as hell.” He said.

“Okay, I might come by. If I do, I’ll bring Riana with me.”

“Shit, you can send her fine ass by herself!” Rell snickered.

“Bye!” Kyla yelled into the receiver, clicking over.

“Girl! He’s there! Hurry up and get dressed and come over here, he’ll be at Rell’s house!” Kyla almost shrieked.

“Okay, I’ll see you in a bit.” She replied and with that, Kyla slammed the phone down and almost broke her closet door flinging it open so fast. There was no way she was going to be around Rasheed without looking as cute as she possibly could.



Chapter 4
After careful consideration on what to wear, Kyla chose a blue and white baby doll tee that read “kiss me” that showed of her belly button, and her best pair of dark blue denim jeans. She rarely bared her midriff, but anything that would make Rasheed notice her was worth it. The door to Kyla’s room swung open, grazing her forehead leaving a small smudge on the mirror she was gazing into.

“Ouch! Don’t you know how to knock first?” Kyla howled.

“Oh, Sorry gal,” Riana snickered peeking out from the opposite side of the door.

“Maybe if that head wasn’t so heavy, you wouldn’t be leaning it toward the door anyway.” She continued, letting herself in.

“Shut up Predator, I’m trying to figure out what to do with my hair.” Kyla whined trying to smooth the frizz in hair that hadn’t been flat-ironed in two weeks.

“You wan me to try to do something with it before we go?”

“No, I don’t have time. I don’t want to get there and miss anything, and plus I don’t want to mess up your clothes.” Kyla admitted. Riana was known for sporting skimpy outfits when it was too hot outside, but never exposed too much skin. She eyed her black pants and cut-up wife beater, and wondered how every pair of pants Riana wore looked as though they were airbrushed on bare skin.

“Hey, help me in here for a second. If I spray it, you won’t be able to tell as much” Kyla said, motioning for Riana to follow her into the bathroom. A little water, African hair oil and a couple gusts from the blow dryer resulted on in a head full of coconut fragrant curls which hid frizz flawlessly. To Riana’s complaint, Kyla seldom wore her hair that way because she felt it made her appear younger, but she preferred looking a bit younger to bone straight strands amidst brillo pad chaos. Before prancing downstairs, Kyla slipped on her mother’s blue and white closed toe sandals.

“Uhh…so you’re gonna walk all the way to Rell’s house in heels? You ankles will break before you even get past MY HOUSE.” Riana taunted.

“That’s why were getting a ride! This is a special occasion.” Kyla replied.

Kyla’s mom was comfortably lying on the couch watching T.V. when the two of them plopped down on the coffee table with their ‘if you don’t do this we’ll die’ faces on.

“Can we get a ride to Rell’s house?”

“Why, you got feet younger than mine.”
Kyla responded by simply holding her leg up.

“You must be up to something. I should have known when you came in here with MY shoes and brand clothes on,” she accused them, squinting her eyes.

“You’re lucky my show just went to commercial.”

~*~
Rell opened the door and the surround sound hit them before the light did. His mother worked the night shift, so if Tray’s parents were home, his house became the ‘chill spot’. He stood there holding his jeans up by one hand and the other out for a hug. He hugged Kyla for a split second before zipping out “That’s enough!’ and shoving her in the door.

“Wassup Jelly!” Rell interjected before picking Riana up and swinging her around.

He called her jelly because he always said her booty jiggled when she walked, and never gave up the chance to touch her. He had been ignoring Kyla for the longest when Riana was around so she was use to it by now. It baffled Kyla how much two people could flirt and never date each other.
Rell led them into the living room where all nine of the neighborhood boys sat sprawled over the couches eating everything from egg sandwiches to blueberry muffins. Rell could throw down in the kitchen although it was hard to picture someone as lazy as him cooking, but everyone took full advantage of his willingness to whip up whatever they asked for.

“Oh yeah, KY, that’s Rasheed over there in the corner with the black shirt, Rasheed, this is Kyla and Riana. You can call her KY, or BB, and you can call her Jelly, or my wife.”

Rell introduced them between chewing on nacho cheese Doritos. Kyla had forgotten the fact that they use to call her BB because she was always seen eating Butterfinger BB’s, her favorite candy.

“Was sup.” he said nodding his head in their direction. Kyla and Riana exchanged a giddy glance on their porcelain faces after noticing how deep his voice was.

“You’re not g’wan get up and greet us?” Riana asked, obviously talking to Rasheed. This made Kyla wince a little due to the possibility that he might fall for her because of her feisty attitude; it’s happened plenty times before, though she was just being herself.

To Kyla’s surprise, Rasheed got up and slowly stepped over limbs to greet them. “Aw man, don’t let them guh’s get you, they ain’t nobody.” TJ said in his thick Texas accent.
Riana stuck her hand out and shook Rasheed’s hand before hopping over the couch to land right on TJ’s stomach. He let out a breath similar to stepping on a bag pipe.

Kyla almost forgot what was going on when suddenly Rasheed pulled his sleeve up exposing a large tribal tattoo across the better of his shoulder. She loved tattoos on men, and she found it strange that she hadn’t found something she didn’t like about him. Coming back to her senses, she held her petite arms out in hopes that he would hug her. He swooped down and wrapped his muscular arms around her body, and she seemed to sink in his embrace. Maybe it was the fact that he was much bigger than her, but his warmth added to the smell of his clothes up against her face was similar to wrapping yourself in linen fresh out of the dryer.
He seemed to let go all too soon, and stared at her for a moment while pulling up his light blue jeans. He took Kyla’s chin with his index and thumb fingers and held her face up to the light hanging over the dining room table.

“Yeeeaaaah, I remember you. You bumped into me a while back.”

“Yeah, that was me. I didn’t hurt you did I?” Kyla asked, shyly.

“I should be asking you that. You looked a little misty eyed.”

“No, her shit was glazed from that crack!” Anthony, another neighborhood boy cackled, walking past them into the kitchen.

“Shut up, you the only one that do those strange drugs.” Kyla shot back.

“Yeah whatever. Anyway, what ya’ll all dressed up for? You try’na impress somebody?” Rell asked. It was funny how boys could just blow you up like that without thinking about it first.

“No. My mom was going to take us somewhere but she didn’t feel that good, so I just told her to call me if she starts to feel better.” Kyla lied. “Not bad to be right off the top!” she thought to herself.

“So where were ya’ll going?”

“None ya business boy! We grown all up and tru here so we don’t got’ta tell you nutt’n!” Riana threw in, still sitting on TJ’s stomach.

In the hours that passed, they all laughed, joked, and watched ‘Friday’, but Kyla kept her focus on Rasheed, who almost didn’t notice she was there. He had pretty smile, but just seeing him smile didn’t feed her hunger to know more about him. At 10:30 his cell phone rang, and he left shortly after. One by one the other’s left until Rell offered to walk them home.

“Bye KY, I’ll call you tomorrow gal!” Riana sighed, holding her spine like an old woman.

“Keep my side of the bed warm Jelly! And put on something pretty, I’ll be back in a minute!” Rell hollered waving to her. Riana just smiled and closed the door behind her. Five houses down, three kidney punches, and two ‘remember when’s’ later Rell stood under Kyla’s porch light looking exhausted.

“Why don’t you and Riana just go out?” Kyla asked intently.

“Man whatever. I got my eye on someone else right now.” He groaned.

“Who? Her momma?” Kyla joked.

“Shit, that ain’t a bad idea, she got a fat ass too!” he laughed pinching his chin.

“EW, you little nasty!” she said putting on the ugly face.

“Na, this other girl. She fine as hell and she’s real cool. She’s a good one. You’d like her if you met her. She goes to our school”

“What’s her name?”

“Man I’m not gonna let you jinx me!” he said stepping off the porch.

“If things work out everything will be perfect, I just gotta get her to feel where I’m coming from, y’know?”

“Yeah. I hope that works out for you. See ya when I see ya!” Kyla said, and with that she closed the door on another day of the summer.