I’m pretty together when it comes to the opposite sex. I pride myself on not being one of those gals who goes nuts about guys. So it came as a surprise when I went gaga over Brody McGraw.
Okay, so he was beautiful. Taller than all the teachers, ripped abs, sculptured chest, disheveled, sandy hair, bright-blue peepers. With those powerful thighs, he was of course, a track athlete. Most beautiful was his smile.
But when I learned that he was the brother of Nick McGraw, and cousin to Bud-the-dickhead McGraw, my hopes and dreams of us meeting, him ditching his girlfriend for me, him falling head-over-heels in love with me, us getting hitched and raising children together, Titaniced.
He’s probably as obnoxious and annoying as Bud, I thought. Probably also drives a truck with a bumper sticker that reads, Honk if you KKK.
Brody and Nick McGraw recently joined our school. They were in a private school before this. Not exactly sure why they enrolled at our school. Heard something about his father wanting his kids to be schooled with his supporters. You know – live among the people, to win over the people.
A ploy or something. If it means that I get to see his beautiful mug every day, then I’d say it’s a mighty fine ploy.
He’s currently dating Alicia Cooper, a cheerleader (who else?) with a small waist and a pea-size brain. She’s eighteen, with long blonde hair, blue eyes. Every guy wants to date her and every girl wants to be her. Including myself. (Be her, not date her. Let’s get that out of the way, okay?)
The bad thing about her – she’s nice. No really, she’s a cheerleader, good looking, popular, and she’s nice. Go figure; I’m still trying to. She smiles at me and she’s pleasant to everyone around her.
Anyway, the object of my perving looks right through me, so I guess I need to lower my standards.
“So, have you decided?” That voice belongs to the pretty pixie called Tina. (Bud calls her Tuna. Don’t let her hear you call her that. She’ll kick your ass.) She’s one of my best friends.
Tina is Mixican too. Her father is white and her mother is from the Seychelles - a mix, French/Indian with green eyes and dark brown skin, all of which Tina has inherited. Her skin is lighter though, but she doesn’t need bronzer.
Tina gets underestimated a lot because she is tiny and sweet. Appears sweet. But … she has a talent and is wonderful at it. She’s a serial shoplifter.
She’s so good, she actually gives lessons to others. Got a special occasion like, Prom night? Talk to Tina before you go shopping.
Hot date and low budget? Talk to Tina first. She’s got a great heart and will happily share anything she owns with you. Maybe it’s because she gets it for free anyway. You know the saying: easy-come-easy-go?
But she’s sweet with olive skin, long, spiral curls and a warm smile.
“On what?” I ask.
Her eyes follow mine to Brody McGraw. “Guess you can perve.”
“Guess I can. He’s so beautiful.” My sigh is wistful. “How can one guy be so good looking? There ought to be a law against that.”
She places herself in front of me with a forget-about-it-he’s-never-gonna-fall-for-someone-like-you look, and blocks out my view of my crush. “Let’s talk about a more pressing issue – your birthday. What d’ya wanna do?”
“I wanna go to Danes,” I say. “I wanna do the Diiiiiirty like Christina Aguilera, get real nassssty.” I put my fists to my chest and shake my booty.
“You’re not eighteen yet. Danes won’t allow you in. Next!”
“Fake IDs,” Laura says. “It’s about time we got them.”
Laura is our problem-solver. She too is mixed – Mexican mother, American father. She looks white, but considers herself Mexican, mainly because her father, asshole that he is, dumped her mother with two children and married another younger, white woman.
Laura shuns whites, doesn’t fit in with them and declared herself Mexican years ago. However, the Mexicans are confused when they hear her speak Spanish, especially since she’s tall, slim, has blue eyes and waist-length naturally blonde hair. So, they sort of shun her.
She’s really pretty, but she wears glasses and she hunches so much, that her beauty is sometimes hidden. Most times hidden.
She’s got an IQ of 162 and sometimes I think she’s way too smart to be joining us. (Mine – I’m still waiting for my IQ to be delivered from God. I have faith that one day it will arrive by registered post.)
She can do great shit, like turn a PC into a supercomputer that NASA would kill for, hot-wire a Lear jet, read a map and even hold it the correct way, create a website without using a ready-made template, and bust the code for Photoshop, so we can all use it without paying for it. All the things I can’t do. But she has no idea how to clean her bedroom and can’t cook for shit. Together we make a great match.
She’s really good with the ‘keystroke’ thing. Like the time Amy’s mother suspected her father of cheating on her with his brother’s wife.
They stole his laptop and gave it to Laura. Even though it was password protected, Laura broke in, captured some keys, and before long, Amy’s mother had all the dirt on Amy’s father. Since she knew when and where the errant couple were meeting, Amy’s mother was there with her video camera to capture the deceitful lovers without their knowledge.
Of course, since the bust was going to be cooler than watching JWow and Sammy from Jersey Shore cage fight, we made it our duty to be there too, iPhones in hand. Cool huh?
But wait, there’s more - Laura went one step further; she rigged things so that every email sent and received, was also cc’d to Amy’s mother’s account. As you can imagine, there was drama after that. Biiiig drama. Humungous.
But wait, there’s even more – Laura went one step further – she got emails from both sides sent to her email account, so we got to see everything: the dirty emails, the sexy nude photos, everything. Entertaining much? You bet! We got a great amount of sex education from it all. Especially since we rewound and watched it over and over and over again.
“Luther can get us fake IDs,” Sultana reminds us.
Sultana is third generation Persian/Lebanese/Arab/Iranian/Pakistanian/Afghanistanian … you name it – she stakes a claim to it.
But she’s a huge disappointment to us – she’s never been to Iran, Lebanon, Iraq or any of the Middle-Eastern countries, doesn’t know how to spell ‘burqua’, has never worn one, has never been involved in any terrorist activities whatsoever.
Not even been trained in Pakistan or Afghanistan to be a terrorist, to our disappointment.
We suspected she was a bona-fide American when we told her that Osama Bin Laden was dead and she said, “Oh, is he? How did he die?” I mean, really? ‘How’, Sultana? What’s the use of having all this scary genealogy if you have no hatred toward America, no ties to Al Qaida and can’t scare the shit out of anyone?
When we first met her, we were so excited. We shivered with delight at the thought of future conversations: “Don’t fuck with me, Bud. My friend here is from the Middle East and we know where you live.” Did we get that chance? Noooo!
To make matters worse both her mother and father are medical doctors in Los Angeles.
Medical doctors. Really, Sultana?
She has olive skin, dark brown, large eyes and humungous boobs – an E-cup. She’s always talking about a breast reduction, even though her boobs get her lots of attention from boys. Unwanted attention, she calls it.
What is she good at? She can belly dance. Almost as good as Shakira. Well, not quite, but she can keep you mesmerized with those hips. But, and this is a huge ‘BUT’, Sultana is pretty dumb. Surprisingly so, considering that her parents are doctors. I’m no Einstein so I don’t mind her dumbness – makes me look smart.
“Let’s pay Luther a visit then,” I say and we all get up and go in search of Luther for fake ID’s.
****
Luther is surrounded by three guys and three girls. All black, all one hundred percent badass, and of course angry as hell.
“Hey Luther,” I say. “Can we talk to you?”
He flexes his finger at me.
“Alone,” I say in a polite voice.
The girls in Luther’s company exchange what-the-fuck? looks.
Luther slouches over a chair and eyes us. “Anything you wanna say, you say in front of mah niggas, shawty. I ain’t getting up for no one, maan.”
Luther is all hood, a Sean Kingston lookalike, complete with low hanging pants and dark shades, even at night, I’m sure. He professes to be related to Jay-Z, Neo and Ludacris – which we think is bullshit. Of course, he adopts the Sean Kingston accent as well.
Having no choice, we walk up to his crew. “We need fake ID’s to get into Danes. Can you do them for us?”
“Sure, I can do them. If you blow me.”
His friends laugh, while my friends look at him with disgust.
“Fuck off!” I say, as I drop my bag and sit down.
“You four can stand in line and take turns or you can do it all together. I ain’t fussy, maan.”
We roll our eyes but stay focused. “The fake IDs Luther – how much?”
His eyes travel over me slowly. “For you, we can work out something, baby girl.”
A girl with a fishnet top – his girl, I assume, or who wants to be his girl – glares at me as if I am considering Luther’s proposal. White bitch!
I ignore her thoughts and focus. “Luther, I’m talking money here, okay? How much?”
Nice watch, white bitch. It’ll look great on my wrist.
I jerk my neck to look at her. She’s eyeballing Laura.
“How much you got, Burn baby?”
I tear my eyes away from her to look at Luther. “How much you asking? We need four.”
“Fifty apiece.”
“When?”
“Three days.”
“Fifty’s too much. I don’t know …” I look at my girls.
They nod eagerly. Too eagerly for Luther.
“Might be a little more than fifty,” he says. “Might be more like seventy, maan.”
I snatch my my bag and stand up. “That’s too much. I can get it for fifty but it’s gonna take a while ‘cause he’s busy, that’s all.”
My girls frown at me. What the hell, Burn?! That’s not true!
“Whoa! Slow down li’l Mama,” Luther says. “We can work somethin’ out. Sit yo fine ass down, baby girl.”
Slowly, I sit down. My friends exhale.
We agree on fifty a piece. I give him the money and get up to leave.
Fishnet and her friends put their heads together and whisper. I get a bit worried when I realize they plan to roll Laura. Fishnet stands up.
I move in front of Laura and look directly at fishnet. “Just you fucking try!” I say in what I hope is a snarl.
Her two friends stand up. The look in their eyes tells me they’re ready to take me on.
They’re fugly, big and tough and we’re absolutely no match for them. Shit! Shit! Shit! I’m gonna get my ass kicked something terrible here.
Fishnet glares at me, but I catch a glimpse of uncertainty in her eyes. Slowly, she sits down. Her friends follow. Whew! I resist the urge to wipe the sweat beads off my forehead.
“Let’s get out of here!’ I mutter to my girls.
Laura talks excitedly about the fake IDs, clearly having no idea of the risk I just took for her.