Belle and Cinderella

"Come here," I call to my cousin Landon,  smiling as sweetly as I can. It's summer time and at 10am, it's already stiflingly hot in the Georgia sun.

My cousin looks very nervous. Just a moment ago he bragged about how in Cleveland,  he's the baddest nigga around. How girls think he's  real "tight" and how his crew used to "get suspended and shit."  He claims that his bitch at home has tits the size of watermelons ("the BIG kind man. Seedless.") and that even though he's short, he's "blessed" where it counts.  He's 14, and I just turned 15.

I guess I don't really have a knack for bullshit. Maybe that's why, a year since moving down here to the suburbs of Atlanta,  I don't have many friends. 

I'm not really into music and don't know much about rap or pop. I guess I'm sorta what you call husky, and I'm not good at sports. I enjoy playing "Call of Duty" on my Xbox, but I'm definitely not a gamer. I do good in math but I'm not gifted and talented. I'm also not going out with anyone.

I like girls.  I mean, my best friend in the world is Alexis Reid, the Jewish Princess next door. She's up in New Jersey, where I moved from. When we were really little we played dolls and dressup. I never minded that she was really bossy, and always knew that beneath it all, she was nice. When we got to be older, she mellowed out and we'd just chill. We could talk about anything, I guess.

When we were 13 she started dating this 17 year old guy. The town we lived in was small, and the middle school and high school were right next door to each other. These things just happened.

She told me about how they touched each other....and about her first time doing it . She said she had been scared but that it worked out OK.  I think I just nodded.

One time, last year before I  moved, she asked if I was jealous of her boyfriend----of the fact that he'd been with her. That he could do what he pleased with her body, and that he had a monopoly on her time.

I was jealous of her boyfriend, but not for the reasons she listed. He was tall, and svelte, and beautiful in a blond sort of way.  I thought it would have been nice to be him. I musta said something like that to Alexis.

I was surprised by her reaction, I definitely know that. I remember she grabbed my hand, and gave it a huge squeeze and didn't say anything. I think she thought I had come out to her or something. Maybe I had.

Anyway, we ended up making out that night, under the bleachers, by the baseball field the middle and high school shared. It was my first kiss, and we definitely messed around.

Neither of us I guess really worried about the implications of what we were doing. The whole thing was just friendly.

Well, that last part isn't exactly true. I moved away before her boyfriend could weigh on on our special "friendship" and Alexis did seem to grow more distant. On the day I left, she have me a peck on a cheek and a photograph of her and me as children. Each of us had dresses on, she Cinderella, and I, a dark skinned Belle from Beauty and the Beast. She hasn't answered my calls, and she's never on gchat anymore. I guess it was a goodbye...

My cousin won't shut the fuck up. He visits every summer but seems to be working particularly hard at being a nigga this year. I don't know why he tries. His Mom (my aunt) is a lawyer and makes bank and, be goes to a private day school.

Anyway, I'm done with this dick measuring discussion. I've always been squeamish about taking about girls and shit with guys. I guess that's why I'm thinking about Alexis.

I offer up a challenge. I have a pierced ear, something that my aunt would never allow Landon. I tell him that if he's truly bad ass, he'll let me put a hole through his ear.

He's scared and he knows that what I'm proposing is ridiculous. But he's been ensnared by the prospect of being an ultimate nigga. He sits down in the lawn chair that I  place in the driveway.

I hold his head still as I take a nail that's been laying  on the ground  in the garage. Holding his ear flap as best I could with my left hand, I plunge the rusty piece as hard as I can into his ear with my right. I miss.

His neck is a blood bath. He's crying and shreiking. He's writhing on the ground.  He's pissing himself and begging that I call 911.

I guess I should.