EMJAY
Damn, Shariece looked like liquid sex. I’d be lucky if I could get through the night without getting wood. I rolled my tongue back in my mouth knowing that I would need it later to lick her from her red, pedicured toenails to her full, glossed lips.
I sneaked up behind Brant and slapped him hard on the back of the neck. He turned around. “Jay, what’s up, boy,” he said as he picked me up in a big bear hug.
I could already feel the blood flow being cut off from my feet. “Damn, bruh, put me down, dang.”
“I see you’ve put on some pounds. What, you eat a small child before you came?”
“More like a busload of kids,” Elsias chimed in, who was another good friend of mine from Rickards High School.
“What’s up, El-B?” We came together in a hug that wasn’t as rib-cracking as the one Bigfoot Brant had given.
“Man, whatever, Ya’ll brothers know I got a glandular problem,” Brett said, rubbing his belly.
“More like pulling your big butt from the all-you-can-eat buffet,” Chadae said.
“Cha, is that you?” I asked.
“The one and only.”
Shariece looked at Chadae oddly as I roped my arms around her. While Brant had put on weight, Chadae had lost all of her baby fat. Home girl was fine, but she didn’t hold a candle to Shariece.
“I would like you all to meet Shariece.”
“Hey, Shariece, how you doing?” Brant said, shaking her hand.
“Try not to break the lady’s hand,” Chadae said. “I love your blouse. Where did you get it, Lane Bryant?” Chadae’s outer shell might have changed, but she was still a bitch. Shariece wasn’t too happy with Chadae’s dig, but she would check her before the night was over with if Chadae kept on.
“No, actually, I bought this from Macy’s,” Shariece said. I knew that I didn’t have a thing to worry about, that Shariece could hold her own with this bunch, and didn’t need me to ride to her rescue.
“Well, ya’ll pull up some chairs. We have a lot to catch up on,” Elsias said. “Since our boy Emjay here don’t come around anymore.” Chadae sat next to Elsias, me next to Brant, while Shariece sat next to me.
“Yeah, I know. I’ve just been so busy with the school thing that I really haven’t had time to hang out much.”
“I know that feeling, Jay,” Chadae said. “These nursing classes are kicking my butt up and down campus. I’m in class all day and studying at night. I barely have time to eat, much less get some sleep.”
“So how’s your mama doing, Jay?” Elsias asked.
“She’s good,” was really all I could say about Mama, considering we hadn’t spoken in three months.
“Is she still running that salon over there on South Adams?” Brant asked.
“Yeah, it’s still going strong. I helped her do some remodeling to it last year, so business is good.”
“Does she still make those cherry cheesecakes with whipped cream and walnuts sprinkled on top?” Brant asked.
“Yeah, she’ll probably be making one for Thanksgiving.”
“Your moms make the best cherry cheesecake.”
“Man, is that all you think about? Food?” Dash asked as he set our drinks on the table.
“What else is there?” Brant asked as he patted his belly.
“Brant is like a bottomless pit when it comes to food. Will eat anything if it ain’t tied down,” Dash said.
“Do you think your moms can make me a cheesecake for Thanksgiving?”
“Only one?” I asked, laughing.
“I’ll pay her for two.”
“Dang, you greedy,” Chadae said. “You don’t need cheesecake. Weight Watchers is what you need.” Everyone laughed while Shariece smiled politely with her hands folded neatly in her lap.
“I’ll talk to her about making you a cheesecake. She won’t mind making you one. One thing she likes about you, Brant, is that you bring your appetite. This brother never turned down an invite for dinner. He ate at our house more than at his own,” I said.
“I think he ate at all our houses like that,” Elsias added.
Brant took one of the sugar cookies that were sitting on a plate in the middle of the table.
“So Shariece, what do you do?” Chadae asked. Everyone got quiet as if Shariece was about to say something astounding and eye-opening.
“I’m a teacher at Tallahassee Community College. I teach English.”
“Cool. How long have you been teaching?” Chadae asked.
“For about four months now.”
“Do you enjoy teaching?” Chadae asked.
“I love it. To be able to influence people, teach them that there’s more than one way to think about an issue, it’s great.”
“So are you and Emjay just friends?”
“Chadae, seriously?” Dash said.
“I’m just asking her a question; what’s wrong with that?”
“Stop interrogating the woman, damn,” Brant said.
“Shut up. Have another cookie, B,” Chadae said.
“We’re friends. This is actually my first time hearing Emjay read, so I’m here for support,” Shariece said.
“I think we all are. It’s about time they got some real talent up in here instead of all these white folks getting up on stage reading poems about flowers and country cabins and shit,” Chadae went on. “Emjay is going to show them how to do a damn thing.”
“That’s what’s up,” Brett said, as he rubbed my shoulder.
“True. What are you going to spit tonight?” Elsias asked.
“I got something new I’m going to reveal on stage for the first time. Trust though, ya’ll won’t be disappointed,” I said.
“Oh, we already know,” said Dash.
I was nervous, anxious and excited all at once. “I hoped I wouldn’t get up there and fuck up.”
“Never that, son,” Elsias said.
“You still got it, trust,” said Dash.
“Jay, do you remember when we took your moms’ car and went joy riding?” Brant asked.
“Oh damn, I almost forgot about that.”
“We got into your mom’s Crown and got drunk off our asses.”
“Yeah, and I remember you throwing up on the floor too. Had the whole car smelling like red beans and rice and Crown Royal.”
“Eww, how long ago was this?” Chadae asked.
“We were like fifteen. All Jay had was his learner’s permit.”
“Man, do you know how long it took me to get the smell out of my mom’s car? I remember grabbing every cleaning supply she had trying to scrub puke out of the carpet.” Everyone roared with laughter.
“‘Why does my car smell like vomit?’ Mama kept asking me.”
“What did you say?” Brant asked.
“I acted like I didn’t know what she was talking about. It wasn’t like I was going to tell her that we took her car to go joyriding up and down Tallahassee.”
Brant laughed so hard he cried.
“Oh, we can all laugh about it now,” I said. “Crazy thing was, we didn’t get stopped once by the cops.”
“Seriously?” Chadae asked.
“We drove to Panama City, and didn’t get pulled over.”
“Ya’ll were lucky. Cops probably would have put ya’ll under the jail had you gotten stopped,” Chadae said.
“How were you able to get your mama’s car without her knowing?” Elsias asked.
“His moms had gone out of town, and she left him the keys,” Chadae said.
“It was to some hair convention in Tennessee, that year, I think. ‘You drive to school and straight back home. Don’t drive my car at night,’ she said,” Leandra said.
“We were bored and this crazy-ass boy got it in his head to go out and try to pick up girls,” Chadae said.
“Figures,” Chadae said.
“Hey, I recall that you were one of those girls we picked up at Popeyes,” Brant said.
“Ya’ll thought ya’ll had real swag,” Chadae said.
“We had swag coming out of our asses and you know it,” Brant said.
“Whatever . . . whatever.” Chadae laughed.
“This fool wanted to drive all the way to Miami, talking about going to damn South Beach and he was dead serious too,” I said.
“So what did ya’ll do?” Shariece asked.
“We spent the weekend chilling in Panama City and came back like that Sunday morning. Mama didn’t get back from the hair show until like six that night, but that next day, she was on my ass about why the car reeked like throw-up.”
“That’s so nasty,” Chadae said. “How long did it take you to get the smell out, Jay?”
“Like three weeks. Mama made me spend my allowance money on getting the seats shampooed.”
“So she never found out about you and Brant driving to Panama City?”
“No one ever did.”
Shariece placed her hand on my knee, looked at me like she was saying my secret was safe with her. Her touch was enough to make my dick bang against the wall of my underwear. All I wanted to do was pick Shariece up, lay her on the table and ravish her fine ass right there in front of Brant, Dash, Elsias and Chadae as they watched in total shock and awe, café patrons capturing every thrust on their cell phones, but that was the kind of shit that got us into hot water in the first place. I had to take care of my hard-on because the last thing I wanted to do was go on stage popping wood. I sent Shariece a text message. Meet me in the men’s room, ten minutes. I watched her pull her phone out of her purse and read my message.
“Ya’ll, I’ll be back.”
“Where are you going?” Chadae asked.
“I have to take a leak before I go on stage to read,” I lied.
I sauntered off to the bathroom where my dick was so hard it hurt. Two of the stalls closest to the door were occupied with guys taking a piss. I took the last stall at the end of the shitter—the bigger, roomier one. I undid my jeans and tugged my hard-on gently out of white, cotton underwear. Gently, I started to massage it, running my thumb over the thick head of my dick. The two men pissed, flushed, washed their hands and exited out of the bathroom. A minute after they left, I heard the door being pushed open as hinges let loose a squeal.
“Emjay, where are you?” It was Shariece. I cracked the stall door slightly to let her know where I was. She slid in between me and the door.
“What are you doing?” She smiled, glancing down at my thick, nine-inch erection.
“Baby, I need you to take care of this before I have to go on.”
“Jay, right now, are you serious?”
“I can’t go on stage with a hard-on. Come on, baby, please.”
“Damn, you picked a fine time for this shit now.” Shariece sat on the commode and placed her purse on top of the tissue dispenser. “We gotta hurry before Dash and them suspect something,” she said. She held my dick at the base as she started to lick the head of my dick.
“Damn, fuck, that’s what’s up.” Her tongue was warm and wet, feeling on point to the touch. She threw her lips around the full plumpness of my dick head, making them tight as she began to suck my dick hard and fast, licking along the shaft of my meat like a chocolate pudding popsicle. With all the crazy shit that had been going on with Deandre, neither one of us was in the mood for sex, so this was the first time since finding out that he had videotaped us, that we had been able to be intimate. I only wished we were at home in my bed instead of in a bathroom that reeked of stale piss and liquid soap. A blow job was exactly what I needed to relieve all the stress and pressure that I was feeling from the last couple of weeks. Shariece took inch after inch in her mouth as she swallowed me, her nose grazing in my thatch of soft, black crotch hair on my groin. She held onto both railings as she sucked, both sides of her jaws caved in as she hugged my dick with her mouth. Damn, my baby had that good head game. Shariece was going in hard when someone walked in. “Shit.” I thought she would stop, but she kept at me with her eyes shut like we were the only two in the bathroom. Shariece kept quiet so as to not draw attention. Pearls of spit trickled down my shaft, dripping off the end of my balls. The brother who had walked in pissed, washed his hands and left, oblivious to what we were doing. This was only the second time I had gotten my dick sucked in a bathroom. The first was when I got head in the shitter in the ninth grade by Chadae, another secret I would take to my grave. She can suck a dick, but has nothing on Shariece. I don’t know what was turning me on more: Shariece blowing me in the bathroom or the thought of getting caught. She began moving her hand up and down the long, thick shaft as she enveloped my appendage with her mouth, taking nine inches to her throat. “Baby, I’m about to come,” I warned her, but she didn’t slow up, but sped up her blow job work until I came, shooting torrents of cum. Shariece throated my load effortlessly, taking every drop I had to give. She gently pulled away, my dick drenched with her spit.
“I wish I could fuck you,” I said.
“I plan on it when we get home,” she said, smiling. Shariece adjusted her dress, pulling it down her ass and thighs as I tucked my drained dick back into tight-whites and denim. “That Chadae is a real piece of work.”
“I’m surprised you haven’t clawed her eyes out yet.”
“The night is still young.”
“She’s cool when you get to know her.”
“You mean when she’s not being a prissy bitch.”
“Stop,” I said, laughing.
“I saw how she was drooling over the table at you. Do you two have history?”
“We went on a couple of dates, but it never led to anything.”
“Let’s go before someone catches us.”
“You go first, and then I’ll follow you out,” I said, as I tucked in my shirt.
Shariece wrapped her arms around me and gave me a wet-hot kiss. “That’s for luck,” she said. “With you by my side, I don’t need luck.” She exited the bathroom and I followed behind her ten minutes later. Shariece was back at the table sipping her pumpkin spice Frappuccino like she was never in the men’s room sucking my dick.
“What did I miss?”
“Nothing yet,” Chadae said, smiling. “Dash is about to kick off the reading. Are you ready for your comeback?”
“This brother never left,” Brant said, as he gave me a pat on the back.
Dash got the crowded café that was standing room only, revved up. He was a natural on the mic. I listened as he read off my bio I had typed up on an index card. As soon as Dash said my name, the crowd let loose a roar of claps and whistles. The love people were giving off sent a jolt of energy through me. I remember how nervous I was before my first reading. I was a senior in high school and Dash was the only friend I’d told about reading at The Warehouse on Gaines Street after finally getting up the nerve to recite my poetry in front of a live audience. Dash swore he wouldn’t tell anyone. “You gotta let me tell Brant and Chadae at least,” he’d said. I had said no at first, but Dash not being able to take hell no for an answer, twisted my arm. A few days before the reading, I went to a T-shirt shop and had my buddy Hank paste “Got Poetry” on the top left-hand corner of a blue T-shirt. I thought I was Eldridge Cleaver or somebody with my militant blue and black camo pants and black Army boots. The idea was some corny, cheeseball shit thinking back on it now. I still have that T-shirt with holes in it and blotches of bleach stains. I almost lost it when I saw Ma using it as a dust rag and snatched it out of her hands.
“Emjay, what do you want with that old shirt?”
“It has sentimental value,” I told her. “It’ll be something I can look back on when I become a famous writer someday.”
“I don’t care what you become as long as you stay in school, off the street and don’t come up in here with a baby. I am too drop-dead gorgeous to be somebody’s grandmama.”
First time I read other than in front of my dresser mirror, my throat was dry and my palms were sweating. Don’t fuck up, don’t fuck up, I thought to myself as I fished three poems I had folded up in the back pocket of my cool camo pants. I was channeling all of my favorite poets: Amiri Baraka, Nikki Giovanni, Alice Walker and my all-time favorite, the man himself, Langston Hughes. I spat three poems and got off stage, happy to get it over with and even happier that I had the balls to do it. I guess I was good, because the host invited me back to read again and before long, I had a following. I did poetry slams all through my senior year in high school and then stopped a few months before starting college. Now, there I was after almost a year of not doing poetry slams, about to get back behind the mic.
Don’t fuck up, don’t fuck up, I chanted in my head.
Armed with five new poems, I started with a piece I wrote for Shariece. All eyes were on me, waiting with baited breath to hear me wax poetic. When I looked out and saw Shariece, I knew everything was everything and began to read the first line of the love poem.