Playing Hard To Get

“Well, it’s called the criminal justice system—not the people’s justice system. And no, I don’t. I don’t see how any African could.”

“You’re one of those militant brothers,” Tamia said.

“Militant involves the military. I’m a warrior,” Malik responded. “I don’t take orders. I deliver results. Every African man has to do his own part if we’re going to get back to Akebulan.”

Tamia didn’t know what Akebulan meant and at that point, she didn’t care. Malik’s logic was smothering her thoughts. How could he virtually sign up to go to prison? He was correct. Black people, some of the best, went to prison every day for a number of reasons that had nothing to do with them. But most of those people simply had poor representation. The verdict was a reflection of their lack of control of their image. A guilty person with a lawyer who was in control wasn’t guilty anymore. She’d seen it. She’d done it.

“So…” Tamia tried to put words into the silent space in the conversation. Once again, he’d shared nothing about the actual case. “You want to go to prison?”

“What?” Malik shook his head and leaned over the desk to hand Tamia a piece of paper he’d written on. There was an address.

“What’s this?”

“The Royal Ankh,” he said. “I’ll be there tonight. Come out and see what we do. There’ll be a lot of sisters from the community there.”

“Oh, I don’t do that—I’m not a—”

“It’s not like that.” Malik laughed and again there were his teeth. Later that night Tamia would think of how much she liked hearing his laugh and

seeing his teeth. It would be great to find ways to make that happen more often. “Just come.”

“I can’t. I promised a friend I’d meet her at this party…and…” Tamia had been invited to countless events by countless clients and turned them down countless times. But somehow this one seemed different. Saying no made her uneasy. The way Malik had written the address on the sheet of paper—for her—wasn’t like any other offer from a client to an attorney, hoping to get an edge, to build a relationship. He didn’t seem like he was trying to get anything.

“Well, you have the address. Use it if you can.”

5

There are no good girls gone wrong, just bad girls found out.

—Mae West

Venus Jenkins-Hottentoten-Hoverslagen-Jackson, a black woman with the most ridiculous last name of any woman in the city on account of two failed marriages to Swedish bankers and one mediocre, yet standing, marriage to a Knicks starting player, was scanning a crowd of beautiful people for the most beautiful victim her eye could spy. Only, to Venus Jenkins-Hottentoten-Hoverslagen-Jackson this beautiful somebody was not a victim. In her mind, they were all friends, who unfortunately fell beneath her social knife from time to time. While the Southern society snob fancied herself a socialite with friends abounding everywhere, the only thing she was truly good at abounding was husbands.

Staring through a crowd of these beautiful friends and possible future husbands (if the Knicks thing didn’t work out) at the annual cover party for ESPN magazine’s body issue in Gramercy Park, Venus spotted a familiar face she hadn’t seen in a while.

“Look what the cat dragged in here!” Venus happily exclaimed as if she was greeting a best friend. People around her looked on as she sat down her glass of wine and pushed past a few couples to wrap her arms around the new find.

“Oh, Venus,” Tasha cheerfully countered in the middle of the tight, overperfumed embrace. “My favorite frenemy.”

“Oh, you mustn’t believe that.” Venus laughed a bit, using a faux European accent she’d picked up two husbands ago.

“Of course, beautiful,” Venus gushed, stepping back to pretend to admire Tasha’s frame, yet she’d already seen and felt the extra thirty pounds Tasha was carrying. “You know I’m everywhere that’s somewhere. This city can’t get nothing on without me. Wish we could say the same for you, darling.”

It was a statement, said flat and to anyone not privy to Venus’s tricks, void of expectation. But Tasha was no anyone and Venus had attempted to put her beneath the knife so many times that she knew the words were more of a question/indictment demoting Tasha from the former front-running socialite she’d once been to a sometime nobody who was lucky enough to have married the right man and been invited to an event she had no business actually attending. Yes, Tasha got all of that from “Wish we could say the same for you, darling.”

“I’m around, bitch,” Tasha said, giggling so her words sounded more friendly than feisty. “Just not around you.”

The women laughed off the short spar heartily. It was a draw.

In Tasha’s old life, the one before she’d been calmed by the suburban breeze and quieted by children’s cries that were louder than her own, she would’ve won this challenge. But she was tired and actually happy to see someone she knew—even if it was a frenemy.

“How’s my favorite Knicks player?” Venus asked, resting her hand on a set of stacked abs Tasha could see rippling beneath her purple chemise. More pretty than beautiful, Venus made up for the difference by working out so much that her muscular, fat-free frame that revealed nearly every bone and muscle through its casing could’ve been featured on the cover of ESPN magazine.

“Oh, I sure hope he isn’t your favo,” Tasha joked. “We know how you do with the men.” The women laughed and quickly spied each other’s purses. Tasha’s Birkin, though old and passed down from her mother, won by a long shot over Venus’s brand-new Gucci BoHo.

“I’m not that bad. Am I?” Venus batted her eyes innocently. “No, really. Where have you been hiding yourself, Ms. Tasha? I heard you moved to New Jersey….”

“Sure did. You know I’m actually happily married and my husband and I moved there to raise our family. Do you have children yet?”