More of You (Dry Ice, 2014)
(This is an excerpt from my Untitled memoir. This piece chronicles my experience as a black teenage girl attending art school in New York. Published in Words 80, 2014.)
“It’s late, I’m tired” I swiftly nudged my thumb against the bright screen of my phone, commencing a tell-all series of texts to my best friend from Maryland, my home state. Just the thought of the superficial nonsense I get into some nights makes me sheepish around the other students in the studio. In an attempt to redeem me from all this shame, I slaved away to finish fifteen seconds of animation in two days.
“Are you leaving to get drunk?” says a boy I barely knew. I clenched my tall stack of papers, looked up at him, and thought “Who told you?” but said, “Wow, what makes you think you could talk to me like that?” I felt threatened. As always, I felt as though he was judging me, hence judging my artwork leading me to believe that he’s doubting my abilities as an artist within seconds of a simple question. Other than the fact that he’s the only other Black guy at this school that I speak to besides the swift U.A.D.S, Universal-African-Diaspora-Salute, which in reality is a nonchalant head nod to acknowledge one’s existence. I couldn’t help but feel slightly offended but more so guilty for abandoning my work. The startled look on his face indicated that he meant what he said as a joke.
He locked up into a twisted look and smiled with one hand gently stroking his neck “Too improper?” he looked down at me as I shoved my giant stack of papers into my cubby. I looked up “Yeah somewhat.” Then I went to gather my things to leave. After working 9 to 6 drawing frame after frame, I felt it was necessary to illegally acquire alcohol and sulk for hours in a crowded room under what felt like 2 pounds of make-up. I spent most of my night running up and down flights of stairs, flirting with ugly boys, bumming drags of lethal smoke that fogged my glasses, and scorched my lungs while standing atop a crummy Manhattan apartment building. Staring at the airy night I dreamt so long and hard about when I was a teen girl staring into the four corners of my sketchbook. Above all things I did that night, I found myself staggering to the safety of a single chair in some girls’ living room as people gradually confronted me.
“So you’re just letting the party come to you?” see this guy standing over me perched up and avoiding the variety of what some would call disoriented youths is another Black boy. I met him earlier that night so we exchanged numbers as I told him how much I enjoy watching Cartoon Network while taking long sips of a Voss water bottle, where the water was substituted for hard rum and coke. I remembered drunkenly slurring something along the lines of “I need more of You in my life”, being close enough to his ear that the dark mauve tone of my lip-stick grazed gently across the collar of his white tee. That same Voss bottle now laid in the stairway nearest to the rooftop, I dropped it at the peak of my inebriation as I was being led down the steps by a divine power that defied all laws of my weight and the amount of balance I didn’t have. “No biggie”, I thought. I remembered there was Vodka in my bag next to the dresser downstairs. I was drinking to have fun. I was drinking out of boredom.
Where I came from the kids danced and ground heavily against each other’s groins in the dark circles of a gathering until pungent smells of sweat and Victoria’s Secret Japanese cherry blossom perfume wafted in the air. We didn’t stand around and drink. We listened to good music and had great sex. We ate without remorse and shared real moments of solidarity with one another, we all bonded. Through my drunken eyes, his brown face and calm demeanor led me back to that place. I believed that I needed more of him, more of that, and that which he could lead me to.
After I stumbled home we spoke for a few moments “Is…is this okay? Oh my gosh! I’m gunna I’m gunna leee on the floor. Whoa, look at this balloon!” I rolled on the floor of my shared room as my roommate coached me through my drunk texts from the top-bunk. “Here, let me see. You may say something you didn’t mean to say.” “Should I tell him, that I’m lonely?” I replied as I flung myself onto the floor. Instead, I told him that it was nice meeting him that I hope he got home safely.
The following morning I woke up to bad hair, bad breath, and a slew of misspelled text messages accompanied by a stark pain in my chest that indicated that I’ve been smoking. I groggily peeled myself off of my fitted bed sheet. I stood up to open the blinds in broad daylight with no pants, a crop-top, and black bikini cut boy shorts that wedged themselves neatly into the crevices of my ass. I swapped my latest fashion for the tights that were swept under all of my belongings I pulled off my desk the night before. The first few words muttered through the mucus buildup in my throat went along the lines of:
“I hate myself”
“It’s almost nine AM I should be at the lab”
“Man, fuck you okay!” I screamed into the mirror.
“He probably only fucks white girls.” I sighed into my phone.
