Act Like You Know

  “Why you sitting there looking so ticked?” Loni asked me.

  Unable to be convincing, I said, “No reason.”

  “You wanna go out?” Torian said. “We are in the nicest apartment in New York, and you want to hit the town! Go on and admit it. We know you, girl.”

  “And if I did? What would be wrong with that?” I said as though I had to defend myself.

  Malloy came out of her guy’s bedroom and said, “Don’t worry. Kade hooked it up.” She dangled his car keys in front of us.

  “What are you talking about?” I asked, completely confused. There was no way she could be trying to play hostess to us when she was playing nurse to Kade. “You’re not gonna be able to leave to take us anywhere. And as bad as I want to party, I wouldn’t even ask you to.”

  “You do know New York though!” Torian added, licking her chops. “You’ve been up here all summer with your clothing internship and stuff.”

  “No, no, no. I’m not leaving.”

  “Well, I’m not going anywhere by myself. Thanks for his keys and stuff, but nuh-uh,” Loni said, making me roll my eyes. I couldn’t believe some of my sorors were such wimps.

  “Where is the club? I can find it.” I stood and went over to grab Kade’s car keys.

  “Uh, no,” Malloy said, stepping in my way. All of a sudden the doorbell rang. “We got some fine gentlemen ready to take you guys out on the town.”

  “I’m not going out with strangers,” Loni said.

  I hit her in the side at the sight of the fine specimens who had come in and now stood in front of us. “C’mon, where’s that adventurous spirit? And look at these guys. They are his teammates.”

  “Oh, teammates? Oh, yeah, yeah. I—I—that’s fine. Yeah, give us a second. We gotta get ready,” Loni said, completely changing her mind.

  Torian and I just burst out laughing. Malloy knew how to do it. The three of us were all giddy as we talked about having a night on the town with some other Giants players. Unfortunately the camaraderie went out the window when we realized there weren’t enough men for the three of us. What could we do with two brothers?

  So I asked, “Where’s the other one? In the bathroom? I mean, there’s three of us. One of us will be outnumbered.”

  We all looked at Malloy, and she looked over at us like, I’m sorry. She said, “Ladies, this is Onyx.” He was the tall one with wavy hair and muscles nearly ripping out of his form-fitting shirt.

  I said, “You are the starting cornerback who got the interception and first touchdown today.”

  “Yeah, that’s me. Who are you?” he said, looking me up and down, showing his tongue.

  “These are my sorority sisters, Alyx, Torian, and Loni,” Malloy said, pulling me back and allowing Onyx to check us all out.

  However, the stud did not look at the two of them. His eyes did not move from me. All of a sudden the room got hot, and I could sense the hate.

  “And this is TJ,” Malloy said, introducing us to Kade’s other teammate.

  TJ was a light-skinned brother sporting the cutest little dreads. He had a very nice frame and was prettier than most women I knew.

  He took my hand. “I didn’t score a touchdown. Go on and say it.”

  “Yeah, but you’re a fullback. You made some nice blocks out there.” I took my hand back and gently rubbed his face.

  TJ asked, “A football fan, huh?”

  “Uh, it’s not my favorite game, but my family loves it, so I guess some of what they like rubbed off on me.”

  “Darnell was supposed to come with us,” Onyx said as he stepped in front of TJ, “but it’ll be just the two of us. Is that all right?” He held out his arm for me to put my arm through it. It was just an innocent little gesture, so I did.

  “Oh, wait a minute, dawg. This one’s for me,” TJ teased as he tried tugging me away from Onyx. Before we’d even left the place, I had two new enemies in Loni and Torian, and as I walked out to the limousine, arm in arm with two hunks, I knew my sisters were behind me calling me everything unsisterly. But you know where they were saying it? Not to my face. I was ready to party. They could roll with it or be pissed all night. Their choice.

  When we got to Top Flight, I took the party straight to the dance floor. Onyx, TJ, and I turned the place out. I didn’t mind getting a little loud. I had two shots in the car, and I was loose. Shucks, all the tears and tension we’d had—making sure Kade was going to be okay—I was ready to unwind, and if Torian and Loni couldn’t handle that, they should have stayed back at Kade’s place.

  “You guys are gonna have to dance with my girls!” I said to the two of them three songs later when I felt hands on the top of my body from Onyx and the lower part of my thighs from TJ.

  TJ looked over at the dull chicks and said, “Your girls need to loosen up.”

  I rubbed his chest and said, “Well, maybe y’all can help them with that. For real, for real—do me a favor. Play with them.”

  “And if we play with them for a little while, you think we can get with you a little later?” Onyx asked, touching my neck.

  “ ‘We’? Oh, you think I roll like that?” I backed away from them both, knowing they wanted to get kinky.

  “I don’t know. You seem like you know how to have fun.”

  “Where’s the money for the drinks?”

  “Why should we give you that? What’s in it for us?”

  “And to think Kade said y’all were gentlemen. Y’all tryin’ to give me ultimatums and stuff. Don’t you know if I wanted to get down like that later, I would? But if you gonna pressure me and stuff, we might as well end all the fun now.”

  “Oh, naw, naw. Here, here, we are gentlemen,” Onyx said as he reached in his pocket and gave me a hundred.

  “Go on over there and drink, and we’ll dance with your girls for a second. Then we will be there to get you,” TJ said. TJ was wearing a sports jacket. I reached over and put my hands where no one could see them, slid them down the back of his pants, and gripped his buns real tight. “Oh, see, now you playin’,” he said.

  “What? What? What she doing?” Onyx asked.

  “Nothing I won’t do to you,” I leaned over and whispered to him as I let my tongue slide out to his ear. “Now go get my friends.”

  As the three of us walked over to Torian and Loni, they looked so mad. If looks could kill, I probably would have been six feet under.

  “They want to dance with y’all,” I said in a foul way. I was trying to do them heifers a favor. I never needed any help getting a guy, but I always had to help somebody else get lucky.

  “The three of y’all seemed like y’all were doing just fine,” Loni said coldly.

  “Girl, you better get up out of that seat and go dance. You know you want to.” I grabbed her arm, pulled it tight, and swung her into the arms of Onyx. I didn’t have to say nothing to Torian. She was on her feet and quickly went over to TJ. I sat alone and ordered a couple more shots.

  These two handsome Mexican dudes came over to me and sat on both sides of me. I said nothing, but I could tell they were eyeing me.

  Finally one of them said, “We thought we’d never catch you alone. You know the black dudes can’t really make you happy.”

  “And all these shots you drinking are not going to make you feel good,” the other one said as he opened up his jacket a little, showing me some fun in a plastic bag. “We got a table right over there. You gonna join us?”

  To keep the peace with my girls, I thought, You know what? Why don’t I just let them have those two fools? I wasn’t into anything crazy, I was simply messing with Onyx and TJ so they’d do what I wanted. To squash all that, I decided to hang out with my kind. I was trying a little something of everything.

  Minutes later, after the drugs set in, my head started spinning, and my stomach started aching. Maybe it hadn’t been the best decision to take drugs from strangers, but I wasn’t happy here.

  Torian and Loni came over to me. “We came to get our girl,” I so
rt of thought I heard them say.

  One of the Mexican guys said, “She’s with us. She’s fine.”

  “You don’t even know where she lives or who she is. We came to get our girl.” Loni grabbed my hand.

  Onyx and TJ stood behind my girls. TJ said to my two guys, “We don’t have no problem, do we?”

  “We were just showing her a good time,” one Mexican dude said.

  Oynx said, “What the heck y’all been giving her, man?”

  “I gotta go to the bathroom!” I shouted.

  The one guy would not get up so I could leave. The next thing I knew, everything in me came up as I let out a long gasp.

  6

  PERTINENT

  I woke up in silky sheets in a panic. I was sweating all over and replaying the night’s events in my mind.

  “You’re okay, you’re okay,” I heard Malloy say as I felt a wet washcloth across my brow.

  “Oh, my gosh, I feel sick. My stomach is burning,” I said as I tossed and turned in the bed.

  Malloy said, “You’re going to be okay. You’re going to be fine. Relax. Torian and Loni told me what happened. You’re okay. You’re at Kade’s house now.”

  I needed some Tums or Pepto-Bismol or something to coat my stomach. I guess because I had been severely depressed about my mom and having my own pity party about my grades, I just kept doing one stupid thing after another. Now I had made myself physically ill.

  “You’re not supposed to be in here with me,” I quietly uttered. “You need to be taking care of Kade.”

  “He’s knocked out asleep. I heard you in here tossing. Torian and Loni were on duty earlier, but they’re asleep now. I told them I would watch you. Kade would be so bummed if you got even worse overnight if somebody didn’t watch you. He wanted to rush you to the hospital to get your stomach pumped for us to make absolutely sure all those drugs—or whatever it was you took—are completely out of your system.”

  “I know. Right. Urgh. What was I thinking, Malloy? I just hate myself right now.”

  “Well, first of all we need to get you a T-shirt.” She walked over to a drawer and tossed me one of Kade’s shirts.

  It hit my nose. “It smells so good. You’re so lucky to have a man so sweet.”

  “I just need to get him well, and I need to get my new friend well, too,” she said as she handed me a glass of water.

  “Drink this. Alyx, tell my why you did this, girl?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, clutching my stomach. “I wish I had the answers.” I looked away, rolled over on my knees, and held my stomach some more. I felt horrible, but Malloy wouldn’t let up. She sat in a nearby chair, and ten minutes later when my stomach calmed down a bit, she asked again.

  “Tell me, girl, what is going on with you? You know why you took something from some guys you didn’t know? They might have been from Mexico like you, but so what?”

  Torian and Loni have big mouths. Or maybe it was good they cared. I had been tripping, and they hadn’t left me alone.

  Malloy got that I was ticked that they had talked. “Don’t be upset. I wanted to know everything, so I made them spill the beans. And Kade was mad at his boys. They were supposed to be looking out for you, and they were trying to get in your pants. Then they turn you over to some strangers.”

  “I’m a grown woman,” I said. “Kade isn’t my dad.”

  “Obviously you’re not big-girl enough,” Malloy said. “Seriously though, Alyx, I know life doesn’t seem fair, and you’re dealing with a lot right now with your mom. Plus, I know you told me school and tutoring aren’t working out all that well, but you got to shake it off and decide you want to make the right decisions. Maybe this turned out okay, but what if you had taken something you couldn’t just throw up? None of us would have known what is was. Those guys bolted. None of us know how to get in touch with them or where they went. I guess I’m saying you’ve got another chance to get it right, but you’ve got to want to do right for you. Do you understand how crucial this is? This is your life, girl.”

  I reached over and hugged her. I really appreciated how much she cared, and in her embrace I felt the urgency. Someway, somehow I was going to shake off the silliness and get my life together.

  A week later, we were back on campus in the Beta Gamma Pi sorority room we weren’t supposed to still have. However, because our Chapter President’s uncle was the president of Western Smith, he was allowing us to still use the space.

  Though my chapter in Texas was smaller, we were big on parliamentary procedures. We used Robert’s Rules of Order; this was the first thing we got trained in after we crossed. My past collegiate adviser believed in running an orderly meeting, but as I looked around the room at my line and Western Smith’s line, I didn’t even see Western Smith’s collegiate adviser anywhere.

  I sat there as the two lines started arguing about whether we should have a party and whether we should go around and help other chapters around with their lines. They were talking over each other. Then they starting saying some truly nasty stuff to each other.

  Bea, in particular, said, “I know we’re suspended, but having a little party to raise a little money isn’t going to kill anybody. The National President isn’t going to know everything we do unless somebody in this room has a direct line to her snitches.”

  “Oh, so what are you trying to say?” Malloy said with angry veins busting from her skull. “Because I want to do things right so we can get our chapter back in compliance and back on campus. I’m not letting some of y’all pull down this chapter again.”

  Hayden tried cutting in when her line sisters and Malloy’s line sisters were almost at blows. “Everybody just needs to settle down.”

  However, sorors started screaming back and forth. The lines were ready to defend their point. Bea looked at me to join her side, knowing I had been hazed and may hold that against my line, and Malloy stared me down—she knew I truly felt bad about all her line had been through and that now I had second thoughts about hazing being right.

  Actually, I didn’t want to be a part of either group. They obviously needed some order, so I raised my hand. Everybody just stared at me and then quieted down for me to speak, but the chair didn’t recognize me.

  I motioned up front to Hayden. “Do I have the floor, Madam President?”

  “Yeah, you may say something, Alyx.”

  “Well, I know you all are wondering why I didn’t just shout out what I had to say, but you all aren’t working in order. The chair has to recognize you before you can speak. I believe Robert’s Rules of Order is an important book that keeps the feelings down and let’s everybody be heard respectfully. Then you vote on what’s best for the body.”

  “And how do you know all this?” Trisha asked impulsively, apparently having heard nothing I’d said about protocol.

  Sweetly as I could, I said, “I wish you hadn’t just talked out of turn, but to answer your question, my chapter got trained in it. That’s one of the workshops we had to do—actually, we had to master it.”

  “Why is it even important?” Torian asked.

  “Well, because you guys have been shouting at each other, and nobody is really hearing anyone’s argument. As I sat here and listened, you all made good points, but if no side is really hearing what you have to say, it’s ineffective for the chapter. Robert’s Rules also says no one should speak on a motion more than twice.”

  “Motion? What’s a motion?” Bea said.

  “Well, that’s just it. We’ve been discussing stuff, but there’s been no formal way of placing that item out there for the chapter to officially discuss. To start this meeting, no kind of agenda was even adopted; thus, anything goes, and we’re wasting time.”

  “Yeah, because I wanted to talk about some things, but the President didn’t put it on the agenda. So we just had to go with what she wanted to talk about,” Bea said.

  “Well, that’s because I’m the only one that takes the time to do the agenda,” Hayden said. “I’
m not saying it has to be this way.”

  “And that’s why you are supposed to jot down the agenda in the beginning of a meeting anyway. That way, anybody can add or take away an item they feel we don’t need to discuss. The agenda must be approved by a two-thirds vote. And if you don’t even have a quorum present. . .”

  “A quorum? What’s that?” Trisha asked.

  Malloy said, “The majority of your members present.”

  “I read the bylaws for this chapter, and we need two-thirds of our members present to do business. In other words, if two-thirds of the people are here, we can conduct business, voting, etc. If two-thirds aren’t present, it’s information only, meaning we can never vote on anything, and nothing can move out of this meeting.”

  “Wow, Soror Cruz. I am really impressed,” Hayden said.

  “I just want what’s best for our chapter. When we fuss and argue and do all that stuff, people get all worked up, and we aren’t working toward change. By operating within the confines of Robert’s Rules of Order, I think we’ll give the respect every soror here deserves and is looking for. Let the vote speak for itself. Our organization is based on moral standards, so whatever rules and grounds the National President sets, we have to stick by it, or we are jeopardizing this chapter. We could be suspended indefinitely, and I don’t think anyone in this room would want to be accused of such an awful thing. What we do now affects those coming behind us; it’s a high responsibility, and I know we’ll all do what’s right.”

  They looked at me, stood, and cheered. Wow. Maybe I did have worth.

  “Act Now. Yeah, that’s right. That’s the title of this workshop,” the sassy state director said to our chapter as we sat in the workshop for problem solving.

  None of us were excited to be at the state round-up event in Bentonville, Arkansas. We all had to be there for many reasons: Malloy’s mom had gotten our rooms comped, and there were no fees because we were suspended, and Grand Chapter had paid for it all because they wanted us to get trained. It was so hard being the only chapter kicked off campus—and we were the Alpha chapter, too. We were supposed to be the premier chapter. Though I was new to it all, I certainly knew everyone had high expectations of us. But we were a joke. Other collegiate chapters were talking about us, and we didn’t like it.