Chill Wind (6 page)

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Authors: Janet McDonald

BOOK: Chill Wind
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The noontime streets swarmed with people buying food, eating food, carrying food in bags. As “all wrong” as Miss Silver had said she was, Aisha felt very right at that moment bumping her way through the throngs. Matter of fact, she felt fly. Supa dupa fly, as Aisha's favorite hip-hop star Missy Elliott would say. She coulda swore that every boy's eye she caught had a special glint in it, and that all the girls she outstared looked jealous.
Aisha swayed and sashayed her hips as she approached the hot dog stand. “Lemme get two franks with everything, a pretzel with extra mustard, and a root beer—” A thought cut short her sentence. “No, make that a
diet
root beer.” Better shed a few pounds. But not too many, 'cause Miss Silver was dead right about girls needing meat on they bones.
She squeezed onto the end of a crowded bench in City Hall Park and balanced the cardboard tray on her knees. Soon she was washing down the last of her lunch with big gulps of soda. Workers returned to their jobs, and Aisha slid to the middle of the bench into a warm shaft of sunlight. The fantasies returned.
I'ma be a model
.
I'ma be a model.
She burped and loosened the drawstring on her leggings.
A parade of cars curled onto the Brooklyn Bridge. On the other side of the river were the projects, where she was born. She squinted at the tall, uniform buildings so far off. No, there would be no workfare for Aisha Ingram. No scrub brushes and dirty water, no heavy brooms or pointy trash pickup poles, and definitely no getting her butt kicked hassling folks on no subway patrol. She was about to blow up. No bout a-doubt it.
Big.
Big respect, big shoutouts, and big benjamins was all coming her way. Across the street, shoppers flowed in and out of the revolving doors of J & R Music World. If she had the cash, she'd be in there too, buying Whitney's greatest and Brandy's latest and Janet's newest. Well, she did have her fifty dollars. The double clang of a church chime jolted her. Sam! He
betta
be cute. Across the park she ran, bouncing and jiggling, and bustled down Broadway.
 
Mornings at the agency were usually calm, the appointments for intakes and interviews carefully spaced. Afternoons
were tumultuous, with girls waiting to be photographed, primping for go-sees, returning from shoots, and excitedly trading tales.
“Omigod, she was like, ‘Stacey, you are sooo going on the Waikiki shoot'—I almost fainted …”
“ … so I says to him, ‘Excuuuuse-me, this
was
a call for big models—am I right or am I wrong?—and now you telling me I gotta lose ten pounds? I don't
think so
.'”
“Swear to God on a mountain of Bibles, Viv, he walked in the studio wearing nothing but his cameras, and he had all this gross, red hair—ugh, it was disgusting …”
“I'm okay. I guess. But that was my
eleventh
go-see. Girls are getting work their
first
time out, but people look at me like ‘Vanish from my world!' One of these days I'm going to just stick my naked behind in an art director's face and scream, ‘Here's where you can put your go-see. Go to hell! See?'”
The boasting, complaining, and moaning were in full blast when the door banged open and in lunged Aisha, instantly silencing all talk. Sweat beaded her brow and darkened the armpits of her blouse, which had finally popped open under the strain. Her carefully smashed-down bang had been blown upward from her run and was sticking out like the brim of a cap.
“Where Sam at?!” she panted. Whispers rose.
Pammie's face registered the disdain she hadn't dared show in front of her boss. She pulled out Aisha's file, looked inside, then dropped it on the desk.
“You were scheduled for two o'clock, not ten after. Sam is very busy and cannot be kept waiting. I already sent another girl. Have a seat. Modeling is so about punctually keeping appointments.”
A few girls nodded in agreement. A project girl dissed is a force of nature. A plume of heat climbed Aisha's spine, fanned through her back, gathered in her neck, and spread to her ears and face. Her eyes sparked, and a tremor shot through her body that seemed to be felt by the whole group. “Uh-oh,” whispered a voice. As though their sky had grown suddenly dark, the models filled the office with anxious murmurs and edgy movements like forest animals sensing danger.
“No, you
didn't
give away my appointment that was for about two o‘clock, or I'ma be so about punctually kicking your stank butt!” A couple of girls eased out the door.
Pammie, a proud Long Islander, was not about to take that from Brooklyn trash. She said out loud to no one in particular, “These ghetto girls are so mouthy, it's not even funny! They get their fee refunded and a free book for their photos, then they have the gall to come in late for a shoot they haven't even paid for! I swear, some people are always looking for a freebie like somebody
owes
them. This isn't the frigging welfare, it's a model agency.”
She got up from her desk. “Look,
honey,
you're
late
. So take a seat and wait your turn like everybody else. Nobody gets special treatment around here.”
Aisha walked slowly around the desk and stood nose to
bosom with the tall, athletic receptionist. Not a girl remained in the room. In the hallway, urgent voices called, “Sam! Sam!”
“What you mean by
ghetto
girls? Why you gotta go
there
when you know ya
mama's
the one who be ghetto! What, you wanna piece of me?” challenged Aisha, ready to fight.
Their bodies pressed hard on one another as if each were trying to walk right through the other.
Aisha was defiant despite being outmatched physically. “And I ain'tcha honey! Do I
look
like some white girl's honey?! Now back up off me!” She pushed forward, attitude made flesh. “Back up
off
me, I said.”
“
You
back up, homegirl, all the way outta here, before I call the cops!” Pammie planted herself firmly against Aisha, a solid mass of former college basketball star.
“
Call
'em, g'head! My
sister
a cop! And you wrong about nobody gettin' special treatment 'cause you 'bout to get treated right now!”
Aisha gave the receptionist a hard shove, throwing her backward against the wall. Pammie gripped Aisha's forehead like she was palming a basketball and held her at arm's length. Aisha swung wildly with serious determination, but her arms were just too short to land a single punch.
That didn't stop her though from shouting as if she were really beating Pammie down. “Yeah, uh-huh, how ya like me now?! I told you to back up, but you had to be
all that.”
Pammie's large hand was gripping Aisha's whole face, but the lips kept moving. “That's all you got?! You ain't nothin'. Now who's all that, Miss Telephone Girl?! Who's all that now?!”
Pammie glared. “It sure isn't you, chubby. Just what are you supposed to be doing?
You're
the one who's nothing!”
Using her upper-body strength and still holding Aisha by the face, she pushed her toward the door. Aisha spun around, breaking Pammie's grip, ducked, and lunged. Both girls went crashing to the floor, Aisha banging away at Pammie's brick-hard abdominals as though she were pounding her way out of a life closing in on her. All of a sudden forceful hands grabbed Aisha under the armpits and yanked her backward.
“What in the name of—are you
crazy
?! Get
off
her! Somebody get a cop up here!” Samantha was a powerfully built woman with a river of silky black hair and a gifted eye for photography. She'd been shooting Debbie Silver's big models for a year. But this was a first! Sam pulled Aisha off the receptionist, who was panting more from surprise than anything else.
“You okay, Pammie?! What's going on in here?!”
The models had returned and were huddled in the doorway.
“Stacey, help me get her inside to Debbie's couch. Viv, bring wet paper towels from the ladies' room!”
Pammie leaped to her feet. “I'm fine, Sam, really! That
wuss can't even punch.” She moved toward Aisha. “You didn't hurt me, dough girl, you're too soft to hurt anything. That's why you got your fat face palmed! Try me again, and I'll dunk you!”
“Oh, you gon'
dunk
me?! Step to me then, donkey, step to me!”
Sam jumped between the fighters and held them apart. “Someone please call 911! Now!”
Aisha snatched her file from the desk and ran as fast as she could.
The Brooklyn Bridge—its cooling air, project views, and solid walkway—calmed her as it carried her back home. The timepiece on the famous Clock Building said three o‘clock. She remembered how that had been her favorite time of day, when school was about to let out and freedom was so close she felt it in her body. Her legs would get to jumping as if the double-dutch rope were already flying, holding her in its magical whirl. Raven would get the three o'clock bug too, and soon their teacher'd be hollering, “Aisha! Raven! Sit still.” Or Aisha would jerk back and forth in her seat, ducking in her imagination the dodgeball always aimed at her legs. At those times, the teacher'd give her a girls' room pass without even asking if she had to go. Once in the hall, she'd tear through school, drumming on classroom doors, and leaping down steps three at a time.
It was true, thought Aisha, that she busted out a lot of energy, but she never wanted nothing much more than to have fun. If anyone had told her then where she'd be at nineteen, she wouldn'ta believed it. She had really wanted to lock down a modeling job, but she screwed it up. Why hadn't she just dealt with it like
whatever
and acted cool? She coulda met the girls, maybe made friends, got her book together. Why'd she always have to get in a fight like a hoodlum? Pammie had dissed her in front of everybody, but so what? Had she put her hands on her? No. And s'pose the cops had busted her and locked her up? What about Star and Ty?
Aisha arrived at the bottom of the walkway steps, still blaming herself for the abrupt end of her modeling dream. She lifted the top off a trash can and tossed in her BIGMODELS file.
 
“Mommy!” cheered Starlett, hearing her mother's voice in the doorway.
Teesha could tell from Aisha's face not to bug her about how long it took her to come pick up her kids.
Aisha gave Starlett a tight hug and swung her in circles, gripping her small hands. “Been good?”
“Yeah, Mommy. And look what I drew for you! Me and you and Ty riding Black Fury the flying horsie I saw on TV!” Starlett waved her crayon-scrawled drawing.
“That's pretty.” Aisha lifted Ty and balanced him on her
hip. “And how you been, bad little boy? You been a good bad little boy? He was okay, Teesha?”
“He was okay. Cried, ate, pooped. Baby stuff. Why your hair so messed up? Or did they send you to the East Village to model?”
Cradling her son, Aisha told Teesha the story, how Debbie Silver had liked her and refunded her money even though she wasn't s'pose to, how Aisha'd gotten on a diet at lunchtime, and how she blew it all by letting some snotty office wench bug her out. Teesha said the whole thing was wak from the get-go because they probably only wanted white girls.
“Nah, Teesha, it wasn't even about white and black. I know Miss Silver woulda tried to hook me up—she was mad cool. But now after I done whipped her office girl's behind … well, would
you
be hot to gimme a job?”
“Nope. I'd be waiting at the door with a bat in case the maniac came back! Nah, but on the serious tip, you think they gon' send the cops after you?”
“They can't. They don't know nothin' about me, 'cause I grabbed my file when I ran. What make me so mad is that Miss Silver was gonna give me a chance even though I wasn't the right type of model, and I had to go and break wild.”
“Ai, you know what me and my sister been saying for years—that you gotta chill on the girl thug thing. You been beefin' with folks long as I know you, and that's long. All of
us is pissed off at
some
body, but you got kids now. Your Tu-pac days is over. Just like his is.”
“You right, I know. Whatever. Hey, you got anything to eat? A plump spongy Sno Ball would definitely hit the spot.”
“Like hungry children, like hungry mama! What y'all Ingrams think this is, the day care
and
the welfare? All we got is canned sardines.”
“Nasty! I hope you ain't fed that cat food to my kids!”
Teesha laughed out loud. “I couldn't get them kitties to
stop
eating.”
“Gimme some sardines then. I'll eat anything right now. But pick out the bones first.”
“Keep dreamin'. Just ‘cause you whipped Pammie White-girl's butt don't think you gon' be bossing me around, ‘cause you playin' yaself in front of ya kittens.”
She pushed Aisha down onto the couch. Aisha stayed put, too worn out to do much more. They ate sardines on crackers and listened to Anastacia. It was agreed that she
had
to be black with a phat voice like that, no matter
how
blond she was. After a while, Aisha collected her family and went home. Louise was waiting for her.
“Here. Your mail. I don't want to know nothin' about it. I wash my hands. But I tell you this, come rent time, I'll be expecting your part. With God as my witness, I can't carry myself, another grown woman, and two hungry, growing children on my measly check.”
Aisha hurried to her room with the letter.
Dear Ms. Ingram,
Your time limits for cash assistance will be expiring as indicated in this notice. Our records as of the date hereof contain no response from you to the Department's 60-Day or 30-Day Notices regarding the 5-year lifetime limit on aid which you will have reached ten (10) business days from the date of this Final Termination Notice. Further, we have no record of your enrollment in our Strict Caring Readjustment Effort to Work to End Dependency program popularly known as “Workfare,” which provides recipients a transition stipend under specified conditions.
YOUR PUBLIC ASSISTANCE BENEFITS SHALL TERMINATE ON THE DATE INDICATED BELOW. YOU MUST CONTACT THIS OFFICE WITHIN THE NEXT TEN (10) BUSINESS DAYS IF YOU WISH TO ENROLL IN WORKFARE.
The Department of Public Assistance encourages you, Aisha Ingram, to take full advantage of this exciting opportunity. To that end, we hope you will schedule an appointment with the undersigned caseworker to discuss how you plan to manage your household expenses.
Yours sincerely,
Charles Covington Poncie III
Louise had shuffled back to her bedroom, her slippers scratching on the floor like sandpaper. Aisha knew what time it was—time to deal. Finished were the days of fantasies and dreams and ideas that ended where they began—in
her head. Nope, wasn't no surprises behind doors or lucky breaks around the bend for a project girl on welfare with no schooling, two kids, and a mother with extra clean hands. Tomorrow morning she'd go see her caseworker.

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