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Get It Girls
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Get It Girls
By Treasure Blue
Copyright Page
GET IT GIRLS
Copyright © 2011 by Treasure E. Blue
Cash Money Content™ and all associated logos are trademarks of Cash Money Content LLC.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
Any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
Book Layout: Candace K. Cottrell
Cover Design: Emily Mahon
For further information, log on to www.CashMoneyContent.com
Library of Congress Control Number: 2011936943
ISBN: 978-1-936-39924-6 pbk
ISBN: 978-1-936-39923-6 ebook
eISBN-13: 9-781-9363-9923-9
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States
Dedication
This book is dedicated to Mr. Marvin L. Grant.
Our son, father, brother, uncle, and cousin. Words cannot express how your passing on has made an profound impact in our lives. Though we have moved on, you continue to have a place in our hearts, and all we have are those memories and wonderful times that we will cherish for the rest of our lives. Thank you for always being you and not changing who you were for anyone. You will continue to have life through us always and forever.
Until we meet again, RIP Marvin aka Shorty!
Contents
Author’s Note
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Epilogue
Author’s Note
I would first like to thank all my loyal readers who expressed their kind words and praise for my very first novel, Harlem Girl Lost. You made it an instant classic, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your unwavering support since my debut.
Over the years, I’ve received literally thousands of e-mails and letters asking if there will be a Harlem Girl Lost 2. My initial response was that I doubted if there would be one because I killed off so many of the supporting characters in the first book. And to be even more candid with you, I also loved the happy ending and wanted to leave well enough alone.
I was at a speaking engagement at a local high school in Harlem, when I was posed this recurring question by a student during the panel discussion. After I expressed to her that I highly doubted if there would ever be a part two, she immediately posed another question:
“In your opinion, how would Jessica’s life have turned out if she hadn’t gotten pregnant with Silver at such a young age?”
I have to admit that it was an excellent question, and it was one of the first times in my life I was at loss for words. Over the next few days, the young girl’s question continued to resonate in my mind, and that’s when it hit me like a ton of bricks.
What would have happened not only to Jessica, but to her entire crew of Vonda, Tiny, and Lynn?
I then called up my good friend and fellow Harlemite, bestselling author and mentor K’wan, and ran the idea past him. He thought it was genius and said it would be considered an alternate reality. The rest is history.
So ladies and gentleman, without further ado, I proudly present to you, Harlem Girl Lost 2: The Beginning....
Enjoy,
Treasure
Chapter 1
April 1981
Harlem, New York
Ay, yo, Jessica! Jessica! Come down before we be late for school,” yelled Vonda.
She, Tiny, and Lynn stood impatiently in front of Jessica Jones’s parents’ three-family brownstone on 138th Street between 7th and 8th Avenue in Harlem. Jessica’s was the only one out of the four of them whose family owned their own property in the upscale section of Harlem’s exclusive Strivers Row, a block that housed well-to-do black professionals such as actors, doctors, lawyers, or businessmen. Though Jessica’s parents had typical city jobs—her mother was a public school teacher and her father was a postal employee—they had the vision to sacrifice and invest in the neighborhood way before Harlem became cliché.
Vonda and Tiny, lived only two blocks away on 140th Street between Lenox and 7th Avenue in a tenement building. Their neighborhood was like night and day to Striver’s Row because it was the ghetto. Lynn’s family lived in Drew Hamilton projects on 142nd Street and 7th Avenue, and she developed a complex because of the stigma that only poor people lived in the projects.
Tiny sucked her teeth and scowled. “She does this same shit every day. We should just leave her ass to teach her lesson.” Tiny looked toward Vonda to see if she would agree with her, but Vonda said nothing. “As soon as she comes out anyway her mama gonna call her back again like she always do. You watch,” Tiny continued.
Lynn and Vonda continued to ignore Tiny as if she wasn’t even there. They were more than used to her complaining, and everything Tiny said just flew by them.
Just then, the front door at the top of the stairs flew open and Jessica came rushing out as her book bag dangled precariously over her shoulder. Halfway down the stairs Jessica heard her mother call her, and she stopped her in place.
Tiny rolled her eyes and shook her head knowingly. “What I fucking tell you?” she said loud enough for Jessica to hear, but low enough so that Jessica’s mother didn’t.
Jessica closed her eyes and reluctantly walked back up the steps. Her mother stood at the doorway with her arms folded and said, “Jessica, what have I told you about sneaking out the house without seeing me first?”
“What, Mama?” Jessica sucked her teeth and sighed. “I’m going to be late for school, and I have a first period test.”
“Don’t get smart with me in front of your friends, Jessica, because I will embarrass you in front of them too.”
Jessica decided to remain silent because she knew it wasn’t worth getting into it with her mother in front of her friends. Mrs. Jones watched her daughter’s three friends walk off toward the avenue and then squared her grim eyes back to her seventeen-year-old daughter.
“After school when you wait for your brother to get off the bus, I want you right back in this house. Take the food out of the freezer for dinner and then fix your brother a snack. You hear me?”
Jessica rolled her eyes, “But Ma, he’s got his own key and—”
“But, my ass, now you heard what I said, Jessica. I want you home as soon as you get out of school waiting on your brother.”
Jessica knew there wasn’t anything she could have said that would change her mother’s mind, so she just kept quiet and walked down the stairs in a huff.
“And I’m going to call at 4:30 to make sure you home too. You hear me, Jessica?”
“I hear you!” Jessica yelled in a tone she knew would infuriate her mother, but she didn’t care any longer because the damage was done. Besides, she had already turned the corner and was too far out of sight to be reprimanded any more. When Jessica caught up with her friends a block away, she began apologizing for the tardiness. “I’m sorry, y’all, but my mom be bugging out and making me do stuff when she know I got to go to school.”
Ever since Jessica befriended Vonda in their freshman year, Tiny despised Jessica for such an intrusion, because she and Vonda had been best friends since they were in Pampers. Since Vonda grew to be nearly six feet tall, and Tiny was barely five-feet-nothing, they were the consummate odd couple and sometimes received ridicule over it. Vonda was dark-skinned with a radiant, smooth complexion. Keen eyes on top of her statuesque body made her look like a beauty queen.
Jessica had a soft, light brown complexion and equaled Vonda in height and stature. Jessica was highly sought after because of her defining beauty wherever they went. To Vonda, it was refreshing to have someone take the heat off of her because boys, men, and even women would constantly harass her because of her looks, and Jessica bore half of the burden.
Lynn, who stood about five feet, five inches tall, was the thickest of the crew, and she came along about the same time as Jessica.
They attended an all-girls Catholic school in East Manhattan downtown called Cathedral High School. Over the four years that they attended Cathedral, they’d become inseparable. But Tiny never came to terms with Jessica seemingly taking her place and constantly tried to show Jessica up with insults. Jessica developed a thick skin and knew from past experience not to show Tiny her weak spots because Tiny would feed on it. So, she simply just checked her hard by talking about her physical attributes, which Tiny hated.
Jessica sneered and said, “I ain’t ask you to wait for me, Tiny. You can do whatever you want to do. Nobody is stopping you.”
Tiny quickly retorted. “Don’t forget we letting you roll with us. So keep talking shit and we gonna leave ya ass next time.”
Jessica chuckled. “Who is we? Like you speak for Vonda and Lynn?”
Tiny looked at Vonda for support and asked, “Yo, Vonda, ain’t you getting tired of her shit?”
For the most part, Vonda tried to stand clear of Tiny’s nonsense and learned to ignore her, but lately she’d been growing weary because of her constant bickering and scheming. “Why don’t you shut the fuck up, Tiny? If you don’t want to wait with us, you can go ahead without us. It’s just that simple.”
Tiny stood stone-faced. “Oh, you gonna play me over her, Vonda?”
“Playing you? No, Tiny, you playing yourself. How you gonna try to tell us who and who not to wait for?” Vonda waited for a response and heard none. “So you can make up your mind what you want to do, because you’ve got options.”
Tiny was still unmoved by her comment and added, “Yeah, whatever, Vonda. But don’t forget we got that biology test first period, and see what happens if they lock us out this morning. Don’t say I didn’t tell you so, and we’ll see who you blame then.”
Lynn snickered and jumped in. “Since when the fuck did you start worrying about a test, Tiny? All you doing is starting shit.”
Tiny turned her attention to Lynn. “Don’t even start talking, Lynn. We waited for your fat ass this morning too.”
“Fuck you, Tiny!” Lynn quickly snapped. “My elevator was broke, and I had to walk down nineteen flights of stairs.”
Tiny gave her a wicked smile. “You should be happy. Maybe you lost some weight in the process.”
“Least I got some weight, Tiny, unlike your bony, malnutritioned ass.”
“Don’t even try it; all that shit is fat,” Tiny joked.
Lynn stopped suddenly and said, “Yeah, but you wish you had a body like mines, you skinny toothpick.” Lynn pointed her thumb at Tiny. “This bitch is so skinny, she could hula hoop through a Cheerio.”
“Oh, you snapping, Lynn? At least my hair ain’t so short that I use Rice-A-Roni to roll it.”
Tiny and Lynn always snapped on each other every morning, and Vonda and Jessica couldn’t help but laugh. These were the moments they enjoyed the most despite Tiny’s constant nitpicking.
Lynn and Tiny went on like this for the next two blocks as they cracked jokes on each other. They were all laughing so hard, they were oblivious to the five girls standing on the corner. When they finally spotted them, it was too late to avoid them, so they all grew silent and braced themselves for the unexpected.
The group of girls, the Lenox Avenue Girls, was a bunch of hard heads who lived for fighting and starting trouble. Cookie, Denise, Tay-Tay, Nikki, and Kimmi preyed on most of the girls in the neighborhood. They were all in their late teens or early twenties, and particularly didn’t like Catholic school girls. They thought all Catholic school girls were stuck up and thought they were better than public school girls. It wasn’t uncommon throughout Harlem, though. Public school girls were frequently seen jumping and beating up a few Catholic girls coming or going to school.
Vonda, Tiny, Lynn, and Jessica had had more than their share of run-ins with The Lenox Avenue Girls during their four years together. Normally, they avoided them by taking the long way to the train station. But today they were caught slipping.
“Oh, shit, Tay-Tay, look what the fuck we have here,” said the ringleader, Cookie. The group began walking in the four girls’ direction.
Jessica and her crew tried to walk around them, but the five girls blocked them by creating a human wall in front of them.
Vonda tried to show no weakness. “What the fuck do you want now, Cookie?” Even though Vonda was tall, she was small in comparison to Cookie in both height and girth.
“I don’t know who the fuck you think you talking to, Vonda, but you better recognize who the fuck you talking to.”
Vonda gritted down on her jaw and cursed herself under her breath for not carrying her knife or razor as she normally did. She wasn’t afraid to throw down with Cookie one-on-one, but she knew if she got in the mix with her she would get jumped on by the four other girls. The only one in her crew she could really rely on was Jessica, because she knew from experience that neither Tiny nor Lynn would be any help. She weighed her odds and decided to use her head for now, but she wasn’t going to be taken advantage of by any means.
Vonda looked her directly in her eyes to gain some respect. “So what do you want, Cookie?”
“Y’all bitches know what the fuck it is. I told y’all last time the next time I see you bitches walking on my avenue, you gots ta pay a bitch to pass.”
Cookie’s partner Denise interjected and said, “What? Y’all bitches thought we forgot?”
Cookie snarled and gained even more confidence when she saw the fear in Lynn’s eyes. “What you got in your purse, Lynn? Come up off that shit right now.”
Lynn began shaking so badly that she was unable to respond.
Cookie stepped directly in her face and screamed, “You heard what the fuck I said, bitch. Up that shit right now or I’m gonna bust your shit!”
Lynn began reaching for her handbag when Vonda and Jessica stepped between them to defend their friend.
Vonda stated flatly, “Yo, Cookie, I’m not going to let you take her money.”
Cookie grimaced. “What? And how the fuck are you going to stop me?”
There was a moment of silence until Jessica spoke up. “She can’t give you her money because she’s a diabetic.”
The five girls looked at each other, not getting the point.
“So the fuck what?” asked Nikki, who looked at Cookie, Tay-Tay, Denise, and Kimmi like they might have an answer.
Jessica shook her head. “Since she’s a diabetic, she got to buy some snacks during and after school so she doesn’t get sick.”
The five girls all began looking at Lynn until Cookie joked, “This bitch look like she could stand to miss a few snacks.”
They all began laughing—hard—in light of the joke.
Cookie turned her attention to Tiny and looked her up and down. “Look at this li’l bitch,” she said, looking over her shoulders and pointing toward Tiny. “She looks like she’s the one that needs to be eating some snac
ks because she ain’t got no fucking titties.”
The Lenox Avenue girls all started laughing heartily and slapping high fives to each other.
Cookie continued digging into Tiny. “This bitch must be one of the board members on the Itty Bitty Titty Committee.”
They bent over in laughter as Tiny stood stoned-faced, clutching her fist.
Vonda and Jessica watched Tiny’s eyes slant and each prayed that she wouldn’t say a word because they knew her, and it would be nothing but trouble.
Cookie’s crew was laughing so hard they seemed to have forgotten they were there until Cookie said, “All right, all right. I’m gonna let y’all go this time, but the next time I catch y’all on my block or on my avenue,” she paused, pulled out a switchblade from her hoodie, flicked it open, and licked the blade, “All y’all bitches is gonna come up with that loot. Y’all hear me?”
Jessica, Vonda, Tiny, and Lynn remained silent as the five girls parted and allowed them to walk through.
As the rough girls watched them walk away, Tay-Tay added one more insult toward Tiny. “Ay yo, Tiny. I know why they call you that. ’Cause you a chicken head with a chicken butt.”
Get It Girls