Earl Sewell - Back to Me

“Please! I don’t want to talk about that right now,” Priscilla said.

“Girl, isn’t it about time to get your perm touched up?” Keysha asked, glancing at Priscilla’s hair, which was looking like a bird’s nest.

“Yes, it is, but every dime I have needs to be saved to buy things for the baby. So, right now I can’t afford to see a beautician.”

“Hasn’t Antonio stepped up and started being a real man yet? I mean, if you had a little help, perhaps things would be different,” I said.

“No. He still doesn’t believe it’s his. He is going to deny it until the baby arrives and he can have a blood test done. I can’t believe how I fell for his bull,” Priscilla said, taking a bite out of her hot dog.

“Are you craving anything yet?” Keysha asked.

“Girl, Chinese food. I swear, the owners at Ming Chow know me by name,” Priscilla said with a chuckle.

“Is your stomach showing yet?” I asked.

“Thank God, no. I would hate to be all big and pregnant over the summer,” Priscilla admitted.

“But that means that during the school year you’ll start showing,” Keysha pointed out.

“I know,” Priscilla murmured. I could tell she wasn’t very proud of that. “You know, when my dad found out I’d gotten pregnant, he cried.” Priscilla took a deep breath, exhaled and then stopped eating. “That was the first time I’d ever seen my dad cry,” she added, getting emotional.

Keysha and I looked at each other and then at her. Neither one of us knew what to do, so we didn’t say a word.

“I’m sorry,” Priscilla took a napkin and dabbed at the tears in her eyes. “I didn’t plan on breaking down.”

“It’s okay,” I said, giving her a hug.

“Thanks,” she said, holding back more tears of regret. After getting her emotions under control, she said, “By the way, I wanted to tell you that you need to be careful about who you send photos to.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked as a feeling of dread filled my heart.

“Everyone knows about the photos of you posing in your underwear. I’ve also overheard girls saying mean things about you.”

“Mean things like what?” Keysha asked.

“Yeah, like what?” I chimed in.

“Well, this one girl got upset because her boyfriend showed her the photos and he wanted her to do the same thing for him and she got really mad at him,” Priscilla said.

“I could just choke Misalo!” I hissed.

“There’s more,” Priscilla continued. “I want you to be careful because people can be very mean.”

“I’m not worried about what people say,” I said.

“But you should be. Look at me. Before I got pregnant, I used to have friends. Now those friends have told me that their parents don’t want them hanging around me. They think I might be a bad influence. It sucks how some people can treat a pregnancy as if it’s the plague.” Priscilla started getting emotional once again.

Both Keysha and I remained silent. I didn’t think we’d given much thought to how a pregnancy or even texting could ruin your reputation. Neither Keysha nor I knew what to make of Priscilla sharing so much of herself.

“Just don’t let people label you as some kind of sex-crazed girl. Ever since people found out I’m pregnant, boys have been trying to have sex with me. They say stupid stuff like, ‘I can’t get you pregnant twice.’ It’s so annoying and humiliating. One jackass even took a photo of his privates with his cell phone and came up and showed it to me. I told him if he ever did it again, I’d call the cops.”

“OMG. I’ve gotten text messages from shirtless guys trying to hook up with me,” I confessed.

“For real?” Keysha asked.

“Yeah,” I said.

“Who? Do you still have the pictures?” Keysha wanted to know.

“No. I deleted them. They were gross,” I said.

“See, that’s what happens when you get a bad reputation. Other girls are the worst. One crazy girl wanted to fight me because her boyfriend was pressuring her. I don’t know how or why, but somehow she got it in her head that when I announced that I was pregnant at the prom, her boyfriend suddenly wanted her to be more like me.”

“How does that happen?” Keysha asked.

Priscilla rolled her eyes. “For the life of me, I just don’t understand how people get stuff twisted. I swear, sometimes I know exactly how President Obama feels. If they could blame natural disasters on him, they would.”

“Wow,” I said. I had never thought about what she was going through. Priscilla finished her hot dog, and the three of us sat around and chatted for about twenty minutes.

Then, all of a sudden, Priscilla said, “My stomach feels horrible.”

“Are you okay?” Keysha asked.

“I just feel like I want to vomit…” A sour expression formed on Priscilla’s face.

“Maybe you ate a bad hot dog,” I said.

“No, it’s not that. It’s morning sickness,” Priscilla explained. “Look, my house is just across the street. My mom is there. I’ll see you guys around.”

“Do you want us to walk you back?” I asked.

“No,” Priscilla said, rising up. She took a hard swallow, looked both of us in the eyes and said, “I’ll see you guys around.” I watched as Priscilla walked toward the edge of the park.

Keysha and I finished eating our food and decided to walk around and explore everything at the festival. We looked at clothing, trinkets and other merchandise. We came across a vendor who sold all types of hats. Keysha decided that she wanted to check it out. She and I both tried on several summer hats that we thought were cute.

“Ooh, that one makes you look grown and sexy, Maya,” she said as I tugged at the brim of a hat I’d tried on. Keysha picked up one just like it and tried it on.

“Now, you know that’s against the rules, right?” I asked.

“I know. I don’t want to walk around looking like your twin,” she said jokingly. Keysha looked at herself in the mirror. “Oh, God, I look like my mother wearing this thing.” She immediately took it off and put it back.

We moved along to another vendor, who was selling sunglasses. Keysha picked up a pair, tried them on, turned and looked at me for approval.

“Oh, you look like such a diva in those,” I said, complimenting her.

“Really?” she asked, searching for a mirror.

“Yeah. You look like a woman who has it all together. Especially with the head scarf you have on.”

Keysha found a mirror, glanced at herself and began making kissy face gestures.

“I do look kind of cute,” she said, removing the sunglasses to check the price. “I think I’m going to get them. Do you see anything that you want?” she asked.

“No. I’m not really shopping for myself. I want to find something for Misalo,” I said, looking around at the other vendors to see where I could go. I spotted a guy who was spray painting T-shirts. “Keysha, I’ll be over there.” I pointed to where I’d be.

“Okay. I’ll catch up with you,” she said as I stepped away.

I made my way over to the artist merchant. There were a number of people looking over his shoulder at what he was creating. When I got a chance to take a peek, I realized that he was finishing up a T-shirt with a caricature drawing of Sabrina and Keysha’s brother, Mike. Mike and Sabrina were sitting on a stool. Sabrina was sitting on his lap with her cheek pressed to his face and her arm draped over his shoulder.

“You guys are going to love the way this has turned out,” I said, admiring how well the designer had captured their features.

When the designer finished, Mike paid him while Sabrina and I stood off to the side.

“Hey, Maya. How are you?” Sabrina asked.