Yer blue toy
Never to forget me...
What up, my people if you with me where you at?
(to the front—to the back)
(NYPD stops photo-ops)
Sterling was the O.C.—Original Cunt. Wild at heart from the mother fuckin’ get go, too bad now she’s aged and melancholic, flaking out at the edges like a yellow wedge of cheese that’s been in the fridge too long.
She only wants to tell you about all her sad, beaten moments, like a washed-up cowboy farting on the porch and scratching his distended ball sack.
Fuck that. Back on the block she used to be the shit. In grade school she was the only girl rockin the shell toe Addidas, the only girl allowed in the back of the bus. I’d sneak awestruck looks back at her from the front. To me, she was cooler than Wonder Woman.
I liked the way her blonde hair was shaved on the sides and pulled into a tiny
ponytail on top, like Bam-Bam.
I liked how she wrote all over her jeans in purple and red ink.
I tried to duplicate the blue rings under her eyes with my mother’s frosted Maybelline eye shadow.
She carried a handful of yellow Number 2s in her jeans—sharp ass points sticking out of her pocket like needles. It made me squint just thinking about them. The sides were dented from pencil fighting—another field in which she was the only woman.
The two of us have talked plenty since about what she thought of my nerdy ass back in the day. Not much, to be sure, although she liked that I watched her. I had heavy glasses, a runny nose and shitty bangs.
I had Strawberry Shortcake on my lunchbox, given to me by my mother despite my protests that all I really wanted was a plain brown bag.
God forbid Sterling caught me looking at her; out of all the things she could pick on me about, that SS lunchbox was her favorite prop.
“Heeeeeyyy, old buddy, old pal!” she cooed, as she sauntered up the aisle.
“Please don’t,” I said, as she reached for my lunchbox.
“What did Mommy pack today?” she said, in a sing-song voice.
“OOOOHHH!” she exclaimed, pulling out my sandwich wrapped in wax paper. Then the apple, then the pretzels. Last but not least, the hated Strawberry Shortcake thermos.
“You don’t mind if I have a sip?”
“Please,” I whispered, as I felt the whole bus lean over.
“What is it, baby?”
“Please stop.”
“Stop what? I just want one sip? Come on, we’re friends, right?”
“Uh…”
“Right?”
Her eyes widened. I pushed at my glasses and sunk back in my seat.
“Go ahead,” I muttered.
“Great, thanks. Just one sip, I promise.”
Sterling popped open the thermos, brought it to her lips, and threw her head back. In the relative silence that followed, I watched, transfixed, as her Adam’s apple bounced up and down.
“Chug! Chug! Chug!” the boys in the back shouted, while I dreamed in vain of an abyss opening up in the road and swallowing the bus whole.
“Chug! Chug! Chug!”
(This would be a skill that would serve Sterling well in the years that followed.)
She gave a satisfied, “Ahhh,” when she finished. She wiped her mouth with her sleeve and burped. Then she hacked up a mouthful of backwash and spit it into the thermos.
“Here you go, tell your mom I said thanks.”
One time—just one out of many—I snapped and said something back to her.
“Fuck-you,” I said, my voice shaking.
“What? What’s that?! Ohhhhh boy! What language! No, no, no. Fuck you. You know what? Fuck your mom. Yeah, that’s right? Fuck your mom. What are you going to say now? Come on!”
I concentrated on the window. My cheeks were on fire.
“Come on! You heard what I said. Your mom.”
I huddled against the corner of the seat, as though trying in vain to hide.
“Whatever,” Sterling proclaimed. She sauntered back down the aisle.
“Your mom,” she said.
“Your mom. Your mom…ye-our maaahm…no wait, your mom, your MOM, YOUR MOM, hold-on, I’ve got it…your mom, no—your mom, your mom…”
She didn’t stop, even after everyone stopped laughing. She went on, like a crazy person.
“Your mom, your mom, your mom…”
All the way to the goddamn school.
diminished responsibility
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