CHAPTER 7
BLOOD SISTERS
I met Mia the summer of 1990, at one of the block parties that seemed to rise out of nowhere like the ‘hood itself decided it needed to breathe.
That evening the sun was dropping behind the bricks, painting a beautiful sunset. The smell of charcoal drifted from makeshift grills. Ol’ heads and kids sharing the same street, like different chapters of the same story.
I didn’t know Mia yet, not really. I had seen her before around the way, the way I see people every day on the block, without knowing their names or their stories. That night was the first time she stepped into my world.
She was double-dutching in the middle of the street, chewing on a Now & Later, like it was the only thing in the world she had patience for.
She had sharp hazel eyes that made you feel she knew your secrets.
Her skin was butterscotch smooth, her hair bouncing in a fresh marcel set that shined even in the dirty glow of the streetlight.
The ropes whipped fast on both sides of her, snapping against the pavement with perfect rhythm.
Mia moved through them like she was born inside the game.
Her feet bounced lightly off the ground, never missing a beat.
When she finally stepped out of the ropes, she peeled the candy from her teeth and scanned the crowd, like she was choosing her next victim. That’s when her eyes landed on me.
“You jus’ gonna stand there watchin’?” She called out, her voice had a bite to it.
“Come on,” she said, grinning now. “Don’t tell me you scared of a jump rope.”
The girls holding the ropes giggled, and the heat rushed into my face. Shay nudged me from behind.
“Go on,” she whispered.
“Don’t let her punk you.”
I stepped forward, tried and the rope caught my ankle, I stumbled. The girls erupted in laughter. I expected Mia to join in. Instead, she shook her head and handed the ropes back to the other girls.
“Nah,” she demanded.
“You gon’ get it.”
She tossed a candy wrapper toward the curb and sashayed over to me.
“Try again.” I did, and this time I lasted three jumps. Mia nodded approvingly.
“See? You ain’t hopeless.” She giggled.
That experience was the beginning of our story.
Over the next few weeks, we became inseparable.
It started small, walking to the corner store together, sharing bags of candy.
Hanging on stoops yapping about stuff girls our age barely understood.
Mia was barely a year older than me, but she carried herself like a person who had already been tested by life and passed.
She was bold in ways I wasn’t. Where I hesitated, she moved.
Where I watched, she acted. Where I worried about what people thought, Mia walked around like the world owed her space.
While Shay taught me the rules of the block, Mia was the one who tested me on them.
Late one summer afternoon we was hanging out at the park down the street, sitting on the swings while older boys played basketball nearby.
The sun was blazing overhead, and the metal chains of the swings burned our hands every time we moved.
I hopped off the swing. That’s when a girl from down the block walked past us.
She bumped into me so hard she knocked my shoulder sideways.
I instinctively muttered an apology. Even though I didn’t do nothing wrong.
The girl turned and smirked, she looked ready to clown me in front of everybody.
Before I could shrink into myself, Mia jumped up, her eyes blazing.
“Nah,” she said firmly.
“We ain’t doin’ dat.”
The girl rolled her eyes.
“Or what?”
“You heard me,” Mia blurted, pushing forward.
“You don’t get ta run into people and den act like you big and bad.”
The tension between them filled the air around us. I softened. I didn’t want to fight. But Mia didn’t even look nervous.
“So move, you big ass bully!” Mia pressed up nose to nose with the girl, unshaken. Mia was smaller, but that never meant weaker. I could feel the tension rolling off her, I just knew she was about to hit her at any second.
Miss Janine was walking home from the corner store and came marching across the street waving that dish rag, her favorite weapon.
“Uh-uh! I know y’all ain’t ‘bout to fight out here!”
The other girl took off and I let out a breath I didn’t realize I had been holding.
Mia stepped closer to me,
“Don’t eva let nobody pull yo’ card.”
She grabbed my hands and shaped them into fists.
“Put ya fist up, like dis,” she said.
“Elbows up. Protect ya face.”
I shook my head.
“I don’t wanna fight.”
She looked at me seriously,
“Sometimes you ain’t got a choice.” She gave me a playful shove.
“Come on. Hit me.”
I swung softly, she smacked her lips.
“Harder.”
I tried again. The sound of my fist hitting her shoulder surprised both of us.
She grinned.
“See? You got it in you. You jus’ scared of it.”
She wasn’t scared of nobody. And if I was with her, I didn’t have to be either.
Mia also knew things about boys that I didn’t. We would chill on her stoop late in the day, our legs stretched across the warm concrete while Jodeci was blasting from an auntie’s stereo. Mia twirled a piece of her hair around her finger while sucking the juice off a Slapstick.
“You know if you laugh at dey jokes they will like you more,” she said casually.
I frowned.
“What if it ain’t funny?”
She rolled her eyes.
“Girl, dey don’t care if it’s funny. Dey care if you care.”
She smirked. I rolled my eyes, but secretly, I filed the information away.
Plus, Mia lived better than the rest of the ‘hood. She stayed exactly seven doors down from us. The same cracked sidewalks ran past her house as every other house on our block. Same busted streetlights flickered at night. Same sirens screamed through the dark every few hours.
Same metal bars on the windows. But when you set foot inside Mia’s front door, you crossed into another world.
I first noticed it when we was like seven. Mia dragged me inside after school per usual.
“Come on,” she teased.
“My mama got new snacks.”
The living room furniture was leather. Not the cheap plastic-covered couches other people had to protect from stains.
Real leather, that was soft when you plopped down.
There was a glass coffee table positioned in the middle of the room with gold legs that curved.
The decor was straight out of a rap video.
A huge television mounted against the wall.
The carpet was thick and white. White. I remember fixating on it, thinking one wrong move might ruin everything.
“Stop standin’ there,” Mia chuckled.
“You actin’ like you neva seen furniture before.”
“I haven’t,” I muttered.
She squinted her eyes and tossed her backpack on the couch.
“You so dramatic.”
Her mama, Keisha, came down the stairs a few minutes later.
In the middle of the afternoon, she was dressed ready to head to a nightclub.
Long acrylic nails. A skintight dress that hugged every curve like it was glued to her body.
Her hair fell down her back in glossy waves, and her makeup looked perfect.
“Mia, you got company?”
She questioned. Her voice carried that smooth Philly attitude, half friendly, half warning.
“Mama, dis is Summer,” Mia uttered casually.
“My best friend.”
Her mom looked me up and down.
“You Denise’s daughter, right?”
“Yes ma’am.”
She gave a measured nod.
“You pretty like ya’ mama.” She turned toward the kitchen.
“You girls want a snack?”
The fridge stayed full at Mia’s house. Name-brand foods. Sodas. Lunchables. Her mom tossed us bags of chips, like it was nothing.
“Don’t eat up everything,” she told us.
“Your Papi comin’ through later.”
Mia’s daddy didn’t live in the house. But the block definitely knew who he was.
Juan Hernández. A Puerto Rican hustler with a reputation so big it traveled across state lines.
People spoke his name with a mixture of respect and caution.
He wasn’t one of the corner boys rolling dice all day, Juan was the boss.
I had never seen him up close before that day.
He showed up as the sun set, the sound of the car came first. A deep engine rumbling down the street and then headlights washed across the front windows. Mia ran to the door before he even knocked.
“Papi!”
When he strolled inside, it was like the whole room lifted.
Juan was broad-shouldered, his skin a warm caramel tone with sharp cheekbones and dark eyes that seemed to study everything at once.
Three gold chains hung around his neck. His watch looked so expensive it could pay our rent for a year.
Oddly, the most noticeable thing about him wasn’t the jewelry.
It was the calm. The subtle confidence that made other men move aside without being asked.
“Mija,” he called proudly, hugging Mia. His eyes landed on me.
“And who is this?”
“Dis is Summer,” Mia answered quickly. “She’s my ride or die.”
Juan nodded once.
“Good, friends are important.”
His voice was smooth but carried weight. He handed Mia a decorative shopping bag. Inside was a small, beautiful teal blue box that I had never seen before. Within the box was a shiny gold tennis bracelet with matching necklace.
“For you mija” he kissed Mia.
She squealed and wrapped her arms around him again.
“Thank you Papi!”
He indulged, but his eyes flicked toward the window, toward the street. Steady watching, calculating. I figured all the nice things in Mia’s house, they came from the same place as the hustlers on the corner, except on a bigger level.
Later that night me and Mia was on the front stoop watching the block. Her mama climbed into a bright red Lexus parked at the curb. The car was expensive.
“Where she goin?” I wondered.
“Out,” Mia assumed.
“Papi gave her dat car last month.”
The engine roared to life and the Lexus rolled down the street owning the pavement.
“Yo’ house different,” I joked.
Mia shrugged.
“Money make thangs easier I guess.”
“But don’t dat stuff come wit’ trouble?”
She laughed.
“Everythang on dis block come wit’ trouble Summer.” She leaned closer.
“At least my Papi got power.”
Her words looped in my head. Power. That’s what Mia admired.
The cars. The clothes. The way people moved when Juan walked by.
To Mia, the streets wasn’t to be feared, they was to be mastered.
Some people were trapped by the block. Other people, learned how to run it.
Mia planned to be the second kind, and she didn’t care if it burned everything around her.