The Hookup

Monday morning couldn’t come fast enough. I was pissed the F off. I don’t know who started this rumor about me, but it’s gonna be dead by this afternoon, you best believe that!

The first person to find: Lashawna. My girl was the know-it-all gossip girl of the school, so if anyone knew who knew the root of a rumor, it was her. Good thing she’s always where I knew she would be: at her table in the middle of the cafeteria holding her court with a crowd of eager students hanging on to her every word.

“Hey, Ni-Ni!” she greeted cheerfully. Unfortunately, her cheer was quickly dispelled once she saw the expression on my face. “Girl, what’s up? You look like someone kicked your puppy.”

“Or Roger didn’t finish the job right,” one of the girls said not so under her breath. A few others laughed, not even trying to conceal their reactions. The minute I hit them with my death glare though, they shut their traps. I may not be the most opposing person in the school, but people know not to mess with me. Shoot, people still talk about the incident between Natalie Shultz and me back in the eighth grade, and that was two years ago. 

I turned my attention back to my best friend.  “Shawna, who’s going around telling people about Roger and me?” 

Lashawna shrugged her shoulders. Her carefree attitude was still evident in her relaxed body language, but in her eyes, I could see curiosity and some concern. “I don’t know girl. I just heard about it myself. Wait, you mean it’s not true?”

“Of course it’s not true!” I exclaimed, then had to stop myself once I saw students at nearby tables glance over. I locked eyes with Lashawna and subtly nodded to the right. Thankfully she got the hint and we stepped away to a nearby alcove. 

“Okay first things first, let’s calm down Nichelle,” Lashawna rubbed my arms gently. It soothed me a bit, but I was still seething on the inside. 

“Shawna, how bad is it? What exactly are they saying?” I asked. 

She tried to hide it, but I saw her grimace before she answered. “They’re saying that you and Roger hooked up after school Friday in the student parking lot.” 

I don’t know whether I huffed my breath, rolled my eyes, or stomped my foot first. But whatever I did make Lashawna take a step back. 

I raised my hands. “I’m sorry. But girl, come on! You really think I would do something like that?”

“I mean no,” Lashawna began. A coy look appeared on her face. “But girl, I couldn’t blame you if you did! Roger is fine! You did use protection, right?”

“I didn’t have sex with him Lashawna!” This time I didn’t even try to keep my voice down, and I didn’t care that now I had the attention of Lashawna’s followers and half of the cafeteria. My rep was important to me. People knowing that I could kick their ass in a minute; doesn’t bother me for a minute. People thinking I’m an easy lay; that’s a problem.  

“Lashawna,” I said after I had taken a couple of deep breaths. “Roger and I did not hook up on Friday. We met up for math tutoring for an hour. He gave me a ride home after. That’s it. Nothing else happened. Plus, if your memory was working, I called you after I got home and I told you. Remember?”

Lashawna’s brow scrunched as she tried to remember, but I knew it was hopeless. I love my girl, but her memory was trash when it came to minor details. 

I tapped my foot as my own wheels began to turn. “Only thing I could think is that someone saw us Friday afternoon when we went to the student lot. Maybe they just…assumed something.”

A light went off in Lashawna’s eyes. “Or, someone with you used the situation to their advantage.”

I glanced at her. “Why would he do something like that? He’s a popular guy; he doesn’t need a fake rumor to get a girl’s attention.”

Lashawna got a knowing look in her eyes. “Well, it wouldn’t hurt to ask him, would it?”

Lashawna and I probably looked like a couple of weirdos, or even stalkers as we waited outside the auto shop connected to the back of the school, but it was the one place Roger told me he spends a lot of time, so I figured he might swing by afterschool. It still blew my mind that someone who’s been in just about every advanced placement class and on the honor roll needed a math tutor. Yet as Lashawna reminded me, not everybody has a quote-on-quote “superhuman computer mind” like mine.

“Girl you sure he’s there?” Lashawna asked for the fourth time. We were sitting on a bench a few yards away from the auto shop door. It was after school, and though the weather was cool, and she had a full battery on her phone, I knew I couldn’t keep her waiting for too long. 

“Yes, go back to the ‘gram,” I replied, keeping my eyes on the auto shop door. Students have been coming in and out. None of them had been Roger. 

“I still say we pull a Jada Pinkett and Queen Latifah and just bust in there and…”

“Not about to go out like that,” I cut her off. “Look, I promise, if he doesn’t come out in the next ten minutes..”

“Ten minutes?!” she exclaimed. 

“Ten more minutes and if he doesn’t appear then..” I stopped. Our prey stepped into the waning sunlight, accompanied by a friend. They said bye to each other, dapped up, and walked in separate directions. Fortunately for us, the intended walked towards us. 

I stood. “Roger!”  

He glanced over at the sound of my voice. Once he recognized me a mix of surprise, shock, and a hint of fear flashed across his face. For a moment I thought he might turn and start walking the other way, but he continued towards us. “Hey Nichelle,” he said cautiously. “What are y’all doing out here?”

“Trying to find out if you started this rumor about us,” I replied, my guard already up. I crossed my arms over my chest as I waited for his reply. 

He raised his shoulders. “I have no idea. I just heard about it now in the shop.”

I lowered my arms slightly. “You told them it wasn’t true, right?”

“I mean I tried,” he began, but once he saw my expression the truth rolled out. “Well, I told them at first to shut up and get back to work. Then they started asking about you and I told them you were cool and stuff, and…”

“Did you tell them that we didn’t hook up?” I asked, my guard going back up.

Roger paused, an obvious look of guilt written all over his face. “I mean, I told them we met up on Friday and hung out but…”

I seethed. Leave it to a boy to use a rumor to boost his rep and ego. “You weak, lying ass piece of…”

“Hey I didn’t lie!” he objected. 

“But you didn’t try to tell the truth!” I counterargued, stepping closer to him. I swore, if my eyes had lasers or if my breath could become fire, he would no longer be taking up space in front of me. 

Roger’s shoulders sagged. “I’m sorry Nichelle.” He bowed his head, and for a moment I could feel genuine shame radiating from his frame. 

I sighed and rubbed my hands over my face. “Who was the one that told you the rumor?”

His brow scrunched as he tried to remember. “One of the guys, Steven I think. He said he heard it from his girl. She’s on the cheer squad.”

I turned back to Lashawna. She’s on the cheer squad. “Lashawna, did you hear the rumor from someone on the squad?”

She thought. “Maybe. I mean, I dropped off my stuff in the studio before going to the cafeteria. But the girls were already talking about it before I got there.”

“Some of them are on the squad, right?” I asked, hope rising slightly in my chest. 

“I think,” Lashawna trailed. “But I bet most of them have friends that are on the squad. They may have heard it from them.”

“Or they got it from The Wall,” Roger suggested. 

We both turned to him. “The Wall?” we asked in unison. 

Roger looked at us in surprise. “Y’all don’t know about The Wall? People put gossip, hookups, crazy shit up there all the time.”

“How have I never heard of it?” Lashawna asked, a surprised look on her face. Even I had to admit I was a little surprised. 

“Where is it?” I asked Roger. 

“You know where Dilmer Park is?” he asked. 

I looked at him, disgust bubbling in my stomach. Dilmer Park was known for three things: drugs, booze, and STDs. Once he asked though, the image of an abandoned little building in the park appeared in my mind. 

I sighed. “Yeah, I know where it is.”

“Niche, is one silly rumor worth all this trouble?” Lashawna asked me moments later as we drove to our next destination. “I mean, if you think about it, with the way the gossip mill runs, you and Roger will be yesterday's news within a week or so. Then it will be as if it never existed.”

I considered her words momentarily before I gave my answer. “Shawna, I don’t want people thinking they can go around making rumors and lies about me. Besides, who’ll know if this is the last one? If I just let this slide, what if someone tries to come up with another rumor about me? Say that I slept with someone else, and then every guy in our school starts to hit on me and start saying other things about me?” I made the turn into the parking lot. “It could make life hell, and I’m not going out like that.”

Lashawna seemed to consider my words silently as we parked and got out. The building was at the edge of the park. From the outside, it was nothing but grey walls with cracks and vegetation everywhere. But as we walked between a space between two walls, a new story was revealed.

“Oh, shit,” I heard Lashawna whisper not-so-subtly. The inner walls were covered in words and ink of just about every color. I recognized a few names from the fresher words, yet everything blended together in a beautiful, crazy collection of gossip and scandal. 

“Niche,” Lashawna called from the opposite end of the wall. She pointed to a part that had fresher ink. I read.

Nichelle and Roger boned in the parking lot. It was followed by last Friday’s date. 

Lashawna gasped suddenly; her eyes widening. 

“What?” I asked. 

“I know who wrote that!” She turned to me. “I saw a paint marker in her hand that was the same color.”

“Who?!” I had to restrain myself from grabbing Shawna by the shoulders and shaking the answer out of her. 

She rubbed her lips together. “Natalie.”

So someone can’t let go of eighth-grade beef, huh? I thought to myself as we drove back to the school. The last bell rang a few hours ago, but people were still milling around in the student parking lot. Fortunately for us, stupid-ass Natalie Shultz was one of them. Lashawna told me a few of the cheerleaders were meeting up after school. Looks like Natalie was one of them. I spotted her ugly ass Nissan the moment we thundered through the main entrance of the lot. She was trying to pull a Lashawna and hold court at her car. Sadly though, Natalie had very few (and a lot uglier) followers. 

I barely stopped and parked the car before I was out and stomping angrily toward her. Lashawna trailed a few steps behind me, but her stride matched my own. “Aye Natalie!” I yelled. 

She turned lazily towards me. I saw a sly grin appear on her mouth. “Oh hey Nichelle.” she crooned. “Were you looking for Roger, because I think he left already.”

I stopped a few steps away from her. The girl closest to me was smart enough to step aside. “Heard you were saying that Roger and I were hooking up.” 

“Oh really? And who said that?”

“The paint marker I saw in your hand,” Lashawna answered behind me. I didn’t see, but something told me she had her phone out and was recording this. 

Natalie tried to play coy. “Hey, I didn’t start anything. I just reported on what I heard from the horse’s mouth.”

“What the hell is that suppose to mean?” I asked, feeling my blood beginning to boil; my hand itching to find a mark on her smug face. 

“I heard what you told Lashawna when you called her last Friday.” Natalie turned to Lashawna. “Don’t you remember? You had the call on speaker and we heard everything.”

I turned to Lashawna, who was standing silently, lowering her phone. I saw her eyes meet her brows as she recalled the events of last weekend. “I had the phone on speaker. We were leaving the studio.”

“And this one,” Natalie pointed towards me. “Said that she and Roger had hooked up.”

I paused, recollection now coming back to me. “I told her that I hooked up with Roger for tutoring! Not that I hooked up with him.”

She shrugged her shoulders. “Well, I heard something went down between y’all in the parking lot. Something about hooking up with him there.”

A flood of shame and annoyance washed over me. During our tutoring session, Roger and I got on the topic of the best music genres. When I told him about a rapper out of Hong Kong, he didn’t believe that they could be good. Once we were in his car, I played a few songs on his system. He liked what he heard. And I told Lashawna I had hooked Roger onto the artist. 

I glanced at Lashawna, who now had a guilty look on her face.“Two things. One: why was I on speaker? And two: you didn’t notice who else was listening?” 

She grimaced. “I do it all the time. How was I supposed to know it would lead to a new piece of gossip?” 

I rolled my eyes. I could threaten Natalie and make her take her words off the wall. I could beat my girl down for putting me on speaker and blame her for letting shit escalate so quickly. Then I remembered what she had said an hour ago in the car. Being yesterday’s news within a week. 

I bucked at Natalie and received the satisfaction of seeing her flinch in fear. Still got it, I thought with a small bit of satisfaction. “Come on Shawna,” I turned to go back to my car. “It’s been a long day.” And it may be an even longer week, I thought as I opened the car door.