told. I was feeling very lazy, floating away out in the middle of a drowsy, sleepy sea.
âThen show me too,â I actually said. I pictured me and Cleo, floating arm in arm up to the sky on a natural high.
âYeah...â Cleoâs voice had deepened. âYeahâI like to ease on back and watch whiles I be poppinâ âum, watch âem knot their brows like they in pain, then smile as though they ainât, and I like to hear âem grunt and cry and moan anâ squeak and beg like how the ladies do once you got them goinâ good, got âem good and sweet and greezed.â
Ooh my goodness, that was nasty, nastier than Iâd ever heard her be. What would Marla say and do? I couldnât exactly see Cleo lying slapped-down on her back, but I couldnât see Marla doing anything less.
âKnow how I picked that fist girl I ever really wanted?â Cleo asked.
âWho was that, Cleo?â I noticed I had caught my breath, the way I do whenever I feel jealous. Me, having to be jealous of a simple-face like Cynamon.
âWhat I mean, liâl sis, is that usually theyâs the ones be wantinâ me, and I just goes along just for the ride, soâs to speak.â
âJust for the ride?â Was it the weed, or was it something else that was making my arms and legs feel so limp and weak and warm? And making me sound so very young and stupid?
âMmâmmm thaâs right. Mmmâ¦hmm. But you want to know how I picked that first girl I ever really wanted?â
âHow?â I obliged by asking. How could a person tell, ever, what it was they really wanted?
âYou mean, howâd I find that girl I wanted? Thatâs the question that Iâm tryinâ to answer you with, now. If I went ahead and answered it, I might be tellinâ you about this party I had went to, deep down in the East Bee-moâ jungle, way way late at night, so late it was getting on toward early. That blue
lightbulb had been burning for a good long while by the time Cool Cleo finally got there.
âSo then I walks right in, real sharp, wid my cap politely in my hands âcause I know itâs goâ be ladies thereâI walks on in, and ooh wee, what right off do I see?â
I opened my eyes, and I leaned so far forward, I almost fell. I propped myself on both my hands. âWhat did you see, Cleo?â
âI saw one whole line of ladies, baby sister, all preening and a-strolling that old hip-grind booty-shake they be using on the street, and all of it is just for me, Cool Cleo.
âThen up to me, comes a lay-dee,â Cleo sang it. âThis long-haired light-skin lady in a evening gown with some silvery tinselish fringe along its front come strolling up to me, hip-grinding booty-shaking right up to me, and ask me would I like a glass of wine. Which you already know, Cleo isnât goâ refuse.
âSo I sits there sippingâthe lady done provided me a seatâand lookinâ all these ladies over, all of which is wanting me, waiting just to do whatever I be wanting them to do for me, when I sees this one in back?â
âUh huh?â I nodded with my eyes closed, thinking all of this was sounding too wild even for a life like Cleoâs.
âThis one look quiet, like sheâs hiding anâ surprised to find herself in this late-night doing, and sheâs wondering why has she been invited? I mean, this one definitely ainât no party lady, so why she been invited here? Look to me as though sheâs thinking that, hanging back there in the corner lookinâ all so quiet and so sweet.
âThen up to me, comes the lady,â Cleo sang again. âThe lady in the evening gown? She seen my glass is drunk down to its dregs. So then she start to poâ some moâ of that plum wine, and then she lean down toward my ear, and then she sing to me:
â âSpill that wine, take that girlââ