The VCR
The day has come. Mama and Papa brung the box in the house. Me and Yannie are upstairs listening to Thriller for like the 10th time and we splitting our bodies in half dancing and foot locking and bopping. Our room becomes this dance studio. Our walls plastered with life sized posters of our favorite dance movies: Fame, Footloose, and Flashdance. We also got our beatbox radio like the one from the Beat Street movie. Yannie gets fancy with the fake glitzy glove we bought last year when she wanted to be Michael Jackson for Halloween, but Papa told her Hell to the No; you ain’t gonna be no boy for Halloween. I don’t care if it’s Michael Jackson.
I hear the noise coming from downstairs. Mama and Papa, they come in like it’s Christmas. But it’s not. It’s July and it’s 1984 and I think they cashed in the money from the Lotto to buy this damn VCR. They are for sure geeked. We kids are like hurry the hell up with that box and sit it’s ass down so we can watch sumthin already.
As a matter of fact I learn, they have axxed the entire goddamn neighborhood and all of the grownies in the family to come and see this VCR. So I’m like damn. I have to get my room ready for my cuzzins and shit. Because they gonna tear up me and Yannie’s toys and stuff. My cuzzin Meek Meek is 4 and she drools over everything still. Her brother Bam Bam is 6 and he’s ruff. He fumbles his head in the wall like it’s a mattress. He say he do that like the cops on that cop show with that Jamaican music. Bad boys bad boys, what cha gonna do, what can gonna do when they come fo you. Bam Bam will come in the door singing that song looking crazy like a 3 legged chair. I tell BAM BAM a wall ain’t fo that, but he neva listen.
He’s so ruff that he just breaks shit and then his wise crackin ‘ass will say Who did that? I go and tell his Mom and she always says, well who did it? My Bam Bam? Nawwwww, not my Bam Bam. Yeah your Bam Bam. Whoever Bam Bam would I be talking about, Auntie? Bam Bam from the Flint Stones? Anyway…..
Mama and Papa put the heavy box on the TV stand and Papa starts to hook up this VCR to the TV. But he don’t know what the hell he doing. Papa’s conspiracy theory brother John John calls the TV the tell lies to the vision. He say he don’t watch no TV because he’s a 5 percenter. At least that’s what I heard the grownies call him. They say he don’t eat pork no more and he be quoting mathematical equations and the grownies they just ignore him and they tell him to take off dem damn man skirts and kufi hats that he be wearing. He changed his name to Muhammad X to the power of 3. Like what the fuck is that?
You will always be Uncle John John to me Mr. X to the power of 3. In what not there.
Papa don’t always understand instructions, so he just puts the VCR together from his own head and it’s get very confusing up there. Like he don’t read no manual and he don’t even look at the pictures. Mama gets mad so she goes off and gets the strange water in the glass jar from the pantry and gets some ice from the freezer. She always puts exactly 3 ice cubes in her short glass and she rocks the glass back and forth as if the ice cubes gonna make the strange water taste better or sumthin.. When Mama dranks that strange water, she closes her eyes real tight and her fists tighten. She starts pounding on her chest like she chokin or something, but when she opens her eyes, they sparkle kinda like when Michael Jackson dancin in the thriller video and his eyes become yellow and bright. And then she cracks this weird smirk on her face and her unibrow tilts. She goes to get another glass of that strange water with the 3 ice cubes hands Papa the glass and starts rubbing his back kinda strange like. Papa always smiles back at her when she rubs his back. These grownies are moody. I tell you. So now Mama swinging her hair back and forth and she starts fanning herself cause she hot she say. It is hot in the damn house. The air conditioner never be working so it be blowing hot ass air through the house. So we got all the damn fans blowing dust in everybody mouth and shit.
Papa dranks some of the water and he now smiling strange back at Mama. His chest gets big like Superman and he start rubbin on Mama’s butt. They be so embarrassing I tell you.
Part II – The Soul Train Line
This water bring the grownies to their feet. Now the glass jar sitting there in the living room. I’m watching it like why this water do this to these people? I dranks water and it taste so nasty so I put ginderrale in my water cause it need some fizz to it.
The grownies their skin looks like it gets warm and redder. Most of my family kinda bright, high yellow, low yellow, middle yellow, I don’t know but they are bright and yellow so they turn red real quick when they dranks this water and they start to do these zombie dances like the ones Michael Jackson and his zombie crew do in the Thriller video.
Uncle John John to the power of 3 starts the family’s Soul Train line. He always talking mathematics, but when he hears Earth Wind and Fire, Prince, or Michael Jackson, he start doing these weird robotic moves with his hands and legs and his face freezes up and everybody start yelling, Go John John, go John John, go John John. My Auntie, Bam Bam’s mom come behind him and start coming down the line with her sweated out perm. She start doing some weird Beat Street dances but she falls out on the floor and makes the same noise BAM like her son. Mama starts fanning her but she do this everytime time we get together. Mama says she fakin.
Now, it’s about 6:30 and the whole damn neighborhood and my bright crazy grownie family is in my Mama and Papa’s living room. It’s so crowded it look like the wall paper walls are sweating. Anyway, Papa got the VCR working so he jumps up and shouts like, “I fucking did it, Yo. I fucking did it”. My eyes roll back in my head and I say in what not there, Papa.
So, they put in the Michael Jackson thriller video in the VCR now and I mean it’s been like 2 years since the video first came out and Papa went out and bought that damn heavy ass cassette tape. He wanted everybody to have the movie experience with the lights out and the big tell lies to the vision TV and the strange water and family and the neighborhood I guess.
Now all the grownies got the same glasses and some ice cubes. I hear my Uncle Bucky from the other side of the room talking about, I love my family. Somebody please give me a hug. I love my family. Kiss me damnit. Uncle Bucky’s voice is always loud and gruff even without that strange water.
Then my Uncle Lou with Baby Nook, his main woman walk in. Uncle Lou always dangles a toothpick in his mouth. Baby Nook neva say nothing. She quiet and I think her spine is broken or sumthin cause she always hunched over like a damn hunch back. She must wash herself in some minty perfume because when I smell mints, I know it’s Baby Nook. She wants Uncle Lou to marry her, so she tries to be nice to all of the kids. She smells minty, wears red lipstick, and wears this asymmetrical haircut. Uncle John John everytime he sees her he jokes and says he’s going to measure her hair with a protractor. But she needs to start speaking up for herself and get a backbone in her back and tell Uncle Lou to put a ring on it.
I asked Mama if I could get my hair cut like that. She said emphatically Hell to the No. She said it would make me look too grown and no nine year old needs to look like she 19. I agree with Mama sometimes. Sometimes Mama tells me things that she want me to do, but I know damn well she won’t do them herself. Like read. Mama want me to read more, but the only thing I ever see Mama read is crossword puzzles, so I’m like why I gotta read if you don’t.
Anyway, I’m kinda small for my age and that hair would make me look even bigger which is why I want the haircut. So I just tuck that idea away and save it for when I’m 19.
Ziranda’s kids run their dirty asses in the house. Ziranda live down the street from us. She got a lot of kids and I neva see no man. So I’m like how the hell she make all them damn babies with no man? Mama told me how babies is made, so I know you gotta have a man and a woman naked in the bed to make babies. I shakes my head. Mama tells me not to judge. I ain’t God, but I’m like neither is Ziranda, so how she make them babies, Mama? Mama squeals and tells them kids to go and wash their hands and face in the upstairs sink. Jesus. They gonna come in my room with their stank butts. So what I do? I stand at the top of the steps as all 8 of them run up trippin over each other. The baby who’s like 3, her name is Izzie, she’s crying and snotting all over the place. She grabs my hand and I can’t help but to pull her up out of the mess of children that have no manners. So I take her to the sink after her brothers and sisters use it as a wading pool and tell her how to wash her hands.
She listens real good to me.
I always wondered if dem kids had water in their own house because they ain’t never clean, but Mama always welcomes them in with a smile because that is what my Mama does. She smiles, but she will talk crazy about your ass when you leave because I heard her mutter to Papa that she didn’t want them sittin on her couches even though they always got plastic over them.
I think all the grownies are finally here. So there’s popcorn, and Doritos, and Cheetos going around and somebody bought them hot ass wings from the Chinese store, and there’s like 30 people in my family’s living room. I’m Mama’s second pair of eyes. I’m looking to see if somebody got dirt on them and if they sitting on the furniture. Mama thinks her furniture is real special. She don’t mind folks sittin on it, but they needs to be clean she say. Mama feel like if somebody disrespects her furniture then they have disrespected her and shit will go down if you disrespect Mama’s furniture.
Part III – It’s about to go down.
Everybody is excited because even though they have seen this damn video 50 times, they can now see it on the VCR.
I see the receipt that Papa has in his hands and it says one thousand dollars and I’m like FUCK OUTTA HERE! Like where the hell did Mama and Papa get one thousand dollars for this goddamn box? Mama said they won the Lotto for $200. Mama and Papa are sooooooooo broke. They throw nothing away, so where da hell they get one thousand dollars from?
So I know Mama and Papa got issues with their credit cards. I have heard Mama say that Papa burns through his credit cards. So I guess they buy the VCR on the card and then burn it so they don’t have to pay for it. Hustlers.
The soul train line dance is still going, Michael Jackson got two black eyes and he’s dancing like a damn zombie, BAM Bam is slamming his head into the wall again and Auntie Jay keeps saying, stop baby befo yo brain bleeds, Izzie crying because she’s scurred of Michael, so I put her in my lap, I cover her eyes and tell her to not watch him. I say it like her mama say it so she say, ok, cuzzin, except Izzie ain’t my blood cuzzin, but everybody in our house is family. At least that’s what Mama and Papa say. Uncle John John to the power of 3X is now swaying his hips from left to right and sticking out his tongue. He looks like he caught that holy ghost people in church keep talking about except he’s a 5 percenter Muslim now so I don’t know if they have holy ghosts in their mosques or their percenter churches. Yannie has always been quiet, but she’s laughing so hard, it feels good to my ears because my sister don’t laugh much, Papa is bobbing his head like there’s jazz going on in his head. Mama is checking for handprints and dirt on her couch and I’m checking for her too. Baby Nook is sitting on Uncle Lou’s lap and she’s rubbing his back. I’m like girl give up the dream, please.
So I get Izzie up and I’m like I don’t like water, but I’m gonna try this goddamn strange water cause it don’t make me wanna dance like the grownies but if they like it then I’m gonna like it too. Me and Izzie walk into the kitchen. I grab us two short glasses and I get the ice cubes. Izzie grabs the ice cube and starts sucking on it. I let her cause she stop crying by now. I pour the strange water. By this time, the grownies get louder and louder, they flipping their arms and hands like Michael Jackson and doing these weird ass faces and dances. I dip the ice cube in the strange water and I give the ice cube to Izzie. She scrunches her face and say dat nasty cuzzin. I’m like fo real? Ok. So I dip the ice cube in the strange water and that damn ice cube burnin my throat. I’m like Jesus Christ, Holy Mary of God Allah Buddha Hail Mary Mother of God.
So I take the whole damn glass jar in the pantry and pour that burning holy hell of strange water down the kitchen sink. I go back in the living room and my Mama axxed me what I threw out in the sink? I tell her that nasty water yall dranks.
Then I hear it. You ever hear what it sounds like when the DJ stops the record and it sounds like it scratched. Yeah, that’s what it sounded like. The music stopped. The dancing stop. The VCR paused and the strange faces and dances freeze. So I tell them again, I threw out that nasty water yall dranks. It burned me and Izzie’s throat.
They still can’t move.
So I put both hands on my hips and if you can imagine my neck making a full rotation of a circle with my eyes rolled in the back of my head, and just when I’m about to say sumthin, Izzy say, Now what?
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