First Semester (24 page)

“Whatever you got, it couldn't be that bad,” I said, pulling one of my hands away to wipe the dampness away from her face. “C'mon, just tell me.”

“J.D.,” she said, looking down at the floor. “I didn't pass.”

“It's really not that big of a deal. You're a straight-A student. Show the professor your transcript. I bet you he'd let you take the final again if you told him about your situation.”

“You don't understand!”

“Kat, it's just a test. I'm sure you passed the class.”

“I'm not worried about passing a class.”

“Well, what are you tripping about?”

“It was a blood test,” she said, in a dismal tone. “J.D., I'm…I'm…I'm…”

“You're what?”

“I'm HIV-positive.”

At that moment, I felt my heartbeat stop. Then, suddenly, it increased to a pulse ten times its normal speed, as if a state trooper had just pulled behind me on the highway, and I was driving in a stolen car with no license, twenty pounds of cocaine in the glove compartment and a dead body in the trunk. My mind went blank. I couldn't think. I blinked. While my eyes were closed I saw my life flash before my eyes. Tears drowned my pupils. My eyesight faltered, but my other senses were enhanced. All of a sudden I could smell the scent of scorched pork chops in the air, and I could hear the tears that fell from Kat's eyes nestling into her carpet. The second time I blinked I saw my casket. From that point on I was afraid to close my eyes.

“Wait a minute…” I said in a low, portentous tone. “So you mean to tell me…”

I took my hand and wiped it slowly from the top of my forehead to the bottom of my chin, in hopes that by the time my fingers rolled off my face, I would awaken from the worst dream I'd ever had. When my fingers reached my Adam's apple, she was still standing there and so was I. I cleared my throat.

“So you're telling me you've got AIDS?” I screamed at the top of my lungs.

My sentences were fragmented. I tried to speak, but couldn't complete a thought.

“Why didn't you…? Where did you…? How long have you known?”

“The test results took a while to come back,” she said, sobbing in piercing shrieks. “I tried to call you, though. You know I did!”

“So, what exactly are you trying to say? Are you trying to tell me that I might have AIDS too? Is that what you've been calling me for? I'm not one to put my hands on a female. But, Kat, I'm telling you right now, if you gave me that shit—”

“J.D., please,” she pleaded. “I really need someone to be here for me right now. I just…I don't know what to do. I don't know who I can turn to. I feel lost…confused.”

“You should! I know I am. I mean, here you are, Miss AIDS Awareness herself—sponsoring STD-free rallies on campus, reciting all of the HIV statistics, wearing red ribbons and you mean to tell me you've got the shit? You can't be serious right now. This is not why I came to college. I swear, I didn't sign up for this. This just can't be happening to me right now.”

“J.D., I said I was sorry.”

“
Sorry?
Bitch, sorry don't cut it! We're talking about life and death here. Of all people, I would think you would take this more seriously. If anybody is sorry, it should be me. I'm sorry I ever met your ass!”

She put her hands on my shoulders and tried to talk, but couldn't find the words. I felt one of her tears drop onto my linen pants. That's when I grabbed her wrists, forcefully removed her hands from my shoulders, hopped off her bed and bolted toward her door.

“Wait!” she screamed, grabbing me by my shoulder with one hand. “Please, J.D., don't leave me right now. I don't know what to do. I don't know if I can go on. I really need someone to talk to.”

“You wanna talk? Okay, cool. Let's talk. Let's talk about who else you've been fucking this semester. Let's talk about all the times you told me you were hanging with your line sisters or
helping your grandmother move,
when you were really with your boy, Downtown-D. Nah, you know what? I've got a better name for him. How about STD? How 'bout that? I can't believe I actually thought you were the genuine, sincere, wifey type. I guess that's what I get for thinking, huh?”

“I mean, if that's how you really feel about me, then I don't know what to say,” she said as she looked up at me, still crying. “When I went out with Deiondre without telling you, that was a mistake. I should have been honest with you, and I apologized for that. But I just found out I'm HIV-positive, and I'm scared to death. Don't kick me when I'm down! I mean, you're acting like this is all my fault. I didn't ask for this. And I didn't ask you to have unprotected sex with me, either. That was your choice.”

“Man, I'm not even figna sit up here and listen to this bullshit, blood. I'm outta here!” I said.

With that, I attempted to make a peaceful exit. I was almost out the door, but then it happened. Somewhere between me trying to remain levelheaded and sane, she tried to grab me with her other hand. And that's when I lost it. I went berserk.

“Get the fuck off of me!” I yelled as I put the palm of my hand on her forehead and pushed as hard as I could. Her head snapped back so fast that for a moment I thought I might have accidentally broken her neck. Her arms flew up in the air and the force of the shove made her feet backpedal until her spine crashed up against her drawer, sending her collapsing to the floor. She let out a loud scream and whimpered like a baby. Her door swung open and Lawry stormed in with Jessica.

“I knew your ass was crazy!” Jessica said, pushing me out of her way.

When Jessica tried to help Kat up from the floor, she resisted violently. Without looking up to see who was trying to help her, she started windmilling her fists wildly, catching her roommate on the chin by mistake.

“Get away from me!” Kat screamed in her loudest voice. Veins popped out of her neck as she grabbed her head with both hands and pulled out two fistfuls of hair. She repeated herself three times in a row, without intermission. “I just want everybody to get the fuck out of my room! I need to be alone.”

“C'mon, let's get outta here, shawty,” Lawry said, grabbing me by my shoulder and pulling me out of the room. “Baby girl definitely needs some time to herself.”

“Let me help you up, Kat,” Jessica insisted.

Kat refused the help for a second time.

“Everybody!”
she shouted.

“C'mon!” Lawry screamed, dragging me to the door. “Let's go!”

Kat's roommate came running out of the room toward us. Lawry ran out of the room, pulling me along with him.

“Yeah, y'all better run!” Jessica shouted. “I'm calling Public Safety!”

We weren't even two doors down from Kat's room before my conscience kicked in, and I stopped in my tracks. Something about pushing a girl down like that just didn't sit right in my heart. The fact that Kat was already in between a rock and a hard place made it even worse. I'd kicked her when she was down. I suppose growing up in a household with my mother and sister may have had something to do with it, but even when I was in the middle of cursing Kat out, it just didn't feel right—even if she deserved it. Lawry was halfway down the hallway before he even noticed I'd stopped walking.

“What you stopping for?” he yelled. “Let's get the hell on!”

“I need to go back,” I said, trying to think up a good excuse to give Lawry as to why.

In the process of thinking up a good reason, I found that I actually had a legit one. “You know what?” I asked, patting my pockets frantically. “I think I might have…”

“Think you might have what?” he asked.

“Did I have my phone with me when I came up here?”

“I think so. Why?”

“I think I left my phone on Kat's bed, blood. I'm going back to get it.”

“Man, hell naw. You heard her say she was figna call Public Safety on us. Later for that phone. You can come back and get that another time.”

“Another time?”
I asked. “Nigga, please. I need my phone. I'm figna grab it real quick and then we can get up outta here.”

Luckily, I made it back to Kat's suite door before it closed.

“You're lucky this door was nigga-rigged,” Lawry said as he followed me inside. “Ain't no way Kat's roommate was figna let us back up in here.”

Aside from Lawry's endless banter, Kat's suite was eerily quiet, especially for a room that was full of commotion less than a minute ago. All of a sudden, I had a really bad feeling about the whole situation, like something wasn't quite right. The closer I got to Kat's bedroom door, the worse I felt. A thick cloud of smoke coming from the kitchen fogged up the living room area. The water on the stove was boiling over, yet neither Jessica nor Kat were anywhere in sight. When I looked at Lawry, I could tell that he was just as leery about the situation as I was.

“I tried to tell you to come back and get your phone later,” he said, fanning smoke away from his face with his hand. “These girls are tripping up in here.”

Just as we cut the corner, the fire alarm sounded off. The siren made both of us flinch. But the sound that followed was one I could never forget.

“Aargh!” a female voice shrieked. “Oh, my God, Katrina, no!”

Even with the fire alarm sounding off, you could hear it loud and clear from under Kat's door.

Instinctively, I froze for a second, before opening the door. Lawry hesitantly followed me inside. I hadn't taken three steps inside the room before I stopped dead in my tracks. The sight of Kat balled up in a corner stuffing the barrel of a chrome-plated 9mm pistol in her mouth caught me off guard. It made Lawry take a few steps back.

“You really don't have to do this, Kat!” Jessica said as she stretched her hands toward her, tears flooding her eyes. “I mean, you've got so much to live for. Kat, please don't do this!”

After scanning the room, looking first at Jessica, then Lawry, then me, Katrina closed her eyes and started rocking back and forth, all the while sobbing profusely. At that point, my stomach fluttered. I thought she was going to kill herself in front of my eyes. Each breath she took was deeper than the previous one. I was afraid each one would be her last. Her fingers were fidgety. One second she'd wrap her finger around the trigger, the next she'd remove it.

A million things ran through my head as I stood there looking at Kat. I went back and forth in my mind, trying to think of the right words to say. But at that point, I was still furious about the possibility that I might have contracted HIV from her. I wanted to tell her, “Go ahead, do the world a favor and pull the trigger.” But before I could fix my lips to say a word, I thought about how I thought the first time I laid eyes on Kat during orientation, and how I thought she was the most beautiful female I'd ever seen in my life.

Then the selfish side of me took over, and I thought about what
my
mother would say, how
my
friends would react, how
I
would go on with
my
life, if
I
found out that
I
was HIV-positive.

Even as the anger resurfaced, I never said a word. Instead, I just kept thinking. I thought about whether she
really
went straight home all of the late nights she dropped me off at my uncle Leroy's during Thanksgiving break, or whether she made a pit stop at Downtown-D's place on the way. I thought about all of the times she might have sucked his dick in the morning and French-kissed me the same night.

I thought about all of the late nights we'd spent together studying, and all of the times she'd helped me study for my tests, when she had term papers to write for her own classes. I thought about how if it hadn't been for her, I probably never would even have had a chance of passing Dr. J's class—not to mention the other five. As I looked around her room, I couldn't help but remember the first night she invited me there, and how excited I was just to be in her room.

Then, for some strange reason, as I looked down at Kat, my hands nervously gripping the seams of my pants, I thought about Robyn. I pictured my little sister in Kat's shoes—balled up in a corner, holding a gun to her head, all because she was ashamed to go on with life. I thought about what I would say to get her to choose life. Then, I said it.

“Think of all the people who love you,” I said. “What about your mom? What about your dad? Kat, you mean too much to too many people to…”

In the middle of my sentence, I could tell I'd said enough. I didn't want to go overboard. I'd said enough to take her mind off her problems and think about how her actions would affect those who loved her most. Slowly she loosened her grip on the gun and removed it from her mouth. As the gun dangled from her hand, her head drooped in between her legs, she spoke softly, in between sniffles.