Yeah Right, Bitch!!
Kendra was the toughest girl I knew. I had known her for most of my life, growing up in Atlanta, Georgia. She was about 5’6” 140 lbs. She had slightly light brown skin and brown eyes and once people started telling her that she looked like the singer, Ciara, she got that hairstyle, and took off the glasses for a pair of contacts.
Ciara
Kendra was trouble since the time I knew her. She was an honest girl, but honest to the point where it drove people up the wall. Nobody wants to hear the truth, especially not me back then. The day I met her at school, we almost had a fight. She told me that my clothes didn’t match and I told her to mind her own business. She got in my face and I wasn’t about to back down, but teachers were nearby. I was taller than she was at 5’8” and I wore four inch heels back then. I just thought she was like the rest of them; jealous of me because I was tall; I had big tits, and because I wasn’t walking around like the world owed me anything. I was Heather Logan, the teacher’s pet when I wanted to be, the chick who sat in the back of the class and sucked on a blow pop knowing you were watching me, the girl who wore schoolgirl outfits to school even though there wasn’t a uniform policy. But I wasn’t the type of girl who gave it up easily. I was still a virgin, just a tease.
Everybody loved “The Sopranos,” that gangster show on HBO. They told me I was a dead ringer for Jamie Lynn Sigler, the actress who played Meadow Soprano, the main character Tony’s daughter. I had that sweet innocent face and that body that just wouldn’t stop. I had really big tits back then, as I do now, so I would wear my skirt well above the bellybutton to accentuate them, and I knew Kendra and everyone else couldn’t stand it. I had so many girls wanting to fight me, but the thing about me was, I could hold my own. I took boxing classes and I knew how to punch with force and how to go to the ribs and the belly, before dropping that bomb right on the nose and knocking you out. Growing up in a house with five brothers helped too; if I had a problem with a girl in the neighborhood or at school, they would make me fight her, but they were and still are so protective of me, even if I remember getting into fights with them over little stuff.
Jamie Lynn Sigler
Kendra and I were destined to fight. That’s what I truly believed because of the dirty looks she would give me. I had seen Kendra fight before at lunchtime, behind the hut where the school guidance counselors had their offices. She was really good and she beat this other Black girl until the other girl walked away. She would stick and move, pop you in the face, knee you in the stomach and take away your confidence, and she’d talk to you while she was doing it. Stuff like, “Ooh, I know that hurt… come on, what you backing up for?… You don’t want it anymore; you know you don’t want it anymore… I’m gonna keep hitting you if you keep putting them hands up… Mmmm, got ya… Girl, I‘m kicking your ass with just my jab and I know you don‘t want that right, ‘cause that right will put out your lights.”
And if you told her that she shouldn’t be fighting because it’ll mess up her chances to get into a good college, she’d tell you, “Fuck college; I’m going to the army.” She was a good fighter; she knew how to body punch and she knew how to swat punches down, but she seemed to rely more on intimidation and those quick shots than her actual skill. She talked so much about beating this one up and that one up that it sort of told me that she was more of a wannabe tough girl than a real one. Like I said, she could fight, but she was the type of girl who tried to dominate everything in the gym. Basketball, football with the guys, she’d punch guys too and bully the geek portion of the school. But this was mainly around other people; when she was by herself, she was calm and I overheard her talking to one of her friends about a group assignment… she was pretty smart too.
Then it happened. Lunchtime in the caf, I was in line holding my tray and she came right up to me.
“I heard you been flirting with my man, Heather,” she said, and she had this group of girls already telling her to kick my ass. I was nervous, not about her, but about this group of girls with her. I didn’t mind a one on one fight, but I didn’t want to get jumped. The stereotype of Black girls, and it’s wrong just like most stereotypes are, is that if you get into a fight with one, the others will jump in and beat you up. I didn’t even really look at her except out of the corner of my eye.
“Wayne and I are in the same group for the project on Nietzsche in Mrs. Vung’s class,” I said, making my voice sound as baby-like and innocent as I could
“Bitch, why the fuck do you always wear a black bra under that white shirt?” she said, “And you got the top three buttons undone so that everybody can see your big ass titties. Nobody wants to see that shit.”
“Wayne did,” I said, looking at her with a smile. I couldn’t help it, and the “Ooooooh” that everyone looking on made was priceless.
“Tell me this bitch didn’t just say that,” Kendra said, looking at her friends. Most women would’ve swung at that point, but not her. She wanted to keep the conversation going and everyone seemed to want a fight.
“Bitch, you don’t know nothing about my man,” she said, “Who the fuck are you? Some cave bitch with your tan and your fat ass cheeks and shit, trying to be all slutty, like that’s fashionable.”
“At least I’m not trying to act ghetto when I’m not.” That got her.
“Tell me this bitch didn’t just say that.”
“I did say it, BITCH.”
Now, the phones were out and the video was being recorded. People wanted to see a fight and I had been in one that prior week. I was aiming for this blonde girl named Ashley Simpson’s (not that one) liver, and aimed too high. I broke three of her ribs with one punch. I knew the fight was over from the sound she made when the punch happened. She was screaming that she was dying and because my Dad is on the police force, I wasn’t getting into any trouble. It also helped me with being a tease. No one was going to take it too far with me when my dad was an Assistant Chief of Police. There was a sexy danger to messing with me for guys, but there was also a danger that was too great for most and that was fine. There were three teachers on duty in the caf that day and two of them made it over to Kendra and I. Right as Mr. Bowers was stepping between us, I threw a right hand that got Kendra flush on the right cheek. I remember the “Unnnnhhh!!” that she made and how her head turned and her legs buckled. I staggered her with that punch and she looked back at me, knowing that I had hurt her just as Mrs. Owens and Kendra’s friends were holding her. But that didn’t stop her.
She raged around Mrs. Owens like a defensive lineman chopping and spinning around an offensive tackle to get to the quarterback. Bowers missed her when he tried to grab her and I remember seeing Mrs. Owens looking at him like he put forth no effort. Kendra reached me and I was already backing up with my arms raised to protect my face because she was winging lefts and rights at my head and I was up against the wall. I thought about just going down, even though the shots weren’t getting through because of my guard, but she grabbed me by the opening in my shirt and threw an underhanded right into my solar plexus. My eyes bulged in my head and my mouth opened with an “Uh!” I had been in a lot of fights, but other than taking a shot or two to the sides, I’d never been hit dead on in the body like that. I couldn’t move and I couldn’t breath.
She drew back to punch me in the face; I knew she was going for the knockout, but I brought my foot up and caught her in the crotch. She made an “Ulllffff!!” sound and her face was somewhere between pain and terror. She didn’t expect that and I nailed her in the jaw with a right hand and got her in the stomach with a left. I noticed that her belly was soft and she easily folded over my fist with an “Ooouuuggghhh.” But she put her arms around my waist and drove me back, and because I had on my heels that day, I went down and she was on top of me. She had me and she hit me above my left eyebrow and ear several times while I covered up and they pulled her off of me. She looked at me while they held her, then she grabbed her stomach and dropped to one knee. I was huffing and puffing and pacing, making it seem like I wanted to get to her, but I didn’t. I raised my arms and some of the students cheered me. I may not have won that fight, but I was the one standing… and I knew that I had hurt her and I also knew that she didn‘t want to fight me.
After that, it seemed like Kendra was more civil to me. We would see each other in the hallway and I would be talking to her boyfriend and she would come up and there wouldn’t be this hate look thing. It was more a look of respect, and I gave her the same back. Wayne, Kendra, and I would sit in the library on the third floor and talk. Well, Kendra would do most of the talking and we’d do the listening. She’d tell Wayne how wild she is and how she’s tired of women coming onto him. I didn’t know if it was an indirect message to me or not. She’d say stuff like, “I can’t keep beating up your hoes, Wayne. There might be that one, one day, who will get me. She might beat me and then, what’ll you do?”
“I don’t think anybody could beat you, baby,” he would say
“But you never know,” was her warning, “Some bitch might be badder than me, better than me, quicker than me, more heart than me. She might get me… right, Heather?”
“I think you fight good,” I said, “I would know, ha ha.”
I also knew we were going to fight again. Kendra wasn’t dumb. I could see that she knew when she looked at me. She knew I had been messing around with Wayne. I don’t know why it happened like it did. I guess having her accuse me of it made me want to do it. So, I did. We didn’t have actual sex. We just made out and I teased him. But she knew. It was the weekend of our big party, Super Saturday. She called me and said she wanted to meet me at the park after the fair was over. I asked her which side of the park and she told me, “Just show up and I’ll find you.”
I showed up at the park and walked around. I made it to the botanical gardens side, where no one was, and she was standing there, waiting.
“You know I’m about to fuck you up, right?” she said
“I don’t think you can,” I said, “Kendra, it doesn’t have to be like this. You don’t like him anymore. You’re holding onto something just to hold onto it.”
“Do you like him?” she said
“No,” I said, “How many dudes do you see me with? Why would I want--”
“That’s what I don’t understand, bitch! Why you had to come at MY man?”
“I don’t know,” I looked down, “He was just there. I don‘t know why I do it. I just do it.”
“You have daddy issues,” that one hurt, “Daddy’s out playing super cop and you don’t have any male contact. I read about that shit. But you about to get spanked now.”
“Whatever,” I said, “If you’re gonna beat me up, go ahead and try. But I’m going to fight back.”
“Good,” she said, “Because as long as we are together, he is mine. And as long as you keep fighting back, you’ll keep on getting your ass kicked.”
We circled each other, and I thought to myself that Kendra was right. This was going to be different. We weren’t fighting over anybody worth it. She was with him to prove she could keep a man and I was messing around with him because I felt like it. We both should’ve been doing something else. She knew that and I knew that, but this was the moment we were in and we were going to fight.
To be continued…
