. . .
Conflict
“Hurry up, Jazz, we’re gonna be late!”
cried my roommate Celìne. “One second!”
I yelled back, swiping on some red lipstick.
“Muah,” I smooched at the mirror and capped the stick. “Ok, coming!” I called to Celìne, and
high-tailed it downstairs. “Jeez, I was
about to leave your slow ass!” she laughed as I jumped the last two stairs and
landed gracefully on my feet. “Well
it’s not like he’s going anywhere, C,” I quipped. To get that quip you’d have to know me and C, and also what’s
been going on the past few months.
I’m Jisela McLeod, and I’m 20 years old. No one can pronounce either my first or last names, so they call me Jazz,
cause I dance. (BTW, it’s ‘Hih-sell-ah Muh-Cloud, if you were wondering.) I’m half Spanish and half Scottish. Weird, right? I got my Spanish mother’s nearly white blonde hair, blue eyes,
and slight build, but my father’s height… if you can call it that. He’s 6’2”, my mother’s 4’10”, making me a
grand total of 5’6”. I modeled for a
while in high school, but I want to be a veterinarian, so I enrolled at the
University of Miami. I had to move
three thousand miles to do so, and I can’t say I regret leaving L.A. Anyway, all you really need to know is I’m really, really, really shy with guys I
don’t know… I haven’t had a boyfriend since senior year, and… sometimes I get
in over my head, if you know what I mean.
Next is Celìne. C to
me. She and I met two summers ago when
we got picked to share a room in our dorm.
I love C, she’s a great girl.
C’s got jet-black curly hair and hazel eyes. I’m always jealous of her.
C’s the kind of girl that makes guys turn their heads and take
notice. You see, the thing C can’t
stand is not being able to have something she wants. Right now she wants Josh Hall.
Josh is a Junior here at UM, and, well… he’s disturbed. He tried to kill himself two months ago, and
he’s being treated for severe depression and anxiety at the Jordan Wright
Center. C just can’t let him go, so
we’ve been to see him every weekend for the past two months. This is visit number nine.
We pulled out of the student lot in my silver Jetta. C instantly reached in front of me to turn
on the radio. “Oh Jazz, it’s the
Backstreet Boys!” She whined, and put a hand to her cheek. “It’s so sad about that one… you know,
AJ? I hear he’s at a clinic getting
treated for the same thing as Josh… plus he’s like, an alcoholic or
something. Isn’t that sad?” she asked,
and made a sympathetic face when AJ’s voice sang “Take my hand, don’t say
goodbye…”. I shrugged. “Guy’s got problems like the rest of
us.” C looked at me like I’d just told
her that her grandmother had died.
“Well, I mean, yeah it’s sad,” I covered quickly. “Well you know I didn’t hear about
that! I don’t listen to pop, C,” I
said, switching the station to my R&B.
“Toya!” I shrieked, turning up the volume. C rolled her eyes but I put down the sunroof and rolled down the
windows. “Maximum power!” I
laughed. C smiled and started groovin’
in her seat. We drove like that all the
way to the clinic. We only turned the
music off when we noticed a man looking at us.
“Josh!” C cried at the man, and jerked open her door. She ran over to him and gave him a full
contact hug. I heard him grunt as she
hit him, and smiled. Those two are so
cute. I walked over to join them on the
benches outside. It was dark, so when I
walked past a tree and saw smoke blow past me, I almost screamed. I turned at lightning speed and pulled out
my pepper spray. Thankfully I noticed
the guy was just having a smoke. “God. You shouldn’t be lurking around in the dark
like that!” I laughed, shaking off my nerves.
I saw the guy smile and flick his cigarette. “You shouldn’t be walking around a hospital in the dark.” I smiled nervously and nodded. “Yeah.
Well, I gotta run. Hope I didn’t
scare you,” I said, then turned. “Nah, no problem,” he said softly, and took
another drag on his cigarette.
Josh and C were cuddled up on a bench. “When you get out, I’m bringing you back to
my place for some of my therapy,” she
giggled into his ear, and he kissed her cheek.
“That’s motivation enough for me.
I’m cured, Doc!” he called into the darkness. I walked out of the shadows smiling. “If you say so, Josh!” I laughed, and put a foot up on their
bench. “You guys need a room, seriously. Josh, is there some rule against her being
in you room?” I asked, and smiled devilishly.
They both dropped their jaws slightly and quirked eyebrows. “Man, Jazz… you need sex,” Josh
deadpanned. Now it was my turn to look
surprised. “What?!” I asked. Josh smiled and patted my shoulder. “Trust me.
C knows. How long has it been? Six months?” he asked, and I blushed. “Nine.”
They both gasped and then giggled.
“Well honey,” C said, “I don’t think you’ll have much luck here!”
We talked for maybe another ten minutes when we heard
someone walking toward us. “Shit, it’s
probably the nurse,” Josh hissed, and put his arm around C. We were tensed, ready to beg for an extension
on Josh’s visit, when the person walked into the light. “Mrs. Davis can I just please-” Josh began,
but stopped when he realized it wasn’t the nurse. It was the guy I almost blinded with my pepper spray. “How many of those things did you smoke?” I
asked, and smiled at him. Then I
realized how incredibly good looking he was, and I got nervous… like I always
do. He pulled out his pack and rattled
it. “I have six left,” he stated in a
gravelly smoker’s voice. I heard C
cough, and I looked at her. Her eyes
were wide, and she was griping Josh’s shoulder so hard her knuckles were
white. Josh looked pained. “Dude, what’s wrong with you?” I asked her,
and took her hand from Josh’s shoulder.
She smiled at the cigarette guy and leaned in to my ear. “AJ!
That’s that Backstreet Boy I was telling you about!” she whispered. I sat up and laughed. “The alcoholic?!” Oops, I’d said that out loud.
The guy with cigarettes cocked his head to the side a little. I looked at him and back to C. “I heard you guys laughin’ over here. Anyone want a smoke?” he asked, and I raised
my hand. C pulled my hand down. “Jazz, I told you to stop that! You can’t dance if you smoke,” she said, and
then realized what she’d said and looked up at the guy we now knew was AJ. “I mean, you can’t dance as well. Of course you can still dance and-” Josh put a hand over her mouth.
“Hey, AJ. Sorry about these
girls. They come to visit every week
and they won’t leave me alone!” he joked.
I made that ‘oh-yeah-sure’ sarcastic face and smiled at AJ. “And I do
want a cigarette, thanks.”
“…And when you first came, I thought you were such a loser!” Josh said to AJ, and they
laughed. “I know man, everyone thought
I was so happy, you know? Why should I
have problems when I have so much money and shit? No fuckin’ clue, man…
no clue,” AJ replied, taking a pull on his cig. “So, you dance?” he asked me after he’d blown out some
smoke. I shyly nodded and flicked my
cigarette butt onto the ground. “Do the
Janet dance, Jazz!” C laughed, hugging Josh.
“Jazz? What’s that short for?”
he asked. I smiled into the darkness
and stood up. “Jisela, but no one can
pronounce it anyway. Ok,” I said,
facing them all. “I’m gonna do… the Janet dance.” C and Josh clapped, and AJ leaned back into the bench, legs
spread like a guy who knew how to judge what he was about to see. I smiled at C and started. I went through the whole ‘night’ dance
sequence from Janet Jackson’s “All For You” video, boob grab and everything. It was something I’d learned in my hip hop
dance class last semester.
When I was done, everyone clapped. “You’re great,” AJ said while they clapped. He stood and walked over to me. “Show me how to do this move,” he grinned, and pretended to grab his ‘breasts’ like
I’d just done in the dance. My face
turned red, I could feel it, and I
shoved him. “Hey, hey now,” he said
defensively. C stood up and came over
to us, Josh in tow. “No, AJ, you need
to show Josh here how to do some of your
moves,” she said, and smiled at Josh.
“God knows it couldn’t hurt!”
Josh made puppy eyes and C was quick to apologize. “Your moves?” I asked him, smirking. “Please.
I’d school you!” I laughed, amazed at how comfortable I felt around him
now. He nodded and hung his head. “How about… this?” he said, and grabbed my
hands, twirling me around. “Do you do
salsa?” he asked, and I nodded, ready for a ‘challenge’.
I had to say it; he was actually very good. “Wow, where’d you learn to dance?” I asked,
curious. “All over Florida. I was a freak in high school, though. Girls probably thought I was gay, you know,
being a singer and dancer,” he smiled, not too fondly remembering his
childhood. I smiled and grabbed his
cigarette pack out of his hand. “Well I
bet those girls are kickin’ themselves in the ass now!” I laughed, and he lit up my cig. “Last one,” he sighed, and I nodded.
We noticed Josh and C on the bench again. “God.
You’d think they’d at least go someplace I couldn’t see them!” I huffed,
and flicked some ashes away. AJ looked
over at me. “You grossed-out?” he
asked, laughing. “Ha. No, I’m jealous,” I replied, and sucked on
my cancer stick. AJ smiled. “Yeah, me too. No girlfriend for two months.
It’s tough, bein’ a guy,” he said.
“Try nine months,” I sighed, and looked at him warily. “You haven’t had a guy in nine months?” he
asked incredulously. “No, I haven’t had
a boyfriend since senior year in high school.
I meant I haven’t had sex in
nine months. Looking at them just makes
me… sick,” I said. AJ flicked his
cigarette away and laughed. Then he
started singing Pink’s “You Make Me Sick” and danced around me. I smiled and listened to his voice. It was nice; rich and full of soul.
When the nurse did
come to get us, we knew there was no stalling for time. She’d been nice enough as it was. I told Josh bye, then walked back over to my
new friend. “I guess… well, I’m coming
back here same time next Sunday. Do you
wanna meet us all here again?” I asked, and I noticed a twinge of pleading in
my voice. I almost slapped myself until
he smiled and nodded. “Yeah, I’d like
that.” A pause for a second, and then
he smiled again. “Next time bring some
music,” he said, then took my hand and twirled me. I laughed and we exchanged a quick hug before C pulled me away.