BY ASHLEY FRAY
I hated white boys after that thing with A.J. He had said he would not date outside his race. Inside I resolved that I would not either. I resolved inside myself that I was no longer biracial, I was Black. I even ignored my white mother. We were of different races. I felt loyal to my dad. I thought my sister was crazy. She was dating white boys all the time and when she was 18 she married one. Something I vowed never to do. I was paying white boys back. I would never let one of them touch me, kiss me or hug or anything like that. The hard part was, that me and black boys never had that same attraction. They never treated me like I was a black girl. But I decided to date black boys exclusively because that’s whoever wanted me anyway. At least that is what I decided to believe. I met one black boy I’ll call Orlando. He said I was “Fine” and asked me for my phone number. Not even realizing that I could say no, I gave him my phone number and didn’t really care if he ever called. This was before cell phones. Then one day, my phone rang. I answered it before my mom could intercept it. A deep voice said, “Is Ashley there?” “Hi,” I answered back. He told me to pick him up on Lake Street somewhere and our first date was just driving around the city’s darkside. I did not feel attracted to him or even think that he was cute and he spoke a language I could not quite understand. I pretended to adapt. But in my heart I was still longing for A.J. I even had dreams that me and A.J. were together. But it never was true. Orlando introduced me to marijuana. We drove around the city getting high on pot. We listened to rap music. Orlando stared out the passenger side window. Finally he directed me to a sketchy looking house on Minneapolis’ Northside. I nervously waited in the car. I flatly refused to get out of my car. Orlando was shorter than me and that made me feel embarrassed to be seen with him. A.J. had been tall and handsome. This guy was just a duck. At least that’s what we called them. After 15 minutes Orlando came outside with three friends. They did not introduce themselves and I didn’t ask. Orlando asked me to turn the interior light on so that his could friends could see me in the clear light. Orlando got really excited and told his friends, “Look at her. Look at her hair. She doesn’t even look black!” His friends got all excited and agreed. I definitely did not look black. I was humiliated. I felt like an animal behind the glass in a zoo. They all celebrated how “Not Black” I appeared while I slumped deeper into depression. My dad had always taught me that I was black. I was not to believe my wicked white mother’s stories of how we were the beautiful combination of two groups. Both white and black. My dad said that was crap. And now, here I was in front of black boys hi-fiving one another at how Orlando had scored a girl who did not look black. Orlando and his friends joked around for a while as I disappeared into my seat. I felt invisible. Spiritually. I no longer existed. All I could think about was A.J. and who he was dating now. But I still resolved to date only black. I had always felt a spiritual connection between myself and white boys like A.J., but I knew they would never love me back, so in spite of their advances I always held back. Orlando’s friends went back into the Northside house and Orlando directed me to drive him back to the Southside and drop him off on a street corner very near Chicago Avenue. We never kissed, hugged or touched at all. I said goodbye and he said goodbye also. He wandered off into the darkness of the inner city streets. I returned home. I wondered why Orlando preferred to be dropped off on a street corner instead of at his house. That was our first and last date and it was horrible. I focused my hatred on my sister’s white husband. He was white and that violated dad’s rules and my own. She was giving herself to a white man and I was convinced her husband was making her into a slave just like dad said. I never missed the opportunity to say something rude to his white ass. But I still wondered about the possibility of dating A.J. I didn’t really hate white boys. In fact, I loved them.
