You and Me (Plus Everyone In Between Us)

Locked Out

Ray and I followed Martha into the thick jungle of clothes in the back warehouse of the studio. It had been yet another uneventful yet embarrassing day back at the ranch.

I was once again reminded of my lack of inherent rhythm, which was even more embarrassing because I was both Jamaican and Nigerian. By default, I should be able to move my waist fluidly and bust out into some impressive legwork. But looks like the dancing genes skipped me entirely.

I remember back when I was seven, and we were at some Nigerian party for the community, and there was this competition for the little kids. If we could dance the hardest, we would get ten dollars. Combined with adrenaline and the inherent hype nature of P-Square, I busted out all my dance moves and promptly face-planted into the floor.

Ray had ignored me since our fight yesterday. Not in the way she usually did, but in a way that made it obvious that her silence was meant to put me on edge.

I was back at square one. Ray wasn't STAN. So then who else could it be? She was the most obvious choice. But here's what I knew. It had to have been someone at the party, it had to have been someone who knew about Andre and me, and it had to have been someone who had some vendetta against me or Andre.

I was moved out of my trance when we got to one of the back closets. There were both two bags of clothes with our names on them, alongside a sheet of our measurements. Martha unzipped them, and it revealed with two outfits.

The one with my name was a a white long-sleeve shirt, with one half of it being mesh layered with a blue velvet crop top, and the shorts made of the same blue fabric. Ray's outfit was similar to mine, but the shorts were red and the top was plaid. It looked amazing, and my eyes gawked at it. Ray however narrowed her eyes, like the outfit was the most suspicious thing in the world.

"I think you have the wrong size," she muttered.

Martha readjusted her cat eyeglasses in visible confusion. "But these were the measurements that we took. We can make some alterations, but let's try it on first."

"No!" Ray suddenly snapped. "I know myself, and I know that this is the wrong size. I would like you to make alternations first."

"How do you know it doesn't fit you?" I jumped in. "We should just try it on first."

"No Ezra!" Ray replied, voice growing louder. "It's the wrong size and I would like you to make a different one. I don't want to wear this because it's not my size and the measurements are wrong."

"Do you want you redo your measurements?" Martha asked.

"No!" Ray shouted. "I just want a smaller size. Can you please make it for me?"

"Calm down," I mumbled. "Don't yell at Martha. Just redo your measurements, but first try it on."

I wondered why she was making such a big deal out of this. It was an outfit. I'm sure Martha knew what she was doing and didn't count the outfit size wrongly. But here Ray was, eyes alight was angry passion.

"Okay," Martha said. "I'll go make alterations. Ezra, you can go get dressed."

I did so, putting on the top then the pants, and walked out for Martha and her assistants to see me. The second top was a little loose on me, and the shorts were kind of shorter than I wore. They just went up to my upper thighs. If I wore this in front of Mom, she would tell me to go upstairs and change without a second thought. She wouldn't want me embarrassing her in public, even though people weren't watching us that closely.

Martha mimicked my thoughts. "We're going to have to alter the top, but everything looks good."

She handed me a pair of white, glossy ankle boots to put on and all they did was elevate the outfit and me into the six-foot range yet again. I was worried about how I was going to dance in these after all. Maybe I could wear them to practice.