Page 60 of Shâhzâdeh

Her head tilted and I could almost hear the challenge she was about to throw at me. “Aren’t you Black?”

I threw my hands up because I wanted to scream yes but since I didn’t know shit about myself it was all an assumption. “Who even knows.”

“You’re a work in progress. I mean I hate to say it but your husband is going to be the best tour guide around this theme park of Blackness as you’ve so eloquently put it.” She reclined back on her side of the couch and gave me a sympathetic look.

I ignored that husband noise she was talking because there was no way that was happening. “I really got done a disservice by being adopted by them white people didn’t I?”

“You absolutely did. But I mean, hey, life’s looking up, right?”

“Most definitely. Okay so, Xerxes, automatic invite to the cookout. Even though he’s biracial? I thought some of them were a problem?”

She cackled at me, and I still didn’t understand what the hell was so funny. “See that’s another nuance you have to catch. Xerxes is good because he’s a mama Black biracial.”

I gripped my hair at the root as I stared at her, feeling my brain was about to explode. “What does that mean?”

“Exactly what I said! His mama is Black. You learn your culture from your mother mainly. Now with these halfricans running around the Consortium, they are well-versed in both sides of their culture, but yeah, they still Black. Look at Safi and Deuce.”

“So because your dad is white or something else, you get a cookout invite. But if your dad is Black and your mom is white, you don’t? Why is that?” Because this whole thing was feeling like math and I sucked at math unless I was calculating a commission on a house sale or a discount at the store.

Frankie sighed apologetically and sat her flute down on my gilded wood and glass coffee table. “I keep forgetting you’ve only seen one very narrow view of Black maleness. For example, look at your ex—”

“He would rather choke than be labeled as Black.”

She pointed at me and I knew that’s what she was getting at. “My point has already been proven. If he was to marry a white woman, do you think he would instill in his children anything positive about Blackness or Black people? Or would he try to pretend they were all one big white happy family?”

I shuddered thinking that it would’ve been his dream to continue to poison the minds of whatever came from his loins. “Definitely the latter. He never had anything positive to say with even me. So I’m sure it would even be worse if his partner was of another race.”

She held her hands out in a ta-da fashion and grinned. “And it is men like him that will go to the other side and claim one of their women as some type of war prize-”

“Okay, this is making sense, I’m following. So your kids, automatic.” I ticked that off on my finger to keep track.

“Yes.”

“Deuce has an invitation through his wife and kids?”

“Really more because that man has more than proven to be an ally and an accomplice through his marriage. I’m sure he has righteously bust his guns for Blackness more than a time or two.”

“Way more information than necessary, a simple yes would’ve sufficed. Now I gotta look at that sweet Scottish man and wonder how many people he’s killed. But thank you for letting me know Mr. Deuce is a ride or die.”

She grinned at the way I was clearly panicking. I mean, I’d assumed, but having it confirmed just meant I couldn’t gather with her without a killer being around. Which had me looking at her even closer.

“You’re welcome. Don’t you feel safer?”

She was grinning proudly, which meant she was definitely part of theI keep that thang on mebrigade. “I feel something. What about Xerxes’ daddy?”

“Okay, he’s half Persian so it’s complicated. By way of the dads liking him, I would say he gets an invite. They really don’t tolerate bullshit. And a lot of Persians have been persecuted too. But then again, some of their community really don’t fuck with us like that. Anti-Blackness is pervasive in a lot of communities around the world, even Black ones. He snagged a woman like Ms. Babette so we can say he’s got his lifetime pass on lock. I mean the man denounced his crown to marry his Black wife so, kind of a big deal.” She was giving me the history of this man like I would be tested on it later. Now I was even more nervous.

“Okay, so—”

“NO! You’re thinking too hard about this.” She waved her hands. I knew I was doing the insecure thing that she hated. I couldn’t help it. I didn’t want to always be the odd person out in every conversation.

“I’m just trying to understand the rules!” I flopped back onto the sofa and she was laughing at me again. Another pillow hit me in the face and she was gone stop throwing shit at me.

“There are no rules, Vanya! That’s what you have to get. You’re too used to the orders of whiteness. How there’s a hierarchy. How rich white people and poor white people don’t ever really mix. Like white folks all have that person in their family that made it that don’t fuck with their kin anymore. Black folks ain’t like that. You’ll see millionaires posted up on the block with dope boys cause they don’t forget where they came from. And it ain’t just someI’ll cut a checkshit. It’s the real life being involved in everything kinda shit. Are there outliers? Sure. But it’s normally the ones who are trying to get closer to whiteness that shed the culture of Blackness. White folks don’t mix like that until it’s time to be racist and then they’re side by side upholding the tenets of white supremacy like it’s their job. Black people know that if the least of us is affected, it’s going to affect all of us. So solidarity is our thing. That’s the word of the day for you when it comes to all this. Solidarity. We have it, they do not.” She widened her eyes like I’d seen her do with Skye. It was a silent scream to tighten up and I was going to listen.

“I’m never gonna be good at this.” I hated sounding so damn weak, but I felt like I was someone who’d been exiled from their homeland for years and then dropped back in the middle of it. I was praying to be accepted and Frankie had done so without question. Because she also knew how it felt to be a Lone Ranger. Other people might not extend that type of grace to me.

“There’s no good at it that you have to be, Vannie. You just have to be. That’s it, that’s all. You think Liam didn’t get shit with blond hair and green eyes speaking a white people language? That didn’t change who he was. How he felt or alter his Blackness. It’s on an end of a spectrum that some people might not identify with but that man is still a Black man. Loc’d up, green-eyed monster that goes bump in the night that he is. White daddy and all. He’s Black. Just like you are. If Safi didn’t teach her kids anything, it was who they were despite how they looked.”

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