by Niyah Moore
This love shit was new to me. Was I supposed to sweat her like this? Was she supposed to disappear for hours and not say anything? Usually, when I got this close to someone, I would push them away or say some dumb shit to make the chick fall out of love with me. This time, I wanted things to be different. I was older now, but I still had some learning to do. I mean, I did some dumb shit from time to time, but on everything I loved, I wanted Desire to spend the rest of her life with me.
After I took a few shots and smoked my weed, I lay on the couch and checked all her social media pages to see if she had posted anything. She didn’t have any updates. I got distracted by some funny shit Mike Epps had posted on his Instagram. I laughed at that craziness and fell asleep.
I was jolted out of my sleep when my phone started ringing, and I jumped up. I saw it was my mom. Feeling disappointed, I answered, anyway, “Hey, Mama.”
“Hey, Poo. How are you?”
“I’m straight. You?”
“I’m good. You got Jon-Jon out of jail?” she said.
“Yes, ma’am. He’s with Lavish.”
“What Spoodie up to?”
She never called us by our street names and hardly ever by our government names. She had said that no matter how famous we got, she would always call us by the nicknames she had given us. I was the oldest, and my birth name was Tyriq, but she called me Poo. Lavish’s real name was Levante, but she called him Spoodie. Frill was named De’Jonn at birth, but she called him Jon-Jon. De’Vonn was Frill’s identical twin, but she called him Man-Man. Travis was the baby, born only a year after the twins, but she called him Dinky. We were her Monnahan Clan.
“Nothing much. What’s up?” I said.
“I’m just calling to make sure you got Jon-Jon out of jail, since he didn’t come home. That’s no place for him to be, especially with me dealing with Dinky being in prison. I need you to make sure Jon-Jon stays his ass out of jail. I don’t want another son spending the rest of his life in no cage.”
“I know. You ain’t try to call him?”
“I did, but he didn’t answer.”
“He might be in the studio at Spoodie’s house, working on the new album.”
“Okay.” She paused for a moment before she said, “I heard you got another baby on the way. How you feel about that?”
I shook my head. This rumor was irritating me. Now my mother wanted to believe it too. “Mama, I took a paternity test, and that first baby ain’t mine, so don’t say another baby, as if it is mine. I’m sure this one ain’t mine, either. You shouldn’t listen to everything you hear.”
She grunted, “So, this is how you gonna keep doing things, huh? If you wear a condom, you wouldn’t have to get no kids tested.”
“Mama, not right now. I got a lot going on.”
“Jon-Jon say you got a new girlfriend. I’m just wondering when I’m gonna meet her.”
“Soon,” I replied, hoping Desire was still my woman. If she didn’t come home with a good reason as to why she hadn’t answered my calls, we were going to have a problem.
“Well, come to see me sometime, Poo. Damn. Y’all done put me in this big house but don’t come to visit. Jon-Jon doesn’t ever come home. I don’t want to have to call to chase after any of you. I’m getting ready to call Spoodie and see if he picks up.”
“Okay. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
I waited for her to hang up first, just in case there was something else she wanted to say.
Thinking about Desire made my stomach hurt. I hopped up from the couch and poured another drink while I called her again. Straight to voicemail. Where the fuck was she at?
16
DESIRE
Death Is Too Unkind
After kissing Papi one last time, I went home. I was overwhelmed with grief and heartache. I couldn’t stop thinking about how many years I had stayed away from home. I could’ve at least checked on my papi more often. He had had cancer for the past two years, and I had had no idea. Never once during our lunch dates had he mentioned it. The reality that the two people who loved me the most were no longer on this earth was devastating.
Death was mean. It didn’t care about nothing or nobody. It had snatched up the most important people in my life, people who had been far too good to me. Death didn’t pretend to care about my feelings. It had ripped away the most significant part of me, my papi. My heart was turning cold, and I felt empty.
When I entered the house, I found Luxury sitting in the living room, looking at the TV. He looked like he hadn’t slept much at all.
He jumped to his feet. “What the fuck, Desire?”
“I know . . . I know,” I said, not knowing what else to say.
“You couldn’t call me to let me know you were all right? Where the fuck were you?”
I paused. My phone had died, and I hadn’t had a charger with me. I hadn’t been concerned about it, because I had been focused on being there for my papi.
“I was at the hospital. My papi . . . I watched him take his last breath . . . I’m sorry.”
He searched my eyes for the truth, wondering if I would be so heartless as to lie about my dad dying. When he saw my tears, he softened. “Come here, baby.”
I went over to him and cried in his arms.
“I was worried and, man, I didn’t know. You got a radio interview this morning, remember?”
I hadn’t been able to think about anything but Papi dying in my arms. I had completely forgot about the interview. I was sure Egypt had called me to remind me.
“Can we reschedule? I . . . just need some time.”
Luxury let go of me and looked confused, and for a split second, it looked like he wanted to cuss me out.
“What?” I scowled.
“You gotta find a way to work through your pain. I know it’s hard, but you have to.”
“That’s what I’ve been doing. Workin’ nonstop. I didn’t even have time to mourn my best friend, and now my papi is dead. I feel like what’s left of me has died, and I’m supposed to just keep going like nothing has happened?”
“I’m not about to get into it with you right now. Your first album drops in less than a month. We don’t have time for any setbacks. You don’t show up for scheduled interviews, you’ll get a bad name before anybody has time to know who you are.”
I wasn’t feeling what Luxury was talking about. He didn’t understand where I was coming from. I hadn’t said I didn’t want to do it. I just needed a little time to myself. Could I bury myself in bed just once? All I needed was a few days alone.
“Maybe we need a break or something. I just feel like I need to breathe,” I said.
His chest was heaving up and down. “You can’t breathe with me around?”
My bottom lip was trembling, and my tears were building back up. “It’s just all this . . . It’s too much. My papi was the one person left in this world who loved me unconditionally.”
“Baby,” he said. “Listen to me. I love you. You got me. I know I’m hard on you, and that’s only because you’re almost there. You have a hit record and an album that’s about to drop. Do this for your papi and for Mina. They wouldn’t want you to quit because they’re gone.”
My chest was hurting, and I felt like giving up, but he was right. I was almost there. I was in too deep to quit.
“I promise, you can have some alone time soon,” he said. “I’ll make sure of it.”
He allowed me to cry in his arms for a little while longer.
17
LUXURY
Time to Shine
When I woke up and realized we were late for Desire’s radio interview, I started cursing. I hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but as soon as we’d sat on the couch, we’d both dozed off. I grabbed my phone, and I had about a dozen missed calls from Egypt.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I groaned.
Desire woke up. “What’s wrong?” She stretched and yawned.
“We’re late, baby. We gotta get showered and dres
sed fast. We don’t have time for hair and makeup and all that shit. So you gonna have to improvise.”
She got off the couch and took a ten-minute shower. I hopped in after her. She put on some ripped jeans, a black shirt, and some jewelry. I wore a long-sleeved white shirt, black jeans, and black Air Jordan 5 Retros. I grabbed my keys and jogged down the stairs to the garage. We got in my car and headed out. My phone was blowing up, and I kept sending the callers to voicemail. As soon as we stepped into the radio station, Egypt began glaring at us.
“You’re almost an hour late,” she said.
Egypt was always on point, always and forever. We went back to childhood, project days. We went to the same elementary school, junior high, and high school. And she and her cousins, Nia and Lala, were still around. Egypt was cool with my mama. She wasn’t on some scandalous shit, and she was about her business. Shit, Egypt had even flushed my dope down the toilet when the cops were coming one time. I trusted her with my life. That was why she had the job. Nowadays her main job was to assist Desire. Desire had never said much to her, so I wasn’t sure if she liked Egypt, but it didn’t matter if she liked her or not. Egypt had a job to do, and that was to stay on top of Desire and handle all her bookings.
“Rough night?” Egypt asked, inspecting us from head to toe.
“Very rough night,” I said.
“Good thing they know how artists are never on time. Don’t make this a habit, though,” she said. “I’ll let them know you’re here. You can wait in the guest area. Follow me.”
Desire and I followed Egypt to the guest waiting area before she walked down the hallway.
“I have to go pee,” Desire said to me.
“All right,” I said. “I think I saw the bathrooms down the hall.”
“Okay,” she replied and excused herself.
After a few seconds, Egypt walked into the waiting area. “Where did she go?”
“To the bathroom. She’ll be right back.”
“Okay, cool. They said in about fifteen minutes, she’ll be on. You are more than welcome to sit in with her.”
“Oh, she wasn’t going in there without me,” I stated.
“You’re so protective of her,” Egypt said, looking at me strangely.
“I gotta be. Too many vultures in this business.”
“Mixing business with pleasure is dangerous,” Egypt warned.
“Not really,” I countered, staring her down. If she didn’t watch her mouth, she would be looking for a new job. I didn’t care how far we went back.
She cleared her throat and shut right on up. She knew me better than that. She had never seen me in love before, so this was all new.
I paid attention to the way she was looking at a nigga. Egypt wasn’t ugly at all, and I had told her she was cute once in high school. Plus, I could’ve fucked Egypt, but my excuse had been that I didn’t want to mix business with pleasure. She could now see that I could combine business with pleasure, and she didn’t like that too much.
“Some chick came up here right before you got here,” she said. “Asking and looking for you.” She handed me an envelope.
“What’s this?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. She said she wanted me to give this to you.”
I took the envelope from her and opened it. I pulled out two sheets of paper and read them in a hurry. The paragraph at the bottom of the first page said that there was a 99.9 percent probability that I was the father of a baby boy named Tyriq Letrell Monnahan Jr.
“Shit,” I said, folding the papers back.
I guessed Charity hadn’t lied when she said she was having my baby. She had given birth to a boy, and he was mine. I had mixed emotions about this. I was pissed, but I couldn’t show I was pissed. It had been irresponsible of me to have sex unprotected with a bitch I didn’t even like. Charity wasn’t a bad person; she just wasn’t what I had in mind when it came to someone I would have to spend the next eighteen years in contact with.
“Do they have something to drink here, like Henny or something?” I asked Egypt, feeling like I needed something to deal with this harsh news.
“Yeah, they have a few bottles of something. Let me get it for you.”
“Get a shot for Desire too,” I told her.
She frowned at first, then nodded and left the waiting area. How was I going to tell Desire this shit?
18
DESIRE
Unexpected Stranger
I used the bathroom, washed my hands, and took a few deep breaths to calm my nerves. When Luxury had told me Egypt would be my assistant, I hadn’t tripped, because that meant I could watch her sneaky ass. When we’d met up with her here at the station, I hadn’t been feeling her at all. I mean, I always side-eyed her whenever she was around Luxury, because she acted like she had a crush on him and couldn’t stand looking at me. I wasn’t stupid or blind. I didn’t have to ask him if they had fucked, because I could tell they never had. She was too thirsty for his attention all the time.
When I came out of the bathroom, I couldn’t believe who was coming down the hall toward me. His handsome face wasn’t paying attention to where he was going, because he was all into his phone. Finally, he looked up, and he smiled when he saw me.
“Are you stalking me, Nasim?” I asked.
He chuckled at the thought. “Nah, not at all. My boy works here. We about to go have a few beers in a little bit.”
“He’s a radio host?”
“Nah. He’s a DJ. You sure you ain’t the one stalking me?”
“Not at all . . . So, you mean to tell me that I see you at the bank, then at the soul-food joint, and now here, at the radio station? Does this sound like a coincidence to you?”
“That’s what it is. What you doing here?”
“I have an interview with Big Joe.”
“You . . . ? You’re the artist Desire?”
I nodded. “That’s me.”
“Damn, I didn’t know. I didn’t even put two and two together. Hey, I like your style. I bump yo’ shit.”
“That’s what’s up. I’m glad you didn’t know who I was at first. Well, I gotta get in here and do this interview.”
“A’ight. Hey, it’s mad cool to text me sometimes, you know. You got the number.”
Before I could respond, he went into the men’s bathroom. My nerves were even more all over the place now. I would be crazy not to admit I was attracted to Nasim, but I couldn’t go there. I pushed him out of my mind and walked back to the waiting area.
Luxury handed me a shot of Henny. “Here. This should calm your nerves.”
“I haven’t eaten anything yet. I don’t want to get sick.”
He pointed to the tray of croissants, muffins, and fruits. “Egypt got that for you.”
I tried not to roll my eyes as I forced myself to smile at Egypt. She smiled back at me. I went over to the table and picked up a croissant. I took a few bites before downing the shot. That was exactly what I needed, because my anxiety calmed all the way down.
“They’re ready for you, Miss Desire,” Egypt said.
I took a deep breath and followed her into the room. Luxury and I sat down.
“Welcome to the show,” Big Joe said.
“Thank you for having me,” I told him.
“We’re about to go live in a bit here. You nervous?” he said with a smile.
“A little,” I admitted, feeling my hands starting to shake.
“This your first interview?”
“Yeah, something like that.”
“Wow. I feel blessed to have you give me your first exclusive interview.”
“No problem. Anytime.”
“A’ight. How you doing, Luxury?”
“I’m good,” Luxury replied. “It’s been a while.”
“I know. I see the label is doing good for you. Got the Monnahan Boyz and now Desire. You’re on fire right now, bro.”
“Yes indeed. You know how I do it.”
“Indeed. A’ight, we’re abou
t to go live . . . in five, four, three, two, one . . . You’re listening to Big Joe in the morning. Sitting in with me this morning is the lovely and talented hot new rapper on the scene, Desire. Welcome to the show, Desire.”
“Thank you,” I said into the mic. “It’s a pleasure to be here.”
“So, tell me how you got started with rap. Was this something you always wanted to do?”
“Honestly, I was just messing around in the studio with the Monnahan Boyz, and they liked the way the track sounded. The rest is history.”
“Right, right. Well, your flow is hot. I know you hear that a lot, but you got bars.”
“Thank you.”
“Tell me about what it’s like working with the Monnahan Boyz. They’ve been on the scene in Miami for years, and now they are platinum-selling artists.”
“You know, they’re like my brothers. This whole experience has been, like, mind blowing.”
“I bet. You seem to be keeping your relationship on a good foot too,” he said.
“Yeah, me and Luxury, we good.”
“Luxury is in the building, sitting right here. I must say, y’all don’t seem too affected by the baby-mama drama that hit the Net.”
“Nah, it is what it is,” I responded. “That was before me, you know. Luxury keeps it real with me. We’re good.”
I kept answering Big Joe’s questions. Luxury spoke up from time to time, when he knew I was stuck. I felt myself sweating. I probably sounded like a hot mess.
After the interview was over, I felt so relieved. I hadn’t wanted to speak about Luxury’s baby mama or any rumors. It had seemed to me like Big Joe wanted to collect some dirt and be the first to get the exclusive story. The shit had bothered me.
“You need to sound more confident,” Luxury told me once we were back in the lobby with Egypt. “I get it that this was your first interview, but you gotta know they will ask some tricky-ass shit to get you caught up.”
I frowned. “Yeah, I see that. I don’t think it’s anybody’s business what goes on in our personal lives, though. I don’t get it.”
