You're the One I Want

by Shane Allison

  “D, what do you mean you fell on hard times?”

  “I met some people at this party a producer was throwing. There was booze and drugs everywhere, mountains of coke, weed, booze, you name it. I was so fucked up that I couldn’t remember anything. I found out a week later that there was this sex tape.”

  “What the fuck?”

  “Yeah, I said the same thing when I saw the tape.”

  “And you don’t remember any of that going down?”

  “I swear on our daddy’s grave that I don’t. I had to pay a pretty penny to get all the copies of the tape and get the video pulled off of YouTube.”

  “Damn, D.”

  “So I came back home to get my life back on track.”

  “So are you clean now?”

  “Three months clean, knock on wood.”

  “I wish you would have called me. I could have helped you.”

  “What, clean up another one of my messes?”

  “D, we’re brothers. That’s what brothers do instead of running away.”

  Yvonne caught our attention when she whispered at us to come to the courtroom. “The judge is about to come in.”

  “Well, I’m glad you’re home.”

  “Right now, let’s keep this between me and you. I’m not ready for Ma to know what’s really going on.”

  “And she won’t.”

  Deanthony threw his arm around my neck as we walked like brothers toward the courtroom entrance.

  40

  BREE

  I was so tired and my back was screaming for some well-deserved relief after the beat down the lumpy mattress had given it, not to mention my upset stomach from the pig shit they were trying to pass off as food in the jail. I told that dyke cop that I had a sensitive stomach, that I couldn’t eat just anything.

  “What does this look like to you,” she’d said, “The Radisson? You eat what we give you, Princess, and if you don’t like it, you have two choices: starve and…starve.”

  I swear they stuck me with the biggest mega bitch ever. I only hoped I wouldn’t shit my jumpsuit from the moldy-ass bread I had to force myself to eat. If I wasn’t on the toilet shitting half the night, I was tossing and turning. I swore that if I got bedbugs in my coochie, I was going to sue the balls off the city, county, and state for every penny their asses was worth.

  Don’t even get me started on this bitch they put in the cell next to me who paces the floor saying, “She wouldn’t stop crying…she wouldn’t stop crying…she wouldn’t stop crying.”

  I asked Iron Titties what her problem was.

  “She drowned her five-month-old in scalding hot water because the baby wouldn’t stop crying. They say she’s crazy, but I think it’s an act. Between you and me, Princess, I hope they fry the baby-killing bitch.”

  The females in the jail would yell at her to shut the fuck up, but she would only get louder with all of her crazy talk. She paced until she got tired and finally fell off to sleep.

  I hadn’t been able to stop replaying the events of that night in my head. I had been having nightmares about Katiesha, finding her lying dead like that with her head split open, all that blood. “I should have stayed home that night,” I kept telling myself. “I never should have opened the door.” I didn’t like Katiesha, couldn’t stand her, but, damn, ole girl didn’t deserve to go out like that.

  It was a good thing Tangela didn’t show up that night or both of us would have been locked up. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t scared shitless about the outcome of this whole thing. I told everybody and their grandmama what had happened that night, including Kent, who hadn’t done much of nothing but jot shit down on his yellow pad. He’d told me the cops found my prints on the door and on the vodka bottle.

  “I don’t care what they found,” I’d told him. “I didn’t kill Katiesha.” He had asked me what my relationship was with her. “She and I danced at Risqué together, that’s it. It’s no secret that we didn’t like each other. You can ask anybody at the club.”

  “I did, and they said there was no love lost between you two girls, especially a Ms. Nakia Wilder, who didn’t mince words about Katiesha and Ms. Ursula Reynolds not liking you. If the prosecution gets ahold of her, and they will, she will be a witness for them. I understand that your brother-in-law was in the room when you attacked Katiesha Foster.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “The prosecution will be calling him to the stand, as well as the officers that arrived on the scene.”

  I hated how he sat there, looking at me over his glasses like I was something he needed to scrape off the bottom of his six-hundred-dollar wingtips. I set his uppity-ass straight quick.

  “I know you think I’m shit, but you can blow it out of your ass. No, I didn’t like Katiesha, and I tried to beat her ass down when I caught her in bed with Kashawn, but I didn’t kill her. I don’t know how many times and how many people I have to scream it to.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Bree, how I feel about you. Kashawn has been a friend of mine for many years, and he hired me to represent you. I’m going to do that to the best of my ability,” he said. “The evidence they have stacked against you is insurmountable, but first we need to try and get you bail.”

  “You have to get me the hell out of here. I can’t do time for something I didn’t do.” It felt like what I was telling Kent was going into one ear and out the other. I didn’t have much faith in this ambulance chaser.

  • • •

  “Rise and shine, Princess. It’s time for your arraignment.”

  Speak of the devil.

  I finger-combed my hair, considering I didn’t have any tools to groom myself proper. I got one shower a week, and the rest of the time, I had to go around smelling funky. I hated the idea of looking at somebody in their face with stink breath. Iron Titties cuffed my wrists and ankles and escorted me to the courtroom. Kent was sitting at a large oak table with papers strewn out on it. He didn’t bother to look up at me. He didn’t look too confident. He was dressed to the teeth in a black suit with pecan-brown wingtips. There weren’t many people in the courtroom. I thought it would look something like Law & Order or some shit, but no. I was so happy to see Kashawn behind Kent. And next to him were Mama Liz, Yvonne, and Deanthony, whom I was a little knocked on my ass to see. I was embarrassed for Kashawn to see how I looked. Instead of the beautiful woman he’d married, I looked like I had been dragged through a ditch of shit. My hair was a rat’s nest and orange was not my color.

  I didn’t care what Mama Liz and Yvonne thought of me. I was done licking their booties. Kashawn stood up when he saw me. Our eyes met. I hadn’t seen him since the night they’d brought me into the jail. I walked over to my husband, wrapped my arms around him, and hugged him as tight as any human being could. I glared at Deanthony over Kashawn’s shoulder, who cut me a soft smile.

  “Hey, baby girl, how are you holding up?” Tears welled up and poured, and Kashawn smeared every streak away with his thumb. “I love you.”

  “I love you more.” The strong scent of Irish Spring shower gel permeated from every part of his body. “I’m sorry, baby. I’m sorry for everything. Please forgive me.”

  “Already have, Bree, already have.”

  “Hey, baby. How are you holding up?” Mama Liz asked.

  “I’m just trying to keep my head clear. It’s not easy, though.”

  “We’re here for you,” Yvonne said, placing her hand warmly on my shoulder.

  “I’ve been a horrible wife to you. If I don’t get out of this—”

  “Don’t talk like that,” Kashawn interrupted.

  “In case things don’t come out in our favor, I want you to move on with your life. Forget about me. Your mama is right. I’m no good. I’ve never been any good.”

  “Baby, I owe you an apology for how I’ve treated you,” Mama said. “I admit that I didn’t give you a fair chance.”

  “Neither of us did,” Yvonne chimed in. “Instead of welcoming you with open arms, I ga
ve you a hard time and I’m sorry.”

  “I’m sorry, too,” said Mama. “We all have a past. Life is too short to allow ourselves to be knocked around by it. We know this is asking a lot, but can we start over, daughter-in-law?”

  “Can you give us another chance?” Yvonne asked.

  I took them both into my arms, letting them know that all was forgiven. “There’s nothing I love more than starting clean slates.” We all began to cry like it was a teary reunion.

  “Bree, we need to take our seats,” Kent said.

  Minutes later a black woman in a black robe, with her hair tied up in a bun, entered the courtroom. She looked to be about in her early thirties, give or take. This woman looked like money, from tip to tail. I was so nervous, I thought my heart was going to burst out of my chest like that thing from the movie Alien.

  “All rise,” the bailiff said, “for the honorable Shonticia Flowers.”

  Shonticia? Anyone with a name like that has to be from the hood. Everyone in the courtroom stood up like she was the Queen of Sheba. She didn’t look up once at me. She shuffled papers around on that big bench she sat behind. I figured it was my record she was looking at, shocked by the Christmas list of shit I’d done since I was fifteen. The prosecuting lawyer was a white lady with long, thick blond hair. This bitch looked like she didn’t have any mercy. I looked at ole girl and knew she was going to filet a bitch. The court clerk read off what I was accused of. It stung to hear my name being read off with murder attached to it. The sound of it made me shake in my ugly, white plastic flip-flops.

  “How does the defendant plead?” the judge asked. She still didn’t look at me, but kept her head down at whatever she was looking at.

  “Not guilty, Your Honor,” Kent said.

  Good answer, I thought.

  The prosecutor started going on about how I was a flight risk, when I’d never been on a plane in my life, telling Shonticia that I’d been in trouble since I was eighteen and whatnot. She did and said everything Kent told me she would say, about how I had previous run-ins with Katiesha.

  “Your Honor, Mrs. Parker is the wife of a prominent doctor in the community and is not a flight risk.”

  Kent and the other lawyer were arguing back and forth like two cats scraping for a rat. Shonticia beat her gavel until they shut up.

  “Bail is set at one million dollars.”

  “Thank you, Jesus,” I heard Mama Liz cry out.

  My heart bottomed out when I heard how much the bail was. I turned to Kashawn and hugged him.

  “I can post it. Bree, baby, you’re coming home.”

  “I love you,” I said.

  As Iron Titties walked me out of the courtroom, Kashawn, Deanthony, Mama Liz, and Yvonne hugged. I was happy as shit that I didn’t have to spend another night on that lumpy mattress, or be kept up all night with diarrhea and having to listen to baby-killing Claudine’s crazy ass. If I had to spend another second in that jail, I was going to pull out what was left of my hair extensions.

  41

  TANGELA

  “What the fuck!”

  I nearly choked on the mouth wad of barbecue chicken sandwich when I saw Katiesha’s and Bree’s faces splashed across my flat-screen HDTV. I grabbed the remote off the coffee table to turn it up. I was officially knocked on my ass when it was reported that Bree had been charged with Katiesha’s murder. It was obvious that if they had arrested Bree, then the cops didn’t find my prints on anything. Bree, murder? No-fucking-way. Home girl was capable of a lot of things, including fucking her husband’s brother, but killing somebody? I didn’t even want to think about what she must have been going through, hell, what my baby, Kashawn must have been going through. I needed to get down to the jail. I had to get my story straight first, though, in case the cops got a hankering to come sniffing around here to ask me questions. I was home all night and didn’t leave my house. I turned in early because I had an early day at the j-o-b. Yeah, that’s what’s up.

  Bree must have come by Katiesha’s crib after I’d left when she didn’t find Katiesha at Risqué. With Bree finally out of the picture, this shit could be a blessing in disguise. It opened up all kinds of opportunities for me and Kashawn. He must be devastated. He was going to need support, a shoulder to cry on. It’s funny sometimes how shit just falls into your lap. I went to my bedroom closet to find something sleek and fierce to wear. I took out this royal-blue pencil dress with a peek-a-boo keyhole in the middle that showed off the perfect bit of skin without it looking too hoochie. I pulled a black-and-white shoe box off the shelf above the rack of clothes and got out the pair of fuchsia, eight-inch pumps I’d been dying to break in. I was giving plus-size supermodel realness.

  A celebrity’s donkey booty didn’t hold a candle to these double-chocolate cakes. As an added bonus, I sprayed on a little Estee Lauder between my breasts before checking my hair and makeup in the mirror one last time.

  “Kashawn Parker, I’m about to show you what you’ve been missing.”

  I’d never had a problem getting a man. Finding a good man is where the problem comes in. Give these brothers out here a taste, next thing you know, they want to play house with a bitch. But I didn’t play that. I cut them off at the knees when they start tripping.

  I’d come a long way since my bookish, nerdy girl days in high school. Amazing what Proactiv and a little makeup will do. After graduation, I couldn’t wait to get that damn barbed wire cut off my teeth. Boys back in the day wouldn’t so much as fart in my direction. Now I had to beat them off with an ugly stick. There isn’t a man yet that has been able to resist my curves, not even Kashawn. I bet he still thinks of that night I sucked his dick, the night I went down on him when Bree was off in Atlanta, probably fucking every man that made a pass at her slutty ass.

  “Where the hell is my earring?” I was rummaging through the jewelry box Mama had given me last year on my twenty-fifth birthday. “Oh, shit. No, no, no, please, God no!” I dumped out the contents of the jewelry box on my dresser, checking every earring, necklace, and brooch. Shit, it must have fallen out of my ear at Katiesha’s house.

  Fuck, what if the cops found it? That shit would link me to knowing Katiesha. I couldn’t go back to that house now. Cops were probably swarming like flies around that place, fucking crime scene tape everywhere. If I went around the cops, asking questions, it could put suspicion on me. They would have tracked me down by now had they found something.

  Okay, girl. Keep it together. Calm down. There’s way too much heat right now with this whole mess with Bree and Katiesha. First thing’s first. Time to go play the concerned best friend.

  42

  TANGELA

  My mood soured when I pulled in front of Kashawn’s house to find Deanthony’s SUV parked outside behind Kashawn’s. Damn twins even drove the same car. It was all good, though. I wasn’t going to trip. I would get Deanthony’s punk ass together if he tried to come for me. I checked in the rearview mirror to see if I had any lipstick on my teeth and made sure my titties were nice and secure in my Michael Kors original. I got out and walked up to the front door. Just as I was about to ring the doorbell with my red, manicured finger, Deanthony answered. Needless to say, he was the last nigga I wanted to see.

  “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “This is my brother’s house. Unlike you, I don’t need an invitation.”

  “Tangela?” Kashawn asked.

  What the fuck!

  “Bree! Oh, my God.” I slipped past Deanthony and wrapped my arms around Bree, giving her a hard hug like I hadn’t seen her in months. Kashawn, Mama Liz, and Yvonne were all sitting in the living room. “Girl, what happened? I just saw you on the news. Are you all right?”

  “Oh, Lord, I’m on the news?”

  “Yeah, it’s all over the TV.”

  “Oh, God, there’s going to be news people all in front of the house.”

  Christmas has come early. I am living for this shit.

  “I doubt that.” Deanthony
grinned. “These people don’t give a damn ’bout no black stripper who lived in the hood being bodied.”

  “Baby, don’t worry about all that. I’ll protect you.” I thought I was going to throw up my chicken sandwich when I saw D wrap his arms lovingly around Bree.

  “All of us are just glad to have you home, baby,” Mama Liz said. The one woman next to me who couldn’t stand to breathe the same air as Bree, now, all of a sudden, was her biggest supporter? Bitch, please!

  “So, Tangela, where are you going all dressed up?” Yvonne asked.

  I turned to face her like she had just slashed me across the back with an ice pick.

  “Yeah. A little too early for the club, ain’t it?” Deanthony asked.

  Fuck was this, Twenty Questions? Why was everyone sweating me? These people don’t feed, fuck, or finance me. Where I go and what I do, was no one’s business but mine. I had no nerves left for Deanthony and would cut his ashy ass to the white meat in due time.

  I had to think of something quick, being that I couldn’t come right out and say, “Oh, I’m just here to seduce Kashawn.”

  “I was invited to a party that one of the girls from the salon was throwing. I was on my way over there until I had to hear about my best friend being arrested for this craziness. How come no one picked up the phone and called me?”

  “Sorry, Tangela,” Kashawn said in his sexy-ass voice. “So much has been going on, I forgot to call you.”

  Deanthony started flapping his gums again. “All of us have been busy with Bree being accused of murder.”

  “Deanthony, hush,” Mama Liz said, cutting his dumb-ass a grimace like he had just called her out of her name.

  “I tried to call you to let you know about what’s been up and about the arraignment, but I couldn’t get you,” Yvonne said.