The sound seemed fake at first, like an echo or a cartoon sound effect, but the pain was real.
Everything moved in slow motion until I felt the burn of my flesh. Dropping to my knees, a scream stuck in my throat as I rolled around in pain on the floor, but my eyes were on the closet. I could get shot one hundred times but I couldn’t let anything happen to Lark.
“Now we can talk. You're in pain… right?” I couldn’t answer. All I could do was grab my wound. “Yeah, you're in pain you dirty bitch. Now talk.” He laughed, pulling me from the floor to my feet like a rag doll.
“Yeah bitch. I know you got somebody else up here with you. I saw you hoes come in, so tell me, where is she at?” Still in the closet waiting for your bum ass to move - is what I wanted to tell him.
“It's just me.” He didn’t believe that. Instead the gun came back up to my head.
“Now now...we both know that’s not true,” He laughed, “so make your choice. Door number 1 or Door number 2?” When a gun is to your head it's impossible to make a good choice.
“Look I’m sorry.”
“Fuck that sorry shit. What about me? What about what the fuck I need?” It was all too much. Too much blood on the floor. Too much pain and too much damn rain still pouring down.
“Please…I just need some help.” I choked, feeling my body start to shiver.
“What the fuck…” he said, his attention on the flat screen that was on the same news as the television downstairs. Like that one, the sound was on mute.
“What the fuck are they saying?” He asked searching around for the remote.
“Please let me go…”
“Shut up…shut the fuck up.” He said in my face “Shut the fuck up before I kill you now.” I did as he said, zipping my lips as he threw me down to the floor. Walking to the television he turned the sound up but it was all information I didn't want to hear.
“Hurricane Harvey is now beating down on the Houston area. Authorities are telling all to stay put in their homes. Being on the streets is deadly.” If only she knew that being inside was deadly for me too. I listened to the report, the sound of the constant rain battling with the pain I felt in my body. I would zone out for a moment, my eyes stuck in a puddle of blood then I would come back and still hear the rain.
“Fuck!” He screamed ripping back the curtains to reveal what the news was already talking about. One of the worst storms to hit the US and here we were stuck right in the middle of it.
“Just leave. You can still get out.” I tried begging him, as my shoulder pulsed with pain so bad that I wished he would kill me, but my sister, I had to stay alive for her. “Please. Just leave, you can take everything.” I told him with one eye on the closet. Lark still hadn’t moved, I needed her to be ready at any second to run the hell out of here.
“Of course I can bitch. I’m the one with the gun, how the fuck you gonna tell me what I can and cannot have?” He laughed but I saw her head peeking out. She was about to make her run for it. I had to at least give her a clear way.
Sitting up slowly I mustered up whatever strength I had left. I waited for the right time to rush this bastard as he turned his back to me to look out the window. Back and forth from him, to the TV, to my sister in the room and I thought about every bad choice I made.
I thought about how I could have done a million other things but bad choices are like a snowball, they just keep piling on each other. My bad decision started when I moved down here to Houston. I should have never come to this motherfucker and now I was going to die here.
Four Weeks Before The Storm
1
Ms. Fendi to you
Fendi
The best time to cry is in the shower. No one will know that your bloodshot eyes are from pain, instead they will assume it’s from the hot water. Trust me, I’ve been hurting in silence all my life and I have mastered silent agony since as long as I could remember. Crying in a room full of people silently and wiping away tears before anyone notices was my specialty.
It's painful, dark and dirty but it's the only way I can survive with this pain. In the shower I cried for everything that was going wrong and that was basically every part of my life.
But my bad luck didn't just happen, it started with my greatest loss. Losing my mother. Losing someone that close is like misplacing a piece of yourself that you don’t know how to get back. And crying into this scalding shower was like a therapy session.
It felt like an eternity of tears mixed with soap suds. I thought about my Mama, how I could tell her anything. How she was my best friend and when she left all of that was gone. Now that I needed guidance and somebody to talk to she wasn’t here and each year I needed her more and more. Hence more sessions of me crying alone or in the shower to let out the pain. There was no one for me to fight, there was no police that could arrest cancer. She was gone and I was left with no justice and no way to bring her back. And now at times when I’m my most confused I had nothing to rely on but the words she gave me.
“You’ll be lucky to have one true friend in your whole life.” She said, and it was true. Because now all I have is me, no one to talk to and I felt her words like she was right here with me. Even though she has been gone for the quickest ten years in history. It seemed like yesterday I was in the hospital sitting at her bedside and now I was in the shower crying after losing her ten years ago. Life is crazy like that, even long periods of time are short.
I washed, rinsed and cried until the cold water had started to spit out shards of ice.
“I’m just working late boo...I’ll be home soon.” I could now hear his lies through the bathroom door and over the sound of my shower. “Sweetheart, I told you that I’m not cheating. I’m just working.” Lies on top of lies. You see, that’s why I’m alone, because the man in the other room doesn’t belong to me.
“Fine...fuck it. I’ll leave work and come home now. Will that make you happy?” I was already wet, my hair damp, and my feelings exposed, of course the universe would make it fit that I had no one to keep to myself tonight.
“Yeah...Fine...bye.” I heard him say. Seconds later the door opened sending most of the steam out from my hot crying session.
“Hey boo I gotta go.” I wrapped the towel tight around me as he waved the steam away. As things cleared I saw why I fell in love with him. The uniform, deep navy blue, creased to perfection, had turned me on that first day and was still getting me wet almost a year later.
“Damn why you gotta have it hot as a sauna in here?” He asked. His thick beard getting small pellets of water beading up on his face. “You're gonna have my uniform looking all damp and shit.” He hated for his uniform to be messed up, but I hated to be lied to.
“I thought we were chilling tonight.”
“I know but I’m gonna go in and get some overtime.” I had to laugh at that. He must have thought I was stupid.
“Look just go. If your wife is calling just go ahead.”
“Ain’t nobody lying to you. I really need to go fill in and do this overtime.” I had heard this all before. He tried to pull me close but I pushed him away. Officer Nicholas Kelly wasn’t going to be able to coax me out of my mood tonight, I had heard too much and I was tired of playing this game.
“Fine then, shit. I’ll just go,” he said walking towards the door. “Where are my keys?” He never looked for anything. He just came here and dumped everything on me from his keys to his clothes, problems, dick, and ill feelings. I took in every piece of him and gave him back to her organized, dedicated, and happy, while I was left with nothing but promises and cash to keep me quiet.
“On top of the bills that I told you that need to be paid.” I’m a fool but I’m not a damn fool. I might love the shit out of his man from the top of his head to the bottom of his dick, but I was damn sure not going to do all this loving for free.
“Man...all you got is bills, bills, bills...what the fuck you be doing with your money?”
“What the fuck you be doi
ng with your time? Huh Nick?” There was nothing he could say to that. It would only bring up the fact that he wasn’t getting a divorce. That he was lying to me, it's what everyone who knew the truth about us was telling me. But of course I refused to believe it all this time, but the truth was setting in. I would forever be a side chick.
“Look, you know what I’m doing with my time. I’m working. I just gotta go take care of some business with the house. It doesn't have shit to do with her.” He told me.
“Well then, you should be cool to take care of these bills for me like you said you would.” I pressed the bills with the keys into his chest. It was a reason for me to make sure he had his bullet proof vest on. Just feeling the steel of the equipment that separated my love from death made me feel a little saner.
“Yeah whateva.” He said heading to the door without giving me a kiss. “I’m gone…” before he could leave someone knocked on the door. I sprang up like a cat, grabbing and pulling at him.
“Get back.” Pulling him towards the back door I shushed him as the knocks continued.
“What the fuck?” He said reaching for his gun, but I tried to shush him.
“I’m just...avoiding someone.” I knew my words made no sense but I couldn’t let him see who was knocking. That was my personal issue, not something to worry Nick about. “Just go out the back...okay...just go.” I pushed him towards the kitchen and to the back door as the knocks kept coming.
“Don’t be in here fucking up this place. You know it's in my name.” How could I forget when he threw that in my face every day? “I can’t have anything getting fucked up.” I wanted to curse him out as he said it but instead I stepped out into the back hallway closing the back door behind me. It wasn’t as fancy as the front, nothing but doors and trash bags hanging out at people’s doors waiting to be thrown into the dumpster.
“Is that all you care about?” I asked the man that I loved as he crept down the stairs, I had to give him a piece of my mind but he was too busy giving me his.
“And you better not have no niggas over here…” It was a threat like he was going to do something if I did.
“So you can have a wife but I have to be faithful?” He was putting the shackles on me and hadn’t given me a ring and that was unacceptable.
“Whatever, you heard what I said. I’ll call you later.” I don’t know what happened at this moment, a powerful voice came up in me like I had before the transition. My old voice, the one that wasn’t soft and dainty but hard and baritone came out of my mouth like a demon from the depths of hell.
“DON’T FUCKING THREATEN ME!” I know I looked crazy, a dainty woman with the voice of a man but when you backed me into a corner some shit always comes out.
He rushed up the stairs back towards me like he wanted to fight. I put up my hands up ready to meet whatever challenge he had for me.
But he came in love, wrapping his arms around me. “I’m not threatening you…I’m just...Look baby we're both just stressed and tripping.” I saw my nosy ass neighbor behind Nick’s back peeking out her door but she quickly shut it as Nick pulled me in tighter.
“I’m not trying to be your enemy or nothing. Shit, I would never threaten you.” He was the perfect gentleman, if only he wasn't married our life would be complete.
“I’m just saying. I’m grown. I know you're older but I know better.” My voice was back, the light and sensual voice of Fendi had returned.
“Baby I’m just tripping. Nervous...just this shit at work. You know this case I’m working on and the undercover.”
“Undercover?” Nick hadn’t told me about going undercover.
“See I didn’t want to tell you. I knew you would worry and...” I squeezed him like a python. I couldn’t imagine life without Nick, especially since he paid my rent and everything else I asked for. How would I survive without his money?
“Just be careful. Okay.”
“No doubt. I gotta go okay.” He gave me a kiss. “I’ll call you later so we can talk.” With a wink of his eye I watched him as he walked away, leaving down the steps, and from the small window I watched as he made it outside and disappeared around the corner of the apartment building. Ducking back inside the knocking was gone but creeping into the bedroom the red icon on my phone flashed alerting me of a voicemail.
“Yeah bitch...I’m gon’ kill you bitch. You fuck me then post all that shit all over social media. You fucking me...you think that’s cool? Your dick all out and shit.” Hearing his words made me laugh. It was the same every time. Men fuck with transgender women then get found out and grow balls. “After all that money I gave you. You sorry bitch, you do this? I’m gon’ kill yo ass bitch. You hear me? I know where you stay and I’m gonna fuck you up.” It was a threat amongst millions. Laughing I tossed the phone on the bed going back to the bathroom to finish up but not before I took a quick glimpse at the front door.
It was safe, locked with the few chains and the two deadbolts that I had secured on it. Back to my regularly scheduled program because none of these niggas were going to stop my show.
“I’m Fendi bitch...Ms. Fendi to you.” I said wiping off the mirror, I stole a look at myself. I was flawless, gone was the boy with bad acne, stubble beard, and cornrows.
Now in front of me was a goddess with long flowing hair, hazel brown eyes, a smooth rounded face, with the best pair of C cups that money could buy. The only thing that stayed was my dick, it was still here swangin below my navel ring and soon it would be gone. Then I wouldn’t have to get these dumbass calls, or fuck with these lowdown men. They were such a headache but boy did they pay well.
When I get my dick taken off this shit would be over for life. But just as soon as the thoughts of the future crossed my mind, someone started knocking at my door again.
I needed to get away, this shit wasn’t going to work forever, I needed a vacation, and maybe a permanent one. Tip-toeing into my bedroom I closed the door, taking my phone with me to the floor, I laid down and called my sister.
She was the only one I could talk to right now. If no one else could save me from these bitch ass men, my baby Lark would know what to do.
I needed a vacation, to get away and clear my head. Dialing her number I prayed that she answered, I needed some help and fast.
“Mama why can’t you be here to help?” I asked the universe, but as always I got no answer.
2
My Brother’s Keeper
Lark
“I got thirty minutes before I gotta get back to the studio.” He told me as he stripped down to his boxers.
“So you think you can make me cum in a half hour.” The shit was insulting but this was what you deal with when you're fucking a man that’s about his bread.
“I can make you cum twice in thirty minutes. How about that?” I bet he could. Just looking at him made me want to cream in my panties. I ran my hands across his chest as his pants dropped to the floor. His dick poking out of his boxers made me damn near drop to my knees instantly.
But I wanted more than thirty punk ass minutes, I wanted a true love making session with my man.
“I hate when you just put me on the schedule. I should be the entire day. Just a day filled with me.” I twirled around for him, letting my ass clap right in front of his dick.
“Baby you know I’m making hits. I gotta get back to the studio and make this money for us.” He said pulling me close, his dick poking between my legs. I wanted to argue my point, tell him that I should mean more and have a bigger priority in his life but right now wasn’t the time. I just wanted some dick for right now, the rest could wait.
“Good cause all I need is fifteen to ride your face so I can finish writing this hit.” He laughed but I was serious, I couldn’t write a song with my pussy throbbing from neglect. He hadn’t been over to see me for a tune-up in a while and I was way overdue to be serviced, but of course there was an interruption. His phone rang, a sharp screech that filled the room, then a bright light from the screen sent
dancing colors throughout the room.
“I thought I told you no phone.”
“Girl you crazy.” He went and looked at it. Her name popping up on the screen. Wifey with a heart behind it. In his phone my name was Larry, not boo, or bae but some nigga’s name so his wife wouldn’t know.
“Turn that off. What I tell you before?...No interruptions!” I had a strict rule, when he was with me he had to concentrate on only me. Not his wife, kids, or his clients, just me, but instead he laughed it off, stuffing his phone into his pants pocket then jumping into the bed and pulling his dick out.
“Look...somebody wants to talk to you.” He made his dick jump swinging around like a tree branch in the wind.
“Does she have a GPS on your dick or something?” He laughed it off and waved me over instead.
“Girl get on this dick and quit playing.”
But his phone kept singing and now mine joined his, filling our dark space with lights.
“I need to get this...give me a second.” He was gone in a flash, out of the room answering his call and I could hear his voice change. “Hey baby…” he only talked soft like that for her. He retreated into the bathroom so I couldn’t hear but it was already too late.
Lark you have to calm down. He’s not yours. Remember. I had to remind myself that this man didn’t belong to me. This is a business deal...remember. That was easier said than done, especially since I was now in love with this man. It started out as business, with me pestering Don for a chance to get in the studio when I worked at Club Passion. I would get off the pole, come to his booth and pester him all night about letting me get in the studio with him.
Your Husband My Trick Page 2
