by Kiki Swinson
“Wow! It sure sounds like you’ve got a lot on your plate.” I couldn’t believe it. She deserved better.
“Honey, let’s just put it like this. Grandma Hattie got more drama than your mama,” she said with a smile. Better her than me.
“So, who’s staying here with you besides Carmen?”
“Carmen’s mama, Sandra, and her little sister, Rachael.”
“How long have they been living here?” I asked.
“For about six months now. But before they moved back in here, your uncle Reginald was sleeping on that sofa you’re sitting on for three years. I just put his butt out a couple of weeks ago because he kept bringing those nasty drug addict women in here all times of the night so he can sleep with them.”
“Oh, my God! That’s awful.”
“Child, you ain’t seen nothing. Be around here longer than a week and you gon’ see what Grandma Hattie be going through.”
“You need to get out of here and go on a vacation.”
“I sure do, but I can’t go nowhere and leave my house.”
“Why not?”
“Because I might not have a house when I come back. I would bet every penny I’ve got saved up in my pickle jar back there in my closet that if I left this house for more than two days, I’d probably come back and this place would be burned down to the ground. Or it would be empty from Sandra trying to sell everything out of here.”
“Why would she do that?”
“To support her drug habit. What else?”
“Are you serious?”
“Grandma don’t be doing no lying. That’s one thing you’re going to learn about her,” Carmen blurted out.
“What is Sandra’s drug of choice?”
“She’s on that heroin stuff. And that mess got her looking really bad, too. You should see her; she does not look like the daughter I once had. She looks like a total stranger to me, especially since her face is all sunk in and she done lost all that weight.”
“I am so sorry to hear that.”
“Honey, all we can do is pray for her because she ain’t gon’ stop running them streets until something powerful stops her in her tracks.”
I really didn’t know what else to say about that situation with Carmen’s mother. I mean, who was I to pass judgment? I was a recovering cokehead myself. Thankfully, I had not gotten as bad as my Aunt Sandra, but the fact that I’d used drugs still lingered in my mind. So I decided to leave that subject alone.
Right before I was about to extend a dinner invitation to Carmen and Grandma Hattie, I heard what sounded like the front door to the house bursting wide open and the doorknob tearing a hole into the wall it smashed into. The shit scared the hell out of me, and the very first thought that popped into my head was that my time of freedom was up and in the next few seconds I was going to be handcuffed and hauled downtown to Norfolk city jail until an extradition order was processed for me to be sent back to Florida. As I sat there and waited for my fate, my mind was telling me to stand to my feet and jump through the window behind me, but my feet wouldn’t move. I was completely numb. And the fact that my heart was about to leap through my chest made my situation feel even worse. I closed my eyes.
I heard my grandmother and Carmen jump to their feet. “What in the world . . . ?” my grandmother said, then her words faded out. Two seconds later, I heard loud thumping noises in the hallway, heading toward where we were sitting. There were at least two or three sets of running patterns going on at the same time. Then I heard a woman scream and a man’s voice saying, “Bitch, you gon’ die this time!”
I opened my eyes, and to my surprise, I witnessed my Aunt Sandra being tossed up against the wall near the entrance of the den area where we were, staring down the barrel of a .357 Magnum. Tears were pouring down her face while she pleaded for her life. I honestly couldn’t believe my fucking eyes. This young-looking street thug, who looked like he wasn’t more than twenty-one years old, seriously had some balls running up in here like this. I sat back in awe and watched the whole scene as it unfolded.
“What in the world is going on?” my grandmother cried out.
“This bitch gave me some fake money for my dope! And this is the second time she done did this shit, too!” he roared, still pointing the pistol at Sandra’s temple.
Grandma Hattie snapped out, “How much does she owe you?” while she dug inside the secret compartment of her bra.
“Forty dollars,” he said.
“Please don’t kill her. I’ll give you the money,” she pleaded, and then pulled out several five-dollar and ten-dollar bills. After she counted it to make sure it was the correct amount, she handed it to the guy.
He took the money and counted it to make sure it was all there, then mashed Sandra in her face really hard, sending her straight to the floor. “Next time ain’t nobody gon’ be able to save you,” he warned her, and then he exited the house.
I stood there in complete fear, not knowing what to say or what in the hell to do. I did know that this was too much fucking drama for me and that I needed to get out of there and go back to my hotel. I was starting to think that coming to Virginia was the wrong thing to do. I mean, I thought the niggas back in Miami were crazy. But now I saw these motherfuckers here weren’t playing with a full deck. Here they had the balls to run up in your house with a gun in their hand and threaten to kill your loved one behind forty dollars. I didn’t know what that guy was going through before Aunt Sandra tried to play him, but whatever it was, it was serious. In all my years, I had never seen anything like this—and I used to live in New York. Maybe since we were in a recession, people were becoming more and more hard up. I just hoped for Sandra’s sake that she didn’t try that shit again, because homeboy already told her that if she did, she was going to be a goner.
After what I had just experienced, I really wanted to get out of there. I jumped to my feet to leave, but I got sidetracked when Carmen’s little sister, Rachael, walked in the house. As soon as she turned the corner and entered the den, she looked at me and smiled. She was unbelievably beautiful. She looked just like Raven-Symoné from the hit television show That’s So Raven, but she was not as chunky. She looked like she was at least five foot eight, which meant she was one inch taller than I was. She wore her hair long, and from the two different textures, it didn’t take me long to figure out that she wore extensions. Her attire was pretty much that of a young hip-hop video chick. It was evident that she was up on the latest fashion because she was sporting an entire ensemble by Ralph Lauren.
“What the hell just happened? And why is Mama lying on the floor looking stupid?” Rachael asked.
“Your mama tried to beat one of Maceo’s boys for some drugs,” Carmen explained.
Rachael looked back at her mother and said, “You ain’t tired of getting beat up?”
Aunt Sandra didn’t respond. She continued to lie there on the floor, acting as if she was in major pain.
“Leave her alone, Rachael, and come on over here and meet your long-lost cousin, Yoshi,” Grandma Hattie said.
Rachael turned back in my direction and smiled. She took two steps toward me with her arms extended. We embraced one another.
“You are so pretty,” I said.
“You are too,” she replied.
“Thank you, sweetie!”
“You’re welcome.”
“Hey, listen, I would love to chat with you and Carmen, pick your brain about how life is treating you, but I’m gonna have to run.”
“Okay, we can talk later.”
“Sounds good,” I told her, and then I turned toward Grandma Hattie. I kissed her on the cheek. “I am glad to see you, too,” I told her, pulling back from her so I could leave.
She apologized to me at least ten times. “Grandma, you don’t have to keep apologizing,” I insisted. “What just happened was completely beyond your control. So stop beating yourself up behind it.”
She hugged me. “I know this wasn’t the best homecoming, but we
are all glad to see you.”
“The feeling is mutual,” I said, and then I turned to leave.
Trying to Regroup
My grandmother walked Carmen and me to the front door, while Rachael followed behind. When we stepped out onto the porch, Grandma gave me another hug. I sensed that she didn’t want me to leave, but there was no way in hell I was going to sit in there another minute. My nerves would not have allowed it, so I kissed her once again and slid her a couple hundred dollars after she mentioned she didn’t have the money to get her front door fixed.
I didn’t say a word to my Aunt Sandra. I was too disgusted with her ass to even part my lips to curse her out. With all that damn drama, she just caused some serious damage to my grandmother’s home and damn near gave me a heart attack, so I looked the other way when I passed her. Carmen, on the other hand, looked at her and told her how stupid she looked lying on the floor. She even nudged her with her foot and told her to get her dope fiend ass off the floor. Aunt Sandra just yelled out and told Carmen to leave her alone.
When I reached inside my handbag to get out the keys to the truck, Carmen poured a little guilt trip on me about the fact that I was running off so fast. She suggested that we at least needed to hang out and get a bite to eat or something so we could catch up a bit.
“What about Grandma?” I asked. “Wouldn’t she feel safer if someone was here with her until she got someone to come by and fix her front door?”
“Grandma is all right. This ain’t the first time her front door got knocked off the hinges.”
“You have got to be kidding me!” I commented, shocked by Carmen’s words.
“Nah, cousin, I’m dead serious. The police bust it down about a couple of months ago looking for Rachael’s boyfriend.”
“That’s a lie!” Rachael blurted out. “They were looking for Rodney’s friend Calvin.”
“Well, did they get him?”
“Nope,” Carmen interjected. “And Grandma was pissed, too. But what was even worse was the city refused to pay for the damages. So she ended up getting Uncle Reginald to come around here to fix it himself, which he finally did. Come to think about it, he’s probably on his way now.”
“Think we should wait and see if he comes? I mean, we can’t just leave her standing there with her front door dangling like that. What if somebody tries to go in there to rob her?”
Before Carmen got a chance to answer me, my grandmother walked to the edge of the front porch and smiled at us. “Why y’all standing there looking like y’all don’t know what to do?” she asked.
“I’m just wondering if you’re going to be all right with your door like that,” I answered.
“Oh, honey, don’t you worry about me. I’m gon’ call my son Reginald to come on over to fix it. He’s probably around the corner somewhere. It’ll be fixed shortly.”
“I told you she was fine,” Carmen insisted. “Uncle Reginald is right around the corner at the bootlegger’s house getting him a couple shots of whiskey. So, as soon as Grandma goes back in the house and picks up that phone to call him, he’s going to be right here.”
“Carmen’s right,” Rachael said.
“What are you going to do in the meantime?” I asked Grandma, ignoring what Carmen and Rachael had just said.
“I’m gonna run in the house and get my cordless phone and come back here on this porch.”
“Grandma Hattie, don’t you think it’s too chilly out here for you to be waiting around for Uncle Reginald? Your best bet is to wait inside before you mess around and catch a cold.”
“Sweetie, I’m gon’ be fine. Now you go ahead and get out of here before it gets too late.”
“I’m gonna hop in the truck with her and show her around town for about an hour,” Carmen said as she circled to the front passenger side.
“Well, you girls go on and have fun.”
“All right,” Carmen replied, and climbed into the passenger seat. I, on the other hand, was still uneasy about leaving my grandmother under the circumstances. But what else could I do? She was adamant about me leaving, assuring me that she would be all right since my uncle would be pulling up at any moment.
When Carmen and I both closed the doors behind us, Rachael asked, “Can you drop me off at my best friend’s house? It’s not far,” then hopped in the backseat. I turned the key in the ignition, said good-bye to Grandma, and sped off.
As we traveled down one of the many one-way streets in Huntersville, Carmen sat back in her seat and started pointing out all the drug dealers she knew. A few of them looked like pure shit. Low budget thugs wearing colorful embroidery with the name Coogi plastered all over their attire. The shit looked ridiculous to me, but Carmen thought they looked like big-time celebrities. “Yoshi, look over to your left. The guy with the black leather jacket and the black skully on his head. That’s Hard Boy. Chicks be going crazy over that nigga.”
“Why?” I asked with utter disgust.
“Because he drives a BMW and he’s got plenty of money. Not only that, look at him. He’s cute as hell and he’s big as a motherfucker! Chicks from around here love cats who are big and tall. That shit is a turn-on.”
I slowed down to get a better look at him. I tried desperately to see what it was she saw, but I couldn’t. He was not my type, though he was kind of handsome. That was as far as I would take it.
Moving along, we passed by a few more clowns wearing the colorful Coogi label. I guessed that was the going trend for these young guys. And what was so funny to me was that they thought they were clean, parading around on the block twirling their dope for some cash. I laughed to myself because it felt like I was watching a circus.
During the drive, I had a chance to break the ice with Rachael. She was a very impressionable young lady, so I attempted to get inside her head before she got out of my truck. “How is school coming along?” I asked.
“It’s okay. I’m in my last year and I can’t wait until it’s over.”
“How does it feel to be a senior?”
“It feels good.”
“So, what are your plans after graduation?”
“Well, I’m not sure,” she said, and then she paused. “I mean, I might attend TCC and take a couple of general courses until I make my mind up. And then again, I may end up joining the military.”
“That might be your best bet right now, since the economy is screwed up.”
“I keep telling her the same thing,” Carmen interjected.
“You better listen to your sister because she’s telling you some good stuff. It’s really hard out there and a lot of companies aren’t hiring right now. So, you are definitely going to need to come up with a good plan, and do it now.”
“I am,” she replied nonchalantly.
“Your boyfriend’s name is Rodney, huh?”
She smiled and said, “Yes.”
“How long have you guys been together?”
“It’ll be a year next month.”
“How old is he?”
“Nineteen.”
“Is he out of school?”
“Yep.”
“So he graduated?”
“No, he got kicked out like a month after we started going out.”
“What’s he doing now?”
“Out here on these streets selling drugs,” Carmen interjected.
“Carmen, you don’t know what Rodney does. He just be out there hanging out with his friends.”
“That’s a lie, Rachael, and you know it.”
“Don’t listen to her. She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”
“Oh, I know what I’m talking about. And the police do too. That’s why they always got him hemmed up against a building—so they can search him. They know he’s out here making plucks. They ain’t stupid!”
“Stop it, Carmen, and please mind your business. Yoshi was talking to me.”
“Look, baby sis, I’m just telling you some good shit because I am tired of you wasting your time with him. He i
s a high school dropout. He is a drug dealer and he’s disrespectful to you. You need to wake up and smell the coffee and realize that that boy ain’t no good for you.”
“Carmen, you know you ain’t never heard Rodney disrespect me, so why you gon’ say that?”
“Yes, I have.”
“Now why you gon’ tell that damn lie? You know you ain’t never heard that boy say something slick out of his mouth to me.”
“Cut it out, Rachael, because you know I did. Don’t let me put you out on front street!”
I spoke up. “All right, ladies, there’s no need for arguing.”
“I’m not arguing with her. I’m just trying to open up her damn eyes so she won’t end up like me.”
“Oh, that’ll never happen,” Rachael replied sarcastically.
“Never say never,” Carmen fired back.
“Yeah, whatever!” Rachael sighed, then took her focus off Carmen. “Can you drop me off at this next corner?”
I said, “Sure,” and pulled over to the curb. We were at the corner of A Avenue and Church Street.
Rachael got out of the truck and closed the door. “Thank you for giving me a lift.”
“No problem,” I told her. “So, when am I going to see you again?” I asked her.
“Well, I’m not going to be at my best friend’s house long. I just came over here to get a pair of shoes I lent her a few days ago and then I’m gonna go back to the house. So, I guess I’ll see y’all when y’all come back.”
