by Mark Anthony
“Shayla, I love you!” my mom stressed to me.
“I love you too,” I said as I started crying and holding onto my mom even tighter.
Through my tears I sobbed, and not with anger or bitterness but with just pure, genuine curiosity I asked my mom, “Mommy, why did you leave me?”
There was a pause and I could feel my tears rolling down my face and onto my mom’s skin. Then I felt and heard my mom sniffle and I felt one of her tears drip on to me.
Through her tears she said, “Baby, Mommy didn’t leave you. There is no way I would have left you. There’s no way in the world, baby. Mommy got hurt in a car accident and that’s what took me away from you. You understand me, sweetie?”
I couldn’t respond because I had missed my mom so much. I was so moved by her presence, I just held her close to me.
“Sweetie, do you?” she asked again.
“Yeah, I understand,” I said through my snot and tears.
“Shayla, I did everything that I could to hold on and not leave you. Trust me, I did. And I tried everything to get out of that casket and just hold you when you were at my funeral in your cute little dress, but baby, I just couldn’t get to you,” my mom said as she wept.
I hated to see my mom cry and I had too much lost time to make up for. The last thing I wanted to do was waste it all on crying.
“It’s okay, Mommy, don’t cry,” I said, sounding as soft and as compassionate as I ever knew I could sound or be.
“Do you believe me?” my mom asked.
“Yes,” I replied.
My mom then stood up and she asked me to stand up so she could see me and see how big I’d gotten. What was funny was that as I looked at my mom I might as well have been looking in a mirror because I looked exactly like her.
My mom nodded and started smiling and told me how beautiful I was. Then she pulled me close to her and hugged me again.
“Baby, I don’t have that much time so let’s sit so I can tell you some things,” my mom said as she and I sat back down on my bed.
“First, Shayla, I wanna tell you that you gave me three beautiful grandbabies. They’re okay and they’re with me, two boys and a girl.”
I looked at my mom, kind of confused, and then I realized that she was talking about the three abortions that I had had. My mouth fell open and almost hit the floor.
“It’s okay, baby,” my mom said as she smiled and stroked my hair.
Then my mom looked at me and I could see her eyes starting to water up. Before long two tears ran down her face, one on each cheek. She held my hands and she said, “Shayla, I want you to know that the things that you were exposed to when you were exposed to them, those things are criminal, and those things made an imprint on your mind and soul. They are horrible and so damaging. Baby, I saw everything, I saw what Joyce did to you, I saw how your dad was, I saw everything baby. It hurt me to no end to not be able to be there to protect you from those things. Understand this, had I been there physically with you, you would not have been exposed to what you were exposed to and things would be different for you, Shayla.”
As my mom said those things it was like I couldn’t talk or anything. The only thing I could do was just hyperventilate from embarrassment and anxiety and shock all wrapped up in one. The last person that I wanted knowing about my past was my mom, but at the same time she was the person that I wanted to see the most because of my past.
“It’s okay, baby, you don’t have to be anxious about anything. I love you. I don’t have the time right now to explain to you why you have gone through all that you have gone through, but believe me there is gonna come a day when God will make it all clear to you. Before I go, I want you to know that God loves you, your kids love you, and I love you. And baby, you are not a whore! I don’t care what anybody tells you, you are beautiful! You hear me?”
“Yes,” I said to my mom as I nodded my head and looked at her.
“Shayla, I’m so proud of you and proud that you finished high school and I want you to know something.”
“What, Mommy?”
“I want you to go to college and become a doctor,” my mom said as she smiled at me.
“Mommy, a doctor?”
“Yes.”
My mom paused after she said that and then she told me that she was just being selfish. Me becoming a doctor had always been her dream for me. She wanted me to at least promise her that I would go to college but that I could pursue and become whatever it was that I wanted to become.
“Listen, Shayla, you’re gonna get a lot of money from my insurance policy when you turn eighteen and then you’re gonna get more money when you turn twenty-one. Please just promise me and make sure that you’ll use that money for your education okay?”
“Okay,” I told my mom.
My mom and I then just looked at each other and she told me that she was gonna have to go. I begged her to stay and I held onto her as tight as I could.
“It’s gonna be all right, sweetie. You’ll be fine.”
I didn’t say anything. I just held onto my mom.
“Shayla, it’s gonna be okay, but this is what I want you to promise me as well. I want you to promise me that you’ll stop doing what you’ve been doing with these men. I’m not judging you for it but you’re more than that, Shayla. You’re beautiful and you’re talented and you’re gonna be hugely successful. Please stop doing what you’re doing. Put away that money that you’re gonna get. Don’t waste it. Pay for your education with it and save the rest.”
I sniffled and I told my mom that she had my word that I would listen to her.
“You’re gonna have some more major hurdles come your way, Shayla. In fact, very major hurdles. But no matter what, you make sure that you don’t let your past, don’t let people, and don’t let the negativity that you endure be the things that define you. Let God define you. God loves you and He designed you just as you are for a reason and He thinks you’re beautiful. Baby if you don’t remember anything else, just remember that you can and you will overcome anything that comes your way but you’re gonna have to first forgive and let go. Okay, Shay-shay? You may not understand all of this now but you will as you get older.”
“Okay,” I said to my mom.
Then she kissed me on my forehead and just like that she was gone.
I popped up out of my bed and my heart was pounding.
“Mommy!” I yelled.
I ran frantically out of my room and downstairs yelling for my mom and searching all over the house for her, but I couldn’t find her.
I then ran back up into my room and I looked under the bed, out the window, in the closet, everywhere, but I couldn’t find my mom.
I was nervous and kind of scared because it was the middle of the night and I didn’t know if I had just been dreaming or what. I knew that there was no way that could have been a dream because it was just way too real.
The light was on in my room and I knew that I had not turned it on. Then I smelled my hands and I smelled my nightgown and I smelled the scent of perfume on them both, That same smell of perfume permeated throughout my bedroom and yet I knew that I took a shower before going to bed and hadn’t put on any perfume at all.
I wanted to pick up the phone and call my dad but I didn’t want him to just brush me off and tell me to go back to sleep.
Then I went into my closet and cleared away some neatly folded clothes that were sitting on top of a black trunk with chrome finishings. I opened up the trunk which contained a bunch of my mother’s things from when she was alive. The trunk held pictures and it held some of her clothes and jewelry. It held her wedding gown and newspaper clippings of the car accident that she had been involved in.
As I searched in the box I got the confirmation that I needed. That indeed had been my mom who had visited me. Not only did I find in the trunk the exact outfit that my mom had been wearing but I also found a bottle of perfume. I opened it and sprayed it into the air. Sure enough, it was the exact same fragrance
that was on my hand and on my clothes. What was more weird was that trunk that held my mother’s things had literally not been opened for about ten years, if not more.
My nervousness started to dissipate because at that point I knew for sure that it had in fact been my mom’s spirit that had come to pay me a visit. I smiled a huge Kool-Aid smile and then tears began to run down my cheeks. The only thing that I could do was get on my knees and thank God.
Yeah, I hadn’t spoken to God since around the time that my mom had died. Back then when I did speak to Him I would always ask Him, since He could do anything, could He just please bring my mom back to me. When my mom never appeared back in my life I sort of gave up on God. I never found much of a reason to believe in Him considering that He couldn’t do such a small thing for me like bring my mother back.
As it turned out, God had heard those numerous prayers of mines from way back in the days and not only had He heard those prayers but on that July night of 1991 He had finally saw fit to answer them.
“Thank you, God,” I said as I sat on my bed and relished what I had just experienced.
I was way too hyped and excited to go back to sleep, so I just sat there thinking back on a bunch of things that I had been through in my life.
My mom was right. I was beautiful.
My mom was also right that it was time for me to make some changes in my life. I decided right then and there that I was gonna become a different Shayla Coleman, a Shayla Coleman that my mom would continue to be proud of.
Chapter Fourteen
The Chant
One of the hardest things for me to do was to go cold turkey when it came to stopping my promiscuous activities and stopping my indulgence into porn. Following my mother’s visit, I had mustered up the strength to throw away all of my sex clients’ phone numbers. I had also changed my phone number so that they wouldn’t be able to call me. As for my porno collection, I destroyed all of my porno tapes and all of my magazines. I even threw away my vibrators and sex toys, which was something that I hadn’t been without since I was nine years old. Those were just some of the steps that I felt that I needed to take if I was gonna be serious about shifting my lifestyle.
One of the big things that I would have to deal with by going cold turkey was knowing that my money would stop flowing the way I was used to it flowing. I loved buying new clothes and shoes and to say I had a serious shopping habit—well, that was an understatement. As with any habit or addiction it usually has to be financed somehow. With me having decided to shut down my call-girl service I had to figure out a new way to make some money and stay independent.
Really, though, I knew that I would only have to find a way to support my lifestyle for the next two to three months or so. That was because in about a month and a half I was gonna be turning eighteen. I would be receiving the first of two payments of 250,000 dollars which was due me from my mother’s insurance policy. I really wasn’t stressing it too much because I knew that I would be good real soon.
My friend Tara had been trying for years to get me to strip with her, but stripping was never something that really appealed to me. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I had a lot of friends who were strippers and I liked the atmosphere in the strip clubs, but for some strange reason, I never saw stripping as being my cup of tea. Besides, with my decision to change for my mother’s sake, I knew that stripping wasn’t an option for me.
However, since I liked the atmosphere of the strip clubs and I knew how to fix drinks, I had Tara put in a good word for me to become a bartender at this strip club in Harlem that she danced at called Pink Chocolate.
With Tara’s recommendation I was hired immediately. Despite my age—which I’d used a fake ID to lie about—in late July 1991 I started working as a bartender at Pink Chocolate on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights. From my first day I loved my job, which by the way had been my first ever real job. The money that I made from tips was one of the main reasons that I liked my job so much.
I made good money from tips for two reasons. The first was because I knew how to talk and bullshit and flirt with all of the horny male customers that would be up in the spot. The second reason was because I made sure that I was always dressed in something provocative that showed a whole bunch of cleavage and was form-fitting.
My flirting, though, was bound to get me in trouble, and about a little more than a month into my job at Pink Chocolate, my mouth as well as my ass had gotten me into a situation where I’d bit off a whole lot more than I could chew.
In most strip clubs there are many dancers who are more than willing to fuck some of the customers that come on to them so long as the price is right. They go about it in a way that is discreet enough to not get them bagged for prostitution. When alcohol is flowing and chicks are walking around and dancing half-ass naked and in some cases butt-ass naked, you better believe that there is a whole lot of sexual propositioning going on. As a sexy bartender I wasn’t immune to being propositioned, as was the case on the first Saturday night in September 1991.
“Yo, you know you a fantasy for most of these niggas up in here, right?” a cute dark skin customer said to me as I handed him his drink. He looked pretty familiar but with so many different people passing through that strip club it was hard to remember every name and every face.
“That’s not true,” I said as I smiled and asked the other people at the bar if they needed anything.
“What? You bugging! You know how many cats would love to leave here witchu right now?” the guy said over the loud music.
I looked at the guy and smiled again as I took an order from a different customer for a bottle of Moët.
After I was done taking the order I sipped on my own drink. I was already feeling nice from having smoked some weed about fifteen minutes prior.
I could feel the dark-skinned guy still looking at me so I looked in his direction. I noticed that an older gentleman was with him and the older guy was whispering something into the cute dark-skinned guy’s ear.
“Y’all better not be talking about me,” I playfully said to the dark-skinned guy as he sat at the bar.
Liquor and weed always made me horny and at that moment I was starting to get turned on by the way the guy kept licking his lips as he sat at the bar. He wasn’t trying to do it in a sensual way or anything like that but it still was a turn-on tome.
“And what if we was talking about you?” the guy said as the other guy who had been whispering something into his ear walked off to a different part of the club.
I looked at the guy but I didn’t say anything. I could tell that he wanted me. It was the vibes that he was giving off. I didn’t respond to what he had said. Instead, I just listened to hear what he would say next.
“I wanna tell you something,” the guy said as he motioned for me to come closer to him so he wouldn’t have to holler over the loud music.
“What’s up, honey?” I said to him as I leaned in toward him with my boobs practically falling out of my top.
“Me and my man wanna leave with you tonight,” the guy whispered into my ear.
I stepped back away from the guy. I didn’t smile or say anything. I just remained neutral and sipped on my drink.
The guy looked at me but I was interrupted by someone that wanted to buy a drink.
“I’ll be right back,” I said to the guy as I whisked away in my high heels and tight jeans and prepared the drink for the other customer.
When I was done I returned back to the guy. Before I said anything I could hear my mother’s voice telling me to just leave that guy alone. Naturally, I thought about the promise that I had made to leave my promiscuous lifestyle. When that lifestyle came so natural to me and when I had combined the weed and the liquor and the strip-club atmosphere I knew that after only a month or so of being clean I was getting ready to relapse. I could just feel it coming.
“So what’s up?” the guy asked me.
I sipped on my drink again and my heart started to pump with nervous anx
iety. Out of nowhere I whispered into the guy’s ear while the loud music thumped and girls shook their asses in the background, “If you got three hundred for two bottles of Moet then we can make this happen.”
The guy looked at me as I stepped away from him. He nodded his head at me to indicate that he had picked up on my double talk.
I walked away from him to go serve other customers and I could have kicked myself for what I had just allowed myself to say.
Shayla, now you acting like a straight ho! Don’t take no money from that nigga, I screamed at myself while walking to the other end of the bar.
Yeah, I’m bugging for real. A’ight just leave that nigga down at that end of the bar and forget about it.
That’s what I told myself as I worked the other end of the bar. I had no plans of going back and kicking it with the dark-skinned guy but before I could blink he had made his way down to the other end of the bar and was up in my face again.
“Yo, let me get them two bottles,” he shouted out to me as he handed me three crisp one-hundred dollar bills.
I looked around to see if any eyes were on me. At that point I knew that I couldn’t front on him so I took his money and told him to just chill for a minute.
“So you got us, right?” he asked me.
I nodded my head but verbally I didn’t say anything.
It was already a little after three in the morning and the club closed at four.
“You in here ’till it closes or what?”
“Yeah, when it closes I’ma get up outta here,” I replied.
“Meet me by the VIP dance area when the music goes off,” the guy instructed me.
I nodded my head as I wondered to myself just what the hell I’d gotten myself into.
Shayla, give that nigga his money back and forget about that shit! the angel on my right shoulder said to me.
Just give them niggas some head real quick and keep the money. It’s nothing, the devil on my left shoulder said to me.
