Turned Out by His Hood Mentality 1

by Diamond D Johnson

  “Unc, she most definitely gotta be the baddest bitch in the world,” I let him know, followed by a laugh.

  My dad leaned in and gave me a pound for saying that. I chopped it up with them for another five minutes or so, and then I stood up.

  I eventually went over to Denim, just to see what her fuckin’ problem was. Just like Sidnesha, Denim had rich, chocolate skin. Both my baby mamas were collard green and cornbread fed. I mean, I ain’t want to discriminate, but I loved thicker women. I felt like thick women could take dick better. I had yet to see otherwise.

  Denim had on a black cotton dress, and I could see the smallness of her waist and the way her hips spread a little bit. Her baby blue toenails showed in the Gucci sandals that she was wearing, and her baby blue and white, long fingernails danced around that damn phone. She didn’t even see me looking at her ass.

  Denim had her hair in dreads. Nice, neat, long dreads that she had been growing since she was a little girl. Right now, she had them pulled up in a neat bun, and a Bantu scarf or whatever the fuck that shit is called was wrapped around them. I could tell since last night that she was in her feelings with a nigga. She barely said two words to me at my party. When that money hit her bank account yesterday morning, she sent me a quick thank you message, and that was pretty much it.

  Because I wasn’t about to be beefing with either of my baby mamas last night at my shit, I never even asked what was wrong with her. Now I wanted to see what the fuck was up because I wasn’t even aware that we had started beefing.

  I snatched the phone from her hands and set it on the kitchen counter.

  Her brown eyes danced over to me, and she rolled them while she kissed her teeth.

  “What the fuck is wrong with you, yo? A nigga comes in the room, and you don’t even speak. All in your fuckin’ phone,” I said, looking down at her.

  “Billion, I just fuckin’ saw you last night! What you want me to do? Jump on you? I’m not them hoes! I’ll take my phone back,” she said and tried to jump out of her seat and get it, but I pushed her back down.

  She sucked her teeth, and I could tell by the way she was bouncing her leg up and down that she was really pissed off about something. The more I pushed, the sooner she would just spit it out. All women did that shit. Push the fuck out of their ass, and I swear, they’ll bring some dumb ass shit up from August 5, 2007. Bitches were fuckin’ crazy, and Nesha and Denim were the fuckin’ leaders of the crazy bitch squad.

  “That’s what this is about? Hoes? You mad at some hoes, Denim?” I questioned, shocked that she was even spazzing like this because we weren’t even together. She was my baby mama!

  “No! I’m not mad. That’s the thing! Look, I ain’t doing this shit in front of your parents and your grandma. Lil Bill and Khari are in the house, and I’m not about to be arguing with you in front of them. Welcome back. Glad I was good enough for a quick fuck while you were in the penitentiary, but you didn’t even bother to look my way the second you touched down. Move! Just leave me alone!” she snapped, this time jumping down from the chair, grabbing her phone, and walking out of the kitchen.

  I ran my hand down my face, thinking about how this was only the third day, and the drama was already fuckin’ starting. A nigga didn’t even do shit.

  Standing in the kitchen was just me, my grandma, my mama, and Twinkle. Sidnesha had gone back into the den area a few minutes ago.

  “I know you don’t like for me to get in your business, Billionaire, but it’s my job to do that. Listen to me and listen to me very clear. If you’re not looking for a serious, committed relationship with either of your baby mamas, leave them the fuck alone and keep your dick in your pants! Make it strictly about the kids, and y’all shouldn’t have to be at each other’s throats all the damn time. I know you know how to have some damn self-control,” my mama snapped as she arranged the pans of seafood.

  My mama would give it to me raw and uncut any chance she got. I felt her, though; I swear I wasn’t about to be doubling back with my baby mamas because I wasn’t looking for those types of problems. I wanted a simple ass life.

  “Ma, I been doing good. I ain’t mess with Denim in damn near five months. I don’t know why she all of a sudden got an attitude with a nigga. I’m chillin’. Ion want no drama,” I said and took the seat that Denim had been sitting in.

  Yeah, I told Denim that I wanted more kids with her, but I said that damn near two years ago. It wasn’t even me who had stopped fuckin’ Denim. One day, she came down to the prison and told me that she didn’t want to do it anymore. That reason alone is why I felt like she was back to fuckin’ her baby daddy and why I was good off her for real. I won’t lie, I entertained the thought of possibly getting in a relationship with Denim when I was locked up, but that day she came down, talking funny, I lost trust in her. She never really gave me a solid reason. With me, the less you divulge, the less I trust your ass.

  “No drama is right up my girl Normani’s alley. You didn’t like her?” Twinkle asked, walking over to where I was standing.

  “If you’re referring to your girl from last night, nah, I ain’t like her, with her slick ass mouth. Stay out of people’s damn business. Where your nigga at, so he can shut all this shit down,” I told her, and she laughed.

  It was all fun and games with Twinkle, but I was right, she was always up in my damn business. She came off like an annoying little sister who was always saying, “Mama said, you gotta let me hang with y’all.” I loved the fuck out of her, although I felt like she was always trying to match me up with somebody, and in her words, find me a wife. I was good, though. I ain’t need nobody to find me shit. Besides, I was about to get so wrapped up in this real estate shit that it was going to be my ole lady.

  “You know my baby don’t like seafood. He said he had to make a run, but he’ll be here soon. For real, though, Billion. Why don’t you like Normani? She’ll be good for you. I feel like she’ll slow your ass down. She’s such a good girl. A doctor, smart as hell with her degrees, got her own house, cars, and she’s a bestselling author of Christian children’s books. You don’t think she was pretty? My girl is fineeeeee,” she bragged on her friend, as she should.

  I wasn’t even going to cap; shorty was all of that. I’d proudly roll around with her in my passenger seat and my windows rolled down, showing her off to everybody.

  “She ain’t my type,” I simply told her.

  “Why? Because she doesn’t have a fat ass?” she questioned, making me laugh.

  “Ultimately, when it comes down to me cuffing a woman and getting on some serious shit with her, I could give a fuck about the physical. A wife ain’t somebody who has a fat ass. In all honesty, that shit is just a bonus. You a woman, so you should already know that. Look at me, Twink. I’m a fuckin’ thug. Tattoos and shit, gold teeth, curse like a fuckin’ sailor, pants sagging down my ass, all which are things that would turn your uppity ass friend off. She don’t want no nigga like this. She’s going to want a doctor in a lab coat, just like her ass.

  “Look at your girl, yo. She’s green as fuck, and she’s a square. My hood mentality will turn her ass the fuck out! Five years from now, she ain’t going to blame me for putting babies in her too soon, making her gain weight or lose weight, blaming me because she smokes weed now, or because she be cursing now. She’s a good girl, and that’s exactly what’s going to happen. I’ll break her little ass, plus she ain’t going to be resenting me and blaming me for shit,” I said, with visions of fuckin’ her small ass.

  “She needs to be turned out, but whatever. I’ll leave it alone. Normani told me that you choked Daniel when he walked his drunk ass in the section and called her a bitch. I know you, Billion. You ain’t going out of your way to choke a nigga for calling a woman a bitch that don’t have shit to do with you. You like her. That’s why you snapped on her when she got slick with you. I know you, nigga, but just mark my words… you’re going to be the one carrying her babies,” she said and cracked up laughing at her ow
n joke.

  I flicked her off while I pulled out my phone to check my messages. I wasn’t paying Twinkle any attention. She was living in fuckin’ Lalaland if she thought that there was any future with me and her doctor ass friend.

  “My mama ’bout ta come out now?” my adorable niece, Dream, asked. She sat next to me, dancing in her seat while waiting for my big sister, Loyal, to come from the line of other women prisoners.

  I hated this shit, man. I’m not even referring to the drive to come down there and visit my sister because I could make that two and a half hour drive any time I wanted. That shit was nothing to me. Besides, the solitude left me with nothing but time and opportunities to think about life and how I needed to make certain tweaks to better my happiness. When I say that I hated this shit, I’m referring to the situation that my niece, Dream, was in. A five-year-old shouldn’t have to witness no shit like this, man. I felt like it wasn’t anything but history repeating itself.

  Loyal and I used to go to the prison as little girls to visit our mother. Just like Loyal, our mama had been into shit like credit card fraud, but my mama was also into boosting whatever she could and selling it at a lower price. Sadly, she fucked around with that white stuff too.

  It’s so crazy the innocence that a child has. I had caught my mama on plenty of occasions snorting coke, and for the longest, I thought the shit was candy. Back then, I used to love Fun Dip candy, and it was like a powder, so I just swore that’s what my mama was doing. It wasn’t until I entered adolescence, and I wasn’t as innocent anymore, that I pretty much found out that I had a junkie for a mother.

  You know what… I’m not even going to sit here and act like my mama was some crackhead, walking down 27th Ave, begging random people to suck their dick for five dollars, so she could purchase some drugs. She wasn’t like that at all. From the outside looking in, a stranger wouldn’t even know that my mama was doing drugs because she didn’t expose that part of her lifestyle to everyone else. Loyal and I knew, and the niggas that she would bring over to the house knew about it too.

  My mother was a beautiful woman. Our whole life, people would always tell her that she looked like the Miami rap star, Trina, which is true. She had that same Miami, southern accent like her, just like we did, she was fly like her, cussed like her, and ultimately, was beautiful just like her.

  As little girls, my mama kept Loyal and I fly. Back in the day, Loyal and I rocked all the designers, like Baby Phat, Enyce, Lot 29, just everything that was in style at the time. For Christmas, we would get shit like Gucci purses, Prada sunglasses, or whatever glamorous things our mother could get for us. All the nice shit we had, yet we still resided smack dead in the middle of the damn hood. Couldn’t buy a house while you were getting dirty money because the underwriters would want to know where that money came from. It’s like when you live in Miami, you do everything to make some money.

  My mama was a real-life hustler out here. I’ve witnessed her on plenty occasions come back to the house with a couple of her homegirls. They would sit right in the living room, pouring out all the clothes, shoes, and accessories that they had boosted. Five minutes later, people would be knocking on the door, ready to purchase whatever my mama and her friends were selling. Her boosting and the credit card fraud was basically how she kept the lights on and food on the table for us.

  My mama was like a daddy who kept going in and out of jail. Grand theft, possession of drugs, and her last and final charge was the credit card fraud shit. She ended up getting five years. Each time she got locked up, we would move in with our grandmother. Living with our grandmother was way different because my grandma worked nine to five as a nurse at a retirement home. She wasn’t out there doing illegal stuff to take care of us. Ultimately, that meant shopping for us at places like Goodwill, Walmart, or her favorite, which was garage sales. Me, I didn’t care, but my sister, Loyal, man, she hated the change.

  Loyal was high maintenance, just like our mother, with a strong desire for the finer things in life. The second she graduated from high school, she pretty much left home and moved in with her boyfriend, Chance. He was four years older than her, sold a little dope here and there, but he was into scamming. He pretty much taught my sister the game, but he obviously didn’t teach her the consequences, because if so, she would have been home.

  Funny how she was the one who got hit with a ten-year charge, yet that fuck nigga was still out. I hated him because I knew it was because of him that my sister, who was damn near my best friend, was in this shit in the first place. I didn’t want to put the whole blame on him because I felt like either way it went, Loyal was going to get wrapped up in a lifestyle like this because she reminded me too much of our mother. I just felt like as a real man, it was just certain shit that you’re supposed to keep your significant other away from.

  Yes, I know that Monterius pushes dope, but that’s pretty much all I knew. He didn’t bring that shit home with him, he didn’t try to make me into his down bitch by picking up a shipment for him, none of that. It’s called keeping me protected, and I felt like Chance didn’t do that with my sister. Even after all this, she was still so stupidly in love with his black ass. She made sure that Dream had a relationship with her father too. Like, right after we leave this visit, I was going to drop Dream off with her father, per Loyal’s request.

  I loved my mama and Loyal to death, but I was so different from them. Yeah, I had a desire to have nice things, but unlike them, I wanted to work hard for that shit and do it the legal way. I had to break the chain because if I didn’t, I was going to be in a prison cell just like my sister. If I ever went to prison, it would be for killing Monterius, but I’ll eventually get to that part of my story.

  Don’t get me wrong, I entertained the credit card fraud shit a few times, but for one, I was always too scared of getting caught, and two, Monterius would probably break my damn neck if he knew I was doing that. He had money, and he was always screaming that I didn’t need to work because he was going to take care of me.

  Yeah, I was a hustler’s girl, but I was older now, twenty-four to be exact, so I looked at it differently. I looked at the fact that my ass could catch a fuckin’ charge by fuckin’ around with this nigga. Not to mention Monterius could possibly end up six feet under or buried under the jail because he was still trapping. Those were all things that I was just now evaluating in my life. I was a Christian, but I didn’t go to church as often as I should. That didn’t mean I didn’t believe in the power of prayer, though.

  I prayed for my man daily. I could be zoning out in the middle of work, and I would just stop and start praying for him. Every time this nigga left in the middle of the night or he didn’t come home at night, I would be worried sick. When I complained and stressed my concern, he always told me that he was bringing this shit to an end, which is why he had been working so hard to tie up some loose ends. God, I hoped that he was telling the truth because I would simply just lose my mind if something happened to him.

  Going to the prison and having to see my sister, I swear that shit broke me each time. I would have to go down there and put up one hell of a front and be strong in front of Loyal and Dream, but deep down inside, I wanted to break down. My sister had ten years to serve, and she was only one year in. This shit was fuckin’ dragging, so it was driving me fuckin’ crazy. I was trying to be a good ass example for Dream, which is why I had gone and got my LPN license. I mean, I always had a little fascination with becoming a nurse, but it wasn’t a life goal.

  I ain’t want to be the girlfriend who stayed at home, sitting on her ass, while I waited for my nigga to bring home a bag. I needed to have my own shit, especially with the number of falling outs that I’ve had with Monterius. I could be suckin’ his dick one night and trying to cut it off the next. I felt like this nigga had fucked me up in the damn head to the point that I didn’t fully trust him like I used to. I swear that cheating shit will have even the prettiest, sanest bitch evaluating life.

  Before
I got with Monterius, I had a subtle little vibe about me. I was chill, I hardly got out of character, none of that. I had a few homegirls that I kicked it with, I would probably entertain a few niggas, and that was it. Yeah, I had little boyfriends in the past, but it was nothing serious. I was only twenty-four years old, so my dating history with men wasn’t that long.

  I didn’t get my first real boyfriend until I was sixteen. Truth was his name. The first nigga to break my heart too. I mean, I should have known, though. At the time, I was a junior in high school, and Truth was a senior. Fine ass nigga too. All the girls wanted him. He was on the basketball team, the best player in the county, and he knew that.

  When I was in high school, I used to be on the dance team, and he approached me one day after practice. He wasn’t even on no flirting shit; he really just wanted to know about tryouts for the next season. His female cousin would be entering high school the next year, and she wanted to try out for the team. From then, he would always find a way to have a conversation with me, asking me stuff that he could easily get the answer to from someone else. It was cute, though, because I could tell that this was actually new to him. He was probably used to other bitches just flocking to him, so he really didn’t know how to approach someone he really wanted.

  Eventually, phone numbers were exchanged, and he became someone I would talk to in the mornings before school, and at night before I went to sleep. I was sixteen, and a bitch was in love, okay! He had a car, so he would pick me up, and we would go on dates and stuff. Because he was a senior, when prom came around, he asked me to be his date, and of course, I went.