Sixty-Nine

by Pynk

  “I’m already proud. And your mom’s proud too.”

  “Daddy. Seriously though, I think maybe I might want to marry again.”

  “You do?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?” he asked.

  “I get lonely. It’s been five years.”

  “I get lonely, too. But in honor of your mother, here I’ll be. Now what you do is up to you. You’re a grown woman. I can’t tell you what to do. All I can say is be true to your heart.”

  “My heart is the reason I haven’t moved on. It’s my head that tells me it’s time to be open to meeting someone new.”

  “Then that’s what you need to do. Just do the right thing.”

  “The right thing. Wow. That sentence sounds simple, but sometimes, Daddy, haven’t you ever done something you knew was wrong? Didn’t you ever give in to temptation? Just throw caution to the wind and be crazy. Wild. Take a risk.”

  “Not much. I pretty much had drama-free years with your mother. My life with her was spent living according to our vows, and my life after she passed has been spent according to my devotion to her memory. Now if something is telling you to move on, that’s your decision, just the same as whether or not you open a store. Your heart will keep you faithful. Listen to your heart. Not faithful to someone, but faithful to yourself. I’m being faithful to myself based on who I am. You be faithful to yourself based on who you are. All the rest is just part of the learning lesson of life.”

  “I hear you, Daddy.” She focused on the words of wisdom he’d spoken, and his handsome profile. “You really do look good.”

  “I feel good, darlin’.”

  “Now that makes me happy.”

  He picked up the remote and aimed it toward the TV, pressing off. He turned toward Darla. “So, you’re forty now, right?”

  “I am.” She turned toward him a bit more.

  “Then it just might be time to start living. You were a good wife. Aaron will always be with you in spirit. Only you know what he’d be okay with, but you’re the one who’s still here. Being here makes me happy. You do what makes you happy.”

  She smiled. “True. I understand.”

  “And when you’re ready to move in, just say so.”

  “Okay, Daddy.”

  “You look beautiful, Darla. Your mother had you when she was twenty-four. She died when you were sixteen. When she passed away, she was forty like you are now. Live.”

  Darla’s heart thumped. “Yes, Daddy. I will.”

  His eyes were in mourning. “Darla, do you ever wish heaven had a phone?” He stared at the wall, at a photo of him and his devoted wife.

  “Yes, Daddy. I surely do.” Darla looked at the photo, too. “I’d dial that number every single day.”

  He nodded and said, “Me, too.”

  After an entire afternoon of talking, heading to Home Depot for the new patio furniture he’d had his eyes on, a new gas grill he’d been wanting to buy, and then to lunch at one of his favorite places to eat, Applebee’s, Darla and her father arrived back at his home, and said their good-byes as she left.

  Darla kept an eye on her father, who watched her walk to her car. She got in and pulled out of the driveway, and kept looking back at him, watching him stand in the doorway, just as she did every time she left, never knowing if it would be the last time she’d ever see him. He’d promised to grill for her soon. She looked forward to that. Unlike some females’, her father had been there from day one, and she was thankful for that. He raised her with values and unconditional love. And he was all she really had.

  I love you, Daddy.

  Fifteen

  “Sexual Healing”

  Rebe

  INT.—REBE’S HOME—MIAMI BEACH—MORNING

  March 10, 2009

  After another night of hanging out at young Armani’s bachelor pad, the sexual athlete himself, getting smacked up, flipped, and rubbed down, bachelorette Rebe walked away at a snail’s pace under the new morning sun. She wore a royally sexed up look on her face, doing the morning after I got some walk of shame, stepping barefoot to her car with her teal blue high heels in her hands. Her head hurt and her stomach cramped. But she had a smile on her face.

  She drove home at ten in the morning, blue skies and zero traffic, listening to the most appropriate song on her radio, “Sexual Healing,” by Marvin Gaye.

  Releasing her mind was just what Rebe needed. She was finally able to feel what it was like to go beyond the thoughts her mother had put in her head, or to be more exact, forced into her head, since she was a child, always labeling Rebe a sinner who equated to a whore. Now it was all about Rebe’s own, grown woman sexy healing.

  Rebe looked ahead, not worrying about the past, just being whoever she wanted to be and doing whatever she wanted to do, without criticism, judgment, or repercussions. She was a stripper, soon she’d try out a swinger’s club for the first time in her life, and she was having regular fuck sessions with a man young enough to be her son.

  Still, she’d made a point of not having Armani over to her place, just because of his age.

  Her no’s were now yes’s, on her terms.

  And the new medicine she was on didn’t hurt either.

  When Rebe arrived home, the garage door trundled up and she pulled her car into the garage, parking next to Trinity’s Mustang. Every time she saw that car it still reminded her of Randall, but nonetheless, she hummed the Marvin Gaye tune, even after turning off the ignition, and walked into the house through the door that led from the garage to the kitchen.

  “Trinity,” she called as she entered.

  “I’m in here,” Trinity said from the family room.

  Rebe followed her daughter’s voice and the sound of the television, and then her eyes leapt. “What are you doing?”

  “What do you mean?” Trinity sat on the micro-suede sectional without looking up.

  “What is Chyna doing here?” Randall’s one-and-a-half-year-old daughter was sitting in Trinity’s lap, playing with a toy telephone.

  “What do you mean what’s she doing here? She’s your stepdaughter.” Trinity angled her eyes toward her mother, looking as though her own actions were routine. Her tone did have a sly bit of sarcasm.

  Rebe noticed, and her antenna went up even higher. “Oh no, she’s not.” She placed her keys in her purse and tossed it onto the sofa chair.

  “How can she be my stepsister and not your stepdaughter? Come on now Mommy, did you take your manic meds? Or maybe it’s those new ones your gynecologist prescribed for your low testosterone. And also, you’re on Avitan, right? Did you skip a pill? ”

  Rebe wondered if her ears were playing tricks. “Trinity. I’m gonna count to three.” She took a grip of her mind and waited for it to rewind, looking away and then back, as though it made a difference. But her flushed skin said it didn’t. “Trinity, maybe when you get your own place you can make these decisions, and talk like that to whoever is in your house, but this is my home, and as much as I don’t want to feel like this, I do. That is trifling Randall’s baby with the white girl he left me for. Actually, the truth is, he left us for.”

  Trinity giggled as she held her sister. “Mommy, please. He didn’t leave me. And that night you went looking for him and found him, if you hadn’t gone off and kicked him out, he’d probably still be here. It’s just that you went berserk.”

  Rebe’s blood pressure was rising. She could feel it. “You know what? I did not go berserk. I don’t know what he told you. And I’m telling you now, you’d better be glad this baby girl is here, because I don’t think I’ve gone upside your head in about six years, but today would be just the day. And it just might be if you keep flapping your lips out of disrespect to your mother. I’m not having that.” Rebe stood over them both.

  Chyna looked up at Rebe and so did Trinity. “Mommy. You…”

  Rebe took a half step closer. “Mommy, you, what? Say it, Trinity. What? Please say it. Because I’m about ready for you today.”


  Trinity ducked her head and shielded Chyna’s face with her hand. “Mommy, don’t hit me. I wouldn’t want to end up getting my head split open like your mother did to you. Are any of those bottles labeled chill pill?”

  Rebe bit her lip and balled up her fist. Her voice was big, and it was pissed off. “Bitch.” She took a deep breath, looked at Chyna’s on-edge expression, and spoke one tone lower. “Trinity. Put that child in the room and come back in here. I give you two minutes.” She stepped in the direction of the stairwell.

  “No.”

  Rebe’s jaw was tight. “I give you two minutes to come in my room. And if you don’t, I’m coming back down here and your ass is mine, Chyna or not.” Rebe’s head seeped smoke from her ears. Her mind was on fire. She stomped her heavy feet that carried her heavy heart upstairs into her bedroom, and slammed the door with a force reserved for a WWE wrestler.

  All that could be heard from downstairs was evil shouting. “Your own mother’s in jail for killing your brother. My Uncle Maestro, who I’ll never ever meet, other than in heaven. Don’t you think you should learn to curb your temper?”

  The three sentence-missiles hit as if seeking a double target. Rebe’s heart and her back.

  Rebe’s ears shook. Forehead was sweaty. Eyes blinked like a tornadic wind was in the room. Nostrils flared. Goose bumps formed on her skin, even on her fingers. She could feel the tattoo with her brother’s name on her shoulder bubbling up like it was boiling syrup. Her mind insisted that she sit on the end of the bed, where she found herself panting, forcing herself to breathe normally. Heart arrhythmia was in overdrive. The video in her head shifted from the fantasy of her beating the hell out of her daughter, and the reality of her mother beating the shit out of her. Rebe couldn’t turn it off, and found herself reeling with anxiousness. She leaned forward with her elbows to her knees, and shielded her face into the palms of her hands, and she cried as a voice asked, Where’s that hammer? Get it.

  Two seconds later she hopped up and yanked the door open, sprinting back into the family room with a red face and a deep frown, ready to put her daughter in her place. Ready to teach Trinity a lesson for having such a fast mouth.

  She entered an empty room. No Trinity. No Chyna. The TV was still on, but they were not there. “Trinity, where the fuck are you?”

  Nothing.

  “Trinity.” Her words reverberated in her head and it shook.

  Nothing.

  “Get the fuck in this room, now.” Her own ears popped. With tears still flowing, she ran through the house, looking in every room, and ended up heading out the front door. The garage door was open, but Trinity’s car was gone.

  Rebe screamed up toward the sky and felt a rumble in her stomach, suddenly running to the side section of the lawn where she vomited, repeatedly, and violently. She heaved and gagged and remained bent over and waited. Her breaths got shorter. More tears flowed from the forcefulness of her expulsion.

  She stayed in place with her mouth open, working hard to catch her breath, her nose running.

  While she wiped her lips with her hand, she said the same four words she’d said every single solitary day of her life. “Mother, I hate you.”

  Sixteen

  “Worst-Case Scenario”

  Magnolia

  INT.—MAGNOLIA’S HOME—MIAMI BEACH

  March 14, 2009

  Guilt was kicking Magnolia’s butterscotch ass.

  She’d tossed and turned for two weeks straight and just couldn’t bring herself to tell Rebe that she’d had a freaky night as sexual cheerleader with her ex-husband and his new wife.

  She wondered if maybe she was having such a hard time because she couldn’t believe it herself. Did it really happen, or was it just her imagination? Did she watch Randall eat pussy and get his dick sucked by his wife and screw her doggy style, the enemy, the other woman who’d stolen her best friend’s man? The man who said “I do” to Rebe, who stood beside her and Darla, Rebe’s maids of honor on Rebe’s wedding day years ago. Yet she’d seen the spectacular penis of the man who crushed Rebe’s heart by cheating on her.

  How could I let myself do that?

  Rebe’s my girl.

  She’s been to hell and back.

  Who the hell am I?

  Magnolia piddled around the house, straightening up and washing clothes, doing mindless things, which were about all her brain had room for. She fixed herself a lasagna dinner with a spinach salad, and then sat on the sofa in front of her television, trying to relax, fighting to chase away thoughts of her newfound online hoochie life, and her staying true to her promise to Rebe and her new lover to go to Erotic City soon.

  She flipped through home design channels, CNN news, the movie New Jack City, which was showing on BET, and a variety of reality shows. Her thoughts shifted to what was possibly awaiting TastyTangie online, on GFF. Part of her was curious. She leaned forward to brace herself to stand, and something pushed her back down when she remembered that Randall had known it was her. She shook her head at herself. I’m shutting all that crap down.

  Magnolia refocused on the television screen and switched back to the Wesley Snipes movie, just as Wesley asked, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

  She crossed her legs, swaddling herself with her leopard Snuggie, when her doorbell rang.

  Magnolia got up and went to the front window, peeking through the thick slats of her wooden living room blinds, but there was no sight of a car, or anyone at the door.

  She walked to the door and looked through the peephole. “Who is it?” Nothing.

  She headed back to the couch, and the doorbell rang again. Along with the voice, “Magnolia, it’s me. Neal.”

  Oh hell. With an angry forehead, she headed back to the door and spoke close to it. “What, Neal? And don’t just show up over here unannounced.”

  “I know. I know. I’m sorry. I just need to talk to you. I’ve been trying to reach you. I need to apologize. I didn’t want to approach you at work, and since you won’t take my calls, I decided this is the best thing, just come on by.”

  “Actually, no, it’s not. I just looked out and you weren’t there. What’s up with you?”

  “I knew if you saw me you’d pretend to not be home. I needed to make sure you were here. Please open the door. Please.”

  “Dammit.” She unbolted the door and jerked the knob, pulling the door toward her. “What?”

  “Mag. Can I come in?”

  She stepped aside, he stepped in wearing a sweat suit, she closed the door and turned her back to it, shifting her weight to one leg. His scent was his usual Old Spice bodywash.

  He stood in the dimly lit entryway and glanced into the family room.

  She said right away, “And no, you can’t. This is as far as you get.”

  “I was just making sure you were alone.” He looked straight at her. “Mag. Why are you on GFF?”

  “Oh Lord.”

  “Really. I want to know. Why?”

  “I’m not.”

  “You are.”

  She shifted her weight onto her other leg. “Dammit, Neal. Even if I was, that would be none of your business, now would it? Obviously you’re on it or you wouldn’t ask. And I don’t give a damn anyway.”

  “Yes, I’m on it. Keyonna and I are on it. And so are you. Same city. Same age. Same height. Same damn orange bra I bought you. Same titties. My titties. Same fucking red tattoo on your neck.” His words grew bigger. “Not to mention the fucking charm you had on. See the problem is, she and I are supposed to be on it. You, Mag, are not.”

  She snickered at him for using the word my anything. She knew he was already a member, but didn’t know he’d found her on there for sure until now. She tried to play it all off. “And what makes you think I’m not supposed to be on a freak site, Neal?”

  “You’re not like that.”

  “Oh, I’m the good girl, huh?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Well, actually, I have found that bad girls like Keyonna finis
h first. So I wanna try and see what that’s like. I’d say it’s way past time for me to be first. You chose Keyonna over me. Randall chose Kandi over Rebe. Maybe being wild in bed has its advantages.”

  “Mag, there’s nothing but trouble on GFF, I’m telling you now.”

  “So why do you pay for it then?” She found herself about to get caught. She rephrased her question. “I mean, you spend money to be on a site that you know is trouble?”

  “I’m part of a couple. The single women on there can get into trouble.”

  “So how many single women have you two gotten with? Did they look like they were afraid of trouble when you and your girl had threesomes with them? That’s what all this is about. I guess I’m trouble, too, then, since I’m a single member. But you’ve finally got what you wanted. You’ve got a freak in the sheets. Remember, you said I was class in the streets and class in the sheets. You said that’s not how it works. So, make it work. I now plan to make it work for me.”

  “See, I don’t understand. Didn’t what Keyonna said give you enough of an idea of how I’m still stuck on your ass? Can’t you see I’m not over you? If I was, I wouldn’t still have you in my head when I’m with her. And I wouldn’t be here now.”

  “You having some woman in your head when you have sex with someone else is no big deal for you. I know when I was with you, you always had someone else in your perverted mind. You think I didn’t notice? I wasn’t as clueless and square as you thought. You were somewhere else in your mind with me then, just like you are with her now.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re in my head, and in my heart.” He looked to the side and let out a large exhale. He aimed his sight back at her and took a step closer. “I want you back, Mag. I want you back in my life.”

  She looked away as she replied. “You only want me because you don’t have me. Once you got me back, then what? You’d do to me just what you’re doing to Keyonna, trying to get some new pussy, old pussy, some pussy other than what you had. Never satisfied. Face it. You’re not a one-woman man, Neal. And it’s okay.” She put her hand on the doorknob. “Now please, if you don’t mind, I’m going to get back to my evening. Alone.”