The Fight Within

by Laveen, Tiana

  And he was loving the new him, hard. The old Sean had been TKO’ed. How happy he felt to have been his very own opponent…and he’d lost the battle, but won the war…

  ‡

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  “That tuna fucking stinks,” Brian mumbled as he sprawled across his father’s expensive, peanut butter colored leather couch.

  “Boy, I told you to not use that language.” Sitting across him in the family room, his father pointed a long finger in his direction.

  Family room. Why the fuck did his father even have such an area in his palace fit for a selfish king? They were no family, they weren’t even acquaintances.

  “Your mother is letting you do anything and everything, and then you get over here and think it’s going to go the exact same way. Unlike Treasure, Brian, I have rules you have to follow.”

  “Man,” the word rolled lazily off his tongue, “what rules? To be ignored by you all night while you work? And you don’t know what Mama is and isn’t doing so you need to be quiet.” Before he knew it, the fucker was upon him, his fist jammed in his chest and his teeth in full view when his lips butterflied open, showcasing freshly born anger.

  “Brian! I’m only telling you one more goddamn time—watch what you say to me!” He loosened his grip and shoved him back, then retook his seat. They sat in silence for a minute or two.

  “I’m going home.” Rising to his feet, he looked for his jacket. Who knew where his dad’s sleazy bitch of a girlfriend had placed it?

  “You’re going home? Like hell you are! You’ve been begging me to come over.”

  “I haven’t begged you for anything in weeks! You told me to come over, said it was your weekend. I don’t give a shit what you do or say to me, I’m going home, and I’m going now!” He dug into his pocket, pulling out some cash, making sure he had enough to get a cab versus going the subway route.

  Enraged, his father shot back on his feet, getting in his face, threatening, screaming and yelling. He couldn’t hear what the man said, only made out his expression, felt his hot breath on his cheek, and the faint odor of alcohol coating each word that rolled out of his mouth. With all the strength he could muster, he pushed the bastard off of him, causing the man to fall to the ground.

  Startled, they stared at one another, both seemingly in shock.

  “What’s going on in here?” The girlfriend waltzed in, wearing an oven mitt, her hair pumped up high as the fucking ceiling.

  “Mind your fucking business, THOT!”

  His father got to his feet and pointed in his face. “You got your wish! You get yo’ ass out my goddamn house!” he screamed, pointing to the front door that seemed a million miles away.

  “What’s a THOT?” the woman asked, as ditzy as she was.

  “It means, ‘that ho over there.’” Brian chuckled, amused with himself.

  The woman’s brows dipped and she crossed her arms, thumping her foot like a damn rabbit. “Jackson, are you going to let this thug talk to me that way?!”

  “Oh.” Brian placed his hand on his chest. “I’m a thug now, huh? Black men are thugs when we aren’t falling all over your ass, right? Damn Becky…”

  “My name is not Becky.”

  “You stupid as hell, you know that?” He snickered.

  “Jennifer, don’t speak to him anymore,” his father said woefully. “Please go back into the kitchen.”

  She hesitated for a second or two, then disappeared, murmuring hateful words under her breath.

  “Brian, never in my life have I met such a disrespectful punk such as you. Worst of all,” he paused to collect a piece of lint off his sweater, then cast it to the ground, “it’s my own damn son. No wonder you’re getting into fights in school. You have a horrible, entitled attitude!”

  “No wonder I’m getting in fights in school? You don’t have nothing to do with nothing, do you, Dad?” He chuckled mirthlessly. “It couldn’t be, hell, I don’t know,” he feigned amnesia as he looked around in a faux confused fashion, “that my father abandoned his damn family. It couldn’t be all the bullshit I’m dealing with due to racist remarks aimed at me at school, and the teachers don’t do shit about it! It couldn’t be that you come to nothing of mine, call rarely, and show no interest whatsoever in my or Asia’s life! My father could have nothing to do with why I’m the way I am, right?! Oh, silly me for thinkin’ you might have a role in this!”

  The man looked at him in complete awe, as if the information presented to him was a completely novel idea, something brand new to discover and mull over.

  “A man takes responsibility for his life, Brian. Your life is a mess, fix it! It’s not my fault. Parents get divorced all day, every day, but not everyone’s children are acting like you! This is your fault, and your fault alone! There are millions of children who would love to have a father like me. A man who works hard and provides for his children… You have anything a boy your age could ever need and want! I said it once, and I’ll say it again—fix your life!!!” He said the shit in such a stone cold, serious tone, it was evident the man believed his own bullshit, ate it and enjoyed the flavor. He crossed his arms over his broad chest and rocked on his heels as if he’d stated something poignant.

  “Hey Dad, you ever notice how the word life and lie are similar? You just remove the ‘f’ and you have a whole new word. That new word is lie.”

  “I haven’t lied to you.”

  “Everything you’ve said is a lie. I don’t like to be wasteful though, Mama taught me that, so I want to reuse that f that I took out of this glorious life you think I have, and repurpose it. That f now stands for fuck you!’ He spotted his jacket, grabbed it off the back of the couch, and wasted no time beating a path to the front door.

  “Brian!” his father hollered out, hot on his trail. “Brian! You get your black ass back here!”

  But he cut that shit off, slammed the door behind him, and walked out into the brisk air of the night. Without losing his hurried pace down the sidewalk, he grabbed his cell phone and called his girlfriend.

  “Shanice, I need to come over,” he began, not allowing her a moment to offer a sweet greeting.

  “What’s wrong? I thought you said you were staying over your dad’s this weekend?”

  “Nah, that’s over with. Can I come over or not?”

  “Yeah, come on, baby.”

  “Bet. I’ll be over in like thirty or forty minutes.” He disconnected the call and made his way to the subway, no longer desiring to spend his money on a cab. He wrapped his jacket around himself, zipping it up to the neck, and shoved his hands in his pockets as he drew nearer to the D Train.

  He and that dumb ass bitch can go to hell, fuck him AND her. I don’t need a father… He was never there for me anyway. What’s the damn difference?

  *

  “I know what a damn ho-ho looks like.”

  Treasure tumbled over on the edge of her bed, holding her stomach and clutching her cell phone as the man spoke of one of his worst dining experiences to date.

  “Sean, you’re exaggerating,” she blurted, finally getting herself together.

  “No, I’m not. I said it just how it happened. I was sittin’ there in that fancy restaurant, spending up my whole check, and they bring a fuckin’ ho ho out, cut in half with strawberry jam smeared all over the top. That was their dessert for the night. Thirty dollars. I called bullshit on it.”

  Treasure fell flat on her back, causing her soft white sheets to puff in the air. She stared up at the ceiling, her mouth wide open as more laughter escaped, making its way out into the open and vibrating her very soul.

  “I told the waitress I wanted to speak to the manager, ya know? She caught a fuckin’ attitude, told me it wasn’t a damn ho ho. I looked at the chick and said, ‘Look, I know a fuckin’ ho ho when I see one, and this right here is a goddamn ho ho! The bastards in that kitchen bought it for 88 cents or some shit, put a little strawberry Smuckers jam on it, and slid that shit back out as if it were some grand
dessert, the best thing since sliced pound cake…fuckin’ thieves! So the damn manager comes over, huffin’ and puffin’ like he’d just finished screwing eight nymphos and I tore him away from his call of duty before he got to round two. He gets over to me and my lady friend and says, ‘I hear there’s a problem?’

  “I told that guy, ‘Hell yeah, there’s a problem. Your staff tried to pull the wool over ol’ Sean’s eyes, but anyone can see that this here is a damn grocery store box dessert. I pointed to it and said, ‘It’s a ho ho.’ He proceeded to give me the same spiel the puppet faced waitress offered, and I told ’im to look in the goddamn trash and he’d find a bunch of wrappers and Little Debbie smilin’ up at ’im! Sweet sassy malassy, as my brother says!”

  At this, Treasure lost it.

  “How sweet is it, to be loved by you!” she crooned the James Taylor song, causing Sean to chuckle, too.

  “You gotta nice singing voice. But yeah, so Little Debbie owes me like $29.00 bucks as far as I’m concerned, because this wasn’t worth more than a dollar and if anything, they owed me money for wasting my time and lyin’ about it.”

  “So what happened at the end? What was the verdict?”

  “That son of a bitch offered to take it off my bill or said he could replace it with something more to my liking. I said with what, a goddamn Twinkie?!”

  “Sean!” Treasure’s eyes blurred with tears of mirth as she rolled about her bed, her stomach cramping from the man’s foolishness.

  “It’s just a regular ol’ processed food gang bang up in the kitchen, huh? Fancy French restaurant my ass! I grew up on Cheetos, ho hos, and those goddamn red and hot wieners floating in jars from the bodegas. My diet consisted of turtle soup, Lays potato chips, and Nerds candy. That’s all I ate for years as a kid. It was amazing I wasn’t fat and still alive and had all my damn teeth. You try to tell me, Sean Mahoney, the fast and junk food aficionado, that something I saw for years on my damn plate and shoved in my mouth on practically a daily basis isn’t what I fuckin’ think it is? Are you serious?! I know a goddamn, motherfucking ho ho when I see one!”

  “Remind me to never give you a ho ho, under any circumstances!” She tried to catch her breath, but it proved an impossible task.

  “I’ll eat one if you’re sitting on it…”

  “Hmmm, you will, huh?”

  “Yeah, I will.”

  “I like ding dongs…remember those?” She couldn’t help but smile at her nasty wit.

  “Do I remember them? I got the best one on the planet…you wanna take a look at it, better yet, taste it? It’s homemade.”

  “…Sounds delicious.”

  “If you do it just right, there’s a creamy filling just for you… Can I slide it in your mouth tonight? Let you have a sample?”

  “You want to come by and let me take a look at your goods?”

  “Does an oatmeal cookie have crannies? I want to push my ding dong in your ho ho, leave you with a crème pie that you won’t soon forget.”

  “If it’s coming from you, then it’s devil crème…”

  “Oh, you got jokes?” She could hear the smile in his tone. “I’ll be right over, honey buns.”

  “I’ll leave the oven light on.”

  “And I expect you to keep the lights on all night. I want to see every expression you make when I’m pushing inside of you, not miss a damn thing. I love to watch you when I make you cum, baby. I have a nutty bar with your name written all over it…special delivery, cummin’ right up.”

  *

  “So, yeah, that was that,” Kyle stated stiffly. He sat with his ankles crossed, looking around Sean’s living room as if in awe of the place.

  Little Dragon’s ‘Runabout’ played on Sean’s iPad through the stereo speakers.

  “Your job sounds really exciting,” Treasure chimed in. She leaned forward with an engrossed expression, holding on to her glass of wine as one would a cherished lover. Dressed in a bright red knee-length halter dress that tied along her narrow waist and showcased some limbs that were to simply die for, she entranced him. Her hair was pulled back from her face in a loose ponytail, featuring her prominent cheekbones and luscious bone structure that he so enjoyed tracing his lips along in their heated lovemaking sessions.

  “It is sometimes, most days are blah!” Kyle laughed lightly, remaining somewhat subdued and slightly aloof.

  “I guess it’s not like the movies, right?” She chuckled.

  “Right, that’s all Hollywood.” He waved his hand lazily in her direction. “I like it though. It makes for a good living,” he said, nodding. A slightly awkward silence ensued. “So…” He sighed. “Sean has told me a lot about you as well, so it was nice to finally meet you.”

  Treasure nodded, wearing a bright grin.

  “He said you’re an interior designer. That’s pretty cool!”

  “I love it, I truly do.”

  “It’s important to enjoy your job, to look forward to it.” He shot Sean a glance, then turned back to Treasure. “What’s one thing about it you wish were different?”

  “Well…” She looked down, searching her thoughts. “The only thing is, there is no consistency.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, I will either have almost too many jobs at one time, or none at all. It comes in waves.”

  “Ahhh, yeah, I could see that. Like, what’s your busiest time of year, would you say?”

  “Typically, people want to change their homes right before spring, after the winter has passed… It makes people feel better.”

  “Makes sense.”

  “The other peak time is right before the holidays, when guests are coming over and they want to impress.”

  “Makes sense, too!” Kyle chuckled.

  Sean sat there simply watching the two go back and forth as he nursed the same beer for over an hour. Something bothered him, but he wasn’t certain what the hell it was. Kyle seemed a bit uptight, as if something sat on his mind that he couldn’t quite part ways with to the point of damn distraction. To the untrained eye, the man seemed courteous and friendly, but Sean had known the fucker far too long. No, something was definitely amiss…

  The two continued to engage in friendly banter, with Sean sharing stories and laughs along the way. When another hour rolled by, Treasure reminded him that she needed to get home; she had lots of work to attend to.

  “It was nice meeting you, Kyle.” She extended her hand to shake his, but the man grabbed her arm and kissed her fingers instead. She giggled, while Sean looked at him like a damn three-headed monster.

  What the hell was that?!

  He pushed his annoyance aside and walked her to his door.

  “You sure you don’t want me to walk you out?” He wrapped his arm around her waist, ushering her close to his groin.

  “No, no. Stay here with Kyle,” she whispered, a big smile on her pretty face. She kissed his lips once again. “I’ll call you later tonight, okay? And again, baby, great job on your apartment! You’re a natural.” She threw him a playful wink before letting herself out his apartment.

  He stared at her, watched her saunter down the haunting green-lit hall before yelling, “I’m a natural at somethin’ else, too!”

  “…Don’t I know it,” she flirted without looking back at him.

  “I expect my ‘payment’ tomorrow! All work ’nd no play, I’m ready to get mine! I’m coming over and stayin’ the night, and you better be there and ready.”

  Chuckling, she turned the corner, disappearing from sight. He closed and locked the door behind him. Kyle had returned to the couch, his black business suit and light gray tie situated just so on his person. The man ran his fingers through his dark brown hair, smirked, then looked back across the room at nothing in particular.

  “You’ve changed, Sean…”

  Sean took a seat by him. “How so?”

  “Well, look at your place? It actually looks nice.”

  “You’re sayin’ it like it’s a bad thing.�
��

  “No, just uh…” The man cleared his throat, glanced down at his shoes and swiped at one, removing a piece of carpet fiber. “This is new, is all.”

  “Just spit it out! Why are you acting so damn weird?”

  Offering a weak grin, Kyle placed his beer bottle down on the table. He clasped his hands together and sighed. “Sean…you didn’t tell me this.”

  “Tell you what?”

  “You said a lot of stuff, but left that part out…wow.”

  “Stop fucking around and tell me what you’re talking about? Left what part out?”

  “You know… you know I’m not a racist but—”

  “Ohhhh! Holy shit! No way!” Sean rolled his eyes in disbelief. “Ya gotta be fuckin’ kidding me, man! You aren’t really going there, are you? You couldn’t be!” He leaned far back in his seat and glared up at the ceiling, not believing his ears.

  “Look, let me finish!” Kyle yelled. “You told me how serious you are about this woman, man. I don’t have an issue with her being a bit older than you… She looks good, damn good actually.” He laughed lightly, as if somehow surprised by that revelation. “And uh, she seems like she has her shit together…no welfare Queen shit.”

  “Kyle! What tha fuck!” Sean rolled his eyes as a deep anger began to grow within him.

  “Come on, man! You know it’s true! Most of the people milking the system are black or Hispanic, and hard working fuckers like you and I have to pay the bill! I only have one black client, Sean, one!” He held up his finger as if that meant something. “They don’t invest money, they just spend it! They don’t invest in people, property, nothing! I’m not sayin’ she’s bad because she’s black, but you might be selling yourself short is all!”

  Sean shot up like a rocket and served him with a glare. “You’ve gotta be kidding me! I can’t believe I am even hearing this shit come out of your mouth! I just can’t believe it! What about Iris, Gabriella and Tammi?! You dated ’em, and more! They were all black!”