Riding Dirty on I-95

by Nikki Turner

  When the phone rang at nine o'clock the next morning, it didn't wake Mercy up from a deep sleep. She had spent the last few hours with her eyes closed, but she was anything but asleep.

  “Hello,” Mercy said.

  “Mercy?” a male voice asked. She didn't recognize the voice.

  “Yeah.”

  “It's good to know that you are a morning person. At least we know that we already have one thing in common.”

  “Who is this?” Mercy asked, sitting up in the bed. “You calling for Chrissie?”

  “No, not right now,” the caller said. “Right now I'm calling for you. Perhaps I'll be calling Chrissie later … to thank her.”

  “Who is this?” Mercy said, becoming slightly agitated. She wasn't in the mood to be playing any games on the phone.

  “It's the next heavyweight champion of the world. I'm Taymar. Chrissie couldn't stop talking about you. I wanted to call you just as soon as she gave me your number, but I figured I had to wait at least twenty-four hours. I'm an impatient brotha, and want it when I want it. So I could only wait sixteen.”

  “Excuse me?” Mercy said, still not certain who this character was, trying to be so slick with his lines.

  He laughed a conceited laugh. “I know, I know. I'm not used to this myself,” Taymar said.

  “Used to what?” Mercy snapped. “Calling women you don't even know the first thing in the morning, like you just woke up with a morning hard-on and gon' jack off to they voice on the phone or something?”

  “Damn,” he laughed. “Maybe I was wrong about you.”

  “You think?”

  “Yeah, I think.” He paused, thinking of some more slick shit to say. “You're not a morning person at all. But, it's cool. I think I can get past that.”

  Mercy couldn't help but let out a little chuckle. This is one of them suckers who like to suck they own dick, she said to herself.

  “Was that laughter I heard?” Taymar asked.

  Mercy didn't respond. She just shook her head.

  “What, did I call you too soon? You want me to wait the eight more hours?”

  Mercy laughed.

  “Now, I know that was laughter.”

  “Do you ever stop?” Mercy asked.

  “Nope, not until I get the W,” he said smoothly.

  “The W, huh?” Mercy asked.

  “Yep, the W.”

  “Is that the win?”

  “Normally. But in this case, it's the woman.”

  Mercy smiled from ear to ear as she blushed. Her initial reaction, to be a bitch and get rid of the ol' dude, disappeared as she found herself talking with Taymar for hours. He talked about his goals as a boxer, and she talked about her goals as a screenwriter. When she looked up at the clock, it was after one o'clock in the afternoon. She had lain in the bed like a teenager in high school, gabbing away on the phone about any- and everything. She needed to get her mind off of all the drama. She needed an escape. Perhaps Taymar was that escape in more ways than one.

  “Do you realize that for what this phone call just cost me I could have bought you a plane ticket to come see me?” Taymar joked.

  Mercy thought about the comment Taymar had just made. Maybe a trip to Chicago was just what she needed. It would be the perfect place to get out of Dodge, so to speak. Mercy thought up a quick comeback to Taymar's comment.

  “Then next time you should just send me a plane ticket instead of calling me,” Mercy said, chuckling, but so serious.

  “Baby, you ain't said nothing,” Taymar quickly responded. “I'm serious. Just say the word.” He added, “See, I don't think you know who I am. I am the next heavyweight champion of the world. I make shit happen,” he stressed.

  She brushed off his last comment since she knew that he praised the ground that he walked on. “Show me. You keep talking 'bout it, show me the money, nigga!” Mercy teased.

  “No, but seriously. I'm going to be training soon. I wouldn't mind taking these last few days before I commit my body to winning this fight to get to know you. My mind is already committed, but once I commit my body, I'll be living in the gym.”

  “When do you start training?”

  “Next week,” he answered.

  “Next week!” Mercy said in shock. “Hell, that means I'd have to come tomorrow.”

  Taymar paused. “What do you say? Your ticket ain't nothing but a click away.”

  “And you still talking, huh?” Mercy played along.

  “Look, I know you don't know me, but damn, I feel like you know more about me in the last four hours than my baby's mama knew about me in the last ten years.”

  “Why is that?” Mercy asked curiously.

  “I don't know. I just felt like I was talking to one of my buddies. There wasn't anything I wanted to hold back from you. From the moment you said hello when you answered the phone, you didn't seem like a stranger. Maybe it was because Chrissie talked you up so much. She couldn't stop bragging about your scripts. Then to actually sit here and listen to you talk about it yourself…. Man, I'm just feeling everything about you.”

  “Do you rehearse the shit you say?” Mercy chuckled.

  “Naw, baby. This is all real.”

  “It's all real?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  Mercy closed her eyes and took in Taymar's voice, the sincerity of it. Taking off on a whim with someone she didn't even know wasn't something Mercy would have normally considered, but she figured if she could do it with Farmer John, then she could do it with Taymar.

  “Then I guess I better get packing,” Mercy said.

  “For real, you coming tonight?”

  Mercy thought for a minute. There was nothing more she wanted to do than to hop on a plane and get the fuck away, but there was something she had to do first. “No,” she replied. She could hear Taymar's sigh of disappointment. “I've got to do a couple of things. I can come the day after tomorrow.”

  “Are you serious?” Taymar questioned. “The day after tomorrow?”

  “Yes,” Mercy assured him.

  “You know I hate waiting. I'm used to people jumping to my beck and call.”

  “And me too,” Mercy said.

  “Well, I'm gonna go online right now. Give me your e-mail address, and I'll e-mail you your itinerary.”

  “It's havemercy@common.com.”

  “This is crazy,” Taymar said, letting out a laugh.

  “What?”

  “Nothing,” he said. “Since you're not a morning person I'm going to get you on the first afternoon flight available day after tomorrow.”

  Mercy laughed. “Sounds good.”

  “Then I'll talk to you tomorrow.”

  “I'll wait for your call,” Mercy said in a sensual tone.

  They ended the call, and Mercy threw herself back on the bed. She couldn't believe she was doing this, but she almost had to. Taymar was heaven-sent in more ways than one. Mercy closed her eyes, and before she knew it, she was sound asleep. She slept deeply for about an hour before she abruptly woke up and remembered why she couldn't leave tomorrow. There was something she had to do before even thinking about leaving town.

  Mercy needed to go see Raheem. She had planned to go see him anyway, but now she needed an explanation as to what in the hell was going on with him supposedly working with the Feds. She needed to hear the bullshit from the horse's mouth. It was on her mind constantly, and she needed some kind of clarity as to why Raheem would sell out. He was her boy, no doubt. He had put her in a position to eat, but she'd been raised by two of the most crucial dudes in the game, and if she'd learned nothing at all, she'd learned that a rat was poison and spineless and could do no good to anyone.

  If she obeyed traffic laws, the ride to the prison in Butner, North Carolina, was three hours away, so Mercy had to break a few. For the entire drive Mercy thought about what words could possibly come out of Raheem's mouth. What words could possibly make her want to fuck with him again?

  When Mercy arrived at the prison she went
through the typical procedures: showing ID, being searched before she was escorted to the visiting room. Although she only waited thirty minutes for Raheem to come to the visiting room, it seemed like an eternity. He walked in and gave Mercy a hug.

  I wonder if this motherfucker is wearing a wire? Mercy thought, trying to inconspicuously pat him down his back and press her front tight against him as she returned the hug.

  “Why you wait so late to get here?” he asked, looking at his watch. “I'm surprised they even let you in as shitty as they be acting.”

  “I don't know,” Mercy said, sitting back down. “I haven't been able to sleep, so when I finally did fall asleep, I just slept.”

  “Why you ain't been sleeping?” Raheem asked with concern.

  “You want to know why?” Mercy said.

  “Yeah. Why?”

  “Because I been thinking about you. I have been thinking about the person that I once was madly in love with. That person who taught me so much. That person who bailed me out of jail with a black eye—that dude. And now I'm wondering, Who is that dude, really? Who is he?”

  Raheem grabbed Mercy's hand and said, “I'm still that dude. I'm still your friend, and I'm still your protector.” He looked into her eyes and then continued. “And never would I let anything happen to you.”

  Mercy looked away from him. “I can't tell,” she half mumbled. She took a deep breath. “You sent the police at me because you wasn't man enough to tell me that you was working with them. You could have told me yourself, Raheem. You should have told me yourself.”

  “Man, you don't understand,” Raheem said, getting huffy. “Twenty years is a long time to be here in a cage around a whole bunch of niggas. Twenty years is a long time to be away from yo' family, loved ones, and kids. Twenty years is a long time to be here and never to touch a woman sexually. Mercy, baby, twenty years is a long time to be away from you. I can't stand having you out there by yourself.” Tears began to roll down Raheem's face as he paused. “Twenty years is a long time.”

  Mercy had never seen Raheem cry before. The day he was sentenced he'd looked like he wanted to cry, but he'd just stuck his chest out and walked out of the courtroom with the deputy. Seeing him show his emotions to her for the first time made Mercy forget for a minute just how angry she was at him.

  “Damn, baby.” She rubbed his hand, and the tears rolled down her face. “I don't want us to be away from each other for that long either. I appreciate and miss a lot of the times we had, but when did we start working with the police?”

  He took a deep breath and tried to make a joke. “Shit, we ain't working with the police. I basically told on niggas because niggas told on me, and as far as that Hyena nigga goes, they gon' pick that nigga up sooner or later and I ain't going to sit around and let them hear what he got to say about me. I'm going to beat that nigga to the punch.”

  “Damn, baby!” She sat staring off, wiping her tears away. “Damn,” was all she could say.

  “Don't worry, baby. Never will I do anything to jeopardize you or to put you in the line of fire,” Raheem said. “You just gotta trust me.”

  “Just talking to them folks is putting me in the line of fire, Raheem,” she said, trying to be selective about what she said because she didn't want to incriminate herself.

  “All you gotta do is go cop from that nigga Hyena. The Feds will handle the rest. The less you know, the less you will expect; the less you'll look like you're in on it.”

  “I'm broke! Where am I going to get the money to cop anyway?”

  “They gon' give it to you.”

  “They who?”

  Raheem looked around and answered in a whisper. “You tell Hy that you know some people that want to buy some work from him. Act like you ain't nothing more than a middleman, someone who knows someone and who is just trying to help someone out. That's all.”

  “That's all, huh? Just play the role of the dumb little broad?”

  Raheem paused as if he had intended to lie, but decided against it. “Naw, they gon' probably get you to do it a couple mo' times. Hyena had you deal with anybody else? We can get them, too. That's even better.”

  Mercy didn't comment. She couldn't believe her ears. Was the time really that much for Raheem to handle?

  “Come here. Give me a kiss,” Raheem instructed Mercy. “I love you, boo.”

  Mercy gave Raheem a kiss. As she looked in his eyes, she saw his desperation: the same look that a boxer gets in the last round of a fight. It was a look that said he couldn't go on and was willing to do almost anything to get out of the ring. Raheem had thrown in the towel. She couldn't believe how the system had torn him down and how weak he was to let those kinds of thoughts even set in his mind, let alone come out of his mouth. The Raheem she knew was a gangsta dude who had killed, robbed, and slung more drugs than a little bit. It was no doubt that he had done his crime, and twenty years wasn't nothing compared to all the things he had gotten away with for so many years. So why was it a problem for him to press that bunk and do his time? Mercy couldn't understand why Raheem had turned over and sold out to the Feds, but she knew one thing for certain: that she loved Raheem and deep down believed that if she had done the bit with him drama-free, when he came home, the two of them would have lived happily ever after. But on the same note, Mercy knew that there was no way she was going to sell her soul to the devil.

  As the visit came to an end, Mercy gave Raheem a big hug and a long wet kiss as he walked her to the door.

  “So do you got me, baby?” Raheem asked her. “You gon' hold me down and do what I need you to do to get me up out of here?”

  As Mercy stood there, she could only think of one thing—the gambler's anthem that her daddy had told her was all she needed to survive: You gotta know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away, know when to run.

  Mercy looked up at Raheem, smiled, and kissed him good-bye. He smiled back. He took her gesture as a yes, but Mercy knew that she had to walk away from Raheem. She had to walk away forever. Raheem was playing a serious game, and she couldn't get caught up in the web.

  “Baby, I can't take no stand against nobody. I love you and the whole nine and probably always will, but real bitches do real things.”

  She exited the prison in tears because she didn't know what hand would be dealt to her at this point. She wished she had never gotten caught up in that life in the first place. All she wanted to do was to continue to focus on her writing, which would lead her to honest money, an honest living. She thought about her script and how her newfound friend just might be her ticket to Hollywood. So Mercy hopped in her car and headed home to check her e-mail. Unless ol' dude was full of shit, Mercy was on her way to perhaps claim what was to be her meal ticket, and damn, was she starving!

  CHAPTER 16

  And in This Corner

  Today was going to be the first day of Mercy's new life. Today would be the first day of her new beginning. She was turning over a new leaf. It all started right here as she waited patiently for the pilot to turn off the BUCKLE SEAT BELT sign. Never in all of her twenty-two years had she ever felt more confident, more secure, and more positive about her life.

  I can't believe that I am taxiing the runway and butterflies are not fluttering around in my stomach. How crazy is that? This was the first time in three years that she had flown in a plane and didn't have some dope shoved up her pussy or some other kind of drugs stashed on her some kind of way. She wasn't even on her way to pick up any, either. Wow, who'dda thought that the game would have totally changed for me?

  In less than fifteen minutes she would be greeted by Taymar “The Razor” Oliver. Although he was known to the entire world as The Razor, Mercy called him Tay He said he liked the way she whispered his name through the phone receiver. He said her voice, her outlook on life, and the places she wanted to go in life were the sexiest things he'd ever heard. Mercy was starting to believe that she could truly fall for him. She had opened up to him and let him hear a
ll of her ideas, goals, and aspirations. Reading and dreaming big had always been her therapy. This was her way of coping with all the abuse, all the agony and pain that she'd dealt with from foster home to foster home and then finally the group home. Her determination to make it in the world, each time she experienced some kind of abuse, had enabled her to run away from the different foster homes. She had no idea where the strength came from. Perhaps it came from her witnessing the desecration of her daddy at his funeral that gave her the spunk to do whatever she felt was best for her. She always reminded herself of the life that her daddy would have wanted for her: great success, lots of money, happiness, and a man who adored her. That's what she hoped she could find in Taymar.

  Tay was also a heavyweight in every aspect of the word. As a matter of fact, that's how he'd gotten his nickname “The Razor.” He was known for being razor sharp—not only in the boxing ring, but in the stock market as well. Five months ago he'd made boxing history. Not only did he knock the most undisputed boxer of our time the fuck out, but he did it in the first round of the fight. That alone would make him go down in the boxing history books as a legend, and Mercy felt that if she became his wifey boo and owned the key to his heart, it would be an opportunity in more ways than one.

  From their long heartfelt conversations, Mercy felt she could finally be loved wholeheartedly the way that she knew her daddy always wanted her to be loved and the way she had always longed to be loved—genuinely loved for who she was inside and not for what she did for a dollar. The way those other men had her jeopardizing her life and freedom, there was no way possible they could love Mercy. But when it came to Taymar, Mercy felt that he would be different, that he saw her for who she was and what she desired to be.

  Mercy couldn't help from looking towards the future with Tay. Becoming wifey to Tay was a way she could live her dream. It could be the key to her film career. Someone in his position definitely had to have the resources and connections to help her get her career off the ground. She had no interest whatsoever in being an actress on the big screen. She was a behind-the-scenes type of gal. After all, those kinds of people made the most money. They called the shots and had all the power. One way or another she intended to be one of those individuals, and with Tay by her side to love her first and foremost and then give her the necessary plugs, she couldn't go wrong.