by Onyxx Black
***
Ashanti
Saturday night finally rolled around after a hell of a week. I had made plans to go out and enjoy myself. I’d been working nonstop and even taking overtime hours now that I had to pay for gas.
“Happy birthday again, bitch. I’ll be there in two hours. If you’re not ready by the time I get there, I’m leaving yo’ ass at home!” I yelled into the phone and Shauna’s ear. I had my car for all of two days and I had taken it upon myself to remind Shauna that I was doing all of the driving from here on out. I slid out of my bath towel and into some blue boy-shorts and a T-shirt bra. My Old Navy jeans were sitting on the bed with my grey crop-top sweater I just bought from Aeropostale. I saw somebody standing outside the door and when I looked up, Ms. Bamidele motioned for me to follow her into her office.
“Thanks hoe! I’ll call you when I get ready,” Shauna was whispering. I knew she was tired from taking her ACT all morning. I hope she still wasn’t stressing after those all night cram sessions we had for two days straight. My brain was so full of 12th grade subjects, spiritual lessons, recipes and Kenyon’s fine ass, it’s a wonder I even remembered how to parallel park for the test. I threw my clothes on and walked barefoot to her office.
“You, Chile, are something else. You really need to work on the words that come out of your mouth. Manners make up a woman and define her worth more than how she looks on the outside. How do you expect to get a man talking and thinking the way you do?” I started to tell her I didn’t need any nigga for shit when she cut me off. “You may not want a man right now, but sometimes love doesn’t come when you want it to or when you decide that it is time. Love is unexpected. Love comes in many packages, even at the bottom of Pandora’s Box. Knowing you and your story, Oshun will have it no other way. When the spirits gift love, they gift it the same way you live. Be careful how you live.” Damn. That was deep. I didn’t know exactly what that was supposed to mean but it still gave me something to think about.
“Yes, ma’am. What did you need me for you?” She sat down in her chair. “Put my hair in one of those braids that wrap around.” I raised my eyebrows at her. The only time I did her hair in a crown braid, was for a special occasion. Let me find out Ms. B. had a date.
“Going somewhere special?” When she smiled, her whole face lit up like I mentioned candy to a little kid. Ms. B. was gorgeous and reminded me of Naomi Campbell. The only difference was she was slightly darker.
“Maybe.” She looked at me through the green trimmed vanity mirror and smiled. For an older lady she didn’t look anywhere past thirty. I made sure to do the braids carefully and tightly so her long curly hair didn’t come unraveled. When I was finished, I watched Ms. B. put on the MAC lip-gloss I bought her for her birthday along with the diamond earrings; I assume came from her new boo.
“You look so beautiful. I hope you have some fun tonight. You deserve it.” I winked at her reflection in the mirror.
“Thank you. Tell Shauna I said happy birthday. I sure hope you make it in before me, Miss Thang.” I went to my room and saw Kennedi staring out the window.
“Is that your car out there?” I slid on my leather bomber jacket, my grey UGG boots and picked up my keys.
“Yeah. You like it?” She nodded.
“I love it, but Ms. G was bitching about it.” I rolled my eyes. Her miserable ass was always bitching about something.
“What did she say?” Just then I heard somebody yelling in the other room. Kennedi jumped up and opened the door. I was right behind her. Ms. Greene stood there with her hand on her wide hips, yelling at Lexi.
“Next time I come pick your ungrateful ass up from work, you better be ready! Not a minute late. As a matter of fact, have your ass outside waiting. You can’t even put a decent amount of gas in my damn car and you bring your ass out late because of some nigga. Don’t even wash your ass right. Out here smelling like must and you want to have me waiting while you out here getting fake abortion money.” Lexi’s whole face was beet red. I was laughing on the inside, but I’ll be damned if I felt sorry for the bitch.
“Bitch I never asked your dyke ass to do anything for me. You did it because you wanted to and you thought I was about to be with you. Yeah, I let you fuck but that’s it. I told yo’ nasty ass that I wasn’t fucking with you like that, but you kept coming for me. Now, you want to play me like I’m some kind of punk ass bitch.” Well damn, I always had my suspicions about her, but this was just too much.
“When you poured yo’ heart out to me about getting you up out this mothafucka you wasn’t saying all of that. Don’t say dyke like I didn’t have you spread eagle in my office the other night. Should have took your dirty, pregnant ass to the clinic and let you spread your legs for them.” Ms. Greene was too reckless and this was about as much as my straight ears could take. Kennedi was way too young to be hearing their conversation anyway. She was only twelve but I'm sure she'd heard a lot more than any twelve-year-old should ever have to know. Ms. B. had to have already left to not hear this shit. Her office door was locked, so I guess she was gone. The only ones in the house now were me and Kennedi, but I guess they thought we had gone out too. Normally around this time everybody was gone either to the movies, the mall or out with their friends. I volunteered to take Kennedi to one of her friend’s house that night and we both packed up our shit. I couldn’t let the chance go by without fucking with the both of their nasty asses though.
“You should invest in your own car or some birth control, bum bitch.” Both of them stood there dumbfounded. Karma was a motherfucker.
***
Kenyon
I couldn’t stop thinking about Ashanti’s fine ass. I don’t know what it was about stuck up females, but the way she turned my money down caught my attention. She was smart as fuck too and independent. I saw the way she rang my shit up without even looking, and the way she rejected my money was a turn on. She might be the woman that could change my dog ass ways. Maybe. Carter invited me to his girlfriend’s 18th birthday party at Suite 38. I wasn’t feeling the club scene, but when he told me she was Ashanti’s best friend, I knew she was going to be there. Plus, I had potential customers lined up at the door. The only thing that I didn’t need was Neeka’s petty ass showing up, but something told me she was showing up anyway. I don’t know who was telling her my whereabouts, but I kept bumping into her in the most random places. I felt like she was stalking me. I was going to give her something to stalk tonight though. Carter told me to dead the bitch and I knew I should’ve but, ending up like my father wasn’t in my future plans.
***
Ashanti
“Bitch, I know you lying.” Shauna stopped in the middle of brushing her teeth to turn around and stare at me.
“No. I really wish I was lying. Both of them fools just stood there looking stupid.” Shauna rinsed her mouth out before busting out laughing.
“What your stupid ass say? I know you said something dumb.” I came over early so I didn’t mind waiting on her to get ready, hell I still needed to borrow something out of her closet to wear. Our top halves were total opposites but we exchanged jeans so often, I know I had at least seven pairs in her closet.
“I just gave her the same advice she gave me.” Shauna shook her head and stepped out of the bathroom wearing a black, long sleeved, body hugging dress that stopped at the middle of her thigh. Her usually curly hair was pressed and hung down to the dimples in her back. “Okay. I see you. Go, best friend. That’s my best friend, that’s my best friend. Yasss! You betta’ you betta’ Oh!” I sang while she popped her ass in the floor-length mirror. I laughed so hard I had tears in my eyes. Shauna stayed acting a fool.
“What are you looking for? I got this cute two-piece from Body Gear. I couldn’t fit the shirt though.” I sat on the bed while she went through her closet. “Here it is.” I picked up the black spandex outfit from the bed and looked at it. “Go try it on.” I stepped in the bathroom and slid on the skirt that fit perfectly around my thi
ck hips. “Aight, bish you cute. Now give me my make-up bag so that I can beat this face to the gawds!” I slid the shirt over my head and analyzed myself in the mirror. The top had a diamond shaped cut in the front that showed off a large amount of cleavage. My black-laced strapless bra showed from the cut out and added the perfect touch to the outfit.
I finished my hair and applied a light coat of lip-gloss while waiting on Shauna. Once she got done, she looked down at my feet and frowned.
“Where you think I’m going with you and those shoes?” I hated how stuck up her ass was sometimes.
“Well, Ms. Perfect, give me some of yours to wear.” I kicked off my black, six-inch heels and slid on the red pumps she handed me. The gold spikes on the straps gave me an edgy look. I hoped her shoe-loving ass put some money away for fashion school.
“I’m ready. Did you get the I.D.’s?”
I pulled out the fake identification cards from my bag and put them in the red MK purse with the gold chain that she let me borrow. “Yep. Let’s go.”
On our way down the winding staircase, I noticed her shoes. “Where you get those?” I pointed to the tall silver, fringed heels that strapped up to her ankle. “Girl, Daddy bought these for me.” I knew by the way she smiled when she said it, that it wasn’t her father she was referring to.
“Let me find out boss man been trickin’.” After the way Carter had come for Kenyon’s ass that day, you’d think this nigga had never paid a female for anything in his life.
“Yep. He still isn’t getting none though.” My mouth just about hit the floor. I never knew Shauna to hold out for any nigga, especially one who bought her shit. Her motto had always been, “You gotta pay to play.” She wasn’t giving it up for free and the shoes she had on had to have set him back a good rack or two. Either she made him pay up first and he was waiting until today when her young ass finally turned eighteen, or he was sprung. I knew they had something going on, but she never told me much. I wasn’t going to press either because from the look of things, Carter had her taking a vow of silence.
Once we got in the car, I turned the radio on and the heat. Here it was mid-September and the weather was already on the verge of December. Indiana weather was so fucking unpredictable. Shauna rolled one up and smoked at least half before handing the blunt to me. I didn’t like being too high, but I was sure Shauna could smoke Snoop Dogg under a table. Singing along to the radio, I put the address of Suite 38 in the GPS to make sure I didn’t get lost. In anybody else’s car, I could tell you a million ways to get to one destination, but driving my own, I was in a foreign country. Naptown wasn’t even that big.
“Want to stop anywhere before we go in?” I knew we were too early and Shauna liked to make a nigga wait on her.
“Yeah. I’m hungry.” I knew she was about to say that, but I also knew that I hadn’t eaten anything all day, so I was right with her.
“Where you want to stop?” The only restaurant that I knew of close to the club was Red Lobster and I knew she wasn’t trying to go in there smelling like a seafood dinner.
“Let’s go to B-Dubs.” My mouth instantly started watering. Some garlic-parmesan wings would be just what I needed. Instead of going to the one downtown, I waited until we got to the west side.
***
Kenyon
“Nigga, I told you it starts at eleven-thirty and I’m going in early to get the VIP cleared out. I need to talk to the owner so I can pay him off for hosting Shauna’s party.” This nigga had to be out his damn mind talking about paying for this underage girl to have her party at a club. I wasn’t mad at him though; she was eighteen so there wasn’t anything wrong with it.
“Aight, well I still need to go find something to wear tonight and you know I’m going to be there if shorty coming through.” I had an outfit in mind, but I had to go buy it before the mall closed.
“How you sprung already?”
He didn’t have room to talk about nobody. “You over here buying clubs out but I can’t buy a shirt and some shoes? Get the hell outta here, nigga.”
“Yeah, but she calls me Daddy. Ashanti has never said two words to you except ‘No, thank you’.”
“That’s probably because yo’ ass old enough to be her damn daddy. Ain’t she like, twelve and you what? Thirty-five?”
Carter laughed, “Nah, nigga you trying to be funny. She’s an eighteen-year old grown ass woman. I’m thirty-two my nigga and ain’t met a bitch yet, who got everything together like she do.” I shook my head at that sprung ass dude on the phone who had just gave me the speech about thinking with my head and not my dick. At least I wasn’t out here tricking. Carter gave me the address before he hung up and I saved the location in my GPS. Castleton mall was far out and I still needed to go pick up something for tonight. I couldn’t show up empty handed either, but Shauna was a stoner so I had the perfect gift that I didn’t even have to buy. It was a win-win situation.
Chapter Six
Ashanti
I knew that I made a mistake when I saw the parking lot to the restaurant was jam-packed. I hated being around a lot of people, especially the ghetto ass females like the ones that were standing outside smoking cigarettes.
“Isn’t that C.J.’s new bitch, right there? She thinks she’s cute, too.” One short Hispanic chick wearing close to nothing, had the nerve to point and roll her eyes at Shauna. I recognized her as one of the groupies that constantly came in the shoe store trying to be in Carter’s face. All I knew was that she looked too old to be coming for my bitch like that with her funny built ass. She looked like a shorter version of Lexi, but with long black hair that hung down her back.
“Do we have a problem?” I instantly jumped to my best friend’s defense. The light skinned, familiar looking chick standing next to her was the one trying to cool the situation down and ended up starting an argument between them.
Shauna finally turned around. “Girl. Let that broke hoe be mad. It’s my birthday, bitch. I’m too cute and too high to fight tonight, plus my shoes alone could buy and sell her.” Shauna flipped her hair and walked right past the girl, into the building.
***
Kenyon
HONK!
Some idiot swerved his car, crashing into the side of my baby.
“Stupid mothafucka!” I couldn’t believe it. My white 2015 Charger was sideswiped by some ignorant ass man racing down the street in some Dukes of Hazard look alike car with the confederate flag hanging off the antennae. “Got dammit!” I hit the horn as hard as I could and took the early exit. As I finally pulled up to the mall I surveyed the damage and realized it wasn’t as bad as I thought. I definitely wasn’t pulling up to the club and possibly pulling off with Shorty with my car looking the way it did. My father did teach me some valuable life lessons before he left though, like to never go to a mechanic’s garage for shit.
“If you need something done on your car, no matter what it is. Do not go to the mechanic’s garage. They will fix the problem, but they’ll also make more problems until you have to buy a new one altogether. Or at least they’ll make you pay what you could’ve spent on a new car, for repairs that you don’t even need. In the case that you would ever need something done, go to Tristan.” My father stood in the kitchen loading his briefcase with papers from all of his storefront businesses and a few grams of cocaine. I watched as he closed the hidden compartment and took off his latex gloves. He handed me a card that had a guy’s name and number scribbled on it. I assumed he was one of the many men or important people that owed him favors.
I had never used the card until now, but I quickly dialed him up while walking toward the mall, only to find out my luck had just run out again and the mall was closed for repairs. I hurried up and wrapped up the call, after explaining a thousand times that I was indeed Kenny’s son. The Tristan guy said it was on the house and proceeded to tell me how it was an honor that I called him up. He asked if I’d seen my father and that ended the conversation right there. I hated when people brought h
im up to me. I was sure the only highlight of my night would be seeing Ashanti’s fine ass and I felt myself getting hard just thinking about her.
***
Ashanti
After we finished eating and no more drama ensued, we headed down to the club. Our high had worn off, so Shauna’s pot head ass decided to spark up another one.
“Damn Shauna.” I fanned the smoke out of my face.
“What? I’m trying to get lit, so I can have a good time.”
I shook my head and put in the DS2 CD. If anything could hype me up, it was Future. “Ayyyyyyye. Fuck it up, fuck it up.” I twerked in my seat while Shauna cheered me on. We sat in the car laughing and acting a fool until Carter broke the mood, calling her cell phone.
“Hey, Daddy. Yeah we’re here. Uh-huh but the line is still long as hell. I don’t care about the capacity. Well, do whatever you have to do and let them in. Tell the old bitches to go home, tell the lame niggas to go home and the ugly hoes. It’s my birthday not yours, not Gotti’s, not the muthafuckin’ owner’s, MINE! Tell him to let them in so I can come in or I’m going home.”
Shauna’s spoiled ass hung up the phone and pointed to the line. We weren’t even twenty-one yet and already had bitches getting kicked out the club. Getting out of the car, we made our way to the front of the line.
“I.D.’s please.” The security guard stepped in front of us. I handed him the cards and he looked at us funny. “Y’all are some young looking twenty-one year olds.” I smiled and Shauna’s high ass busted out laughing. “Something funny? Or is there something in the air that gave you the giggles, little girl?” This big man who looked like a bigger version of Dewayne Johnson, had a serious anger problem and Shauna wasn’t helping.
